In Israelite life, music was central to all that the people did. It is found not only in their worship, but also in their work, in their personal recreation, and in their military activities.
Genesis 4:21 mentions Jubal as the proto-musician. The distance, both stylistic and chronological, between him and the later music-making of the Jewish community, can only be a matter of speculation. The real importance of Jubal is in the attention given to music-making this far back in sacred history, and further, that such attention is focused on its natural appearance along with other human and cultural activities. Jubal’s brother, Jabal, was a cattle breeder; his half-brother Tubal-Cain, the first smith.
This is important, for music is first described in a functionally neutral sense. Jubal is the “father of all who play the harp and flute.” His music-making is not religiously caused or primarily associated with worship, nor is it necessarily an activity that, by contrast, bears only the association of any number of so-called secular activities. Even though Yahweh was to be worshiped in his sanctuary, the earth, and all its fullness was also his; and as human habitat, of which humanity was to be the steward, the world was to be an arena for praise. Accordingly, the use of music is as much an integral part of the gathering of harvest as the worship in the sanctuary. The uniqueness is that while harvest songs are sung, they are sung to the Lord of the harvest; while battle songs are sung, Yahweh is to win the battle.
Thus if there is one consistent stand concerning music in the Old Testament, it is that it is inseparable from all of life. Although in its earliest stages or as related to certain activities, it may have been little more than noise-making, music accompanied work, worship, merrymaking, and military activities (Gen. 31:27; Exod. 32:17–18; Num. 21:17; Judg. 11:34–35; Isa. 16:10; Jer. 48:33). Instances of music-making are connected with specific acts of God: the collapse of the walls of Jericho (Josh. 6:4–20), the enthronement of kings (1 Kings 1:39–40; 2 Kings 11:14; 2 Chron. 13:14; 20:28), music for the court (2 Sam. 19:35; Eccles. 2:8) and feasting (Isa. 5:12; 24:8–9), as well as for the restoration of prophetic gifts (2 Kings 3:15) and the soothing of personality disturbances (1 Sam. 16:14–23).
These latter two instances superficially seem to belong to the psycho-musical realm, or the blatantly magical. Along with the narrative in Joshua 6:4–20, in which the combination of trumpet sounds with people shouting precede the felling of Jericho’s walls, an immediate relation is seen by some biblical scholars between music and magic. It cannot be denied that this relationship is assumed in the myths and legends of the religious systems surrounding Judaism. Nor can it be denied that music and magic are linked in religious systems of primitive cultures everywhere. Furthermore, the more sophisticated Greek ethos, which granted intrinsic power to activities in the created order, still has overtones in much of today’s thinking regarding musical values.
In the earliest parts of Scripture, however, the created order is to be subject to human dominion, and it is good. Humankind is to be sovereign over it and not the reverse; the goodness of creation is a reflection of God’s handiwork, but it is a goodness not in the sense of inherently causing good; otherwise, it would be sovereign and the cultural mandate would be irrelevant. In addition, the fact that creation has been ravished by Satan does not mean that it has become intrinsically bad in the sense of causing immorality. Ultimately, the Judeo-Christian perspective maintains that humankind is wrong within itself and that until persons are made right they will place the blame for their condition outside themselves. Hence, they will assume that created things or activities have power over them and their activity, as is often the case with music. Consequently, the parallels that are drawn, in comparative religious studies, between Israelite religion and its contemporary systems are in fundamental error because fundamental perspectives are overlooked.