ROUGHLY EDITED COPY LUTHERAN WORSHIP 2 64.LW2 Captioning provided By: Caption First, Inc. P.O. Box 1924 Lombard, IL 60148 ******** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. ******** >> NICK: In his writings, Luther places very high value on music stating that it is a gift of God and possesses great power. How do his observations help pastors, congregations, and musicians in our time? >> DR. JAMES BRAUER: It's good to ask about music. We just did kind of the visual art, and Luther made a couple comments on that. But he made some really significant comments on music so to explore music from Luther's viewpoint for Lutherans is very helpful. Now, I have here the Volume 53 from Luther's works, on Liturgy and Hymns. And he wrote prefaces to hymnals. And this is primarily where we find some very fine quotes. Page 316, if you happen to own this, we find these words about using song. He looks to 1 Corinthians 14 and Colossians 3 and says, �St. Paul himself instituted this namely, to sing spiritual songs and psalms heartily unto the Lord so that God's words in Christian teaching might be instilled and implanted in many ways.� I think that's his central notion about the power of music in worship that it connects to the word. And we'll be coming back to that. He also says, in the same writing, �I want to give an incentive that people can do better, have with the help of others, compiled several hymns so that the Holy Gospel, which now by the grace of God has arisen anew maybe noised and spread abroad.� So he sees this as an evangelical evangelism kind of move. And it focuses on Jesus as he says in these words, �That we should know nothing to sing or say save Jesus Christ our savior.� It's pretty clear that it connects to the gospel. Powerful words. If we turn further in these prefaces to Page 321, we see a great focus on the music itself. �I would like certainly to praise music with all my heart as the excellent gift of God which it is and to commend it to everyone." It's interesting. He sees this not as we do today as something that is our music, but he views this as God's gift to us. It belongs to him first. That's kind of different in society when we do so much listening alone that this is actually God's. It's an excellent gift. He commends it. And he continues with that thought, just picking out a few sentences here. "First then, looking at music itself, you will find that from the beginning of the world, it has been instilled and planted in all creatures individually and collectively. Nothing is without sound or harmony." Even as the medieval university taught that the orbiting of the planets, it's thought of as a musical event. Now, how would they think that? When you have two tones sounding at once, there is a ratio between those tones, a number, and if somebody studies music, these intervals, in a sense, are things you begin to learn to control. So this is like a philosophical concept. Then we can think of structures like even a DNA in a very complicated arrangement. These are almost mathematical designs, structures. And so he's thinking here that God has put things into this kind of arrangement, harmony, that can be used by us. And he says, "Music is still more wonderful in living things, especially birds so that David, the most musical of all the kings and minstrel of God in deepest wonder and spiritual exaltation praised the astounding arts and the ease of songs by birds." In the next paragraph, "That the human voice above all is abundant and incomprehensible as a sign of the wisdom of our creator." So that moves him to the notion that you can make the sounds of music and the sounds of words. And you bring these two together out of the mouth, you have done something that is of great benefit to us. To put the praise or the making of music of God next to the word. So this is like the highest use of the arts. �Namely, that next to the word of God, music deserves the highest praise.� This is page 323. So he's thinking if God's word is our great treasure, the thing you're going to put next to it is music. Now, this is a pretty high place for arts. And he praises especially artistic music, Page 324. "When musical learning is added to all this, namely the using of music, and artistic music which corrects, develops, refines the natural music, then at last it is possible to taste with wonder that not to comprehend God's absolute and perfect wisdom and his wondrous work of music.� So music is a gift so marvelous that when it's used artistically, this just causes individuals who experience wonderfully designed music to just be in awe and wonder at such a creative thing given to us. And then on the same page at the bottom he gives a warning. And this is worth reminding. "Take special care to shun perverted minds who prostitute this lovely gift of nature and of art with their erotic rantings. And be quite assured that none but the devil goads them on to defy their very nature which would and should praise God its maker with this gift so that these�--he doesn't mince any words��these bastards purloin the gift of God and use it to worship the foe of God, the enemy of nature and of this lovely art." Pretty stern and pointed warning. We could go to Page 328 as well and see how art is used in funerals. I think this is really a great insight. He looks at funerals as done under the Roman Catholics, that practice that he knew in his youth, and he says on Page 328, "We want the beautiful art of music to be properly used to serve her dear creator and as Christians. Thereby, he is praised and honored, and we are made better and stronger in faith when his holy word is impressed upon our hearts by sweet music." What they had done is they had made quite a ceremony out of a funeral. But it was so mournful that he urges and gives three pages of text of hope and texts to write music about, quotations from scripture, such as Christ is my life and dying my gain, Philippians 1:21, that he urges people to use music in this way in a powerful connection between the sounds and the words that a human mouth can employ.