SENSES

The Scripture speaks of the “Lust of the eye, the lust of the flesh and the pride of life.”  I notice there is no mention of the “Lust of the ear” or the “Lust of the nose.”  Is this because there is some special property of vision?  Is there some way that this particular sense has more power to be damaging? Is it wired more directly into emotions and passions not being filtered first through the thinking mind?

A nude body is of the eye, but music is of the ear.  You can sexually arouse yourself by seeing images of nudes.  You can even imagine morally damaging visual scenes.  But can not sexually arouse yourself through music absent any visual image.  Today’s options include music videos.  If you heard the music without ever seeing the video could you get the same impressions (thoughts, emotions and feelings) as you could be seeing the video?

You can get impressions through the lyrics of music.  The lyrics can carry sexual messages.  Lyrics can be carried and reinforced by music, but the music does not carry the message.  Music without lyrics can  not carry the visual image.  The song “The Stripper” by itself will not convey the image of a stripper, the listener has to have, if fact, seen a stripper’s performance.  The imagery of the stripper, once seen, can be overlaid on the music in the listener’s mind.

Can the music alone give all people the same visual impression?  I’ll bet not.  I’ll bet ten different people could get ten different visual impressions from a piece of music – even one with lyrics, but if all ten saw a video with the music they would all get the same impression - - that of the videographer, not necessarily of the one who composed the music or wrote the lyrics.

The song, “the Song Remembers When” talks of a song being able to evoke a strong memories of a past event.  But it was an event that had a host of other senses tagged to it - - not the least of which is what was seen when the event occurred.  These are the events inside the head of the listener, not of the song writer. The lyricist has his memories, visual or otherwise, and the listener has his; they are not the same.