ABSTRACT
Theology is not the only reason its appeal proved limited, but the simultaneous engagement with conflicting perspectives on the sacred does not make Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach's oratorio an easy work to appreciate. The oratorio is both Neologist and orthodox, balancing a rational religion of feeling and morality against the irrational power of revelation. Bach's setting of Die Auferstehung strengthens the contrast between the epic grandeur of the miracle scenes and the sentimental intimacy of the encounters between Jesus and his followers. In part, the fame of the keyboard works has overshadowed Bach's achievements in vocal music, but Die Auferstehung has also suffered from a general inattention to the eighteenth-century German lyric oratorio. Two additional aspects of Bach's setting emphasize the revelatory rather than the sentimental side of Karl Wilhelm Ramler's text: the harmonic language, and the teleological shape of the work as a whole.
