Searching for God in Classical Music

So, Vic, evidence, evidence and again evidence. Then, "speculation presented for evidence" and, finally, "a matter of record, evidence for others...". On the other, I am a man of honour (with honourable intentions!), but my credibility is... "shot" (but my honour and integrity are still intact?!).

However, "you suggest there is no evidence, that the rate of..." (so it's a suggestion, after all, not a fact of evidence).

Such a fury, rage and feud (and maybe more) for "a lost penny" (if you don't have these Variations of Beethoven, you should get them; it's a good lesson, after all). You just contested my claims. There is no evidence for the opposite, either! Maybe, now it's a safer speculation for you to "suggest" that "the rate of deterioration would...".

In any case, to make myself crystal clear, my evidence, first of all, is what I hear and notice in my listening process for more than 30 years and with a very vast collection of CDs. So, if I hear a "difference or deterioration", nobody can contest the truth of my statement. If, in your listening experience, you never notice or hear what I claim, you can simply state it as your valid statement. And that's all!

I answered all your interrogation in the best possible faith, always bearing in mind that, somehow, we may communicate...to reach a positive statement (this is always the way I "handle" the views of "others"). Instead, I received your "polemic", your "refusal" to comprehend even some aspects of my truth...Anyway, I think there is no use to go on. It's futile.

Thanks, however, for the best wishes (I hope you don't patronise me). All the same to you, sir, with all the honesty and respect (for your strong convictions). Life is short indeed and Music is endless. So, let's move on...

Parla

No dissonance in your fine post as far as   i'm concerned, Atonal.

For some reason I am overcome with an overwhelming calm during the closing pages of the Grande Messe des Morts.

Whereas at the end of Beethoven's Missa Solemnis I always see angels on either side of God.

I made that last bit up.

An earlier contributor to this thread thought it should not be deflected into a discussion on the existence of god.  But in effect, this would make a presumption of his existence a precondition and exclude many/most music lovers.  Is this thread only open to those who believe there is something (other than beauty) to be found in the search? 

The question of Bach's motivation to compose, whether from his religious belief on the one hand or for economic reasons on the other, is beside the point, unless and until the question of external intervention, "inspiration" is invoked.

If Bach's belief is the source of that inspiration, we can only conclude that he was using man-made criteria to express that belief, that is, making god in man's image.  He is a man of his time, notwithstanding his towering genius.

If however, as seems implicit in some believers' contributions here, god is the source of that inspiration - god guiding his hand, as someone put it - we are entitled to ask questions like, if he can be bothered to intervene in the creation of music to glorify his existence, what does it tell us about his action/inaction in the herding infants into gas chambers, for instance?    

Or perhaps Einstein was wrong and god does play dice with the universe: at bit of intolerable suffering here, some lovely classical music there.

It is beyond unreasonable!

Vic.

Parla - not heard that Bach son will have to dig it out (huge gaps in my knowledge). I used the word 'divine' a bit tongue in cheek.

Vic - you make a very pertinent point. I think the thread has got diverted somewhat (apologies) by the existence of God in music rather than music being 'spiritually profound'. I shall dig out Parla's recommendation see what makes him tick!

Troyen - I assume your dissonance comment refers to my name? I can't stand Atonal music - but I do love much modern music, Sculthorpe being a fave at the moment. 

In answer to Archduke55's original question (above) Vaughan Williams' second movement to his second symphony and I'm definately transported. His slow movements equal Mahler in my 'umble opinion.

What unites us here is that we are all profoundly moved by some music, and I wouldn't argue with Atonal's use of the term "spiritually profound" to describe the music that inspires it - despite its potential as religious ammunition.

Atheists discount "the hand of god" of course, as it hardly bears scrutiny, as I argue above.  So particularly for religious music, but not exclusively so, what is that spiritual profundity? 

The connection created between composer and listener, that amazing sense of being moved, taken out of oneself, glimpsing the profound or the infinite, for which language feels inadequate, is more than just a connection with beauty, and, in a thread with this title, needs some close analysis (if you are a non-believer, as I say).

Bach leaves me with this sense, despite my not sharing the belief that motivated the creation which has then left me so moved.  (If you see what I mean!) How can this be?  It is more than a suspension of disbelief, like the reading of a novel.  So what is left is what I myself invest in the experience.

I can only conclude that we have evolved an emotional reaction (as well as a questioning, rational reaction) in the face of certain phenomena.   When a beautiful sunset or a piece of music, becomes for us more than an aesthetically pleasing tingling of the senses, this is what we are tapping into.

If it's god for you, you need to do your homework (in my contentious opinion!); if it's an appreciation and profound enjoyment of an art form, you are lucky enough to be enjoying the benefit of a good education (self-taught or otherwise); if it's what I think it may be, it is another aspect of that amazing but enigmatic process of evolution that has got us where we are and makes us such a unique and amazing product of nature.

The feeling seems to be universal across all times and cultures, and has been "evidence" for believers for ever, but now that reason has replaced superstition in the search for answers, other explanations are needed.  This is the only one that occurs to me so far.

I would love to hear what other non-believers feel about this dimension of spiritual profundity. (But will no doubt enjoy the reaction my believing chums.) 

Vic.

Here, we started all over again! This thread, I think is going to be a never-ending story (maybe because it has to do with the "undefined" whatever).

As a believer to the "Unknown God" (Socrates), I consider that, as long as what we call "human spirit" is undefined, since we don't want to confine it within "borders of limitations", whether we believe or not to the general concept of God (a sort of "spirit" also), we are not that far apart.

If we consider that music, in its more abstract and perfect  form (not that much in the religious works, where the text can do more than one may sustain about any divinity), is the most elusive of all the Arts, there is no wonder why some of us what we (all sort of believers) "see" (feel, comprehend) is very close to the what is generally perceived as God.

In other words, as long as we (all, or most us) agree that we see something "profound" or even more "spiritually profound" in Classical Music, it has very little significance what and how we name "it". That's why I can comprehend Vic's stance (and, possibly, he can do the same, in his own way).

Anyway, it's getting too late (and the "spirits" are going to pop out... ?!).

Parla

I don’t think you are missing
anything, Vic. I think we have a considerable amount in common. The thought
experiment you set out is entirely clear and logical in its own terms, and is
obviously built on the a priori assumption (by you and the many, many others in
the example) of the existence the fairies at the bottom of your garden. How you
and they came to have this belief in the first place is irrelevant, since your brilliance
as a composer is something that has presumably occurred subsequently to that
initial belief. The use of (in this instance) music as a subsequent tool of
faith justification is the essential issue.

Where you and I both part company
with the ‘inspirationalists’, (and bearing in mind that we do so from very
different perspectives on initial belief itself) is in the next step in the insprationalist
argument. You sum it up when you say ‘such profundity left you with an experience you had no words to describe, leaving the conviction that it could not
have been achieved other than by the truth of my inspiration’. Of course,
this is the position, or conviction, that anyone who claims divine inspiration has
to take, but like you, I’ve never bought into the ‘divinely inspired’ school
regarding music or any other art form.

So leaving aside the question of
belief in God (or fairies) per se, to
claim that some music is ‘divinely inspired’, or that it proves the existence
of a deity, or that some such deity can be ‘found’ or seen in or through the
music, have always seemed very curious propositions to me.

JKH