Luther Among the Musicians A STUDY DOCUMENT FOR STUDENTS OF CHURCH MUSIC BETHANY LUTHERAN COLLEGE Dennis W. Marzolf Copyright © Dennis W. Marzolf Mankato, Minnesota Edition of 2003 2 3 LUTHER AMONG THE MUSICIANS Hezekiah became king when he was twenty-five years old; And he did right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his father David had done. In the first year of his reign, in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of the Lord and re- paired them. And he brought in the priests and the Levites, and gathered them into the square on the east. Then he said to them, “Listen to me, O Levites. Consecrate yourselves now, and consecrate the house of the Lord, the God of your fathers, and carry the uncleanness out from the holy place. For our fathers have been unfaithful and have done evil in the sight of the Lord our God, and have for- saken Him and turned their faces away from the dwelling place of the Lord, and have turned their backs. They have also shut the doors of the porch and put out the lamps, and have not burned incense or of- fered burnt offerings in the holy place to God of Israel. My sons, do not be negligent now, for the Lord has chosen you to stand before Him, to minister to Him, and to be His ministers and burn incense And they brought seven bulls, seven rams, seven lambs, and seven male goats for a sin offering for the kingdom, the sanctuary, and Judah. And he ordered the priests, the sons of Aaron, to offer them on the altar of the Lord. And the priests slaughtered them and purged the altar with their blood to atone for all Israel, for the king ordered the burnt offering and the sin offering for all Israel. He then stationed the Levites in the house of the Lord with cymbals, with harps, and with lyres, accord- ing to the command of David and of Gad the king’s seer, and of Nathan the prophet; for the command was for the Lord through His prophets. And the Levites stood with the musical instruments of David, and the priests of David, and the priests with the trumpets. Then Hezekiah gave the order to offer the burnt offering on the altar. When the burnt offering began, the song to the Lord also began with the trumpets, accompanied by the instruments of David, king of Israel. While the whole assembly worshiped, the singers also sang and the trumpets sounded; all this contin- ued until the burnt offering was finished. Now at the completion of the burnt offerings, the king and all who were present with him bowed and worshiped. Moreover, King Hezekiah and the officials ordered the Levites to sing praises to the Lord with the words of David; and Asaph the seer. So, they sang praises with joy, and bowed down and worshiped. Hezekiah and all the people rejoiced over what God had prepared for the people, because the thing came about suddenly.1 Cleaning, repairing, opening, reconstruction, reconsecration, singing. These words describe the startling reformation of King Hezekiah, and they also appropriately portray the Lutheran Reformation of the sixteenth century. Both were times of renewal when God’s Word was restored to its rightful place at the center of life and worship. For Hezekiah this meant that the temple sacrifice and the obser- vance of the liturgical calendar were reinstated. For Luther this meant that the pure sacrifice of Law- Gospel preaching was renewed, and the sacraments were once again administered to the people of God in their fullness. For both Hezekiah and Luther this re-introduction and renewal was accomplished by a glorious flowering of the musical art. This verdant flowering among the Lutherans of the sixteenth century continues to astonish and challenge, especially when it stands in stark contrast to certain mod- ern trends in Lutheran worship.2 1 II Chronicles 29, selected verses (NASB). The similarity between Hezekiah’s reform and the renewal of the 16th century was not lost to Lu- ther, as he writes in the German Mass, 1526 (LW 53, p. 90): “in short, this or any other order shall be so used that whenever it becomes an abuse it shall straightway be abolished and replaced by another, even as King Hezekiah put away and destroyed the brazen serpent, though God Himself had com- manded it to be made, because the children of Israel made an abuse of it (II Kings 18:4). For the liturgy must serve for the promotion of faith and love, and not to be a detriment of faith. As soon as it fails to do this, they are invalid, dead, and gone…” 2 Contemporary worship among Lutherans, especially in the United States, continues to lose its identity in a society that is overwhelmingly Protestant. Despite the successful efforts of many of the Lutheran colleges in the land, where music departments strive to produce trained musicians for the church, “Christian” radio, televangelism, and suburban evangelicalism (in the tradition of Moody and Graham), are the “religion of the people.” The liturgical service and its preoccupation with the sacramental mysteries of absolution, preaching, Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and its consequent formal and aesthetic structure are not immediately appealing. Indeed, they cannot be, for their very exis- tence is drawn from the reality of the Incarnation; a reality in which God becomes form and matter for the salvation of fallen form and mat- 4 The way of reform was clear to Luther. The Word of God must be given its pre-eminent place in the lives of the faithful. This Word must play a primary role in theological discussion and in orthodox wor- ship. Theological tract, sermon, hymn, motet, and artwork were all considered legitimate vehicles for the dynamic Word of God. Luther was not content, nor was he allowed to merely reform the schol- arly/theological aspects of the church. He was vitally concerned that the worship forms used by the people from day to day reflect the pure teaching of God’s Word. Luther realized that it was in the litur- gical service, perhaps more than at any other place or time, that God and man came into contact. Here God came to serve man, and this liturgical service of God included the sermon, the sacrament, the read- ings of scripture, the hymns of the choir and congregation and the artwork in the church. The forms used in this liturgy were not commanded in scripture, and therefore they could be cho- sen in a spirit of Christian freedom. Indeed, no form save the Lord’s Prayer, the Words of Institution, and the Baptismal formula had divine mandate. Consequently every evangelical parish was free to use whatever forms it thought profitable and worthy; choosing from a vast wealth of Christian ceremony, art, and music that which was pure and beautiful. To begin with, we must repeat the prefatory statement that we do not abolish the Mass but religiously keep and defend it. In our churches Mass is celebrated every Sunday and on other festivals, when the sac- rament is offered to those who wish for it after they have been examined and absolved. We keep traditional liturgical forms, such as the order of the lessons, prayers, vestments, etc. In a long harangue about the use of Latin in the Mass, our clever opponents quibble about how a hearer who is ignorant of the faith of the church benefits from hearing a Mass that he does not understand. Appar- ently they imagine that mere hearing is a beneficial act of worship even where there is no understanding. We do not want to belabor this point, but we leave it up to the judgment of the reader. We mention this only in passing in order to point out that our churches keep the Latin lessons and prayers. The purpose of observing ceremonies is that men may learn the Scriptures and that those who have been touched by the Word may receive faith and fear and so may also pray. Therefore, we keep Latin for the sake of those who study and understand it, and we insert German hymns to give the common people some- thing to learn that will arouse their faith and fear. This has always been the custom in the churches. Though German hymns have varied in frequency, yet almost everywhere the people sang in their own language. No one has ever written or suggested that men benefit from hearing lessons they do not understand, or from ceremonies that do not teach or admonish, simply ex opere operato, by the mere doing or observing. Out with such pharisaic ideas!3 We gladly keep the old traditions set up in the church because they are useful and promote tranquility, and we interpret them in an evangelical way, excluding the opinion which holds that they justify. Our ene- mies falsely accuse us of abolishing good ordinances and church discipline. We can truthfully claim that in our churches the public liturgy is more decent than in theirs, and if you look at it correctly we are more faithful to the canons than our opponents are. Among our opponents, unwilling celebrants and hirelings perform Mass, and they often do so only for the money. When they chant the Psalms, it is not to learn or pray but for the sake of the rite, as if this work were an act of worship or at least worth some reward. Every Lord’s Day many in our circles use the Lord’s Supper, but only after they have been instructed, examined, and absolved.