The Art Of Hebrew Thinking

To the chief musician, a psalm of David Psalm 41:1 (Hebrew text)

Musician – In most of our English Bibles, this address is not counted as a verse.  That’s unfortunate because ignoring it sweeps aside a very important point about Hebrew thought.  David’s praise is directed to the chief musician (natsah).   We are confronted immediately by a particularly Hebraic point-of-view.  Natsah isn’t a noun.  It’s a verb that means “to lead, direct or oversee.”  In other words, this psalm (like so many others) is directed to someone whose purpose is his action.  His leading, directing and overseeing is the same as his existence.  What he does is who he is.  While the English translation suggests that this is a man who happens to be the chief musician or choir director, that isn’t the way the Hebrew expresses this thought.  In Hebrew, there is no difference at all between the leading, directing and overseeing and the one who leads, directs and oversees.  He is what he does.

Of course, this changes the way we understand “chief musician.”  All we really know is that this directing person leads.  But this implies something else, something that helps us recognize how different Hebrew thought is.  It implies that David’s words are much more like a musical score than they are like meditations.  You probably always recognized that most psalms are really hymns of praise.  We have the words today, but we no longer have the notes.  Nevertheless, we need to reflect for a moment on the fact that these were intended to be set to music.  Why is this important?  Because it tells us something about the way Hebrew works.

Greek thinking is like architecture.  Greek thought proceeds from one foundational proposition to another, building one step of an argument or examination on top of a previous step.  The aim of Greek thinking is to produce a well-ordered edifice of logical development, a construction that moves from point to point until an inevitable conclusion is reached.  The paradigm of Greek thought is geometry, a system that moves from a few basic but indubitable axioms toward a plethora of proofs based solely on logical deductions from those axioms.  Greeks build thought-buildings.  To do so, they spend an enormous amount of energy securing the foundations.

Hebrew thought isn’t about construction techniques.  Hebrew thought is like a great symphony where the simple theme is repeated again and again in artistic and creative variations.  Hebrew thought proceeds along the lines of emotional involvement, psychic development and artistic flair.  Hebrew thought is more like hearing the 1812 Overture than it is like examining Cantor’s theorem.  While Greek thought is about the abstract and eternal, Hebrew thought is about the realities of the present life-world.  Hebrew thought transports us into the midst of the orchestra where we are confronted, overwhelmed, bathed in the sheer beauty of the musicians’ movements.  The reason that David’s praises are to be set to music is that music is essential and integral to the Hebrew view of reality.  In Hebrew, you and I are players in this great symphony of God.  We are not sitting in the audience observing, measuring and critiquing the performance.  We are the performance.

The Gospels attempt to capture this present existential involvement as well.  When we read the words in English, the translators routinely convert present tense Greek verbs into past tense.  Why?  Because in English it isn’t proper grammar to say, “And Jesus saying.”  We convert this Greek present tense to “And Jesus said.”  But the writers of the Gospels used present tense in order to involve the reader as if the reader were actually there at the moment of the event.  When we convert the tense to the past, we make ourselves observers, not participants.  We make the text more Greek than it already is, and in the process, we remove one more layer of its Hebraic worldview.

What would happen if you began to read Scripture as if it were music?  What would you hear if the words were like the lyrics of a song, repeating the familiar chorus over and over in a thousand variations?  Who would you hear singing?  What would happen if you listened instead of simply converting the linguistic characters on the page into mental constructions?

“Hear, O Israel” is the opening onslaught of the world’s greatest musical score.

Topical Index:  musician, natsah, direct, lead, oversee, Hebrew thinking, Psalm 41:1

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Amanda Youngblood

I wonder if it’s a testament to our Biblical origins (prior to the Greek way of thinking) that we love music so much. It’s so powerful and emotional, going from soaring highs to the depths of darkness and mystery. It really is quite like life. I like your imagery here of us as the symphony being played, each instrument slightly different, each note purposefully written, discordancy artfully resolving into harmony weaving through the melody of God’s purposes – a theme replayed over and over, eventually building to its powerful conclusion. I imagine our awareness of the Scriptures would deepen quite a bit if we could listen to it as a whole.

Now, to read with an ear for the music, the theme, and the chorus. Thanks again, Skip!

Linda K. Morales

I know the tune to this one and I love to sing it as the theme of my life:
“Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory
forever and ever. Amen.” I Timothy 1:17 Amen. Be honor and glory for ever and ever Amen.

Rodney

Oops – forgot (or messed up) the closing tag so the whole post appears as a link. Not what was intended – sorry.

Drew

Shalom,

The music … a Uri Harel and friends based project has produced some amazing music. I have three individual collections: “Days Of Majesty”; “Isaiah Project”and “Music From God” Each has a very distinct style …. simply stated …. I have been greatly blessed by the music produced from this project!

If you were to get just one … I would recommend “Days Of Majesty” … it is simply awesome!

John Adam

Beautifully and profoundly expressed, thank you.

“Hebrew thought is more like hearing the 1812 Overture than it is like examining Cantor’s theorem.”

The nation of Israel has produced many great scholars over the centuries…it would be interesting (but probably non-productive) to see what proportion of them “leaned” towards the artistic expression (Hebrew) as opposed to the sciences and mathematics (Greek).

Your point about us being instruments in that great orchestra is one I have thought about in the context of who we are in God’s sight, and whom He made us to become. Each one of us is gifted by Him to “sound” a different note, or sequence of notes, and without any one of us playing and being played as we should, the resulting sound is incomplete…amazing stuff, the stuff of Earth and Heaven.

Gayle

When I read this, it took me back to the mid 1970s, a song by the name: To The Chief Musician, by Candle. I actually looked for the LP/cassette, whatever it was, media, for a while before giving up. Found it on a podcast freely downloaded through iTunes @ Full Circle/Classic Jesus Music. If you were influenced by the plethora of beautiful, inspired music of that time, you can enjoy it again! Just Google it.

carl roberts

Well this will certainly bring out the “artists!”
Firstly (?)- Who is this particular psalm addressed to? The “chief musician”, right? Next, – Who might this “chief musician” be? Who gives to His children- “songs in the night?” (Job 35.10)
Okay.. now we have identified the “Source”. He is the ONE who inspires the music. The Source of our singing.
Now we can consider the song. (the song of the redeemed- no doubt!). What is the song without the melody or harmony, but a group of words. What is the music without the words but a meaningless melody.
And now- here’s come that kid beating that ol’ tired drum again.. (no shouting please..) but… “it’s not either/or it’s both!!” Not either the melody or the message- it’s both!. Not male, not female- both. Not spiritual or physical- both! Not heaven or earth- both! Not Hebrew or Greek- both! Christ is (both) our Redeemer and our Reconciler. Is He G-d? Yes. Is He man? Yes. Not “either-or”- He is both. He is the G-d/man. He is (both) the blend and the balance of the human and the Divine. Shall we continue on with this? Not could we, -but should we?
Christ is all and in you all. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3.28) We are one in the bond of love. We are (all) one in Christ Jesus.
“For G-d was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.” (2 Corinthians 5.19)
“And they sing the song of Moses the servant of G-d, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvelous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are Thy ways, Thou King of saints. Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for thy judgments are made manifest.” Revelation 15:3, 4

Fred

Thank you Skip for bringing me one step closer to understanding God’s Word from a Hebrew perspective. It is no wonder that the praise and worship during the Messianic meetings that I have attended have so lifted the spirit.

Michael

“We are confronted immediately by a particularly Hebraic point-of-view.”

Hi Skip,

As I recall, my first encounter with The Art of Hebrew Thinking came
in the summer of 67, when I read a book called The Art of Loving by
the German psychotherapist, and humanistic philospher, Eric Fromm.

The Art of Loving introduced me to a kind of utopian synthesis of
Marx, Freud, and Jesus, which was being prescribed for a European
culture that was trying to recover from the atrocities of Fascism and
Auschwitz.

Soon after that I stumbled upon Eros and Civilization by Herbert
Marcuse, another Jewish intellectual and philosopher loosely
affiliated with the so called Frankfurt School in Germany.

Reading Eros and Civilization had the same affect on me then as
reading Ezekiel does today. So needless to say I was very drawn to
Marcuse’s view of the world, sometimes referred to as “critical
theory.”

I also studied the critical theory of TW Adorno, whose Philosophy of
New Music (Stravinsky and Schoenberg) showed how the different forms
of modern “classical” music reflected the social contradictions inherent
in modern society.

Of these Jewish intellectual giants, Walter Benjamin’s work
(Illuminations) was probably the most mystical, as it turns out he was
something of a Kabbalist, from what I now understand.