
One need not be a historian of the Puritans and their quest for a New Jerusalem to know that America has been influenced by the Old Testament. It’s evident from so many place names, such as Hebron, Kentucky; Bethesda, Maryland; and Rehoboth, Delaware. Less appreciated is how much Old Testament stories have inspired some of the country’s most original and powerful music. The homegrown gospel music of the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, the African-American Church of God in Christ, and white “fundamentalist” congregations is often so devoid of New Testament references, it would not be out of place, except stylistically, in my synagogue.
From black gospel music, to the hymns and arrangements of nineteenth-century gospel composer Ira Sankey, to the powerful bluegrass “sacred songs” (as they’re known in bluegrass gospel circles) of the Stanley Brothers, the Old Testament has always been at home in America’s religious music. In his 1991 song “Cryin’ Holy Unto the Lord,” Bill Monroe, the “father of bluegrass,” sings: “If I could I surely would / Stand on the rock where Moses stood.” Banjo and mandolin virtuoso Ricky Skaggs, with Ralph Stanley of the Stanley Brothers, popularized the 1967 song “Take Your Shoes Off Moses,” which, as the title suggests, recounts the story of how “God spoke to Moses at the burning bush.”
My personal favorite is “Daniel Prayed,” written by the prolific gospel music composer G. T. Speer. The lyrics are strictly Old Testament in their telling of the Book of Daniel:
Oh, Daniel served his living God
While upon the earth he trod
He prayed to God each morning, noon, and night
He cared not for the king’s decrees . . .
First recorded by the Bailes Brothers in 1946 and dozens of times since, it remains popular today thanks to renditions from country star Patty Loveless, who included the song on her celebrated 2001 album Mountain Soul; bluegrass stars The Isaacs (current Grand Ole Opry performers); and 1950s pop singer Tennessee Ernie Ford. The version by the Stanley Brothers, who were raised in a Primitive Baptist church in rural southwest Virginia, is transcendent, combining Carter Stanley’s virtuosic flat-picking with modal quartet harmonies. Ralph Stanley himself described their adaptation as “more sad and more mournful,” rooted in the a cappella “line singing” of the Primitive Baptists. They helped the song become a Christian music standard.
Another contemporary Christian showstopper is “Rivers of Babylon”—originally adapted directly from Psalm 137 by the Jamaican reggae group The Melodians. Christian stars such as Sheri and Jeff Easter have performed moving renditions of the song: “By the Rivers of Babylon / there we sat down / we wept as we remembered Zion.” Again, this would not be religiously out of place in a synagogue.
The Old Testament emphasis has, historically, been more pronounced in the African-American church. References to the Hebrew children abound in black gospel music. What were once called “negro spirituals” include “Go Down Moses,” “Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho,” and “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.” Commercially successful black gospel quartet groups from the 1950s, such Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers, the Five Blind Boys of Mississippi, and the Swan Silvertones, were no less influenced by the Old Testament.
The black and white gospel traditions are far from separate; they cross-fertilize in their style and songs, as they have more broadly to create American popular music. There may be no more quintessential example than the hymn “Handwriting on the Wall.” Written by the Ohio-born evangelist Knowles Shaw, it was arranged and popularized by Sankey. It has been regularly recorded by black gospel singers, first by the Trumpeteers in 1948 and later by Mavis Staples and Levon Helm, the influential Sensational Nightingales quartet, and gospel luminary Andraé Crouch in “funk-gospel” style.
I particularly like the adaptation of an obscure black gospel quartet, the Jubalaires, who also recorded songs about Noah’s Ark and Samson and Delilah.
Well, if you read in the Bible and read it well
You know the story I’m goin’ to tell
Belshazzar was sittin’ at the banquet board
Drinkin’ from the vessels of Israel’s God
They tell me that his eyes were red with wine
When God come jumpin’ on the wheels of time
He come on down in the banquet hall
Set his handwritin’ on the wall
Belshazzar looked up from the banquet board
Beheld the hand of Israel’s God.
“Go get Daniel!” I heard him yell
“Tell him to read the writing and read it well.”
It’s an African-American gospel standard written by a white composer and originally popularized by a white evangelist. One wonders what leads one hymn to attain such popularity. Perhaps its story of God condemning hedonism resonates in America, where the holy and profane continue to compete. Amen to that—and to America’s Old Testament music tradition.
Image by Joey Gannon licensed via Creative Commons. Image cropped.
Purity Culture Isn’t the Problem
The last decade witnessed a sharp turn against the so-called purity culture that emerged in the 1990s…
Give the National Endowment for the Arts Back to the Public
For decades, Americans have become increasingly alienated from the American arts establishment. The main source for their…
The Future of First Things
I hope you like our new website. Our content remains first-rate. Now, the internet delivers timely and…