Johann Rist was one of the most prolific German baroque poets. His lasting contribution to German culture has, however, proved to be his sacred poems set to music, among the best known of which is "O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort" (Oh eternity, you word like thunder). Although he spent nearly all of his life in the provincial region of his birth--Holstein in northern Germany--Rist achieved widespread fame. By careful self-advertising and the establishment of his own language society he gained a reputation as an arbiter of poetical norms, a north German Martin Opitz.

One of twelve children, Rist was born in Ottensen in Holstein on 8 March 1607 to Caspar Rist, a preacher and the supervisor of the lunatic asylum in Ottensen, and Margarethe Rist, née Ringemuth. Rist received an excellent education at the Johanneum in Hamburg and the Gymnasium Illustre in Bremen. From 1626 to 1628 he studied theology in...