Christian Heinrich Postel

Christian Heinrich Postel (11 October 1658 – 22 March 1705) was a German jurist, epic poet and opera librettist, who wrote 28 libretti for the Oper am Gänsemarkt in Hamburg: set by composers such as Johann Philipp Förtsch, Reinhard Keiser and Georg Philipp Telemann. His texts for a St John Passion were set by composers Christian Ritter, Johann Mattheson and Johann Sebastian Bach in their respective St John Passion.

Career

Postel was born in , the son of the theologian Lorenz Postel and his wife Dorothea, née Isentrut. His father was a minister at the in Hamburg. Christian Heinrich Postel attended the . He studied law at the University of Leipzig from 1680 with Christian Thomasius. When the plague threatened Leipzig, he continued his studies at the University of Rostock, where he graduated as a licentiate on 10 May 1683. He travelled for six months with , a historian and theologian, in the Netherlands, England and France. Their diary of the journey, "" (Description of a journey through the north-western Germany, to the Netherlands and England in the year 1683), not printed until the 19th century, shows their many interests, especially in foreign universities and libraries.

Around 1700, Postel wrote the libretto for an oratorio (Passion and death of Jesus Christ, or St John Passion).