Gloria in excelsis Deo (Glory to God in the Highest), BWV 191, is a church cantata written by the German Baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach, and the only one of his church cantatas set to a Latin text.

[3] Gloria in excelsis Deo was written in Leipzig for Christmas Day, as indicated by the heading on the manuscript in Bach's own handwriting, "J.J. Festo Nativit: Xsti."

(Jesu Juva Festo Nativitatis Christi – Celebration for the birth of Christ), to be sung around the sermon.

Recent archival and manuscript evidence suggest the cantata was probably first performed in 1742, for a regular Christmas celebration by the university of Leipzig at the Paulinerkirche,[1][2] rather than in 1743, or 1745 at a special Christmas Day service to celebrate the Peace of Dresden, which brought to an end the hardships imposed on the region by the Second Silesian War,[3][4] Unlike Bach's other church cantatas, the words are not in German, taken from the Bible, a chorale or contemporary poetry, but in Latin, taken from the Gloria and the Doxology.

The final movement may contain ripieno markings (to accompany the chorus) similar to the ripieni found in Unser Mund sei voll Lachens, BWV 110, which was also a nativity cantata.