Aesthetics and “Joyful Noise”-part 1

 

Aesthetics and “Joyful Noise”-part 1

          We have discussed the development of a Christian music

aesthetic. We have also discussed a noise-based music aesthetic and

translations that have mistakenly translated ruwa as joyful noise. As

we mentioned earlier, the actual Hebrew word used in all of the texts

mentioned that have been translated joyful noise is the word ruwa

(7321) which meant to shout with joy. The NIV justly translates Psalm

66:1-2 as follows: “Shout with joy to God, all the earth! Sing the glory

of his name; make his praise glorious!” It also translates 81:1 as “sing

for joy”; 95:1, “come sing for joy”; 95:2, “extol him with music and

song”; 98:4, “shout for joy”; 98:6, “shout for joy”; and 100:1, “shout

for joy.”

          Some Christian musicians declare that these verses command

Christian musicians to perform religious music with noise. There

are no biblical imperatives for musicians to include noise in musical

offerings to God. There is nothing in the Bible record that encourages

Christians to include noise in musical worship to God.  The use of beauty

in the arts in worship serves the purpose of creating atmospheres and

preparatory moods for the corporate worship experiences.

 

Music theology that is based on God’s Word

 

Music theology that is based on  God’s Word

Any music theology or philosophy that is not based on or at least congruent with, the true truths that are written in God’s Word is faulty. Also, if a music theology or philosophy does not give God and His Word preeminence, it is not  Bible based, Christocentric, or truly faith based. All Bible based beliefs concerning music’s origin must espouse the truth that in the beginning God created and that those actual acts of creation included music. Music was not originally the creation of any ancient musician or any ancient culture. Remember, God took nothing and made something which we call music and that  man only takes the building blocks of music which God created and organizes them into creative patterns. No musician has ever taken nothing and created music. Believing that music was an actual part of the acts of God’s creation, and not the original work of some musician or evolutionary process is necessary to place music squarely under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. This knowledge and understanding is absolutely necessary in the process of developing a Christocentric music philosophy.

It is not a novel thought that the 21^st century Christian musician should be deeply involved in thinking about music. As far back as the Levite musicians in ancient Israel, the Egyptian musicians, the musicians from Sumer, Akkad, and Ugarit philosophers like Plato, Aristotle, and the church fathers such as Aquinas, Augustine, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John and Charles Wesley, to mention only a few, have been greatly concerned about music as is reflected in their writings.  

Bringing proper form to everything on the earth

     Bringing proper form to everything on the earth

Revelation 4:11 explains why God created, “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.”  God wanted music, so He spoke it into existence.  God took nothing and formed the mathematical ratios that make musical tones possible and formed them into a most wonderful gift to bring glory to His name. He also created it for our enjoyment as a small part of the wonderful perissos (4053) mentioned in St. John 10:10.  One should note that in His acts of creation, God in and of Himself took nothing and made music. Although God has given musicians the gift of creativeness, they are incapable of making something out of nothing. They can only take God’s musical building blocks and arrange them in creative ways. God allows us to do wonderful things with His blocks, but we should always remember that they are still His blocks.

    Although the discussions in my earlier writings about music being a part of God’s acts of creation are of utmost importance to Christian musicians, I will refrain from repeating them here. However, I will add some additional thoughts about  “in the beginning God created…” that were not mentioned in my earlier works. One of God’s acts of creation was to bring form to the earth. Genesis 1:2 states,  “And the earth [erets 776] was without form [tohuw 8414], and void [bohuw 922]; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”  One of the valuable lessons to be learned from Genesis 1:2 is that because of God’s omniscience He included, as a part of His acts of creation, bringing proper form to everything on the earth. So, it is reasonable to deduce that God is very interested in form. God saw that the erets i.e. the world at large and not just the adamah (127) i.e. the ground, needed to have proper form.

Bible Principles of Musicing (revisited)-part 4

 

Bible Principles of Musicing (revisited)-part 4

            By Bible standards, church music is not all a matter of taste.  The Bible teaches that there are principles that do govern all music practice including both secular and sacred.  It only makes sense that when the Holy Spirit admonishes us in the musical discourse of Ephesians 5 to prove “what is acceptable unto the Lord” that He would also provide from the Word of God principles that would enable us to go about the process of “proving” what is or is not acceptable unto the Lord.

          So, twenty-first century Christian musicians do not need to be “programmed” or “caught in the wheel” since they may choose to retain God in their musical knowledge and be renewed in the spirit of their mind.  Church musicians do not have to accept the world’s music matrix but rather they may elect to believe the principles set forth in the Bible and base a Christocentric music philosophy and praxis on these eternal principles.

          The belief that what the Bible teaches about music and musicing is profitable in the 21^st century is not a poplar view.  As a matter of fact this belief will bring ridicule to the conservative Bible believing Christian musician.  The Christian musician who         believes that the Bible is an accurate reliable historical source, will cause liberal musicians and musicologists and a host of others who have crawled on to the liberal bandwagon not having much if any historical knowledge of ancient sacred music and musicing in ancient Israel to declare that the musician who trusts OT Scripture is either a dunderhead or at least has been hiding under a rock. 

 

            By Bible standards, church music is not all a matter of taste.  The Bible teaches that there are principles that do govern all music practice including both secular and sacred.  It only makes sense that when the Holy Spirit admonishes us in the musical discourse of Ephesians 5 to prove “what is acceptable unto the Lord” that He would also provide from the Word of God principles that would enable us to go about the process of “proving” what is or is not acceptable unto the Lord.

          So, twenty-first century Christian musicians do not need to be “programmed” or “caught in the wheel” since they may choose to retain God in their musical knowledge and be renewed in the spirit of their mind.  Church musicians do not have to accept the world’s music matrix but rather they may elect to believe the principles set forth in the Bible and base a Christocentric music philosophy and praxis on these eternal principles.

          The belief that what the Bible teaches about music and musicing is profitable in the 21^st century is not a poplar view.  As a matter of fact this belief will bring ridicule to the conservative Bible believing Christian musician.  The Christian musician who         believes that the Bible is an accurate reliable historical source, will cause liberal musicians and musicologists and a host of others who have crawled on to the liberal bandwagon not having much if any historical knowledge of ancient sacred music and musicing in ancient Israel to declare that the musician who trusts OT Scripture is either a dunderhead or at least has been hiding under a rock. 

 

Bible Principles of Musicing (Revisited)-part 3

 

Bible Principles of Musicing (Revisited)-part 3

           If God said in the Book of Amos that He would not hear the melody of their viols because of the noise then what causes a contemporary Christian musician to conclude that God will accept noise in church music today?  If God said take this musical noise “away from me”, what makes a twenty-first century church musician believe that he has changed His mind today? This will be discussed at some length in my new book Music Philosophy in Christian Perspective which is forthcoming. (See chapter 11 on Aesthetics and the Christian Musician)

          This discussion of Bible principles concerning music could continue here for pages and pages.  However, I will leave that discussion to those mentioned above.  If you are interested, I suggest you read my book, Music of the Bible in Christian Perspective, which treats this subject thoroughly.  We know that there are Bible principles that make a prescriptive approach to music philosophy biblically sound.

 

Bible Principles of Musicing (Revisited)-part 2

 

Bible Principles of Musicing (Revisited)-part 2

           Not all music was considered appropriate for public worship in ancient Israel.  There were many instruments mentioned in the Bible but only some of them were used in Temple worship.  Some music was no doubt used for sensual purposes including harlotry.  Loud music was played at funerals by the hired professional mourners.  A word by word study of dance in the Bible reveals that most of the references do not refer to any type of religious dancing.  Some of the dancing was used specifically for idol worship and some of it was possible used for human sacrifices.  Dancing and furious drum beating was certainly never used in the Temple in the worship of Jehovah and dancing or rhythmic movement is nowhere traceable in the first or second Temple.        Although some secular music was used for improper purposes, not all references to secular music in the Bible were considered improper or for lewd effect. The student of music in the Bible should look very carefully at the occasion and content of each mention of music to see if it was performed in the Temple as a part of public worship of YHVH or if it was a part of a public entertainment or a military victory which was not public worship at all.

           The term “joyful noise” of the Authorized Version is most unfortunate since the Hebrew word translated “joyful noise” meant with power, acclamation and great joy, NOT NOISE or noisy raucous music.  However, the Bible does say in Ezekiel 26:13, “And I will cause the noise (hamown 1995) of thy songs to cease...” and Amos 5:23, “Take thou away from me the noise (hamown 1995) of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols.”  The word hamown used in the aforementioned Scripture does not mean strength or joy or acclamation but rather NOISE.

Bible Principles of Musicing (Revisited)-part 1

 

Bible Principles of Musicing (Revisited)-part 1

            What are some principles of music found in the Bible?  Vocal music was most important since it was a vehicle for the word of Jehovah to ride into the hearts of the worshiper.  The instruments used to accompany vocal music were mostly string instruments that would not cover up the words.  Percussion was used but it was used to mark beginning and pauses and never used as a continuous driving beat.  Instrumental music was used for music therapy purposes.  We have every reason to believe that this instrumental music was melody oriented and produced a pleasing beautiful, restful effect on the listener.  We have absolutely no reason to believe that it was ugly, raucous or harsh sounding.  There were two species of music mentioned in the Bible which Jewish musicologists have recognized and explained in their scholarly writings.  These two species of music mentioned in the OT are “men’s music”, which was controlled by melody and words, and “women’s music”, which was controlled by rhythm.  The use of women’s music is nowhere traceable in either the first or second Temple.

 

Christian Musicians Should Think about Music

 

Christian Musicians Should Think about Music

It is not a novel thought that the 21st century Christian musician should be deeply involved in thinking about music. As far back as the Levite musicians in ancient Israel, the Egyptian musicians, the musicians from Sumer, Akkad and Ugarit, Plato, Aristotle, the church fathers such as Aquinas and Augustine, Martin Luther, John Calvin, John and Charles Wesley, to mention only a few, have been greatly concerned about music as is reflected in their writings. 

          A plethora of conflicting books either partially of in entirely written about music philosophy have been written in the last 100 years from a secular perspective.  It is unfortunate that so little has been written about music philosophy from a Bible basis or even from a faith basis.  Most of the books written by Christian musicians that discuss music philosophy have only devoted a portion of their works to a serious study of music philosophy.  It is also most regrettable that Christian authors have for the most part not struggled with many of the major concepts of music philosophy that the secular music philosopher have and are still dealing with in this century.  So, there is much need for current philosophical writings about music from a Bible and faith basis.

 

Ancient Knowledge of the Effect of Instrumental Sounds

 

Ancient Knowledge of the Effect of Instrumental Sounds

          We are often made to understand from the writings of current practicing church musicians that it is a “Jonny come lately” notion that instrumental music is capable of arousing passion and sensuality.  However, A.Z Idelsohn stated, “…from our record of the manner of use of the musical instruments we may deduce that at the time of its height, Egyptian  religious music had a certain dignity and holiness, inasmuch at those instruments employed were not held conducive to arousing sensuality.”  Jewish Music in Its historical Development, p.4. He went on to say,”neither did they employ a great number of instruments of percussion, but usually they employed only one drum and one pair of cymbals in the entire religious orchestra.”  Ibid. p.4. 

          Although the Egyptian worship was in no way Christian worship, it does show that at this early date they were careful of the sounds that were used in worship.  They were sensitive to the power of percussion and the sounds that the musical instruments made and their effect on the hearer’s emotional states.  If during ancient times musicians had such knowledge of the effect that instrumental music made on worshipers, it would behoove us to also become aware of the emotional effect that instrumental has on Christian worship.

The Song of Fools

 

The Song of Fools   

 Ecclesiastes 7:5  It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise, than for a man to hear the song of fools.

        Church musicians sometimes get a little worried that their musicing unto God is too serious,  because all of us want people to like our music ministry.  What does the writer of the book of Ecclesiastes mean by “the song of fools”?  Is he suggesting that the content of the song is foolish or that those who are singing the songs are actually fools?  He probably means all of the above. 

       Never be afraid of the seriousness of the musical message of Christ crucified.  The awesome depth of this message is the very thing that makes it worthwhile.  The message of Christ being obedient to the will of His Father: which included being reviled, rebuked, rejected, misunderstood, abused and tortured physically and mentally is a very solemn and worthwhile message.  Never be ashamed of the awesome and solemn truth about Christ’s suffering and death. The Christian musician should never water it down or fail to sing about the precious blood that Christ shed for the sins of the whole world.

       Although the message of His suffering and death is a very solemn message, there is another side to this musical coin.  Turn it over and you will see victory through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. You will see the joy of the debt of sin being paid by His suffering and death and resurrection.  You will also see that we can have a clean and pure heart through the efficacy of His precious blood that was shed on Calvary.  You will further see freedom from the guilt of sin.  You will also see the joy of having a relationship with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in this life and in the life to come.

       Sing, play and tell through your musicing, not only the suffering and death of our Savior but also of the fact that He was victorious over sin, death, hell and the grave.  This message is the antithesis of the “song of fools” which is merely a social gospel.  This message of Christ crucified and resurrected is far better than the foolish, light, chaffy, religious music that contains little eternal value. Church musician look up!  Lift up your head because you are doing the King’s business when you music the deep message of Christ crucified, buried, risen again and seated on the right of the Father praying for us all.