The subject of music for church is an old yet ever new I topic, and one on which complete agreement can scarcely be expected. In the hope of contributing to peace and unity, we offer analytic suggestions. The bases of musical classification are manifold. A few of these are applicable here.
Some music is elevating. Other music is recognized as being Satanic in origin. Its effect upon the emotional nature is to stir the base passions, to stimulate sensual thinking. We may call this distinction a moral one. Where the distinction is obvious, there is no debate about church usage. Satan's music has no place in our secular lives, much less in the sacred service. On another axis the distinction is not moral but intellectual. Here some of the most heated arguments center. Here we need peace and unity.
When Jesus talked about love He told three stories: The Lost Sheep, The Lost Coin, and The Lost Son. When Paul discoursed on love, he wrote the highly rhetorical, intellectual, penetrating analytical thirteenth chapter of First Corinthians. Jesus chose the more universal appeal, but that does not invalidate the writings of Paul, which the majority of Christians do not fully understand. But it is good to read his writings, even if we do not fully understand them. To Christian scholars Paul's writings are supreme expressions of Christian truth.
All worshipers can appreciate "My Jesus, I Love Thee" and "I Need Thee Every Hour." The melodies are sweet and pathetic, and the harmonies simple. Not all can appreciate a Gounod "Sanctus," or a Bach "How Shall I Fitly Meet Thee?" These are eminently appropriate and may be deeply spiritual to those of musical discernment, to whom they may convey far greater meaning and uplift than the simple songs. The distinction here is intellectual rather than moral.
The musically untrained can gain something by listening to music that is above them, and they should refrain from attributing ostentatious pride to those who sing arias from oratorios for the sacred service. The question of the wisdom of such selection is another matter.
On the other hand, the musically educated are in danger of exhibiting this same ostentatious pride, and never more so than when they cease to find spiritual value is such hymns as those previously mentioned. Simply because a man finds his highest musical fulfilment in listening to a somewhat sentimental rendition of "When They Ring the Golden Bells," we need not hold him devoid of spiritual understanding, though we may well hope for his advancement in religious penetration. And the man himself needs to recognize that he should one day grow up to greater musical maturity.
Understanding and tolerance should lead to peace on this particular musical front. Where no moral values are involved, where the music is all sacred and appropriate for worship, intellectual distinctions should not be allowed to form a basis for friction and division.
A third axis of distinction separates the sacred from the secular. Here the differences are less obvious and the decisions more diffcult. We shall have to recognize that some music is sufficiently equivocal in effect to serve more than one purpose as far as its innate character is concerned. Hymns have been sung to the tune usually associated with the love lyric "Drink to Me Only With Thine Eyes," and certainly there is nothing inappropriate in the musical structure itself. The only objection arises from a connection with the secular song, but this association is so widespread that the music has become unusable for church.
Fewer people are disturbed when listening to "Give of Your Best to the Master" than by hearing echoes of "Take Back the Heart That Thou Gavest." Some may object to the Christ in Song musical setting for the "I Think When I Read That Sweet Story of Old" because of remembering the words of "Fair Harvard." Thus secular associations may render an appropriate musical setting unfit for sacred use.
In a different direction an "Ave Maria" may be musically perfect as an instrumental selection for worship, for the Catholic Church has a centuries-old tradition of producing musical liturgy that inspires the spirit of worship. But the Bible Christian cannot comfortably worship to a musical setting which suggests subversive doctrine. Shall the organist use music that was composed to un-Biblical words, or composed from a Catholic service? In the case of Schubert's famous and beautiful "Ave Maria," which has been concertized under that title throughout the world, the answer must be No, for everyone at once thinks of the title upon hearing the melody.
On the other hand, Henselt has composed a very fine "Ave Maria" which few Adventist church members would recognize. Shall the organist refuse to use it because it was composed for the Catholic service? Here is a church bulletin listing as offertory "Andantino" by Henselt. Is his "Andantino" any better than his "Ave Maria" if you don't know the name? As it turns out, the offertory actually is the "Ave Maria" wisely disguised under the technical term. Surely no one should object to hearing this lovely and fitting music for an offertory.
It seems obvious that the safe course lies in being guided by good taste and musical discernment, making the character of the music the basis of judgment and being careful to eliminate any selection that has secular associations or unbiblical suggestions. On this basis such songs as "The Rosary" or the barcarole from Offenbach's opera The Tale of Hoffman should be left out of the sacred service. Such unsecular sources, such as "My Jesus, as Thou Wilt," from von Weber's Der Freischutz, several adaptations from folk melodies and the like. The character of the music rather than the point of origin must be the guide.
There is still room for disagreement on the character of the music itself. It should be recognized that music for the church does not always have to be slow and melancholy. Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus" is eminently sacred but is rhythmic, spirited, and syncopated. Gounod's "Unfold, Ye Portals" has tremendous verve and movement. But music such as this has a dignity arising from its melodic and harmonic maturity and excellence that makes it highly appropriate for worship and that sets it far apart form the cheap chorus song which has little else but rhythm and syncopation.
There is no solution to this ultimate problem of selecting music for church aside from good taste and musical sense. There is no rule of thumb. There is only the indispensable discernment between the sacred and the common, the sensitiveness to spiritual values which tells the listener when he is being carried into the spirit of worship.
Finally, then, by being careful to close our ears to the devil's music at all times, by being tolerant and understanding when distinctions are purely intellectual, by avoiding all music with objectionable associations, and by cultivating sensitivity to the difference between the sacred and the common, we may come to please God in the musical part of our worship.
Richard Lewis is an associate professor of English at Pacific Union College, Angwin, California.
