Deo Gracias

One angle the Augsburg Confession does not consider is the ancient question of the relation of sin and Jesus' coming. Only in the Large Catechism does Luther approach the threshold of the 'triumph of grace.' There he reflects this Benjamin Britten hymn:

Deo Gracias! Adam lay ybounden, bounden in a bond, four thousand winter, thought he not too long; And all was for an apple, an apple that he took, as clerkes finden written in their book. Deo Gracias! Ne had the apple taken been, the apple taken been, ne had never Our Lady a been Heavene Queen. Blessed be the time that apple taken was. Therefore we moun singen: Deo Gracias!