Song (prop. i^Tl", shir, i^crj). Songs were gener- ally used on occasions of thanksgiving and triumpli, as the song of Moses at the deliverance from Piiaraoh and his host (Exod. xv, 1); the song of Israel at the well of Bt-er (Numb, xxi, 17); the song of Moses, in Deuteronomy (eh. xxxii); that of Deborah (Judg. v, 12); that of David on bringing up the ark (1 Chron. xiii, 8); of Hannah (1 .Sam. ii); of the Virgin (Luke i, 40): of the four-and-twenty elders (Hev. v, 8); of Mo- ses and the I^ml) (xv, 3). But a few also were sung on occasions of sorrow, such as that of David on Saul and Jonathan (2 .Sam. i, 18, etc.); the Lamentations of Jeremiah, and the song he composed on the death of Josiah (2 Chron. xxx v, 2.')). It is said of Tyre, in lizek. xxvi. 13, as one mark of her desolation, *• I will ctuiHC the nojue of thy sontrs to cense, And the kouiuI of ihy harps shall be no more heard." Songs and viols were the usual accompaniments of sac- rifiw-s among the .lews and heathens (.Vmos v, 23). *' Siiciincii, didces tibia efTundat nntdos, El ulveu niiijiuu vittiniu ante aras cadiit."
(Seiiec. Trnad.) EccImi. xi, 4, "And nil the daughters of song shall be broujjht low," i. p. all the organs which perceive and di»tingui»h musical soiniils, and those also which form and miHlidale the voiie; age producing incapacity of cnjoynuiit, as old Bar/.illai remarks (2 Sam. xix, 35); and at Juvenal noticcti, thus translated by Dryden : " What mnslc or ciichnntbig voire can cheer A f I lipid, old, impenetrable curf" I'm. Ixviii describes the manner of Jewish musical fes- tivities:
" The singers went hef )re, After came I he pl.iyers on instrnments, Between the damsels playing on timbrels."
In Hos. ii, 15 siiiffiiir/ implies the manifestation of the divine favor, where the Targum says, " I will work mir- acles for them, and perform great acts, as in the day when they ascended up out of the land of Egypt." In this sense a song denotes a great deliverance and a new subject of thanksgiving; so a new song, as in Psa. xl, 3 : Kev. v, 9, and elsewhere, implies a new work of sal- vation and favor, requiring an extraordinary return of gratitude and praise. See Hymn; Psalm; Singing.
SONG OF DEGREES. See Degrees, Song of; Gradual.
SONG OF SOLOMON, or SONG OF SONGS. See Canticles.
SONG OF THE THREE HOLY CHILDREN is the title of one of the minor pieces found in the Apoc- rypha, and placed in the English Version immediately after the book of Baruch. See Apocrypha. The fidl caption of the translators is as follows: "The Song of the Three Holy Children, which followeth in the third chapter of Daniel after this place — fell down honnd into the midst of (lie burning Jxery furnace, ver. 23. That which followeth is not in the Hebrew, to wit. And they iralked [the first words of the piece in question] — unto these words. Then Nebuchadnezzar, ver. 24." It contains sixty-eight verses.
I. Title and Position. — This piece is generally called The Song, or Hymn, of the Three Holy Children because ver. 28 says that " the three, as out of one month, praised, glorified, and blessed God," though it ought rather to be denominated The Prayer of Azarias, and the Song of the Three Holy Children, inasmuch as nearly half of it is occupied with the prayer of Azarias. Orig- inally it was inserted in the 3d chapter of Daniel, be- tween the 23d and 24th verses; but, being used liturgi- cally in connection with similar fragments, it was after- wards transposed to the end of the Psalms in the Codex Alexandrinns as Hymn ix and x. under the titles of " The Prayer of Azarias," and " The Hymn of our Fa- thers." It occupies a similar position in many of the Greek and Latin psalters, and most probabh' was so placed already in the old Latin version.
II. Design. — This piece is evidently liturgical in its purpose, being suggested by the apparent abruptness of the narrative in Daniel (iii, 23), as w-ell as by the supi)ositi<)n that these confessors, who so readily submit- ted to be thrown into a fiery furnace, in which they re- mained some time, would employ their leisure in prayer to the God whom they so fearlessly confessed. Accord- ingly, Azarias is represented as praying in the furnace (ver. 2-22), and, in answer to his prayer, we are told that the angel of the Lord appeared, who, notwithstand- ing the increased heat of the furnace, cooled the air like "a moist whistling wind" (ver. 2G, 27); whereupon all the tliree martyrs burst into a song ol' praise (ver. 28- 1)8), thus attording an example of prayer and thanks- giving to the afliicted and delivered Church, which she has duly a])()reciatcd by having used it as a part of her service ever since the 4th century, and by its being used in the Anglican Church to the present day.
HI. Unity, Author, Date, and Original Language. — There is hardly any connection between the prayer of Azarias and the song of the Tliree Holy Children. The former does not even allude to the condition of the mar- tyrs, and is more like what we should expect from an assembly of exiled Jews on a solemn fast-day than from confessors in a furnace. This want of harmony between the two parts, coupled with the fact that ver. 14, which tells that the Temjile and its worship no longer exist, contradicts ver. 30, 31, (U, 02, where both are said to exist, and that the same author would not have put the prayer into the month i\i Azarias <(/o«f, shows tliat the two parts proceed from different sources. Those who are acquainted with the midtifarious stories where- with Jewish tradition has embalmed the inemorv of