Suggested tune: DIES SIND DIE HEILGEN
===================
Dies sind die heilgen zehn Gebot. M. Luther. [Ten Commandments.] After the 13th century, the Ten Commandments began to be used in Germany at the confessional, and for the instruction of children, and in later times on pilgrimages and as an introduction to the Litany during Passiontide. Luther's catechetical, metrical setting 1st appeared in Eyn Enchiridion, Erfurt, 1524, and thence in Wackernagel, iii. p. 15, in 12 stanzas of 4 lines, each stanza ending with "Kyriolys." Included in Schircks's edition of Luther ‘s Geistliche Lieder, 1854, p. 47, and as No. 364 in the Unverfälschter Liedersegen, 1851. The only translation in common use is:—
That men a godly life might live, in R. Massie's M. Luther's Spiritual Songs, 1854, p. 55, and thence, as No. 204, in the Ohio Lutheran Hymnal1880, and in Dr. Bacon, 1884, p. 28.
Other translations are:—(l) "These are the holy commaundements ten," by Bp. Coverdale, 1539 (Remains, 1846, p. 544). (2) " Moyses upon the Mont Sinay," in the Gude & Godlie Ballates (edition 1568, folio 5), edition 1868, p. 6. (3) "These are the holy ten Commands," as No. 433, in pt. i. of the Moravian Hymn Book, 1754. (4) "These are the holy commandments," by J. Anderson, 1846, p. 53 (1847, p. 69). (5.) "The Lord Himself from Sinai's hill,” by Dr. J. Hunt, 1853, p. 83. (6) “These are the holy ten Commands," by Dr. G. Macdonald in the Sunday Magazine, 1867, p. 571, thence, altered, in his Exotics, 1876, p. 84. [Rev. James Mearns, M.A.]
-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)