A Parable about Music

March 23, 2011

A team of archaeologists makes a stunning discovery. While excavating a desolate site, they stumble upon a vast collection of documents that employs unfamiliar notation. The archaeologists reason that the collection must be of great importance because of the painstaking efforts that were taken to preserve it.

After months of secretive examination by leading scholars, the documents are finally deciphered as ancient music notation. A whirlwind of secretive activity ensues. A team of leading musicians from around the world is secretly chosen and collaborates for months to examine the documents.

Finally, all the documents are deciphered and analyzed fully. Upon rendering the music into modern notation and having it played by the world-class musicians in the team, everyone is stunned by the extraordinary beauty, majesty, and grandeur of the music. Practicing for months, they prepare for an international debut for the music that all the major networks in leading countries agree to carry.

They choose to debut only the instrumental music that they discovered. The rest of the music is kept under very tight security.

The worldwide response to the music is phenomenal. Music experts everywhere deem the music to be among the finest music ever produced. Somehow, the source of the instrumental music remains a tightly guarded secret throughout the entire process.

Many leading Christian musicians who hear the music write beautiful lyrics to accompany selections from the collection. Numerous churches worldwide use the music in their worship services.

A year later, in an international press conference, the team who produced the music then makes known its identity. They reveal that this was the music used when Nebuchadnezzar demanded worldwide worship of his image. They then release the rest of the music, which is immediately enthusiastically received all over the world.

Having accepted the music enthusiastically and used it in worship, what do the Christians who did so do now upon learning of the origin of the music? Do they reason that the music itself is still fine to use, in spite of its original ancient use?

Does the fact that the music was specifically used originally for the worship of a man forever taint this instrumental music that was of phenomenal musical quality? If it were known whether the pieces of music in the collection were composed specifically for that occasion or not, would that change anything?

Copyright © 2011-2024 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.

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Copyright © 2011-2024 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.