A Mighty Fortress Is Our God
The hymn opens, addressing the "liebe Seele" (beloved soul) of the speaker, such as some psalms do, for example Psalm 103, . This look at the individual differs from Martin Luther's approach in his hymn "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott" ("A Mighty Fortress Is Our God"), written a century earlier, which covers a similar topic: trust in God against adversaries including Satan, called "Teufel" (devil) by Luther. The beginning is a paraphrase from Psalm 42, , in Luther's translation: " (Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God).