St. Job as a Patron of Music

Abstract

THE Saints of the Early Christian and Mediaeval church include a considerable number who were honored for their merits in the field of religious music, either as reformers of the Chant or as composers of hymns and songs. Others achieved sainthood by renouncing their careers as secular musicians. Yet, oddly enough, the patron saints of music were not drawn from these ranks. The four saints who did attain this status—Saint John the Baptist, Saint Wilgefortis, Saint Cecilia, and Saint Job—had no connection with music at all, so far as the official sources are concerned. Each of them came to be linked with music only as a result of peculiar circumstances that demand investigation. We propose here to trace the way in which Saint Job came to be connected with music, and thus try to explain the numerous representations of this Old Testament figure surrounded by musicians.