the ritualistic use of silver trumpets to be blown by the priests (Numbers 10). David is really the creator of liturgical music, and to his arrangements, as we see from the Chronicles, every thing was afterwards referred, and in times when it had fallen into disuse, restored. So long as David lived, the superintendence of the liturgical music was in his hands (1Ch 25:2). The instrument by means of which the three choir-masters (Heman, Asaph, and Ethan-Jeduthun) directed the choir was the cymbals (מצלתּים or צלצלים)[1] which served instead of wands for beating time; the harps (נבלים) represented the soprano, and the bass (the male voice in opposition to the female) was represented by the citherns an octave lower (1Ch 15:17-21), which, to infer from the word לנצּח used there, were used at the practice of the pieces by the מנצּח appointed. In a Psalm where סלה is appended (vid., on Psa 3:1-8), the stringed instruments (which הגּיון סלה Job 9:17 definitely expresses), and the instruments generally, are to join in[2] in such a way as to give intensity to that which is being sung. To these instruments, besides those mentioned in Psa 150:1-6; 2Sa 6:5, belonged also the flute, the liturgical use of which (vid., on Psa 5:1) in the time of the first as of the second Temple is undoubted: it formed the peculiar musical accompaniment of the hallel (vid., Psa 113:1-9) and of the nightly torch-light festival on the semi-festival days of the Feast of Tabernacles (Succa 15 a). The trumpets (חצצרות) were blown exclusively by the priests to whom no part was assigned in the singing (as probably also the horn שׁופר Psa 81:4; Psa 98:6; Psa 150:3), and according to 2Ch 5:12. (where the number of the two Mosaic trumpets appears to be raised to 120) took their turn unisono with the singing and the music of the Levites. At the dedication of Solomon's Temple the Levites sing and play and the priests sound trumpets נגדּם, 2Ch 7:6, and at
- ↑ Talmudic צלצל. The usual Levitic orchestra of the temple of Herod consisted of 2 Nabla players, 9 Cithern players and one who struck the Zelazal, viz., Ben-Arza (Erachin 10 a, etc.; Tamid vii. 3), who also had the oversight of the duchan (Tosiphta to Shekalim ii).
- ↑ Comp. Mattheson's “Erläutertes Selah” 1745: Selah is a word marking a prelude, interlude, or after-piece with instruments, a sign indicating the places where the instruments play alone, in short a so-called ritornello.
