Joys of Noise

For much of my life, I have been battling against noise. The most notorious episode was my crusade against what are still called “Leaf-blowers.” For several months, I was the leader of a local campaign to get enough signatures on a petition to have a ban on those outrageously noisy machines, which are more accurately described as dirt-blowers, placed on the City ballot. In the end we were successful – but the ban, which became part of City Law, referred only to the noisier gas-powered machines, leaving the electrically-operated ones, still bothersome, but not quite as noisy, still legal.

But the Hebrew Bible (aka the Old Testament) especially the Psalms, are full of references concerning, expressions of, and exhortations invoking “joyful noise,” which usually meant making music as celebration, or as expressing praise to God.

But there was at least one episode in which the sounds were not joyful, but extremely hostile.

That came with the celebrated siege of the fortified City of Jericho – the first major military engagement after the Israelites had successfully emerged from their enslavement in Egypt, and (after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness), embarked on their conquest of the neighboring supposedly Promised Land of Canaan. The Biblical account is very specific as to the campaign they waged, under their leader Joshua against the first major military obstacle they encountered after crossing over the River Jordan. Jericho was a heavily fortified City, with a series of walls, behind which the inhabitants might, in those pre-gunpowder days, feel reasonably secure.

We might attribute to what happened next the distinction of being the first recorded use of noise as a weapon, or as an instrument of destruction. There is a detailed description in the Book of Joshua, in which Joshua plays the same type of role which Moses played a little earlier, as a sort of intermediary between God and his People, relaying specific instructions involving what seems to have been the magic number of Seven, with everybody going all around the walls seven times, for seven days. 

But here is where the noise comes in, because there is to be much blowing of trumpets (which were probably made of rams’ horns – as are, to this day, still sounded in certain synagogue services). Then, on the seventh day, in addition to the horn-blowing, all the people are supposed to “shout.” And we are asked to believe that, at that point, the walls came tumbling down.

And it is certainly a fact that even a barrage of loud voices can strike fear, and possibly panic, into one’s opponents. One feature of our own Civil War was used by the Confederates of the so-called “Rebel Yell.” And where would we be today, at football games, without “Cheer-Leaders,” to generate noisy support of their team?

The British comedy team “Monty Python” concocted a sketch based on the idea that a joke can be so funny that it immobilizes anybody who hears it, by convulsing them with laughter. The Army immediately sees its military possibilities by weaponizing the joke, although some scientists engaged in the process become useless through laughing at the work. And when an attempt is made to use it against the Germans, there are frustrating problems in translation.

In World War II, Japanese troops were notorious for refusing to surrender, even though they were bombarded with “Permission to Surrender” leaflets printed in both Japanese and English. Experts in “Psychological Warfare” who were brought in, advised that the word “surrender” in Japanese was dishonorable. So, the message in Japanese was changed to say “I cease resistance” – and apparently, this was much more effective.

The only time Officers of the Law were ever called on me involved one of those very noisy carpet-cleaning vehicles. The cleaning is done quietly indoors, but the vehicle emits an atrocious blast of sound. When one was being used right next to my house, I found it unbearable, and had the temerity to silence it by going out, finding the key which turned it off and removing it. I was seen, and two armed Officers appeared at my door. Hospitably I invited them in. I knew I had “The Right to Remain Silent.” But they knew I had the key, and demanded that I return it. I complied, and they left, without ever having to use their guns.

But I can claim a moral victory – because that vehicle, as far as I know, was never seen or heard in my neighborhood again.