PSALLO
With no authority for Musical Instruments as tools of worship, the Greek word PSALLO is used to show that God actually commanded musical worship. This is not true.
Summary: An inspired passage from the Bible written as prose was not written so that it could be accompanied with a mechanical instrument.
However, an inspired passage written in a poetic form can be "spoken in the heart", spoken out loud, sung, or played with a mechanical accompaniment.
By saying "song" we mean that we can use it to meditate, speak, sing or sing with an instrument.
By this definition we do not demand that either be done.
Therefore, when Paul told the early Christians to speak the psalms one to another he knew that a psalm could be chanted by a group while prose is not usually suitable. The psalms which he commaned are from the Greek noun form:
Psalmos (g5568) psal-mos'; from 5567; a set piece of music, i.e. a sacred ode (accompanied with the voice, harp or other instrument; a "psalm"); collect. the book of the Psalms: - psalm. Comp. 5603 (an ode).
Proponents of musical rituals insist that a "psalmos" necessarily includes a mechanical instrument. However, look again at the definition from Strong's even though scholarship denies that it included instruments at the time:
- A sacred (inspired) ode
- Accompanied by the
- Voice
- Harp
- or other Instrument
The Britannica or Click Here Notes That:
"Music, like the word, also may have symbolic meaning. The basic elements out of which musical symbolism is built are sounds, tones, melodies, harmonies,
- and the various musical instruments,
- among which is the human voice.
Sound effects can have a numinous (spiritual) character and may be used to bring about contact with the realm of the holy. A specific tone may call one to an awareness of the holy, make the holy present, and produce an experience of the holy.
This may be done by means of drums, gongs, bells, or other instruments.
The ritual instruments can, through their shape or the materials from which they are made, have symbolic meaning. The Uitoto in Colombia, for example, believe that all
the souls of their ancestors are contained in the ritual drums. (See liturgical music BM members.)
Strabo, Geography [10.3.9] But I must now investigate how it comes about that so many names have been used of one and the same thing, and the theological element contained in their history.
Now this is common both to the Greeks and to the barbarians, to perform their sacred rites in connection with the relaxation of a festival, these rites being performed sometimes with religious frenzy, sometimes without it; sometimes with music, sometimes not; and sometimes in secret, sometimes openly.
And it is in accordance with the dictates of nature that this should be so, for, in the first place, the relaxation draws the mind away from human occupations and turns the real mind towards that which is divine; and,
secondly, the religious frenzy seems to afford a kind of divine inspiration and to be very like that of the soothsayer; and,
thirdly, the secrecy with which the sacred rites are concealed induces reverence for the divine, since it imitates the nature of the divine, which is to avoid being perceived by our human senses; and,
fourthly, music, which includes dancing as well as rhythm and melody, at the same time, by the delight it affords and by its artistic beauty,
brings us in touch with the divine, and this for the following reason;
for although it has been well said that human beings then act most like the gods when they are doing good to others,
yet one might better say, when they are happy; and such happiness consists of rejoicing, celebrating festivals, pursuing philosophy, and engaging in music; for,
if music is perverted when musicians turn their art to sensual delights at symposiums and in orchestric and scenic performances and the like,
we should not lay the blame upon music itself, but should rather examine the nature of our system of education, since this is based on music.
AUGUSTINE: on the Morals of the Manichaeans riducules them for believing that the gods came out of brass and other things by rubbing or abrading (making melody with them). Augustin uses figurative language much like Paul's warning that our melody must never be external but in the heart:
Augustine on the Psalms noted that making melody external is a work which David always performed trying to find God whom he believed had become lost:
"Make melody unto the Lord upon the harp: on the harp and with the voice of a Psalm" (ver. 5). Praise Him not with the voice only; take up works, that ye may not only sing, but work also.
- He who singeth and worketh,
- maketh melody with psaltery and upon the harp.
Therefore, Augustine makes the harp figurative:
Now see what sort of instruments are next spoken of, in figure: "With ductile trumpets also, and the sound of the pipe of horn" (ver. 6). What are ductile trumpets, and pipes of horn?
Ductile trumpets are of brass: they are drawn out by hammering; if by hammering, by being beaten,
ye shall be ductile trumpets, drawn out unto the praise of God, if ye improve when in tribulation: tribulation is hammering, improvement is the being drawn out. Job was a ductile trumpet.
When one speaks to teach and admonish one another Paul outlaws the nerve-frazzling forms of instrumental pagan "singing" where external singing was always a secular act. The spiritual form of worship was to teach the inspired word with "melody" in the heart. In a parallel passage to the Colossians, the "melody" means with "grace" in the heart. When one speaks with a "lilting voice" they are speaking melodiously or gracefully - but not with an instrument.
Paul makes it clear that the "psalmos" which is to be sung is accompanied with the instrument of the "harp of God" or the fruit of the lips. The verb form "psallo" or the method of making the melody is in the heart gracefully.
If Paul had not made this distinction there would have been no difference between the carnal worship of the pagans and the "in spirit and in truth" worship which Jesus accetps. If he had not made the distinction there would have been no difference between the pagan singing in the Corinthians pagan temples with instruments and Christian speaking or chanting which is a Christian group activity.
Lipscomb wrote as late as 1878 that:
We do not think anyone has ever claimed authority from Scriptures to use the organ in worship. They only claim it is not condemned. It is used as an assister in worship...Prayer, praise, thanksgiving and making melody in the heart (mind) unto the Lord are acts of worship ordained of God, but no authority do we find for the organ."
We cannot, therefore, have much confidence in modern efforts of musical churches to "evangelize" everyone into theatrical performance which can never be "worship in spirit and in truth." Only as a last resort, having abandoned the Bible, is "contending over words" used to force people into something they would never promote to the point of creating a sectarian division between God's people.
It should be noted that if "instruments" are inherent in the word psallo then each singer must have their own instrument or they cannot psallo. If all human experience is not adequate, it may help to summarize some of the evidence which denies that psallo gives the authority for instrumental worship. First, look at one of the examples:
Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; Ephesians 5:19
These are all the inspired text of the Bible and are therefore "Spirit" or the product of Jesus Christ as Spirit or Word.
Hymns "was that part of the Hallel consisting of Psalms 113-118; where the verb itself is rendered 'to sing praises' or 'praise' Acts 16:25; Heb 2:12. The Psalms are called, in general, 'hymns,' by Philo; Josephus calls them 'songs and hymns.'" Vine on Humneo
We can settle the issue quickly and you can move on. Psallo does not meant just "play the harp." If Psallo still meant to sing a song with musical accompaniment then Paul said:
Speaking (teaching, dialoguing) to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
(singing) and (singing with instruments) in your heart to the Lord; Ephesians 5:19
Well, don't accuse the Holy Spirit of Christ with being confused!
Or is this typical parallelism which says:
Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
Which just says in another parallel way:
singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; Ephesians 5:19
The object was not what we call "worship" or God-directed, it was one-another directed to teach and admonish.
We will see that the "oding" was an act of the community and it cannot be done by one person to a group any more than speaking or dialog can be a team ministry.
From "filling up with the Spirit" or "the Word of Christ" in Colossians 3:16 the actions are:
be informed of the words of Christ (Spirit Eph 5:18; John 6:63),
speak those words one to another,
the result will be teaching and warning one another,
we will honor Christ by recycling His Words back to Him or else they are void (Isa 55)
and there will be unity which can come only through unison-type dialog and singing.
Looking at What Messiah Would bring to the World.
In Isaiah 11 Messiah would not be filled with a "little person" other than Himself. He was and is full Deity. Rather, Isaiah predicted that the Spirit which rested upon Him would be the mental disposition of God:
And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord; Isaiah 11:2 and spirituality or "quick understanding" in the next verse.
This was the APPROVED PATTERN: The Spirit of Wisdom would rest on Jesus before He began to SPEAK in the synagogues and PREACH in all of the cities.
He left that Spirit in His Words. Later, Isaiah defines a process much like that defined by Paul in his "singing" passages.
As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the Lord; My spirit that is upon thee, and
my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed,
nor out of the mouth of thy seeds seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and for ever. Isaiah 59:21
Christ supplies all of our food stuffs for both body and soul. This form of presenting Christ's revelation is not new to Paul; it appears throughout the Word.
In Ephesians 4 and 5 Paul described the assembly of the pagans where wine, singing, instrumental music and dancing was used to create an artificial "spirit" so that they "prophesied." We would hear this as speaking in tongues. In chapter 4 and 5 Paul also shows that God pours out His wrath by the use of wrathful men who are identified by the modern form of out-of-your-mind charismatic preaching, shouting, hand waving and dancing across the stage. The Church Fathers identified as God inducing an effete principle, as with Saul, and this was supposed to cause people to just consider him mad.
Wherefore be ye not unwise (egotistical, ignorant, lacking understanding as in 1 Cor 14:20), but understanding what the will (what Jesus taught) of the Lord is. Ephesians 5:17
And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; Ephesians 5:18
Speaking (speaking or dialoging) to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; Ephesians 5:19
"Philo uses humnos regularly for the OT Psalms."
Even before the time of Paul there was often a clear distinction between the melody of the song and the musical instrument.
[1408a][1] for instance "having gone and having conversed with him," or, "having gone, I conversed with him."Also the practice of Antimachus is useful, that of describing a thing by the qualities it does not possess; thus, in speaking of the hill Teumessus,1 hesays,
There is a little windswept hill;
for in this way amplification may be carried on ad infinitum. This method may be applied to things good and bad, in whichever way it may be useful.
Poets also make use of this in inventing words, as a melody "without strings" or "without the lyre"
Chorus
Under his shepherd care, in joy at his songs, were also spotted lynxes, [580] and there came, leaving the vale of Othrys, a pride of tawny lions, and the dappled fawn stepping beyond the tall fir-trees with its light foot [585]
- danced to your lyre-playing,
- rejoicing in your joyful melody.
[812d] Athenian
So, to attain this object, both the lyre-master and his pupil
must use the notes of the lyre, because of the distinctness of its strings, assigning to the notes of the song notes in tune with them;
but as to divergence of sound and variety in the notes of the harp,
when the strings sound the one tune
and the composer of the melody another,or when there results a combination of low and high notes, of slow and quick time, of sharp and grave,
1 i.e. the notes (single) of the instrument must be in accord with those of the singer's voice [melody].
"The tune, as composed by the poet, is supposed to have comparatively few notes, to be in slowish time, and low down in the register;
whereas the complicated variation, which he is condemning, has many notes, is in quick time, and high up in the register." (England.)
But the only clue we have to the mental process by which in a preharmonic age different characteristics can be ascribed to scales identical in all but pitch,
is to be found in the limited compass of Greek musical sounds,
corresponding as it does to the evident sensitiveness of the Greek ear to differences in VOCAL EFFORT.
We have only to observe the compass of the Greek scale to see that in the MOST ESTEEMED modes it is much more the compass of SPEAKING 'than of singing voices.
Modern singing is normally at a much higher pitch than that of the speaking voice, but there is no natural reason, outside the peculiar nature of modern music, why this should be so.
It is highly probable that all modern singing would strike a classical Greek ear as an OUTCRY; and in any case such variations of pitch as are inconsiderable in modern singing are extremely emphatic in the speaking voice,
so that they might well make all the difference to an ear unaccustomed to organized sound beyond the speaking compass.
Again, much that Aristoxenus and other ancient authorities say of the character of the modes (or keys) tends to confirm the view that that character depends upon the position of the mese or keynote within the general compass. Thus Aristotle (Politics, v. (viii.) 7, 1342 b. 20)
states that certain low-pitched modes suit the voices of old men,
and thus we may conjecture that even the position of tones and semitones might in the Dorian and Phrygian modes bring the bolder portion of the scale in all three genera into the best regions of the average young voice,
while the Ionian and Lydian might lead the voice to dwell more upon semitones and enharmonic intervals, and so account for the heroic character of the former and the SENSUAL character of the latter (Plato, Republic, 398 to 400).
Pausanias, Description of Greece
[5] There is a statue of Pronomus, a very great favorite with the people for his playing on the flute. For a time flute-players had three forms of the flute. On one they played Dorian music; for Phrygian melodies flutes of a different pattern were made; what is called the Lydian mode was played on flutes of a third kind. It was Pronomus who
- first devised a flute
- equally suited for every kind of melody,
and was the first to play on the same instrument music so vastly different in form
Did the fire begin at the top, and spread to the rest -- his head, his face, his phiale, his kithara, his foot-length tunic? Citizens, I direct my soul to the form of the god, and my mind sets his likeness before my eyes, his face so gentle, his stone neck so soft, his girdle across his chest that holds his tunic in place, so that some of it is drawn taut, other parts allowed to billow out. Did not the whole composition soothe the spirit to rest?
- For he seemed like one singing a melody,
- (PLUS) and one could hear him strumming, so they say, at noon-tide.
Ah, blessed ears that did so! For his song was in praise of our country. And I see him as if pouring a libation from his golden bowl . . . and as the fire spreads it destroys first the Apollo, almost touching as he does the roof, then the other statues,
the Muses fair, the portraits of the Founders, the sparkling stones, the graceful columns.
We noted that the Greek demands speaking to one another in a liturgical sense, while the pagans used singing, instrumental and dancing groups to perform for the paying audience. This was a violation of the Christian principle of a "one another" ministry.
The Theologial Dictionary of the New Testament notes that:
"In the NT there is still no precise differentiation between ode, psalmos, and humnos. e.g., in Col.3:16 or Eph.5:19, in contrast to a later time,
when ode (canticum) came to be used only for biblical songs (apart from the Psalms) used in liturgy.
From the NT passages we may gather the following elements in the concept or the Christian ode as also confirmed from other sources.
(Sing in Ephesians 5:19 is Ode (g5603) o-day'; from 103; a chant or "ode" the gen. term for any words sung)
"a. Odai are the cultic songs of the community. They are not sung by the individual, but by the community gathered for worship...
Of a piece with this is the anonymity or the early authors, as also the attachment to OT tradition. Only in the 2nd century are the authors sometimes mentioned. In the Didascalia, 2, p..5.29, we can still read: 'It thou desirest hymns, thou hast the Psalms of David."'
(5) And He says by another: "Depart from me; the sound of thine hymns, and the psalms of thy musical instruments, I will not hear."
"b. The ode is inspired. This is shown by the epithet pneumatikos, though it does indicate more generally its religious character. . . . With the inspiration or hymns is linked their improvisation, e.g., in I C. 14:26 (cr. Acts 4:24); Tert. adv. Marc., 5,b; Apolog. 39,18." (Note: and condemned, we might add).
In Acts 1:20 psalmos is the book of Psalms and in Rom. 15: sing is psallo.
- "Psallo is best translated by chant,
- not sing.
- The Greeks sharply distinguish chanting (psalmodia)
- from singing (tragoudi).
- The first is a sacred activity;
- the second, a secular one. In English, unfortunately, the distinction is not sharp.. Constantine Cavarnos
The Head must be in charge as the only performer (See the above table):
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom;
teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
singing (no instruments included) with grace (divine influence) in your hearts to the Lord. Colossians 3:16
And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. Colossians 3:17
Paul is not confused about pagan singing to enthuse or exhilarate but connectes it to external teaching of God's Word and internal singing to God:
- O give thanks unto the Lord; call upon his name:
- make known his deeds among the people. Psalm 105:1
- Sing to the LORD, for he has done glorious things;
- let this be known to all the world. Isaiah 12:5
The Definitions Used in the New Testament
Words are defined by how they are used in the Bible. If one sings a psalm with the accompaniment of a harp then the person is singing with a harp. By analogy, if one is eating "wine" from the cluster and it is obviously not intoxicating. It it bubbles in the vat and exhilarates and then intoxicates then this wine is intoxicating. The same is true of psallo.
"The very oldest of these psalms, a number of which point to David as their author,
are not liturgical congregational hymns,
but were originally individual prayer-songs, which emanated from personal experience,
but were, in later times, employed for congregational use..." Int Std Bible Ency., The Religion of Israel.
We might add that the preamble such as: "Upon the harp" or "To the tune of Lilly of the Valley" were added to the simple poems after death because they were the personal property of the composer, just as American Indian chants belong to them alone.
We have no evidence of congregational singing with instrumental accompaniment as worship in the Bible. The clergy performed the music in the Temple before the priests while the "congregation" even outside of the walls fell and "worshipped" when they heard the trumpet blast.
The common people were put outside the gates or "outside the camps" where they met God while the temple, sacrificial or civil-state rituals were taking place.
There was no praise service in the synagogue!
Zodhiates': Lexical Aids To The New Testament, pg. 1769 "...Actually a touching, and then a touching of the harp or other stringed instruments with the finger or with the plectrum; later known as the instrument itself, and finally it became known
as the song sung (Note: this says that psallo was assigned to the song which they sang with the instrument. Therefore, if you want to add secular melody you need to specify the instrument. Paul did: he called it the heart and not the harp)
with the musical accompaniment.
This latest state of its meaning, 'psalm,' was adopted in the Septuagint.
"In all probability the psalms of Ephesians 5:19; Colossians 3:16 are the inspired psalms of the Hebrew Canon. The word certainly designates these on all other occasions when it occurs in the New Testament, with the one possible exception of I Corinthians 14:26..." (Our Note: this would agree with the idea that in Corinth they were singing the self-composed songs of paganism which didn't need both mind and spirit engaged.)
It should also be noted that the Septuagint also takes a dim view of most musical passages while other versions can be distorted to see God giving approval. For instance in the Septuagint or LXX:
|
You strum away on your harps like David and improvise on musical instruments. Amos 6:5 NIV |
"who excel in the sound of musical instruments; they have regarded them as abiding, not as fleeting pleasure." Amos 6:5 LXX |
Without knowing that Amos was condemning the marzeah which was a festival with and for the dead ancestor or god we might see him condemning the idleness and not the music. However, Jesus read the LXX and would have known that Amos was condemning religious festivals which had no abiding value. At the same time they neglected the Scriptures. This symbol of music and an idle disregard of the Word are common themes in the notes which follow. Jesus would call the "vain worship" at best because they invented and improvized and it was, therefore, by the rules of men.
Justin's Dialog with Trypho the Jew translates this passage--
- Who applaud at the sound of the musical instruments;
- they reckon them as stable, and not as fleeting.
- Who drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments,
- but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph.
Christ came that we might "anoint" ourselves with His words so that we might teach or educate and grieve or admonish one another with the melody (grinding to bits) left in the human heart.
Music, here, is used as a metaphor for those who anoint themselves with wine, music, and effeminate perfume because they see their external body as the lasting part and neglect the spirit or mind.
Vincent's: Word Studies Of The New Testament, Vol. III, pg. 269-270 "...The noun psalm (Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16; I Cor. 14:26), which is etymologically akin to this verb (psallo in I Cor. 14:15 DEM), is used in the New Testament of a religious song in general, having the character of an Old Testament psalm...
"Some think that the verb has here its original signification of singing with an instrument. This is its dominant sense in the Septuagint, and both Basil and Gregory of Nyssa define a psalm as implying instrumental accompaniment...
"But neither Basil nor Ambrose nor Chrysostom, in their panegyrics upon music, mention instrumental music, and Basil expressly condemns it. Bingham dismisses the matter summarily, and cites Justin Martyr as saying expressly that instrumental music was not used in the Christian Church. The verb is used here in the general sense of singing praise."
CONEYBEARE AND HOWSON: "Throughout the whole passage there is a contrast implied between the Heathen and the Christian practice, q.d. When you meet, let your enjoyment consist, not in fulness of wine, but fulness of the Spirit; let your songs be, not the drinking-songs of heathen feasts, but psalms and hymns; and their accompaniment, not the music of the lyre, but the melody of the heart; while you sing them to the praise. not of Bacchus or Venus, but of the Lord Jesus Christ." (P.775, n. 5.)
Ephesians 5:19 enjoins: (1) Speaking TO ONE ANOTHER in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs; (2) singing (adontes) and making melody (psallontes, psalming) with your heart TO THE LORD. (One is done with voice and lips, the other with the heart.)
Playing and singing or praising was a warrior's practice.
The bow, bow string and arrow "twangs." When, you hear this it is not "music" but you look down to see where the arrow "made melody right into your bleeding heart."
P. Ovidius Naso, Metamorphoses See more by Clicking Below.
- As wretched as my case doth seeme, yet have I left me mo
- Than thou for all thy happinesse canst of thine owne account.
- Even after all these corses yet I still doe thee surmount.
- Upon the ende of these same wordes the twanging of the string
- In letting of the Arrow flie was clearly heard: which thing
- Made every one save Niobe afraide. Hir heart was so
- With sorrowe hardned, that she grew more bolde. Hir daughters tho
- Were standing all with mourning weede and hanging haire before
- Their brothers coffins. One of them in pulling from the sore
- An Arrow sticking in his heart, sanke downe upon hir brother
PSALLO: From psao, to rub, to wipe; to handle, to touch (Thayer): Liddell and Scott.- I. To touch sharply, to pluck, pull. twitch;
- to twang the bow-string;
- to send a shaft twanging from the bow;
- so, schoinos miltophures psallomene a carpenter's red line,
- which is twitched and then let suddenly go, so as to leave a mark. II.
To play a stringed instrument with the fingers, not with the plectron.
Later, to sing to the harp,sing, N.T.
The connection is that the BOW was a musical type instrument which SHOT OUT ARROWS. It is a fact that they also spoke of SHOOTING OUT HYMNS. Therefore, there is NO musical content in Psallo and that is why Paul said "keep it in your mind."
Psallo CANNOT include an instrument because the Greek word psalmODIA meant to sing with a harp. A harpIST or fluteIST defines other words and the musical performers claimed to be sorcerers but were known as parasites.
THAYER: Shows that psalms, hymns and spiritual songs are not necessarily different:
(Sym. humnos, psalmos, ode: ode is the generic term;
psal. and hum. are specific,
the former designating a song which took its general character from the O.T. 'Psalms' (although not restricted to them, see 1 Cor.14:15,26), the latter a song of praise. (Note: these were also songs of ecstasy sung with the mind disengaged)
"While the leading idea of psalm is a musical accompaniment,
and that If hum. praise to God, ode is the general word for song, whether accompanied or unaccompanied, whether of praise or on any other subject.
Thus it was quite possible for the same song to be at once psalmos, humnos and ode (Bp. Lightft. on Col-3:16). See Trench, Syn, Syn. sec. lxxviii.)
Thayer: a. To pluck off, pull out: the hair. b. To cause to vibrate by touching, to twang; spec. to touch or strike the chord, to touch the strings of a musical instrument, to play the harp, etc.;
The idea is not to "make music" because Psallo is restricted to touching or yanking ONLY with the fingers.
Sept. for zamar and much oftener for nagan; to sing to the music of the harp; (Condemned: see below)
In the N.T. to sing a hymn, to celebrate the praise of God in song, Jas.5:13; Eph.5:13; Rom.15:9; 1 Cor.14:15 .
Evolution of Psallo: 1. From psao, to rub, to wipe; to handle, to touch. 2. To touch sharply. 3. To pluck off, or pull out, as the hair. 4. To pull, twitch, as a carpenter's line. 5. To twang the bow-string. 6. To send an arrow twanging from the bow. 7. To twang the strings of a musical instrument. 8. To play the harp or other stringed instrument with the fingers. 9. To sing to the accompaniment of the harp or other stringed instrument.
10. To sing (whether accompanied or not,
and in Christian context it was not in New Testament times and for some centuries later).
11. Currently used of chanting
This word is derived from the word yavw (psao), which in ancient Greek originally meant to rub, to wipe; to handle, touch (Thayer references Aeschylus, d. 456 BC). .. later in "Classical Greek", "psallo" meant to pluck off, to cause to vibrate by touching, to twang (ref. to Euripades, d. 406 BC), or to touch, to strike the chord, to twang the strings (ref. Aristotle, d. 322 BC), to play on a stringed instrument, to play the harp (ref. Aristotle again, Aratus, 270 BC, and Plutarch*, d. AD 120). * Other writers of Classical Greek contemporary with the N.T. age also used the word in reference to the playing of an instrument (Strabo, Josephus, Lucian),
but scholars universally recognize a clear distinction between the "Classical Greek" of these and other writers,
and the "Koine Greek" in which the N.T. is written.
Thus Thayer makes a distinction between the Classical Greek usage of "psallo," and the Koine use of the word and says, "In the N.T. to sing a hymn, to celebrate the praises of God in song."
Romans 15:9 (immediate context: Rom. 15:7-12)
. . . and for the Gentiles to glorify God for His mercy; as it is written, "Therefore
- I will give praise to Thee among the Gentiles,
- And I will sing to Thy name."
"Psallo is best translated by chant, not sing. The Greeks sharply distinguish
chanting (psalmodia) from singling (tragoudi).
The first is a sacred (chanting or speaking) activity; the second, a secular (singing) one.
"In English, unfortunately, the distinction is not sharp, and the word singing is frequently employed to refer to the sacred activity of chanting.
A Greek would never,
- never say tragoudo (I sing),
- instead of psallo;
the two terms have connotations and associations which are worlds apart --
- the first is related to the earthly realm,
- the second to the heavenly."
(Letter to James D. Bales of Harding University, September 22, 1959, from Constantine Cavarnos, of the Institute for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, 113 Gilbert Road, Belmont 78, Massachusetts.)
"Your letter to the St. Anthony Guild concerning the Greek word psallo has been referred to me, an editor of the new English Catholic version of the Old Testament. You ask the question:
'Does the use of mechanical instruments of music inhere in the Greek word Psallo as used in the New Testament?'
The answer is no.
The meaning of this word in the New Testament usage is simply 'I sing a sacred hymn in honor of God."' (Letter to Dr. James D. Bales from Father Stephen Hartdegen, C.P.M., Holy Name College, Franciscan House of Studies, 14th & Shepherd Streets, NE, Washington 17, DC)
Arndt and Gingrich on Psallo: "Abs sing/praise Js.5:13, M-M."
"Continually I stand amazed at the scholarship in the Arndt-Gingrich lexicon. It is my understanding that under the direction of Dr. Gingrich you are now revising that lexicon. On the word psallo, since Thayer, Green, Abbott-Smith, etc., limit the New Testament meaning to sing praises, I would appreciate the reasoning that brought Doctors Arndt and Gingrich to insert "to the accompaniment of the harp" in relationship to Romans 15:19; Ephesians 5:19; and 1 Corinthians 14:15. Further, why is the phrase excluded in relationship to James 5:13. (Hugo McCord to Dr. Frederick W. Danker)
Response: It was so kind of you to take the time to make your inquiry regarding the word psallo. I see by comparison with Bauer's first edition that the editors of A.-G. have incorporated the
- obvious Old Testament meaning
- into the metaphorical usage of the New Testament.
Bauer did not make this mistake, and we will be sure to correct it in the revision. I doubt whether the archaeologists can establish the use of the harp in early Christian services.
The revision of the Arndt/Gingrich lexicon gives this definition of psallo: . . . This process continued until
- psallo in Modern Greek means 'sing' exclusively . . .
- with no reference to instrumental accompaniment . . .
Moulton and Milligan: "Psallo, 'play on a harp,' but in the NT, as in Jas-5:13 = "sing a hymn."
We are forced to contend over words when words are used to force God to say what He never said but rather refuted throughout the Bible's reference to music.
Don't get personal: this is not about what you are allowed to do. That is not my job. It is about honestly handling the Words of Christ the Spirit. If we mishandle the word psallo then our conclusions will be wrong and the division always created over music between "internal" thinkers and "external" thinkers will never end.
Kenneth Sublett Click for more details. We will see that all Bible properly read and all of the external witnesses prove that worship singing was without instruments.
Counter added 10/31/04 12.01.07 1213
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