The Seedy Legacy of Rock Music II

Just because the drum is used by the salvation army does not mean it is a scriptural instrument... or that God approves of it

 

It has not be demonstrated that God has an "Instruments that I disapprove of" list lying around somewhere, let alone that drums are on it.

 

Only certain drums.

Again y'all have to remember that although Aaron et al think they are basing their narrow definition of "Church Music" on the scriptures, it really is just a rampant expansion of the same old association argument. Hence, timpani=godly, while trap set=worldly

The scripture could cut both ways, I could just as easily argue that the musical style promoted and financed by Godless European monarchs is "Un-Christian" and should not be mixed with sacred words. Some actually made this argument at the time.

Not that I think Wagner is the great for a Worship service, but my style considerations are driven by association and appropriateness, in addition to my preferences culturally, not necessarily scripture. Only the general principles are there, not specific "thou shalt not use a Jews-harp in corporate worship" statements. I at least am willing to admit that.

 

Wow. I think we can sum it up this entire multi-year argument right here. There seems to be two sides. Those who believe the primary distinction between Christianity and paganism is...

1)the line of demarcation between the holy and the profane
2)faith in Jesus Christ.

 

I'll go with number two myself, and I'lll bang a drum to that effect

 

Dear Lady Eagle,

The tambourine is one of the many frame drums found around the world. See: http://www.rhythmweb.com/frame/index.html

Also, from the dictionary:

tambourine:
n : a shallow drum with a single drumhead and with metallic disks in the sides

Why does the idea of a drumhead being played with the hands or sticks upset you so?

In Christ,

Dale

 

Dear Lady Eagle,

The tambourine is one of the many frame drums found around the world. See: http://www.rhythmweb.com/frame/index.html

Also, from the dictionary:

tambourine:
n : a shallow drum with a single drumhead and with metallic disks in the sides

Why does the idea of a drumhead being played with the hands or sticks upset you so?

In Christ,

Dale

 

Dear Aaron,

You wrote: " quote:
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Originally posted by tinytim:
Especially when people say that drums are evil because they came from Africa.
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I have never heard anyone say this. This certainly needs to be corrected. Could you link us to a post? "

I'll do you one better...

How about Dial the Truth ? http://www.av1611.org/


From: http://www.av1611.org/cqguide.html

"THE DRUM

The Bible lists many kinds of instruments: Psalms 150:3-5 says:

3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet: praise him with the psaltery and harp.
4 Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments and organs.
5 Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals. Psalms 150:3-5

With all the many references to musical instruments, there is one instrument that is NEVER mentioned! The DRUM! Why is that? The drum was a very common instrument in Egypt and the lands around Israel. And yet the DRUM is NEVER mentioned in a King James Bible.

Did the Lord just forget to include the DRUM or is there another reason?

Is it because — drums are associated with voodoo, shamanism, paganism and magic rituals?

"[Drums] represents the beat of the heart and is played to summon up magic powers." (Miranda Bruce-Mitford, The Illustrated Book of Signs & Symbols, DK Publishing, 1996 p.80)

"The shaman was the original 'long hair', the first rock star draped in leather, dancing POSSESSED to a rhythm banged out on A DRUM." (Danny Sugerman, Appetite for Destruction, p. 208)

In Siberia, in northern Asia, drums are used in shamanic rituals to heal people. It is believed that the shaman can communicate with the spirit world THROUGH DRUMMING. (Louise Tythacott, Musical Instruments, Thomas Learning, 1995, p. 37)

"Pagan dances and rituals are always accompanied by the incessant BEAT of DRUMS. Rhythm plays a major role in these demonic activities." (Hart, Lowell Satan's Music Exposed, Salem Kirban Inc., 1980 p.71)

Robert Palmer is a contributing editor to Rolling Stone and other rock magazines. Palmer has also taught courses in music at Yale, and many other universities. Palmer was the chief advisor for the highly acclaimed "History of Rock 'n' Roll" that aired on public television. Palmer, an advocate and lover of rock music, is among the leading authorities on rock music. Here's what Palmer says about rock and the drum:

"Bata drums [drums used in voodoo], sacred to the Yoruba people of Nigeria and Cuba: Their push and pull provided a template for the inner rhythms of rock and roll." (Palmer, Robert Rock & Roll An Unruly History, Harmony Books, New York, 1995 p.46)
"The idea that certain RHYTHM patterns or sequences serve as conduits for spiritual energies, linking individual human consciousness with the gods, is basic to traditional African religions, and to African-derived religions throughout the Americas. And whether we're speaking historically or musicologically, the fundamental riffs, licks, bass figures, and drum rhythms that make rock and roll can ultimately be traced back to African music of a primarily spiritual or ritual nature. In a sense, rock and roll is a kind of 'voodoo' . . . ," (Robert Palmer, Rock & Roll, An Unruly History, Harmony Books, New York, 1995 p.53)

Palmer describes how drums are used in "voodoo" possession — and the same drum patterns are part of the basics of rock 'n' roll and CCM!

"Bata drummers tap out their toques, or rhythm patterns, like signals to the realm of the gods, inviting and enticing them to come on down and mount or POSSESS their horses, or devotees. . .The specific drum patterns or toques include some riffs and licks basic to the rock and roll vocabulary." (Palmer, Robert Rock & Roll An Unruly History, Harmony Books, New York, 1995 p.62)
Here's an episode from the occult, new-age magazine, New Age Journal, describing the "possessing" power of drums. Notice, even the devotees of the occult stay away from those drums:

"I remembered a conversation I'd once had in Cuba with a reporter from The New York Times, 'Stay away from those drums,' he had told me, referring to the ones said to call down the gods in Santeria's sacred ceremonies. 'If I ever really gave in to those DRUMS, my life would change in ways I'm not prepared to take on,' he had added. I knew what he was talking about. It was all there in the drumming. Listen long enough, and some energy field, some kind of interconnectedness, became palpable. I was hungry for those drums. Yet I still ran from them." (A Shaman's Story, by Elizabeth Hanly (A Vodoun priest leads the author on a journey of understanding, New Age Journal, March/April 1997 pp.56-57)
Little Richard, the self-professed "architect of rock ’n roll", readily admits Satan’s control and influence in his life and rock music:

"My true belief about Rock ‘n’ Roll — is this: I believe this kind of music is demonic . . . A lot of the BEATS in music today are taken from voodoo, from the voodoo DRUMS." (Charles White, The Life and Times of Little Richard, p. 197)
Danny Sugerman, an authority on rock music, and author of several books on rock, writes in Appetite for Destruction:

"The shaman was the original 'long hair', the first rock star draped in leather, dancing possessed to a rhythm banged out on a DRUM. . . To these people, communication with the gods was synonymous with DRUMS . . .the body can become the conduit for a deity, a deity not necessarily the same sex as the worshiper, and DRUMS are the catalyst for the whole process. The trance of the RHYTHM then begets the hysteria, which begets what Westerners simplistically call 'possession'." (Danny Sugerman, Appetite for Destruction, p.208, 181)
David Tame writes in The Secret Power of Music:

"Today's DRUMMER differs but little from the shaman in his incessant beating out of a rhythm, and likewise often enters into a form of trance while performing." (The Secret Power of Music, David Tame, p. 199)
The DRUM has always been associated with the paganism and the devil. In fact, a little more than a hundred years ago, drums were forbidden (exy th for the military) in America!

"The arrival of African slaves has had one of the strongest influences on North American music. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, millions of African people were taken as slaves to the U.S. to work on plantations in the South. They brought many of their own traditions with them but were forbidden to play their DRUMS." (Louise Tythacott, Musical Instruments, Thomas Learning, 1995, p.19)
Do you know why New Orleans is the voodoo capital of the U.S, and also the birthplace of jazz? Because drumming was forbidden in the U.S. – except in New Orleans!

"This was especially true in New Orleans. African-based DRUMMING, singing, and dancing, discouraged and repeatedly banned elsewhere in North America, had flourished there since the early eighteenth century. This unique heritage has informed and enlivened New Orleans music ever since, as well as distinguishing it from the rest of American musical culture, making the city an ideal incubator for a nonmainstream music as rhythmically oriented as rock and roll. (Palmer, Robert Rock & Roll An Unruly History, Harmony Books, New York, 1995 p.21)
When the first blacks from Africa were converted to Christianity they knew the power and evil influence of DRUMS. And the converted blacks strictly forbid the use of drums! They referred to the drums as "the Devil's drum". (Martha Bayles, Hole in Our Soul: The Loss of Beauty and Meaning in American Popular Music, p. 138)

"Historically blacks had drawn the line between particular instruments and practices; They permitted tambourines, for instance, but not DRUMS." (Martha Bayles, Hole in Our Soul: The Loss of Beauty and Meaning in American Popular Music, p. 130)
One simple guideline for Christian music is NO DRUMS!

CHRISTIAN MUSIC SHOULD FEED THE SPIRIT — NOT THE FLESH!

CHRISTIAN MUSIC SHOULD EMPHAZIE THE MELODY — NOT THE BEAT!

CHRISTIAN MUSICIANS SHOULD BE DEDICATED TO THE LORD — NOT WORLDLY"

How about David Cloud's Way of Life ?

http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/fbns-index/musicfbns.htm

And YOUR posting on 01/06 in the "Seedy" thread:

" quote:
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Originally posted by tinytim:
If you do not believe that drums are pagan, then good. I agree with you, drums are not pagan.
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Now this is a different statement. Drums as primary instruments are better suited to paganism than to Christianity. "

In Christ,

Dale

 

Thanks, Dale. That's a very good article.

 

Dear Lady Eagle,

You're very welcome! Glad to help!

In Christ,

Dale

 

great article on drums, Dale

 

Dear Standing Firm in Christ,

I DO NOT BELIEVE IN OR SUPPORT the article on drums from Dial-the-Truth Ministries at all!

I quoted at length from that article to answer Aaron's retort regarding drums & paganism,including his post in this thread.

In Christ,

Dale

 

Aaron wrote:

Funny; it's in many hymnals; and in Churches that shun "worldly music"!

The Church just used the style that was popular in the culture it came from. And with the making of that culture the new chosen people (based on heredity combined with works; just like Christ-rejecting Israel in the NT!) The Church used its power of doctrine to proclaim the culture, and thus the music it produced as "Sacred", and everything else was judged "holy and profane" by that standard. Like you today, nobody ever showed that it was really so, except for going around the cycle of "those heathens over there use their style for evil, and look at all the righteousness in our society, so God only accepts our style". Once again; repeating all the mistakes of NT era Israel. (Who should have learned from the NT record and the Gospel!?)

those are particular sins, that those styles may not have come in handy for those sins, but those aren't the only sins.

And this is the whole fallacy! "military discipline" is assumed to be always good, so let's have nothing but marching rhythms only in church, to get everyone in line, and keep "sin" down. (That's what the arguments used basically boil down to, and if you don't believe this, then once again, search Cloud's site. You can get even more clear examples of anti-Africa rhteoric from Mike Paulson's site). But we see, it was used for evil, and trying to use it that way in Church is an unbiblical humanly devised method of control, and likewise smacks of evil!

 

And he knows this...how, exactly?

Now Playing: Mountain Heart - "Mountain Heart"

 

"Revisionist"? Talk ablout playing a "card". That is just a memorized "conservative" response for when your assumptions of history are exposed, and you have no more answers.
If that is revisionist, then where did the Church get the style from? A sheet down from Heaven? That type of thinking (that the music was so heavenly compared to other styles in the world) is the real revisionism. Once again, when you are accustomed to a grossly revised history, setting it straight will appear to be revision!

You think he has bad points? What are those? I guess something he holds that you don't ascribe to, like KJV-Onlyism, right? In any case, all that stuff is related, and his whole premise is how the old time fundamentalist church did everything right, and the modern church is doing everything wrong, so it seems to me that all hs teachings stand or fall together.

Here we go on the cycle again. "God just doesn't like it", with no proof from anywhere in God's Word. And this made a separate criterion from the "association" factor of shamanism. (though "better suited for" is a very weak argument. They may have come in handy for that, but that doesn't mean they can't be removed from that context, any more than marching can be removed from an ungodly army).

And once again, you, who criticizes "revisionist history" still places man's own distorted account of history over God's account of history. Since the Fall, all of human society was a stronghold of Satan, for all of its history! Africa, Asia, Europe, and even the Middle East where God was directly dealing with Israel. No less than that was able to free even the very people of the covenant from sin and false worship. Africa was simply a neighboring land God was not dealing with yet, like all others outside Israel. Europe was just further away so in the OT you don't see as much of its culture, until the conquests begin, and even then, you weren't seeing the average people in their own land, just the conquering armies coming over. But if you went there, you would find the same false worship, though the music and movements to it might be more what you call "sober".
Still, false worship is false worship. And once again, even with God, Israel kept falling into it; and the WORST sin of theirs is when they tried to go the opposite extreme with rigid applications of the letter of the Law, and completely were ignorant of their own sin, and looked at only others as "sinners". (which ultimately led them to reject Christ!)
This is the same mistake people are making by calling Africa a particularly "Satan stronghold". This is why a "race card" still gets played. Because people still have not gotten over the same self-exalting fingerpointing of sin at other groups of people, and assumptions of the inherent righteousness of their own that led to the race problems of the past in the first place.
The Gospel is the solution to this. The Gospel tells us that all have sinned, and Christ is the solution to sin, not the "right" culture. (Remember who was justified between the Pharisee and the Publican. Else, as Horton puts it "The new gospel will be salvation of the chosen nation by moral clean-up and social legislation.")
But many don't even seem to know what the Gospel is. I think people need to learn that before they try to tell other Christians about what music God likes and dislikes.

 

I feel the love.

Yep, they kept falling into the idolatry of heathen nations, worshipping pagan gods, building groves to pagan gods, and participating in pagan god practices - all throughout the OT. Since they were slaves in Africa/Egypt, one would think they would know better.

God sending plagues to Egypt/Africa was not dealing with them? Killing the firstborn of the land was not dealing with them? Uhmmmm....

http://www.piney.com/MuEzWord.html

 

Having been born in Libya, I do know a little of Africa's geography, and LadyEagle is correct. Egypt is a part of Africa, it is just to the east of Libya.

And yes, the plagues were dealing with Pharaoh's refusing to let God's people go.