Music and its Virtues in Islamic and Judaic Writings

Amnon Shiloah is Professor of Musicology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.

'... this is a valuable collection. Shiloah's concise and clear survey articles provide particularly useful teaching material. Much of the material covered here touches on topics of continuing wide interest such as music in the Bible and the place of music in Islam. For the specialist scholar, Shiloah's meticulous exploration of texts puts valuable but little known material into the public forum. Finally, his inclusion of Jewish and Arabic materials side by side reminds the reader of important musical and scholarly relationships and interactions, which are all too easily overlooked by scholars without the rare linguistic expertise to explore both these musical, scholarly and religious canons side by side.' Ethnomusicology Forum

• Contents: Preface; Part 1 Theories of Origins: The beginning of things: theories of origins in Arabic and Hebrew sources; A passage by Immanuel ha-Romi on the science of music; Biblical references to music as interpreted in Arabic treatises; The davidic traditions concerning music; The singing birds; Réflexions sur la danse artistique musulmane au moyen âge. Part 2 The Symbolic, Philosophical and Metaphorical Interpretation of Music: L' approche humaniste et métaphorique dans les premiers écrits arabes sur la musique; La musique entre le divin et le terrestre; 'Ên-kol' - commentaire hébraïque de Å em Tov ibn Å aprût sur le canon d' Avicenne; Jewish and Muslim traditions of music therapy. Part 3 The Transmission of Musical Knowledge: Qalonimus ben Qalonimus, 'Ma'amar be-mispar ha-hokhmôt'; Musical concepts in the works of Saadia Gaon; Some comments of the cantillation of the 10 Commandments; A propos d' un 'petit livre arabe de musique' (with A. Berthier); Notions d' esthétique dans les traités arabes sur la musique; L' évolution de la vocalité et de la technique vocale dans les traités anciens de la musique arabe. Part 4 The Ideological Attitude Towards Music: Music and religion in Islam; Maïmonide et la musique. Part 5 Music in Contact: The Romaniot musical tradition (revised version); Development of Jewish liturgical singing in Spain; Muslim and Jewish musical traditions in the Middle Ages; Andalusian instruments of music and instruments of entertainment; Index.