In the early Byzantine era, it was not uncommon for Jews and Christians to appropriate imagery of Graeco-Roman gods, as this mosaic of David in the guise of Orpheus demonstrates. The synagogue community of Gaza (where this mosaic was discovered) would have been accustomed to Hellenistic imagery. The compelling parallel between the psalmist who drives out King Saul’s demon with his playing, and the Greek hero who tamed wild beasts through his song, probably made the syncretic image-type a particularly popular choice.

In this mosaic fragment, the boyish-looking musician is dressed as a Byzantine emperor (Ovadia 1991: 129–31); he is labelled as ‘David’, and is shown playing a fourteen-stringed lyre (or more likely the closely related kithera). The fingers of his left hand rest lightly on the strings as he strikes them with a small hammer in his right hand. The directional gesture of both his arms invites us to discern the most prominent member of his immediate audience, a lion cub, or lioness. The creature appears, in accordance with the Orphic legend, to be bowing its head in docile submission to the music.

For the synagogue worshippers, King David was the pre-eminent biblical musician (‘the sweet singer of Israel’; 2 Samuel 23:1 CJB), so intimately was his identity tied to the Sēfer Tehillīm (book of Psalms).

The Hebrew word tehillīm can be translated as ‘praises’ (without musical connotations), while ‘psalms’ derives from the Greek word psalmoi, meaning ‘instrumental music’. These slight divergences of meaning come together at numerous points in the psalm collection, including in Psalm 150:3, in which the psalmist summons the worshiper to ‘Praise him with lute and harp’ (see also Psalm 149:3).

Unlike Orpheus’s lyre, which had ‘elevating powers’ that allowed it to continue playing even after Orpheus’s death (Bernstock 2006: 35), David’s harp was an earthly object that relied on the Israelite king’s accomplishment. In David’s case the divine gift was not the instrument, but the ability to express his gratitude to God through music.

References

Bernstock, Judith. 2006. Under the Spell of Orpheus: The Persistence of a Myth in Twentieth-century Art (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press)

Friedman, John. 1960. Orpheus in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press)

Ovadia, Asher. 1981. ‘The Synagogue at Gaza’, in Ancient Synagogues Revealed, ed. by Lee I. Levine (Jerusalem: The Israel Exploration Society)