THE following article was written seventy five years ago by the Rev William Parks, an Anglican clergyman and a faithful preacher of the truth in his day. Its subject matter is as relevant to Christian behaviour today as it was at the time when the writer took up his pen. It has now become fashionable for some ministers, office-bearers and members in the Free Church and the APC to take to the dance floor at weddings. Recently, for instance, on the Island of Lewis, where the Free Church is regarded as being most conservative, one of its elders was on a Friday night, resplendent in Highland dress, cavorting on the dance floor; on the Sabbath night he was leading the praise in his church! – Rev. J. MacLeod
The article, as now published, is an abridged and edited version of the original. –Editor
A dancing Christian! What an anomaly! At a ball last night and at church this morning? In the waltz and at the Lord’s Supper within the space of a few hours! What! Is this Christianity? Does Christian liberty justify indulgence in the pleasures of the world under any circumstances? As a minister of the Christian religion, I unhesitatingly say, No. Ah! dancing Christians, either give up your profession or your practice; for be assured you are a laughing stock to infidels and to devils; the one detect your glaring inconsistency, the other gloat over your delusion. Maybe you think my views are melancholy; but let me ask, Who that knows anything, by the teaching of the Holy Spirit, of the terrors of sin, or of the blessings of salvation, could for a moment feel happy in frivolous, worldly, dancing company?
Perhaps some of you fancy you have Scripture to refute me, and to warrant your proceedings. The saying of Solomon may occur to you, “There is a time to mourn and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3: 4); but let me tell you that such dancing as Solomon alludes to is not the dancing of the ballroom; is not the dance movements learnt with care and exhibited with pride; but the exuberant thankfulness of the heart, for blessings bestowed and grace manifested.
I assert that dancing, as it is practised, is sinful. One Scripture alone proves it to be so, namely, “Do all to the glory of God,” for who in a dance ever thinks of giving glory to God? Who in a dance ever thinks of God at all? Will it be said, “Oh, this is stretching the cord too tight; would you have us always to be thinking about God? Shall we have no relaxation?” Ah! my objecting friend, your very objection plainly manifests the state of your heart. You want pastime, do you? And you confess it is a pastime to be relieved from thoughts of God? I read this of the wicked in the tenth Psalm – God is not in “all his thoughts.”
But perhaps you say that it does not necessarily follow that because you dance, you cannot do it to God’s glory. In refutation of this objection, I would ask and answer these four questions: 1. What sort of company do you meet at dances? 2. For what purpose do you dance? 3. What preparations do you make for the dance? 4. What are your thoughts and feelings after the dance?
What sort of company do you meet at dances?
In reply to the first question, “What sort of company do you meet at dances?”, I say (and I know it to be true), The frivolous, the empty-headed, the vain, the silly, the dissipated, and the dissolute, both men and women. Those, in short, whose hearts are wrapped up in the world and its amusements, its vanities and joys. I read in my Bible an awful assertion about association with such persons: “The friendship of the world is enmity with God; whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God!” (James 4:4). Oh! my young friends – you who have been led away by worldly companions to rank yourselves, even for a single night, among the antagonists of God – pause over this tremendous declaration! In your association with your worldly partners in the dance you have avowed yourselves the friends of the enemies of the living God! Oh! may you be separated from the world, and constrained to see that there is no possibility of keeping friends with Him and it!
For what purpose do you dance?
I now answer the second question, “For what purpose do you dance?” Is it for health? No; for if you required exercise you would take it in the open air, and not in a close room. Is it to exhibit your joy for God’s blessings? No! for if this were your motive you would choose other company in which to manifest your joy. Is it for the purpose of exhilarating your spirits? No! for those in low spirits cannot dance. I will tell you what you dance for. You dance for the purpose of exhibiting your skill, or letting people observe your fine figure, your graceful movements, or your dress. And you dance for mere sensual enjoyment. The real motive may be concealed beneath a very modest appearance; but that it is not for the glory of God you dance is abundantly evident.
What preparation do you make for the dance?
We come to our third question, “What preparation do you make for the dance?” There are various articles of dress got together: including perhaps that disgrace to a virtuous woman, the low-bodied dress, and all arrayed and gazed upon long before the dance begins. Then there is staring in the mirror in order to see how you will look or what you be thought of in the dance: a sort of rehearsal of the vanity show that is to take place by and by. And there are such questions as, “Does my hair suit me; do I look nice?” Those of the opposite sex are quite as vainglorious. Young men clothe themselves in the fashions of the day. They often run into reckless expense in gratifying their passion for the dance. In short, the preparation made for the dance tends to anything but “the glory of God,” but everything to the glory of self, the vanity of the world, “the lust of the eye,” and the “pride of life!”
What are your thoughts and feelings after the dance?
One other question remains to be answered: “What are your thoughts and feelings after the dance?” Are they those of a Christian who is about to retire for the night? Are they placid, calm, holy? Are they fixed upon God and occupied in communion with God? Has the veil of night shut out all objects from view but God and Christ and the Holy Ghost? Ah, no. I know it well. The feelings are excited, the pulse beats quick, and the brain throbs; the world has just had its revel in the heart! There is the remembrance of the bright lights, the many people, the winning smile, the agreeable small talk, the flattering compliment, all floating in the head, all glorifying self, but not a thought, not a feeling enlisted on the side of God! No! No relish for prayer, no prostration of spirit before the throne, not a knee bent (except in formalism or mockery or delusion), not a sincere breath wafted on high by any soul engaged in the dance.
Tell me, how can such a practice, tending to such sins of omission and commission, be countenanced, much less encouraged, by any child of God or minister of God? Surely the whole proceeding, from first to last, has the stamp of Satan upon it! Yes, I unhesitatingly say that the ball and the dance, their consequences and concomitants, are devices and amusements of the devil, by which he effects his purposes against many of his incredulous victims! I should like to ask the fashionable devotee of the ballroom: “When your presence graces the gay circle, or you whirl through the maze of worldlings, or sink exhausted on a seat, or wander forth in the cool air to calm your excited mind, how could you then give an account of your stewardship? Were Christ to speak to you there, could you answer Him? Were death to summon you, could you calmly follow Him from the ballroom to the grave: from the worldling’s gaze to the presence of your Maker?” Awful, terrible thought! Yet, believe me, such things have been. Many is the victim who has been launched into eternity whilst his heart has been throbbing with delight in that which God has cursed!
I shall now notice a few attempts at argument in justification of the practice of dancing. It has been asserted that “we have Scripture examples to warrant our engaging in the dance.” The devil (as somebody has quaintly said) never goes out without his Bible under his arm! Satan has Scripture at his fingers’ ends, but he sometimes mutilates and mangles it. Ah, my young friends, let me warn you against the sophistical practice of falling back upon Scripture to justify ungodly and worldly actions! It is by such a practice that the pleasure loving clergyman justifies himself in his association with the world. It is his plea, in defence of his conduct, that Jesus Christ never shrank from dining with Pharisees and unbelieving Jews; but he thinks proper to forget the purpose which Jesus had in view, and that He never failed to teach, to rebuke and to exhort His host and fellow-guests, whoever they were. Jesus Christ, although meek and unobtrusive, never suffered the rank, the hospitality, or peculiar views of any man to deter Him from His grand purpose of “doing good” and maintaining truth inviolate. If those who quote Scripture in support of their adopted errors and sinful courses would but submit to the Word of God as a whole, they would soon cease to make such uses of the inspired volume.
Also, it is said that David danced, that Miriam danced, and that the daughter of Jephtha danced, and that, consequently, you may dance. It is quite true that David, Miriam and Jephtha’s daughter danced; but let us see why and how they danced. I read in 2 Samuel, chapter six, that David employed himself in bringing the ark into Zion, and that he was so overjoyed at the successful issue of the work that he actually flung aside his dignity for a time – forgot himself, in a manner – and danced and leaped before the Lord. He was overpowered by religious joy on this occasion, which broke out in boisterous movements; and mark you, it was “before the Lord” (verse 21). He danced for the sheer purpose of giving glory to God. And note that the Bible tells us that when David danced he took off his imperial robe and clothed himself in a plain linen ephod. But young men in the dance today put on fine clothes; and what David danced for, they never think of. And now, with this plain interpretation of this passage, will any man or woman, any lady or gentleman, aver that there is a justification here for their dancing? Is your motive religious joy? I think not. So there is an end to any prospect of justification for your practice from the case of David.
Let me now examine the case of Miriam. She danced, and therefore you say you may dance. Just meditate a moment upon the passage in which the fact of Miriam’s dancing is alluded to: “And Miriam, the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand: and all the women went out after her, with timbrels and with dances. And Miriam answered them, Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea” (Exodus 15: 20,21). Do you read that Miriam led off the dance with a man? Is there any mention of male partners with the damsels who followed her? No. Here was a company of godly women praising Jehovah for His recent wonderful deliverance of them from the power of Pharaoh. The men were otherwise engaged. The women only danced, and danced alone too.
Now, when you dance, is the name of the Lord upon your lips? Is it for the purpose of glorifying Jesus that you dance? Ah! my friends, is it not a fact that if the word “Jesus” were to escape from your lips in praise or commendation of Him, in the dance, you would be sneered at? Would not the name “which is above every name” be the signal for mockery? If you were to sing out to the Lord and say, “Praise His name in the dance,” would you not be laughed to scorn? If you object, “Oh, there is a time for all things; what have we to do with Jesus in the dance?” I reply in the words already quoted, “Whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God.” The one who has nothing to do with Jesus in the dance has nothing to do with Him at all. But may the Lord have pity upon such, so that Jesus may be enthroned, and have His name glorified, in whatsoever company they may be! There is no parallel, then, between you and Miriam; no warrant from her dancing for your sort of dancing. The two are as essentially different as a loose immoral song is from a psalm of praise to Jehovah.
Will you plead the case of Jephtha’s daughter? She danced, certainly, but it was a dance of filial love – love which induced her to come and congratulate her father upon his victory over the enemies of God. There is no analogy whatever between this case and the dancing of a modern ballroom. I may express a wish, in passing, that daughters who are devoted to the sinful practice of modern dancing, and who are ever ready to seize upon the instance of Jephtha’s beloved child’s dancing as a warrant for theirs, were as amiable and dutiful and religious as she! Suffice it to say, that the dancing noticed in Scripture, from which you profess to take your warrant for the modern practice, was invariably the expression of religious joy, and was totally different and distinct from modern dancing, and consequently can afford you no authority whatever for your present tastes and practices.
I admit there is in Scripture dancing of another sort than that I have just been noticing, but I take it for granted that you would not for a moment acknowledge the horrible sin of idolatry and its associated dancing (Exodus 32: 6, 19), nor the dancing in which the world and the profligate amongst the Jews indulged. You will not confess that you take your warrant for dancing from the voluptuous performances of Herodias’s daughter. The Scriptures leave you altogether unsupported and unequivocally condemned. Remember that it is written, “Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.”
I now notice a few objections to dancing, and reply to them.
Objection: People might do a deal worse than dance.
Answer: True; people might be profligates; but does the possibility of deeper degradation warrant any degradation? If dancing is sinful, objectors do a great deal worse than dance, for they lessen the sin or extenuate it.
Obj: But Solomon has said, “There is a time to dance.”
Ans: Dancing here and elsewhere in Scripture is put as a general expression for joy. “Thou hast turned my mourning into dancing” (Psalm 30: 18), exclaimed the Psalmist, evidently meaning joy of heart, not physical play of the limbs.
Obj: It is better to dance than to join a clique in speaking scandal about one’s neighbours.
Ans: This is begging the question. We have no right to do either. The gossip and the dancer are on a par. I am certain that much sinful conversation takes place amongst religious professors; but surely a man is not justified in sinning because he knows of the existence of hypocrites or of the abuse of privileges.
Obj: Young people will dance, and to prevent their going to objectionable places to learn, it is better to allow the thing and provide them with the means of learning in a quiet way.
Ans: This is advocating that we “do evil that good may come,” a maxim abhorrent to the Apostle Paul, and which ought to be repudiated by all moralists, though they never profess Christianity.
By this time I fear I have quite tired my readers, but I must say two or three words more: You who feel yourselves condemned will conclude that my religion extinguishes all amusements, but you wrong me. My religion teaches me to give up the world with its vanities and all the sinful lusts of the flesh. My religion teaches me to avoid the ballroom, the concert-room, and the theatre. My religion teaches me that if I do anything over which I cannot ask God’s blessing, it is sin; it is forbidden! My religion teaches me that the world’s practices and God’s requirements are totally at variance: that it is impossible to “serve two masters” (Matthew 6: 24). I thank God for having enabled me to come out from the world. My hopes, my desires, my longings, are all centred in Christ; and though I feel and know that I am a miserable sinner, I have the happiness to possess Scriptural evidence of my call by God. Yea, I am convinced that no one can have sound and satisfactory reason to believe in his or her personal interest in Christ’s atonement until such repudiation of the world, its joys and its amusements, has been accomplished: not, mind you, by self-power, but by supernatural power. Yet, notwithstanding all, I feel that I am not debarred from innocent games and harmless amusements, nor that I am compelled to be of a sorrowful countenance. As for harmless games and amusements, however few: modern dancing is indubitably not one of them; neither is any pastime which brings the opposite sexes into too close contact reckoned among them.
Dancing by adults has been proved by experience and by Scripture to be injurious to the soul, and against the command of God. I shall never cease to warn against the folly and sin of it. Let serious readers meditate upon the following texts of Scripture: Psalm 1:1; 90:12; 119:37; Proverbs 4:14, 15; Matthew 6:13, 24; 16:24; Romans 12:1, 2; 1 Corinthians 6:19, 20; 10:31; 15:33; Ephesians 5:8, 16; 1 Thessalonians 5:22; and 1 John 2:15.