Tears into Wine: J. S. Bach’s Cantata 21 in its Musical and Theological Contexts by Eric Chafe (review)

This detailed study is about one cantata, J. S. Bach’s Cantata 21, Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis. The thesis—pursued relentlessly, with copious detail and documentation—is that Cantata 21 is not a heterogeneous patchwork by the young Bach, but has a careful “musico-theological” design characteristic of Bach’s works generally, which fits the understanding of the period. The theme that undergirds this thesis is a sustained demonstration of the necessity for both a “liturgico-theological” investigation and a musical analysis to understand Cantata 21 and by implication other pieces of its sort.

Eric Chafe, Professor of Music at Brandeis University, has written extensively about Bach, but also about Wagner, Monteverdi, and Biber. In this book, after an introduction that summarizes its genesis and development across decades, Chafe divides twelve chapters into four parts: 1) the theological context of the period, including the work of Johann Arndt, Philipp Nicolai, and three followers of Arndt; 2) music and the foretaste of eternity as a common theological concept of the time, including Christoph Raupach and Johann Matheson; 3) a detailed analysis of Cantata 21; and 4) a discussion of six other Bach cantatas from Weimar in 1714 when Cantata 21 was written. The book contains extensive footnotes, often with original German texts; twelve illustrations plus musical examples; three appendices with the text and translation of Cantata 21 and the Gospels and Epistles for both the Third Sunday after Trinity and the Second Sunday after Epiphany; a bibliography; and an index. (At the end of p. 62 “ch. 8” should be “ch. 5”, and on p. 225 the period in the last line should be a comma.)

Chafe argues that, “although Lutheran authors rejected many of the older allegorical interpretations, they remained close to the ancient traditions in others. In general, the idea that interpretation should be governed by the ‘analogy of faith’ was the touchstone for all interpretation” (66). The wedding at Cana, for example, “remained paradigmatic for the meaning and interpretation of scripture as a whole” and was connected to two allegorical wedding stories, the Song of Songs and the wedding of the Lamb in Revelation (66–7).

This breadth of meaning, with its relation to the Wedding at Cana—the Gospel for the Second Sunday after the Epiphany—carries over into Cantata 21. Although written for the Third Sunday after Trinity with its joy in the Gospel (Luke 15:1–10) over one sinner who repents and the Epistle (1 Pet. 5:6–11) with its concluding lines of honor and power to God forever, Bach includes on the title page not only that Sunday, but also “Per ogni tempo”—“for any time.” Cantata 21 progresses from the cry for God in Psalm 42, to the patience required for the tribulation that God sends, to the tears into wine that God provides at the right time, and to an eschatological teleology with praise of God as the goal of human existence. Chafe’s complex written analysis about this progression is confirmed by simply listening to the Cantata.

The thesis and its undergirding theme quickly become apparent. The details unfold more slowly. They reveal connections between the church before and after the Reformation, between internal and external emphases, and between orthodox and pietist themes before they hardened into battle-lines.