Does God love all kinds of music because He invented it all?

God loves all kinds of music because he invented it all—fast and slow, loud and soft, old and new. You probably don’t like it all, but God does! If it is offered to God in spirit and truth, it is an act of worship.

—Rick Warren, Purpose Driven Life, Zondervan, 2002, p. 65

In my opinion, the truthfulness of these claims that Warren makes are some of the most fundamental points of dispute in the worship music wars.

Poll Results

Does God love all kinds of music because He invented it all?

Yes, God loves all kinds of music because He invented it all. Votes: 1
No, God does not love all kinds of music even though He invented it all. Votes: 0
No, God does not love all kinds of music, and He did not invent it all. Votes: 4
Other. Please specify in a comment below. Votes: 1

(Migrated poll)

N/A
0% (0 votes)
Total votes: 0

Discussion

I read this quote to my wife and we both had the same one word response. CULT!

I wonder if “simple concerning evil” (Rom 16:9), though admittedly a few more words, might be a better idea.

Why the necessity to know a lot about evil? Wouldn’t it be wise to be “simple concerning evil”?

[Larry]

I read this quote to my wife and we both had the same one word response. CULT!

I wonder if “simple concerning evil” (Rom 16:9), though admittedly a few more words, might be a better idea.

Why the necessity to know a lot about evil? Wouldn’t it be wise to be “simple concerning evil”?

We were in a religious cult and the quote I cited and Romans 16:9 were used regularly to explain why we were never told specifically what “evils” we were to fear. If we asked what was evil about a specific thing, we were told that the less we knew about it, the safer we would be. The examples in this thread are the refusal to address Sibelius and Ode to Joy.

"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan

[RajeshG]
Kevin Miller wrote:

Quote:
Moreover, Scripture clearly distinguishes between idolatry and the occult. When people engage in occult practices that they explicitly say are designed to put them into direct contact with demons and have the demons direct or control them and at times even possess them, any such instrumental music that they use in those demonic practices is categorically off-limits to all righteous people because it is demonic music.

So how does the use of a particular piece of music make that music demonic? Is the music causing demon control or possession? This is where I think you are making your leaps of logic. Contacting demons is sinful. The Bible doesn’t say that what you wear while contacting demons becomes sinful or demonic, The Bible doesn’t say that what you eat while contacting demons becomes sinful or demonic. The Bible doesn’t say that what you listen to while contacting demons becomes sinful or demonic.

It is not necessary or even necessarily possible to answer the types of questions that you ask here. It is enough to know that something is made by evil humans involved in evil occult activities. All such things must be rejected as demonic unless it can be proven that they are not.

Scripture provides an excellent passage that shows what believers are to do with evil things of the occult that practitioners of the occult have made for their evil practices:

Acts 19:19 Many of them also which used curious arts brought their books together, and burned them before all men: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver.

When they were saved, these new believers in Ephesus instinctively knew that they must destroy the occult books that they used in their occult practices prior to their having been saved.

The physical materials of these books were incredibly valuable from a monetary standpoint and could have been sold for a vast amount of money (if the equivalent of those books would have been burned in 2011, they would have been worth almost $6,000,000). The new believers, however, destroyed those books.

God has provided this passage for our instruction and profit. We do not have to explain how the evil contents and prior uses of these books “tainted” the (supposedly intrinsically good) combinations of physical materials that they were written on—it is enough that God has revealed to us that such occult books were categorically rejected by His people, including the combinations of physical materials of those occult books.

OK, so since the Bible autographs were written on the same kind of parchment and papyrus used by the magicians, and moreover using the same kind of ink, then by your “logic”, Rajesh, it is sin to read the Bible. I also must state that I have in my possession two beautiful, leather-bound volumes of the Berlenburger Bibel (the Torah and the books of history from the OT) that are made of the same materials as books of magic, and which are printed using the same kinds of ink that were used for books of alchemy and magic in the same time period. Those horrible people at Berlenburg even used many of the same fonts!

Moreover, I have it on good authority that one can even today purchase books on magic printed on the very same kinds of acid free paper, and with the very same kinds of soybean oil ink, which are used for printing Bibles today.

Again, by your logic, Rajesh. Don’t you think it’s long past time to stop this farce? To give up your guilt by association logical and rhetorical nightmare?

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]
RajeshG wrote:

Alrighty then, Rajesh, your version of a “categorical divine prohibition” says that a little bit is OK, but you get to draw the line exactly where. Somehow I’m reminded of the analogy where someone asks their children whether they’d like “just a little bit” of dog waste in their brownies.

For my part, I think it’s important that we understand pagan customs simply because it’s a bit of how we can understand those of Israel and our own. It’s important to know that pagan altars were often the exact same dimensions as the altar to God in Jerusalem. It’s important to understand the significance of groves, Asherah poles, Oral Torah, gnosticism, Arianism, and the like. And if many of us don’t understand these false religions well, good luck showing people the error of their ways and why it’s significant.

And regarding Simmons, OK, not all, but most modern music, yes, you did. Seriously, quibbling over all vs. most? And again, of course you get to be the one to draw the line….

Wrong. Being given brief information warning about evil people and evil practices but not going into details about them and forbidding people to inquire further about them is divine wisdom. If you do not like it, you are the one who has the problem.

Precisely where is this “categorical prohibition”, Rajesh? I think I’ve demonstrated pretty clearly that learning about the practices of the pagans can not be seen as categorically prohibited for the simple reason that Scripture itself teaches us about a lot the practices of the pagans, and going further, every study Bible I’ve ever seen contains further details of the practices of the pagans so that modern readers can understand why Israel and the church were responding as they did. Was, then, John MacArthur in sin for putting this kind of details in the study Bibles he’s edited?

Going further, every language reference I’ve ever seen contains references to other languages as a hint to the Hebrew , Aramaic, and Greek word definitions—and you cannot do that without carefully analyzing the pagan literature. So are Brown, Driver, and Briggs, along with the Kittels and those who wrote for them, in sin for doing serious linguistic work? The men and women who create language references cut their teeth on the works of pagans. More or less, what you propose is to take most of the tools out of the toolbox for serious exegesis.

Which, I guess, explains your great love for guilt by association and other logical fallacies. Lacking the skills to approach the text faithfully, you’ve got to grab for something.

Deuteronomy 12:29 When the LORD thy God shall cut off the nations from before thee, whither thou goest to possess them, and thou succeedest them, and dwellest in their land; 30 Take heed to thyself that thou be not snared by following them, after that they be destroyed from before thee; and that thou enquire not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their gods? even so will I do likewise. 31 Thou shalt not do so unto the LORD thy God: for every abomination to the LORD, which he hateth, have they done unto their gods; for even their sons and their daughters they have burnt in the fire to their gods. 32 What thing soever I command you, observe to do it: thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it.
God is right—you are wrong. You are not wiser than God. God demanded that His people not even inquire about how these wicked people served their gods. There are other similar statements, including Romans 16:19 that Larry has cited.

[Bert Perry]
RajeshG wrote:

Kevin Miller wrote:

Quote:
Moreover, Scripture clearly distinguishes between idolatry and the occult. When people engage in occult practices that they explicitly say are designed to put them into direct contact with demons and have the demons direct or control them and at times even possess them, any such instrumental music that they use in those demonic practices is categorically off-limits to all righteous people because it is demonic music.

So how does the use of a particular piece of music make that music demonic? Is the music causing demon control or possession? This is where I think you are making your leaps of logic. Contacting demons is sinful. The Bible doesn’t say that what you wear while contacting demons becomes sinful or demonic, The Bible doesn’t say that what you eat while contacting demons becomes sinful or demonic. The Bible doesn’t say that what you listen to while contacting demons becomes sinful or demonic.

It is not necessary or even necessarily possible to answer the types of questions that you ask here. It is enough to know that something is made by evil humans involved in evil occult activities. All such things must be rejected as demonic unless it can be proven that they are not.

Scripture provides an excellent passage that shows what believers are to do with evil things of the occult that practitioners of the occult have made for their evil practices:

Acts 19:19 Many of them also which used curious arts brought their books together, and burned them before all men: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver.

When they were saved, these new believers in Ephesus instinctively knew that they must destroy the occult books that they used in their occult practices prior to their having been saved.

The physical materials of these books were incredibly valuable from a monetary standpoint and could have been sold for a vast amount of money (if the equivalent of those books would have been burned in 2011, they would have been worth almost $6,000,000). The new believers, however, destroyed those books.

God has provided this passage for our instruction and profit. We do not have to explain how the evil contents and prior uses of these books “tainted” the (supposedly intrinsically good) combinations of physical materials that they were written on—it is enough that God has revealed to us that such occult books were categorically rejected by His people, including the combinations of physical materials of those occult books.

OK, so since the Bible autographs were written on the same kind of parchment and papyrus used by the magicians, and moreover using the same kind of ink, then by your “logic”, Rajesh, it is sin to read the Bible. I also must state that I have in my possession two beautiful, leather-bound volumes of the Berlenburger Bibel (the Torah and the books of history from the OT) that are made of the same materials as books of magic, and which are printed using the same kinds of ink that were used for books of alchemy and magic in the same time period. Those horrible people at Berlenburg even used many of the same fonts!

Moreover, I have it on good authority that one can even today purchase books on magic printed on the very same kinds of acid free paper, and with the very same kinds of soybean oil ink, which are used for printing Bibles today.

Again, by your logic, Rajesh. Don’t you think it’s long past time to stop this farce? To give up your guilt by association logical and rhetorical nightmare?

Ah, so you were there so that you know exactly what these specific books were written on and exactly how they were designed, including exactly everything about how they were styled? Right.
Your fallacious argumentation fails to even answer why these books were destroyed and not “redeemed” for use in making more Bibles. After all, they were immensely valuable and could have been scrubbed to use for making more Bible manuscripts, right? Isn’t that what should have been done with them according to your views?
But no, godly believers burned those books! You are wrong. There is no redeeming wicked things of the occult. Scripture provides this explicit revelation which categorically refutes any contention that you and others can try to make about the legitimacy of “redeeming” wicked things of the occult.

We were in a religious cult and the quote I cited and Romans 16:9 were used regularly to explain why we were never told specifically what “evils” we were to fear. If we asked what was evil about a specific thing, we were told that the less we knew about it, the safer we would be.

The evil was identified in the example given. If the evil is not identified, then it is a bit different. But yes, quite often the less we know about something the safe we are. I think that is the point of being simple concerning evil. It is usually enough to know it is evil and the basics of why, Is there a compelling reason to explore more? I ask that seriously.

The examples in this thread are the refusal to address Sibelius and Ode to Joy.

Is this really controversial? Are there a lot of people arguing about Sibelius or Ode to Joy?

[Larry]

We were in a religious cult and the quote I cited and Romans 16:9 were used regularly to explain why we were never told specifically what “evils” we were to fear. If we asked what was evil about a specific thing, we were told that the less we knew about it, the safer we would be.

The evil was identified in the example given. If the evil is not identified, then it is a bit different. But yes, quite often the less we know about something the safe we are. I think that is the point of being simple concerning evil. It is usually enough to know it is evil and the basics of why, Is there a compelling reason to explore more? I ask that seriously.

The examples in this thread are the refusal to address Sibelius and Ode to Joy.

Is this really controversial? Are there a lot of people arguing about Sibelius or Ode to Joy?

My point is simple. There are claims of demonic/evil “things” we should avoid, but those “things” are never specified. The questions asked about Sibelius and Ode to Joy are just examples of refusal to apply generalities to specific cases.

"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan

There are claims of demonic/evil “things” we should avoid, but those “things” are never specified.

Never? That has not been my experience. I have almost never been denied an explanation but then that may be my background was more accepting of questions than other backgrounds were.

The questions asked about Sibelius and Ode to Joy are just examples of refusal to apply generalities to specific cases.

What’s the particular question here with Silbelius and Ode to Joy? Is there really some sort of controversy about this that I am unaware of?

Larry, the hypothesis that Rajesh offers up is that any tenuous connection to paganism or “the occult” makes that very genre of music an unclean thing that we cannot touch. Ode to Joy is originally a pantheistic (yes, occult) poem by Schiller and put to music by Beethoven, and “Be Still My Soul” is Sibelius’ musical adaptation of the Finnish national epic, which is also part pagan.

So if we’re going to be doing guilt by association fallacies, that’s where I’d recommend Rajesh start to prove he really means business. See here. Otherwise, he’s just proven that he’s not about any coherent theological principle, but rather just about using any club to beat on the rock & roll music he abhors.

Or, as Ron’s wife noted, it’s cultish behavior.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]

Larry, the hypothesis that Rajesh offers up is that any tenuous connection to paganism or “the occult” makes that very genre of music an unclean thing that we cannot touch. Ode to Joy is originally a pantheistic (yes, occult) poem by Schiller and put to music by Beethoven, and “Be Still My Soul” is Sibelius’ musical adaptation of the Finnish national epic, which is also part pagan.

So if we’re going to be doing guilt by association fallacies, that’s where I’d recommend Rajesh start to prove he really means business. See here. Otherwise, he’s just proven that he’s not about any coherent theological principle, but rather just about using any club to beat on the rock & roll music he abhors.

Or, as Ron’s wife noted, it’s cultish behavior.

“Any tenuous connection to paganism or “the occult” … (bold added to original).” This is your distortion of what I have said. There is vast evidence that rock and other ungodly instrumental music are ungodly instrumental musics of the occult.

There is vast evidence that rock and other ungodly instrumental music are ungodly instrumental musics of the occult.

Then give specific examples of ungodly instrumental music.

"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan

Here are Schiller’s lyrics. By the way, it’s also worth noting that Beethoven’s personal life would have fit in pretty well with that of many rock & roll stars. I look forward to your justification of this, Rajesh. It’s also quite puzzling, really, how you would have “all that evidence” of the occult vis-a-vis rock & roll if you’re “categorically prohibited” from investigating these things.

Joy, beautiful spark of Divinity [or: of gods] ,
Daughter of Elysium,
We enter, drunk with fire,
Heavenly one, thy sanctuary!
Thy magic binds again
What custom strictly divided;*
All people become brothers,*
Where thy gentle wing abides.
Whoever has succeeded in the great attempt,
To be a friend’s friend,
Whoever has won a lovely woman,
Add his to the jubilation!
Yes, and also whoever has just one soul
To call his own in this world!
And he who never managed it should slink
Weeping from this union!
All creatures drink of joy
At nature’s breasts.
All the Just, all the Evil
Follow her trail of roses.
Kisses she gave us and grapevines,
A friend, proven in death.
Salaciousness was given to the worm
And the cherub stands before God.
Gladly, as His suns fly
through the heavens’ grand plan
Go on, brothers, your way,
Joyful, like a hero to victory.
Be embraced, Millions!
This kiss to all the world!
Brothers, above the starry canopy
There must dwell a loving Father.
Are you collapsing, millions?
Do you sense the creator, world?
Seek him above the starry canopy!
Above stars must He dwell.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

It’s rather puzzling to me as well how someone claiming multiple degrees in Bible, as does Rajesh, would ignore the obvious context of Deuteronomy 12:29-31, which makes clear that what is prohibited is not knowledge itself, but rather knowledge with the intent of following a pagan example. The law of context is, after all, a basic rule of exegesis, and one would at least hope that someone with multiple Bible degrees would have learned and absorbed this principle.

It is even stranger to me to contemplate the fact that someone with multiple Bible degrees—and ample reason to learn these things—would be unaware that historians and archeologists have found that there are a very limited number of forms of books out there, and that there is not, in fact, any huge difference in how books are put together. Any significant ancient manuscript goes under the microscope, mass spectrometer, and the like to figure out its composition, approximate age, and the like. As any modern bookbinder would tell you, you’re dealing with a limited number of types of “paper”, cellulose and protein/skin based, you’ve got a limited number of ways to bind it together, and you’ve got a limited number of types of ink that you can use.

Never mind that if you’ve got a case—which is exactly what Rajesh argues—where you’re claiming a different method, but you don’t know what that is, how exactly is one to “avoid” that, and what exactly is the implication for other areas like music?

It really all comes down at the end to the fallacy of guilt by association, and that’s another point of puzzlement for me. Again, all those degrees, and no comprehension of basic informal logic?

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]

It’s rather puzzling to me as well how someone claiming multiple degrees in Bible, as does Rajesh, would ignore the obvious context of Deuteronomy 12:29-31, which makes clear that what is prohibited is not knowledge itself, but rather knowledge with the intent of following a pagan example. The law of context is, after all, a basic rule of exegesis, and one would at least hope that someone with multiple Bible degrees would have learned and absorbed this principle.

It is even stranger to me to contemplate the fact that someone with multiple Bible degrees—and ample reason to learn these things—would be unaware that historians and archeologists have found that there are a very limited number of forms of books out there, and that there is not, in fact, any huge difference in how books are put together. Any significant ancient manuscript goes under the microscope, mass spectrometer, and the like to figure out its composition, approximate age, and the like. As any modern bookbinder would tell you, you’re dealing with a limited number of types of “paper”, cellulose and protein/skin based, you’ve got a limited number of ways to bind it together, and you’ve got a limited number of types of ink that you can use.

Never mind that if you’ve got a case—which is exactly what Rajesh argues—where you’re claiming a different method, but you don’t know what that is, how exactly is one to “avoid” that, and what exactly is the implication for other areas like music?

It really all comes down at the end to the fallacy of guilt by association, and that’s another point of puzzlement for me. Again, all those degrees, and no comprehension of basic informal logic?

What Deut. 12:29-31 (and other passages) prohibits in principle is precisely what disobedient Christians have done by going to wicked occultists (and other wicked people) and learning their wicked music and bringing their wicked music into the church to use in worship.
As for your GBA (guilt-by-association) mantra that you repeatedly spout, you have made many false claims about what I have said. I have called you out in previous threads and in this thread about your false claims, yet you still have not repented of your unethical behavior.
You continually falsely claim that I have associated things that I have never associated, such as the music in the GCI and rock music. No matter how many times you utter your false claims about my using such guilt-by-association argumentation, what you claim will not become true.
Furthermore, you refuse to acknowledge the force of explicit biblical revelation (Acts 19:19) that shows that godly NT Christians categorically rejected wicked things of the occult. They did not “redeem” them.
If you want to claim that this revelation does not teach us to reject music of the occult, you have the burden of proving biblically that is true.

Rajesh,the guilt by association fallacy is called a “law of informal logic”, not a mantra. You hear about it often because you use genetic fallacies like this a lot—and that by necessity, since Scripture really doesn’t tell us anything about which musical forms might be inappropriate, saying nothing about prohibited bass lines, rhythms, and the like.

Hence you are stuck trying to connect modern music, however tenuously, to the abominations of those dancing around the golden calf, to Gene Simmons’ throwaway lines on American Idol (ahem, what’s a nice boy like you doing watching that?), and the like.

The problem is that it’s false reasoning. If we take it to its limits, we would say that because pagan altars were five cubits square, and many of them were, that therefore the altar in the Tabernacle was an abomination—though that size of altar was precisely what God had commanded. Logically and exegetically, you were at a dead end a long time ago, and you’re proceeding to go off the cliff.

It’s fun to watch your blatant hypocrisy as well—you tell us that it’s wrong to learn about the habits of the pagans, and then you proceed to tell us that you know a lot about the occult habits of rock & roll stars. Ahem. You also are blatantly hypocritical when you ignore the fact that, contrary to your hypothesis, Scripture itself describes many of these practices.

Again, applying the principle of context, the fact that Scripture mentions these things means that your interpretation of the passages is wrong. This is basic, something that ought to be known and acted on by anyone who’s taken any introductory exegesis course.

Regarding your notion that believers ought to need to “prove from Scripture” that their choices in music are acceptable, I’m going to cordially refuse your demand to ask “mother may I” to you. Again, the default position for believers is not being bound to legalism, but liberty unless it is proven that there is something sinful in play.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]

Rajesh,the guilt by association fallacy is called a “law of informal logic”, not a mantra. You hear about it often because you use genetic fallacies like this a lot—and that by necessity, since Scripture really doesn’t tell us anything about which musical forms might be inappropriate, saying nothing about prohibited bass lines, rhythms, and the like.

Hence you are stuck trying to connect modern music, however tenuously, to the abominations of those dancing around the golden calf, to Gene Simmons’ throwaway lines on American Idol (ahem, what’s a nice boy like you doing watching that?), and the like.

The problem is that it’s false reasoning. If we take it to its limits, we would say that because pagan altars were five cubits square, and many of them were, that therefore the altar in the Tabernacle was an abomination—though that size of altar was precisely what God had commanded. Logically and exegetically, you were at a dead end a long time ago, and you’re proceeding to go off the cliff.

It’s fun to watch your blatant hypocrisy as well—you tell us that it’s wrong to learn about the habits of the pagans, and then you proceed to tell us that you know a lot about the occult habits of rock & roll stars. Ahem. You also are blatantly hypocritical when you ignore the fact that, contrary to your hypothesis, Scripture itself describes many of these practices.

Again, applying the principle of context, the fact that Scripture mentions these things means that your interpretation of the passages is wrong. This is basic, something that ought to be known and acted on by anyone who’s taken any introductory exegesis course.

Regarding your notion that believers ought to need to “prove from Scripture” that their choices in music are acceptable, I’m going to cordially refuse your demand to ask “mother may I” to you. Again, the default position for believers is not being bound to legalism, but liberty unless it is proven that there is something sinful in play.

You are wrong again. I do not have to connect in any of the fallacious ways that you repeatedly have falsely asserted that I have done modern music directly with music talked about in the Bible. The point of my treatments of certain specific Bible passages about music was never to establish that musicologically that music was the same as modern music in highly specific musicological ways—that is the lie that you have repeatedly asserted.
Exodus 32 and other passages establish that there is such a thing as demonic music that God rejects. Therefore, you and others (like Warren) cannot beg any questions about God accepting whatever music you want to use regardless of its source or its nature.
Because Scripture teaches us that there is instrumental music that God rejects, you have the burden of proving that in violation of divine prohibitions you can still righteously go to wicked people like occultists and take their wicked music and use it acceptably to worship God. Those of us who reject that wicked music do not have to prove that it is evil—you have to prove that it is acceptable to God.

Give a specific example of a piece of instrumental music that God rejects.

"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan

[RajeshG]

Exodus 32 and other passages establish that there is such a thing as demonic music that God rejects.

This is where you are making your leaps of logic again. Please show me WHERE in Exodus 32 God rejects the music. Please show me the verse that specifically establishes the music itself as demonic. You’re the one making the dogmatic assertion here, so you should have to prove it Biblically. Especially since you use this claim as the basis for your next point - “Because Scripture teaches us that there is instrumental music that God rejects, …”

I just DON’T see you as having adequately supported that point. In my opinion, your main support has been your claim that other people must prove you wrong. That’s NOT support for a position. Using your logic, you could claim anything to be evil and then refuse to show Scriptural support. You said “Those of us who reject that wicked music do not have to prove that it is evil—you have to prove that it is acceptable to God.” Switch out the words “that wicked music” for “anything” and you have the statement “Those of us who reject anything do not have to prove that it is evil—you have to prove that it is acceptable to God.” Is that really the logic you would use in regards to any other subject in this life?

[Kevin Miller]
RajeshG wrote:

Exodus 32 and other passages establish that there is such a thing as demonic music that God rejects.

This is where you are making your leaps of logic again. Please show me WHERE in Exodus 32 God rejects the music. Please show me the verse that specifically establishes the music itself as demonic. You’re the one making the dogmatic assertion here, so you should have to prove it Biblically. Especially since you use this claim as the basis for your next point - “Because Scripture teaches us that there is instrumental music that God rejects, …”

I just DON’T see you as having adequately supported that point. In my opinion, your main support has been your claim that other people must prove you wrong. That’s NOT support for a position. Using your logic, you could claim anything to be evil and then refuse to show Scriptural support. You said “Those of us who reject that wicked music do not have to prove that it is evil—you have to prove that it is acceptable to God.” Switch out the words “that wicked music” for “anything” and you have the statement “Those of us who reject anything do not have to prove that it is evil—you have to prove that it is acceptable to God.” Is that really the logic you would use in regards to any other subject in this life?


You seem to have failed to notice that I said “Exodus 32 and other passages establish …” I am not going to discuss all that material again.
Moreover, Acts 19:19 in principle establishes the same basic point because it proves that people who had been involved in demonic activities and had made combination/composite products (books) that they used for those activities destroyed those products once they became believers. They did not “redeem” them.
The physical materials, including whatever ink(s) was/were used to write the contents of the books, were all substances that originally at some level were made by God yet the combination/composite final products (the books) themselves (and not just their contents and previous uses) were categorically rejected by godly people.

If you want to claim that godly believers should not do the same with the demonic music of occultists, you have the burden of proving that is true biblically.

[RajeshG]
Kevin Miller wrote:

Quote:
More importantly, God categorically prohibits having any fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness (Eph. 5:11). You have the burden of proving from Scripture that the instrumental music of the occult is an exception to that categorical prohibition.

Define a “work of darkness,” please. Verses 19-21 is a pretty comprehensive list, and music isn’t included in it. If you claim that music is included in the list of “works of darkness,” then you would have to prove that claim from Scripture. Otherwise, it’s just a leap of logic. Are the garments and food of the occult also part of the “categorical prohibition?” Occult practitioners use tea leaves to read the future. Is drinking tea part of the prohibition, or is tea an exception?

God does not provide definitions of such things. He expects us to understand what they pertain to based on what He has revealed in His Word. Ephesians 5:19-21 does not have anything to do with providing a list of works of darkness, but Galatians 5:19-21 does and explicitly tells us that the list is not comprehensive: “and such like” (Gal. 5:21).

Considering the overlap between the sins in Ephesians 5 and Galatians 5, I’d say they both are listing works of darkness. Music of any style could be used during the commission of any of those sins, yet the use of music during a sin does not make the music a work of darkness.

Have practitioners of the occult actually said that their garments, food, or tea leaves are themselves evil things that they have made specifically to promote evil in the same ways and for the same purposes that many of them have said that their instrumental music has been made for?
According to the Wikipedia article “social effects of rock music, “rock music and fashion have been inextricably linked.” The article goes on to say ” As rock music genres became more segmented, what an artist wore became as important as the music itself in defining the artist’s intent and relationship to the audience.” Here are a few other quotes from the article - “Heavy Metal bands in the 1980s often favoured a strong visual image. For some bands, this consisted of leather or denim jackets and pants, spike/studs and long hair.” “In the early 1990s, the popularity of grunge brought in a punk influenced fashion of its own, including torn jeans, old shoes, flannel shirts, backwards baseball hats, and people grew their hair against the clean-cut image that was popular at the time in heavily commercialized pop music culture.”

So it certainly seems that the clothing of rock musicians is an integral part of the message they are trying to convey. If it is true that demonic influence is present in the music of rock stars, then wouldn’t it also be present in their attire, seeing as how the attire is so closely related to their intent? I still remember the time one of my daughters came home from a week of Bible camp and told me that her counseler had made her stop wearing her baseball cap backwards. Wouldn’t your position logically be that the clothing of rock stars is unacceptable to God?

Moreover, taking tea leaves that God actually created and using them to make a beverage that people drink in a non-worship context is very different from taking instrumental music that evil humans have made and offering it to God in worship.
But I wasn’t talking about tea as a beverage in a non-worship context. I was talking about tea teaves being used as an aid in receiving messages from the spirit world. Tasseography is a divination or fortune-telling method that interprets patterns in tea leaves, coffee grounds or wine sediments. Shouldn’t we abstain from drinking tea if such a practice is used during a divination session? Or is it okay to use something that, though wicked people may use it in wicked ways, we ourselves have no intention of using it in that wicked way?

[RajeshG]

You seem to have failed to notice that I said “Exodus 32 and other passages establish …” I am not going to discuss all that material again.

I realize that. I’ve come to expect you to just make dogmatic assertions without actually backing them up. That’s also what happened the last time we discussed that material.

Moreover, Acts 19:19 in principle establishes the same basic point because it proves that people who had been involved in demonic activities and had made combination/composite products (books) that they used for those activities destroyed those products once they became believers. They did not “redeem” them.

The physical materials, including whatever ink(s) was/were used to write the contents of the books, were all substances that originally at some level were made by God yet the combination/composite final products (the books) themselves (and not just their contents and previous uses) were categorically rejected by godly people.

But weren’t the books destroyed because of their specific content? The words written within those books were specific occultic statements, just as lyrics would be within a song. The books contained specific written messages that were clearly understood as occultic. That’s an entirely different situation from instrumental music.

If you want to claim that godly believers should not do the same with the demonic music of occultists, you have the burden of proving that is true biblically.
Of course, you would first need to prove that demonic instrumental music exists, which I know you’ll refuse to do. Oh, I imagine you could go back to verses about the devil being a musical entity, but the Bible doesn’t explain what specific music may or may not have been played by the devil, so we can’t very well abstain from music that we have no information about.

OK, if we want to talk about some truly nasty things that are going to tend to discredit the cause of Christ, I’d like to talk about this. It’s Rajesh’s most recent post on his personal blog, and let’s take a look at the links he provides.

First, he links to a post that talks about “that long snake moan”, a post that argues that the roots of rock & roll are in voodoo. Now, let’s imagine you read that as a black man, one who knows that the roots of rock & roll go through spirituals, black Gospel, jazz, and blues. So what’s being implicitly argued here is that black gospel and spirituals—the music which carried African-Americans of faith through the horrors of slavery and Jim Crow—is functionally equivalent to voodoo.

I’d call that bigotry.

He links to another post linking drums and dancing with the occult arts, arguing from a Grateful Dead drummer (whose playing can really only be described as rather mellow) that because some people made drums from skulls, that all drums are out of line. Keep in mind here, this is something that Rajesh has endorsed.

Reality in music is that pretty much every culture has used percussive instruments, and most cultures have some forms of dancing and danceable music, so to single out African culture as somehow uniquely pagan really hearkens back to the roots of Frank Garlock’s work—the antebellum and Jim Crow era smear of African-American music with language like “voodoo” and “jungle beat”. Garlock santizes it a bit so the racism isn’t as overt as it used to be, but that’s really the roots of the argument.

Rajesh, this kind of nonsense is NOT acceptable.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]

OK, if we want to talk about some truly nasty things that are going to tend to discredit the cause of Christ, I’d like to talk about this. It’s Rajesh’s most recent post on his personal blog, and let’s take a look at the links he provides.

First, he links to a post that talks about “that long snake moan”, a post that argues that the roots of rock & roll are in voodoo. Now, let’s imagine you read that as a black man, one who knows that the roots of rock & roll go through spirituals, black Gospel, jazz, and blues. So what’s being implicitly argued here is that black gospel and spirituals—the music which carried African-Americans of faith through the horrors of slavery and Jim Crow—is functionally equivalent to voodoo.

I’d call that bigotry.

He links to another post linking drums and dancing with the occult arts, arguing from a Grateful Dead drummer (whose playing can really only be described as rather mellow) that because some people made drums from skulls, that all drums are out of line. Keep in mind here, this is something that Rajesh has endorsed.

Reality in music is that pretty much every culture has used percussive instruments, and most cultures have some forms of dancing and danceable music, so to single out African culture as somehow uniquely pagan really hearkens back to the roots of Frank Garlock’s work—the antebellum and Jim Crow era smear of African-American music with language like “voodoo” and “jungle beat”. Garlock santizes it a bit so the racism isn’t as overt as it used to be, but that’s really the roots of the argument.

Rajesh, this kind of nonsense is NOT acceptable.

He does a blog post and then starts a thread on S/I to troll for clicks

[Jim]
Bert Perry wrote:

OK, if we want to talk about some truly nasty things that are going to tend to discredit the cause of Christ, I’d like to talk about this. It’s Rajesh’s most recent post on his personal blog, and let’s take a look at the links he provides.

First, he links to a post that talks about “that long snake moan”, a post that argues that the roots of rock & roll are in voodoo. Now, let’s imagine you read that as a black man, one who knows that the roots of rock & roll go through spirituals, black Gospel, jazz, and blues. So what’s being implicitly argued here is that black gospel and spirituals—the music which carried African-Americans of faith through the horrors of slavery and Jim Crow—is functionally equivalent to voodoo.

I’d call that bigotry.

He links to another post linking drums and dancing with the occult arts, arguing from a Grateful Dead drummer (whose playing can really only be described as rather mellow) that because some people made drums from skulls, that all drums are out of line. Keep in mind here, this is something that Rajesh has endorsed.

Reality in music is that pretty much every culture has used percussive instruments, and most cultures have some forms of dancing and danceable music, so to single out African culture as somehow uniquely pagan really hearkens back to the roots of Frank Garlock’s work—the antebellum and Jim Crow era smear of African-American music with language like “voodoo” and “jungle beat”. Garlock santizes it a bit so the racism isn’t as overt as it used to be, but that’s really the roots of the argument.

Rajesh, this kind of nonsense is NOT acceptable.

He does a blog post and then starts a thread on S/I to troll for clicks

Too bad the dates do not support your false contention. I started this thread on May 14; the blog post is from June 6. I also did not link to that post; someone who has deceitfully misrepresented what that post links to put a link to my post in this thread. I will deal with that deceitful misrepresentation later, when I have more time.

Rajesh, you certainly did link to those posts, and those links still worked as of noon (eastern) today.

Here it is. If you try to deny it, I took a screen shot, too.

I’m going to suggest that you need to make an apology for that post of yours, and you need to seriously consider the fact that the Garlockian thesis you champion does indeed have its roots in efforts to assault black culture during the Jim Crow era. It’s been somewhat sanitized for public consumption today, but it still boils down to “white peoples’ music prior to Elvis Presley is fine, along with music in our subculture, but everybody else’s, not so much.”

It’s not Biblical, and it’s not acceptable.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]

Rajesh, you certainly did link to those posts, and those links still worked as of noon (eastern) today.

Here it is. If you try to deny it, I took a screen shot, too.

I’m going to suggest that you need to make an apology for that post of yours, and you need to seriously consider the fact that the Garlockian thesis you champion does indeed have its roots in efforts to assault black culture during the Jim Crow era. It’s been somewhat sanitized for public consumption today, but it still boils down to “white peoples’ music prior to Elvis Presley is fine, along with music in our subculture, but everybody else’s, not so much.”

It’s not Biblical, and it’s not acceptable.

No, you have deceitfully misrepresented the articles that I linked to in my blog post.
In my comment responding to Jim, if you had read the comment properly, I said that I did not link to that post (meaning my blog post) in this thread; you are the one who posted a link to my blog post in this thread. Jim’s assertion that implied that I had posted a link to my blog post in order to get clicks from this thread to my blog was false.
You need to work on your reading comprehension skills and repent of your repeated unethical misrepresentations of my statements.

I was quoting those articles, Rajesh. So I was being “deceitful” in the same way that your mirror might be seen as “deceitful” if you don’t like what you see when you shave.

And like it or not, the musical traits to which guys like you, your source, Frank Garlock, and Bill Gothard object all have roots in spirituals and black Gospel. Rock & roll is derived significantly from blues and jazz, which are in turn derived from spirituals and Black Gospel, which are in turn derived from (among other things) the native music of peoples in Africa. Insult one, you’ve more or less insulted them all.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

As a result of someone else’s directing attention in this thread to a post on my blog that otherwise had gotten very little previous attention, I may now already have had 28 additional views of that post just today that I very likely would not have ever gotten had that link not been placed in a comment here on SI.

God has a way of turning upside down the ways and efforts of people who continually misrepresent what others say.

[Kevin Miller]
Quote:Moreover, taking tea leaves that God actually created and using them to make a beverage that people drink in a non-worship context is very different from taking instrumental music that evil humans have made and offering it to God in worship.

But I wasn’t talking about tea as a beverage in a non-worship context. I was talking about tea teaves being used as an aid in receiving messages from the spirit world. Tasseography is a divination or fortune-telling method that interprets patterns in tea leaves, coffee grounds or wine sediments. Shouldn’t we abstain from drinking tea if such a practice is used during a divination session? Or is it okay to use something that, though wicked people may use it in wicked ways, we ourselves have no intention of using it in that wicked way?

I did not say that you were talking about tea as a beverage in a non-worship context. I am saying that taking something that God made that had been used in the occult and then using it merely as a beverage in a non-worship context in a use that others have also used it independently of the occult and outside of the context of the occult is an entirely different matter than taking evil occult music made by evil humans under demonic influence and using that music in a worship context. You have zero Bible to justify doing any such thing.

[Kevin Miller]
Quote:Moreover, Acts 19:19 in principle establishes the same basic point because it proves that people who had been involved in demonic activities and had made combination/composite products (books) that they used for those activities destroyed those products once they became believers. They did not “redeem” them.

The physical materials, including whatever ink(s) was/were used to write the contents of the books, were all substances that originally at some level were made by God yet the combination/composite final products (the books) themselves (and not just their contents and previous uses) were categorically rejected by godly people.

But weren’t the books destroyed because of their specific content? The words written within those books were specific occultic statements, just as lyrics would be within a song. The books contained specific written messages that were clearly understood as occultic. That’s an entirely different situation from instrumental music.

How do you know that the books were destroyed only because of their specific content and not also because of something evil about how they were designed or consecrated for their wicked uses? You do not just get to assume or assert that was true. You have to prove that was the case.
Moreover, the comparison of these books and their contents to the distinctive kinds of instrumental music of evil occult songs and their lyrics shows precisely that the believers’ destroying of the physical materials of the books instead of just scrubbing them and reusing them teaches us that it is not just the lyrics of evil occult music that godly people are to reject—they must also reject the wicked kinds of instrumental music that are distinctively used in those activities to accompany whatever evil lyrics may have been sung or whatever other evil sounds may have been made in those occult activities.

[Bert Perry]

I was quoting those articles, Rajesh. So I was being “deceitful” in the same way that your mirror might be seen as “deceitful” if you don’t like what you see when you shave.

And like it or not, the musical traits to which guys like you, your source, Frank Garlock, and Bill Gothard object all have roots in spirituals and black Gospel. Rock & roll is derived significantly from blues and jazz, which are in turn derived from spirituals and Black Gospel, which are in turn derived from (among other things) the native music of peoples in Africa. Insult one, you’ve more or less insulted them all.

Wrong again. Anybody who takes the time to objectively read carefully in their entirety the two posts that I linked to in my blog post will see that you certainly did not “quote” those articles. You put your own false spin on the contents of those posts and distorted what was said in them.
You are also very wrong about your claim about who is my source. I did not get my approach from the source that you claim; I have intensely studied the subject on my own for around a decade or maybe longer.
Furthermore, my approach to the evils of CCM differs in important ways from the other people whom you falsely link me to in this comment. How telling it is that you fallaciously try to use guilt-by-association to try to discredit my independent work by associating with me with other people whom you regard to have faulty positions. You lie again when you make your false claim about who is my source.

Yes, Rajesh, I’m sure that saying “the roots of rock & roll are in voodoo” is completely different from saying (as did your source) “the roots of rock lie deep in the soil of voodoo”. I guess if you can see a compelling case against modern music in the golden calf incident, you’ll be able to derive something from that, too—but the word for what you’re doing is “isegesis”, not “exegesis”.

And like it or not, yes, your thesis is the direct descendant of Garlock’s and those of the late 19th/early 20th century made to support Jim Crow. Yes, you put your little spin on it, but by endorsing those works of Mr. Brennan, you’re admitting, implicitly, that the heritage of your thought is there.

And that’s why Ron and I, among others, are challenging you to apply your (il)logic consistently. If it is objectionable, say, that a modern song has a bass line that is inflected along African pagan roots, why is it permissible that another song is copied from a pantheistic song by Beethoven and Schiller? If African roots are objectionable, why would we tolerate “Be Thou My Vision”, whose musical styles would be derived, ultimately, from Celtic music and paganism?

How, then, would we have any music in the church (this is a command of God after all) if we removed all music with a plausible connection to paganism or the occult? Alternatively, if we selectively apply your illogic, what do we have to say to African-American brothers and sisters in Christ when they say to us “yeah, I’ve heard that before, and the guy that was saying it wore his sheets to social gatherings.”

If I were you, I’d start with “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize what I was saying. Please forgive me.”

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]

OK, if we want to talk about some truly nasty things that are going to tend to discredit the cause of Christ, I’d like to talk about this. It’s Rajesh’s most recent post on his personal blog, and let’s take a look at the links he provides… .

He links to another post linking drums and dancing with the occult arts, arguing from a Grateful Dead drummer (whose playing can really only be described as rather mellow) that because some people made drums from skulls, that all drums are out of line. Keep in mind here, this is something that Rajesh has endorsed.

Reality in music is that pretty much every culture has used percussive instruments, and most cultures have some forms of dancing and danceable music, so to single out African culture as somehow uniquely pagan really hearkens back to the roots of Frank Garlock’s work—the antebellum and Jim Crow era smear of African-American music with language like “voodoo” and “jungle beat”. Garlock santizes it a bit so the racism isn’t as overt as it used to be, but that’s really the roots of the argument.

Rajesh, this kind of nonsense is NOT acceptable.

1. Bert Perry claims the following about the 2nd post of Tom Brennan’s that I linked to in my blog post:

He links to another post linking drums and dancing with the occult arts, arguing from a Grateful Dead drummer (whose playing can really only be described as rather mellow) that because some people made drums from skulls, that all drums are out of line. Keep in mind here, this is something that Rajesh has endorsed.


The shocking and appalling dishonesty of what Bert Perry says here is truly disturbing. I challenge any objective reader on SI to read that 2nd post and provide anywhere in the post where the writer of the post argues “that all drums are out of line.” This is a bald-faced lie that Bert Perry has set forth.
I have never made or endorsed any statements anywhere to the effect “that all drums are out of line.” Had the writer of that post that I linked to on my blog made any such statement in his post, I would have called him out for saying something that is patently false. I would never endorse such a sentiment, regardless of who might express it.
2. Furthermore, Bert Perry asserts that the post somehow does the following: “Reality in music is that pretty much every culture has used percussive instruments, and most cultures have some forms of dancing and danceable music, so to single out African culture as somehow uniquely pagan …”
Any objective reader of that post can plainly see that the writer does not do any such thing. In fact, the writer talks about the occult practices of the following:

1. North American occultists
2. Japanese occultists
3. (East) Indian occultists
4. Venezuelan occultists
5. Greek occultists
6. West African occultists
Plainly, this post therefore does not single out the culture of any group as “uniquely pagan.” That false assertion about the post is a deceitful misrepresentation of the post and of me by asserting that I endorsed a post that supposedly did that.
Also, the vast majority of the post is excerpts directly from Mickey Hart’s book on drumming. The post lays out clearly just how knowledgeable Hart is about occult drumming from many parts of the world.
Early in the post, Brennan relates:

Mickey Hart, born in 1943, came of age in the Sixties and embraced them with all the vigor and enthusiasm of youth. He remained with the band for the totality of its existence. In 1994 he and the rest of the band were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
As the decades passed Mickey grew to become a world class drummer. Over time, as he traveled around the world playing with the band, he began to collect drums. His drum collection gradually developed into first a fascination and then a full blown obsession with the history of percussion in ancient cultures all around the globe.
In 1998 he published the results of his more than three decades of research as Drumming at the Edge of Magic: A Journey Into the Spirit of Percussion. It is a painstakingly researched synchronization of the best of Western Civilization’s doctorate level research and the myths and legends of ancient cultures. The Library Journal in a recommended review of it said in part, “His spell-binding drumming stories come from his studies and travels and his consultation with anthropologists, ethnomusicologists, and students of mythology, Joseph Campbell among them.”
Mickey Hart owns more drums than any man in the world. He has played them in private and in public for tens of thousands of hours. He spent decades collating the legends, myths, and stories surrounding their use for millennia. No man on Earth knows more about drumming than Mickey. It would well behoove us to pay attention to what he says.

Here is how the post ends:

So there it is – a summation of the book that is sitting on my desk that changed my life. What I had long suspected about rock music and its present connection to an ancient demonism had been proven in excruciating detail. And not by some wild eyed ignorant Baptist preacher, but by the rock drummer of our age who knows more about drumming than any other man on the planet. I will leave you with one last quote from Mickey Hart. I urge you to let it soak in for a while…
None of my friends talked about shamans, and yet that’s what we were all trying to become, without knowing it.


Yet Bert Perry thinks that he is the authority who can objectively dismiss all that material from one of the world’s leading experts on drumming by misrepresenting it as he has done.
3. Bert Perry has deceitfully misrepresented me and Tom Brennan through what he has written here on SI. There really should be some mechanism through the moderators of SI to hold members of SI who engage in such deceit accountable. How many times is Bert Perry going to be allowed to lie about me and not be dealt with?

You endorse the post here.

The part about the skulls is midway down here. To quote:


-To all those who feel the power of the drum and don’t know why.
-The most distinctive damarus are made from human skulls.
-“I hope you have been most careful, Mickey Hart. This is a drum of great, great power. It wakes the dead you know.”
-It takes commitment and apprenticeship to learn how to find a drum’s sweet spot. But once you do, the potential arises for contacting the drum’s second voice – one I have come to think of as the spirit side of the drum. Exploring the spirit side of the drum has been the major adventure of my adulthood, if not my whole life.

You endorsed it, buddy. Own up to it.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

[Bert Perry]

You endorse the post here.

The part about the skulls is midway down here. To quote:

-To all those who feel the power of the drum and don’t know why.

-The most distinctive damarus are made from human skulls.

-“I hope you have been most careful, Mickey Hart. This is a drum of great, great power. It wakes the dead you know.”

-It takes commitment and apprenticeship to learn how to find a drum’s sweet spot. But once you do, the potential arises for contacting the drum’s second voice – one I have come to think of as the spirit side of the drum. Exploring the spirit side of the drum has been the major adventure of my adulthood, if not my whole life.

You endorsed it, buddy. Own up to it.

Yes, I did endorse the post. I did not endorse a post that asserted the lie that you claim I and/or it asserted:

He links to another post linking drums and dancing with the occult arts, arguing from a Grateful Dead drummer (whose playing can really only be described as rather mellow) that because some people made drums from skulls, that all drums are out of line. Keep in mind here, this is something that Rajesh has endorsed.

Where does the post say that “all drums are out of line”? Where have I ever said that? Prove what you claim.

[Kevin Miller]
Quote:If you want to claim that godly believers should not do the same with the demonic music of occultists, you have the burden of proving that is true biblically.

Of course, you would first need to prove that demonic instrumental music exists, which I know you’ll refuse to do. Oh, I imagine you could go back to verses about the devil being a musical entity, but the Bible doesn’t explain what specific music may or may not have been played by the devil, so we can’t very well abstain from music that we have no information about.

Aside from the fact that Scripture does provide evidence for the existence of demonic instrumental music, who says that I have to prove only from the Bible that demonic instrumental music exists? We have many testimonies from unbelievers (and former unbelievers) that demonic instrumental music exists. I have proven in another thread that Scripture teaches us that unbelievers can give valid testimonies of their contact with demons. Therefore, you cannot legitimately assert that all those testimonies from unbelievers about demonic instrumental music are inherently invalid merely because they come from unbelievers.
From both Scripture and the testimonies of many unbelievers involved in occult activities, we know that demonic instrumental music does exist.

From both Scripture and the testimonies of many unbelievers involved in occult activities, we know that demonic instrumental music does exist.

If you could provide an actual example of demonic instrumental music it might help in providing a warrant for your claim. Or, you could provide an actual example of CCM that uses demonic instrumental music. Take your pick.

"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan

[Ron Bean]

From both Scripture and the testimonies of many unbelievers involved in occult activities, we know that demonic instrumental music does exist.

If you could provide an actual example of demonic instrumental music it might help in providing a warrant for your claim. Or, you could provide an actual example of CCM that uses demonic instrumental music. Take your pick.

He “knows it when he sees it” (and he is the judge of it).

Ron, he’s been asked this multiple times and has failed to respond

[Kevin Miller]
Quote:Have practitioners of the occult actually said that their garments, food, or tea leaves are themselves evil things that they have made specifically to promote evil in the same ways and for the same purposes that many of them have said that their instrumental music has been made for?

According to the Wikipedia article “social effects of rock music, “rock music and fashion have been inextricably linked.” The article goes on to say ” As rock music genres became more segmented, what an artist wore became as important as the music itself in defining the artist’s intent and relationship to the audience.” Here are a few other quotes from the article - “Heavy Metal bands in the 1980s often favoured a strong visual image. For some bands, this consisted of leather or denim jackets and pants, spike/studs and long hair.” “In the early 1990s, the popularity of grunge brought in a punk influenced fashion of its own, including torn jeans, old shoes, flannel shirts, backwards baseball hats, and people grew their hair against the clean-cut image that was popular at the time in heavily commercialized pop music culture.”

So it certainly seems that the clothing of rock musicians is an integral part of the message they are trying to convey. If it is true that demonic influence is present in the music of rock stars, then wouldn’t it also be present in their attire, seeing as how the attire is so closely related to their intent? I still remember the time one of my daughters came home from a week of Bible camp and told me that her counseler had made her stop wearing her baseball cap backwards. Wouldn’t your position logically be that the clothing of rock stars is unacceptable to God?

Have you found statements from rock musicians or other occultists that specifically say that their clothes themselves that are distinctive to them and have been made by them are demonic? Have they testified to having been under demonic influence and their distinctive clothes just made themselves and appeared on their bodies?

Rajesh, here’s a money quote.

“Rock music is a door to the occult world via percussion”

Later in the column, about drums it is said

“it wakes the dead, you know?”

In another part, it talks about the spirit power of the drum and a bunch more. So yes, the article clearly argues that drums are evil. It’s not subtle at all, and you now find yourself, Rajesh, in the interesting position of having endorsed an article you clearly did not understand.

Personally, my thought is that Mickey Hart’s statements on drums are (a) intended primarily to get press and sell records and (b) probably have a bit more to do with the drugs Hart was taking than any actual power of drums. The guy’s drug use (among other things) got him expelled from the group for a time in 1971, after all.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.