Te Deum: The Church and Music
By Paul Westermeyer
Discussion Questions by Micah Hunter
Chapter 1: The Study of Church Music
1. Westermeyer states: “What makes church music complex is the number of disciplines it calls into play.” Explain what he means by this statement. Which of these disciplines have you not considered before as being integral to church music?
2. What does Westermeyer mean when he says: “The study of church music ought to introduce the dimensions of the topic. It will not solve all the problems, but it does have the advantage of getting the players in the same ballpark?”
3. What are the four reasons for studying church music that Westermeyer gives in this chapter?
4. What is the hazard that the fourth of these reasons may promote? How will you avoid it as you progress through this study?
Chapter 2: Prolegomena
1. Why must the “intrinsic” nature of music to our humanity be understood in order to study church music from the beginning? In what ways does our modern culture promote the notion that music is “extrinsic” to our humanity?
2. Explain how the use of music in the festivals of ancient Israel was fundamentally different in orientation from the use of music in other ancient cultures & religions.
3. Describe the general organization that J.S. Bach considered to be the “foundation of church music.”
4. Briefly describe the three musical textures.
5. List and describe three common systems of pitch organization other than the modern Western system of major and minor tonality.
6. What does Westermeyer mean when he says that ancient music was “folk-like in character?”
7. Why does oral transmission of musical tradition preclude any radical break with the past?
8. Did music begin with singing, drumming, blowing, or plucking?
9. Briefly explain Curt Sachs’ terms: logogenic, pathogenic, and melogenic.
10. List and briefly describe the three “musical forms for worship” outlined by Abraham Idelsohn.
11. Why does antiphonal singing suggest “a choir distinct from the people?”
12. Please explain synonymous, antithetical, and synthetic parallelism in the book of Psalms, and give an example of each.
13. In corporate worship, why do “singing words and the verbal forms they imply take priority over instruments and instrumental forms?”
14. List and describe at least three ancient Hebrew musical instruments.
Chapter 3: Psalms
1. Support Westermeyer’s statement: “the Psalms are the womb of church music.” What does this mean?
2. Westermeyer claims “the question why [the church has used the Psalms so much] is complicated and eludes simple answers, but it calls into play concerns that lie at the heart of our study.” Briefly, what are these concerns?
3. Discuss this sentence: “It also suggests why superficial music simply cannot bear the weight of such a potent and significant song.” What does this mean? Do you agree?
4. List and describe Westermeyer’s five good reasons for singing in Christian worship.
5. Why must any discussion of the music of the church include the Psalms?
6. How is music “world-making?”
7. Westermeyer distinguishes the “true church musician” from the “musician who happens to be working in the church.” How does he distinguish these two musicians? What does he mean when he says “the true church musician lives there too?”
8. How can overemphasis on Christianity’s “priestly” and/or “prophetic” aspects affect its worship and its music? Can you think of examples of these different emphases and the effects they have had?
9. Explain how “musicians and the song of the Christian church resist these polarities.”
10. Why is it dangerous to extend “an arbitrary Hegelian formula of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis” into our interpretation of the Old Testament? Why will it not work?
11. In this discussion of the prophetic and priestly offices complementing eachother, why are psalmists “required for the whole picture?”
12. Why do Protestants tend to err on the prophetic side? Catholics the priestly?
13. Why does Westermeyer say that church musicians have been largely protected from this division? Do you agree?
14. As thoroughly as you must, explain what Westermeyer means by “the Old Testament sings. So does the New.” Be sure to connect your explanation to Christ.
Chapter 4: Canticles
1. Why is I Corinthians 13:1 not to be interpreted as a restriction on music? I believe there is a better reason than what Westermeyer provides, and it has to do with what Paul is saying and the context in which he is saying it.
2. Why is the literature of the Old Testament far more varied and diffuse than that of the New Testament?
3. Broadly speaking, what are the two sorts of documents contained in the New Testament?
4. Give two reasons that “it is easy to overlook the musical practice which the New Testament church simply assumed.”
5. What does Westermeyer mean when he says “we have to supply the assumptions” when reading the New Testament?
6. Who led the music in the worship of the Jewish temple in first-century Jerusalem? Would this worship have included Christians?
7. Roughly describe the synagogue worship of first-century Jews and its relationship to the development of early Christian worship practice.
8. Broadly speaking, which two strains of musical practice converged to lead to the development of what we know as Gregorian chant? What caused this convergence?
9. What three elements are common to all known descriptions of Christian worship before the early 3rd century? What sources do scholars look to in order to find these descriptions?
10. Briefly describe the development of the Mass. What basic elements combined to form the mass? How did this happen?
11. How is the mass the “fundamental liturgical context in which the music of the church developed?”
12. The Mass is a service of “word and table” designed for the entire worshipping community to participate together. What other Christian service developed at the same time? How was it different from the Mass?
13. Westermeyer states “the person of Christ paradoxically both particularized and universalized everything.” Explain what this means.
14. What does the term “canticle” mean? How is it used in this book?
15. How are canticles similar in content to Psalms?
16. Why is this similarity significant after Jesus Christ enters the picture?
17. What is an “infancy canticle?”
18. Please list the four infancy canticles by their common Latin titles. For each one, provide the full Latin text AND either a word for word translation from the Latin OR the English text of the biblical reference. In either case, please list the Scripture reference from which the canticle comes. Finally, please find a recording of a musical setting of each infancy canticle AND provide either the discography information OR the URL of the online recording. (The idea is that I want to be able to find what you are recommending.)
19. Worthy is Christ is a canticle drawn from several passages from Revelation. Please provide the full English text of this canticle, and indicate which Scripture passages are referenced in each line. Please provide bibliographic information OR a URL for online sources that you use. Please find a recording of a musical setting of this canticle that you enjoy, and provide discography information or URL.
20. Explain why the Te Deum is not strictly a canticle. Explain why the Te Deum may properly be called a canticle.
21. Provide the full Latin text of the Te Deum. Provide a literal English translation as well. Find two recordings of different musical settings of this canticle, complete with discography or URL. Please compare and contrast the two recordings in terms of style, clarity of text, and overall effect. (I recommend John Rutter’s Te Deum, and George Frederic Handel’s Dettingen Te Deum. They are very different and both outstanding.)
22. Please list 5 other New Testament texts that were likely formulated to be sung. Choose ONE of these texts and compose a melody to sing the text. Try to keep the melody simple enough for you to write it down accurately as part of your assignment.
23. What two questions led to the development of the church’s Christology?
24. What question led to the development of the church’s ecclesiology?
25. What branch of theology grew out of the church’s judgments about Christ in relation to time?
26. Broadly, how are Christology, ecclesiology, and eschatology “inextricably concerned with music?”
27. How might overemphasis on Christ’s humanity influence the church’s music? Overemphasis on his divinity?
28. How might the orthodox position (Christ is both fully God and fully human) be reflected in the church’s music?
29. What is the problem in viewing Christ as merely an example to be followed? As merely a Savior? As merely a conqueror? How might these theological problems present themselves in musical practice?
30. Why is it necessary to hold all three views of what Christ did in tension with one another? How might this balance be reflected musically?
31. Westermeyer states: “Few communities manage to hold together the fullness of the theological affirmations much less the fullness of the musical ones.” Do you agree? Can you think of an example you’ve experienced or that you know of where this has been true?
32. Please describe the three basic ecclesiological positions that Westermeyer outlines. Why is it necessary to hold the third or “middle” one? What are some musical ramifications of each position?
33. Do you think that you personally tend to emphasize the already at the expense of the not yet, or the not yet at the expense of the already? Why is it important to hold the already and the not yet in tension with one another?
34. Dr. Westermeyer has outlined several common emphases in the theological branches of Christology, ecclesiology, and eschatology. In each case, he has claimed that the best option is to somehow hold the totality or the polarity in tension. There is a danger of misunderstanding this position as simply “anything goes,” or as relativism of some kind. This is not Westermeyer’s position. Believing Christ to be all of the above – example, savior, and conqueror – is not contradictory, but biblical and true. Believing the Church to be both followers of Christ and the body of Christ on earth is not relativist, as these two identities are not mutually exclusive, but profoundly true. Believing that the reality of Christ’s rule is both already true and real and here, and yet in some sense has not yet been fully realized is not wishful thinking or “having it both ways,” but is accurately reflective of what we see in God’s Word and in our experience of life in this world. Please describe which part of this discussion (Christ as all of the above, Church as both/and, Time as already and not yet) you have found most difficult to accept or wrap your mind around. Why was this difficult for you? How has your thinking been challenged?
35. How is the tension of the already and not yet present in the Church’s music?
Chapter 5: With One Voice
1. “The Christian Church was born in song…” Explain this statement. What facts from history and scripture make it true?
2. Give some examples of chants that Westermeyer calls “ordinary” and “proper.” What is the main distinguishing textual characteristic that separates them? What is the main distinguishing musical characteristic that probably separated them?
3. Please briefly distinguish responsorial, direct, and antiphonal performance practice.
4. What is the ecclesiological theme that runs throughout the musical observations given from Clement of Rome (c. 95), Ignatius of Antioch (c. 35-107), and Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215)? Explain how this theme illustrates, as Westermeyer puts it, “a proleptic reality at work here, an eschatological already and not yet held in incarnational tension that is expressed musically.”
5. What is the Didache?
6. Briefly describe the following beliefs that came out of early Christianity: Montanism, Gnosticism, Marcionism, Arianism.
7. What action did the Council of Nicaea (325) take to defend the church against Arianism? (You may need to look outside the book.)
8. Give at least three reasons (one historical, one musical, one theological) that many early church leaders began a polemic against using musical instruments in worship. Please cite Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Basil, and Chrysostom in your answer.
9. Do you believe that Westermeyer’s repeated reference of I Corinthians 13 as an example of the New Testament being standoffish toward instruments in worship is accurate? Why or why not?
10. Explain how both the Alexandrian (allegorical) and Antiochian (literal) schools of biblical interpretation found a way to interpret favorable Old Testament allusions to musical instruments in worship in such a way that still condemned such usage for the church. You may use Psalm 150 as an example.
11. Read footnote 78. Have you noticed any of the weaknesses that Williamson points out in Westermeyer’s presentation so far? What does Westermeyer’s inclusion of this footnote tell you about him? Does it change the way you approach this book at all?
Chapter 6: Diffusion
1. Create a timeline from the first century through about the fifth century. On the timeline, include people and trends that had an effect on the participation of women in Christian worship – particularly in their singing.
2. Westermeyer notes the strong correlation between the use of boys as “lectors” (those who read Scripture aloud in the assembly) and the beginning of the position of the “cantor” (the person who prompts and leads the assembly’s song). Please consider reading Timothy Page’s book, The Christian West and its Singers: The First Thousand Years for a detailed and thoroughly documented presentation of this relationship. Why does Westermeyer conclude that the office of cantor was not distinct until the fourth and fifth centuries?
3. What document from roughly what time period is the earliest known specification of the “cantor” as a canonical office?
4. What musical force began to overtake the roll of the cantor in the 4th-5th centuries? Speculate as to what circumstances may have contributed to this. (There isn’t a direct answer in the book; speculate about what you know of this period in history and the culture surrounding it. Why might choirs have become more feasible at this time?)