Can music bend us towards virtues? Can it help us distinguish good from bad? Does it have to have the support of words? According to Music and Ethics: a mildly interesting view, a scientific paper written in the Oxford Handbooks music does have the the power to build moral character: "If music enlarges our capacities of emotional empathy (not for everyone, or all music, and not on all occasions), then it has a role to play in building moral character."
Thinking of some philosophers:
"Music is a part of our human nature; it has the power either to improve or to debase our character."
- Boethius (ca. 480–ca. 525)
“Music is a moral law. It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, a charm to sadness, gaiety and life to everything; It is the essence of order and lends to all that is good, just, and beautiful.”
- Plato
"Music directly imitates the passions or states of the soul...when one listens to music that imitates a certain passion, he becomes imbued withthe same passion; and if over a long time he habitually listens to music that rouses ignoble passions, his whole character will be shaped to an ignoble form."
- Aristotle
Musical training is a more potent instrument than any other, because rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul, on which they mightily fasten, imparting grace, and making the soul of him who is rightly educated graceful, or of him who is ill-educated ungraceful.
- Socrates
Good deeds and bad deeds are decided by the king of dharma.
- Guru Nanak
Singing oneness!
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