And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to [walk off the stage of life], but God will visit you, and bring you out of this land to the land which he swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” Genesis 50:24
From the beginning of the Bible to the end, theology is presented to us through story. This is the biblical way of imparting truth; it is incarnate in the lives of those whose drama God chose to enshrine in Holy Scripture for all time. When we look at these stories, even the rather prolonged Patriarchal Narrative that we just worked through, we stand in amazement at the concise nature of the stories, the economy of style where nothing is superfluous, every detail is relevant. Never does the narrator moralize and expand or extrapolate points to take to heart. A respect for the integrity of the reader is always maintained; readers must engage in the story and draw his or her conclusions about themselves, according to the receptivity of their souls. God knows the fundamental flaw in our fallen humanity; we cannot be told outright! We have to come to truth via an encounter with God through the stories.
We westerners love stories like the rest of humanity, both ancient and contemporary. But by and large, the ordinary westerner tends to look at them differently. By instinct we paddle along upon the surface of a story, following its story line to its conclusion, and take in whatever impressions that might present themselves. For serious and in-depth thinking on any subject, we look to systematic presentations of materials arranged in categories and expressed in logical progression, like textbooks. Systematic presentation of theology has its place in our culture in that truth can and must be contextualized to appeal to the western mind. But the western mind is in flux; systematic presentations built on sequence of logical propositions no longer move many, those who have lost faith in universal truths. Narrative, however, never ceases to move us.
In associating Joseph with drama and the stage as we did in earlier posts, we are making the case that biblical narrative is drama at its core. Here we turn to Hans Urs von Balthasar and his magisterial Theodrama. His “dramatic theory,” as he calls it, picks up on what Shakespeare made famous, but goes way back before him: “the world is a stage and we are the actors.” The task of the stage is “…to make the drama of existence explicit so that we may view it… thus expanding it into something new.” God interacts with man on stage; man interacts with self on stage as both spectator and player. Our personal drama is within God’s cosmic play; our play is a play within His play. By its existence, theater is existential. Therefore, theater and theology are inseparable. God’s passion play of the forsaken Christ on the cross and Easter resurrection, which was played out in Joseph’s drama centuries earlier, is the act of all acts; it is unmatchable, the answer to every cry. Like Joseph and Jesus, our life must be acted out intentionally; we must not be mere spectators, but actors as well.
It is truly amazing how deep and rich theology by story and drama is. In our study of Genesis, we have pondered many of the great questions of human existence through its stories. There is nothing like it in all of human literature. Story has a way of presenting truth in all its paradoxes and complexities in a most simple way. For instance, volumes have been written in systematic theologies on divine sovereignty and human freedom, whether creation is a closed system (everything is determined) or open (the system can be influenced by wills and choices of created beings). In the Joseph story, every character is portrayed as a free agent and is self-determining. This cannot be denied. At the same time God is sovereign over everything, even the free choices of the brothers who acted autonomously with evil intent, bringing the whole story to conform to His will. The famous line “…you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good…” (Gen. 50:20 cf. 45:5-8), is the closest thing we have in the story like a teaching, but it is not abstract; it is a part of the fabric of the narrative where Joseph comforts his brothers by drawing their attention to the reality of God underlying their lives.
As we connect with these ancient stories, they become ours in a highly personal way. They meld in with our own story, creating an overarching “meta-narrative” that links our story with the origins of the world and continues on till the end. Our little journey through life becomes a critical link in the cosmic drama. Doing theology is therefore a meditation on stories that inspire us to act out our short earthly dramas in an authentic way. It is not incidental that Luke recounts St. Paul’s story of conversion 3 times in Acts (9:1-18, 22:4-16, 26:9-18). Ideas can be argued, but no one can argue the story. One must confront the story and make a decision. Every one of our stories is deeply theological. We become aware of their depths as we ponder them in light of the biblical narratives and the great meta-narrative that builds upon it. It is shocking how many people are ignorant of these biblical stories, their own stories, and seem totally uninterested in other people’s stories. This is theological poverty.
With this we conclude our discussion of this most famous yet most common family, and indeed, this magnificent book of Genesis. Though it is, as we have said earlier, a magnificent literary masterpiece, it profoundly differs from epics of other nations. There we are bound to find stories that glamorize national heroes, often warriors, and that glorify the fatherland. In our story, humanity is not exalted but seen for what it is, for Israel’s first family represents every man and every woman as they are in real life. It is true that they and we are not much to look at, for we are but mortal dust. However, it is the God of Jacob that catches our eye and inspires our souls to aspire to heights beyond anything we mortals could imagine on our own.
Takeaway: The Bible presents theology, that is, the “study of God,” through story and drama, and therefore it is not only historical, but highly literary in its structure and forms, inspiring us to live out our own personal drama in light of its overall “meta narrative.”
Questions: 1) In what ways does this post challenge the way you have approached theology before? 2) Do you see your life as a play with a part you have been given to play out by God?
Resources used:
Von Balthasar, Hans Urs. Theodrama: Theological Dramatic Theory, vol. I Prolegomena. San Francisco, Ignatius Press, 1988. Quotes above from Introduction, pp. 17-22.