Maronite Music and Art

From Maronite History

The early ascetical roots of simplicity and poetry echo through its liturgical music and art forms. Most of the hymnody unfolds in short repeated strophes, basic melodies adapted to verses of similar syllable count. Their repetition serves as a teaching tool and memory aid. St. Ephrem, father of Syriac church music, greatly influenced these ancient musical traditions which are still used today. Maronite icons, like windows to creation, image the divine world. Shapes, colors and figures symbolically reflect God's presence to his people. Syriac icons, the oldest being the Rabbula (Gospel Book, 560 AD), portray human figures, and manifest them with divine mystery. Persian and classical Greco-Roman art forms are present in this art, and serve as inspiration for Maronite art today.

Sources

Kamal Salibi - A House of Many Mansions - The History of Lebanon Reconsidered (University of California Press, 1990). Butros Dau - Religious, Cultural and Political History of the Maronites (Lebanon, 1984) Matti Moosa - The Maronites in History (Syracuse University Press, 1986).