Worship in the sub-apostolic church

History furnishes conclusive evidence that in the early centuries doctrinal errors came into the Christian Church. Jerome who died in the year 420, had declared that the church was "a thicket of heresies". Extant records tend to confirm this strong statement. Under such circumstances it would have been strange if the worship handed down from the Apostles had retained its pristine purity. Nevertheless, but few uninspired hymns were imported into Christian worship. We have seen that when the opponents of Christianity sought to destroy the books of the Christians, they recorded having seized copies of the Scriptures and especially copies of the Psalter, but they made no mention of finding prayer-books or hymn-books. In the church of the early centuries there was stout opposition to the use of uninspired hymns in worship. The Council of Laodicea, which met circa 360 A.D. declared against the use of such hymns, and the Council of Chalcedon in 451 A.D. did likewise.

Dr. William Binnie gave this very temperate appraisal of the situation: "upon the whole, therefore, it may be accepted as a well ascertained fact that, down till so late a period as the middle of the fourth century, the Psalms reigned supreme and almost alone in the service of song throughout the whole Church, and especially in the west. The remarkable prominence still given to the Psalter at the beginning of the fifth century comes out perpetually in the life and writings of Augustine." (The Psalms, p. 368).

In his Confessions, Augustine tells of the influence of the Psalms upon him throughout the whole of his Christian life. Here are a few brief extracts: "Oh! in what accents spake I unto Thee, my God, when I read the Psalms of David, those faithful songs and sounds of devotion, which allow of no swelling spirit. . .and how was I by them kindled toward Thee, and on fire to rehearse them. . .and yet they are sung through the whole world."

The following paragraphs are from The Psalms, by Dr. Binnie (pp. 373-384). "In order that the people might sing with the understanding, Augustine bestowed much pains on the exposition of this part of Scripture. In his collected writings, a much larger space is devoted to the Psalter than to any other book of Scripture. He published in his life-time Enarrations, a kind of running commentary on all the Psalms; and of these the greater part were discourses actually delivered to Christian congregations. Besides the Enarrations, there are some twenty-two sermons founded on texts in the Psalms. In introducing his Enarrations, the preacher would sometimes say, "I have united with you, beloved, in singing this psalm; I beg that you will now, in your turn, unite with me in applying your minds to a devout meditation upon it." There is evidence that Augustine's expositions were listened to with breathless attention by great congregations. . .His Enarrations were much read and greatly prized for a thousand years; and indeed were only superseded by the exposition of the Reformers."

The apostolic church, as the contents of the Book of Acts reveal, worshipped God and carried out their vast evangelistic work among Jews and Gentiles without resorting to the use of musical instruments. The Gospel in itself was the attraction. It needed and received no embellishments from the apostolic Church. This accounts for the total lack of references in the New Testament Epistles to instrumental music in the Christian Church. This was to be expected seeing that the worship of the Church was modelled after the synagogue worship. The New Testament writers gave injunctions to sing to God with the voice but none to play instruments of music, for such were foreign to their worship. For centuries the early Christians observed this simplicity of worship. As the New Testament is destitute of any reference to the use of incense in Christian worship, so it is destitute of any reference to instrumental music in New Testament worship. To introduce both into Christian worship is to do that which lacks any Scriptural authority. To employ one of these, and not the other, is to act illogically and inconsistently.

In the early centuries eminent Christian leaders such as Justin Martyr, Basil, Chrysostom, Jerome and Augustine all practised in their churches singing unaccompanied by musical instruments. Reference is made to these, not that we follow the examples of men, however much renowned, nor because we regard the sub-apostolic church as providing guidance for the church of later centuries, but for the purpose of making it abundantly plain that the legacy of worship bequeathed by the Church of the Apostles to the Christian Church of all ages did not include instrumental music and man-composed hymns.