Songs You Didnt Know Were Reigous

Knowledge of the biblical menses is mostly from literary references in the Bible and post-biblical sources. Faith and music historian Herbert Lockyer, Jr. writes that "music, both vocal and instrumental, was well cultivated amid the Hebrews, the New Testament Christians, and the Christian church through the centuries."^[1] He adds that "a look at the Old Attestation reveals how God'southward ancient people were devoted to the study and do of music, which holds a unique place in the historical and prophetic books, too every bit the Psalter."

The music of religious ritual was first used by Male monarch David: according to the Larousse Encyclopedia of Music, he is credited with confirming the men of the Tribe of Levi as the "custodians of the music of the divine service".^[2] Historian Irene Hesk notes that of the 30-nine books of the Onetime Attestation, the 150 Psalms in the Book of Psalms ascribed to King David, have served every bit "the bedrock of Judeo-Christian hymnology," last that "no other poetry has been fix to music more frequently in Western civilisation."^[3]

The written report of aboriginal musical instruments has been good for centuries with some researchers studying instruments from Israel dating to the biblical period.^[iv] Archaeological and written data take demonstrated conspicuously that music was an integral office of daily life in aboriginal Israel. Figurines and iconographic depictions show that people played chordophones and frame drums, and that the man vocalization was essential as women and men sang love songs forth with laments for the deceased. Data also describes outdoor scenes of music and dancing in sometimes prophetic frenzies, often with carefully orchestrated and choreographed musicians and singers inside specially built structures.^{[four] : 106}

Co-ordinate to ancient music historian Theodore Burgh, "If nosotros were able to step into the . . . biblical period, we would find a culture filled with music . . . where people used music in their daily lives."^[four] "Such music was capable of expressing a great variety of moods and feelings or the broadly marked antitheses of joy and sorrow, hope and fear, religion and doubt. In fact, every shade and quality of sentiment are found in the wealth of songs and psalms and in the diverse melodies of the people."^{[1] : 10}

Cultural influences [edit]

Egypt [edit]

Egypt was among the oldest cultures of the Near Eastward and had a highly adult musical culture dating dorsum to effectually 3000 BC. Egyptian sources, however, include only pictorial relics, some instruments, and a few literary records concerned with performance practices. On diverse pieces of sculpture in that location are reliefs of harpists and flutists taking part in religious ceremonies and social entertainments.

A number of instruments accept been identified every bit beingness used in Egypt, including the lyre (a blazon of harp), an oboe-similar instrument, various drums from Asia, the lute and the sistrum (rattle). Murals showing singers and instrumentalist performing have also been plant. According to music historian Homer Ulrich, it is likely that Egypt influenced the "educational and ethical aspects of Greek music".^{[5] : ten} Stephen Batuk equally observed that the historical link of music was consummated during the week of cosmos where birds in the air brand sounds which could be seen as music.^{[ commendation needed ]}

Sumer and Babylonia [edit]

Although records are minimal, it is known that betwixt 3000 and 2300 BC organized temple music with singers existed in Sumer and Babylonia, the oldest cultural groups in Mesopotamia. Excavations have uncovered several musical instruments, including harps, lutes, double oboes, and a few others.

Because of the political interrelations between the Hebrews and the Semitic nations of Babylonia, Assyria, and the Hittite empire, there were similarities between the Hebrew music of the Judean people and the others. Jewish music began in the early years of tribal life, and the "references to music in the Bible are numerous," writes Ulrich.^{[5] : eleven} After the Hebrews established a kingdom in State of israel, their musical activities were to increase substantially.

Ancient Israel [edit]

18th-century painting, "The Song of Miriam", by Paulo Malteis, Italy. Celebration subsequently crossing the Red Sea from Egypt

According to music historian Avraham Sharon, "probably the most important musical contribution of the ancient Hebrews was the meridian of the status of liturgical music in matrimony with ritual ceremonies." He notes the "loftier degree of musico-liturgical system" from the descriptive accounts of King Solomon's Temple, such every bit the 24 choral groups consisting of 288 musicians which took function in 21 weekly services.^[6]

Despite the similar instruments used past the Hebrews which were besides used in neighboring cultures, including Phoenicia, Arab republic of egypt, Assyria, and Greece, Sharon writes that "it would be authentic to state that . . . it is in the item uses of music—sacred and secular, ethical and aesthetical—that ancient Jewish music made a unique contribution."^[6]

Music historian John Stainer notes that the before human relationship between Abraham and the Canaanites "in all probability influenced future Hebrew music," and which probably caused his posterity to carry a certain amount of Assyrian music or musical instruments into Egypt. He adds that a stay of four centuries "in then civilized a culture as Egypt must have largely added to their knowledge of the art."^{[7] : five}

1 Chronicles 25:one–31 lists and organises the skilled musicians who were to perform, or "prophecy", with cymbals, stringed instruments, and harps in the service of the Temple.

Although the ancient music of the Psalms and the other Bible books (which were all chanted), is oft idea to exist lost, the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible contains cantillation marks indicating a melodic line for the words. Following the French archaeomusicologist Suzanne Haik-Vantoura, some government now argue that these cantillation marks engagement from temple times and tape the music sung in the temple. Attempts take been made to decipher them in mod musical annotation.^[eight]

Babylonian exile [edit]

The musical traditions of the Temple were broken by the devastation of the First Temple and the exile of the Jews in Babylon during the sixth century BC. Hindley notes that most of the psalms seem to have been written in the years afterwards the return of the Jews to Jerusalem. At this time besides the exercise of antiphonal singing betwixt the cantor and the congregation seems to have become mutual.^[2]

The music of ancient Israel represents nearly fourteen centuries of change, roughly from 1300 BC to 70 Advertisement, when Titus' siege of Jerusalem took place. Stainer points out the lack of many artifacts during this menses. He concludes that the "sad lack of national monuments relating to the Jews is not surprising, when it is remembered that Jerusalem stood nigh seventeen sieges, each of which was accompanied past more than or less devastation, and that, too, at the hands of victors who seemed to take a malicious please in effacing the national characteristics of those they conquered."^{[vii] : nine}

Second Temple destruction [edit]

However, afterwards the fall of the First Temple, Werner states that the fabric of dreams spun about its earlier music included reminiscences, visions, and fantasies, as the Rabbis took pains to eradicate both its choral and instrumental traditions. "Their time had arrived, and their ideas on liturgy and music were radically different from those of the Temple priests." Werner finds information technology paradoxical that mod day rabbis go on to praise the instrumental music of the Temple only prohibit any and all instrumental music in their synagogues today.^{[9] : xviii}

The destruction of the Second Temple in 70 Advertisement led to the collapse of the Hebrew nation and the beginning of the Diaspora (dispersion or exile) of Jews to other lands, such as Spain, Italy, and the Rhineland. In these places, the synagogue would supervene upon the destroyed Temple, with new liturgical services, prayers, and rabbinical writings oriented to mourning the loss of both the Temple and personal liberty.^[six]

Christian period [edit]

Very piddling is known well-nigh primitive Christian music, notes Whitcomb, considering like about of the ancient, it was unwritten. As a consequence, as songs passed from generation to generation, they grew very different from the original. Nonetheless, she notes that "much of this early music derived its dazzler from the Greeks and its holiness from the Hebrews."^[10] According to Ulrich, Hebrew music "was of direct and firsthand influence on the musical practices of the early Christian church building."^[v] He cites Werner in noting that "the connections between Hebrew and Christian dirge have been scientifically investigated and proved."^[ix]

The musical art of the Levites, the Temple musicians who were named later their historic ancestors, was lost by the end of the 1st century. In 70 Advertisement the 2nd Temple was destroyed by the troops of the Emperor Titus and in the years following the Levites along with the majority of Jews fled from Judea. As a result, the synagogue music of the Dispersion lost the joyful character of that of the Temple and the big instrumental forces were dispensed with.^[2]

The New Attestation was not written until centuries later than the quondam and the music had attained much higher evolution, according to music historian Ida Whitcomb. Equally information technology related to Christ, it is chosen Christian music. Notwithstanding, there are merely few allusions to information technology in three of the Gospels: in the Gospel of Luke, there are the "Angels' Song," Mary'due south "Magnificat," and Zacharias's "Vocal." In Acts, Paul and Silas sing behind prison-bars: the prison is shaken, the doors wing open, and they are free. In the Epistles, there are just few references to music, but in Ephesians there is a "cute ane," in which Paul exhorts the churches to sing "Psalms" and "spiritual songs."^[10]

Hindley adds that antiphonal chants between cantor or priest and the congregation originated in Hebrew worship methods. At its peak around the first of the Christian era, the elaborate music of the Temple was performed by a large choir of highly trained men singers, with boys sometimes added, and during this period many instruments besides were used by the Temple orchestra.^[2]

Whitcomb adds that many of our noblest Church hymns have been suggested by the Psalms, which she notes was "the first hymn-book of the Hebrew nation and remains today non only the hymn-book of the Hebrew Temple, but also of the Christian Church".^[10]

Musical instruments [edit]

Among the primeval pictographic signs establish have been of a boat-shaped harp found on a Sumerian clay tablet dating dorsum to 3000 BC, and an earlier depiction of this harp was as well constitute in modern southwest Iran dating around 3200 BC.^{[1] : 45}

Bar Kochba coinage showing trumpets and a lyre, c. 132 AD

Many relics of musical instruments take been plant in Palestine dating from the Hellenistic age giving details about the state, grapheme, and practice of liturgical music.^[9] In other cases, many musical instruments of the Hebrews mentioned in the Bible are identified by illustration with like instruments found in other nearby cultures, such as Egypt and Babylonia. An example of some instruments mentioned in the bible can be found in Daniel 3:5:

that when you hear the sound of the horn, piping, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music...

According to Josephus Flavius, all details of the Outset Temple, including its musical instruments, were fabricated and viewed equally "symbols of the universe", especially instruments like the kithara or lyre. In his Antiquities of the Jews, Josephus explains that the musical instruments, along with other matters of Jewish faith, correspond a perishable "image" of the cosmos, or of "a catholic Temple."^{[9] : 1}

String instruments [edit]

Lockyer notes that co-ordinate to the Scriptures, Jubal was the father of harpists and organists (Gen. 4:20–21). He points out that the harp was among the chief instruments and the favorite of David, and its use is found more than a hundred times in the Bible. It was used at both blithesome and mournful ceremonies, and its utilise was "raised to its highest perfection under David" (1 Sam. sixteen:23). Lockyer adds that "It was the sweet music of the harp that often dispossessed Saul of his melancholy (1 Sam. 16:xiv–23; eighteen:ten–11).^{[1] : 46} When the Jews were captive in Babylon they hung their harps up and refused to utilise them while in exile, earlier being office of the instruments used in the Temple (1 Kgs. x:12).

Another stringed musical instrument of the harp grade, and ane also used past the ancient Greeks, was the lyre. A similar instrument was the lute, which had a large pear-shaped torso, long neck, and fretted fingerboard with head screws for tuning. Coins displaying musical instruments, Bar Kochba Revolt coinage, were issued past the Jews during the Second Jewish Defection against the Roman Empire of 132–135 AD.

In addition to those, there was the psaltery, another stringed instrument which is referred to almost thirty times in Scripture. According to Josephus, it had twelve strings and was played with a quill, not with the hand. Another writer suggested that it was like a guitar, simply with a apartment triangular grade and strung from side to side.^{[one] : 49}

Current of air instruments [edit]

Among the wind instruments used in the biblical menstruation were the cornet, flute, horn, organ, piping, and trumpet.^{[i] : 50}

There were too silver trumpets and the double oboe. Werner concludes that from the measurements taken of the trumpets on the Arch of Titus in Rome and from coins, that "the trumpets were very high pitched with sparse body and shrill sound". He adds that in State of war of the Sons of Calorie-free Against the Sons of Darkness, a transmission for armed forces organization and strategy discovered among the Dead Body of water Scrolls, these trumpets "appear conspicuously capable of regulating their pitch pretty accurately, as they are supposed to blow rather complicated signals in unison."^{[9] : 2}

Whitcomb writes that the pair of silverish trumpets were fashioned according to Mosaic police and were probably among the trophies which the Emperor Titus brought to Rome when he conquered Jerusalem. She adds that on the Curvation raised to the victorious Titus, "there is a sculptured relief of these trumpets, showing their aboriginal form. (encounter photo)^[10]

The flute was commonly used for festal and mourning occasions, co-ordinate to Whitcomb. "Fifty-fifty the poorest Hebrew was obliged to employ two flute-players to perform at his married woman'due south funeral."^[ten]

The shofar (the horn of a ram) is still used for special liturgical purposes such as the Jewish New year's day services in Jewish communities. As such, information technology is not considered a musical musical instrument but an musical instrument of theological symbolism which has been intentionally kept to its primitive grapheme. In ancient times it was used for alarm of danger, to announce the new moon or beginning of Sabbath, or to denote the death of a notable. "In its strictly ritual usage information technology carried the cries of the multitude to God," writes Werner.^{[9] : 12}

Percussion instruments [edit]

Miriam and women celebrate the crossing of the Scarlet Sea; Tomić Psalter, 1360/63

Among the percussion instruments were bells, cymbals, sistrum, tabret, hand drums, and tambourines. Percussion instruments are those producing tones past beingness struck in various ways and have been used by bands and orchestras throughout history.^{[1] : 59}

The tabret, or timbrel, was a small paw-drum used for festive occasions, and was considered a adult female's instrument. In modernistic times it was often used by the Conservancy Army. According to the Bible, when the children of State of israel came out of Egypt and crossed the Red Sea, "Miriam took a timbrel in her easily; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dance." ^[1]

Singing [edit]

Whitcomb writes that "much of the most beautiful music of the Bible is independent in the Psalms," and the word "psalm" comes from the Greek discussion significant "to sing, to strike lyre." The psalter or psaltery was one of the instruments which accompanied the Psalm.^[10] The discussion before long came to signify whatsoever course of tune. The psalms were sung antiphonally or responsively, peradventure by the priest and congregation, or by two choruses.

Co-ordinate to Shiloah, most of the customs and ceremonies mentioned before, such as weddings or other celebrations, were accompanied by music made by women and attests to the importance of women'south songs. But there were many instances where women sang lonely or with friends and family. "The woman fortifies her spirit by singing to herself, and perhaps to her babe, who hears and absorbs the mother's confessions, longings, complaints, and dreams." There were too "female parent-songs, soldier-songs, grass-widow-songs, orphan-songs, and adult female'due south-trade-songs." According to some, writes Shiloah, women'due south songs existed because of the need to compensate for the ban against public participation of women in synagogue rituals.^[11]

Ancient music historian Joachim Braun notes that Philo had mentioned ritualist vigils virtually Alexandria, that included a repast and the singing of hymns by a double chorus as accompaniment to the processions and libations.^[12]

Trip the light fantastic toe [edit]

According to biblical historian Amnon Shiloah, trip the light fantastic was straight associated with music and was an important aspect of diverse events, although the actual dance movements are nowhere described in particular. There is meager evidence about dance when compared with a wider variety found in Arab republic of egypt. However, there are many biblical descriptions of occasions that inspired dancing in biblical times.^{[11] : 209}

In the Bible, Mishnah, and Talmud, dance is referred to in various contexts, and in Megido, the Negev, and other sites in State of israel, recently plant iconographic remnants show dancing figures. In Judg. 21:21, a festival is described during which it was customary to dance in the vineyards. Dancing was too associated with celebrations of military victories and for welcoming home heroes. In Exod. fifteen:20, Miriam and the other women burst into song and trip the light fantastic toe accompanied by drums to mark the departing of the Red Sea which saved the people of Israel; Jephtah'south girl danced to meet her father returning from victorious battles (Judg. 11:34); the women of Israel came out to dance before Saul and David upon their render from fighting the Philistines (1 Sam. 18:6); the king and his subjects were also inspired to dance when the Ark of the Covenant was brought upwards to Jerusalem (2 Sam. Ch. 6).^{[11] : 210}

Musical traditions [edit]

Purposes of music [edit]

The Bible mentions many uses of music including songs of praise, songs of victory, songs of mourning, and above all the Psalms. Dances were also a common music expression along with the combination of singing with instrumental music. During later times there was also a purely vocal music which prevailed for a flow.^[5] Co-ordinate to Ulrich, music played an important function in both the secular and the religious life of the Hebrews. Kings and other leaders of the people were customarily acclaimed in songs and fanfares, and very elaborate musical services in the Temple, described in the Bible, were important parts of worship. There are, for example, descriptions in the Bible of an orchestra consisting of 9 lutes, ii harps, and a cymbal.^[5] In other parts there are accounts of all-women choirs combined with singing and dancing to the men's percussion accompaniment. Werner adds that the choir's repertoire consisted of psalms, canticles, and other poetic passages from Scripture, although it may take contained some noncanonical texts. The choice of psalms is said to accept been determined by God's activities on the first seven days of creation, and the verses which insinuate to them.^{[nine] : 13}

Werner writes that "unique in the history of music is the firm belief in the purifying and sin-atoning power of the Temple's music, ascribed to both chant and instruments."^[nine] The music had to be gratuitous from blemish or fault, and avoided magical elements. Fifty-fifty the High Priest'south garment had symbolism: (Exod. 28:34–35): "a gilded bell and a pomegranate, circular about on the skirts of the robe . . . and its audio shall be heard when he goes into the holy identify before the Lord . . . " Co-ordinate to Philo and Josephus, the bells represented symbols of cosmic harmony.^{[9] : 10}

Music training [edit]

Co-ordinate to the text of the Mishna, the early musicians, both singers and instrumentalists, were strictly trained to be professional person musicians with their boilerplate grooming lasting 5 years. Bible historian Alfred Sendrey notes a "sudden and unexplained upsurge of big choirs and orchestras, consisting of thoroughly organized and trained musical groups, which would be virtually inconceivable without lengthy, methodical preparation." This has led some scholars to believe that the prophet Samuel was the patriarch of a school which taught non only prophets and holy men, only also sacred-rite musicians. This public music school, perhaps the earliest in recorded history, was not restricted to a priestly course—which is how the shepherd male child David appears on the scene as a minstrel to Male monarch Saul." :"^[13]

Types of music [edit]

Different types of music were also defined:^[5]

• Cantillation. Used when parts of the Bible were read during the service and parts of the text were sung or chanted.
• Antiphony (also referred to as responsorial singing). Since Hebrew poetry is based on parallelism (the expression of one idea in two different ways), several types of performances were possible: either by two separate alternating choruses, or by a soloist alternate with the chorus. At its elevation around the first of the Christian era, antiphonal music was performed by a large choir of highly trained men singers, with boys sometimes added. According to Hindley, "Antiphony is amongst the debts owed by Christian music to its Jewish predecessor."^[ii]
• Hymn songs. Within the service they were performed by either a soloist, called the cantor, or by groups. Some of the hymns were freely organized with groups of melodic motives with their variants connected to create a continuous melodic dirge.
• Orchestration. Werner writes that "the audio of the Temple'southward orchestra consisted of never less than twelve instruments and rarely exceeded thirty-six." The trumpets were never mixed with the residuum of the orchestra—being used for signals exclusively. One pair of cymbals were used in Temple rituals besides as a point instrument, "not unlike the gong in the mod theatre."^[nine]

Written notation [edit]

Musical notation in the modern sense did non exist during this menses. Notwithstanding, the Hebrew alphabet allows for special symbols to indicate how the music was to be performed. The alphabet consists of consonants and half-consonants, and vowels are indicated by dots and dashes higher up and below letter symbols. In improver to the vowel signs, a number of other signs, called "masoretic," refers not to single notes merely to "melodic particles or groups," writes Ulrich. These particles were handed down past oral tradition amongst singers for centuries and were first codified in the 16th century. Ulrich notes that the "Expressionless Sea Scrolls contain signs like to those in the liturgical script of early Christian sects . . . strengthening the conjecture that a common musical heritage is shared by the people of related cultures . . ."^[five]

Influence on later music [edit]

Music historian William Smoldon notes that despite the fact that instrumental music was not revived and used in the synagogue after the destruction of the Second Temple in seventy Advertising, (excluding the symbolic Shofar still used in orthodox communities,) "the chant connected, and of late years research has made information technology increasingly clear that many of the forms and fifty-fifty melodic patterns of the Byzantine and Western Christian chants were adaptations from the music of the synagogues."^[14]

He besides notes that later the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, the "one steadfast feature was the Western Christian Church" which was "respected past the barbarians." He adds that in that location seems "little doubtfulness that the worship-music of the early Church building, i.e. at such centres as Jerusalem, Damascus, Antioch and Alexandria, grew from materials . . . of Greek and Syrian origins, together with the service-chants of the Jewish synagogue."^{[fourteen] : 20}

Psalms

The Psalms have been sung through all the ages up to the present. Whitcomb describes the importance of the Psalms:

"the Crusader has chanted them as he ascended the Hill of Zion; and the victorious general was welcomed on his return past a hallelujah chorus. The sailor on the dark nighttime at sea, the shepherd on the lonely plain, the little waif upon the street, have alike been cheered past the music of the Psalms. They have enlivened the vintage-feast, the boatman on the Rhine, the soldier by his camp-burn down have been softened and the sad have been cheered past these sweet inspirations to faith, penitence, thanksgiving, and admiration."^[10]

Lockyer writes that Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor and champion of the pope, requested passages from his favorite psalm, Ps. 90, be read to him equally he lay on his deathbed in September 1558. In that psalm, "Moses contrasts the eternity of God with the transience of homo life, and Moses ends his song with a prayer for God's forgiveness and favor."(Ps 90:1–6)^{[i] : 21}

Notes [edit]

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i} Lockyer, Herbert Jr. All the Music of the Bible, Hendrickson Publ. (2004)
2. ^ ^{a b c d e} Hindley, Geoffrey. Larousse Encyclopedia of Music, Chartwell (1971), Ch. "Jewish Music"
3. ^ Hesk, Irene. Passport to Jewish Music: Its History, Traditions, and Culture, Greenwood Publishing (1994) p. 41
4. ^ ^{a b c} Burgh, Theodore W. Listening to the Artifacts: Music Culture in Aboriginal Palestine, T & T Clark International (2006)
5. ^ ^{a b c d east f thou} Ulrich, Homer, A History of Music and Musical Style, Harcourt, Brace & Globe, Inc. (1963)
6. ^ ^{a b c} Schwadron, Abraham A. Music of Many Cultures: An Introduction, Ch. 16. Univ. of California Press (1983)
7. ^ ^{a b} Stainer, John, Music of the Bible, Da Capo Press (1970)
8. ^ Haik-Vantoura, Suzanne La musique de la Bible révélée (Robert Dumas: Paris, 1976); Mitchell, David C. The Songs of Ascents (2015)
9. ^ ^{a b c d east f chiliad h i j} Werner, Eric. The Sacred Bridge, Columbia Univ. Press (1984)
10. ^ ^{a b c d east f one thousand} Whitcomb, Ida Prentice. Young People'south Story of Music, Dodd, Mead & Co. (1928)
11. ^ ^{a b c} Shiloah, Amnon. Jewish Musical Traditions, Wayne State Univ. (1992)
12. ^ Braun, Joachim. Music in Ancient Israel/Palestine, W. B. Eerdmans Publ. (2002)
13. ^ "A Theatre Before the World: Functioning History at the Intersection of Hebrew, Greek, and Roman Religious Processional" The Periodical of Religion and Theatre, Vol. 5, No. 1, Summer 2006.
14. ^ ^{a b} Smoldon, William. A History of Music, Dimension Books, Inc. (1965)

jacksonusin1959.blogspot.com

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_music_in_the_biblical_period

Share this post