# History of Psalm Singing



## Travis Fentiman (Apr 23, 2016)

Friends,


Here is a collection of resources on the history of Psalm singing throughout all the ages of God's people (up through the 1800's).

The History of Psalm Singing​
There are subsections on the Early Church, Calvin and Geneva, the French Reformed, the English and American Puritans, etc.

I hope it may be a blessing to you.


‘If a history of the use of the Psalter could be written, it would be a history of the spiritual life of the Church.’

A.F. Kirkpatrick, 1905​
For such a book, see Prothero’s _The Psalms in Human Life_ linked on the webpage.


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## Dekybo (Apr 23, 2016)

Thank you for the resource.


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## Cymro (Apr 23, 2016)

Thanks for another helpful tool.


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## Guido's Brother (Apr 24, 2016)

Under "The Dutch Church," you could also add this item, Rev. H. De ****'s Case Against Hymns.


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## Travis Fentiman (Apr 24, 2016)

Guido's Brother said:


> Under "The Dutch Church," you could also add this item, Rev. H. De ****'s Case Against Hymns.



Thank you much Wes for the Dutch article. I will certainly put it up shortly. Is the J.A. Wanliss that helped edit and annotate it, Elder James Wanliss of the Free Church in Greenville, SC? I am friends with him. If so, what involvement did he have in editing the document?

Thank you much for making this work by DeCock available!

And for the others who have written above: Thank you much for the encouragement; it is refreshing to this weary laborer.

Blessings.


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## Guido's Brother (Apr 24, 2016)

Travis Fentiman said:


> Thank you much Wes for the Dutch article. I will certainly put it up shortly. Is the J.A. Wanliss that helped edit and annotate it, Elder James Wanliss of the Free Church in Greenville, SC? I am friends with him. If so, what involvement did he have in editing the document?



Yes, one and the same. James did most of the heavy-lifting with the translation. I did most of the editing and took care of the footnotes.


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## Travis Fentiman (Apr 24, 2016)

Guido's Brother said:


> James did most of the heavy-lifting with the translation.



He knows Dutch?? The things I never knew!


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## Travis Fentiman (Apr 24, 2016)

If it is of further interest to anyone:

Some of the most beautiful and precious quotes of praise have been attributed to the Psalms though Church history. Here is a collection of such quotes that will inflame your soul to sing to the Lord with even more grace in your heart!

Eulogistic Quotes on the Psalms through History​
(I also added this new page as a subsection to the page in the original post)


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## Guido's Brother (Apr 25, 2016)

Travis Fentiman said:


> Guido's Brother said:
> 
> 
> > James did most of the heavy-lifting with the translation.
> ...



He's from South Africa and therefore knows Afrikaans, which is close enough.


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## richardnz (Apr 28, 2016)

I had a look through the historical articles on the site and I think some of them need work to make them accurate. I have found that Bushell is not reliable on church history. I suspect he has quoted earlier writers without checking their sources.
After reading through here are some critical notes I made:
The Council of Laodicea was around AD 363-365, not 343-381. “No psalms composed by private individuals nor any uncanonical books may be read in the church, but only the Canonical Books of the Old and New Testaments.” (Canon 59).
Canon 59 concerns only what was read in the church, not what was sung, so is not much help in defining psalmody. Canon 15 says “No others shall sing in the Church, save only the canonical singers, who go up into the ambo and sing from a book.” Binnie says that common practice was congregational singing until Pope Gregory made it the domain of professional singers in the late 500s, but maybe the practice started earlier in some areas. This was not an ecumenical synod, with only about 30 local clerics, so is no representative guide to common practice.
The Council of Braga (563) was even smaller with only 8 clerics.
“Moreover, in the first Council of Braga, held A. D. 563, it was ordained, in response to memorials from certain quarters, that no poetic composition be sung in the Church except the Psalms of the sacred canon, ” Ut extra psalmos vel canoni-carum Scripturarum Novi et Veteris Testamenti nihil podice compositum in ecdesia psallatur.” It is true that this decree seems to allow the use of other songs than those contained in the Psalter, yet it plainly debars the use of any songs in worship except those contained in the Word of God. It is observable also that, according to this ordinance the singing must be limited to poetic portions of Scripture, not extended to any part of the Bible whatsoever.”The Psalter in the Early Church by The Rev. Jas. Harper, D. D., LL. D. (1891)

With such a small number of participants all we can say is that a small part of the Church believed that all worship songs should be drawn only from scripture, and maybe others thought the same. This does not provide us with much evidence that the early church sang only the Psalms of David.
The Council of Chalcedon (451), more than 500 clerics, the 4th ecumenical council, did confirm the earlier synods, (except for the 449 Council of Ephesus).

Canon 1 

We have judged it right that the canons of the Holy Fathers made in every synod even until now, should remain in force.

But there is no deliberation on the issue of psalm-singing so it does not tell us any more than we know from the two small synods, which is not much.
Second Council of Nicaea 787
All that the quote says is that clerics were required to know the Psalter well. There is nothing about singing. This was not a good Council anyway because they approved of idolatry. 
This Council does not tell us anything about the practice of EP.

Fourth Council of Toledo 663

This Council was another regional one (Spain only). 

Bushell quotes Smith. “The Council of Braga which decreed that poetic compositions were not to be used in the divine service of praise. The fourth synod of Toledo in the seventh century reiterated the same prescription.¹”
¹ William S. Smith, Musical Aspects of the New Testament
I think Smith has got his wires crossed somewhere. Canon 13 says that anyone who rejects the singing of hymns, such as those composed by Hilary or Ambrose, should be excommunicated. (!) It is hard to imagine a more militant group of hymn-singers!

Canon 14 says that the Canticle of the Three Young Men should be sung on Sundays and feast days.

“A Handbook for Liturgical Studies” (Chupungo) p188 says, “ One of the clearest objectives seen in the liturgical canons of the Fourth Council of Toledo was to eliminate some of the peculiarities of the Braga see...they rejected hymns and other poetic texts”.

This is what I mean by how unreliable Bushell is because he does not check his sources. It should be clear that Braga, singing only scripture songs and rejecting hymns, was a peculiarity in Spain and offers no help in determining what was typical in the church at large. Similarly the 4th Council of Toledo only tells us about Spain, and tells us that that the majority were militant hymn-singers. 
This does not provide us with any evidence that the early church sang only the Psalms of David, rather it speaks to the contrary.

Eighth Council of Toledo 653

No one henceforth shall be promoted to any ecclesiastical dignity who does not perfectly know the whole Psalter.” Again, this does not establish anything regarding what was sung.


Maxwell “An Outline of Christian Worship” pg 17, 27

The point of these quotes from Maxwell I assume is to show that the liturgies contain instructions to sing “psalms” and nothing else, but if you read further, page 17 and 31 shows that part of the liturgy is to sing the “Sanctus” which is a hymn. Pg32 “Then the angels' hymn, glory to God in the highest was sung in its scriptural form, followed by the “Hosanna” and Benedictus Qui Venit.

Hosanna to the Son of David
Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord
God is the Lord and hath appeared unto us
Hosanna in the highest “

In summary I do not think it is accurate to say, “The only things sung were the Psalms”.

On Divine Psalmody by Agobard of Lyons (c.836)
Agobard is arguing for scripture songs not just the psalms of David.


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## Travis Fentiman (Apr 29, 2016)

Richard,


Thank you much for the notes brother. I was aware of a number of the things you mentioned, though some of it I was unaware of. I have updated the webpage with a number of your suggestions and made some further qualifications, though some of your points I do not have time or desire to debate.

Do you have a English link or reference for the Fourth Council of Toledo 663 so that I can look it over?

Thanks brother!


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## richardnz (May 3, 2016)

Travis Fentiman said:


> Richard,
> 
> 
> Thank you much for the notes brother. I was aware of a number of the things you mentioned, though some of it I was unaware of. I have updated the webpage with a number of your suggestions and made some further qualifications, though some of your points I do not have time or desire to debate.
> ...



Travis, I am sure that you want your site to be good quality, but when referring to historical sources it is difficult to maintain a high standard. 
I cannot point you to a English translation for the Fourth Council, but I have found that you can get close by using schoolboy Latin plus an online Latin-English translator on the Latin link:-
http://www.benedictus.mgh.de/quellen/chga/chga_046t.htm
There is an English summary at:-
http://www.biblicalcyclopedia.com/T/toledo-councils-of.html

This article calls the fourth council the eighth but safer to go off the dates, ie 633 council. There seems to be no convention for numbering the councils, which initially confused me.

One other note. On the quote from James Good there is a sentence which I have underlined that seems to be missing:-

James I. Good, The Origin of the Reformed Church in Germany (1887), ‘Final Conclusion’, p. 453
“The Reformed in many places closed organs, and introduced the singing of the psalms into the churches. Many of the old hymn books contained nothing but psalms, although others added hymns to the psalms. But the psalms constituted the basis and center of the book, and not the church year, which was generally unnoticed in the hymn books. These psalms sustained the Reformed in persecution and linked their hearts more fully to God’s Word.”
I firmly believe that it is worth the effort of checking original sources. I have been surprised at how many Reformed writers have quoted inaccurately on the subject of the history of worship. I do not know why this is, but it has happened often enough that I usually check the source if I can. The accuracy of quotations is only one problem. Another is the conclusions that are drawn from the facts.
To illustrate my point consider the following:-
Bushell is clearly uncomfortable with the fact that Calvin sang the Apostle's Creed. Bushell's section on Calvin using the Apostle's Creed says that the Geneva Psalter never included a hymn. He then admits that there were scripture songs, but omits the fact that the Ten Commandments were sung, which is not a scripture song. He tries to deal with the problem that Calvin sang the Apostle's Creed by suggesting that Calvin was caught up in a common misconception as outlined by Schaff. (The quote from Schaff is on p37, not p22 as Bushell asserts.) It is clear that Calvin did not regard the Creed as scripture and yet sang it, a fact which Bushell describes as “unfortunate”. Calvin does not fit Bushell's mold of an exclusive psalmist. Calvin seems very close, in terms of practice, but not quite as close as Bushell would like.

“The Apostles’ Creed was thus seen by Calvin as having Apostolic sanction, if not authority, and as deriving directly from the Apostolic age, if not from the hands of the Apostles themselves. It was in his view a creed that had the honor and respect attending its use in the Church for some 1,500 years. Should we then be surprised to find that Calvin included a metrical version of such a creed in his psalter? It is unfortunate that he did so, but we can certainly see reasons for his having done so, which ultimately have nothing to do with whether the Apostles’ Creed is inspired. Certainly there is a wide difference between the inclusion of such a creed in the psalter and the inclusion of contemporary hymns, which is something that Calvin never did…. the final and complete version of the Genevan Psalter (1562) did not contain a metrical version of the Apostles’ Creed. Whatever reasons Calvin had for including the creed in the first place, he evidently changed his mind.” (Michael Bushell “Songs of Zion”)

I think Bushell puts a good case for why Calvin held the Apostles Creed in great respect, and he is correct in claiming that the Apostles Creed was not in the 1562 Psalter. (He does not mention its inclusion of the Ten Commandments). My concern is that he concludes from this that Calvin changed his mind. This is certainly a possibility. But Sherman Isbell, quoting Garside, has said, Calvin was constrained by the Council in Geneva, and so the Strasbourg Psalter was more representative of Calvin's thought. So Isbell is dealing with the same facts, but drawing different conclusions.

A similar problem occurs with recounting the history of the Dutch synods dealing with what should be sung in worship. The early synods, 1578, 1581, 1586, seem to be taking a strong line on restricting worship to the 150 Psalms. But the 1618 Synod adds versifications of the Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, the Twelve Articles of Faith, and the Songs of Mary, Zacharias and Simeon. When I first read these I thought that it showed that the churches were moving toward hymnody. If you read the following links a different picture emerges. 

http://heidelblog.net/2014/09/the-long-struggle-to-reform-dutch-reformed-worship/

http://www.clarionmagazine.ca/archives/2003/105-132_v52n5.pdf

The picture is of decreasing hymnody, which you do not get from the synod decisions. Again, it is easy to draw a conclusion from a few facts, and that conclusion may not be right.

Even the use of the word “Psalter” needs careful checking. The word sounds as if it is a book containing only the 150 Psalms. But the Genevan Psalter and others contained other songs. Similarly a “psalm” can have a more or less restricted meaning. Working out what the writer meant always needs investigation. I hope you can make a good quality list of historical quotes but it looks like a lot of work to me.

Your history of the Dutch and Dutch-origin churches finishes with the CRC in 1932. You could note that there are churches in the Netherlands as well as HNRC, NRC, FRC and PRC in the USA that still have church orders that contain the original 1618 Synod list of 150 Psalms plus Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, the Twelve Articles of Faith, and the Songs of Mary, Zacharias and Simeon. There are minor variations from the list, but most would consider these churches to be psalm-singing churches who have maintained the 500 year-old psalm-singing tradition of Calvin.


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## Travis Fentiman (May 4, 2016)

Richard,


Thank you again brother for the many helpful notes. I updated and added a few things therefrom to the webpage, and will make a few more changes as I am able.

Do be it noted that on the webpage I am not trying to make all of Church history to be exclusive psalmody, but to document were dominant psalmody has occurred. I have tried to be as honest and careful as my time, resources and energy have allowed. 

While I appreciate your further notes and researches, the webpage is not meant to be a dissertation on the subject, but simply a collection of resources, that, if one wants to look further into, they can. And of course, different writers are going to disagree on certain historical things (for instance Bushell and Isbell), and the reader will have to make an informed judgment accordingly, or not.

I agree with most of the background you have further elucidated on, and never intended (or did) say otherwise. For instance, neither I nor Bushell ever said that Calvin and Geneva was exclusive psalmody. do note that the 10 Commandments, while not a song, are inspired, and are still not a 'hymn' as most people (including Bushell) mean by the word, namely an uninspired construct.

While it is very true that councils often do not describe a uniform state of practice current at the time, precisely because they are trying to make the practice uniform, and hence do not always represent the popular opinion or practice of the people (though aren't usually too far off from it), such was also the case in the French Reformed Church, yet such councils do reflect the majority vote of what the officer of the Church think should be the case at that time.

Regarding the Fourth Council of Toledo:

While I am not a early church historian, in Article 14, the song of the three young men of Daniel in the Apocrypha, I would guess, would probably have been considered something akin to a Bible song rather than a man-composed hymn by man's authority, and hence this article would be in line with the Council of Braga, allowing for such Bible songs of the Old and New Testaments (the apocrypha sometimes having been considered part of the Old Testament). 

My school boy Latin skills are not the best, but the english webpage translation of article thirteen seems to conclude:

'Reject it, then the hymn composed by men whom every public or private office...'

A good translation of those few paragraphs are needed before I would feel comfortable actually knowing what it says. 

If you would like to write a dissertation on the various nuances of the content of divine praises through Church history, I will be glad to put it up on the website. 


Blessings brother.


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