Macht hoch die Tür, die Tor macht weit

Macht hoch die Tür, die Tor macht weit. Georg Weissel* (1590-1635). This Advent hymn is found in the Preussische Fest-Lieder (Part I, Elbing, 1642), and subsequently in an edition of Johann Crüger*’s Praxis Pietatis Melica published in Berlin in 1661 and in Frankfurt-am-Main in 1662. It had five 8-line stanzas, with a sequence (in line 7 of the first three stanzas) ‘Mein Schöpfer… Mein Heiland… Mein Tröster’ (Creator… Saviour… Comforter’: see The Hymnal 1982 Companion, 1994, Volume 3B. p. 820). It is based on Psalm 24, but uses the door image as a metaphor in stanza 5: ‘meins Herzens Tür dir offen ist’ (‘my heart’s door is open to you’). It is found in EG in all five stanzas, where it is...