Are Some Kinds of Instrumental Music Objectively Better Than Others?

Is it even possible to "approach answering the question" of what make "some kinds of music" better than others without providing examples of specific kinds of music that would be arguably considered better?

Doesn't the word "better" imply the existence of some "purpose" for which one or more styles may be "better" suited? In which case, the particular purposes and the corresponding better styles to meet them would have to be part of the conversation.

Since someone answered, "No," to the poll question, I wonder if that person thinks that all kinds of instrumental music are all equally good?

Or they could be thinking that all kinds of instrumental music are equally bad.

I believe the answer to the basic question is yes. In God’s opinion there must be some music that is more objectively beautiful. However, since He has not revealed what that is (Rajesh seemingly disagrees with this point but does not provide examples) we cannot conclude what that is. I’m pretty sure that Bach is more objectively beautiful music (though I could never prove it) than Justin Bieber. I believe that, very broadly speaking, that which requires more expertise and time to develop at least usually will be objectively more beautiful. The beliefs and intention of the musician do come into play as well though they are often difficult to disentangle from the sound of instrumental music.

I believe the answer to the basic question is yes. In God’s opinion there must be some music that is more objectively beautiful.

This brings up the question of whether "beauty" itself is the primary factor by which kinds of music should be judged as to whether one kind is better than the other.

I once organized a roller skating activity for the Baptist church I attended at the time and another Baptist church. We rented out the whole rink and could use our own music. I chose Handel's water music because I think that music is very beautiful. I know some of the young people at the event thought there was a better kind of music for roller skating. The most beautiful music may or may not be the best music for every situation.

No believer whose thinking is sound holds such a view because they know that there are kinds of instrumental music that are pleasing to God so they would not be bad in any sense.

Of course, your opening post wasn't even about badness or goodness. Your opening post was simply about the concept of being "better." Some bad music can be better than other bad music and some good music can be better than other good music.

Consequently, there is no one whose thinking is sound who says that all kinds of instrumental music are equally bad.

That depend upon the theological context in which you are working. There are some religious groups which believe that all kinds of instrumental music are equally bad when used in the context of church worship. They believe musical worship in a church service should only be done vocally. We might claim that such a person does not have sound thinking, but they are only using the principle that if God has not instructed believers in a New Testament church setting to use something, then we shouldn't be using something that God has not instructed us to use. Is that principle a sign of unsound thinking?

Yes, that "principle" is a sign of unsound thinking. I have addressed that faulty notion in previous threads.

And yet here you've started an entirely new thread. So can you please remind me? Is it your position that Christians can use things in a New Testament worship setting (such as instrumental music) even when God has not specifically authorized the use or commanded us to abstain from the use?

In any case, none of those people to my knowledge hold that all instrumental music is equally bad across the board.

What difference does that make? Not being bad "across the board" wouldn't really matter if the music were bad in the particular setting in which it is used.

“On what biblical basis do you hold that "in God's opinion there must be some music that is more objectively beautiful" [emphasis added to the original]?”

On the basis that God is the source of all beauty and moral perfection. Whatever most accurately mirrors his perfections is “better.”

This new thread is not about that subject. You are in effect making this thread about that subject.

If you don't want to talk about any particular aspect of music in a music thread that you've started, then you certainly don't have to. It's not like I started talking about death or taxes.

This thread is about instrumental music that is "better." That seems to me to provide a number of legitimate avenues of discussion that are well within the topic. What factors are we to discuss in regards to being "better." Beauty has been mentioned as a possible factor in which some music styles could be better than others.

You yourself first mentioned the word "good" in the thread, so that's what got us into the discussion of what might be good or bad in music. I even already mentioned that the ideas of good and bad are a bit off topic when I said, " Of course, your opening post wasn't even about badness or goodness. Your opening post was simply about the concept of being "better." Some bad music can be better than other bad music and some good music can be better than other good music." You than continued responding with a comment about bad music, so I thought we were having an approved-by-you discussion.

Another aspect of "better" that we haven't even mentioned yet is whether some instrumental music is more worshipful than others, or whether some is more performable than others. If we start asking whether some instrumental music is more "useful" than others, we would also then have to discuss various uses, such as personal listening or congregational worship.

Absent of direct Biblical commands and prohibitions regarding what is good, bad, or better in regards to music, we can only derive principles from various passages that may have nothing directly to do with music. You tried doing that with 2 Tim 3:16-17, which doesn't say anything about music. The passage says that all Scripture is profitable for doctrine and instruction, but it's NOT saying that just because God commanded one set of believers at one time to do something that God is always going to command believers at other timeframes to do the same things. You used the picture of heavenly worship, but that picture does NOT tell us that everything God commands angels to do in Heaven is supposed to be done by believers here on earth.

I would agree with the general principle, though, and I acknowledge that this is what you were trying to get at by using those passages, that God's pattern of liking instrumental musical worship makes a complete prohibition of instruments in NT worship very unlikely.

God has done much more than just "like" instrumental musical worship--He has profoundly and repeatedly commanded humans to use musical instruments to worship Him.

I see from the list that not a single one of those verses about instruments was from the New Testament. The only New Testament verse included was a command to sing. Isn't there something for us to at least consider from the complete absence of NT commands to use instruments? We can't make definitive assertions based on a lack of information, but such a lack can cause us to ponder.

Using the word "picture" to speak about divine revelation of heavenly worship seems highly problematic to me. What Revelation reveals about heavenly worship is reality, not just figurative language.

When you read a highly descriptive passage of Scripture, doesn't that passage ever produce a picture in your mind of the scene being described? That is the sense of the word "picture" I was using. In that sense, the word "description" would have been just as valid, but you hadn't provided in your comment the full description of heavenly worship. You had just mentioned it, and your mention brought the picture of it to my mind, so I used the word "picture." Sorry that I used a word that could be misconstrued.

No, because there are commands in the OT for the whole world to use musical instruments in worshiping God--those commands were not just for Jews, and they were not part of the Mosaic Law or any other teaching that is no longer in force.

We do not, therefore, need any NT commands to know that God wants us to use musical instruments to worship Him. Those who say that we should not use them have to prove that the worldwide commands in passages such as Ps. 98 are no longer in force.

Since you brought up Psalm 98, what is your position regarding how specific we need to be in order to be obedient to the commands in those verses? Consider verses 5-6, "Sing unto the Lord with the harp; with the harp, and the voice of a psalm. With trumpets and sound of cornet make a joyful noise before the Lord, the King."

Do we need to be using harps and trumpets and cornets in our worship services in order to be obedient to those divinely inspired commands? Should we consider the specific instruments to be merely "categories" of acceptable instruments rather than specifically commanded instruments?

Considering the topic of this thread, when Psalm 33:2 specifically tells us to " Praise the Lord with harp: sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings," are we to understand that God considers an instrument of 10 strings to be "better" in some way than an instrument of 5 strings or 7 strings?

Yes, we need to use those instruments and those categories of instruments in worship.

If a church doesn't use a harp or trumpet in it's worship, is it in disobedience to God's will?

Because the Bible (to my knowledge) does not reveal how many strings harps and psalteries had, which He has also commanded to be used in this very same statement, I hold that we may not be able to answer this question conclusively. After further study, I might have a more definitive answer.

I agree it can't be answered conclusively, but I suspect the number of strings on a harp or psaltery would not make a difference to God. My initial thought is that the phrase "an instrument of ten strings" in Hebrew flowed "better" than other designations for the meter and rhythm of the poetry of that psalm. Does that sound like a reasonable possibility to you?

Because God uses that expression three times in Scripture, I do not think that sounds like a reasonable possibility:

Ps. 33:2 Praise the LORD with harp: sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings.

Ps. 92:3 Upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the psaltery; upon the harp with a solemn sound.

Ps. 144:9 I will sing a new song unto thee, O God: upon a psaltery and an instrument of ten strings will I sing praises unto thee.

Posting those three verses doesn't tell me why you consider my thought to not be a reasonable possibility.

I initially asked you "are we to understand that God considers an instrument of 10 strings to be "better" in some way than an instrument of 5 strings or 7 strings?"

You answered, "I hold that we may not be able to answer this question conclusively. After further study, I might have a more definitive answer."

Are you now saying that you have a definitive answer? Does the use of the phrase three times mean that God does consider the harp of 10 strings to be better in some way than a harp of any other string number?

I'm not understanding your reasoning for eliminating the possibility I suggested. Are you saying that God has absolutely no appreciation for poetical form and flow in spite of inspiring a POET to pen these Scriptures?

I am not a fan of either Bach or Biber, but I question the theory that if it takes longer to compose a piece of music, then it must be better. It has been years since I watched Bob Ross paint, but he could do much more quality work in a very short time than I could do if I spent days or months longer than he did trying to paint a picture.

Hmm. I think that we might have to back up because it's apparent to me that I do not understand what your original point was about "poetical form and flow." What is "poetical form and flow" in the sense that you are using the expression and what does it have to do with speaking about a 10-stringed instrument versus an instrument with some other number of strings?

I've written a fair number of poems in my life. In fact, one year, my older brother took my collection and bound it in a book for me. There are numerous times that I could have used either one phrase or another to express my thoughts, but one phrase would fit the meter of the poem better and actually rhymed with the other lines. That phrase was better for the poetical form and flow of my poem more so than any other, even though I could have used another phrase that equally expressed the idea I wished to express.

The Psalm writer was expressing thoughts about musical worship. He could have used any number of instruments in his poetry and often did use more than one and often repeated the same instrument in various verses. I don't know what the Hebrew words for "an instrument of ten strings" are, but that phrase could very well fit the form and flow of the poem better than the Hebrew word for "psaltery" alone. Thus, the phrase "an instrument of ten strings" would be better for the "beauty" of the poem.

We talked about beauty earlier as a possible reason why God might consider some instrumental music to be better than others. I think beauty would also be a possible reason why God would consider some phrase in a poem to be better than another.

I was right in what I thought you were saying. I very strongly disagree with your notion that seems to assert that God merely used these words for poetic effect but what the words actually say does not communicate propositional truth.

Hold on a minute. I never said there was no propositional truth to the command to play an instrument having 10 strings. That IS what the words actually say and I never denied that. If the psalm writer had written the command to play an instrument of 7 strings, that ALSO would have been propositional truth. Either one of them would be propositional truths, so David choosing by divine inspiration to write one of them instead of the other for the sake of poetic beauty does not deny any propositional truth whatsoever.

What then is the point that you are making with what you have said about "poetical form and flow" in relation to Ps. 33:2?

I've repeated the same point several times. If you're unable to understand it, then I don't think repeating it again is going to help.

Scripture reveals various biblical comparisons that instruct us about what God considers to be better than other things. For example, Jesus taught that humans are of far greater value to God than sheep or sparrows. That God Himself made all three categories of life forms does not require, necessitate, or mean that He values them all equally.

Well, yes, if God tells us specifically that he values one thing over another, then we can know that one is valued over the other. That is a rather obvious thing to point out.

In the same way, even for whatever kinds of instrumental music that God Himself may have made, there is no biblical reason that requires us to believe that He holds that they are all equally good, valuable, acceptable, etc.

However, in this case, since God hasn't specifically let us know that He values certain instruments over others, then we can't really make definitive assertions either way. We can only present reasonable possibilities.