Born: Ap­ril 11, 1675, Bop­fing­en, Würt­tem­berg, Ger­ma­ny.

Died: Feb­ru­a­ry 5, 1723, Halle, Ger­ma­ny.

Johann’s fa­ther, G. A. Herrn­schmidt, was di­a­co­nus at Bop­fing­en, 1673-1702, and town preach­er, 1702-1714. Johann en­tered the Un­i­ver­si­ty of Alt­dorf in 1696 (M.A. 1698), and in the au­tumn of 1698 went to Halle. In the spring of 1702 he be­came as­sist­ant to his fa­ther, and in Ju­ly 1702, Hel­fer at the town church. In 1712 he be­came su­per­in­ten­dent, court preach­er, and Con­sis­tor­i­al­rath at Id­stein. He al­so grad­u­at­ed from Halle that year. In 1715, he was ap­point­ed Pro­fess­or of The­ol­o­gy at Halle, and in 1716 al­so sub-di­rect­or of the or­phan­age and Pä­da­go­gi­um there. Most of Herrn­schmidt’s hymns were writ­ten dur­ing his first res­i­dence at Halle, and ap­peared most­ly in Geist­reich­es Ge­sang­buch, by Frey­ling­hau­sen.

Sources

Hymns

1. Er wird es thun, der fromme treue Gott
   • Our God Is true, Most Faith­ful Is His Word
2. Gott wills mach­en, dass die Sach­en
3. Kommt, dank­et dem Hel­den mit freud­igen Zung­en
   • With Hearts and with Voic­es, O Praise Ye the Lord
4. Lobe den Herr­en, O meine Seele
   • Praise Thou the Lord, O My Soul