"Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" (literally: Awake, the voice is calling us) is a Lutheran hymn written in German by Philipp Nicolai, first published in 1599 together with "Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern".

[5] Johann Sebastian Bach based a chorale cantata on the hymn, Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140, one of its many musical settings.

Philipp Nicolai wrote the hymn in 1598, a time when the plague had hit Unna[6] where he lived for six months as a preacher after studies in theology at the University of Wittenberg.

[9] Portions of the melody are similar to the older hymn tune "In dulci jubilo" ("In sweet rejoicing") and to "Silberweise" ("Silver Air") by Hans Sachs.

[11]Nicolai's former student, Wilhelm Ernst, Count of Waldeck [de], had died of the plague at the age of fourteen, and Nicolai used the initials of "Graf zu Waldeck" in reverse order as an acrostic to begin the three stanzas: "Wachet auf", "Zion hört die Wächter singen", "Gloria sei dir gesungen".

His son Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach wrote a cantata for a four-part choir, Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme.

In Felix Mendelssohn's St. Paul oratorio, Wachet auf features prominently as a chorale and also as the main theme of the overture.