Beauty of Holiness
Do aesthetics have moral weight? This question is asked among those that do music in a religious context. In the case of music, the more specific question can be summed up as the following: Does music, apart from the words themselves, have moral weight?
Generally, the two sides fall as follows:
One side believes that music, in of itself, does not have moral weight--and therefore endorses all styles, types, and forms of music. As one group put it: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all music was created equal, that no instrument or style of music is in itself evil—that the diversity of musical expression which flows from man is but one evidence of the boundless creativity of our Heavenly Father." [1]
The other side believes that music and all artistic expression is bound by some moral lines. As Dr. Wolfgang Stefani put it: "What fills the heart, forms the art." [2]
The main argument against music intrinsically having moral value is sometimes explained with the following: "Is a 'C' note more holy than a 'B' note?" Since it is hard for any sensible person to argue that one pitch--a literal number of vibrations per second (what scientists define as "Hertz")--is better than another, you can sensibly make the jump that music, which is entirely made up of pitches, doesn't have moral weight.
A cousin of this question of pitches is something like "Is 'red' a better color than 'blue'?" Again, since people generally are not arguing that one color is more virtuous than another, then the analogy is applied to music to argue that music, in of itself, is not moral.
While it is true that singular colors or pitches are not inherently moral, this analogy, however, is reductionistic. In other words, when it comes to music, or any other aesthetic, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. While singular colors might not be inherently moral, a picture–which is simply a combination of colors–does have moral value. Colors together can be used to communicate moral values depending on what the picture is expressing.
On that same token, while a singular pitch might not be inherently moral, a piece of music–which is simply a combination of pitches played at a certain time for a certain length–logically contains moral value.
The Bible shows this connection between aesthetics and morality in showing a relationship between beauty and truth: “Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name; Bring an offering, and come before Him. Oh, worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness!” [3] In the biblical perspective, holiness is beautiful. This was (and still is) a countercultural idea, because to the Greeks and those who inherited their mindsets, the beautiful is uplifted as holy. [4] The biblical viewpoint reverses this.
Ellen White corroborates the relationship between beauty and truth in her book Education: “The Author of all beauty, Himself a love of the beautiful, God provided to gratify in HIs children the love of beauty.” [5] If God, the most holy being in existence, loves beauty, then it would stand to reason that holiness has beauty.
This idea applies to all aesthetic fields, including music. The Bible shows not all aesthetics are valid in communicating ideals such as “holiness” or “truth”. However, we are not presenting a neat box to explain how moral virtues can be communicated through music. But we are saying that since holiness is beautiful, our ideas of what is holy, good, and true will influence our ideas of beauty.
In other words, what you (implicitly or explicitly) believe is holy will determine what you believe is beautiful.
References:
[1] “Christian Rocker’s Creed,” CCM Maagazine (November 1988), p. 12.
[2] The Christian and Rock Music, p. 19. http://www.anym.org/pdf/the_Christian_and_rock_music_samuele_bacchiocchi.pdf
[3] 1 Chronicles 16:29 NKJV
[4] https://rabbisacks.org/covenant-conversation/vayakhel/the-beauty-of-holiness-holiness-of-beauty/
[5] Education, p. 41. https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/29.118#118