The darker the night, the brighter the stars,
the deeper the grief, the closer is God!
--Fyodor Dostoevsky,
Crime and Punishment
Johann Sebastian Bach lost his little daughter and then three sons and then his wife. Then he remarried and then he and his second wife, Anna-Magdalena, lost four more daughters and three sons. Eleven beloved children of twenty... predeceased the composer.
Many researchers have wondered: how did Bach manage to handle these losses? How did he not stop breathing; how did his heart not stop? And most importantly, how could he continue to write music? Cantati, cello suites, Masses, concerts... The most beautiful music the world has heard.
Do you know how he did it? At the end of his music, he always wrote SDG, Soli Deo gloria, or Glory to God alone, and at the beginning, JJ, for Jesu juva, or Lord, help. Therefore, you can pray during Bach's music because the music itself is prayer. You could, then, consider Bach's music a conversation between man and God.
How do you deal with pain? Worship is the best solace.
--Heidi McCarthy
In November we remember All Souls…
Image source: Edvard Munch, The Sick Child (1907), https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/munch-the-sick-child-n05035
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