Josephus on Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs

Josephus on Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs

 Josephus in his Antiquities of the Jews stated: “And now David being freed from wars and dangers, and enjoying for the future a profound peace, composed songs and hymns to God, of several sorts of meter; some of those which he made were trimeters, and some were pentameters.  He also made instruments of music, and taught the Levites to sing hymns to God, both on that called the Sabbath-day, and on other festivals.”

          Josephus follows this discussion with an explanation of musical instruments and does not explain anything about the difference in "hymns" and "songs."  One of his statements is in line with the Ephesians 5:19 and Colossians 3:16 statements "making melody in your heart to the Lord" and "singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord."  He explains that King David taught the Levites to "sing hymns to God."  So, at the time of the preparing of this work we have no Biblical or archaeological evidence that tells us precisely what the word humnos (5215) means.

          Finally, are the words spiritual (pneumatikos 4152) songs (oide 5603)J.  As has been alluded to earlier, St. Paul was careful in both his letter to the Ephesians and to the Colossians to carefully state that the third category of songs was to be spiritual songs.  If he hadn't, there could have arisen the belief that he was condoning the singing of secular odes unto God.  There is some conjecture among writers that there is no real distinction between the terms psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.  If this is the case, why did Paul use three distinctly different Greek words in this passage?  So ends our discussion of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs at this point.  The section on Significance of the Holy Spirit in Music Ministry in Chapter IV will discuss the phrase "singing with grace in your hearts."