Post by Matthew JohnsonPost by r***@yahoo.comone of the questions that i had about this, was that the chants seem
rather technical.... maybe they aren't, but the music seems beyond the
capabilities of the average worshipper.
True. They were and are sung by choirs, not by congregations. And the Greek
tonal system is somewhat different from the modern scale. They teach how to sing
this in seminaries.
I was doing a little research into this subject the other day, having
found some sights documenting the 8 greek modes.
But honestly, I didn't get it just reading the info.
I am a musician, but not trained... I simply play by ear. I learned some
theory after I started playing, but I think that to understand the
concept of the modes, I would need someone to play examples, then I'd
likely grasp it. But just reading, nah.
Post by Matthew JohnsonPost by r***@yahoo.comBut I am thinking in terms of
my own worship experiences....
were songs like phos hilaron sung in unison by the early church?
It is a 6th century hymn. Of course, the original 6th century melody and harmony
has not survived.
From my reading, I believe the hymn must be older than that.
The orthodoxwiki article on it states that Basil the Great [330-379]
mentions the singing of the phos hilaron as a cherished tradition of
the church, already being considered old in his day.
Post by Matthew JohnsonBy the 4th century, we already have references in St. Cyril of Jerusalem's
Catechetical lectures to the way these were sung: by soloists.
BTW: why _do_ you assume that the early church would have had the whole
congregation singing these? They didn't have Xerox machines to hand out sheet
music.
Well, actually I was asking about how it was done, hopefully not
making assumptions.
My own background in evangelical protestant churches is of
congregational singing, so I immediately think in those terms. But
listening to the liturgies and chants, I noted that perhaps it was a
different scenario altogether.
However, there are a couple of things that make me think that the
early church did indeed sing congregationally:
Jesus and the disciples sang a hymn before they left the last supper
Paul and Silas sang hymns while they were in jail
Paul encourages singing in Col. 3 and Eph. 5
So the average believer was encouraged to sing and apparently knew
hymns themselves.
Origen in his letter against celsus mentions of the believers
"everyone prays and sings praises to God as he best can in his mother
tongue"
Pauls writing in Romans 15:6 was "so that with one heart and mouth you
may glorify..." seems to have been taken by Ignatius as singing all in
unison: "in unison you may sing with one voice".
One other thing as well... the oxyrhynchus hymn was unique in that it
was found with the musical notation intact, so the ancient melody
could be reconstructed. Listening to it, one understands it as an
actual hymn, not a chant. It has a recognizable melody and it is easy
to imagine early Christians singing it congregationally. It is not
adorned with technically difficult musical passages.
So given that the Lord and the apostles knew and sang hymns together,
songs they had most likely heard and sang in their worship services,
biblical injunctions to sing, and the witness of the fathers to
widespread singing of praises, it seems reasonable to accept that
there was congregational singing.
However I also found Eusebius had said in his Ecclesiastical History
18.1 that the ancient practice was "while one man sings in regular
rhythm the others listen silently and join in the refrains of the
hymn".
Most likely then chanting, responsorial singing and congregational
praise were all present in the church.
Post by Matthew JohnsonThere is also a lot we still do not know about how these were originally sung.
And a lot of conjecture passed off as solid conclusions:(
True. It is unfortunate, but other than the cantillation marks in the
masoretic text and the oxyryhnchus hymn, we have no clue as to what
the melodies might have been.
And if HaikVentouras theory turns out to be true, even then we can
only get the melody of the Hebrew psalms, we can't know what kind of
musical accompaniment or score existed in the ancient Hebrew worship.
If we take the Bible for what it says, The Lord, through the Holy
Spirit to David, ordained 4000 for playing musical instruments [1
Chronicles 23:5] which is a staggering number of musicians in an
orchestra in any age.
To what degree there was instrumentation, it's impossible to know now,
but there was apparently an awe inspiring spectacle of worship.
But again thanks for your input.
One of the things I am more and more interested and to be honest I
have to admire, is the Orthodox connection to the past... I really
appreciate the recognition that our faith is built on generations of
faithful adherence to the bible and the faithful work of God in the
saints before us.
Take care,
dave