Most anyone who has studied Reformation history is aware of the restrictions that John Calvin and others in the Reformed communion placed on the role of music in the church. Unlike the Lutheran reformers, who drew on a wide range of sources—including Psalms, Latin hymns, medieval German songs, and sixteenth-century ballads—to build a stunning repertoire of congregational hymns, Calvin insisted on singing only the Psalms in metered verse. In its own way, the Genevan Psalter (1562) was a remarkable achievement, especially with regard to the wide variety of meters and tunes in contained. As for the accompaniment of those Psalms, instrumental music was, for the most part, forbidden. While much of Lutheran congregational singing went unaccompanied in the early years, it was seldom prohibited, and gave way soon enough to a rich practice of accompaniment by organ and other instruments.
What is less known (at least by this reviewer) is the debate over these restrictions that ensued within the Reformed camp. To that end, Randall Dean Engle’s Sound Theology quite successfully sheds light on the dispute that raged in the Reformed churches in the Netherlands in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Drawing on a vast array of original sources, including considerable archival material translated by the author, Engle takes the reader on a remarkable journey that brings to light the politics and passions that drove much of the controversy.
A helpful insight that the author provides at numerous points is the inherent clash that existed between the church and the political establishment. Following the weakening of Spanish hegemony over the Netherlands late in the sixteenth century, a system of governance emerged that prevented the bourgeoning Reformed confession from exercising control as the Roman Church had in previous times. The result: civic authorities who frequently pushed back against the dictates of the church. Their ability to do so was aided by the fact that they, and not the congregations, owned and operated the church buildings.
Engle’s richly alliterative subtitle, Pipe Organ Power Plays among Protestants, Pulpits, Professors, and Peers, nicely captures the substance of his study, namely, that the use of the organ in Reformed worship was far from uniform. Following three chapters that set the stage and provide useful background, the author proceeds to examine in some detail three case studies. The overarching theme of the overview is that there was a significant divergence—both in time and place—in the application of the Reformed proscription against the use of the organ. The presbyterian form of church governance that emerged after independence from Spain often carried with it many of the local customs. Among those customs was a deep appreciation for, and even pride in, the pipe organ. Even as religious leaders pressed their case against the organ by asserting that the issue was not merely a matter of adiaphora but actually one of essential doctrine, civic officials carried on by shielding their instruments and promoting their use.
Arguments against the use of the organ frequently focused on the frivolous settings that sounded before and after the service. Equally contentious was the accompaniment of Psalm singing by the organ. Proponents of the organ countered the latter charge by asserting that unaccompanied singing of the Psalm hymns was abysmal and required the leadership of the organ if there was ever to be any sense of order in the service. Both opponents and proponents of the organ made copious appeals to the Scriptures as well as to interpretations of those references through the ages.
The lengths both sides went to in order to make their case sometimes tested the limits of Christian decorum. Preachers, for example, routinely preached against the use of the organ, only to be ignored by the city magistrates (90). In places where the civic authorities dictated that the organ be used, some pastors would exit the church before the postlude as a form of protest. As retaliation, the pastors were sometimes fined. (92). In one case, the civic authorities authorized the construction of a new organ and then hired a Roman Catholic organist to play it (95)! In another case, an organist got especially creative during the Psalm singing by improvising interludes between stanzas. In response, those in the congregation who opposed the organ protested by closing their hymnbooks, putting their hats back on, and sitting down (102). In the case of Jan Calckman, his opposition to the organ was so severe that the church council not only reprimanded him but banned him from the altar for a year (163). Churches regularly hired bailiffs to patrol the grounds during Saturday organ concerts (168). And strangest of all, they would sometimes pay off “dog beaters,” who apparently caused disturbances by mistreating their animals during concerts (168).
Though Sound Theology is a narrow study on a topic that may not suggest immediate application to the pastor’s calling, there is much that one can learn. Conversations about frivolity in worship, for example, still abound. Navigating the contentious waters of adiaphora remains a treacherous business. That the Reformed Church averted a schism over this centuries-long debate suggests that we too can address important matters of church practice without having to express our disapproval by the donning of hats or the beating of dogs!
Paul J. Grime
Professor of Pastoral Ministry and Missions
Dean of the Chapel
Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana