Women in Church Music and Church Choirs

The universal, perpetual, and uniform Christian church repudiates feasibility and practicality as her founding Charter, but instead prefers to rely on the guidance of the Holy Spirit given through the Sacred Scriptures: the doctrine, practice, discipline, ritual, and ceremony of the Church ultimately rests on the teachings of her Divine Founder on questions of faith or morals, fully contained & clearly worded in the Bible, and entrusted to the Apostolic College, and by them, taught to every church founded under their sanction. The Church obeys her Lord's teachings not because they appear to be practical or unpractical, but because she knows that these are her Lord's teachings, and He is able to ensure victorious success even of those parts terms and provisions of His divinely revealed doctrine which seem to worldly human wisdom to be most infeasible and unpractical!

 

You are of course free to take that stance, but that isn’t the Anglican approach, and never has been.

 

So what IS the Anglican approach, then?

 

Having choirs made up of boys and men to get the range for four part singing has nothing whatever to do with pedantic, slavish theological adherence to questionably relevant texts. It is entirely about practicality historically, and about quality of tone. Not that women's and girls voices have a quality which is inferior in any way, just different. Some cathedrals have two choirs, one for boys the other for girls and they both equally participate in the duties of providing music to accompany the cathedral's worship.

Cathedral worship differs from parish worship in that the congregation is not expected to participate in any part of the singing except the hymns. The rest is provided by the choir, not for entertainment, but for contemplation and mystic union with God. The choir does the work of worship and hopefully transports the congregation into the presence of God through the act of listening and contemplation.
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The Anglican approach is known as the ‘normative principle’ (as opposed to the ‘regulative principle’). Under the former - and admittedly at the risk of oversimplifying - modes of worship need to be compatible with or not contrary to the Scriptures, whereas under the latter principle, such things require a positive warrant to be permissible. Anyway the normative vs. regulative debate was a source of much controversy during the Reformation and for some time afterward.

 

Excellent summary.

 

Dear OP, Please may I enquire what you are trying to achieve? You are a member of the Seven Day Adventists. Your faith, therefore, is rather different from Anglicanism. You clearly demonstrate your church's attitude towards Roman Catholicism. I am just wondering what your flurry of very long posts on an Anglican Forum are trying to achieve.

 

Adam Clarke's commentary on 1 Corinthians 14:34 might shed some light on the issue of women in the church. (bold emphasis added by me)

Let your women keep silence in the churches - This was a Jewish ordinance; women were not permitted to teach in the assemblies, or even to ask questions. The rabbins taught that “a woman should know nothing but the use of her distaff.” And the sayings of Rabbi Eliezer, as delivered, Bammidbar Rabba, sec. 9, fol. 204, are both worthy of remark and of execration; they are these: ישרפו דברי תורה ואל ימסרו לנשים yisrephu dibrey torah veal yimsaru lenashim, “Let the words of the law be burned, rather than that they should be delivered to women.” This was their condition till the time of the Gospel, when, according to the prediction of Joel, the Spirit of God was to be poured out on the women as well as the men, that they might prophesy, i.e. teach. And that they did prophesy or teach is evident from what the apostle says, 1Co_11:5, where he lays down rules to regulate this part of their conduct while ministering in the church.
But does not what the apostle says here contradict that statement, and show that the words in chap. 11 should be understood in another sense? For, here it is expressly said that they should keep silence in the church; for it was not permitted to a woman to speak. Both places seem perfectly consistent. It is evident from the context that the apostle refers here to asking questions, and what we call dictating in the assemblies. It was permitted to any man to ask questions, to object, altercate, attempt to refute, etc., in the synagogue; but this liberty was not allowed to any woman. St. Paul confirms this in reference also to the Christian Church; he orders them to keep silence; and, if they wished to learn any thing, let them inquire of their husbands at home; because it was perfectly indecorous for women to be contending with men in public assemblies, on points of doctrine, cases of conscience, etc. But this by no means intimated that when a woman received any particular influence from God to enable her to teach, that she was not to obey that influence; on the contrary, she was to obey it, and the apostle lays down directions in chap. 11 for regulating her personal appearance when thus employed. All that the apostle opposes here is their questioning, finding fault, disputing, etc., in the Christian Church, as the Jewish men were permitted to do in their synagogues; together with the attempts to usurp any authority over the man, by setting up their judgment in opposition to them; for the apostle has in view, especially, acts of disobedience, arrogance, etc., of which no woman would be guilty who was under the influence of the Spirit of God.
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One should not pull a single verse of scripture and interpret it in isolation, apart from the context of the whole Bible. Or, for that matter, apart from the situation in which it was penned. There is no sign that the verse was intended to proscribe, for example, women singing in church.

Incidentally, if we wanted to be extremely literal and dogmatic about the NT pattern, Christians would not have any church buildings to meet in; we'd all do as the earliest Christians did, namely, we'd meet at someone's house for worship. But today every group (Adventists included) has special buildings.

 

A very sensible observation.

What needs to be understood is that assemblies in Corinth at that historical period were very different than church meeting are today in most cultures.

I still feel though that we need to consider the social context in which these prohibitions were delivered to a specific Christian assembley, i.e, that at Corinth.

The Christian assembly at Corinth, like many of Paul's church plantings, had retained distinctly Jewish characteristics in the way religious debates were regularly engaged in, to the point of having stand up arguments over the meaning of the scripture in front of the entire assembly when they met. This was regarded as perfectly normal behaviour 'in church' (for men), at that time and in that place. Nowadays such behaviour would not be tolerated in a church service even if it was exhibited by a man, let alone by a woman. It would be regarded as being generally undignified and demeaning behaviour in the context of a meeting supposed to be focussed upon the worship of Almighty God.
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The 'social context' idea has a ring of plausibility to it. If we go with that idea, then some things Paul writes would apparently have less force of authoritativeness than usual. There is some tension between that idea and the concept of "the inspired word of God," for if some things the Bible says people are to do were dependent upon societal norms only, then they are not matters of sin, and one might ask whether the writing of those proscriptions were indeed inspired. Are those words the 'word of God' for us all, or were those words only for the church of that time and that social situation?

One interesting point about 1 Cor. 14 is, right after talking about this matter of (v. 34-35) women keeping silent in the church, it says this in v. 37:
If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord.
So there is some reason to think that God meant these words about women in the church to apply at all times and in all societies. Those who lean in this direction would interpret 1 Cor. 11:5 as speaking of women praying or prophesying at home, since the context deals with marital relations (a personal, not public, issue).

I can see both sides. This is obviously been a source of some contention for many centuries.

 

And that right there is the very heart of the matter. Is the Bible the "Word of God", and if so, what does that mean exactly? There has to be some agreement on that question before basic exegesis can even get off the ground. We live in a world where several centuries of scholarship has pretty much demolished the idea of "plenary verbal inspiration", but where we also don't want to give up the idea that God was ultimately the source of the text and that as such it has relevance for us today, since God is "the same yesterday, today, and forever".

 

God being "the same yesterday, today, and forever" does not mean that God does not wish to speak to different generations in different ways. God did not speak to Abram or Moses or Elijah in the same way that he spoke to us through Jesus or His Apostles, or for that matter 'the scriptures'. The original contexts of the biblical statements of 'God's word' should be accounted for and a clear differentiation drawn between 'God's word' to the Corinthians, (who were abusing the Lord's supper, arguing in church, committing incest and having a 'wild old time' with very little New Testament scriptural guidance as yet. While we on the other hand, have a whole Bible full of advice, in which the direct and pertinent advice to those Corinthian believers is more a question of underlying principles of general Christian conduct for us in 21st century USA or UK or Europe, rather than hard and fast rules to be slavishly adhered to. It is more important to God, I think, that we understand the principle behind what the advice to the Corinthians was, than to just ignorantly impose a rule of absolute silence on all our women in church meetings because we think the Bible tells us so.

I would be inclined to say that the principle is that there should be good conduct and order from both men and women in church. In Corinth that principle had the practical application restraining those who Paul perhaps thought were the main cause of the problem. They just happened to women in Corinth at that particular period of time. It could just as easily have been men in another time and another part of the world who Paul would have told to shut up and behave themselves in church.

I have a story to tell. At a Midnight service a very long time ago, when I was a very young choir boy, there were two youths the worse for drink standing in a pew in front of my father in the congregation. They were taking the micky and poking fun at the proceedings. This went on for some time. My father eventually lost patience with them and stood up and banged their heads together hard, saying, "Don't you buggers know how to behave in the house of bleedin' God". He was quite unaware of how profound his theological insight actually was about God bleeding for all our sakes. Though misguided his action was aptly in keeping with the principle of people 'keeping silence' and generally acting with due restraint in church, I think.
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That is true. However, the point I was making is that a text written thousands of years ago that was bound to the society, laws, and culture of the time can have no practical relevance to us at all, unless the inspirer of it was not Himself bound to the time and perspective in which the text was written. No one reads the Epic of Gilgamesh or Homer's Iliad today with a view to discovering great moral truths about the world or insight into worlds we cannot see.

 

Yes, I do see your point. The particular Corinthian texts in question reveal more to us today concerning the social situation in Corinth at the time than it does as a guide to church praxis for all time. The text does though carry forward into all time the principle that things should be done in church in an orderly manner, with due respect and reverence. This applies as much to the passages about how to conduct the Lord's Supper as to head coverings and apparent 'prohibition' of interruptions. I do not believe anyone in the Anglican church of the First World should be taking such specific advice to a particular situation, in a particular church, at a particular time and trying to make it a general rule, for all churches, everywhere, for all time. Particularly since whoever was offering this advice appealed to 'the law' as his reason for offering it. It must be the only appeal to 'the law' as a reason for obedience, throughout the entire teachings of the Apostles. We are more used to reading St Paul telling us we can't live by the law but must live in the Spirit.

I would contend that living in the spirit of this 'law' entails both men and women keeping 'silence' in church, to the extent that that would metaphorically mean, acting with due and proper restraint and dignity in God's House during holy worship.
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Several Anglican Forum members have pleaded that the real reason why the Church of England traditionally had MALE choirs in their cathedral choirs is because "It was simply the most practical way to achieve the desired end". But the most formidable enemy of women's voices in Church Choirs in the Protestant Episcopalian Church of Victorian and Edwardian America, Dr. / Rev. G. E. Stubbs, wrote an article entitled, "Why We Have Male Choirs in Churches". He gave a theological reason AGAINST admitting women and girls in church choirs. He quoted an article from the "roman catholic" Church explaining why it is unlawful for women to sing in the choir in the Holy Mass.

Here then is the syllogism to illustrate Mr. Stubbs's arguments against women in church choirs.

Proposition 1: Major Premise. Nunquam Licet – Nunquam Licuit – Nunquam Licebit (it always is, was, and will always continue to be unlawful) to ordain women to the priesthood.

Proposition 2: Minor Premise I. The Liturgy is entrusted unto the priests.

Proposition 3: Minor Premise II. But singing in the Choir is a LITURGICAL act.

Proposition 4: Conclusion I. Therefore women cannot sing in the choir during the Sacrifice of the Holy Mass.

Proposition 5: Minor Premise II. Though certain Church Fathers allowed women to take part in singing the psalms, this was only because the singing of Psalms was not at that time liturgical, but more in the nature of folk-singing.

Proposition 6: Conclusion II. Therefore it is only the liturgical portion of the Divine Service that this exclusion of women refers to, and not to the rest of the Divine Service.

Proposition 7: Corollary: ‘When, as is much to be desired, our beautiful Psalms become real folk-songs, when at Vespers and at Compline the whole congregation are able to answer the priest, there will be no objection to the participation of women in this part of the service’.

Later, if God wills it, I will expose the fallacies of this Ritualistic Tractarian "anglo-catholic" romanizing syllogism. Particularly Propositions 3 & 5 are the only fallacious premises. I must therefore DENY the Minor Premises I and II.

But after this, our Episcopalian/Anglican author writes:

"In summing up the first division of our subject we find:

(1) That Praise and Adoration of the Almighty were the chief characteristics of the ancient Temple Worship." [WRONG. Anyone who reads the last 4 books of the Torah will clearly show that the chief essential characteristic of External Formal Temple Worship of JHVH (Blessed be He) was ritual sacrifice. Not even the remotest provision for praise and adoration of the Almighty in a musically modulated fashion was ever made in the Torah.]

"(2) That the singing voice was therefore used exclusively in all parts of the musical ritual." [TRUE.]

"(3) That the intoning of the officiating priests and the responses of the choristers formed a choral entity, and were inseparable.

(4) That the male choristers formed a part of the ministerial body.

(5) That there was an elaborate and consistent ceremonial.

(6) That architectural provision was made accordingly.

(7) That these facts were recognized both in theory and in practice by the Primitive Church." [But the hypotheses presupposed by this matter or concern of exclusive ministerial or sacerdotal prerogative are contrary to the fundament essential DISTINCTIVE marks of the Gospel!]

"The choral principles above enumerated have for obvious reasons played a secondary part, if indeed they have exerted any influence, in the adoption of male choirs in Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, and other churches." [But the last five of those principles are contrary to the Gospel!]

Now this may have been true under the Levitical dispensation. But to now argue in the New Testament for the restriction of the right of singing in the Choir to ordained members of the clergy as opposed to the laity is quite at variance with the spirit of the Gospel.

But I shall be told by these Romanizing Ritualist Tractarian Anglo-Catholics that the provisions in the OT making the male choristers a part of the ministerial, clerical body, from which the Law of Male Headship excludes women, stand in full force until expressly repealed.

I now write another syllogism to articulate this new objection of theirs:

Proposition 8: The OT provisions concerning choirs in public worship are still in full force in the NT until expressly repealed.

Proposition 9: Singing in the choir is an exclusive ministerial prerogative under the OT provisions.

Proposition 10: But all exclusive ministerial prerogatives are denied to women under the Male Headship Law.

Proposition 11: Therefore women cannot join the choir.

As it turns out, this new syllogism is fallacious, because it turns out that Proposition 9 does not apply to the New Testament. In the Old Testament, there may have been a very good reason for restricting the singing in the choir in public worship to just the males among certain specially selected families of the Levites. (This positive institution (if at all) of the Lord God JHVH mandating the restriction the choral service to the Levites, and not even duly enacted in any book of the Torah, has been abolished on the cross by Him who has sworn concerning His Eternal Son: Thou art a high priest forever after the order of Melchisedec.)

Another significant truth is that it is not just women & girls that by virtue of their sex were excluded from the psalmody of the Temple and the Tabernacle: but also, all non-Levites even of the male sex (however pious, skilled and devout), yea, even of royal rank, were rigidly excluded from the same, on pain of the Divine Vengeance. (This exclusion is a matter of the principle Expressio unius est exclusio alterius – the specification of one thing is the exclusion of everything else, as well as the Divine Negative Precept in the Torah against adding or taking away where it concerns any Divinely instituted action, ritual, or ceremony.)

Hymns and Choirs: or, the Matter and the manner of the service of song in ... - Austin PHELPS (of the Andover Theological Seminary.) - Google Books:

And therefore the limitation of the prerogative of choir-singing to the ministerial, clerical body of the Church (which under the Written Torah, was de jure confined to certain families of the tribe of Levi), and every precedent and example in the OT by which the choir, just by virtue of being a choir, should be ex vi termini considered, a minor order of the clergy, and/or liturgical attendants to the priest at the altar and/or the clergyman (i.e. pastor, elder, bishop, curate, vicar, prelate, dean, etc.) who officiates at the preacher’s pulpit, the baptismal font, and the Lord’s Eucharistic Table (all of which properly belong in the Chancel), ‘belonged appropriately to the Jewish system of religion, and was a legitimate result of the principle pervading the system, by which the mass of the people were to be sedulously excluded from all near approach to Jehovah in acts of worship. The "bounds" which were set at the base of Mount Sinai to keep both people and priests from attempting to ascend its sides when Jehovah should come down upon it, illustrate this principle. Everywhere the sword of divine displeasure was seen flaming forth, in more or less menacing aspect, to remind them that their sins were a wall of separation between them and Him. He could be approached by the nation only through the ministry of a selected priesthood, sanctified for this express purpose. They were to appear in the temple as the representatives of the nation. Their worship at the altar of sacrifice, at the altar of incense, and in song, was official and vicarious. They worshipped for the people, who, as individuals, had not the privilege of so near an approach to God as to come to the inner courts of his house, and who probably could not, even upon their great national festivals, when assembled at Jerusalem by thousands, join in those lofty temple songs, commemorative of national prosperity and renown, by which every heart was touched, and which doubtless every tongue was well qualified to sing.’

But the necessity and utility and binding de jure divino obligation of the ‘principle pervading the system, by which the mass of the people were to be sedulously excluded from all near approach to Jehovah in acts of worship’ has ceased under the NT. Therefore, where it concerns the particular provisions of David’s decree of appointing choristers to the temple, the binding obligation of the particular provisions thereof, whereby not only all females and all non-Levites even of the male sex were sedulously excluded from the Temple Choir, but also the choir was made de jure a part of the official ministerial body (actually the Levites were already a de jure part of the official ministerial body irrespective of their role in the choir) and/or a minor order of the clergy (actually the Levites were already a de jure minor or major order of the clergy irrespective of their role in the choir) if not also a share in the government and jurisdiction of the Church, have ceased in the NT. They are not de facto nor de jure divino part of the primitive Apostolic order of the government, worship, psalmody, or hymnody of the Christian, nor of the truly One Holy Universal and Apostolic Church. And thus I rest my case AGAINST G. E. Stubbs's Romanizing Ritualistic Tractarian "anglo-catholic" exclusion of women and girls from Church Choirs. QED

 

The schoolboy interpretation of QED seems particularly apt where it resides at the end of this particularly exhaustive, and I think unnecessary, 'proof'. Quite Enough Done. Still foolisness does need to be disproved I suppose, just for the record.

Surely Psalm 150 verse 6 alone would have been enough to completely remove the need for any of this 'proof' at all. I'm all for brevity.

Interesting too, that it is itself a final summary of the entire Book of Psalms.
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What I am about to write is entirely my own opinion, therefore I may be entirely wrong, however I think I have good grounds for believing the following analysis to be accurate.

I think what makes this statement concerning women remaining silent in church 'inspired' is because it has for generations become an effective shibboleth in the church.

If we take 1 Cor. 14:26-40, the entire chain of reasoning, containing the incentive for the writer writing the passage, here is what we get.

26 What then, brethren? When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for edification.

Here we have the subject the author intends to deal with: i.e. participation of everyone when they come together for worship, and the proper conduct of that participation. This is further emphasised and repeated at verses 39 and 40.

39 So, my brethren, earnestly desire to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues; 40 but all things should be done decently and in order.

So here is his advice:

27 If any speak in a tongue, let there be only two or at most three, and each in turn; and let one interpret. 28 But if there is no one to interpret, let each of them keep silence in church and speak to himself and to God.

So 'keeping silence' in this author's opinion is merely holding one's tongue with constraint while allowing others to speak in turn. (He is not suggesting dumbstruck silence by order of God, throughout the entire service).

29 Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others weigh what is said. 30 If a revelation is made to another sitting by, let the first be silent. 31 For you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all be encouraged; 32 and the spirits of prophets are subject to prophets. 33 For God is not a God of confusion but of peace. As in all the churches of the saints,

The proof of this 'silence' not being an edict from God banning speech at any time for anyone, is contained in verses 29-32. All can prophesy, but only one by one. All may learn and all be encouraged. God is not a God of confusion but has given his prophets restraint. Therefore uncontrolled outbursts of speech, whether from male or female prophets are inappropriate when they all meet together.

36 What! Did the word of God originate with you, or are you the only ones it has reached?

Still on the subject of order and the ability of all prophets of either sex, in all the churches of the saints to control their own outbursts of what God has revealed to them, the author challenges the Corinthian prophets, both male and female, (ALL still stands here), "Do they think they are something special, compared to all the other churches"?

37 If any one thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that what I am writing to you is a command of the Lord. 38 If any one does not recognise this, he is not recognised.

Far from being addressed to just the women at Corinth, this rebuke seems aimed primarily at the men who have been monopolising the speaking positions and not allowing others, (probably the women) to speak. (This may be what Chloe's people had complained about to Paul prompting him to write this letter to the Corinthians. 1 Cor.1:11). Furthermore Paul's authority had been questioned previously by some men in the Corinthian church, so Paul makes it clear that his words to the men at Corinth are "A command of The Lord" which requires their obedience, Paul is pulling rank on them. He does so even more in 2 Corinthians, presumably because they still were recalcitrant to him.

39 So, my brethren, earnestly desire to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues; 40 but all things should be done decently and in order.

Everything should be done decently and in order. Just as God and Paul would have desired.

34 the women should keep silence in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be subordinate, as even the law says. 35 If there is anything they desire to know, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.

And you are wondering why I have put verse 34 AFTER verse 40. Well that is where it actually is in some western texts, including D and G which puts it v34-5 after 40. Though this is more because the copyist probably was perplexed as to where it should go rather than an indication that it should actually go after v40. It highlights the fact though that generations of bible scholars have wondered whether v34-35 might be an interpolation inserted very early on by a misogynist copyist in the Corinthian church. We shall never know for cetain, this side of heaven, whether it is or not.

I however still believe it is inspired, but for an entirely different reason than those who insist that women must remain silent in church by order of God.

I think it is a shibboleth and by that I mean it is a means by which misogynists may be identified in the church. Those who relish the opportunity to gag the women using the blunt weapon of God's word to do their bidding, reveal their hearts intent for all to see by ignoring everything else St Paul said about 'all of us being one in Christ'. Those of us who take verses 34 and 35 with a pinch of salt, use it as a shibboleth to identify misogynists in the church and beware of them appropriately.

noun: shibboleth; plural noun: shibboleths

a custom, principle, or belief distinguishing a particular class or group of people, especially a long-standing one regarded as outmoded or no longer relevant.

Judges 12:4-6.

 

Dear OP, given your prevailing view on the role of women in the church in this and at least one other thread why does your own denomination place so much emphasis on the writings of Ellen White? I would be most obliged for a concise answer, if you are minded to provide one.

 

What do you mean by "OP"?

 

Original Poster. See how your profile picture to the left of your post has a red 'STARTER' banner? That means in this thread you are the "OP".