Back in March 2009, the Adventist discussion group FIG posted an article from Christianity Today about Christian worship music. While that article made some good points, it also perpetuated the claim that Martin Luther “composed hymns based on popular melodies, including drinking songs.”
I posted a reply, stating my concern with the Christianity Today article. Another FIG subscriber, Stevan Mirkovich, and I had a short exchange of posts on FIG about this topic. Stevan cited research in a then-unpublished manuscript by Dr. Lilliane Doukam, entitled “In Tune With God: The Challenge of Music in Worship.” Apparently a chapter of that manuscript is devoted to the subject of Martin Luther’s use of contrafacta (popular melodies). According to Doukam, Luther used existing tunes, both sacred and secular, and substituted his own lyrics for “trivial and indecent ones.”