From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution

by Peter Leithart

Publisher:

Canon Press

, 2003

Overview

The debate in many Reformed circles over worship music is only a small part of the larger question of Reformed liturgics. And dancing. All sides admit that the New Testament offers relatively little instruction on liturgy, and so the debate over the regulative principle continues with apparently little hope for resolution. In this study, Peter Leithart’s key insight reveals a prominent scriptural example of a liturgy that interprets God’s commands for worship in ways far more biblically grounded than traditional regulativism allows. King David’s tabernacle worship becomes a rich story, not only in respect to liturgical wisdom, but also to the significance of Zion in the fulfillments of the Christian era.

Contents

Top Highlights

“Not worship in general, but specifically musical worship, worship in song, is the Chronicler’s central concern.” (Page 29)

^“10 Israel’s eschatology always focused on David, not Solomon, and Zion, not Moriah.” (Page 17)

“When Yahweh instituted the covenant of circumcision, Abraham had only one descendant but many servants (see Gen. 14:14). All of these servants and their sons were circumcised (Gen. 17:23), and thus became part of ‘Abraham’s seed.’ From the beginning, then, the community of the circumcised was larger than the community of blood descendants of Abraham.” (Page 47)

“, I will show that song was understood, among other things, as a new form of sacrifice, the ‘sacrifice of praise.’” (Page 56)

“David’s system of worship was a preview of the eschatological worship in the renewed Jerusalem, and with the pitching of the tent the foundation of the temple was already laid. Solomon’s job was only to act as a Joshua to David’s Moses.” (Page 53)

Product Details

• Title: From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution
• Author: Peter J. Leithart
• Publisher: Canon Press
• Publication Date: 2003
• Pages: 144

About Peter Leithart

Peter Leithart is President of Theopolis Institute and serves as Teacher at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Birmingham. He is the author of many books, including a two-volume commentary on Revelation (T&T Clark, 2018), God of Hope (Athanasius, 2022), On Earth As In Heaven (Lexham, 2022), and a forthcoming book on God the Creator (IVP). He writes a fortnightly column at FirstThings.com, and has published articles in many periodicals, both popular and academic.

Leithart has served in two pastorates: He was pastor of Reformed Heritage Presbyterian Church (now Trinity Presbyterian Church), Birmingham, Alabama from 1989 to 1995, and was pastor of Trinity Reformed Church, Moscow, Idaho, from 2003-2013. From 1998 and 2013 he taught theology and literature fulltime at New St. Andrews College, Moscow, Idaho. He received an A.B. in English and History from Hillsdale College in 1981, and a Master of Arts in Religion and a Master of Theology from Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia in 1986 and 1987. In 1998 he received his Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge in England.

He and his wife, Noel, have ten children and fifteen grandchildren.