"God Likes Music of All Kinds"

"Is it sinful for believers to sing Goodness of God?"

Since it was our third song this past Sunday morning, I certainly hope it isn't... =)

This is, in my mind, precisely the place to apply Rom 14. Who am I to sit in judgment of my brother because he is free to do this? If I believe he's wrong, I may try to convince him, but I should be very careful about how I think and speak about a fellow servant of Christ who is praising the Lord in sincerity of heart. And if he were not sincere, I would be unlikely to be able to tell, so I should assume he is unless he tells me otherwise, don't you think?

I agree with those who say that musical style is a matter of weakness/strength(Rom14). Someone might object for one of 2 very different reasons:

1. “It’s a matter of conscience because it’s impossible for any music style to be wrong for any reason.”
2. “It’s not a matter of conscience because some music styles are intrinsically, universally sinful.”

Considered in a spectrum:

AnythingGoes—1—Conscience—2—EvilMusic

You, Don, are concerned about #1. But this thread is about #2.

Rajesh,

I don't see Kauflin mention worship at all in the OP, so I don't think your comparison to animal sacrifices is valid (unless there's more in the context of the book that you did not share). The fact that God declared all that he had made "very good," does indeed imply that he takes pleasure in the richness of creation, even those things which are not acceptable as sacrifices.

I don't know Bob Kauflin, but I sincerely doubt that he believes any and all kinds of music are appropriate or acceptable in worship. That's certainly not in the brief quote above.

RajeshG,

If I were to adopt your view on music and what is and isn't acceptable to God to listen to or perform, I'd have to throw out classical music as no longer acceptable because of all the times its been associated with erotic and occultic practices in its history (especially recently due to latter interpretations due to post-modern, sexual-revolutionary, 3rd and 4th wave feminist and queer influences). To sum, contrary to some people believing that classical music is a dying genre of music, there has been a "queering" of classical music that has rejuvenated it throughout America during the 21st century. While the majority of current professional classical music composers, conductors, and musicians are not queer, there is a sizable minority that are and exert considerable influences in classical music spaces, especially in medium-size and large cities across America. Progressive elites fund them, which is why there have been an increase of feminist and queer interpretations of just about any classical music you could think of, whether it is the Boston's Gay Chorus, reinterpreting Handel's Messiah to celebrate "queer resilience" in their 2020 Pride concert, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra's In Unison program, which promotes LGBTQ diversity, including queer musicians and conductors, through concerts featuring works by LGBTQ+ composers like Copland and Bernstein with its 2021 Pride Concert highlighted queer narratives in classical music, and also several dozen blatenly sexualized interpretations of Rite of Spring, Carmen, Tristan und Isolde, and La Bohème by various famous Ballet companies and Opera Companies across America. By the way, there is a network of over 190 LGBTQ chorus groups (GALA Choruses) throughout America. That is 10X more local groups than BLM local groups throughout America.

I don't think that's the logic Rajesh is following, and quite honestly, it is disengenous to argue this way.

It is not the uses a piece of music is put to that are corrupt, but the message and purpose of the music as conceived.

The theory of those who oppose some styles of music is that they are conceived in a compromised or corrupt mind or for a corrupt purpose, and aren't legitimate for Christian use.

I will grant that the case is challenging to make, that's why we keep having these discussions.

But you aren't going to get anywhere by parading sophistry as logic.

It is not the uses a piece of music is put to that are corrupt, but the message and purpose of the music as conceived.

I don't think this represents what Rajesh has been saying at all. He asserts that the origin of a musical kind renders it either acceptable or offensive to God.

Of course, it would really be impossible for anyone to know with certainty if a particular song had been composed in cooperation with demons (aside from obviously demonic things like drums made from human skulls). And it's also difficult to know if a genre could be rendered completely and permanently out of bounds based solely on its original association.

If someone were totally unaware of a particular genre's association with false worship and wrote a song of that kind, would it still be offensive to God?

Rajesh,

Again I am compelled to ask how we are supposed to know with certainty the origin of each of the musical kinds that might be used in worship. If it has nothing at all to do with ongoing association with the occult, then how can we be certain that the hymns and gospel songs which have been accepted by churches in recent centuries are not part of those kinds that have evil origins and therefore are corrupt and devilish?

What liberty could anyone have to worship by any means? We don't even have record of the music used to sing the psalms, so we can't be sure we're even doing that right, if your view is correct. We are left to seek esoteric knowledge without which we cannot freely worship God at the risk of inadvertently dishonoring him.

There is no biblical basis to hold that such evil people are incapable of
inventing evil combinations of musical elements such that those kinds of
instrumental music are unchangeably unacceptable to God.

Where does the Bible tell us they are capable of this?

You’re not appealing to biblical authority in a consistent way. When you have assumed something and want to claim biblical backing for it, you ask “Where does the Bible say this is not so?” And when you want to challenge what someone else is claiming, you ask “Where does the Bible say this is so?”

You’ll be more effective if you decide what your standard for truth is. If your standard is that the Bible has to say it in order for it to be true, then that should be your standard all the time for all of your own assertions, not just other people’s.

But if your standard is, “It’s true unless the Bible says it is not,” then use that standard all the time, for other people’s assertions also and not just your own.

Otherwise, you’re doing a bait and switch all the time. Which doesn’t argue well for your views.

Rajesh, I wrote a reply to your last, but then I read Aaron’s.

You’ll be more effective if you decide what your standard for truth is. If your standard is that the Bible has to say it in order for it to be true, then that should be your standard all the time for all of your own assertions, not just other people’s.

You really need to understand what he said there.

It is not the uses a piece of music is put to that are corrupt, but the message and purpose of the music as conceived.

The theory of those who oppose some styles of music is that they are conceived in a compromised or corrupt mind or for a corrupt purpose, and aren't legitimate for Christian use.

If you hold to this, what is your view of Jubal in Genesis 4:21? He came from morally corrupt line of Cain. His father Lamech’s sins of polygamy, violence, pride reflect the deepening corruption in Cain’s lineage, contrasting with the hope offered in Seth’s line where they began calling on the name of the Lord. Yet among all these compromised and corrupt minds, It is Cains line where cultural achievements and advancements take place, including Jubal who "was the father of all who play stringed instruments and pipes." And the reason being is that Cain's line is imaging God, in their cultural achievements and advancements.

This is work of God's common grace, fulfilling the cultural mandate as God's image-bearers where the ungodly can create music that is not evil as part of a corrupt and demonic culture as was the line of Cain. Lets look at a more recent genre of music that was birthed a little over 50 years ago. Most Fundamentalists/conservative Christians have no idea of Hip-Hop/Rap's history and have created their own false revised history so that is why I am going the extra mile in sharing its historical origins. Hip-Hop/Rap started in the early 1970’s in the poorest sections of the Bronx as a positive alternative to the negativity of the gang-life in the streets. And it derives its influences from a number of other African-American and African music genres and cultural aspects, including jazz, ragtime, talking blues songs, Negro spirituals, Black gospel, R&B, West African Griots, and Jamaican “Toasting.” By 1990s corporations saw the $$$$$ potential and contributed to compromising the genre by marketing Gangsta’ and G-Funk rap from the west coast, which glorified street-life, violence, and sex. During this time East Coast Rap, including Hard Core Rap in the 1980s and even the beginning of the 1990s had been socially conscience rap, much more true to Hip-Hop's origins. While telling stories from the streets of the inner-city, it rejected the gangsta life, it was anti-violence, anti-drug dealing, pro-self-discipline, pro-education, pro-family, and also giving first hand accounts of systemic issues of poverty, housing, and racism. When West Coast Hip-Hop began dominating the markets becoming a billion $$$ industry (driven by white suburban youth, which were around 80% of its audience), East Coast began copying their successes and merged with the Gangsta and G-Funk rap, and by the mid 1990s, it had developed into the mainstream Hip-Hop/Rap that dominated the air waves of radio, MTV where the glorifying of street-life, violence and sex overshadowed the socially conscience hip-hop/rap which were its main origins.

Hip-Hop/Rap is also a work of God's common grace. It was conceived with good intentions as a stark alternative to the negativity of the streets. Even though its originators weren't Christians they were using black music elements that had its roots in Negro Spirituals. In fact, the foundational root of Hip-Hop/Rap are Negro Spirituals. It actually influenced all of the genres associated with Hip-Hop. The syncopation of Ragtime, the spiritual testimonial themes of Black Gospel, the improvisation of Jazz, the emotive expressions of R&B, and the storytelling of Talking Blues. What I find is that Fundamentalists/Conservative Christians who take the doctrine of separation beyond what the Scriptures say, functionally deny the doctrine of Common Grace and lack a robust view of what it means to image God in a fallen world.

You want to make a theology of music out of Jubal? As I recall, his line came to a watery end. That would seem to be God's view of it.

Seriously though, the reference to Jubal is too obscure to build much on it.

It is amazing the tortuous ends you take it to with the "image of God" nonsense in all the various genres you endorse

Put differently, many engage in special pleading by taking broad statements such as Romans 1:30 and asserting without any biblical basis that they do not apply to kinds of instrumental music.

So the ability to invent is comprehensive? They are able to invent anything unless the Bible tells us they are not?

Where does the Bible say that ability to invent is unlimited?

Where does the Bible say that ‘broad’ statements are comprehensive, with no exceptions whatsoever?

But let’s suppose for a moment that this ‘rule’ is a real rule. Then these inventors of evil things can also invent evil things that later can be used for good.

Where does the Bible say they are not capable of inventing such things?

The standard of truth problem remains, because you appeal to it arbitrarily, then set it aside when it doesn’t work for the point you want to make.

So… as I noted before:

You’re not appealing to biblical authority in a consistent way. When you have assumed something and want to claim biblical backing for it, you ask “Where does the Bible say this is not so?” And when you want to challenge what someone else is claiming, you ask “Where does the Bible say this is so?”

You want to make a theology of music out of Jubal? As I recall, his line came to a watery end. That would seem to be God's view of it.

Seriously though, the reference to Jubal is too obscure to build much on it.

It is amazing the tortuous ends you take it to with the "image of God" nonsense in all the various genres you endorse

Don, by dismissing my arguments as nonsense or sophistry without providing any substantive counterargument or evidence you are committing the informal logical fallacy of "Appealing to the Stone." It's a lazy way to avoid grappling with the argument's premises or reasoning. You are sidestepping the burden of proof and failing to address the substance, assuming the dismissal alone is sufficient. When it came to Classical Music, its more than just the uses of the pieces of music/interpretations that were corrupt when it came to Rite of Spring, Carmen, Tristan und Isolde, and La Bohème. The composers Stravinsky, Bizet, Wagner, and Puccini purposely wrote them to be sexually erotic at different levels and ended up shocking their audiences, even leading to a riot with Rite of Spring and moral outrage and controversy with the operas (although they've been taken to an entirely new level in the 21st century for the shock value and we've been desensitized to it).

When it comes to Hip-Hop/Rap and its historical origins, this has been a life-long study because of my missionary work in the inner-city. My masters in Intercultural studies and cultural anthropology classes prepared me for research and much of my research in the 1990s and the 2000s was among "Hip-Hop" culture and African-American culture. I've read about 20+ primary sources and about 60 or so secondary sources that corroborate what I just shared on SI. I also have a bachelor's degree in music at Cornerstone U and am classically trained. I spent my last two years in undergraduate studies in my early twenties focusing on ethnomusicology, as I expected to use music in whatever missionary field God would call me to, leading me to study Hip-Hop/Rap and the subculture that created it.

As for Jubal, I am not formulating a theology of music based on Jubal, but what i am doing a theology of culture, highlighting Common Grace which includes Genesis 4 and Jubal and music. I am building on what Calvin, Berkhof, Murray, Kuyper, Kline, and Sproul have already said over several centuries. In Calvin's commentary on Genesis, for example, "Calvin points to Jubal, “the father of all who play the harp and flute” (Genesis 4:21), as an example of God’s common grace. “Moses now relates that, with the evils which proceeded from the family of Cain, some good had been blended. For the invention of arts, and of other things which serve to the common use and convenience of life, is a gift of God by no means to be despised, and a faculty worthy of commendation”.