Merely
Sounding Brass—part 2
There are a host of opinions about
what the Greek words echo chalkos
(2278 5475) which were translated sounding brass mean. The best explanation
that I have found of the Greek words <echeo>
<chalkos>, (sounding brass)
comes from the writings of Marcus Vitruvius Pollio who lived in the 1st century
b. c. He was a Roman architect,
engineer, and author of the celebrated treatise De architectura
(On Architecture), a handbook for Roman architects.
Vitruvius explained that the echo chalkos were tuned acoustic brass
or bronze vases that were strategically placed around the Roman out-door
theaters. Each vase was tuned
chromatically and when a particular pitch was produced by the human voice, that
particular vase would amplify the actor’s voice. However, these metal sounding vases produced
a hollow sound that was not a true representation of the actor’s voice
quality.
So, when one reads “Though I speak
with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity i.e. love that acts,
I am become as sounding brass” with the knowledge of what we learned from
Vitruvius, we understand that if a person says that he loves his or her
neighbor but does not really care for them—this person’s speech is hollow like
the sound produced by the Roman hollow sounding vases that amplified sound in
the roman theaters.
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