Jesus IS The Song – Logos and Music
Jesus IS the Song – Logos and Music.
“The Lord is my song, The Song!” (Isaiah 12:2, Exodus 15:2, Psalm 118:14).
“In the beginning was the Logos-Word, and the Logos-Word was with God, and the Logos-Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being by Him, for God created everything through Him; not one thing came into being except through Him. In Him was life, and the life was the light of mankind.” (John 1:1-4).
“And the Logos-Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14). “We saw Him with our very own eyes. We gazed upon Him and heard Him speak. Our hands actually touched Him, the One who was from the beginning, the Logos-Word of life.” (1 John 1:1).
“John, who has faithfully reported everything he saw in the vision – that is, the Logos-Word of God, the message of truth revealed by Jesus Christ.” (Rev. 1:2). “He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called the Logos-Word of God.” (Rev. 19:13).
“The Lord Is The Song!” There are a few ways to understand this recurring biblical passage… The Lord is the reason I sing. The Lord is Who I love to sing about. The Lord is the object of my singing. The Lord is Who we sing to. The Lord is the one Who inspires our singing. I sing because of the Lord, in honor of the Lord, in obedience to the Lord. Many translations put this verse as saying, “The Lord is my song.” But biblical scholars say that this passage could just as correctly be translated as, “The Lord is The song,” or even, “The Lord is the song of God.”
The Song in the Flesh. So this important piece of Scripture captures the imagination as it makes clear that… Jesus Himself IS the Song. Christ is the divine song with flesh on. He embodies the Song of the universe. Jesus is God’s Song to the world. The life of Christ is itself a Song. The Christ-Song is a perfectly constructed piece of eternal music in the flesh. Just as a song is the composer’s method of self-expression, Jesus is God’s perfect and ultimate form of Self-expression. As our Savior, Jesus is the Song of Salvation. As the Redeemer, He is the Song of Redemption. As the Deliverer, He is the Song of Deliverance. As the Wonderful Counselor, He is the Song of Wisdom. As the Prince of Peace, He is the Song of Shalom.
Thinking of Jesus Christ as The God-Song in the flesh while at the same time as believing Him to be Logos makes perfect sense. The Greeks tied together music and Logos way back in the centuries before Jesus was even born. Perhaps, if we had been flies on the wall of the village Greek spa around 500 BC, we might have overheard this socratic discussion between the local philosophers (the “lovers of wisdom”) who liked to think about such things….
Heraclitus: “Okay, men, I really think we’re onto something here, and we’re not just flying by the seat of our pants as usual about abstract thoughts that lead us nowhere. I think we can agree on this, right? That surely there must be something significant behind this amazing universe we are all enjoying. When we look at this world of ours, it’s just way too coherent, too reasonable, too purposeful, too orderly, too-well-designed, too beautiful, too organized, too…
Pythagoras: “Yes, yes, we get your point! It’s easy to see that the universe is just too spectacular in every way to exist and carry on will-nilly. There must be a divine law, or a universal principle, or something behind all this. It doesn’t make sense otherwise! There has got to be a universal Thought behind all thinking, a universal Reason that inspires all reason!
Diogenes: “Exactly! We need to name this Reality behind all the other realities. There must be a word we can use for this universal principle, so we all know what we’re talking about when we talk about it, right?
Heraclitus: “I agree! I think the best name for this organizing principle is Logos! I know, I know, it’s the word we use in our bookkeeping when we add up numbers and count tallies and give an accounting of something mathematically. But what better word could we find for the underlying Logic behind all things? Our universe doesn’t add up if there isn’t a governing force making sense of the world, right? So I propose that Logos is the word we can use when we think of Reason, Thought, Word, Expression, Organizing Principle, Inherent Purpose, Transcendent Source. What do think of this, my friends?
Pythagoras: “Perfect! That was brilliant, Heraclitus! I wish I would have thought of that myself! But this Logos, this invisible intelligence somewhere behind everything, it is truly beyond our understanding, is it not? Is there any hope that we can get to the bottom of what it all means?
Herodotus: “Well, we can get the ball rolling by assuming what might be true just by using our good ol’ Greek logic. For instance, Logos is an expression, a Word that is spoken to bring order out of chaos, right? So maybe we can safely assume that all the truth, goodness and beauty we find in the world is somehow spoken into reality by Logos. And I would think that when Logos speaks, the world listens. And as soon as this Logos-Word is expressed, whatever is said comes into existence the moment it is spoken. Does that make sense to you men?
Thales: “Well said, Herodotus! That makes sense to me. But I have a question here… Are there any hints in the reality around us that point to Logos? Logos is invisible and inaudible, so are there visible or audible pointers that part the curtain and prove that there is a Logos? In other words, is there anything in our this-worldly existence that shouts to us the existence of this other-worldly Logos factor in the universe? What can we point to that certifies there is such a thing as Logos?
Orpheus: “Thales, Thales! You don’t have to ask the same question in a million different ways. We get it! But I do like the question. There must be some Logos that is arranging all the obvious coherence in this world. There must be lots of hints in our world that have been dropped by the Logos of the other world, something physical that represents this invisible structure that we’re talking about.
Heraclitus: “Yes, and that hint is harmony! Think of all the harmony we see in the world, when different things somehow fit together coherently. The universe is structured in such a way that there is harmonious function everywhere!
Pythagoras: “Well said! And what do we immediately think of when we think of harmony? Music! How unlikely that such a heavenly reality even exists in our world! The existence of music only makes sense when we see music as an expression of Logos, like the sunbeam from the sun. Think of the beauty of the musical sounds to our ears. Think of the fixed truths and order of the musical scales. Think of the goodness that music brings to our souls and to our world. Nothing moves us as deeply as music, am I right? On top of that, I would bet you a million denarii that even the stars and planets are all moving to the music of Logos! In fact, I wonder if Logos and Music are intertwined so intimately that we couldn’t even tell the two apart if we tried!
Diogenes: “Whoa! So music is not just a gift of Logos, but actually the physical expression of the spiritual Logos? So are you suggesting, Pythagoras, that when we play an instrument, or sing, or simply enjoy music, we are actually experiencing somehow the essence of Logos itself? Hold the phone. I’ve got to think about this for awhile.
Heraclitus: “While we’re thinking about Logos and music, I’ve got the perfect topic for our next discussion… Mathematics! Think of the structure and orderly beauty of mathematics, and the objective truth of it, and how mathematical music actually is?
Herodotus: “Okay, okay! Let’s sink our teeth into that later this week! We need to let this Logos idea digest for awhile. See you in a few days, gentlemen…”
Logos in the Flesh? Don’t be Absurd. In a sense the Greek logos is able to create truth and reality. The Greeks never dreamed that their logos would become an actual person. The idea that logos would take on flesh would be laughable and unthinkable, and would actually defeat their whole understanding of this ideal of an impersonal, governing force in the world. The Greek logos had many hints of the true faith, though, and has been called a “bridge-word” because of the many Greeks who baptized the Greek logos into Christian belief after finding Christianity a logical step forward.
The Hebrew Logos. The Bible used during the time of Jesus and the early Christians was usually the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. The original Old Testament was written in Hebrew, but Greek was the prominent language used during Jesus’ time. The Septuagint had been translated several centuries before Christ, and so it was commonplace for New Testament writers to quote the Greek version and not the Hebrew version of Scripture. For the most part, when we see a quote from the Hebrew Bible in the New Testament, it is from the Septuagint. The Greek term logos was used literally hundreds of times in the Greek Old Testament, and was often used to highlight the Word of God. Logos was also used to translate “truth,” and implied thought, meaning, planning and design. It’s interesting that the Hebrew Bible’s logos was so similar to the Greek understanding. In many ways, the Greek Old Testament laid the groundwork for John’s use of logos. The Word of God in the Hebrew Bible (logos), as with John, signified the presence of the Lord. Logos suggested God’s self-expression, whether in creation, in the prophet’s message, or in the Torah itself. When a prophet declared “the word of the Lord,” the prophet’s words were considered coming from the mind and mouth of Yahweh Himself.
The Gospel Logos. The term Logos in John 1 has been the most debated and discussed term in all the Greek New Testament, according to the biblical scholars. It has been described and amplified and studied and defined in any number of ways. But for our purposes in the Christian faith, Jean Vanier’s definition of Logos is as good as any other: “Logos has come to mean the spoken Word, the thought and idea behind that Word, and the wisdom that inspired that Word.” The term logos was not a foreign word in that part of the world during the time of Jesus and the early Christians. The Greek version of the Hebrew Bible, the Septuagint, was widely used for biblical reading and considered the Bible of reference of that time. John decided to adopt that term and baptize the Greek version with a more complete understanding of it from the Christian viewpoint. In the New Testament era, logos meant the expression of a thought of the Father through the Holy Spirit; an utterance or a word embodying a divine idea; a message through speech or in writing; or more generally, reasoning expressed by words. John’s logos would include these sorts of thoughts:
(1.) There is indeed a universal Reason that is behind the well-ordered and reasonable world. This powerful force of divine intelligence is the God of the holy Scriptures, Yahweh, the Sovereign God who put the cosmos together. This God is the Person who created the world with His spoken Word, “Let there be...” and has sustained it ever since.
(2.) This personal Creator God, the eternal Lord of the cosmos, wanted to yet again use His spoken Word to start a new beginning. God’s Word would once again be in the act of creation, but this time would create salvation and renewal. God’s spoken Word was actually a divine Presence, His Son, Jesus Christ.
(3.) The Creator God expressed Himself with His spoken Word, and His ultimate self-expression was when He revealed Himself to the world in the form of His Son. In this way, God revealed His divine Reason and Wisdom, and His desire to personally share His presence in this world He created. So God, the invisible Source of Reason and Wisdom, sent forth His Son as His visible, eternal spoken Word. Jesus, the spoken Word, is thus the Voice of God.
(4.) Jesus Christ is the Logos, the living Word of God, the Word who once said, “Let there be light!” That creative Word has taken on flesh and is the visible image of the invisible God. Jesus is the physical representative of God’s existence, heaven’s Ambassador of the Godhead to bring messages from His home. Jesus is the Co-Creator of the cosmos and has been face-to-face with the almighty God for all eternity. The Word that spoke light into the world has now become the Light of that world.
(5.) So John declares that Jesus, the Son of God, is in fact the Logos…not only the spoken Word of God in the flesh in a new creation, not only God’s thought behind that living Word, but also the embodiment of the Wisdom that inspired God’s spoken Word. John presents Jesus as the absolute revelation and self-expression of God. Jesus is Yahweh spoken into flesh, the holy Scripture in the form of a Person. If we want to read God’s mind, we read Jesus.
The Living, Singing Logos. Another way to understand Jesus “fulfilling” the written Torah is that He is indeed “Logos,” the Living Word. He is the living, singing Torah. He embodies the Law of Moses, and was the spiritual inspiration to all that is in the Hebrew Bible. He is the Author of the absolute truth that is in the Jewish Bible. Jesus fulfilled Torah by fulfilling the OT prophecies about Him, through His teachings saturated with truth, through His actions performing God’s will. Jesus was the perfect fulfillment of the Law. The Greek Bible translated the term “the Ten Commandments” (Deut. 5, Ex. 20) into “the Ten Logos,” the Ten Words.” That’s why so many refer to the “Decalogue” when referring to the Ten Commandments. As outrageous as this might sound, Jesus wasn’t merely fulfilling the Word of God, He was embodying it. He wasn’t merely living in light of the Ten Commandments, He was a living, breathing version of them. Jesus was not merely unpacking the Torah in His teachings, He was the Torah. Jesus the living Word, Scripture in the flesh, Torah with a pulse. Jesus is the God-Song as expressed in the Torah, and His life was the perfect expression of the divine Song of the universe.
John’s Logos is a Hymn! It is not surprising that John’s famous opening to his gospel in John 1:1-4 is an excerpt from an early church hymn. Logos and music were just natural partners in describing Jesus the Anointed One. The leading scholars of John’s gospel claim that John 1:1-4 is quoted from a hymn in the first Christian community that was sung in honor of Christ and His identity as Logos. They have concluded this because its lyrical style is more like a poem that is sung, with a structure that uses short, linked phrases and repetition, with the end of one phrase starting the next phrase. And so its flowing quality to the words is said to be typical of a song at that time. The words to John’s gospel opening also mirrors the language and themes that were typical of early Christian hymns. John’s Logos-Word expressions were consistent with a condensed version of the core beliefs of the Church at that time, including especially that Christ was the co-creator of the universe at God’s side, and that Jesus was the God-song in the flesh, the divine Reason behind all reason, the inspired Thought that designed the universe, and God’s Expression in its fullest form.