In the very midst of life

An essential feature of attitudes prevailing in the days of Luther was the ubiquitous concern with death and dying, assailed by plague, wars and the never-ending dangers of daily life. The associated fears sometimes escalated to the grotesque, as in paintings by Hieronymus Bosch, and the ‘dance of death’ was a popular motif in those years. Luther’s chorale of 1524 In the very midst of life / we see death all around us (the Erfurt Enchiridion) is based on the Gregorian Media vita in morte sumus that emerged in France in about 750, evoking thoughts of mortality in its outline form.