The first quotation from the Bible is sung by the tenor, like an
Evangelist. This
recitative, saying "" (He calls His sheep by name and leads them out), is accompanied by three recorders, an instrument with
pastoral associations. The recorders also colour the first
aria, a movement in time with a text which refers to green fields. The following short recitative asks in a dissonant and dramatic way, like a lost sheep for its shepherd: "" (Where can I find you? Ah, where are you hidden?). The second aria is about the shepherd's arrival. Bach took the music from the secular cantata , although the meter of Ziegler's poetry does not fit, as if Bach had not communicated the idea of the
parody with the poet. Bach
transposes movement 7 from his congratulatory cantata up a
minor third for tenor rather than bass voice and with an obbligato part for violoncello piccolo contrasting with the low range of the instruments he used in the first version. It is in the form of an extended
da capo bourrée. The central recitative, movement 5, is the first movement of the cantata accompanied by the strings. It begins with the quotation from the gospel "" (But they did not grasp what it was, that He had said to them), sung by the alto as the Evangelist, and leads to an
arioso on the final warning not to overhear the words of Jesus, which "may be to your well-being" (). This warning is enforced by two trumpets in the bass aria which reminds of the death of Jesus: "" (Jesus has sworn to you that He has laid low devil, death). The trumpets are silent in the middle section, dealing with the gifts of Jesus, "grace, sufficiency, abundant life" (). The aria may also be a parody, but the model is not known. The chorale is repeated from the cantata for Pentecost, . The melody of the hymn for Pentecost "" is set for four parts and three independent recorder parts, instead of strings in the earlier version, thus returning to the scoring of the beginning of the cantata. == Recordings ==