Song of Rejoicing

"As the power of God is everywhere and encompasses all things so nothing can resist it, so too the human mind has great power to resound in living voices and arouse sluggish souls to watchfulness by a song. . . . [15]

"For the song of rejoicing softens hardened hearts, leads to tears of reconciliation, and invokes the Holy Spirit. Those voices you hear and the voices of a multitude, lifting its sound on high, jubilant praises offered in simple harmony and love, lead the faithful to the consonance where there is no discord, and make those who still live on earth yearn with heart and voice for their heaven. [16]

"And the sound of these voices passes through you so that you understand perfectly. For wherever divine grace has worked, it casts out all the shadows of darkness, and makes pure and light those things that have been obscured by the bodily senses in the weakness of the flesh. [17]

— Hildegard of Bingen, Scivias (Know the Ways of the Lord) 3:13, 13 -14

"[15] These texts on the power of music are taken from the last section of the Scivias and follow fourteen songs composed by Hildegard, plus a lament, a prayer of intercession for the fallen, and a play.

"[16] The word consonance is used here in its musical sense – that is, a combination of notes that are in harmony with each other due to the relationship between their frequencies. This experience of music is the closest humans get to heaven while on earth.

"[17] Here Hildegard writes that music is transcendent, for song passes through the body, to a place of pureness and light, surpassing all weaknesses of the flesh."