Of the three oratorios which Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach composed when he was music director in Hamburg, Die Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt Jesu is particularly intended to create splendor and effect with its use of magnificentsounding trumpets and timpani. Bach liked this work very much and had it published in 1787, the year before his death. The following year the oratorio was performed by Mozart in Vienna.

The text of the oratorio by Carl Wilhelm Ramler (1725–1798; better known as the poet of the frequentlyset “Der Tod Jesu”) covers the Easter story of the disciples at Emmaus and the doubting Thomas, up to the image of Jesus ascending to heaven.