Catherine Winkworth translated it from the German "Nun danket alle Gott", written c. 1636 by the Lutheran pastor Martin Rinkart.

[1][2] Martin Rinkart was a Lutheran pastor who came to Eilenburg, Saxony, at the beginning of the Thirty Years' War.

The walled city of Eilenburg became the refuge for political and military fugitives, but the result was overcrowding, deadly pestilence and famine.

During the height of a severe plague in 1637, Rinkart was the only surviving pastor in Eilenburg, conducting as many as 50 funerals in a day.

In Rinkart's Jesu Hertz-Büchlein (Leipzig, 1636), "Nun danket alle Gott" appears under the title "Tisch-Gebetlein", as a short prayer before meals.

Below is the text in a modern version from the German hymnal Evangelisches Gesangbuch,[3] and a 19th-century translation by Catherine Winkworth:[4] Nun danket alle Gott mit Herzen, Mund und Händen, der große Dinge tut an uns und allen Enden, der uns von Mutterleib und Kindesbeinen an unzählig viel zu gut bis hierher hat getan.

Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices, Who wondrous things has done, in Whom this world rejoices; Who from our mothers’ arms has blessed us on our way With countless gifts of love, and still is ours today.