The Sacred and the Secular
"It is not what a man does that determines whether his work is sacred or secular. It is why he does it." Tozer, A. W. The Pursuit of God.Our CyberNeighbors
There’s quite a lively discussion over at Notes on traditional versus modern church music, plus technology, etc. Besides serving as a friendly advertisement, I bring this up because I wonder how it applies to book media.
Meanwhile at Home
Pardon the generalization, but it seems we hear much warning against listening to secular music. I can’t recall that same level of warning about books. This is not a complaint, but a musing. Is it because we don’t read books as much as we listen to music? Or that we are more influenced by music than books? Or that secular music is more harmful than secular books? Or something else entirely?
posted by Lee Ann at
7/07/2007 01:02:00 AM
3 Comments:
Lee Ann,
Loved your “musing” there at the end. It does seem to be that way. And I have a theory about it. Maybe a bad theory, but a theory nonetheless.
Music is something flows actively from its source, into the ears of a passive listener. This alone should at least give the recipient some degree of pause about the totality of what will play before the recipient intends to shut it off.
Books don’t have the accidental collateral damage—by that I mean a child won’t walk into a room during the active and silent act of one reading a book and be exposed to a possibly disturbing sequence, or unexpected dialogue. The reader themselves, already engaged directly with their reading material, also meets with the immediate obligation to close the book if what they’re reading checks their spirit.
And when a negative in music is broadcast, all within earshot are affected, whether they are intended recipients or not.
As the saying goes, “one cannot un-ring a bell.”
-R
I've also wondered about that too. I can't tolerate music that depresses me or has negative themes or profanity. There's something about music I can't quite put my finger on that tells me it must be ultimately uplifting, something redeeming about it. I'm talking specifically about music I choose to listen to. But I can't say that I quite apply the same criteria to books I read. It seems that sometimes some of the most excellent writing has an overall negative theme--an example that just came to mind is Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison. I feel if I were to apply the same standard to everything I read, I would be shutting myself off from having an authentic view of the world. I would never had read 100 Years of Solitude, for example. But somehow, I don't feel the same way about music.
Perhaps it's because of the lifestyles of sub-cultures attached to certain sub-genres of music (a good point brought up by Ron in a Notes comment) that goes very strongly against the lifestyle we live that secular music is warned about so much more strongly. I don't know. Interesting musing!
As an English Lit major, I wonder the same.
My conclusion is that because we have inherited the notion that education (the stuff not done in our UPC bible schools) is generally looked down on. That view is in the process of transition, thankfully. But it is still around, nontheless.
This negative view of education is coupled with the negative view of reading literature published or written by non-upc authors (not just non-pentecostals). Again, this is not taught from pulpits ... but it has somehow been insinuated. And this is in transition as well, but there seems to be lingering contention about it. Maybe this is just on the theological venue of books? Maybe it's just the older generations? Maybe it's just an excuse to not read?
The bottom line is this ... music and literature definitely affects us ... positively and negatively. We cannot deny it.
But, are we teaching and allowing people to mature in the Spirit so that they can have HIM filter ALL their incoming media? Why must we rely on someone to tell us what is good or bad. Maybe because it's easier?
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