Authentic Worship...and the Place of Music (Harold Best)

"As to all of our music, we cannot afford to forget that the whole of all musical undertaking in temple, church, and basilica, is based on a three-in-one commandment, one sentence long, from the Psalms: 'Sing (play) to the Lord a new song.' We can also not afford to forget that it is the commandment, God's commandment, that is of prime importance. We must understand that when God commands, He means what He says, and that it is the commandment that makes music important and not the reverse.

"When we attempt to empower God's commands with something even as wonderful as music we have stepped over a forbidden line, for there is such a thing as musicolatry. We must recognize that as wonderful as music is, and as much as we lovingly strive for excellence in its practices, there are no such ephemera as a theological Mozart effect, or expose-yourself-to-the-masterpieces talk, or what-will-music-do-for-me talk. When music becomes of prime importance and God's work is conditioned upon, or made subject to it, we have already paid the entrance fee into the darkened complexities of religion posing as godliness, of Truth conditioned by beauty, and music taking on the qualities of sacrament, if not Transubstantiation."

-- from Dr. Harold Best, Former Dean of Wheaton Conservatory of Music and Author of "Music Through the Eyes of Faith." From an address entitled "Authentic Worship and Faithful Music-making" presented at the American Choral Directors Association.Location: Music & Worship Interest Session, ACDA National Convention, Chicago, Illinois, February 27, 1999