Treasures Old & New

The Rich Tradition Of A Timeless Spiritual Pilgrimage Revealed

With the release of The Odes Project, by renowned composer and arranger John Schreiner, a collection of ancient Christian hymns had been reintroduced to the modern church for the first time in a century. Yet re-imagining these masterpieces of devotion is more than simply an exercise in musical archeology: it is part of a living, breathing tradition that characterized the worship of our first brothers and sisters in the faith.

These mystical and magisterial odes, twenty-eight of which have been selected by Schreiner for The Odes Project, comprise one of the most significant contributions to contemporary worship in recent memory. At the same time they provide a direct link to the pilgrimage of praise as practiced by the early church. It is an achievement all the more extraordinary considering the history of the odes themselves, a history which preserved these masterpieces of devotion against all the ravages of time.
While titled The Odes Of Solomon, these forty-two poems set to music where actually written by an unknown psalmist who might well have dedicated them to King Solomon. The language of their composition was a form of Syriac spoken throughout Northern Palestine and Western Syria in a region that included Galilee. Scholars generally agree that the Odes originated in or around the city of Antioch approximately 100 AD or perhaps even earlier.

It was a single inspired artist, most likely a Jew who became a follower of Jesus Christ, who composed all The Odes Of Solomon, writing them as lyrics since, at that time, no form of musical notation had been developed. Yet, by their very poetic form and intended purpose, there is little doubt that the Odes were intended to be sung in a participatory act of worship by the whole community. Members of the young church would have quickly memorized both the words and melodies and the ecstatic joy of redemption and the affirmation of spiritual union with Jesus could only have been expressed through the emotional language of music.

The poet's Jewish heritage played a central role in the writing of the Odes. There remains a powerful element of Jewish temple worship in the words, cadences and imagery of the Odes, harkening back to a time when the followers of Jesus borrowed directly from Hebrew rites and rituals to express their newfound faith. Accordingly, scholars have long debated whether this timeless poetry is primarily Jewish, Christian or Jewish-Christian in origin. Yet there is no question that The Odes Of Solomon harkens back to an era when both Judaism and Christianity expressed their love and devotion to God in the same cultural context.

As such, the collection has been included throughout early church history in a wide variety of extra-biblical writings. Yet, despite its importance to early believers, The Odes Of Solomon eventually slipped into obscurity, only to be rediscovered in 1909 by a Quaker scholar who, while cleaning out his study, came upon a dusty manuscript that contained the long lost treasure. Since that momentous event, the Odes have been the subject of numerous translations and critical studies, eventually being recognized as "masterpieces of Christian devotion" authentically Biblical in spirit and content.

Yet, it was not until 2007, when Schreiner, with the assistance of renowned scholar Dr. Chuck Fromm, undertook to create new music for these timeless lyrics, that the original intent of The Odes Of Solomon was fully restored. With The Odes Project, the inspiration of that unknown First Century poet, the shared faith of a community and the power of God's revelation across thousands of years have indeed come full circle. It's a history that has a brand new chapter, thanks to this extraordinary undertaking,