It all began in Babylonia. For instance, in ancient Near Eastern Clay Tablets, Ea was the "patron god of music." Ea is a name for Lamech who was the father of Jubal, Jabal, Tubal-Cain and Naamah.
Ea held the "rules of the game" or supernatural powers called the ME. Inanna (call her Ishtar, Zoe, etc) got him drunk and stole the powers. Among these she became:
- The holy priestess of heaven!
- The setting up of lamentations!
- The rejoicing of the heart!
- He gave me the princess priestess.
- He gave me the divine queen priestess.
- He gave me the incantation priest.
- He gave me truth.
- He gave me decent into the underworld.
- He gave me ascent from the underworls.
- He gave me the kurgurra.
- The kurgarru, the assinu, and the kulu'u performed plays,
- music, dances, and games during rituals
- He gave me the loosening of hair.
- He gave me the binding of hair.
- He gave me the standard.
- He gave me the quiver.
- He gave me the art of lovemaking.
- He gave me the art of kissing the phallus.
- He gave me the art of prostitution.
- He gave me the holy shrine.
- He gave me the holy priestess of heaven.
- He gave me the resounding musical instrument.
- He gave me the art of song.
- He gave me the art of the elder.
Now, Flash-Forward To Your End-Time Blend of Religion and Sex
See Speaking in tongues Index.
Speaking in Dialects. People stopped off in Corinth and wanted to dialog or sing in tongues. This was their home DIALECT.
"After she (Carol Wimber) had a dream in 1976 of standing preaching to a large crowd a seven-point sermon on the gifts of the Spirit, at the final point, 'a sensation like hot electricity' hit her head, travelled down her body, then up and out of her mouth. She awakened speaking in tongues. The sensation of heat and electricity is typical of that experienced in the current revival. She said 'Soon God stopped showing me what he had wanted to do in the past and began to show me what he was going to do in the future. I had a strong sense of God's desire for his bride, for the whole Church - Protestant, Catholic, Orthodox.' (Riding the Third Wave - 1987)
In the article "Worship: Intimacy With God the philosophy behind the 'praise and worship' found in the Vineyard churches it is explained that there is a 'well-thought out philosophy' guiding how God is worshipped through music and movement in order to achieve the goal through "Worship: Intimacy With God" .
"To understand how we worship God, it is helpful to learn about our fellowship's history, which goes back to 1977. At that time my wife, Carol, was leading a small group of people in a home meeting that evolved into the Anaheim Vineyard. I'll let her describe what happened during that time.
"After we started to meet in our home gathering, I noticed times during the meeting -- usually when we sang -- in which I experienced God deeply... occasionally we sang a song personally and intimately to Jesus, with lyrics like 'Jesus, I love you.'
Those types of songs both stirred and fed the hunger for God within me... Thus we began to see a difference between songs ABOUT Jesus and songs TO Jesus. "About that time we realised our worship blessed God, that it was for God alone and not just a vehicle of preparation for the pastor's sermon. This was an exciting revelation. After learning about the central place of worship in our meetings, there were many instances in which all we did was worship God for an hour or two.
"At this time we also discovered that singing was not the only way to worship God. Because the word worship means literally to bow down, it is important that our bodies are involved in what our spirits are saying. In scripture this is accomplished through bowing heads, lifting hands, kneeling, and even lying prostrate before God. ... we are blessed as we worship him.
He visits his people with manifestations of the Holy Spirit. "Thus worship has a two-fold aspect: communication with God through the basic means of singing and praying, and communication from God though teaching and preaching the word, prophecy, exhortation, etc.
........ We lift him up and exalt him, and as a result are drawn into his presence where he speaks to us.""In the Vineyard we see five basic phases of worship, phases through which leaders attempt to lead the congregation.... as we pass through these phases we are headed toward one goal:
........ intimacy with God."....The fourth phase is described as "God Visits His People when "Expression then moves to a zenith, a climactic point, not unlike physical lovemaking... We have expressed what is in our hearts and minds and bodies, and now it is time to wait for God to respond.
........ Stop talking and wait for Him to speak, to move. I call this, the fourth phase, visitation:"The fifth phase is called "Generosity "The fifth phase of worship is the giving of substance. The church knows so little about giving, yet the Bible exhorts us to give to God. it is pathetic to see people preparing for ministry who don't know how to give. That is like an athlete entering a race, yet he doesn't know how to run. If we haven't learned to give money, we haven't learned anything... " From Source
And That Brings us to Voodoo
"Where there is no music, the spirit will not come." This West African proverb daily greets the divinity students in the Introduction to Preaching course taught by Brad R. Braxton, Assistant Professor of Homiletics and Biblical Studies at Wake Forest University. Explained Braxton,
"fundamentally, in African American worship, music serves the role of conjuring God's spirit...
When Black folks get together, they don't necessarily assume that God is there or that the conditions are ripe for God's presence to be manifest.
But rather, the conditions have to be made ready through fervent prayer and soul-stirring music. So, music creates the conditions for a meaningful encounter with God." Trevón D. Gross, Vice President for Programs and Partnerships of the American Bible Society (New York), says it another way,
"it is through music that we ascend and God descends."
"Agreeing with the sentiment expressed by Gross, Cunningham asserts that churches exclusively using a hymnal can have a rousing worship experiencefacilitated by traditional gospel music. "You can take Because He Lives from the hymnal and make a person shed a lot of tears." How true. Lisa R. Foeman
Paul warned about this in 1 Corinthians 10 speaking of "rising up to play" in Egyptian musical idolatry. In Romans 10:
But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise, Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) Romans 10:6
Or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.) Romans 10:7But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; Romans 10:8
Christ moves in the human heart in the falsely-called "singing" passages only when we "speak that which is written" (Romans 15), the Spirit (Eph 5) or the Word of Christ (Col. 3)
That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. Romans 10:9
For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Romans 10:10
If we are singing "praise songs" we are confessing the composer but we are not confessing Christ with the Mouth. When we speak that which we have heard as the SON spoke only what He heard from the FATHER then we will be safe.
Singing erotic praise songs and hand-clapping music is the tyrants method of "getting more work" out of the slaves. Showing that "praise singing" is derived in part from Voodoo which replaced West Africal devil worship:
"The transfer of these West African tribal traditions to the slave fields, railways, and rivers of the southern U.S. was of advantage to oppressed and oppressor alike,
the slave obviously taking solace in the cultural memory of his own collective past, the slaveowner encouraging work songs in the
same spirit as an infantry general might approve of military bands-
for the stimulus they gave to work rate.Many of the early examples of primitive vocal jazz relate closely to the labours being performed, and the content of the lyrics is a reminder that not only the cotton plantations but also the levees and railroads of the Deep South were created and maintained by slave labour. Click for More.
This is the meaning of the instrumentalists under the law. They were not "musicians" but sounders primarily for the HARD LABOR during offering of thousands of animals and more especially during the burning:
David, together with the commanders of the army, set apart some of the sons of Asaph, Heman and Jeduthun for the ministry of prophesying, accompanied by harps, lyres and cymbals. Here is the list of the men who performed this service: 1 Chron 25:1NIV
The service was not MUSICAL WORSHIP but:
Abodah (h5656) ab-o-daw'; or abowdah ab-o-daw'; from 5647; work of any kind: - act, bondage, / bondservant, effect, labour, ministering (-try), office, service (-ile, -itude), tillage, use, work, * wrought
Abad (h5647) aw-bad'; a prim. root; to work (in any sense); by impl. to serve, till, (caus.) enslave, etc.: - * be, keep in bondage, be bondmen, bond-service, compel, do, dress, ear, execute, / husbandman, keep, labour (-ing man), bring to pass, (cause to, make to) serve (-ing, self), (be, become) servant (-s), do (use) service, till (-er), transgress [from margin], (set a) work, be wrought, worshipper.
Abad (h6) aw-bad'; a prim. root; prop. to wander away, i. e. lose oneself; by impl. to perish (caus. destroy): - break, destroy (- uction), / not escape, fail, lose, (cause to, make) perish, spend, * and surely, take, be undone, * utterly, be void of, have no way to flee.
Abaddown (h11) ab-ad-done'; intens. from 6; abstr. a perishing; concr. Hades: - destruction.
Hell is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering. Jb.26:6
Rubel Shelly speaking for a revival of such worship wants a Musical Worship Facilitator (manipulator) to:
Work with the worship planning committee, the preaching minister and worship presentation groups (music, drama and technical) to facilitate group worship experiences which will help
bring worshipers into the presence of God.
"And Euripides does likewise, in his Bacchae, citing the Lydian usages at the same time with those of Phrygia, because of their similarity:
But ye who left Mt. Tmolus (Sardis was on this mt.), fortress of Lydia,
revel-band of mine, women whom I brought from the land of barbarians as my assistants and travelling companions,There are, it may be, so many kinds of voices in the world, and none of them is without signification. 1 Corinthians 14:10
Therefore if I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto him that speaketh a barbarian, and he that speaketh shall be a barbarian unto me. 1 Corinthians 14:11
uplift the tambourines native to Phrygian cities, inventions of mine and mother Rhea.
And again, happy he who, blest man, initiated in the mystic rites, is pure in his life, . . . who, preserving the righteous orgies of the great mother Cybele, and brandishing the thyrsus on high, and wreathed with ivy, doth worship Dionysus.
Come, ye Bacchae, come, ye Bacchae, bringing down (double entendre) Bromius, (boisterous one) god the child of god, out of the Phrygian mountains into the broad highways of Greece.
"Come Holy Spirit, come, make us truly new creatures in Christ"
ACU: See Ken Cukrowski, Mark Hamilton, and James Thompson endorsed by Royce Money trying to make GOD'S HOLY FIRE come.
The Zoe Group also looks to the hills to worship the MOUNTAIN GODS and are INVITING the CONSUMING FIRE. Look to the Hills: A CONSUMING FIRE an experience in worship.
Now will I rise, saith the Lord; now will I be exalted; now will I lift up myself. Psa 33:10
Ye shall conceive chaff, ye shall bring forth stubble: your breath, as fire, shall devour you. Psa 33:11
Meaning: "You GET PREGNANT on chaff and GIVE BIRTH to stubble." Therefore, YOUR words will devour.
Contrary to this, in the Christian system, Paul insists that God isn't far from any of us. One who has the Spirit of Christ has God dwelling in the human heart.
The new wineskin or Voodoo system works only because some kind of spirit works in the flesh. And the imagry is always sexual as the new praise songs are erotic:
"Where there is no music, the spirit will not come."
After all, Rock and Roll which some seeker or vineyard-influenced church is one of those "F" words induced into pseudo-Christian vocabulary right out of Voodoo.
"For decades African Americans had used the term rock and roll as a euphemism for sex, and Presley's music oozed sexuality. Presley was hardly the only artist who embodied this attitude, but he was clearly a catalyst in the merger of black and white culture into something far bigger and more complex than both.
The history of rock and roll is a history of infamy, a parade of perversion&emdash;illicit sex, drugs, rebellion against authority, and violence&emdash;in both the purveyors and consumers of it.
"The Praise Team leads the congregation into the presence of the Lord with exciting praise and worship. The Word says that God inhabits the praises of His people and we are a people desiring to be inhabited!
Praise plows the ground for the seed to be planted when the Word is taught (Hosea 10:11). The team unites together as the Levites did in the Old Testament to bring praise and glory to God."
What this person does not know, cannot know, is that the musical idolatry at Mount Sinai cursed Israel with the Levites. They stood as flaming cherubim to kill any of the non-priestly Jews if they tried to enter into God's symbolic presence. The people were excluded from this ritual of music when Israel's elders fired God and demanded a king like the nations so that they could worship like the nations.
Furthermore, this music was related only to animal sacrifices. Consistent with this, the Jewish clergy mocked Jesus with music as they were sacrificing Him on the cross.
Praise and Worship plows the ground to make it ready for planting. A good worship team does the plowing and the pastor (and others) plant the seed. Without the plowing, the seed might fall on the stony ground and not take root!
Yes, the Holy Spirit still is welcome and still comes whether you are participating or not.
Yes, the theme is "Women and children rule over you."
"Women and girls from the different ranks of society were proud to enter the service of the gods as singers and musicians. The understanding of this service was universal: these singers constituted the 'harem of the gods'." (End of Quasten Click to see Music and the Feminine connection)
"Music was understood to drive away hostile chthonic demons who loved tranquility and quiet. this concept of music's magical power is found in the formula of a love spell published by S. Eitrem:
"X.X. is bound with the tendons of the holy phoenix so that you will love N.N. with your whole heart and no barking dog or braying ass,
cock or conjurer, the clash of cymbals or the noise of flutes or anything else under the heavens will ever set you free.""The harmful screaming of those who were to be killed in sacrifices was particularly attractived to the wicked demons,
........ with whom the pagans believed the air (1 Corinthians 14:9) was filled.
You must be aware that the Israelites ROSE UP TO PLAY at Mount Sinai. This was the Musical Worship of Egypt. Stephen in Acts 7 and others show that God TURNED THEM OVER to worship the starry host. This included Chiun (Saturn = Chaldee 666) and/or Molech. Later, the elders essentially FIRED God and demanded a king be set over them. God understood this to be so that they could worship like the nations. The Monarchy was a curse because they had to try to have assurance by the sacrifice of tens of thousands of animals. They were sacrificing GOD and a form of Jesus Christ. Therefore, the "music" was identical to a pagan temple's EXORCISM:
"Consequently, music was found to be especially appropriate at the time of sacrifice as a means of driving away the evil spirits who would destroy its efficacy. From this it can also be seen why music had to be uninterrupted during the actio. It was not necessary, then, that music drown out cries of pain but rather that it simply drive away the demons who had been attracted by those cries." (Quasten, Johannes, Music and Worship in Pagan and Christian Antiquity, pgs 16-17)
Of the musical idolatry at Mount Sinai, Paul warned the Corinthians of their own charismatic, pagan worship which made their "assembly do more harm than good."
No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons (who distribute fortunes or gifts of spirits), not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. 1 Corinthians10:20
So it is with you. Unless you speak intelligible words with your tongue, how will anyone know what you are saying? You will just be speaking into the air. 1 Corinthians 14:9
"In Greek ritual the sacrifice was accompanied by the invocatory cries of women.
Their purpose was to call the good gods so that they cound enjoy the sacrifice.
Music had the same character of epiclesis. It was understood to "call down" the good gods."Menander attests to the attribution of this significance to music.
According to Plutarch, the inhabiants of Argos blew trumpets on the feast of Dionysos
so as to call the god up from the depths of the river Lerne for the sacrifice."Because song and music increased the efficacy of the epiclesis the words of epiclesis were nearly always sung to instrumental accompaniment.
Thus the Dionysian fellowship used the ritual of women in order to obtain the appearance of their god.
"Arnobius alludes to such songs of the pagans performed to flute accompaniment, and he mockingly asks whether the sleeping deities will be awakened by them." (Quasten, Johannes, Music and Worship in Pagan and Christian Antiquity, p. 17)
Arnobius also attributes most "worship" musical performance to women and homosexuals.
Unattributed quotes in black from: Gospel Hymns Sandra S. Sizer p. 186 - 187 Eerdman's Handbook To Christianity in America.
As slaves were forbidden to drum in their new "christian" worship, a style of singing developed to fool the masters. This had a huge impact on praise and worship songs even today:
"By 1810 the slave trade to the United States had officially ended and the slave population began to increase naturally, making way for the preservation and transmission of religious practices that were, by this time, truly "African-American."
This transition coincided with the period of intense religious revivalism known as "awakenings." In the southern states, where the institution of slavery still prevailed,
increasing numbers of slaves converted to evangelical religions such as the Methodist and Baptist faiths. Their praise and worship songs merged African and American styles.
Many clergy within these denominations actively promoted the idea that all Christians were equal in the sight of God, a message that provided hope and sustenance to the slaves.
They also encouraged worship in ways that many Africans found to be similar, or at least adaptable, to African worship patterns, with enthusiastic singing, clapping, dancing, and even spirit-possession.
In the slave quarters, however, African Americans organized their own "invisible institution." Through signals, passwords, and messages not discernible to whites, they called believers to "hush harbors" where they freely mixed African rhythms, singing, and beliefs with evangelical Christianity.
Their praise and worship songs had the drum beat of hand clap to enforce the dark meaning of Voodoo.
It was here that the spirituals, with their double meanings of religious salvation and freedom from slavery, developed and flourished; and here, too,that black preachers, those who believed that God had called them to speak his Word, polished their "chanted sermons,"
or rhythmic intoned style of extemporaneous preaching.
Part church, part psychological refuge, and part organizing point for occasional acts of outright rebellion
(Nat Turner, whose armed insurrection in Virginia in 1831 resulted in the deaths of scores of white men, women, and children, was a self-styled Baptist preacher), these meetings provided one of the few ways for enslaved African Americans to express and enact their hopes for a better future.
Albert Barnes, commenting on Colossians 3:16, explained why those who make the hymns have control of the church. They are, in fact, the overseers of the church in its only Scriptural role:
"It is true in a more important sense that he who is permitted to make the hymns of a church,
need care little who preaches, or who makes the creed.
He will more effectually mould the sentiments of a church than they who preach or make creeds and confessions.Hence, it is indispensable, in order to the preservation of the truth, that the sacred songs of a church should be imbued with sound evangelical sentiment."
However, modern praise and worship songs tokenize the Bible and most often teach error.
At Passover Jesus gave us an approved example and defined the meaning of "hymn."
And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives. Matthew 26:30
Humneo (g5214) hoom-neh'-o; from 5215; to hymn, i.e. sing a religious ode; by impl. to celebrate (God) in song: - sing an hymn (praise unto).
Humnos (g5215) hoom'-nos; (to celebrate; prob. akin to 103; comp. ); a "hymn" or religious ode (one of the Psalms): - hymn
This also defines the meaning of "singing praises." When Paul and Silas were in prison their praises were hymns:
About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns (praises) to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Acts 16:25
There is no word for singing plus hymning and praising: the ideas is that they were "hymning praises."
We know for certain that the hymns sung at Passover would be from the Great Hallel or Psalms 111-118. When the "fifth cup" was sung, Psalm 137 was sung.
The Septuagint includes the three Greek expressions Paul, "psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs". All three classes are included under the Greek word "Psalms." Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs are defined by Paul as "the Word of Christ" or "Spirit." Each is a type of the inspired Word of God.
Saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I sing praise (hymns) unto thee. Hebrews 2:12
Declare is:
Apagello (g518) ap-ang-el'-lo; from 575 and the base of 32; to announce: - bring word (again), declare, report, shew (again), tell.
Sing is:
Apalgeo (g524) ap-alg-eh'-o; from 575 (to smart); to grieve out, i.e. become apathetic: - be past feeling
The singing of James is not congregational but the advice is that all singing should consist of singing the Psalms. This word would include Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual songs:
Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms. James 5:13
James does not include the three forms because they are all included under the term "Psalm" or praises and they are all inspired and from God.
Hymns Sandra S. Sizer
"One of the remarkable developments in middle and late nineteenth-century evangelicalism was the emergence of a popular American hymnody.
Puritans before the Great Awakening had chanted psalms from the Bible but disapproved of the use of hymns in church services.
After the revivals of Edwards and Whitefield, New Light Presbyterians and Baptists used some hymns, mostly those of the British hymnist isaac Watts. Methodists coming to America brought Wesleyan hymns with them.
Click to see how the First Great American Awakening produced wholesale division.
And the SHOUTING METHODISTS where shouting in early Christian Church became an act of worship.The Cane Ridge revival was a later version with similar divisive results.
But at the turn of the nineteenth century most evangelicals were still singing either psalms or hymns by British composers.
The Britannica notes of the Spiritual songs that "A second source was the singing of hymns (as opposed to psalms only), reintroduced by such 18th-century religious dissenters as John and Charles Wesley, the founders of Methodism.
Hymn verses were composed and set to borrowed melodies, often secular folk tunes. Many of these evangelical hymrs even passed into oral tradition.
Plato noted that when people change the music you should fear that they are also changing the laws. Therefore, modern praise and worship songs clearly flow from a changed view of God's laws.
"In the late 18th century and up to the mid-19th, there were several waves of religious revivalism. The resulting camp meetings and revivals were marked by spontaneous mass singing. It is not completely known how the camp-meeting songs and revival spirituals were sung;
but it is thought that they were sung unharmonized, the tune typically begun by the high male voices, the women and basses joining in an octave (or other comfortable interval) above or below. A call-and-response pattern (as in lining out) may have at times been used. Melodies were apparently ornamented.
"A 19th-century offshoot of the spiritual was the gospel song. Influenced by "correct" European music,
it had composed melodies and texts, was sung with instrumental accompaniment, and (unlike the folk hymns) was written to be harmonized.
The Britannica also notes that: "Racial, ethnic, and language distinctions also can operate to create and maintain exclusive communities.
"The Negro churches of the United States, though open to members who are not Negroes,
have become, in many sections of the United States, exclusive communities, largely through the exclusion of Negroes from white churches.
The worship of Negro communities has incorporated elements from African religions and has focussed upon forms of worship appropriate to a people oppressed by the larger society and excluded from many of its benefits. The service generally is "freer" than that of the white churches, including a more significant place for congregational singing and responses and more active participation by the congregation than has become customary in most white churches. (See black American.)
We will see later that women and preachers were also somewhat excluded and were largely responsible for the charismatic outbreaks: the preachers often for control purposes and the women needing to approve and be approved.
Musically, it is believed that a complex intermingling of African and white folk-music elements occurred and that complementary traits of African music and white U.S. folksong reinforced each other. For example, the call-and-response pattern occurs in both, as do certain scales and the variable intonation of certain notes.
Most authorities see clear African influence in vocal style and in the complex polyrhythmic clapped accompaniments.
African tradition also included polyphonic and choral singing. The ring shout (a religious dance usually accompanied by the singing of spirituals and clapped rhythms) is of African ancestry.
After the Civil War the black spirituals were "discovered" by Northerners and either developed toward harmonized versions, often sung by trained choirs, or, conversely, preserved the older traditional style, especially in rural areas and certain sects. Like the white gospel song, the modern black gospel song is a descendant of the spiritual and is instrumentally accompanied. Black gospel music is closely related to secular black music (as is the spiritual to the work song and blues) and often
includes jazz rhythms and instruments alongside traditional clapped accompaniment and often dance. Though gospel songs are usually composed, the melodies are taken for improvisational bases in church services, as popular tunes are improvised upon in jazz.
In "Recollections of John Rogers" notes that:
Thomas Dooley I remember as one of the sweetest singers of Israel I ever heard. He had a clear, soft, sweet and most melodious voice. I shall never forget, while memory lives, the deep impression his singing made upon me; there was so much of heaven and complacency in his eye and beaming forth from his countenance. He threw his whole soul into his song. While I write of him, he stands before me in imagination, as he did in reality some forty-two years ago, the embodiment of Christian meekness, gentleness, patience, hope and love. I seem to be looking upon that beautiful, peculiarly soft, placid, heavenly- beaming countenance, as it shone upon me while he sang - as only he could sing - that most beautiful lyric of Dr. Watts', entitled, "Happy Frailty." I remember the tune yet, and many of the words. The first verse runs thus:
- How meanly dwells the immortal mind,
- How vile these bodies are!
- Why was a clod of earth designed
- To inclose a heavenly star?
- Weak cottage where our souls reside,
- Earth but a tottering wall!
- With fearful breaches gaping wide,
- The building bends to fall."
The whole song is in Dr. Watts' best style, full of pathos, of the most soul-stirring thoughts. And although it is more than forty years since I heard it sung, yet sung then to the beautiful tune in the inimitable style of Bro. Thomas Dooley,
"The camp-meeting revivals on the western frontiers sparked the composition or adoption of more popular tunes and easily learned words. Some elements came from English sources. while others--especially the pattern of verse-and-refrain--were borrowed from black folk music.
"Still, however,
"the more conservative church leaders, especially among Presbyterians and Congregationalists, tried to keep such songs out of regular services, reserving them only for seasons of revival."Not until after the Finney revival era, 1825-1835, did the proscriptions on popular religious song fall away.
........ During the same period, the teaching and learning of music,
........ ........ especially singing in choruses, was becoming a popular pastime.The music teacher became a familiar figure in the West and the music institute in the East, bringing songbooks and the skills of reading musical notation to the populace at large.
........ These developments opened the way for the genre of popular religious song called the "gospel hymn."Consistent with this praise and worship songs are billed as "worship entertainment."
The replacement of the psalms with human compositions was a product of the "high church" movement which gave protestants the same authority as the Catholic church to "change with the times." However:
"The first three centuries of the church witnessed many controversies; some of them concerned themselves directly with music. The most important of these issues were:
(a) organized versus spontaneous praying and singing;
(b) scriptural versus extrascriptural poems;
(c) fusion with Hellenistic music;
(d) vocal versus instrumental music;
(e) the rise of monasticism and its influence upon ecclesiastical chant." (Interpreter's Dict of the Bible, Music, p. 467).The first problem occurred when the doxologies of the Bible which were like Psalms were replaced by "a great number of spontaneous and highly individualized doxologies."
........ However, the non-Biblical responses were ratified and codified at the second synod of Vaison in 529.
........ This writing of their own "song book" virtually destroyed spontaneous or Biblical worship.
However, sectarian introduction of any thing not Biblical is almost always based on commercial interest (more attendees, etc.)
"The large displacement of the Psalter by other matter of praise in the Protestant Churches during the last one hundred years has been due, no so much to the lack of appreciation of the Psalms,
........ as to the commercial enterprise of music publishers." (Int Std Bible Ency., Psalms, p. 2494B).
The Result of Violating Paul's Direct Command About Women
From the most ancient times, women promoted charismatic religion as a way to "rule over men" who could not be controlled but who could be seduced.
Johannes Quasten. In Music and Worship in Pagan and Christian Antiquity, beginning on page 41:
"Philodemus considered it paradoxical that music should be regarded as veneration of the gods while musicians were paid for performing this so-called veneration. Again, Philodemus held as self deceptive the view that music mediated religious ecstasy.
He saw the entire condition induced by the noise of cymbals and tambourines as a disturbance of the spirit.He found it significant that, on the whole, only women and effeminate men fell into this folly.
Accordingly, nothing of value could be attributed to music; it was no more than a slave of the sensation of pleasure, which satisfied much in the same way that food and drink did.
"Leading the hearts and minds of whole congregations to the throne of God is a serious responsibility which deserves much thought and prayer... Think what a blessing would come to our worship if we produced people who wrote modern Psalms to voice our deepest needs and concerns." (Rubel Shelly and Randy Harris, Second Incarnation, p. 137)
"The gospel hymn, with a simple melody and chorus, and Iyrics proclaiming the love of Jesus, was soon to become a prominent feature of the American evangelical scene.
Ordinary clergy and laypeople,
including large numbers of women,
wrote the Iyrics themselves, modeling their poetry on Wesleyan-style verses
....... such as "Jesus, Lover of My Soul." (I.e. Erotic)
It is an absolute certainty from Scripture and all of the ancient stories birthed at the Tower of Babel, that when music, drama and dance are promoted it is catering to secular females or the effeminate principle in the male, charismatic leaders. Parkes notes that all ancient priests and "prophesiers" were honored because of their fully-expressed or thinly-veiled bent-gender.
The man of sin is apoleia or Apollyon or Abbadon: See His Seeker Center and the music connection. He uses music and his preside-over "preachers with a tune" are women or the effeminate:
Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth (dwells) in the temple (naos) of God, shewing himself that he is God. 2 Thess 2:4
The "liturgy area" is the holy place in cathedral architecture:musical worship teams are standing in the holy place claiming to be mediators or that their "awsome" power comes from GOD: the idolatry of talent.
Showing is: Apodeiknumi (g584) ap-od-ike'-noo-mee; from 575 and 1166; to show off, i.e. exhibit: fig. to demonstrate, i.e. accredit:- (ap) prove, set forth, shew.
The two basic Greek religious cults--one devoted to Apollo, the other to Dionysus--became the prototypes for the two aesthetic poles, classical and romantic, that have contended throughout Western cultural history.
The Apollonians were characterized by objectivity of expression, simplicity, and clarity, and their favoured instrument was the kithara, a type of lyre.
The Dionysians, on the other hand, preferred the reed-blown aulos and were identified by subjectivity, emotional abandon, and sensuality. (See Greek music, Apollo, Dionysus.)As Dionysus apparently represented the sap, juice, or lifeblood element in nature, lavish festal orgia (rites) in his honour were widely instituted. These Dionysia (Bacchanalia,)
........ quickly won converts among the women in the post-Mycenaean world.
........ The men, however, met it with hostility.In Romans 15 Paul defined the synagogue as excluding PLEASURING self. The only way to glorify God was to speak with ONE MIND and ONE VOICE using "that which is written."
It is an absolute certainty from Scripture and all of the ancient stories birthed at the Tower of Babel, that when music, drama and dance are promoted it is catering to secular females or the effeminate principle in the male, charismatic leaders. Parkes notes that all ancient priests and "prophesiers" were honored because of their fully-expressed or thinly-veiled bent-gender. Goldschmidt notes that:
"It is no accident that a high proportion of those who suddenly show symptoms of being bewitched (such as fainting or going into a semi-trance) at 'squaw dances' or other large gatherings are women or men who are somewhat neglected or who occupy low social status.
In most of these cases it is probably not a matter of consciously capitalizing on the credence of their fellows in order to get the center of the stage for themselves.
It is unlikely that Navahos often deliberately complain of the symptoms of witchcraft as a device for getting attention. The process normally takes place at an altogether unconscious level:
those whose uneasiness goes beyond certain point have to do with something; and if they are believed to be at the mercy of witches they are likely to get help." (Goldschmidt, Walter, Exploring the Ways of Mankind, p. 518, Holt, Rinehart and Winston)
The familiar spirit of the witch of instrument was an empty wineskin. It has the same meaning as the harp or nebel and of the instruments condemned by Paul in First Corinthians chapter 13.
Most musical forms were always a form of witchcraft or sorcery.
"By the time of the 1857-1858
prayer-meeting revival, songbooks were in great demand. Hymns like "Just As I
Am" and "What a Friend We Have in Jesus" were favorites.
........ Over the next few decades devotional poetry that
had appeared in religious
magazines
........ ........
and Iyrics from Sunday-school songs
........ ........
were collected
together with the writings
of professional hymnists.
"Fanny Crosby, the
famous blind hymnist, became known across the country for
the thousands of hymns she wrote ("Rescue the Perishing,"
"Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour" l. P. P Bliss, whose career
was cut short by his death in a train accident in 1876, was
one of the most prolific. writing both words and music to
such songs as "Let the Lower Lights Be Burning" and "Hold
the Fort."
"Affer Bliss's death Ira D. Sankey, the partner of Dwight L. Moody, became the best-known of revival singers and musicians. Together with other musical evangelicals, he compiled a series, Gospel Hymns, which was the most popular set of hymnals in the late nineteenth century. This movement transformed the appearance of urban revivalism.
........ a professional singing evangelist to provide a counter-point to prayer and sermon.
"The popularity of the gospel hymn is closely tied to
........ the emerging forms of nineteenth-century white urban revivalism and to the social conditions of the period.
Middleclass Protestants in postindustrial America were increasingly literate producing and devouring newspapers magazines, histories, novels, and poetry in enormous quantities.
At the same time, male and female roles were being redefined, and many men spent their energies in the business and politics of an expanding society.
Those were arenas from which both women and ministers, by custom and/or law, were excluded.Religion itself was becoming a separate sphere, no longer directly linked to government and public affairs,
and ministers had lost the prestige their forefathers had as scholars and advisers to magistrates.
Together with their most faithful followers, middleclass women,
........ they created a realm of intense religious experience,
........ separate from the larger society,
........ and gave it expression in poetry and hymnody.
Strabo Geography 7.3.4 Notes:
"Further, it is not reasonable to suppose that the same people regard as wretched a life without many women, and yet at the same time regard as pious and just a life that is wholly bereft of women. And of course to regard as "both god-fearing and capnobatae"
"capnobatae," or "smoke-treaders" (see Herodotus 1. 202 and 4.75) to the custom of generating an intoxicating vapor by throwing hemp-seed upon red-hot stones. Berkel and Wakefield would emend, respectively to "capnopatae" and "capnobotae" ("smoke-eaters," i.e., people who live on food of no value).
those who are without women is very much opposed to the common notions on that subject;
........ for all agree in regarding the women as the chief founders of religion,
........ and it is the women who provoke the men to the more attentive worship of the gods,
........ to festivals, and to supplications,
........ ........ and it is a rare thing for a man who lives by himself to be found addicted to these things."Decline of woman in Israel was always due to the invasion of heathen influences. Morality lapsed as idolatrous customs were countenanced.
The prominence of women in idolatry and in the abominations of foreign religions is indicated in the writings of the prophets (Jeremiah 7:18; Ezekiel 8:14, See Exodus 22:18).
The sordid effect of idolatrous women ruined the religious life of Judah and Israel and contributed to their downfall." (Lockyear, The Women of the Bible, p. 14).
The prevelance of women in idolatry and false prophetesses in Judaism flowed from the worship of femail goddesses. This is the theme of the Sophia-Zoe movement in ancient and modern paganism.
The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke me to anger. Jeremiah 7:18Do they provoke me to anger? saith the Lord: do they not provoke themselves to the confusion of their own faces? Jeremiah 7:19
Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Put your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices, and eat flesh. Jeremiah 7:21
For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices: Jeremiah 7:22
But this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people: and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you. Jeremiah 7:23
Then he brought me to the door of the gate of the Lords house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz. Ezekiel 8:14
When Paul speaks of women being silent and sedentary in the assemblies there is no way to get around his clear statement. Women in Corinth were the key players in the oracles such as that just up the road at Delphi and lesser Seeker-Centers. This Apollo Seeker-Center is the meaning of Apollyon or Abbadon.
The other part of "women and children ruling over you" flows from the worship of Hermes or Mercury a Dionysus figure the Jewish clergy tried to force Jesus into. He is the figure of Jubal or Genun in the Book of Enoch and other apocalyptic writings which all give credit for Satan for seducing the youth into "triumphing over" the more spiritual with mixed-sex choirs and instruments.
The masculine influence was always the synagogue which had no praise service. The feminine forms of worship in every culture centered on rituals of sight and sound, music and dance. Because Paul had already implicated the warfare instruments used as enchanting instruments and equated them to the feminine-dominant speaking in tongues, Paul understood that if foreign influences were to be kept out of the Christian assembly it would simply not be possible to exercise authority which was "sexual authority."
Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. 1 Cor 14:34
And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church. 1 Cor 14: 35
Women were usually the spokesperson for the oracles. They used wine or drugs or music to fall into ecstasy after which their gibberish was sold to customers after being put into song or poetry form and theninterpreted by a priest and put into whatever message he thought appropriate.
Therefore, Paul asked:
What came the word of God out from you? or came it unto you only? 1 Cor 14: 36
This Corinthian "unity in diversity" fuels the identical forms of Apollyon Seeker Centers where the chief agent of the gods believe that music can actually "lead the worshipers into the presence of God." The song writers, usually women giving the erotic twist to "Christian Music," actually believe that they are inspired.
"Revivals in urban America were no longer occasions for the church to renew itself as a community, but meetings of individuals who did not know one another to share their religious feelings.
........ The revivals created a community of feeling among people who had no other communal bonds.
........ Further, as the minister and his sermon declined,
........ personal prayer and testimony came to the fore. Correlatively,
........ ........ the hymn Iyrics usually either bore witness to a generalized personal experience,
........ ........ as in "I Love to Tell the Story," or made personal pleas: "I Need Thee Every Hour."With personal experience as the ultimate authority, they could disregard the ordinary world--so the hymns portrayed the world as a stormy sea, full of turmoil and strife, and looked forward to personal transformation and the hope of heaven after death.
[In contrast to the hope of the word of God, this is the southern black contribution of hoplesness]
While the seekers claim that they are open, innovative and tolerant, the musical urge is usually propelled by the clergy's sense of loss of influence. This is especially true in the time of better TV sermons and all of the free Bible Study material one can tolerate--free of charge. In fact, as attendance dwindles rather than restore the preacher to evangelism, the manipulative schemes of the world are adopted in order to defend themselves against the challenge of pluralism.
"The gospel hymns thus became an important medium of expression for the emotions and yearnings of Protestants--
........ "first, the clergy and women who ruled the religious sphere, and later evangelicals generally,
........ ........ as the churches attempted to defend themselves against the challenges of American religious pluralism.
As the clergy lost its faith in the Bible and the Biblical demand that it is the already-preached sermons and already-composed songs, the audience follows along like those in Amos and hunger and thirst for the Word of God and cannot find it. The natural response is just to invent a new Word along with a new song.
"The hymns represented a burst of creativity from the people themselves, a rich, intensely devotional experience by which one could rise above the ordinary world.
"The danger, however, was that the inward-turning quality of the hymns and their sentimental melodies "would reinforce the retreat from social issues which by 1875 was visible throughout Protestant evangelicalism.
"The power of poetry and music, sweeping revival crowds along on "billows and tides of heavenly emotion," as a nineteenth-century writer put it,
........ could become a mere mass movement,
........ without the discipline of intellect and organized action
........ that Protestantism needed to meet the challenges of the era.
