3427 - Dancing by W. T.

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · May 16, 1911

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 38, No. 19.

3427 — Dancing

By W. T.

Is it wrong to dance?

W. T.

It depends on the purpose and motive. People sometimes dance for very joy, unconsciously. This is oftenest seen among children. David danced when the ark of God was brought to Jerusalem. 2 Sam. 6:14. It was with him an expression of holy joy. So Miriam and the women of Israel sang and danced after the deliverance from the Egyptians. Ex. 15:20. But in all these ancient dances, which were largely rhythmic marches to the sound of music, the sexes danced separately; they were not the lust-breeding, vice-engendering dances of modern times, dances in which the sexes intermingle. The modern dance is to be condemned for the following reasons: (1) It is generally held in an ill-ventilated, super-heated, sometimes over-chilly, ballroom, in an atmosphere more or less saturated with dust or impurities. (2) It is accompanied by more or less drinking of intoxicants, or iced drinks when the person is overheated, both of which are productive of harm. (3) It does not have in it a single normal exercise that is promotive of health. Exercise is good, but exercise perverted is evil. (4) Customs in the dress of the gentler sex are often such as to arouse base passions in male participants of the dance, however innocent the wearer. (5) Confessions of dancing-masters and hundreds of others have told the same story; namely, that the initial step in a life of shame was first learned in the dance, too many of which dances could well bear, in their relation to some soul, "The Dance of Death." We are told that one learns in the dance the grace of motion, etc., but purity of heart and life is worth infinitely more.