Welcome to the Men of Issachar podcast. This
is episode number five. We have an exciting and
I think fruitful conversation with Mr. Joe Davis.
It brings a lot of knowledge and passion to the
table and presents an idea about music that if
you stick around until the end you might learn
from a perspective that you may not have considered
to this point in your life. Such a fun conversation
with someone who obviously cares about God's
art and beauty in literature and in music as
well as other areas of course. So, join us, Jeff
Wright, Terry Gant, Joe Davis, and myself, Jason
Gall, as we strive to be Men of Issachar. Welcome,
everyone, to the Men of Issachar podcast. We're
going to be talking with Mr. Joe Davis today,
and we're going to be discussing music and what
that means to a believer. So, let's take it away.
Well, thanks for having me on, for the listener
who doesn't know me. My name is Joe, and I'm
involved with the group of men here in a couple
of different ways. I'm a member of Midway Baptist,
and I teach at Hickory Classical Christian School.
And I'm going to talk about music in a way that
I've come to appreciate its qualities. Well the
way that's maybe a little different than then
you're maybe used to hearing it talked about
it's gonna get a little mystic it's gonna get
a little metaphysical but hang with us because
I think it's gonna be good stuff and Whether
you're convinced or not about My particular position.
I hope that you have an opportunity to meditate
on music and how important is that's kind of
the goal So gentlemen, do you mind if I start
with a quotation here and to kind of set us up?
No, do we need a do we need a? Preface the quotation
or you're going to, you're going to lay it on
us. Well, let's, let's give the quotation and
then I'll jump to the thesis. All right. So,
uh, this is a excerpt from, uh, the return of
the King, which is the third, um, portion of
Tolkien's Magnus Opus, the Lord of the Rings,
um, his great work. And the scene, let me give
you a little setup for the scene here, is if
you're familiar with the films, the Lord of the
Rings films, we're coming up to where the Riders
of Rohan have arrived at the Siege of Gondor,
and sort of they're there to eucatastrophically
turn the tide. It's one of the most incredible
cinematic scenes. It's still widely lauded as
being a piece of cinematic masterpiece. But the
book scene is a little different. and hopefully
will give us some insight into music and what
we're going to be talking about today with music.
So, Theoden, who is the king of the Rohirrim
riders, has arrived and I will be picking up
the text here with Mary's thoughts. Mary is a
hobbit who's riding with the king and he's our
POV character. He's the one who's kind of observing
and letting us know what's going on. So, after
a while, the king led his men away somewhat eastward.
to come between the fires of the siege and the
outer fields. Still they were unchallenged, and
still Theoden gave no signal. At last he halted
once again. The city was now nearer. The smell
of burning was in the air, and the very shadow
of death. The horses were uneasy. But the king
sat upon snowmane, motionless, gazing upon the
agony of Minas Tirith, as if stricken suddenly
by anguish or by dread. He seemed to shrink down,
cowed by age. Mary himself felt as if a great
weight of horror and doubt had settled on him.
His heart beat slowly. Time seemed poised in
uncertainty. They were too late. Too late was
worse than never. Perhaps Theoden would quail,
bow his old head, turn, slink away to hide in
the hills. Then suddenly Mary felt it at last,
beyond doubt. A change. Wind was in his face.
Light was glimmering. Far, far away in the south
the clouds could be dimly seen as remote gray
shapes rolling up, drifting. Mourning lay beyond
them. But at that same moment there was a flash
as if lightning had sprung from the earth beneath
the city. For a searing second it stood dazzling
far off in black and white, its topmost tower
like a glittering needle. And then as the darkness
closed again there came rolling over the fields
a great boom. At that sound the bent shape of
the king sprang suddenly erect. Tall and proud
he seemed again, and rising in his stirrups he
cried in a loud voice, more clear than any there
had ever heard a mortal man achieve before. Arise,
arise, riders of Theoden! Fell deeds awake, fire
and slaughter! Spear shall be shaken, shield
be splintered! A sword day, a red day, ere the
sun rises! Ride now! Ride now, ride to Gondor.
With that he seized a great horn from Guthloff,
his banner bearer, and he blew such a blast upon
it that it burst asunder. And straight away all
the horns and the hosts were lifted up in music,
and the blowing of the horns of Rohan in that
hour was like a storm upon the plain and a thunder
in the mountains. Ride now, ride now, ride to
Gondor. Suddenly the king cried to Snowmane and
the horse sprang away. Behind him his banner
blew in the wind, white horse upon a field of
green, but he outpaced it. After him thundered
the knights of his house, but he was ever before
them. Eomer rode there, the white horsetail on
his helm floating in his speed, and the front
of the first Aorid roared like a breaker foaming
to the shore, but Theoden could not be overtaken.
Fae, he seemed. For the battle -fury of his fathers
ran like new fire in his veins, and he was born
up on Snowmane like a god of old, even as Orame,
the great of the battle, the Valar, when the
world was young. His golden shield was uncovered,
and lo, it shone like an image of the sun, and
the grass flamed into green about the white of
his steed. For morning came, morning and a wind
from the sea, and a darkness was removed, and
the hosts of Mordor wailed, and terror took them,
and they fled. and died, and the hooves of wrath
rode over them. And then all the host of Rohan
burst into song, and they sang as they slew,
for the joy of battle was on them, and the sound
of their singing was fair and terrible, and it
came even to the city." My thesis for you all
is that music and singing is more than just an
emotional experience. It is more than just a
speaking of truth into the heart and mind of
the listener. It is more than just an articulation
of abstract concepts, but that music is a form
of metaphysical combat. That music is the means
by which God has baked into his creation to fight
against principalities, forces, powers of darkness,
and that when we sing, we are, in a very real
sense, making some kind of war. And that is my
thesis. What do you all think? I'm in agreement.
I'm in agreement. And just for the, in all clarity,
this is the second time we've had to record this
podcast, the first time It was an error on my
part, and it stopped recording about halfway
through. So it actually let me dive a little
bit deeper into this, and I looked through a
lot of the Bible and gleaned some more examples
of this. So I think it's very scriptural what
you're theorizing. There are several examples,
like I said. The first that comes to mind is
King Saul and David. David used to calm the evil
spirit that was afflicting King Saul by playing
his harp and singing. But it doesn't stop with
David. It actually follows in David's footsteps
because David anointed Haman to be his man of
music. And he was known as the Seer and he was
task with defending and preparing God's people.
Yeah, I'm in agreement in a less spiritually
mature way in that I think it's sort of an inductive
agreement or argument rather. Music is always
connected to combat in human experience. So you
think about everybody who's been on a sports
team, They were playing something to get them
fired up in the locker room before they went
out and it's not like Bach or Chopin it's something
that cultivates aggression There's something
about the music that feeds the endeavor, you
know Every once in a while you find somebody
that has a particular classical piece that they
like for that kind of thing But it's gonna be
one of the ones that's very obviously Intense.
I mean you would think Wagner or something, right?
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah I mean, Carmina Burana comes
to mind. That one's a... Gustav Holst. Yeah,
Holst's Planets, right? Mars. So there's a few
examples of that, but you're right. That's the
minority, clearly. And there's something mystic
about music too, again, working inductively,
in that everybody knows some pagan ritual portrayed
either in some kind of documentary or in a historical
fictional narrative. based on historical sources.
The Northman is a good example of this. Apocalypto
by Mel Gibson. They're going to do something
with drums and rhythm and chanting or singing.
Often dancing as well. Yeah, dancing to sort
of set the climate or the bloodletting that's
to follow. So it seems to me that this principle
is Like I said with Jason, most maturely expressed
in the scriptural texts where it's being fit
is being used fitly, or Tolkien who's riffing
off of them saying something more fit. But even
the most base behaviors of human conduct reflect
this as something like a universal truth. Yeah,
a natural law. I chose the text, the opening
text. I've had the opportunity and pleasure to
teach Tolkien to eighth grade students over the
last few years, and every time we get to that
particular passage, which I think is one of the
greater passages that Tolkien ever penned, the
students are always challenged by the fact that
in this scene of mass carnage, the the riders
of Rohan break out into song. And the text indicates
that their song is a reflection of the joy that
they experience in combating evil, right? That
it is, to quote Wordsworth, Wordsworth thought
that poetry was sort of the spontaneous outpouring
or overflow, is the overflow of emotion in the
state of tranquility. that that's where good
poetry comes from, that it's a natural byproduct
of this sort of metaphysical reality. And, you
know, the Lakeside guys, they probably would
disagree with what we're saying here, but there's
kind of going back to the universality of this
thing, that there's a kind of generally accepted
principle that all throughout the ancient and
the medieval world, It was generally accepted
that music and martial spirit and spiritual engagement
with the metaphysical realities of our existence,
that those things were very deeply wedded in
a way that was mysterious and not fully explainable.
And living in sort of a post -enlightenment materialist
world, we've largely cut ourselves off from that
kind of an understanding of music. That music
has become all about expressionism. and retreatism,
and a way to sort of in an Aristotelian sense
experience catharsis by venting emotional distress.
Or not, you know, or good things too, but it's
very located on sort of the individual, the self,
and that idea of music is a real modern one,
I think. Not that those things didn't exist in
the ancient world, you know. Catullus was writing
poetry that basically, if you set it to Taylor
Swift's four chords, you would get a pop song,
right? So these things have always kind of existed.
But nevertheless, Virgil, when he opens up his
Aeneid, right? It's, you know, Virrumque armacanto,
right? I sing of the arms and the man, right?
The great martial text. of the ancient Roman
world that was meant to be a competitor and to
be downstream of and to be in the vein of the
Odyssey, the Iliad and the Odyssey, which are
the great epics of Greek culture, these things
are song, right? The Latin word for song is cantus,
which is also the word that they would use for
poetry. These things aren't disconnected. the
epic poetic tradition is an appeal to the muse.
The muse is the goddess of song, the goddess
of the arts. And so there's just this deeply
wedded idea that music and a martial spirit go
hand in hand. And like you said, Jeff, we need
to become more comfortable with the idea that
the forces of darkness are very comfortable with
this idea. That much of the way that Wicked men
who are wanting to tap into a supernatural dark
force, they're doing it by means of music. And
that if we don't reclaim music as a modality
of spiritual combat, we're charging the hosts
of Mordor with water guns instead of spears.
One example, another example that I came across
was Elisha. And this is an account of King Jehoram
and Elisha having a confrontation. And Elisha
instructed a harpist to calm them. Jeff, you
want to read that passage? Yeah, so in verse
15 is really where it comes to a head. The prophet
says, now bring me a minstrel. And it came about
when the minstrel played. that the hand of the
Lord came upon him, him being the prophet." Verse
16, he starts issuing the prophecy. He said,
"'Thus says the Lord, make this valley full of
trenches. For thus says the Lord, you will not
see wind, nor shall you see rain, yet that the
valley will be filled with water, so that you
shall drink both you and your cattle and your
beasts.'" Like this is the mechanism of unlocking
the prophetic word coming to the prophet. That
makes you wonder if he's saying that prophecy.
It doesn't specifically say that, but I just
wonder if maybe. Well, on the same front, again,
dealing with like the lower level, kind of proving
something about the higher level, the inductive
side of this. We have even in the experience
of music, we have language for this, even with
pop music. We were, we were watching Gone In
60 Seconds last night as a family. Wow. That's
a classic. Yeah. And if anybody's listening,
who's familiar with that movie, there is a timestamp
we're all aware of that we start fast forwarding.
Um, but the rest of it's just, you know, cars
and Nicholas Cage being himself. And before they
go out to do the great big car robbery, they
put on all my friends know the little rider.
I don't know what the name of that piece is,
but that's like central to their method. And
you'll even hear, um, kind of even more like
bass level. Um, people will talk about putting
on music to set the vibe. Right there's something
beyond Mere mechanics that music does to alter
the person who's experiencing it. Yeah, I don't
think it's coincidence right when you think about
you know, who are the people who are kind of
on the fringes of society and who are the most
comfortable with alternative views alternative
lifestyles and tapping into supernatural or or
spiritual experience to inform them about the
world, it's the artists, right? This is actually
a key component in Call of Cthulhu, right? Lovecraft,
you know, when the demons of the ancients, when
the ancients, you know, are sort of trying to
be reawakened in Lovecraft's legendarium and
they interact with people through dreams, but
the ones who are deeply affected by the supernatural
interference that these demonic, these very powerful
sort of demonic forces are enacting on human
society, it's the poets, it's the artists, it's
the sculptors, and it's the singers, right? They're
the ones who are attuned. And again, right, we
use this kind of, we are attuned, right? That's
musical language, right? I'm tapped into a Power
source that is that is deeply greater than myself
and you know, I want to be obviously I want to
temper this with reason right that I what I'm
not suggesting is that you know music Will turn
you into Superman right that it will unlock that
you will suddenly be able to leap tall buildings
in a single bound if you just strike the right
chords in the right process, but there nevertheless
there is this connection to We have a massive
problem or a massive need for some kind of power.
And what's our solution? Our solution is to tap
into a very deep well of power. I know, Jason,
you've used that language a lot, right? That
there's this sort of... It's infinite. Infinite
well. Yeah, thank you. Infinite well of power.
And that music is the on -ramp, off -ramp. of
that well. And I think the Bible is clear, and
human history is clear, that people who are tapping
into supernatural darkness are very comfortable
with doing that. But as believers, we have a
greater source. Well, the evil is a counterfeit
or derivation of the good, right? And so, I think
I heard this from a guy named John Mason Hodges.
He was talking about the nature of music as what
we said earlier, natural law. What role in God's
economy does music perform? And if you understand
contextually that the world is full of demonstrations
of who God is and what he does, they show up
in Scripture all the time, like we this Sunday
were talking about. light coming into the darkness
in Christmas season. Common motif, right? Light
comes up, darkness goes away. I heard Doug Wilson
say one time that we tend to think of that as
like Jesus being really good at drawing natural
comparisons. So he sees a vine and he says, oh,
my relationship to you is like a vine with a
branch that bears fruit. But Doug Wilson said
you're getting that backwards because he's the
creator of all things. So the reason a vine exists
in the world is that humans would have a ready,
well -met, well -understood example of what it
means to be a believer bearing fruit in connection
with Jesus. You know, it's not him being a good
illustrator. It's that he baked it into the world
so we would know it. Same deal with Father. How
do we know what it means to call God Father?
It's because from your earliest days, you should
know someone as Father who's powerful, loving,
working for your best interest, directing you,
right? That's built there so we can understand
something of God. So John Mason Hodges was saying,
music is how God has taught us about the Trinity.
Because the doctrine of the Trinity in orthodox
formulation is there are three persons in one
Godhead. And so there's one God who exists eternally
in three persons. So what you have there is unity
and distinction. And it's the most unique doctrine
in the religious world. You know, it's kind of
a fascinating subject in and of itself, but it's
true. So where do we see diversity and unity?
And he would point to music. So you have these
distinct notes or whatever, but they're unified
in the theme of the song. And that God had provided
music, which I think makes sense of why every
culture, no matter how isolated from one another,
no matter how unique and all the other cultural
expressions they've generated, they all have
some sort of music that is going to be very important
to their shared life together. Music's universal.
I think it's because, according, I think John
Mason Hodges is right, it's because God universally
gave a testimony to Himself as the triune God.
And that would also explain why forces that have
set themselves up to be opposed to God and His
goodness have such a desire to see it corrupted,
right? And play off of the thing he built in,
right? Like how do we, I mean, I guess the idea
is there's like this flowing stream of water
and what they do is say, well, how do we divert
that towards something unprofitable? The stream
exists, it's flowing towards whatever God's profit
is in mind, but because they're counterfeiters,
derivers, they divert it for some other bad end.
One of the biggest counterfeits that I've seen
example of is in 1973, they were in New York
City. A bunch of rappers got together and started
talking about a concept. And then that led to,
in 1996, KRS -1 created a temple of hip -hop.
And it's a 501C3. It's a quote, temple. All the
hip -hop. has really grown out of that. Out of
the religious nature of the temple? Yes. Everything
that it stands for, you know, it's a certain
culture. It's a certain way to behave. It's a
certain thing that you're owed and everything.
It's just really, you've really seen the institution
of hip hop gain so much steam and power over
the years that I think it's a good example. of
the dark side of what you're speaking of, Jeff.
Yeah, right. The power source exists, and so
people are going to attempt to plug into it for
nefarious ends. Yeah, and I think that we're
really comfortable in 2025, about to be 2026,
right? In our culture, we're really comfortable
with recognizing that music is powerful. I think
most people would say music has a certain kind
of power to it. But it's usually localized in
very either as I was as I was saying earlier,
like very individual enterprises. And so I won't
rehash like that's the artist expressing himself
fully through music. And then that and then it
becomes a means of like cultural change. Right.
Like you can enact you can you can cast a vision
and sort of enact changing the minds of people
by appealing to their Aesthetic senses, right?
So we're comfortable with that as an idea brings
people together of certain interests as well
You know like you mentioned Taylor Swift's four
chords if there's one specific thing that she's
famous for amongst in at least in terms of her
music, it's the constant flow of breakup songs,
right, right and This is probably arguably the
biggest artist in the world and her claim to
fame is that she just sings about how many ex
-boyfriends she has and how bad they were. Occasionally,
probably how sad she is about that. What is that
going to affect her millions of listeners who
listen to her stuff on repeat? What is their
opinion of relationships going to become? How
to handle difficult times in relationships? Yeah,
catechesis is a good way to think about it. Yeah,
we know this at the school that we work at, right?
Like we understand that it's a good mnemonic,
it's a good way to memorize things, is to chant
them, is to set them to rhythm, and it embeds
something into the heart and into the mind of
the person that's engaging in the practice, but
we... I think we like to think about that in
very materialist categories. It's purely cognitive.
It's purely cognitive, exactly. That we're not
talking about something supernatural. We're not
talking about something metaphysical. We're talking
about something that is, you know, for the atheist
out there, he would say, you know, we're talking
about something that is sort of an evolutionary
byproduct of the development of man that he's
recognized in his Freudian subconscious that
this is the best way to transmute core principles
and ideas that will continue the line that will
continue, you know, continue the race into the
next generation. You know, it's, it's, it's so
disconnected from any kind of acknowledgement
of a supernatural reality, something transcendent,
something transcendent, which is a shame because
we didn't always think this way. You know, we
used to understand again that this was the understanding
of music well up into the Renaissance is that
music is a way to, you cannot cut the veil and
step through a portal, but music is a way to
make that veil very thin. It's a way to see a
shadow. Well maybe we might say you can't lawfully
step through the veil. Is there maybe somebody
who ends up hearing this who's using ayahuasca
or something like that to kind of get. what may
legitimately be a glimpse of the other side in
whatever way, right? Absolutely. We don't endorse
that. You're right. That's an unlawful breaching
of appropriate boundary. Right. But like music
is somehow an appropriate bridge. Yeah. That
you're authorized to walk. And the great composers
understood, you know, the Age of Enlightenment
is a really interesting time period to study
because what you had happening socially was a
continuation of the scientific revolution that
comes before it. And basically what the enlightenment
thinkers were trying to do was take what they
saw were very good benefits of the scientific
revolution in the world of industry, in the world
of science, hard sciences, the mechanical arts.
And what it's all kind of rooted in is the idea,
is the hypothesis really, of can you take what
science has clearly been able to achieve in the
mechanical arts and can you apply them to other
domains and get similar results? And so really
what the enlightenment people, what the enlightenment
thinkers were trying to do was essentially discover
what is the scientific method that will produce
utopia, right? How can we come up with a testable
process, scientific process that will carry humans
into a higher, loftier, more beneficial way of
living. And we're big fans of reason. We think
that man is reasonable and he ought to use his
reason. So there's some good there. But it's
a complete divorce from Galileo and Copernicus
and the guys of the scientific revolution. who
what they were trying to do was catch a glimpse
of the transcendent glory of the creator by looking
at how he had articulated those divine attributes
in the world that he had made. And so the Enlightenment
people, what they're really, in essence, what
they're trying to do is get all of the order
that God has baked into creation without the
God who made it, right? Which produces, eventually,
disastrous results, the further away from Christianity
you get. And the Romantic movement that was sort
of a backlash against the Enlightenment, what
those people understood was that man is not simply
a reasonable creature, and that if you take the
Enlightenment too far, what you get is Stoicism,
which we don't want, because it denies 50 % of
what it means to be a human, which is that we're
not just thinking things, we're also feeling
things. And so the Romantics wanted to reclaim
the emotional aspect of humanity, or at least
try to remind everybody, hey, we ought not to
jettison that out as we try to achieve utopia.
But again, what they were trying to do was reclaim
that, but the Enlightenment people are right
in that we don't need God anymore. We've transcended
the need for a religious fencing and a religious
translator. in trying to understand those aspects
of human society and really the makeup of even
the individual. And so you get the lakeside poets.
You get, you know, I wandered lonely as a cloud,
which breeds sentimentality, and that kind of
leads us up into modernism and postmodernism.
And now music has come so far away from Handel's
Messiah, right? We had the opportunity to catch
the Nashville Symphony just a few nights ago.
Several of us went to go see Handel's Messiah
performed. Handel's Messiah was composed during
the Enlightenment, leading up to the Enlightenment.
And one of the interesting things about when
you study that time period is socially and scientifically
you're seeing, and even in the visual arts, you're
seeing massive departures away from the Christian
moorings of the medieval world, like they're
departing from that to try to achieve a higher
reason. But the music of that time period is
almost is almost universally and deeply Christian.
It's a very interesting, it typically doesn't
go that way. Or at least what survived from that
period. Yeah, yeah, sure. What we think of is
like, when you think of the great Enlightenment
composers, right, they're still tethered to a
mooring that is much more medieval than it is
Enlightenment. But they're applying the reason
of the Enlightenment to create musical genius.
It's really quite something. Now, I'm much more
of a layman on this topic, but I see both romanticism
and the Enlightenment as fundamentally materialist
and rationalist projects. Yes, I agree. Because
the one thing they really hold in common is that
God is entirely inessential. You can have the
romantic experientialism, but it just sort of
happens for whatever reason. We don't really
know But it's part of the human experience, right?
It kind of hangs on its own in the air. It becomes
asaic, right? It becomes like a principle that
we would normally only attribute to God, right?
That everything else in existence, it exists
by the word of His power. God is the only self
-actuating being, right? God is the only one
who exists. Because he exists everything else
exists because of him what they would both of
those projects are doing and they're kind of
fighting. Against each other in some ways but
also fighting hand in hand on the common ground
on the common ground which is exactly what you're
describing right that these things are just.
They are the highest good. Or they are good,
maybe is not even the right word, but they are
just the highest expression of what is. Yeah,
and I would even say like a reflection. So as
image bearers, we're privileged to know that
the reason I have a capacity to experience love,
any form of sentiment, anger, right? It's because
I bear the image of the one in whom those things
are self -actuatingly present. So God experiences
anger, therefore his image bearers can. It's
a product of being creature to His Creator, right?
But the Enlightenment guys and the Romantic guys
are both saying, well, those things are present.
They exist, but with no reference to God, right?
So the hard sciences exist, but no reference
to the God who is the order of His creation.
And the, what we would call the humanitarian
arts or experiences, those exist, but in no reference
to the Creator that they're of. derivative of
which is incredibly dangerous because if we're
right about music being Having something in its
nature that is supernatural divine a way to tap
into an infinite well and It's but it's been
completely divorced from understanding that the
world is more than just the sum of its parts
that it's directly connected to and a reflection
of the creator, then what you have is a nuclear
reactor that anybody can tap into and turn on,
turn off, crank it up to 11 or crank it down
to one, right? Like you just have this infinite
power source that - We've self -consciously thrown
the manual away to - Right, away, which is incredibly
dangerous. It is. It's almost like it speaks
to and from our soul, but it can bridge our mind
and our body. So its source is like spiritual,
but it can speak to all three parts of us. It
bridges the physical and the non -physical parts
of what it means to be human. Yeah. The common
term is soul music, but I think there's more
truth in that than being soul and spirit the
same thing. It has really capitalized on that
idea without being directly, you know, attributed
to it. Well, this is why, I mean, everybody in
this room and probably everybody listening is
a fan of Tolkien and C .S. Lewis. And the Enlightenment,
the Romantics, all those kind of history of ideas,
concepts, they're held in much higher regard
than the medieval period. You know, there's been
this horribly false and wicked Slander campaign
against the medieval period to call it the Dark
Ages It couldn't be further from the truth. Maybe
the pinnacle of human thought but Tolkien and
Lewis are both medievalists and so in their fiction
that continues to captivate Subsequent generations
year by year and people of very different worldviews
some who have no reference to God at all because
they remain against him It continues to find
new fans And, you know, Narnia, I think, is kind
of aping Tolkien's legendarium, but this is why
Tolkien's legendarium is the second best outside
of the... It gives the best creation account
that's not the actual one that shows up in Genesis,
because the medievalist guy had a sense of this
power, and so he has, in the creation of his
world, Middle Earth, the creator sings it into
existence. And even the bad guy, who's trying
to thwart the designer's intentions with the
song, he begins to sing as well and accomplish
his aims through his song. Yet the creator is
so transcendently powerful that he integrates
the discordant themes into his own song. These
sons of the medieval period actually saw through
the darkness of empiricism and romanticism to
something that's much more, not just true to
our lived experience, but true to what we all
intrinsically know about reality. Yeah, I couldn't
have articulated it better. And then that, so
for the listener, okay, if you go with us on
this intellectual experiment here, and you say,
okay, music is this thing that is More than what
I've sort of been led to believe by my culture
or more than what I've more than what I've ever
considered in the past What is that? What why
does that matter? What does it mean, right? And
so Tolkien I think again is helpful here, right?
There are a couple different scenes in the text.
I'll let you talk about The the great Tom, but
don't give me a second. I'll do Frodo and then
you do Tom so Frodo in the Lord of the Rings
early early in the adventure The party is attacked
by ringwraiths, Nazgul. They're essentially demons.
If you've never watched the movies or read the
books, they're the Dark Lord Sauron's greatest
servants. They're like demon ghosts, but they
can't be killed. And just his biggest thugs,
the big bads. Yeah, they're a power that no mortal
man can really interact with and hope to survive.
And if you watch the movies, there's a great
scene on the top of Weathertop where Frodo and
the other hobbits are beset by them, Frodo falls
to temptation, he puts the ring on, he sees them
sort of revealed for what they really are, and
he is stabbed by the Witch King of Angmar, the
very same one that was described in the text
that I read at the beginning of the podcast.
And this sort of... Moment of absolute despair
where it looks like oh, this is gonna be a really
short story The bad guys gonna get the ring the
world's gonna end and close the book nihilism
everybody. Yeah, right Not only if George RR
Martin wrote it then what happened in the movies
Aragorn shows up wielding a sword and a flaming
brand and he fights them all off and It's a great
scene. I mean it really works for the films,
but in the books the scene plays out a little
differently. They're all wielding firebrands
and they're all sort of standing back to back
and the Witch King sort of sneaks into the firelight
and he stabs Frodo very clandestinely. More like
a rogue or an assassin than a British assailant.
And Frodo, he recites a poem. In this moment
of distress, he recites an ancient poem about
Elbreth. And in the aftermath of the battle,
Though it's not really a battle because he does
that and then they all kind of run away and then
they move on. Aragorn makes a comment and what
he says is that the name of Elbereth in the poem
that Frodo recited, a song, a kind of song, that
the song that Frodo sang, Aragorn says, that
was more deadly to the foe than Frodo's sword
ever could have been. And Frodo's actually got
a sword of the westerness, like he's got a pretty
good sword. at that moment in the story. But
it would have done nothing to the Witch King.
But the song is what caused them to flee. The
name of Elbereth, he was tapping into something
that was ancient and powerful and good and greater
than himself. It's a reference to elves that
fought against the same kind of dark powers in
the past. And then the song commemorated it and
it became... I don't know, something like a hymn,
perhaps. I don't know if that's too far, but
they, you know, to remember the deed they wrote,
there was a ballad which takes the form of this
poem and it comes up a few times in the book.
So, you know, he calls upon Gilthoniel, Elbreth,
and then, and it's, you know, it's not necessarily
always, cause you know, you just walk around
saying that and all the bad guys run off. That
doesn't really work that way, but it does come
in clutch a few times. Yeah, absolutely. There
was a very well -meaning teacher that I used
to work with who used to say, you know, Lord
of the Rings was really hard for me to read.
Then I skipped the songs and I was able to get
through the book. And what I told this person
was then you missed the point, right? If you
skipped the music. you're really missing the
point of the entire text. And there's a secondary,
or maybe this is primary, what I'm saying is
secondary, but there's another reason why that
particular scene and what you just talked about,
Terry, with the reference to the past, a key
theme in Tolkien is that as time progresses,
things degenerate. The long defeat. The long
defeat, right? The heroes that we have now, as
great as they are. are not as great as the heroes
that we had in the past. But also the evils that
we face now are not as significant as the evils
that they faced. That there's this sort of long
degeneration, and I do think he's talking about
medievalism and enlightenment, and modernism
and then postmodernism, right? That we're just
constantly moving further and further away from
the old glories of the world. Everything's getting
weaker. Everything's getting weaker. Okay, enough
on that. All right, I'm supposed to do Uncle
Tom? Yeah. No, that's the way, that's a different
guy. That's a different guy. Tom Bombadil is
another of Tolkien's characters, which by the
way, I don't know if, Jeff, I don't know if you
mentioned it or not, but if you're interested
in that singing creation account, that is in
the Silmarillion, which is probably the, well,
if you count the Lord of the Rings as one volume.
And you should. And you ought to read it as one
story. That's his number one. The Hobbit is his
number two. The Silmarillion is probably his
third most read. It's a much more complex work.
Yeah, it reads very much like a history text.
So if you like Middle Earth, you'll enjoy it.
And if you are kind of could take it or leave
it, but you like the Lord of the Rings for its
own sake, you might not love it. But I really
think everybody ought to read the creation account.
Yeah, it's at the beginning of the book and it's
not, you know, it takes up a little bit. But
anyway, that's where it is. So Tom Bombadil is
in the Fellowship of the Ring, which is the first
of the Lord of the Rings books and Fairly early
on in the text, although every time I read it
I'm always surprised how far into the book it
is before they actually get there so the hobbits
have been wandering through the old forest which
is Rumored to be haunted or possessed of some
sort of dark Presence and they're not really
sure exactly what it is But by the time they've
arrived where they are when they encounter him,
it's very clear that the forest is malevolent
And it has changed the trails, it is hemming
them in, it is pushing them towards this river
which seems to be the epicenter of the darkness,
the withywindle. And so they find themselves
on the banks of the withywindle, near a very
old gnarled willow tree, and they begin to fall
asleep. And this is very apparently some sort
of miasma that's being put upon them by an outside
force. not personified yet as far as we know.
So they fall asleep and two of them are captured
by this old gnarled willow. He just sort of envelops
them in the bark and is going to try to kill
them as far as we can tell. So two of them are
not. Frodo and Sam are the ones that are out
loose and they don't know what to do. So in desperation,
they literally just start running around in a
bent and a haunted forest screaming for help
from someone that they have no reason to believe
is there. Then here comes some dude bebopping
down the trail literally And he is an outlandish
character. He's one of Tolkien's more mysterious
and unusual ones and he really feels When you
first meet him, he really feels like he stepped
in from another story He's got his you know,
his yellow boots his blue hat. Correct me if
I'm wrong on any of these colors And he is out
gathering water lilies for his wife Who is named
Goldberry and he's whistling his way along and
they call for help and when he arrives You know,
they they tell him what the problem is this old
man Willow, which they don't know They said the
trees, you know trees gobbling up our buddies
They're stuck inside and everything that we've
attempted to do can't can't work. Maybe it's
a blue coat Not a blue hat yellow hat. It's a
his boots are yellow boots are yellow. I said
that Blue coat. Blue coat, okay. So anyway, very
brightly colored, outlandish fellow, comes singing
down the trail in the middle of a haunted forest.
Why would this guy be in such a good mood in
a haunted forest? So he's gathering up water
lilies for Goldberry, and they tell him what's
going on, and he responds by saying, ah, old
man Willow, I have the song for him. And so Tom's
magic, which becomes, it is used a few different
times, seems to be primarily based on singing
specific songs. And it doesn't appear to be the
case that if the hobbits knew the song, that
they would be able to have dominion over the
swillow, but Tom does, and the method that he
uses is his songs. So he saves them from that,
and then... Later, after they stay with him for
a bit, then they head off on their journey. They
have to pass near a dangerous place and they
get off track and find themselves captured by
whites, which is a kind of an old fashioned term
for like a ghost kind of thing. It's like an
undead creature. So where they are is a large
graveyard where the kings had been buried from
This was Angmar, right? Yes, the North Kingdom.
Yeah, which was an evil kingdom that had collapsed
in the past. And it was kind of just a wasteland
now. And so they had fought against the good
guys. And this is kind of a reference to what
you were talking about. Things had degenerated.
So now this used to be the epicenter of this
major war between two large powers. And it's
mostly woods and fields now. They get stuck in
one of these and that fortunately, though, Tom
had taught them a song and that if they sing
the song, he will appear to help them within
a certain distance of his home. And they're close
enough that they call for him and he just cracks
the barrel wide open, gets rid of the ghost,
drags all the treasure out into the sun. And
they're set on their way with brand new shiny
swords of westernness. Yeah, it's the way that
Tom. articulates in the material world his power
is through song. Like you said, Old Man Willow,
I know the song for him. And you know, Old Man
Willow's fun because he sings the song and then
he grabs a tree branch and whacks him a few times.
And that's like, you know, sort of making sure
it seeps deep into the roots. The period on the
sentence, I think. And then when he, same thing
with the Barrowites, right? He sings them out
of a grave. right, they're in a grave. And he,
using the power of his, the magic of his song,
he pulls them out of a living death and sets
them running, you know, in freedom. And, you
know, the kids are always like, oh, a little
bit, because they had been sort of regarbed to
look like princes, because the Barrow White was
essentially reenacting The pre the defeat that
you're describing happened ages ago And so they're
they've lost their clothes and he says get rid
of those dead man's clothes So they they actually
run naked for a while while he goes and finds
their packs and their ponies Which have wandered
off and then they get you know, they get redressed
but for a while I mean, there's a there's a real
picture of new life and innocence and freedom
That's and you know, a lot of like Edenic imagery
right and so that does weird people out, you
know Who's the only people in society? that it's
acceptable for them to be running around naked,
it's kids. They have no sense of that kind of
proprietary garbing being necessary. So like
a kid will hop out of the tub and run through
the living room in the middle of all the company,
right? Adam and Eve are naked in the garden.
It's because they're both in a state of innocence.
So like it is, particularly in a very sexualized
culture like ours, people running around naked
is something to raise an eyebrow against. But
what Tolkien's doing is saying they're kind of
in a state of innocence. Right. They've they've
and they really are childlike throughout that
entire episode. And Lord of the Rings in many
ways is a coming of age story as they as they
sort of mature into from childlike naivete into
the kind of manhood that that Tolkien. Yeah.
Which is often symbolized by what they're wearing.
Yeah. They can scourge the Shire. But to get
back to music. Right. So so all throughout the
Lord of the Rings. music plays a significant
role and to get back to the original thesis i
think we've covered well the idea of sort of
the metaphysical reality that we live in and
that is inescapable but then again to get back
to practical application what does that mean
for us it's a it's combat right like this is
how you fight how do you fight when paul tells
us that our fight is against flesh and blood
it's against principalities powers how do you
fight an immaterial being. How do you fight against
the supernatural forces? There's several answers
to that question, but music, I think, has got
to become part of the conversation. It's too
neglected. It's too neglected. We have reduced
it to that it has all of these wonderful effects
on the individual. It's all internalized. And
subjective. And subjective. But when you're in
a combat situation, you know, the individual
is important, but the unit is important, right?
The entire division is important, and the opposing
division is the object of our ire. That's what
we're trying to destroy. And so we have to externalize
these principles and understand that there's
a real combat, there's a real battle. And if
we don't arm ourselves using the sort of created
divine principles that the Lord has baked into
his creation, we're selling ourselves short.
You know, I wonder, so we in the church, we have,
I think we like to think that we have a better
grasp of the power of music because of our emphasis
on true lyrics, which is not nothing. Yeah, very
important. And so it's not merely about the feels,
but because of our distrust of emotion. at least
in our tradition, I think that we tend to maybe,
and I don't want to say overemphasize the trueness
of the lyrics, but there is, it seems like a
premium on the effect of the music on us, like
on the physiological, like on the emotional level
is de -emphasized, probably to our detriment
maybe. Well, I think we would also say that the
experience or the power of music, the way Joe's
talking about can't be reduced either to rationality
or Emotionalism right it comprehends both but
does more. Yeah. Well, that's kind of what I'm
getting at right So this it reminds me a little
bit of you know, you're talking about it as warfare
So we're thinking in weapons terms and it reminds
me of a scene from dances with wolves where Late
in the movie Kevin Costner has befriended this
Indian tribe and it's become clear that an Indian
enemy tribe is going to attack While most of
the Braves are off doing something else And so
he makes a decision to arm the ones that were
left behind with lever action rifles, which they
had not had access to. So he gives them the guns
and then they lay in wait for the enemy to attack.
And when the enemy finally shows up, they all
rush out and start clubbing the enemies with
these rifles. And so I'm wondering if Christians
are thinking of music in this turn. It's like
you pick up this weapon that you can use. And
you're looking at it going, well, this is a great
club when really it's a gun that you should be
firing. You know, like you just need to, we need
to use it to its fullest potential. I think there
is so much truth in what you're saying because
you look at the state of worship and the church
culture and you look, they are using the hip
hop tactics now. It's bigger, better, flashy.
It's got the baselines. It's got the drums. It's
got everything else. They're using elements.
that the secular folks have found power in and
trying to reapply that to Christianity. Well,
a lot of it's mechanistic. And so, it's not just
kind of tapping into the wrong side of the spiritual
force, but this chord progression is going to
make the person hearing it feel something when
I then change it with this one particular chord.
It's again, it's just counterfeiting. It's the
pagan drums versus... Well, it's very enlightenment,
right? Like the scientific method has revealed
that this chord progression elicits this response.
Yes, exactly. It's back to that hyper materialist
project. And so again, I mean, I think I'm very
well on the record about I want church songs
to be doctrinally rich and scriptural. I think
that's... A minimum necessary qualification.
Right. That's not all it needs to be. And it
should be structurally very lovely. And the instrumentation
should be well performed. Those things are important.
Non -negotiably important. But nonetheless, we
would say that there's something beyond even
that recipe. The way you said earlier, something
greater emerges from that. than just can be explained
by the sum of the parts. Yeah. And, you know,
for the listener who's frustrated, like, that's
fine, tell me what it is. To do so would be almost
to transgress the very nature of what we're talking
about, because it's not materialist in its nature.
It cannot be, it's not the kind of thing that
you can quantify. But I know it when I see it,
or maybe when I hear it, right? When you feel
it. Or when you're caught up by it. It's what
the architects of the medieval period were trying
to do in the Renaissance. It's what they were
trying to do with cathedrals. What am I trying
to do? I'm trying in a limited way with the materials
that God has given me using the reason that I
have. and the aesthetic understanding of God's
creation that I have. I'm trying to catch the
people who walk into this building up into the
transcendent glory of the omnipresent, omniscient,
omnipotent creator. And that will always, as
created beings who are sub -creating, there will
always be a limitation to what we can do in relationship
to what our God can do. But The chief aim is
a transcendent universality that even if you
had never been, if you're not a son or daughter
of the West and you have no idea what this cathedral
is or what it's for, when you walk into it, it
still has an effect on you that is universal.
And outside of you. And outside of you. And music
is even better at that than buildings are. Take
someone like Jacob Collier. I mean, I talked
to a friend of mine who went to his concert recently
in Nashville, and he's like, you just experience
a connection to something bigger than you. And
even though that wasn't Christ -centered, I mean,
it still has an effect. And they still have mastery
of those tools. Right. Still using the same power
source. Yeah. And you've made this point repeatedly
in the past, Jason, which is that Satan is the
master musician. Right? What is his role as the
preeminent angel of light in the heavenly hosts?
I mean, he's described as being made of musical
instruments. The access to the knowledge of the
power of music. I mean, you know he has that
because he did that on a heavenly level. So we
can only imagine the yet untapped resources that
he's about to. because he's about to pull out
all the stops. Well, and our enemy has had thousands
of years to take that expertise and use it for
nefarious purposes in God's creation. He's very
good at what he does. Which gives us things like
pagans preparing human sacrifice, playing music
to set the vibe, to establish the right atmosphere
for something so heinous to be done, or to consume
another human being, right? Like rituals. are
musically connected. It's because Satan knows
what music does. Our language informs us. What
is a chant? We understand chanting as a sort
of rhythmic, quasi -musical expression of whatever.
Bringing you into an enchanted state. What does
it mean to be enchanted? We're talking about
magic here. We're talking about something that
is metaphysical in its nature. It's a bridging
of the two worlds. And the forces of darkness,
they're very comfortable with that understanding
of music. You're talking about practical fronts
on this. I said it on our previous recording.
You would think a preacher is kind of immune
to this, but on a Lord's Day corporate worship,
I'll often come into corporate worship feeling
quite spiritually dead. And it is the experience
of singing with the church and often hearing
the church sing that re -provokes and cultivates
within me a zeal for the Lord. And so I would
tell you, you know, on a Lord's Day, You need
to be able to hear the people singing with you.
You don't need to just be hearing what's coming
off the stage. Like the singing of the people
has a real spiritual impact upon you. It's pleasing
to the Lord. But as I tell our church often,
the New Testament twice tells us that we actually
minister to each other. We encourage each other.
We admonish one another. And those things aren't
just rational. They go beyond the rational component
that's inherently there. Practically though,
too, Terry and I very lamentably recently had
a chance to be in a place that quite possibly
had a track record of spiritual darkness. And
so, we had went to that place, and what we did,
because of what we had available to us, is we
prayed, right? But the one thing I think we would
both agree, and we've even talked about, if my
memory serves, is if we get a chance to go back,
we're going to sing Psalms. We're going to sing
hymns. We're going to, you know, to borrow from
N .D. Wilson, pollute the darkness. And there's
something, again, who's going to belittle prayer?
And songs can be prayers. I think there's something
very common between the two forms. But I do think
that there's something with the singing of truth,
God's truth, God's word, that goes beyond merely
the recitation of truth. As vital as that is,
I don't want to do anything to limit that. But
these are the kind of things that Jared Moore,
right? So, he was on the previous episode of
the podcast. He's written a book to help people
experience the breaking of the power of lust
in their life. And one of the brilliant parts
of the book is that there's all this cognitive
data, all this rich material of Scripture filling
your brain with the thoughts of God. But at the
end of the book, too, there's a song for you
to sing and listen to, you know, during that
period of studying in that chapter. Because it
is something like a rifle that's not just reducible
to a club It does something different and it
does something that's very important and I think
he's really wise to frame it that way Yeah, I
agree. I agree that that's where I was going
with as far as again just continue with application
like listener if you're you're dealing with or
battling some kind of sin or An uncharitable
ungrateful disposition You're dealing with anger
and resentment in your relationships. You need
to sing. You need to sing more. David is the
perfect example of this. What is his constant
go -to when he finds himself in places of distress?
It is the myctams, the golden themes that are
composed in the Psalms. And again, just to reiterate,
I think it's more than just an emotional shot
in the arm. I think it's something deeper. Now,
Jason's trying to get me to read it, but it was
his point earlier, so I won't insist he does.
No, no. But it was just in 1 Samuel 1623, David's
heart playing is described not just to soothe
Saul emotionally, but it actively forced it.
the evil spirit that was installed to depart.
It's combat! I'm telling you, it's a martial
spirit! I don't know what Jason is reading from,
but I can see his screen. The next sentence is
really profound. It says, this demonstrates music's
power to shift the spiritual territory. by replacing
demonic oppression with the atmosphere of heaven.
What's the language we have for one place being
governed by a particular power, then being displaced
by a superior power who then enforces its administration?
That is conquest. That is militant conquest.
Thinking pastorally and as a dad. So I have a
child who is uniquely beset by fear. just a very
fearful creature, beyond rationality. But then
also I know people who have what could be supernatural
reasons to fear. So people who have night terrors.
I don't know that all night terrors are something
supernatural, but I'm very open to the idea that
some of them are supernatural. And I do think
we appropriately say pray and read the Bible
and do those things too, right? But what do you
do with a child who's terrified to be in a dark
room? I think one of the things you should probably
do is sing Come Thou Fount, Be Thou My Vision,
right? Sing that. Sing some of the Psalms that
have been set to music where the psalmist is
afraid and begging God to intervene. Our school
hymn, the second verse is, He lives to crush
the fiends of hell. Glory, hallelujah. Right.
So again, it's having a rifle and treating it
like a club or leaving it in the holster. We
just can't do that. And so Is it a magic bullet?
Is it a perfect antidote? I don't really know.
But when you have a problem, you shoot all the,
you know, you fire all the weapons you have against
it. And this is one that we just leave in the
gun case. Far too often. Far too often. You know,
Jason, you brought up previously that when Paul
and Silas are in jail, right, they sing and There's
a supernatural deliverance earthquake and the
shackles fall off and the doors open So what
I want to be clear about I know you guys will
agree like we're not saying that if you can just
be a certain Level of this is not magecraft,
right? This is not a D &D campaign Well, it's
similar with the Jericho situation, right? Like
I've heard people say like well they screamed
at the exact right pitch to crack the mortar
You're missing the point. How desperate are materialists?
I mean you're just missing it entirely right
and and what we're not saying is like that that
that economy of power is just available. Even
that is kind of a materialist view, right? It's
mechanistic. It's mechanistic, right? Like if
I can just tap, if I can just do it rightly,
then I can achieve certain levels of supernatural
power that they did, like as if I was leveling
up in a D &D campaign. Like that's not what we're
talking about. And get the Tom Bombadil spell
book. Yeah, right. It's not witchcraft. It's
not, it's not witchcraft. And it's not Mario
snacking on a fire flower. Right, exactly. So
that's not what we're describing. But nevertheless,
what all of those stories illustrate is that
there is some kind of wedding between what we
understand as music and song, and also what we
understand as supernatural power. And when we
deny that those things are as intertwined as
I think scripture makes it clear that they are,
then we are not availing ourselves. of the natural
resource in the supernatural well, the infinite
well that you've described, that is available
to every believer because they have been indwelled
with the Holy Spirit, right? Again, if you find
yourself locked up for your faith, I'm not saying
that if you sing, the locks are going to snap
open. But you should sing. But you should sing
anyway. You should sing. And you will claim ground.
You will conquer, even if it is just that five
-by -five jail cell. you will claim ground for
the kingdom of God. Even over your own unbelief,
the temptation to believe God's not good because
of what you're suffering like, there's a lot
of this. And what would be, so if we're treating
music as an instrument, I know music involves
instrumentation most often. I don't mean it in
that way, but if music is an instrument the Lord
has provided for us people, what's the right
usage? What's the humbly go to the one who created
the instrument and empowers the instrument and
saying, I'm going to use this ultimately trusting
you to work out whatever your good providence
is, sort of in the same way of the Hebrew use
thrown into the fiery furnace, right? Like, we're
going to do what's appropriate to be done. You
know, it would be wonderful if the Lord would
choose to use this to deliver us, but it doesn't
matter. I'm still just going to do what's right.
And so, like, get the thing out of the holster
and put it to use and see what the Lord's pleased
to do with it. Yeah. That's the best way to articulate
that. And I think that we won't do that, or at
least we'll have a hard time doing that until
we reclaim and reshape our understanding of music
to be more than just instruction, more than just
emotional correction or inspiration. Again, I
think you said earlier, it comprehends those
things, but it is over, under, Around and through
those things right it is it is the Lutherans
listening are very encouraged Next week So I
don't know if that was convincing to you listener
I don't want to also prematurely close if people
have other thoughts, but I'm deeply interested
in a recovery of and classical and medieval understanding
of music. Among other things. Yeah, because there's
a single -mindedness, a Greek mindset that we've
adopted. And I've mentioned it in previous podcasts,
too. But the Hebrews are very dualistic in their
thinking. ebbed and flowed between the spiritual
and the physical and the spiritual and the physical.
And they understood that there was a direct correlation
between the two and direct interaction between
the two. And I think we have done the opposite.
We've gone back to the Greek mindset and we explain
everything in the physical by the physical. We
don't take into account the whole spiritual realm.
Even though we subconsciously acknowledge that
it is there, Right, so if you ask every Christian
that you... Well, a believer would also explicitly
affirm it. Right, that's what I mean. The disconnect
is in our own personal thinking through and acting
through the faith. Right. That's right. You know,
we are people that have absolutely no problem
when the atheist comes and says, you really think
a donkey tonked one time? Yeah. You really think
a snake in a garden spoke? Yeah. You think a
man walked out of his own grave? You better believe
it. Seriously, you better believe that, right?
We have no problem where the Bible makes explicit
supernatural claims. Even the most, you know,
I should probably temper my thoughts. There's
kind of a shift to reinterpret the metaphors
of the Bible. You know, everything's a metaphor
now. But generally speaking, Christians still,
even in 25, they're very comfortable with the
supernatural elements of Scripture as they are
explicitly laid out in Scripture. And then when
it comes to understanding the Christian faith
and daily practice, it's just totally divorced.
I want you to explain to me one thing that's
not spiritual about this statement. A virgin
birth, God coming to earth, who died on the cross,
taking the wrath of our sins, He rose, and then
we expect Him to come back. That is the cornerstone
of all of our spiritual hopes. It's all supernatural.
Absolutely. Well, and there are like anti -intellectual
fruit loop poofs out there who would do a version
of this, but Christians are the only ones who
can do it as thinking people. Yes. That Louis
was really helpful to me on this front. In his
ransom trilogy, he goes to another planet and
he encounters these bubble trees where when he
bumps into one of the bubbles produced by the
tree, he comes away reinvigorated. And that sounds
so sci -fi and so out there and esoteric, right?
We see an apple tree as a magical thing. What's
an apple tree? It's a magical thing because it
grows this thing that gives us life and it's
a delight to eat. It's not reducible to, well,
over eons of history, it evolved the ability
to produce its fruit in such a way that other
creatures would consume it and carry it and distribute
the seed through their feces. God made a world
where trees grow fruit that give you life. It's
a magical world. When you are articulating the
materialist explanation of an apple tree, I throw
up in my mouth a little bit. It's so ridiculous.
The magical explanation actually makes sense
of the thing, and Christians are the only ones
who can do it intellectually, without denying
some core component of human existence. Indy
Wilson's kind of famous, like, we really live
in a world where a bug crawls on a tree, makes
itself a sleeping bag, and then comes out a butterfly,
right? Like, this is a magical world. And it's
because it's not just stuff. God interlaces the
mundane with the supernatural and sees no problem
wedding them very inseparably in all of our daily
experiences. Yeah. In a conversation recently,
I had with my brother -in -law talking about
not necessarily this specific topic, but just
more generally about the materialist and the
spiritual and how Christians, kind of exactly
what you just articulated, how Christians are
the only ones who can reasonably make sense of
these things. I was talking about, you know,
in the current understanding we typically think
of the material world and the spiritual world
as being kingdoms separated by a chasm, and that
occasionally, in very specific instances, God
builds a bridge and then because of his divine
purposes will either, you know, obviously in
the incarnation, we have the ultimate expression
of this, but in lesser senses, you know, angel,
angelic messengers and miracles, donkey talking,
right? Like there's just, there are like these
singular instances in history where the two kingdoms
are bridged by God's divine will, right? And
I think that that's fundamentally flawed. That's
not the way that these two things work. That
it's much more like the shore of a beach where
the water and the sand, the shoreline is, which
is constantly ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the
wave comes in big. Right. But they're always
connected. They're never disconnected. There
is an overlap and an interaction. that you can
never divorce them. You can never separate the
shoreline, the water and the sand. That is where
the water meets the sand is by definition the
shoreline. And though it moves and though it
shifts, it can never by its definition ever be
anything else. You know what I mean? And I think
that, again, it's not a perfect metaphor, but
I think that's much more closely articulates
what the Bible actually presents to us about
these things. and music maybe is the ultimate
modality to see that. I actually think it's true
in many. The most readily accessible. Exactly,
exactly. I think it's actually true of our entire,
now go with me listener, I think it's actually
true of everything, right? That this is the power
of catechesis and lots of other topics for lots
of other days. But I think music is the most
readily accessible, most easily understood. which
is why it's so criminal that it's put on the
shelf because God has put the cookies on the
bottom shelf here for us. Jeff, you work on a
farm. I do work on a farm. It's very cold on
that farm right now, Jason. My hands are being
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I mean, you know, I wear gloves. but the gloves
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Well, I mean, I appreciate you telling me the
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wraps up this episode of Men of Biscar. Listener,
thank you so much for joining us. I sure got
a lot out of this episode. I hope you did too.
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