All of these people did not perform at one time; for the ordinary services they used twelve male singers, twelve players on instruments,—nine harps, and two players of the psaltery and one of cymbals. Women were not allowed to sing in the temples but they were a part of the court and sang at funerals and at public festivities and banquets.
The great Jewish historian, Josephus, tells us that Solomon had two hundred thousand singers, forty thousand harpists, forty thousand sistrum players and two hundred thousand trumpeters. This is hard to believe, but as everything belonged to the kings in bygone days, probably this was only Solomon’s musical directory.
The psaltery was an instrument something like our zither, with thirteen strings on a flat wooden sounding board, rectangular in shape. The sistrum was a metal rattle which made a very sweet sound.
It isn’t easy to describe the instruments used thousands of years ago, for the names have become changed through the ages, and we find the same type of instruments called by different names in different countries and periods. For example, the psaltery is much the same instrument as the dulcimer, the Arab’s kanoun and the Persian santir. We find the same psaltery in Chaucer’s “Miller’s Tale” as sautrie. By the addition of a keyboard this Biblical instrument became the spinet, which you will meet again in the 15th and 16th centuries. In the 13th century, in Italy, we find a kind of psaltery hung around the neck and called “Istroménto di porco” because it looked like the head of a pig.
Not all the songs of the Bible are religious. The Song of Solomon, a most beautiful poem of marriage, gives us a vivid picture of luxury and magnificence, as well as showing us that music was used for other than religious ceremonies.
After the death of Solomon, the music in the temple lost its splendor and again the Children of Israel were made captive. When one hundred years later Nebuchadnezzar (586 B.C.) the King of Babylon, destroyed their temple, the song of the Hebrews became sad and mournful, as you can read in the Book of Lamentations and in this beautiful song of grief, the 137th Psalm:
SORROWS OF THE EXILES IN BABYLON
By the rivers of Babylon
There we sat down, yea, we wept,
When we remembered Zion.