Living Theodrama

Reimagining Theological Ethics

Wesley Vander Lugt

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317103929
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Theology

Living Theodrama is a fresh, creative introduction to theological ethics. Offering an imaginative approach through dialogue with theatrical theory and practice, Vander Lugt demonstrates a new way to integrate actor-oriented and action-oriented approaches to Christian ethics within a comprehensive theodramatic model. This model affirms that life is a drama performed in the company of God and others, providing rich metaphors for relating theology to everyday formation and performance in this drama. Different chapters explore the role of the triune God, Scripture, tradition, the church, mission, and context in the process of formation and performance, thus dealing separately with major themes in theological ethics while incorporating them within an overarching model. This book contains not only a fruitful exchange between theological ethics and theatre, but it also presents a promising method for interdisciplinary dialogue between theology and the arts that will be valuable for students and practitioners across many different fields.

Chapter 1
Prologue to a Theatrical Theology

If theology, therefore, is full of dramatic tension, both in form and content, it is appropriate to turn our attention to this aspect and establish a kind of system of dramatic categories.

Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Theo-Drama, I, 128

We need to conceive of revelation not as a drama that plays out in front of us, but the drama that is our drama.

Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, I/2, 498

The Theatrical Turn in Christian Theology

Two opposing currents run deeply in the Christian tradition: the anti-theatrical prejudice and the intrinsic theatricality of faith. The former appeared as footnotes to Plato, whether as ontological objection to imitative representation or ethical disapproval of arousing the passions.¹ Equally dismissive was the Puritan and later fundamentalist perspective that theatre is an epicenter of evil, existing merely for base entertainment.² Although many Christians today endorse neither Platonic nor Puritan prejudices against theatre, the lingering effects still permeate everyday parlance. Petty conflicts are dramas to be endured or to avoid; causing a public ruckus is making a scene; authenticity is the opposite of play-acting; and, more specific to Christian practice, living by grace is placed in opposition to relying on personal performance.

Alongside outright denunciation or subliminal suspicions of theatre, however, Christian theologians have long recognized the theatricality of divine revelation and human response. For example, James K.A. Smith observes that underneath Augustine’s critique of theatre exist enduring affirmations regarding the goodness of creation, fleshly incarnation, and embodied resurrection, all supporting a theatrical aesthetic.³ As a result of these affirmations, theologians as diverse as Clement of Alexandria, John Calvin, and Pedro Calderón de la Barca have employed theatrical metaphors and models to describe God’s world and work. In addition, liturgical dramas and medieval mystery plays sustained theatre within the Christian tradition and provided a precedent for positive theatrical expression.⁴ Although the relationship between Christianity and theatre remains strained in some circles, the involvement of Christians in religious and mainstream theatre is flourishing and considered a godly vocation.⁵

Another indication that the anti-theatrical prejudice is crumbling among Christians is the greater number of Christian scholars pursuing interdisciplinary dialogue between theatre and systematic theology, biblical studies, ethics, worship, and other areas of Christian thought and practice. In fact, a cursory glance over the landscape of Christian theology will reveal a “theatrical turn” throughout the last several decades. What accounts for this theatrical turn? What motivations and methodologies are guiding Christian theologians and ethicists in their dialogue with theatre? Although there are a myriad of motivations, the rest of this section will outline nine movements that have influenced the theatrical turn, highlighting the foremost scholars advancing interdisciplinary dialogue between theology and theatre.

From Theatrical Social Science to Theatrical Theology

The theatrical turn in Christian theology is intertwined with the more general theatrical turn in the social sciences. Psychology was the first discipline to draw deeply from theatre, with Jacob Moreno in the 1920s pioneering a new method he later called “psychodrama.” As an original approach to group therapy, psychodrama valued the power of spontaneous encounter and experimented with role-play and improvisation.⁶ Later developments, such as drama-therapy and socio-drama, blurred the lines between psychology and theatre by seeking self-transformation through performance.⁷ Since performances of the self always occur on a social stage, a similar dialogue with theatre emerged within sociology, with G.H. Mead’s sociological dramaturgy interpreting individuals as playing roles according to social scripts.⁸ Perhaps the most influential figure in popularizing sociological dramaturgy and role theory, however, is Erving Goffman, who explored the dynamics of everyday interactions and how people negotiate believable performances of social roles.⁹ With the advent of postmodernism, sociologists such as T.R. Young have expanded on interpersonal dramaturgy popularized by Goffman to address macro-social and political dramaturgy.¹⁰ Within these large-scale performances, verbal communication is clearly a critical component alongside non-verbal communication. As such, J.L. Austin and John Searle investigated the nature of linguistic “performatives,”¹¹ or things people do with words, with subsequent sociolinguists examining the influence of social and cultural norms on verbal performances.¹²

Finally, drawing on the vast dialogue sustained between theatre and psychology, sociology, philosophy, and linguistics, anthropologist Victor Turner identified humans as homo performans, employing theatrical models to explain human and cultural rituals.¹³ At the same time, Richard Schechner elaborated multiple points of contact between theatre and anthropology, merging these interests by creating the first ever department of performance studies, at New York University. Schechner maintains that whereas not everything in life is performance, almost everything can be studied as performance.¹⁴ With every discipline and sphere of life now open to investigation as performance, it was inevitable that this theatrical turn would extend to theology. In fact, through the work of Schechner and others, a major barrier to interdisciplinary dialogue with theatre had been overcome, namely, dismantling the association between theatre and showy hypocrisy, focusing instead on theatre’s authentic creativity.¹⁵ Similarly, theologians are interacting with theatre in more constructive and less disparaging ways, forging new insights and dissolving long-standing suspicions of theatre. In doing so, the social sciences are critical dialogue partners for wrestling with the drama of existence and forging productive interdisciplinary methodologies for interacting with theatre. As theologians draw insights from the social sciences and the world of theatre, however, John Milbank warns that theology must be governed by God’s revelation rather than secular norms.¹⁶ This caveat motivates a primary aim of this book: clarifying how theology can dialogue with theatre without losing its grounding in divine revelation.

From Human Drama to Divine Drama

Theologians, along with social scientists, that human existence is dramatic. Hans Urs von Balthasar observes that we are inherently familiar with drama “from the complications, tensions, catastrophes, and reconciliations which characterize our lives as individuals and in interaction with others.”¹⁷ Like drama, our lives have a beginning, middle and an end, a plot riddled with conflict in which we play many roles. If Christian theology merely reflected on the shape of human existence—a theology from below—this would be reason enough to employ a theatrical model. But theology also begins from above, reflecting on and responding to God’s revelation. God does not reveal himself in logical formulas or secret knowledge; God reveals himself by saying and doing things on the world stage. The whole purpose of Balthasar’s five-volume Theo-Drama is to explore the drama of God’s infinite being and redemptive action that frames every finite drama. The theodrama, therefore, is the drama of God’s communicative action in dynamic interaction with his creation. Several theologians have adopted Balthasar’s theodramatic approach, such as Kevin Vanhoozer, who affirms that both “the content and the process of divine revelation” are dramatic, a covenantal comedy of the triune God who speaks and acts for the sake of our salvation.¹⁸

Vanhoozer observes that theology as human projection (à la Feuerbach) “eliminates the theo from theodrama” and theology as existential expression (à la Bultmann) “drains the drama out of theodrama.” By contrast, beginning with God’s dramatic revelation keeps both together.¹⁹ If revelation is dramatic, then theology should follow suit.²⁰ Rather than choosing between text-centered or history-centered theologies, Michael Horton maintains that dramatic theology draws from the entire scope of God’s textual and historical performance.²¹ Consequently, the theatrical turn in theology recognizes the primacy of a revelatory, divine drama that precedes, enlivens, and interfaces with the drama of human existence in real time and space. This is seen most clearly in the drama of Jesus’ incarnation, life, death, resurrection, and ascension, which Max Harris explains is theatrical in the best sense: the Word becoming flesh and dwelling among us, engaging all our senses and drawing us into the drama.²² In the theodrama, God’s incarna...