The St. Thomaskirche in Leipzig, where Bach worshipped and performed

Johann Sebastian Bach and his family attended the St. Thomas Kirche here in Leipzig. All of his children were baptized there. Richard Wagner was also baptized here. Mozart visited and played here. It’s a beautiful church with good feels, the highlight of our visit to Leipzig.

Bach and his family lived in Leipzig for many years, until his death in 1750 at age 65. He was going blind and had cataract surgery on both eyes (in March and then in April), leaving him blind. The British doctor was a “charlatan” and it’s believed he blinded hundreds of people. Bach died from complications of the surgery that led to a stroke in July. His last words were, “”Don’t cry for me, for I go where music is born.” His last work was dictated note by note from his bed.

Bach died at the Johann Hospital and was buried at the St. Nikolai church. When it burned down some years later, they identified and took Bach’s bones in a wagon/wheelbarrow to the St. Thomas Kirche to be buried there. Now they’re in a crypt inside the St Thomas church (under the floor in the choir section. Bach and his family attended church here.

Tomb of Johann Sebastian Bach

The remains of Johann Sebastian Bach have been buried in the Thomaskirche since 1950. After his death on 28 July 1750, Bach was laid to rest in the hospital cemetery of the Johanniskirche in Leipzig. With the start of the Bach renaissance in the 19th century, the public started to become interested in his remains and their whereabouts. In 1894, the anatomy professor Wilhelm His was commissioned to identify the composer’s remains amongst disinterred bones from the cemetery where Bach had been buried. He concluded that “the assumption that the bones of an elderly man, which had been found in an oak coffin near the Johanneskirche, were the remains of Johann Sebastian Bach” (translated from German) was very likely. On 16 July 1900 the bones were placed into a stone sarcophagus underneath the Johanniskirche.

During the bombardment of Leipzig on 4 December 1943 the Johanniskirche burned down. The bones from Bach and Christian Fürchtegott Gellert were found without damages in 1949 in the crypt of the ruin. The bone from Bach was transferred to the Thomaskirche. The new grave with a bronze cover (sponsored by the Leipzig cultural officer of the Soviet Army) was inaugurated on 28 July 1950, 200 years after the death of the composer, who is now buried in the sanctuary of the Thomaskirche.

On one end of the church is the choir nave behind the altar where the choir sat. Above was a beautiful stained glass window. The pulpit is the fancy stand the preacher climbs up into, usually part way back in the church (so people can hear him). In St. Thomas, the pews on either side of the main aisle faced each other instead of facing forward. I’ve never seen that before. Then at the back, they faced forward. The ceiling was light with red criss-crossing ribbing in the gothic ceiling. It was simply beautiful.

There was a room in the church like a little music museum. We saw instruments used during Bach’s time here and some of his original music.

This is the beautiful choir chamber.

Below you can see Bach’s grave stone in the floor of the choir area.

This is the font where Bach’s children were baptized.

There are 2 organs in the church, the Bach Organ (explained above) and the main organ used now (below).

John learned about a concert there Monday morning, so of course we’re going.

We came back this evening for another visit. It was beautiful.

In the morning we came back for the Easter concert. We had time to walk around a bit before and re-read the posted history about the church outside. When we went in, it was nice to see that the church was quite full of people there for the service–I’d guess maybe 100 or more.

This Lutheran Easter church service featured Bach’s music. There was a printed program that outlined all the parts and talks and music. In the middle of the service there was a Bach cantata. The choir and soloists and a small orchestra were in an upper balcony area by the organ.

There was music throughout the service. We sang along with some of it. There was a preacher and a preacher woman, taking turns. At one point there was the absolution of all sin where everyone repeated together an asking for forgiveness, and then after that the preacher absolved everyone and said they were now “sinless.”

After that, they had people passing the donation bags, personally in front of everyone they could get to. You had to drop money in the bag or you were in trouble. They said on the info outside that it costs 4,230 Euros/week (220,000/yr) to keep the church open, and they depend on donations to do that.

We recited the Lord’s prayer. Other prayers were written in the program. There was some teaching about Easter. It was all good, reverent, with beautiful music in this beautiful place. It felt like Easter Sunday again.

Afterward we bumped into 4 young missionaries and a Leipzig member taking them on a P-Day tour. They’d popped in for the last 15 min of the 1.5 hour service.