Thomas Yee

Marrying Music and Theology: Martin Luther's Views on Worship Thomas Yee

Seminar paper from the year 2011 in the subject Musicology, grade: A, Pepperdine University (Seaver College), course: Music History I, language: English, abstract: In the tumultuous era of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther did far more than revolutionize church theology. As a self-proclaimed "friend of music," Martin Luther pioneered the inception and development of the congregational hymn, though the Catholic church and other reformers such as Calvin and Zwingli greatly minimized the role of congregational worship in their services. Luther, on the other hand, was a musician himself and viewed music as a perfect means to use the talents that God had bestowed to glorify Him, to unify the congregation rather than partition them into clergy and laity, and to express the theology of the Universal Priesthood of All Believers. This approach to music-especially the emphasis on the average person's contribution-was immensely popular among the German people, and thus congregational hymns like "Ein Feste Burg ist Unser Gott" became the fuel by which Lutheranism spread like wildfire throughout all of Germany. And, as the test of time has shown, the congregational hymn as inaugurated by Luther has continued to be one of the primary modes of worship in the Christian church to this day.