God’s Lyre

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>God’s Lyre is about a network of ancient ideas that connected musical expression to natural philosophy. This network included Aristotelians, Stoics, and Alexandrian monotheists, and it had more than a minor effect on important theories of language as well. What held the various strands together was a common orientation in which musical phenomena were theorized as a consequence of nature and natural processes. When music happens, the authors studied here suggest, it is nature rising to a certain pitch of passionate intensity. Chapters discuss Theophrastus, Diogenes of Babylon, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Philo of Alexandria, Clement of Alexandria, and John Chrysostom.</jats:p>