That Divine and Most Excellent Gift (Paperback)

Mark P. Bangert

ISBN 10: 150648669X / ISBN 13: 9781506486697

Published by Augsburg Fortress Publishers, 2025

About this Item

Paperback. This posthumous compilation of writing by beloved scholar, teacher, and musician Mark P. Bangert explores how, in addition to his other contributions, Martin Luther expressed a theological valuation of music that can inspire and inform today's understanding and use of music, especially in Christian worship. Luther's preface to Symphoniae iucundae ("Delightful Symphonies," 1538) presents the clearest explication of this theology. At the time of his death, Bangert had composed core components of a book on Luther's preface. Drawing on this work and other writings by Bangert on Luther and music, Martin Seltz has edited a collection that pays tribute both to Luther's theology and to Bangert's important body of scholarship. How is music a "divine and most excellent gift" of God, as Martin Luther called it in his preface to a 1538 music collection? This posthumous compilation of writing by scholar, teacher, and musician Mark P. Bangert explores Luther's theological views on music and how they might be both inspiration and model for believers today. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781506486697

Bibliographic Details

• Title: That Divine and Most Excellent Gift (Paperback)
• Publisher: Augsburg Fortress Publishers
• Publication Date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 150648669X
• ISBN 13: 9781506486697
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

This posthumous compilation of writing by beloved scholar, teacher, and musician Mark P. Bangert explores how, in addition to his other contributions, Martin Luther expressed a theological valuation of music that can inspire and inform today's understanding and use of music, especially in Christian worship. Luther's preface to Symphoniae iucundae ("Delightful Symphonies," 1538) presents the clearest explication of this theology. At the time of his death, Bangert had composed core components of a book on Luther's preface. Drawing on this work and other writings by Bangert on Luther and music, Martin Seltz has edited a collection that pays tribute both to Luther's theology and to Bangert's important body of scholarship.

About the Authors

Mark P. Bangert (1938-2023) was John H. Tietjen Professor of Worship and Church Music emeritus at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, having previously taught at Christ Seminary-Seminex and Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. Bangert served on drafting committees for Lutheran Book of Worship (1978) and Occasional Services (1982). In addition to promoting ethnic church music, growing out of his work with the Lutheran World Federation's Study Team on Worship and Culture, he authored studies related to theological Bach research.

Martin A. Seltz, retired pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, served as vice president and publisher for congregational resources at Augsburg Fortress Publishers, where his work included leading the publication of the Evangelical Lutheran Worship family of resources.