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| - DRAMATIC THEOLOGY and DRAMATIC THEOLOGY METHODOLOGY I. INTRODUCTION Rev. Paul Siu in his new release in Chinese, “The Horizon of Theology: Constructing a Method for Evangelical Theology” has two major parts: Part One is to discuss and reveal the reasons why we need the theology. Part Two discloses 8 chapters of how to study the theology. And in his concluding words after p.386, he outlines 15 thinking approaches or points related to the Evangelical theological method. I appreciate Rev Siu’s labor and input in these topics that there are really too few publications concerning this realm among the Chinese theological studies. However, the methods he lists are general principles, rather than offering a usable method. For example, the second point, “Man cannot avoid theology” and the third point, “Theological studies cannot be separated from our life or living” both are just common senses, not a specific theological method. From this illustration, you might catch a phenomenon that among theological studies, there are not many writings concerning the theological methodologies. Although almost all theological students and researching theologians have to consider the theological method before they get into their thesis or dissertations; there are still very few titles directly named “Theological Methodology” in all libraries. A. MOTIVATION & PURPOSE Due to the rare publications concerning theological methodology, of course it arose my attention and stirred me up to get into the journey of discovery for more methods to solve the theological issues. This is the major motivation that I am willing to jump into such a cold subject, for I believe if I labor on it, many people or the ones to come will be benefited by my labor, and this is much worthier than I just enjoyed my own interesting subjects. For this purpose, I have reviewed several scholars’ writings related to certain types or categories of theology. Such as Biblical Theology, New Testament Theology, Old Testament Theology, Historical Theology, Systematic Theology, Philosophical Theology, Apologetic Theology, Spiritual Theology, Religious Theology or Religious Pluralism, Contextual Theology, Neo-Orthodox Theology/Neuorthodoxie, or Crisis Theology/Theologie der Krisis, or Paradoxical Theology/Paradoxe Theologie, Hope Theology/Theology of Hope, Process Theology, Liberation Theology, Feminism Theology, Asian Theology, Ecological Theology, or Animal Theology, Political Theology, Ecumenical Theology, and finally Narrative Theology…etc. More than 20 different kinds of theologies are published and disclosed in the 20th Century. I fully believe there will be more creative and understandable terms of new theology will be released in the coming years! The reason why there are so many different kinds of theology (let us call it XT to represent all above theologies) existed is because a new method or new concept to understand the theology changed or introduced. You can easily discover each XT’s emphasized objects are different; their focused points of view are quite different. Even within Contextual Theology and Asian Theology, their basic concerns are similar, but just different groups of people or territories, then the theologians can develop out so many books and articles to publish their own interests. Although each theological approach is unique and reasonable in their own focal points, but none of them can explain more than two or three different subjects or hard to interpret well in other areas of discussion of theologies. Therefore, this kind of theological methodology is good to take advantage of certain realms, but not good enough to all the other aspects of issues. I personally regard them just as a key to open a certain door, but not a powerful master key to open the majority of doors. It’s a good method, but not a better or even the best method that I am trying to find! I hope this thesis could be a good trail for me to explore another better theological method. B. METHODOLOGY What is DTM? “Dramatic Theological Method (DTM) is a methodology of what I created for the further discussions of theological issues. Most theological methods sourcing from either the Liberalism or Pragmatism; are not sufficient to do theology describe for the entire Biblical. For this shortage, I rethink a method to solve, cover or explain more Biblical Theology, and the result is DTM. Since the entire dissertation is related to the theological method, DTM. Here I would just disclose the methodology how to produce or issue the result of DTM for the readers. In the following chapters, I will focus on each element of DTM and its function and importance; before going too far, I will first compare the differences between “Drama/Dramatic and Narrative” among the academic references. discuss about the topic: “Observing Upon the Narrative Theology”, in order to learn from the modern theologies, no matter their positive parts or negative parts! Therefore, we can establish a healthy attitude and understanding concerning these theological methods. We will give a brief sketch about Narrative Theology, including its initiation and its major leaders from the Yale School. From discussing about its strengths and important points, we can take advantage from its positive parts as our evangelical appropriation. DTM means Dramatic Theological Method, and dramatic and narrative are quite similar in our understandings, therefore, we have given some definitions for these terms before we presenting the methodology. The way I got the concept of DTM is from many times of discussion between the scholars, teachers, and reading repeatedly from certain books, and prayed to digest them and deeply mused among all the clues and elements how to link them together before I go to the next steps. Methodology is very fundamental to all researches, for this matter, I purposely studied some other practical methodological titles such as “Quantitative research and statistical analysis in social & behavioral sciences” and “ Logico-Linguistic Analysis—Methods of Thinking” by Tien-Ming Lee who is the professor of the Chinese University of Hong Kong and referring from “Studium Der Theologie: Eine Enzyklopadische Orientierung” by Gerhard Ebeling; of course, also I studied several “Research Method and Thesis Writing” titles, one of the excellencies is written by Dr. Fred Young…etc. To study the other methodologies is the best and fastest way to result in your own methodology, for the scientific considerations are very logic and important, without standing upon other giant’s shoulder is extremely hard to reach our Zion! Finally, I was very lucky to have both Rev. Chen and Rev. Lu as my Mentors; they are humble but well educated professors, they both knew their strengthen parts and weak parts, but never limited my personal developing of my own theological thoughts! This is not a simple matter to allow someone who has the talent to study in their own ways, because my teachers are the best opened hearted guiders; therefore I could have such an opportunity to launch on this kind of cold subject. Otherwise, I could only be a follower, not an inventor or pioneer in my theological educational career. To discuss with them is one of my very important methods to get the concepts of DTM. Without such an all aspects mentoring, and no limited and opened environment that I could ask and present all what I wanted to know or all what I gained from the studies, I could never have such an opportunity or ability to summarize or conclude my own theological thoughts into the methodology—DTM. May the Lord be with them and remember their wonderful input for the DTM. C. SCOPE OF RESEARCH Although DTM can be applied and tested in many aspects of theological issues, due to the limitation of time and resources, we have to focus our discussion on the major relevant topics such as the postliberal Narrative Theology mainly developed by Hans Frei and George Lindbeck of the Yale school, and the current most significant Evangelical theologian Kevin J. Vanhoozer’s theological voice who is the Research Professor of Systematic Theology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. The reason why we focused on these two major groups is not just because their writings are more popular and affective to the theological academy, but also because of the similarity and relevancy with DTM. Moreover, DTM absorbs both parts’ strengths and abstracts the useful parts to be formed another independent system that could be applied to interpret many Biblical Scriptures and theological issues. By the way, although DTM can be used like a tool to present the hermeneutical matters, but currently we only focus upon its function of interpreting the major theological issues. Thus, it should be categorized as the level/rank for the theological method, not the level/rank for the biblical hermeneutics. It is a theological interpreting tool, not a skillful tool for the Biblical verses. Although the theological issues include many Biblical interpretations or hermeneutical skills, but a complete theological concept should also involve something else beside of the biblical scriptures, such as the historical tradition and practices of the Church, and contemporary and contextual thinking. Thus, DTM is applied not just the biblical interpretation or hermeneutics, but all things related to the divine theological topics such as the XTs. For example, LT, FT, PoT and EcT all has its own focal points, but if we replace the DTM’s structure and methodology, we can still result some similar theological interpretation according to different kinds of presumptions or emphases. Nevertheless, to approve DTM’s effectiveness in all other theological talking or issues are not our current urgent jobs; our main duty is to guide the readers to get the entire concept of DTM and understand the application and functions of DTM. Therefore, our scope of research should be limited only on the process of the resulting DTM by observing the Narrative Theology and abstracting from the discussion of “the Drama of Doctrine” in this dissertation. Otherwise, the wider scope we involved, the less time we have and less accuracy and depth that we can assure and provide. I think the first disclosure of DTM is just a simple beginning of the following studies. My primary goal setting is to make sure its logic and approach is acceptable toward the theological academy, not to attempt to perfect its contents and model. Maybe in the near future, I can spend more time in the deeper research for its multiple applications to the other XTs as a universal theological methodology. Here, in order to express the Evangelical view by appropriating the Narrative Theology (postliberal perspective), we will spend more time in Narrative Theology and the Evangelical appropriation issues. The scope of researching could be somewhat theoretic and boring, but the result of this dissertation could be taken advantage by more theologians and theological students in the future. Thus, I still felt it’s worthy to labor and accomplish it in the way of more solid logic and theological discussions response. II. DRAMA/DRAMATIC VS. NARRATIVE A. DEFINITIONS Before we get into Narrative Theology, we regard to define some terminologies is very necessary. Especially DTM is related to Drama, and the Narrative Theology, we think it is very important to identify first what are the definitions of drama/dramatic and narrative, and their relevant theories in the academic discussion. Although this is an academic thesis, however, concerning something not the core items of theology, we won’t spend too much time in the detailed research; actually, many online referenced records such as WIKIPEDIA already present a lot of updated, useful and accurate information. Unless the content from the internet has certain references that we have to honor the original providers, the rest editorial works can be even edited by anyone, even including ourselves, and there are no personal copyright issues, that we will only give a footnote to identify where did we quote from. i. What is Drama/Dramatic? Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. It is derived from a Greek word meaning "action" (Classical Greek δράμα / dráma), derived from "to do" (Classical Greek δράω / dráō). Dramas are performed in various media: theatre, radio, film, and television. Drama is often combined with music and dance: the drama in opera is sung throughout; musicals include spoken dialogue and songs; and some forms of drama have regular musical accompaniment (melodrama and Japanese Nō, for example). In certain periods of history (the ancient Roman and modern Romantic) dramas have been written to be read rather than performed. In improvisation, the drama does not pre-exist the moment of performance; performers devise a dramatic script spontaneously before an audience. The following definitions concerning drama/dramatic are both coming from Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913). Drama 1. A composition, in prose or poetry, accommodated to action, and intended to exhibit a picture of human life, or to depict a series of grave or humorous actions of more than ordinary interest, tending toward some striking result. It is commonly designed to be spoken and represented by actors on the stage. A divine pastoral drama in the Song of Solomon. --Milton. 2. A series of real events invested with a dramatic unity and interest. ``The drama of war. --Thackeray. The drama and contrivances of God's providence. --Sharp. 3. Dramatic composition and the literature pertaining to or illustrating it; dramatic literature. Note: The principal species of the drama are {tragedy} and {comedy}; inferior species are {tragi-comedy}, {melodrama}, {operas}, {burlettas}, and {farces}. {The romantic drama}, the kind of drama whose aim is to present a tale or history in scenes, and whose plays (like those of Shakespeare, Marlowe, and others) are stories told in dialogue by actors on the stage. --J. A. Symonds. Dramatic is of or pertaining to the drama; appropriate to, or having the qualities of, a drama; theatrical; vivid. The emperor . . . performed his part with much dramatic effect. --Motley. OTHER ONLINE DEFINTIONS OF DRAMA: · play: a dramatic work intended for performance by actors on a stage; "he wrote several plays but only one was produced on Broadway" · an episode that is turbulent or highly emotional · the literary genre of works intended for the theater · the quality of being arresting or highly emotional wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn · "Drama!" is the first single released by Erasure from their fourth studio album Wild!. It was issued by Mute Records in the UK and Sire Records in the U.S. Written by Vince Clarke and Andy Bell, the synth pop song begins with a low-key keyboard line and a subdued vocal from Bell. ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama! · Drama (Classical Greek δρᾶμα) is a literary form involving parts written for actors to perform. It is a Greek word meaning "action", drawn from the (Classical Greek δρᾶν), "to do". en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama · Drama is the tenth studio album by British progressive rock group Yes. It is unique for being the only Yes release without vocalist Jon Anderson. ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama (Yes album) · Drama is Flaw's third and final indie album, self-released in 2000. All of these songs were re-recorded for Through the Eyes. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama (Flaw album) · Drama is the third official album by southern rapper Trae. It is a doulble disc, one is regular the other is Screwed and Chopped. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama (Trae album) · Drama is Beseech's fourth album, released in 2003 by Napalm Records. The CD features 8 tracks. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama (Beseech album) · Drama is the debut album from British R&B star Jamelia. The album, a mix of R&B, hip-hop, and pop was released on June 26, 2000. The album features four singles including "I Do", "Money" (Jamelia's first top 5 hit), "Call Me" and "Boy Next Door", which just missed out on a UK top 40 place. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama (Jamelia album) · Drama is an album by British girl group Bananarama. It is their ninth studio album (not including hits collections), and the fourth album released by Bananarama as a duo. ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drama (Bananarama album) · a literary composition, usually in dialogue form, that centers on the actions of characters. method.vtheatre.net/dict.html · A form of literature to be acted out before an audience mdk12.org/instruction/curriculum/reading/glossary.shtml · A scripted screenplay in which the dramatic elements of character, theme and plot are introduced and developed so as to form a narrative structure. ... www.afc.gov.au/gtp/definitions.html · A story acted out, usually on a stage, by actors and actresses who take the parts of specific characters. ... library.thinkquest.org/23846/library/terms/index.html · the literary genre which describes texts written for performance on stage, or on radio or television www.longman.co.uk/tt_seceng/resources/glosauth.htm · a literary work designed for presentation by actors on a stage. Examples: Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice; Miller, Death of a Salesman. www.depaul.edu/~dsimpson/awtech/lexicon.html · The art of composing, writing, acting, or producing plays; a literary composition intended to portray life character or tell a story usually involving conflicts and emotions exhibited through action and dialogue, designed for theatrical performance. www.dpi.state.nc.us/curriculum/artsed/scos/theatrearts/tglossary · This term actually has several meanings; however, in this unit, drama refers to plays, works of literature that can be read and performed on stage. wire.rutgers.edu/p_reading_discipline_features.html · A story written to be performed by actors. Dramas are often divided into parts called acts, which are often divided into smaller parts called scenes. www.necompact.org/ea/materials/GLE/GLEsFeb05/NECA%20ReadingGlossary.doc · Software environment for the development of network distributed real time systems. DRAMA is used extensively at ING. The IMPB observing system uses DRAMA to communicate with the Telescope Control System (TCS). www.ing.iac.es/~docs/wht/ingrid/wht-ingrid-2/terminology.html · A written story meant to be acted out on a stage www.thinkport.org/5d8dadfd-d99a-4295-88ce-ca8a39e449ff.asset · a literary work in which the characters experience some sort of internal or external conflict. The term Drama often refers to a "play," a story written to be performed by actors in front of a live audience. www.iclasses.org/assets/literature/literary_glossary.cfm · Literary work with dialogue written in verse and spoken by actors playing characters experiencing conflict and tension. In Greek drama, a play derives its plot from stories from history or mythology. The English word drama comes from the Greek word "dran," meaning "to do." . ... www.cummingsstudyguides.net/terms.html · Focus on conflicting elements to bring forth a stronger imagery, particularly in use of generating emotional reaction through demonstration of contrasts. forum.mediaminer.org/index.php · 1. n. a story written to be acted out, as on the stage of a theatre; a play; 2. a series of interesting or exciting events. station05.qc.ca/csrs/bouscol/anglais/book_report/glossary3.html · Stories containing a state, situation, or series of events involving interesting or intense conflict of forces. versaphile.com/sgrecs/key.asp · a composition in verse or prose that portrays the actions of characters in conflict; the literary form of a play; a series of events involving intense conflict. filmplus.org/thr/dic1.html · Story that is written to be acted for an audience. www.cougar.issaquah.wednet.edu/teachers/wangeman/handbook_of_literary_terms.htm · any work meant to be performed on a stage by actors. Diderot and Beaumarchais are responsible for narrowing its meaning to a 'serious' play, yet not necessarily a tragedy. heterologies.free.fr/Heterologies/cours/1/girard/master1litimpO.html · the form of literature known as plays; but drama also refers to the type of serious play that is often concerned with the leading character’s relationship to society. henry.mpls.k12.mn.us/1Sep20053.html · A play; a story that has no narrator but is instead written to be performed by actors on a stage before an audience. Like fiction (which does have the narrator), drama typically centers in the conflict between protagonist and antagonist. See character. www.york.k12.sc.us/Standards%5CELA%5CGlossary.doc · A literary work written to be acted on a stage. It may be in pantomime or dialogue, in poetry or prose, comic or serious, and with or without musical accompaniment. Often, a major goal is to create the illusion of reality. Drama includes comedy, farce, No drama, theater of the absurd, and tragedy. shark.comfsm.fm/~crgood/Mythology/EN206_Glossary.htm ii. What is Narrative? What is Narrative? Sometimes terms that everyone uses but no one can quite define is about vast, various concepts. I get asked "What's narrative?" all the time and, given the name of our slice of the Nieman Foundation, I've been pressed on it. When the program was new, I suggested, in jest, that we should call ourselves The Nieman Program for "Contactful" Journalism: journalism that doesn't assume the reader is a robot, that acknowledges the reader knows lots and feels and snickers and gets wild. Perhaps the question "What's up with this narrative stuff?" is an uneasy one — a question that denotes factions and discomfort with the clear movement toward more narrative in news coverage. At a minimum, narrative denotes writing with (A) set scenes, (B) characters, (C) action that unfolds over time, (D) the interpretable voice of a teller — a narrator with a somewhat discernable personality — and (E) some sense of relationship to the reader, viewer or listener, which, all arrayed, (F) lead the audience toward a point, realization or destination. To comment on each of these:(A) Set Scenes: Lots of unpracticed narrative writing simply is haphazard or naive about painting physical location: Objects fly about, are near and far, we're inside and outside. I call it "Chagall-like description." Narrative — engaging narrative — sets the reader down in a scene. (B) Characters: The standard news-voice is the voice of a beneficent bureaucracy — the speech of informative sentinels on the walls of the city, issuing heads-ups to citizens ("A fire yesterday at 145 Elm St. destroyed . . . damage is estimated at . . ."). It is a voice that eschews investigations of character. In the world of news-voice, people are citizens, not characters, and they have "civic traits": addresses, ages, arrest records, voting district and precinct locations, official hospital conditions and military statuses. Narrative is about people doing stuff and, to some extent and in the right places, must reach past civic traits if it is to cover real folks' real stories well. (C) Action that unfolds over time: This is the very essence of narrative construction: the I-beams of narrative on which all else leans. Action also offers a nontopical way of organizing material — arraying it chronologically as it's experienced by a character in a setting, crossing outline categories but following experiential ones. (D) Voice: Most narrative articles, books and documentaries represent a sensible truce in the struggle between chronological and topical organizational principles. This is possible only (1) if readers, viewers or listeners are so engaged by the strong voice of the teller that . . . (E) Relationship with audience: . . . they willingly follow the teller through unset topical digressions, shift gladly and interestedly to other settings and characters and back; and (2) if readers then start assembling in mind a sequence of subtextual comprehensions that works toward their engineered discovery that . . . (F) Destination: . . . the story has a theme, purpose, reason, destination and that it's worthwhile to ingest. Mark KramerFounding DirectorNieman Program on Narrative Journalism Narrative 1. Of or pertaining to narration; relating to the particulars of an event or transaction. 2. Apt or inclined to relate stories, or to tell particulars of events; story-telling; garrulous. But wise through time, and narrative with age. --Pope. · a message that tells the particulars of an act or occurrence or course of events; presented in writing or drama or cinema or as a radio or ... · consisting of or characterized by the telling of a story; "narrative poetry" wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn · A narrative is a story: an interpretation of some aspect of the world that is historically and culturally grounded and shaped by human personality (per Walter Fisher). ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrative · Telling a story. Ballads, epics, and lays are different kinds of narrative poems. www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0903237.html · How the plot or story is told. In a media text, narrative is the coherent sequencing of events across time and space. www.medialit.org/reading_room/article565.html · Choreographic structure that follows a specific story line and intends to convey specific information through that story. www.nmlites.org/standards/arts/glossary.html · the images combine with other news elements, to inform and give insight to the viewer or reader. www.orionpedia.com/en/wiki/Photojournalism.html · presentation of a series of events in a purposeful sequence, either fictional or factual www.lupinworks.com/roche/pages/glossary.php · A piece of writing that tells a story www.wcgs.org.uk/artman/uploads/glossary_of_literary_terms_for_gcse.doc · in story form. www.oed.com/learning/ks4/notes.html · having a story or idea. www.worldimages.com/art_glossary.php · (noun) a story or description of events; (adjective) telling a story www.oneontacsd.org/hs/murphy/terms.htm · in its simplest sense, the telling of the story. Narrative theory uses the term in a more complex manner: to point to such formal aspects as who tells the story, how much omniscience the teller has, the order in which the events are told, the ratio of scene versus summary, etc. ... www.case.edu/artsci/engl/marling/hardboiled/Glossary.HTM · Ability to describe events in a sequential, chronologically correct, and logically consistent manner. www.apraxia-kids.org/site/c.chKMI0PIIsE/b.695215/k.D979/Glossary.htm · The structured series of events, linked by cause and effect, that provides the film's plots. www.geocities.com/Axiom43/cinematerms.html · (na-RAH-tiv): any writing that tells a story. Most novels and short stories are placed into the categories of first-person and third-person narratives, which are based on who is telling the story and from what perspective. www.wallkillcsd.k12.ny.us/glt.htm · The presentation of a structured plot in the form of a film. A given narrative tells a certain story in a certain way. For example, some epic films start by telling the audience the entire back story from the very beginning. This does not change the structure. ... hs34.order-vault.net/~admin160/film/glossary.html · a text that presents a series of events that forms a meaningful pattern. These events, together with character and setting, constitute the story. www.engelska.uu.se/a.lit.terms.html · There are two types of assignments: the paper in which students recount and reflect upon a personally significant experience OR the paper in which students report and record reactions to an observed event. ... www.gower.k12.il.us/Staff/WRITEON/21_writi.htm · The RFP or Guidelines will often instruct the applicant on how to organize the required project information into a proposal narrative. www.palmbeach.k12.fl.us/grants/Glossary%20Terms.htm · A story or first person narrated account www.discoveringthestory.org/ugrr/glossary.asp · A complex term referring to a sequence of events organized into a story with a particular structure freespace.virgin.net/brendan.richards/glossary/glossary.htm · An adjective describing a film as being primarily a work of fiction, or a noun that loosely means a fictional story. faculty.salisbury.edu/~dtjohnson/filmterms.htm · a story; an account of a sequence of events, whether fictional or non-fictional. To be distinguished from writing that is strictly descriptive, expository (like an essay), or dramatic (i.e., like a play). A narrative may include some description and analysis, but it must tell a story. ... www.iolani.org/usacad_eng_eng10ssterms_cw9404.htm · personalized and often emotive expression or interpretation of knowledge, as history, anecdote or story; link-theme between mental dimension and emotional dimension www.tetradian.com/glossary · A story, actual or fictional, expressed orally or in writing; a text that tells about a sequence of events. www.necompact.org/ea/materials/GLE/GLEsFeb05/NECA%20ReadingGlossary.doc · a framework of events arranged in some kind of order (e.g., temporal, causal), involving a set of "characters" and relationships between those characters. Narratives can be descriptive and/or explanatory. www.americanenvironics.com/methodology/glossary.shtml · The way in which the story is constructed through a particular point of view and arrangement of events. cc.purdue.edu/~corax/filmtermsglossary.html iii. Comparisons or Differences Since drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance And a narrative is a construct created in a suitable medium (speech, writing, images) that describes a sequence of fictional or non-fictional events. It derives from the Latin verb narrare, which means "to recount" and is related to the adjective gnarus, meaning "knowing" or "skilled". (Ultimately derived from the Proto-Indo-European root gnō-, "to know".) The word "story" may be used as a synonym of "narrative", but can also be used to refer to the sequence of events described in a narrative. A narrative can also be told by a character within a larger narrative. What are the differences between Drama/Dramaic (Plays) and Narraive (Other forms of Writing)? 1. Plays are performed while stories are told. Plays show what actors do; stories tell what they do. 2. Action is the main ingredient of a play. Dialogue is considered an action in plays. Words are the main ingredient of a story. 3. Time is much more elastic in fiction. A play deals with one or several units of time, which should provide the effect of real time passing. (Unity of Time) 4. Place or setting is more restricted in plays. Stories and especially novels can have many far-flung settings, but a play should be restricted to only several at most. (Unity of Place) 5. Fiction tells what occurred in the past; drama presents what is happening right now. 6. Story is a finished when written, while the finished form of a play is not the script but the production. The script of a play presents a blueprint for action, but not the real action. Here's a chart, which reiterates these differences between Dramatic and Narrative: Dramatic Vs. Narrative Drama= Show Stories=Tell Visuals Reader's Imagination Action on Stage Action recalled or described Script=unfinished blueprint Story=Complete Dialogue=Central Dialogue=one of many elements If we considered the differences between the dramatic and narrative, we might have a further vision concerning the application between the Bible as the narrative script of God’s will and the Church or the world as the dramatic action on stage in reality based upon the script’s direction and revelation. Don’t you think it’s perfectly matched? Praise the Lord for His amazing arrangement through this dramatic theological way by DTM. B. ELEMENTS OF DRAMA & THE DRAMATIC STRUCTURE i. Elements of Drama Most successful playwrights follow the theories of playwriting and drama that were established over two thousand years ago by a man named Aristotle. In his works the Poetics Aristotle outlined the six elements of drama in his critical analysis of the classical Greek tragedy Oedipus Rex written by the Greek playwright, Sophocles, in the fifth century B.C. The six elements as they are outlined involve: Thought, Theme, Ideas; Action or Plot; Characters; Language; Music; and Spectacle. 1. Thought/Theme/Ideas What the play means as opposed to what happens (the plot). Sometimes the theme is clearly stated in the title. It may be stated through dialogue by a character acting as the playwright’s voice. Or it may be the theme is less obvious and emerges only after some study or thought. The abstract issues and feelings that grow out of the dramatic action. 2. Action/Plot The events of a play; the story as opposed to the theme; what happens rather than what it means. The plot must have some sort of unity and clarity by setting up a pattern by which each action initiating the next rather than standing alone without connection to what came before it or what follows. In the plot of a play, characters are involved in conflict that has a pattern of movement. The action and movement in the play begins from the initial entanglement, through rising action, climax, and falling action to resolution. 3. Characters These are the people presented in the play that are involved in the perusing plot. Each character should have their own distinct personality, age, appearance, beliefs, socio economic background, and language. 4. Language The word choices made by the playwright and the enunciation of the actors of the language. Language and dialog delivered by the characters moves the plot and action along, provides exposition, defines the distinct characters. Each playwright can create their own specific style in relationship to language choices they use in establishing character and dialogue. 5. Music Music can encompass the rhythm of dialogue and speeches in a play or can also mean the aspects of the melody and music compositions as with musical theatre. Each theatrical presentation delivers music, rhythm and melody in its own distinctive manner. Music is not a part of every play. But, music can be included to mean all sounds in a production. Music can expand to all sound effects, the actor’s voices, songs, and instrumental music played as underscore in a play. Music creates patterns and establishes tempo in theatre. In the aspects of the musical the songs are used to push the plot forward and move the story to a higher level of intensity. Composers and lyricist work together with playwrights to strengthen the themes and ideas of the play. Character’s wants and desires can be strengthened for the audience through lyrics and music. 6. Spectacle The spectacle in the theatre can involve all of the aspects of scenery, costumes, and special effects in a production. The visual elements of the play created for theatrical event. The qualities determined by the playwright that create the world and atmosphere of the play for the audience’s eye. Another Brief Introduction of the elements of drama: 1. Plot - the sequence of events or incidents of which the story is composed. A. Conflict is a clash of actions, ideas, desires or wills. a. human against human. b. human against environment - external force, physical nature, society, or "fate." c. human against herself/himself - conflict with some element in her/his own nature; maybe physical, mental, emotional, or moral. B. Protagonist and Antagonist - the protagonist is the central character, sympathetic or unsympathetic. The forces working against her/him, whether persons, things, conventions of society, or traits of their own character, are the antagonists. C. Artistic Unity - essential to a good plot; nothing irrelevant; good arrangement. D. Plot Manipulation - a good plot should not have any unjustified or unexpected turns or twists; no false leads; no deliberate and misleading information. 2. Character A. Direct Presentation - author tells us straight out, by exposition or analysis, or through another character. B. Indirect Presentation - author shows us the character in action; the reader infers what a character is like from what she/he thinks, or says, or does. These are also called dramatized characters and they are generally consistent (in behavior), motivated (convincing), and plausible (lifelike). C. Character Types - a Flat character is known by one or two traits; a Round character is complex and many-sided; a Stock character is a stereotyped character (a mad scientist, the absent-minded professor, the cruel mother-in-law); a Static character remains the same from the beginning of the plot to the end; and a Dynamic (developing) character undergoes permanent change. This change must be a. within the possibilities of the character; b. sufficiently motivated; and c. allowed sufficient time for change. 3. Theme - the controlling idea or central insight. It can be 1. a revelation of human character; 2. may be stated briefly or at great length; and 3. a theme is not the "moral" of the story. A. A theme must be expressible in the form of a statement - not "motherhood" but "Motherhood sometimes has more frustration than reward." B. A theme must be stated as a generalization about life; names of characters or specific situations in the plot are not to be used when stating a theme. C. A theme must not be a generalization larger than is justified by the terms of the story. D. A theme is the central and unifying concept of the story. It must adhere to the following requirements: 1. It must account for all the major details of the story. 2. It must not be contradicted by any detail of the story. 3. It must not rely on supposed facts - facts not actually stated or clearly implied by the story. E. There is no one way of stating the theme of a story. F. Any statement that reduces a theme to some familiar saying, aphorism, or cliché should be avoided. Do not use "A stitch in time saves nine," "You can't judge a book by its cover, " "Fish and guests smell in three days," and so on. 4. Points Of View A. Omniscient - a story told by the author, using the third person; her/his knowledge, control, and prerogatives are unlimited; authorial subjectivity. B. Limited Omniscient - a story in which the author associates with a major or minor character; this character serves as the author's spokesperson or mouthpiece. C. First Person - the author identifies with or disappears in a major or minor character; the story is told using the first person "I". D. Objective or Dramatic - the opposite of the omniscient; displays authorial objectivity; compared a roving sound camera. Very little of the past or the future is given; the story is set in the present. 5. Symbol - a literary symbol means more than what it is. It has layers of meanings. Whereas an image has one meaning, a symbol has many. A. Names used as symbols. B. Use of objects as symbols. C. Use of actions as symbols. Note: The ability to recognize and interpret symbols requires experience in literary readings, perception, and tact. It is easy to "run wild" with symbols - to find symbols everywhere. The ability to interpret symbols is essential to the full understanding and enjoyment of literature. Given below are helpful suggestions for identifying literary symbols: 1. The story itself must furnish a clue that a detail is to be taken symbolically - symbols nearly always signal their existence by emphasis, repetition, or position. 2. The meaning of a literary symbol must be established and supported by the entire context of the story. A symbol has its meaning inside not outside a story. 3. To be called a symbol, an item must suggest a meaning different in kind from its literal meaning. 4. A symbol has a cluster of meanings. 6. Irony - a term with a range of meanings, all of them involving some sort of discrepancy or incongruity. It should not be confused with sarcasm which is simply language designed to cause pain. Irony is used to suggest the difference between appearance and reality, between expectation and fulfillment, the complexity of experience, to furnish indirectly an evaluation of the author's material, and at the same time to achieve compression. A. Verbal irony - the opposite is said from what is intended. B. Dramatic irony - the contrast between what a character says and what the reader knows to true. C. Irony of situation - discrepancy between appearance and reality, or between expectation and fulfillment, or between what is and what would seem appropriate. Drama has one characteristic peculiar to itself - it is written primarily to be performed, not read. It is a presentation of action a. through actors (the impact is direct and immediate), b. on a stage (a captive audience), and c. before an audience (suggesting a communal experience). Of the four major points of view, the dramatist is limited to only one - the objective or dramatic. The playwright cannot directly comment on the action or the character and cannot directly enter the minds of characters and tell us what is going on there. But there are ways to get around this limitation through the use of 1. soliloquy (a character speaking directly to the audience), 2. chorus ( a group on stage commenting on characters and actions), and 3. one character commenting on another. ii. Aristotle's Six Main Elements of Drama 1. plot 2. character 3. thought 4. diction 5. music 6. spectacle Of these Aristotle considered plot and characters the most important. Plot As in a story the plot of a play is the series of accumulated actions, which create changes in the main characters.. In drama plot also happens in the meetings between characters. Each character that enters the stage should turn the plot in some way, should turn or advance the plot in some way. A dramatic plot also includes all the choices that each character makes during the course of the play. Characters Your play must reveal many things about the main character or protagonist. 1. what he or she wants 2. how he or she reacts to obstacles 3. enough about his or her past to reveal what he or she wants 4. what other characters think about your character and how they relate to him 5. The actors reveal how the characters look, their costumes what they wear, and the props the objects that they carry use. In a story you must describe how the character looks in words, but in a play, the physical presence of the actors makes much of this description unnecessary. This is one of the most amazing things about playwriting to have your character come alive in an actor's actions, and your words come alive in an actor's voice. Sometimes in plays, other characters give verbal descriptions about the protagonist. This is particularly true of plays where an element of appearance is vital to the plot. Look at this bit of dialogue from Edmond Rostand's pay Cyrano de Bergerac. Such a nose!—My lords, there is no such nose as that nose—You cannot look upon it without crying: "Oh no, impossible! Exaggerated!" Then you smile and say: "Of course—I might have know; presently he will take it off." But that Monsieur de Bergerac will never do. Dialogue In plays dialogue is not idle conversation. Dramatic dialogue should only be included if it does at least one of two things (if not both): advance the plot, and/or develop characters. Definition: William Packard defined dialogue as "the rapid back and forth exchange that takes place between onstage characters." He said that "good dramatic dialogue always advances the major actions of the play." 1. Remember most people seldom speak in whole sentences. 2. Have each character speak in unique patterns, vocabulary, and choice of subject. Carol Korty said that the "words of the whole play are like a piece of music—they create sounds, rhythms, tones that are heard and physically felt. They also create images. In this way, dialogue is also poetry, whether or not it rhymes or has a definite meter." Monologues Technically monologues are considered a type of dialogue in plays. The difference is that in a monologue only one character speaks. Monologues are quite effective at revealing character. They are also a good place in a play to give exposition, or provide background material for the audience about what has occurred in the past, or what will occur in the future. In monologues characters also reveal their emotional states, as well as their dreams, wishes, problems, and conflicts. Characters also share in monologues their feelings toward other characters. In real life people seldom speak in monologues. In that sense monologues are artificial constructs. But just as in life when thoughts run through your head, monologues in plays are usually not directed at the character's self but at a significant other character; such as, a father, mother, lover, sibling, or close friend. iii. Dramatic Structure (Linear/Pyramidal) Now we have a clear picture about the definitions of drama/ dramatic and narrative; and we also disclosed the elements of drama including Aristotle’s view of points. All the above discussions are not our major concerns, but just provided as a common base for us to go further in the development of DTM. Of course, we have researched hundreds pages of dramatic theory and narrative theory for DTM; however, if we present them all in this dissertation that we may miss our major topic/subject—DTM, thus we have to briefly present the dramatic structure with the linear or pyramidal models. We may not have enough time to explain what each point means, but the related researches are given in the footnotes and bibliography. The major reason why we present the elements and dramatic structure in this dissertation is because we have discovered many Biblical Narrative structures and elements are quite similar correspond to our researched contents. For example, the Song of Songs is a very classical Biblical Poetic Narrative Drama in the Bible, if you read it carefully and compare with all what we discussed here, you can easily discover many corresponding and correlative points; not only the psalmic scriptures, but also the historic and prophetic scriptures such as Ruth, Judges, 1,2 Samuel, 1,2 Kings and even Isaiah and Daniel…etc. Thus, the Narrative Theology has its strengths and foundation without any doubt. However, to appropriate it to be used by the Evangelical Theology is our major concern! A brief linear/pyramidal dramatic structure without further explanation: 1. Exposition Sets Tone Theme Man Vs. Man / External Struggle Man Vs. Himself / Internal Struggle Man Vs. Society / Moral Struggle Man Vs. Nature / Struggle Against Fate 2. Rising Action 3. Inciting Incident Compounding Conflict / Alternation Comic Relief / Tension Release 4. Obligatory Moment 5. Climax 6. Deus Ex Machina 7. Denouement / Falling Action We take “Song of Songs” as the example and apply the above dramatic structure to its verses, we can match these 7 steps perfectly: 1. Exposition: Song of Songs 1:1-4a 2. Rising Action: Song of Songs 1:4b-2:7 3. Inciting Incident: Song of Songs 2:8-3:5 4. Obligatory Moment: First part Song of Songs 3:6-4:6; Second part Song of Songs 5:2-6:3 5. Climax: First part Song of Songs 4:7-5:1; Second part Song of Songs 6:4-13 6. Deus Ex Machina: Song of Songs 7:1-13 7. Denouement / Falling Action: Song of Songs 8:1-14 After we matching the dramatic structure of Song of Songs, we can assure at least one thing: some parts of the Bible were composed with the dramatic style; and we can use the dramatic studies as a tool or method to study these Biblical Scriptures. And this also provides a base for us to develop DTM to study some parts of the Bible, moreover, the entire theological issues can also be studied by the similar way or method. That’s the strong reason why we value DTM as one of the best useful methodologies to interpret the Bible and Theology! III. APPROPRIATION OF THE NARRATIVE THEOLOGY B. THE YALE SCHOOL i. Hans Wilhelm Frei Hans Wilhelm Frei (1922-1988) is best known for work on biblical hermeneutics, especially on the interpretation of narrative. His 1974 book, The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative (Yale University Press) is an influential history of eighteenth- and nineteenth century biblical hermeneutics in England and Germany; The Identity of Jesus Christ (Fortress Press, 1975) tried to show what kind of theology (specifically Christology) would cohere with a renewed attention to the narrative nature of the Gospels. He is regarded as having become, in the 1980s, part of a movement known as the Yale school (with George Lindbeck and David Kelsey), a form of postliberalism, focusing attention on the embeddedness of theological and hermeneutical claims in the lives and practices of Christian communities. 1. Early life: From Europe to America Hans Frei once described his early years as involving a series of 'worlds left behind'. He was born in Breslau, Germany on April 29th 1922 to secularized Jewish parents (Magda Frankfurther Frei, a pediatrician; Wilhelm Siegmund Frei, a venereologist on the medical faculty of the University of Breslau). That Jewish culture did not play a huge part in his upbringing can be seen from the fact that he was baptized into the Lutheran church along with most other members of his class, and from his memory that he was forbidden from using Yiddish phrases at home. His family was reasonably respectable and well-to-do (indeed, they had a distinguished past), and young Hans seems to have spent a good deal of time getting a solid German education and reading widely in the German classics. However, as the atmosphere in Germany soured, he was for his safety sent away from that world - away from Nazi Germany to the Quaker school in Saffron Walden, England, in January 1935. Although he found the language problem daunting and was sometimes lonely, he found England a welcoming and courteous place, and despite his own isolation and anxiety was struck by the absence in England of the pervasive fear, which he thought had been a feature of life in 1930s Germany. Young Frei believed that war was on the way, and wanted to stay where he was in safety. It was, it seems, whilst at the Friend's school that Frei saw a picture of Jesus and suddenly 'knew that it was true' - a conversion experience of some kind which led him to a form of Christianity which at this stage had nothing to do with attendance at church. Later in his life, even when it ran against the grain of his theology, he still found Quaker meetings more deeply satisfying than his adopted Anglicanism. After three years, in August 1938, his parents left Germany, and Frei moved with them to the United States, where he was terrified by his encounter with New York City. It was a difficult time, and Frei had trouble feeling that he belonged. The family was very short of money, and was only able to find him a scholarship to study textile engineering at North Carolina State University (after seeing an advert for it in a paper). He gained a B.S. there in 1942. Nevertheless, he took to his adopted country and made it thoroughly his own - so much so that when he went back to Germany for a visit in the 1950s he felt most definitely like a visiting American Professor rather than a German exile returned. In particular, he found a home within America in New Haven, Connecticut, at Yale University. 2. Turning to Theology While at North Carolina State, Frei heard a lecture by the prominent theologian H. Richard Niebuhr, began corresponding with him, and eventually enrolled for a B.D. degree at Yale Divinity School, Niebuhr's base. It was there that he found a kind of home. Despite some wanderings in the years between 1945 and 1947 and 1950 and 1956, Frei described YDS as the 'world not left behind'. There he was taught by Niebuhr and by R.L. Calhoun and Julian Hartt, and there some of his deepest theological attitudes were shaped, some of his deepest friendships formed, all his most important work done, and his tremendously successful teaching and administrative duties carried out. He graduated in 1945, and became a Baptist minister, at the First Baptist Church, North Stratford, New Hampshire. Despite the work involved in the parish, in being a local preacher, and in some teaching work, Frei found time to read a great deal in solitude. He found himself drawn towards Anglicanism, towards what he saw as its more obviously 'generous' orthodoxy - to such an extent that in later life he was to say that Baptist ministry had always felt like a staging post on the way to somewhere else. At the same time, he developed a yearning for more academic work. Frei returned to the graduate school at Yale Divinity School in 1947, and began a lengthy doctoral dissertation under H. Richard Niebuhr, on Karl Barth's early doctrine of Revelation. This was to take until 1956 to complete - but some of that time is explained by the other things Frei was doing. In 1948, on October 9th, he married Geraldine Frost Nye. He landed a job as Assistant Professor of Religion at Wabash College, Indiana, in 1950. A son, Thomas, was born in 1952. In 1953 Frei became Associate Professor of Theology at the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest (with some time as Visiting Lecturer in the Southern Methodist University in 1954), and was involved with St. John's Episcopal Church in Crawfordsville, Indiana. In 1955 a second son, Jonathan, was born. He completed his thesis in 1956 and was promoted to Professor of Theology. A year later, he returned to Yale Divinity School as Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, and, in the same year, his daughter Emily was born. Between 1958 and 1966 Frei worked away more or less in obscurity. As can be seen from an annotated bibliography, there are very few recorded writings from this period. After the publication of two essays for a festschrift for Neibuhr in 1957 (including extracts from his thesis), and a short article on 'Religion, Natural and Revealed' in a handbook of Christian theology published the following year, there is a great gap. Frei delivered a talk on Feuerbach at the 1965 meeting of the American Academy of Religion, admittedly, but this does not seem to have been particularly central to his work. All the indications are that he had thrown himself into teaching, and into the slow, painstaking research that would eventually emerge as The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative. In many ways he felt that the stands he had taken in his thesis against prevailing modes of apologetical and anthropocentric theology isolated him (again), made his work a struggle against the tide. He did not have the temperament for the kind of sweeping statements and rabble-rousing clarion calls, which might have pulled supporters to his side, and he produced his careful and complex writings only after taking great pains. It was during this period of obscurity that Frei received a Morse Fellowship and a Fulbright Award for research at the University of Göttingen (1959-60) . A little later, with the help of an American Association of Theological Schools Fellowship and a Yale Senior Faculty Fellowship, Frei spent some time in Cambridge, England (1966-7). His trip back to Germany was clouded by the sense that the recent past had been brushed under an inadequate rug, that it didn't matter, that Germany had re-invented itself rather than dealing with what had taken place. A meeting with E.D. Hirsch, which was only granted when Frei agreed not to raise the question of Nazism, confirmed Frei's impressions. Frei also spent time in England, which he appears to have enjoyed, and even though he found that nothing much was going on theologically in Cambridge that interested him, he frequently referred back in later life to how much he had enjoyed his time there. 3. Earlier theological work Frei was appointed Associate Professor in 1963. Then, between 1966 and 1968, almost as an interruption to the work which was proceeding towards Eclipse, Frei produced a 'theological proposal' - a lengthy article, expanded a little later into an adult education course, commented on in a lecture, and accompanied by a contribution to a seminar on the work of Karl Barth, after the latter's death. This 'proposal' emerged to wider scrutiny only some years later, when (in 1975) the adult education course was republished as The Identity of Jesus Christ. This strange project, an exercise in the rethinking of the structure and bases of Christology and, even though Frei soon developed doubts about various important aspects of it, it sets the tone and the themes for most of the rest of what he went on to say in theology. After that brief flurry of activity, Frei returned to honing his work on Eclipse, which was eventually published (to much wider recognition) in 1974. By that time, Frei had been Acting Master of Silliman College, Yale (1970-1971), and Master of Ezra Stiles College (from 1972), the latter a post he was to hold until 1980. The publication of Eclipse coincided with Frei's appointment to a full Professorship. Frei then entered another period of comparative silence, although this time it was not in complete obscurity: his name was out, rattling around in theological and historical circles attached to the massive and ground-breaking Eclipse, with Identity as a strange accompaniment. His silence was not so much due to the pressures of teaching or to isolated and exhaustive research, but to his commitment to his job as Master of Ezra Stiles. Frei also served as chair of the council of masters in 1975. The 1970s were a difficult decade for Frei. He found himself troubled about his links to the church. Firmly convinced theologically that he should have some kind of ecclesial grounding and location for his work as well as his academic setting, he nevertheless felt distanced from his adopted Anglican home, and yet committed to stay there. He found himself theologically uneasy about the places where he did feel less isolated - in particular, Quaker meetings. At the same time he found himself unable easily to call himself a theologian, particularly not a systematic theologian, and he concentrated his energies instead on the 'religious studies' (for which read 'historical') side of his work. Nevertheless, the questions he asked, the issues, which interested him, the way he pursued that historical work - all were theological, and he knew it. The ambivalence seems not exactly to have haunted him, but at least to have been never far from his working mind. The major work which Frei completed in this decade (after Eclipse) was all historical. He directed a National Endowment for the Humanities summer seminar in 1976 (his title was 'Modernity as Temptation'), and he delivered various lectures including the Rice Lectures in 1974 (on Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Johann Gottfried Herder and Immanuel Kant) and the George F. Thomas Memorial Lectures in 1978 (on Lessing). He also produced a piece of work which he thought of as perhaps his finest: the essay on David Friedrich Strauss which was eventually published in 1985, although Frei finished it in the very early 1980s after having worked on it throughout the last years of the 1970s. 4. Later theological work and his key writings In the late seventies, Frei's outlook began to shift. He found himself increasingly drawn away from purely intellectual history and towards social history; in tandem he found his doubts about aspects of the Identity and Eclipse phase of his work crystallizing in a shift away from more theoretical hermeneutical solutions towards more social, 'cultural-linguistic' - and, we might say, more ecclesiological and pneumatological - solutions. In the 1978 George F. Thomas Lecture, he issued what can in retrospect be seen as something of a personal manifesto, using the word 'sensibility' to denote the object of a kind of historical study which would look for the shape and development of religious styles, attitudes and doctrines firmly embedded in the development and interaction of social institutions of various overlapping kinds. In 1981, he spent some time in England during which he looked, on advice from Owen Chadwick, at visitation returns and sermons from the eighteenth century life of a couple of English parishes, hoping to find a way to combine the more social and cultural historical insights which these things gave him into the Christianity of the time with the insights he had hitherto gained through a more traditional study of well-known high-culture theologians and philosophers. From 1982 until 1988, his time as Master over, Frei returned to publishing and writing with a vengeance. Although still not prolific by the standards of many of his contemporaries, by his own standards his output was vast. He returned to both strands of his earlier constructive theological work: hermeneutics (which had been the subject matter of Eclipse) and Christology (the subject matter of Identity). In 1982 he delivered a paper on the interpretation of narrative, at Haverford College; in 1983 the Shaffer Lectures at Yale (in which he began to develop what has subsequently become a famous five-place typology for understanding modern theology) and delivered a long paper on hermeneutics at the University of California. His work did not even flag when he became chair of the Department of Religious Studies from 1983 to 1986. He spoke in 1985 in response to an assessment of his work by the evangelical theologian Carl F. H. Henry; in 1986 he spoke at a conference in honor of Jürgen Moltmann, delivered a lecture at Princeton University, and spoke on Barth and Schleiermacher at a conference at Stony Point, New York. In 1987 he delivered the Cadbury lectures in Birmingham, England, and the Humanities Council lectures at Princeton. He prepared a contribution to Bruce Marshall's festschrift for George Lindbeck, and another for a conference on H. Richard Niebuhr to be held in September 1988. Most of these papers and lectures were indirectly or directly directed towards one end: a history of the figure of Jesus in popular and high culture in England and Germany since 1750. Frei seems to have found a new theological confidence bubbling up with this historical project, however: now, more than ever, the two sides of his work (which had been the source of his ambivalence in the 1970s) become inextricably linked. One moment he can be talking about the rise of the professions in Germany and the impact that had on theology in the Universities. The next moment he can be talking about the sensus literalis of scripture and theology as Christian self-description. The next moment (although this is not immediately evident from his published work) he can be talking about providence and pilgrimage. It is hard now to gauge exactly what shape the final project would have taken in which all this rich material would have been combined, but it is clear that Frei wished to pursue theological reflection through the medium of detailed historical work, and wished to hone a full-blown Christology of his own - a Christology which would have had a significant political dimension - by paying detailed attention to the ways in which Jesus had been described and redescribed in Western Protestant culture since the Enlightenment. The project was, however, never completed. Before he could deliver a paper he had written for a conference on H. Richard Niebuhr, he fell ill, and the paper was given in his absence. On September 12, 1988, at the peak of his theological and historical career, he died. His key writings The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative; The Identity of Jesus Christ; Types of Christian Theology; Theology and Narrative. ii. George Lindbeck and the Postliberal Concerning another major leaders of Narrative Theology, George Lindbeck, we will spend some more spaces to disclose his accomplishments and his achievements under the Postliberal flag. B. GENERAL SKETCH OF NARRATIVE THEOLOGY Narrative theology began as a late 20th-century theological development. It supported the idea that the Church's use of the Bible should focus on a narrative presentation of the faith as regulative for the development of a systematic theology. “Narrative theology” is a fairly broad term, encompassing a variety of specific approaches to theology, interpretation and application. Most generally, it is that approach to theology that finds meaning in story. Sometimes, this is coupled with a rejection of meaning derived from prepositional truths (e.g., systematic theology). At other times, it is associated with the idea that we are not primarily to learn ethics from Scripture, but rather to learn to relate to God, and to play our part in the great meta-narrative of salvation. Other combinations are also common. In general, the idea that we learn theology from narrative portions of Scripture is not only sound but also biblical (Luke 24:27). The Bible’s stories are there to teach us truth; we are supposed to learn from those truths, and to apply these lessons to our lives (e.g., Mark 2:23-28). We are supposed to interpret and apply these stories according to the original intentions of the authors of Scripture — this is why the stories have been preserved for us (Rom. 15:4). Used rightly, narrative theology provides the building blocks for systematic and for biblical theology. We might say that systematic theology tends to default to drawing theology from more prepositional literature (e.g., the New Testament letters). On the other hand, Old Testament biblical theology tends to depend primarily on narrative for its theological building blocks. When we recognize truth in narratives, we call our recognitions “theology.” When we formulate our recognitions into logical relationships, we are doing “systematic theology.” When we formulate our recognitions along historical lines, we are doing “biblical theology.” When we apply these recognitions to our lives, we are sometimes said to be doing “practical theology,” or even simply “theology.” Also frequently referred to as postliberal theology, narrative theology was inspired by a group of theologians at Yale Divinity School, many influenced theologically by Karl Barth, Thomas Aquinas and to some extent, the nouvelle théologie of French Catholics such as Henri de Lubac. The clear philosophical influence, however, was Ludwig Wittgenstein's philosophy of language, the moral philosophy of Alasdair MacIntyre, and the sociological insights of Clifford Geertz and Peter Berger on the nature of communities. Partly a reaction to the modern, individualist, rationalist and romantic trends of theological liberalism, important postliberal thinkers included George Lindbeck, Hans Wilhelm Frei, and Stanley Hauerwas. Grenz and Olson discuss the rise of “narrative theology” during the 1970s and its attempt to utilize the concept of “story” as the central motif for theological reflection. Grenz and Olson assert that the new emphasis on narrative opened the way to “a new means of conceptualizing the divine transcendence while giving place as well to immanence, for its transcendence is the transcendence of the story” (271). This movement has provided much of the foundation for other movements, such as Radical orthodoxy, Scriptural Reasoning, paleo-orthodoxy, the emerging church movement, and postliberal versions of evangelicalism and Roman Catholicism. In contrast to liberal individualism, postliberalism tends toward more tradition-constituted and communitarian accounts of human rationality and personhood. Theological rationality is not to be rooted in the authority of the individual but in the language and culture of a living tradition of communal life. The postliberals argue that the Christian faith be equated with neither the religious feelings of Romanticism nor the propositions of a Rationalist or fundamentalist approach to religion. Rather, the Christian faith is understood as a culture and a language, in which doctrines are likened to a second-order "grammar" upon the first-order social practices, skills, and habits of the worshipping community. Thus, in addition to a critique of theological liberalism, and an emphasis upon the narratives of scripture, there is also a stress upon tradition, and upon the language, culture and intelligibility intrinsic to the Christian community. As a result, postliberal theologies are often oriented around liturgical action and descriptions of Christian practice as resources for critical inquiry (e.g. culture critique). Critiques of postliberalism often have been concerned with its "post-foundational" aspects; debates have been centered around issues of incommensurability, sectarianism, fideism, relativism, truth and ontological reference. A number of works have sought to resolve these questions to various degrees of satisfaction, and the debates continue across the theological disciplines. C. PROBLEMS OF NARRATIVE THEOLOGY Narrative theology has become problematic at times when it has been used irresponsibly. When interpreters are unconcerned with the Bible’s original meaning and are driven by their own intuitions, and even by their own responses to the literature, they often use narrative in harmful ways. Liberalism and neo-orthodoxy have both been guilty of this on a grand scale, but conservatives have done it too. Nevertheless, the Bible contains huge portions of narrative that are intended to convey truth to us, so it is important for us to adopt some form of narrative theology. Narrative theology has also been misused when people imagine that narrative does not have an underlying systematic theology, or that its underlying theology cannot be known. In such cases, it is implied that the lessons of narratives can be understood apart from the worldviews of the authors. This error is common in conservative circles as well, especially among those who subscribe to mechanical inspiration rather than organic inspiration, although conservatives more often apply this mistaken idea to systematic theology. This error has resulted in some proponents of narrative theology moving straight from story to application, and disparaging more logical analysis. But in reality, this can’t be done. Unless we find a correspondence between the text and our lives, we can’t apply the text. And any such correspondence can be described in some manner, even if we don’t bother to do this at the time we make our applications. So, in summary, narrative theology is not all good or all bad (just like systematic theology and biblical theology). When used rightly, it provides helpful insights and true understanding. Used wrongly, it causes as many problems as any other misused approach to theology. These days, it seems to me that it is more popular among those who would undermine the traditional stances of systematic theology, so that it is obtaining a poor reputation by association. But as long as we don’t use it independently of systematic and other approaches to theology, and as long as we don’t ignore legitimate literary concerns (e.g., the author’s theology and intent), we can make responsible use of it. D. APPROPRIATION OF NARRATIVE THEOLOGY FOR THE EVANGELICAL Based upon the disclosure of the above background of Narrative Theology, now we have a clearer understanding concerning Narrative Theology (NT). Somewhat we are exciting for a new theological thought and method introduced, for we will take advantage of it to understand the Biblical Narrative (BN) with more perspective angles. However, when we noticed its defects and problems, as evangelical believers, we are avoiding to touch it, never mentioning to apply NT, for we would like to “protect our lambs without damaged by any uncertain or problematic method”. Therefore, even though we have proved NT has its strengths and usage toward some parts of the Biblical Narrative, as evangelical believers or church leaders, we prefer to ignore NT without a further discussion or contemplation over how to avoid the bad issues of NT, but to appropriate NT to our evangelical Dramatic Theology (DT). The key reason that I am trying to launch on NT is for our evangelical DT. I believe all theology (XT) has its own strengths and weaknesses; therefore always XT can draw some followers to appreciate their input or accomplishments. However, the other issues may also cause them to a certain trap, and without a thorough consideration, their response toward their weak parts will be easily discovered by other theologians. And after an enlarged misunderstanding circulation, such XT will be easily rejected by many conservative groups, and some opened-heart believers as well. The word “theology” comes from the Greek words theos, god, and logos, word, reason, discourse. So theology is thinking about, or talking about, God. Actually, whenever our own thoughts turn to questions of the meaning of life, ultimate values and the mystery of human destiny, we are theologizing, doing theology already. Of course this is the basic level of theology, the higher or highest level of theology may involve all intellectual activities or disciplines contain or imply a theological dimension. Whenever we start reading the Bible, Gen. 1:1, “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth!” we are touching and facing a series of theological issues: what does it means of “in the beginning”? What is the difference between this “beginning” and John 1:1’s “in the beginning”? What kind of “God” we are reading in Gen. 1:1? How come a plural form of noun “God” corresponds with a single format of verb “create”? How does this God create the heaven and the earth? Did God create the heaven and the earth at the same time….? See, there are so many theological issues and thinking coming from even just one verse! Therefore, we should keep an opened-heart to exam which XT is really meaningful and useful to solve so many theological issues. Narrative Theology is just the first XT that I tried to exam and appropriated from the modern theologies. As we mentioned, no matter which XT that we exam and research, we can shortly discover its strengths and weak points. Thus, we have to be very careful and well educated before we exam each XT, otherwise, it’s quite easy we might lose our stance, and lose ourselves among so-called “masters” or so many “theologians” after reading so huge amount of their (XT’s) approved proofs and illustrations. How to appropriate NT to be our DT? First of all, we have to make a clear distinguishing term from the original NT. That’s my reason why I purposely change the Narrative to Dramatic, because I want to distinguish our DTM from the NT’s approaches. Although naturally, narrative and dramatic both are similar terms in the literature realm. That’s also one important reason that I spent so many pages to tell what’s the definitions and differences between these two, for there are still several obvious differences between them. Of course, we fully understood some narrative parts are also dramatic format among the Biblical Narratives (BN); but the most important reason why the specific dramatic is better than the general narrative is because we believe the entire Bible was perfectly written by the Almighty God, it’s not just a random narrative from the human beings! For there could be many narrative stories from every tribes, and there could be very similar myths from different nationalities. But the true and unique version is base upon the Bible, which was written through the Holy Spirit by the servants of God in different generations. Bible is not just a common narrative book, but it’s a well perfectly God-made drama, along with His own will, purpose, according to His own heart’s desire. And God is the very Director to arrange all characters appearing hours and He set up the plot and some unknown incident, like the book of Ruth or Esther, you will never have the chance to guess what’s going on after the main characters followed His own will to act or do according to God’s own plan; then suddenly the climax comes with a glorious result for the characters. Of course, if the Director wanted to set the Deus Ex Machina to make it more complicated or interested, He might use certain new events to direct the plot, until He satisfied to make a great Denouement. Don’t you feel the entire drama (Bible) is been written according to the above descriptions? See the Exposition from Genesis, all the divine seeds were sown by God in the very beginning, especially in the very first two chapters; The Man Adam was introduced to appear to His dramatic stage, then he was put in front of two trees (hidden plot for all stories afterward), a river of life was flowing through that land, and three building materials were generated under that river (Gold, Pearl and Precious Stones), and finally the Woman Eve (Church as her real interpretation in the New Testament) appear to the Man (the last Adam is Christ Himself) . However, the perfect creation was ruined by the opposer (Satan), this could answer many theological issues concerning WHY God allows Satan to cheat Eve? If you are a great director and the playwright, will you make the entire drama with only one good tone? The entire story without any lower valley, but just high mountains, can you really know and appreciate you are standing on the Zion, not the midst of Dead Sea? Now I understand why the apostle Paul mentioned at least twice in his epistles: 1 Cor. 4:9 “For, I think, God has set forth us the apostles last of all as doomed to death, because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men.” Here the spectacle is a metaphor, referring to the fights between criminals and wild beasts in the Roman amphitheater. The apostles became such a spectacle to the world, seen not only by men but also by angels. Another verse is from Heb. 10:32-33, “But call to mind the former days, in which, having been enlightened, you endured a great conflict of sufferings; On one hand, being made a spectacle both in reproaches and in afflictions, and on the other, having become partakers with those who are treated the same.” Not only the apostle became a spectacle, but also all the believers being made a spectacle to the world! Can you see the Drama of God now? It is fully biblical and divine spiritual! Actually, you might conclude the entire Bible is based upon God’s own dramatic plan to be presented to the world and angels. God is not only a story teller, He wanted to direct the entire story to be shown by His own characters. Sometimes or in certain period, He even arranged Himself as the main character to appear to the world stage! For example, in Gen. Chapter 12, 15 to 19, almost every single chapter we can see His own appearance; in the historical scriptures, such as Joshua, Judge and 1, 2 Samuel and Kings…etc., you can also see His showing up. Till the climax, at the beginning of the New Testament, He even became a Man—Jesus Christ, to express His own heart and will to the world! He so loved us; He even died for us (the Church) as a real Husband in order to make us the same as He is in life and nature (but not in His Godhead), to sanctify us (the Church), cleansing us by the washing of the water in the word, that He might present the Church to Himself gloriously, not having spot or wrinkle or any such things, but that we would be holy and without blemish. We see the climax was shown in the midst of the entire Bible, but the divine drama was not finished yet, God wanted to enjoy the process of our changing (transforming) period, that’s OUR wedding day and honeymoon! So He did not want to finish that so early! He wanted to come into us with another form (the Holy Spirit), to be mingled with us as one New Man! He even wanted to transform us to be Shulammite (the female noun of Solomon) returning as Mahanaim (cf. Gen. 32:2) to be likened to two armies, or camps, dancing in celebration of their victory. What God wanted is not just a sweet Bride (the Church), He wanted the Church becoming a real strong Fighter and Warrior , to deal with the spiritual enemy. In Eph. 6:10-12 said, “Finally, be empowered in the Lord and in the might of His strength. Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the stratagem of the devil, For our wrestling is not against blood and flesh but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenlies.” Have you realized the divine drama is indeed an epic poem? Not just the Song of Songs, but the entire Scriptures mentioned the same Romance of God and Man, Christ and the Church! Sometimes the drama may appear as an Epic, sometimes a Romance, sometimes as a narrative novel, but sometimes it could be a tragedy or comedy…etc. Wow, it is indeed a wonderful Drama of God! Therefore, I said in the very beginning, the approaches of NT are useful, but its negative problems (side) can be dealt with by DT, and to be appropriated for the orthodox and traditional evangelical Church. Finally, we shall realize that the NT is not just a hermeneutic theory, but it directs a way of interpreting the entire theology. We cannot just take advantage of the hermeneutic level for the Biblical Narrative Interpretation; but should understand its functions in front of the Bible, Traditional Interpretation history, and the modern thoughts…etc. all aspects of theological issues. Actually, if you catch my above points enough, we can end DTM right here. But for those who are not fully understood yet, I will continue explain more details for the thoughts and models of DTM in order to present it more completed. IV. THOUGHTS OF DRAMATIC THEOLOGY (DT) What are the major thoughts of DT? Before we answer this question for the readers, we will present two major theologians that I personally appreciated—Dr. Kevin J. Vanhoozer and Dr. Goerge Lindbeck. Actually, George Lindbeck uplifted the flag of Postliberal with his renounced writing “The Nature of Doctrine”; for some reasons, I believe Dr. Kevin J. Vanhoozer tried to uplift another view of points from his evangelical background in order to modify or criticize Lindbeck’s Postliberal approaches. His recent famous classic writing “The Drama of Doctrine” was named purposely “Postconservative” among the theological arguments. Both views are excellent and useful for the theologians to consider, however, both thoughts have partially appropriated by my Dramatic Theology and used/appropriated by my Dramatic Theological Method. Of course, I did not fully accept their points of view, because our Christian growing backgrounds are quite different. Although my points of view are closer to Vanhoozer’s than the other. I will explain more in the following discussions. A. “THE DRAMA OF DOCTRINE” OR “THE NATURE OF DOCTINE”? i. Vanhoozer’s Accomplishments I have read through “The Drama of Doctrine”, and I have to show my appreciation for Dr. Vanhoozer’s thoughts and his well-done writing. I have to confess that as a native Chinese theological Student, even I do my best in the English writings; my wordings will never surpass his excellent English skills. However, after talking with Dr. Vanhoozer individually, he appreciated my fluent English conversation. Thus, I was encouraged by his encouragement. I think his kindness as his first and great achievement that many students can be stirred up and present what they learned and thought. I also have separated a book review in the appendix that you might have a better idea about Vanhoozer’s accomplishments in the related discussions. Dr. Vanhoozer enjoys seeing connections between things - not only between doctrines but also between things in everyday life. He is interested in the history of ideas and how these ideas take on flesh and influence culture, and the church. Being a systematic theologian allows him to indulge all his interests - in literature, film, art, and music - by relating them all to God. I prayed that I could be the same as him in this similar area. Most of all, he appreciates the privilege and responsibility of seeking to understand God for the sake of his own well-being and that of the church. I really appreciate his sharing and plain life philosophy, although his underlying thoughts are so completed and complicated while discussing all the logical theological matters. I think this is the most important character for being a good systematic theologian. I will also take this as my own pattern. As Dr. Alister McGrath (The professor of Historical Theology from Oxford University) recommended, “Kevin Vanhoozer is emerging as one of the most significant younger theological voices of our generation. This book “The Drama of Doctrine” will consolidate that reputation still further. It is a magisterial treatment of the origins and nature of doctrine, worthy to be ranked alongside George Lindbeck’s classic “The Nature of Doctrine.” It is essential reading for all concerned with the nature and future of doctrine.” Yes, it is what Dr. McGrath said, although Lindbeck has already led the Yale School (Postliberal Narrative Theology) for years; but Vanhoozer successfully present another solution for the conservative evangelicals. He used Postconservative as the flag or territory of where he stands for, but the major core is still biblical and even canonical authority! If we positioned a chart for the two-party system of conservative and liberal, George Lindbeck produced a manifesto of sorts for a “postliberal, cultural-linguistic theology” and a regulative theory of doctrine.” However, the “Drama of Doctrine” sets forth a “postconservative, canonical-linguistic theology and a directive theory of doctrine” that roots theology more firmly in Scripture while preserving Lindbeck’s emphasis on practice. Liberal Postliberal CENTER Postconservative Conservative George Lindbeck Kevin J. Vanhoozer I will say this as the brief conclusion for Vahoozer’s accomplishments (especially based upon his “Drama of Doctrine”): 1. He is one of the very few positive evangelical theologians with a traditional belief and evangelical background, but would like to communicate with the liberal theologians. 2. His versed language and vertiginous writing skills create a readable but profound art that penetrates into the systematic theological realm. 3. His unfeigned and almost unimpeachable presentations in his series writings make him an unwonted and titanic evangelical theological warrior. 4. His Canonical-linguistic approach provides the evangelical systematic theologians another choice of views and reworks the Lindbeck’s Cultural-linguistic model so as to give greater authority to the Bible and make clear the fallibility of the church. 5. He points out the drama of doctrine is rooted in Israel’s history and is narrated with a high degree of literary sophistication so as to establish a worldview. The biblical narrative is a three-dimensional discourse that operates with historical, literary, and ideological principles. 6. To speak of the “drama of doctrine” is to call attention to what is involved, and what is at stake, in doing theology. Vanhoozer’s achievement is to model a postcritical approach to biblical interpretation that respects both the principle—or rather, practice—of sola scriptura and the location of the interpretative community that nevertheless results in performance knowledge and doctrinal truth. 7. He shows his appreciation toward the postliberal cultural-linguistic approach, both agree that meaning and truth are crucially related to language use; however, his canonical-linguistic approach still maintains the normative use is ultimately not that of ecclesial culture but of the biblical canon. 8. Vanhoozer thinks that the doctrine is the bridge between the gospel as theo-drama and theology as gospel performance. And the Canonical-linguistic theology gives scriptural direction for one’s fitting participation in the drama of redemption today. And Canonical-linguistic theology conjoins the postliberal emphasis on theology as church practice with the notion of biblical interpretation as performance in order to set forth a dramatic conception of doctrine. Therefore, this involves taking account of the biblically scripted theo-drama together with its historical reception, as well as the stage and setting (e.g., the cultural, social, and intellectual contexts) in which new scenes are played out. 9. The entire model of the Drama of Doctrine is a powerful methodological rethinking of Scripture, doctrine, and Christian practice in dramatic and performative terms. And it argued vigorously, immersed both in Scripture and in the literatures of theology and philosophical hermeneutics, overflowing with provocative ideas, this is a book that draws upon and furthers the contemporary renaissance of Christian doctrine. 10. Of course, Dr. Vanhoozer’s accomplishments are not limited with this book, but I think the most important value is that he believes that the ultimate authority for theology is the triune God speaking in the Scriptures, and he thinks that theology is faith seeking understanding, however, understanding is more than theoretical. If we really grasp who and where we are as disciples, we should know how to live out our faith. All too often, the church professes its faith but is unsure how to practice it. Even some of his seminary students come to theology classes somewhat reluctantly, assuming that doctrine is neither practical nor relevant to their future ministry. Therefore to bridge the gap between theology and the practice of the church is one of his major burdens in his book. To define doctrine as direction for fitting participation in the drama of redemption - in what God is doing in Christ through the Spirit to form the church and renew creation - is to ensure that the understanding that faith seeks will not stop short of practice. His goal as a theologian is to move beyond the acquisition of knowledge to its application in real life: in a word, he wants to get wisdom in his researching life. He appropriates the “speech act theory" in his books, which is a helpful way of focusing attention of God's communicative action in Scripture. But he is not a speech act theorist, he just thinks that the insight into illocutions - that we do things in saying things - marks an important and permanent gain in our knowledge of language. Actually, he believes all biblical exegetes and theologians have a theory of language, whether they acknowledge it or not... The reason why I so appreciate Vanhoozer’s accomplishments is not only because of his above accomplishments, but also his thoughts, writings and personal encouragement to open a wide door for my theological thoughts and studies. I should give him a lot of credit of generating the thoughts of DTM beside of my Mentors. ii. Lindbeck’s Accomplishments Honestly speaking, it’s so hard for me not to mention Dr. George Lindbeck’s “The Nature of Doctrine” within my dissertation no matter I like it or not. When I chose to appropriate Narrative Theology (NT) as my subtitle, I have to mention this great postliberal narrative theologist for sure! I am interested about Lindbeck’s background, for he was born in China (1923- ), the son of Lutheran missionaries who were Americans of Swedish decent. He went to school in China and Korea until he attended Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota. After receiving his B.A. from Gustavus in 1943, he moved to New Haven, Connecticut, where he received both a B.D. (1946) and Ph.D. (1955) from Yale University. Dr. George Lindbeck is one of the most famous Yale School leaders in the modern theology; even Hans Frei was affected by his thoughts. “The Nature of Doctrine: Religion and Theology in a Postliberal Age” is one of his most powerful and illustrious works in the world! Although it impulse so many arguments among the theological academic realms, it is still indubitable an influential publication. He lays the foundation for a "postliberal theology" based on a cultural-linguistic approach to religion and a rule theory of doctrine. His early scholarship focused on medieval philosophy and theology, Lindbeck is perhaps best known for his extensive reflections on and engagement in ecumenical dialogue. Because of his expertise as a medievalist, he was invited as an observer to the four sessions of the Second Vatican Council, representing the Lutheran World Federation (LWF). Ever since the years of the council, Lindbeck has continuously devoted his career to ecumenical dialogue, especially between Lutheran and Roman Catholic churches. His two first books, The Future of Roman Catholic Theology (1971) and Infallibility (1972), along with numerous articles in many journals, reflect his interest in and commitment to the doctrinal reconciliation of divided confessions. He has also been active in many joint study commissions of Lutheran-Roman Catholic dialogue, both nationally and internationally. Lindbeck’s longstanding engagement with the ecumenical movement finally crystallized in his seminal work, “The Nature of Doctrine”. In the last decade, Lindbeck’s postliberal position has also received a great deal of attention from evangelicals in the USA. In his understanding of doctrines as “communally authoritative rules of discourse, attitude and action”, Lindbeck offers a new alternative for dealing with ecumenical disagreements as well as interreligious conflict over truth claims. With this approach, Lindbeck thinks that “reconciliation without capitulation” among different and competing claims is possible. Lindbeck thinks “Just like a language always needs a grammar in order to function, so also a religion always has a set of doctrines. Doctrines are essential for the identity of the community, since they function as communally authoritative rules that govern thoughts, actions, emotions, etc. In this sense, doctrines become second-order rather than first-order devices. They can involve propositions, but within the cultural-linguistic approach propositions do not refer to “extra-linguistic or extra-human reality”; they can be ontologically true, not in the cognitivist sense, but by virtue of being intrasystematically and categorically true. In other words, the significance of a religion is located primarily not in prepositional truths but rather in “the story it tells and in the grammar that informs the way the story is told and used”. What is most important for the church is the grammar, rather than vocabulary, of the story (religion).” Thus his cultural-linguistic approach has modified many liberal notions. In his last chapter of Nature and Doctrine, subtitled “Toward a Postliberal Theology,” Lindbeck articulates the main purpose of his postliberal approach, namely, “to overcome the polarization between tradition and innovation by a distinction between abiding doctrinal grammar and variable theological vocabulary”. To do this, the most important remaining task is to show how the cultural-linguistic approach could serve three main areas of Christian theology: the systematic concern with faithfulness, the practical concern with applicability, and the apologetic concern with intelligibility. Although Lindbeck does not spare cognitivist-propositionalism from criticism in this chapter, His polemic is aimed primarily at the liberal theological task and its reliance on a universal foundation for apologetic strategies. George A. Lindbeck’ book, The Nature of Doctrine, has powerfully emphasized the necessity of guarding and articulating the distinctive identity and voice of the Christian viewpoint in the contemporary world. By undermining the plausibility of a universal foundation of common experience and of the adequacy of cognitive propositionalism, postliberal theology enables the adherents of different religions to engage their own systems of meaning on their own terms. This proposal has enriched Christian theological discourse and has given rise to many important debates. It is still too early, however, to decide whether or not postliberal intertextualism will survive as a viable theological option. The answer depends on the ability of its proponents to defend their basic principles, make necessary adjustments, and respond to contemporary issues. This, obviously, requires their willingness to enter into continued dialogue with other theological systems. B. POSTCONSERVATIVE OR POSTLIBERAL? Both Vanhoozer’s and Lindbeck’s accomplishments are great, and both developed their own approach for the theological discussion. And moreover, both standed or positioned themselves a distinguished flag and territory: Postconservative and Postliberal. Like what I disclosed earlier: George Lindbeck produced a manifesto of sorts for a “postliberal, cultural-linguistic theology” and a regulative theory of doctrine.” However, the “Drama of Doctrine” sets forth a “postconservative, canonical-linguistic theology and a directive theory of doctrine” that roots theology more firmly in Scripture while preserving Lindbeck’s emphasis on practice. Both generated the thoughts and notions of DTM in certain areas. Thus, you might be interested to know where DTM positions itself in these two territories? Postconservative or Postliberal? To me, the fundamental faith cannot be removed at all; in this part, my thoughts are more like a precriticist. However, to consider the methods or approaches of theologies, my thoughts are more like a pragmatist. To consider the application for the church or individual believers, my thoughts maybe are closer to the empiricists. It’s not hard to identify my thoughts, neither nor the DT locution, although it still too fresh in the theological academic discussion. I believe this is a clue why the postmodern theology prevailed so fast and deep into our age. Take myself as an example to explain the phenomenon, I grew up in a traditional Chinese family, but my mom is a godly Christian. This background provides my thoughts a nourished land to accept the liberal and lenient concepts. To accept a foreign religion in Taiwanese traditional society is just a few people (less than 3% of their entire population). Thus, how to communicate and keep a good relationship with our neighbors is a great lesson to learn. I have to understand the Chinese traditional culture and their long and proud mega-central kingdom thoughts. Actually, I did a great job by all kinds of tests in my early years. However, my wife was an American born Chinese, who has an incommunicative and indefinite belief family. We migrated to USA in 1994, and generated 4 beautiful children (two girls and two boys). All my kids were raised up in the Orthodox Church life in Southern California. If I still kept my own Chinese traditional “doctrine” to teach them, will you image how difficult it is? Thus, I have to be more flexible and adjustable as a pragmatist. When I was young and studied the Bible and its 66 Scriptures, I could not understand most of its meanings unless some spiritual leaders or pastors explain with many empirical stories then I could grasp the meaning over that portion. And most of my experiences told me that the cognitive/prepositional aspect of the Christian view is not so easy to comprehend, but the experiential/expressive way is more friendly and understandable to my early Christian pilgrim. Nevertheless, when I devoted my life time to the Lord and became a full time servant of Him, accumulating with enough Biblical knowledge, and the church practices, the cognitive/prepositional approach means a lot to me, and formed a great foundation to my thoughts and understandings of the Bible and theological issues. Thus, cognitive’prepositional, experiential/expressive approaches and to combine these two emphases are all meaningful and explainable to me. You might consider my thoughts could be too wide. Well, I have fellowship with many missionaries, someone went to the minor races in China for years, someone went to East European Countries for years, someone even went to India, Malaysia or Indonesia for years… if you learned more about their narrative experiences, “to be flexible” will become the major element for them to fit their current environment, “never insist” the outward practices will the key for them to be survived. Of course, we have no doubt about their strong and affirmed faith at all. I think we are all the same: to lay hold the affirmed truth and faith, and never move from it, but be practical and reasonable and flexible in our practices. Actually, if you exam the way of Jesus Christ did, He is the best pattern that holds the unchangeable truth and faith, but soft and flexible in His daily living and practices. Most of the modern theologians are coming from the Western Christian environment, although they passed the impact and washing of the rationism and liberalism. But I am sure if the modern western theologians could invest some time to see what’s going on in the other regional Christian developing histories (for example, China and Korea), their thoughts might be obfuscated. I knew many great missionaries like Hudson Taylor or the Cambridge Seven… they tried their best to fit the needs in their missionary territory. They practiced like the native way, and tried to sow the Gospel seeds into them, and nourished and cherished the ones to believe until they grew up in faith. They follow the path of the Apostle Paul, to be the same kind of person while preaching to them. They never changed their underlying faith, but they are quite flexible to face to all kind of situation. Even as Dr. David Wright mentioned about the practices of Daniel in Dan.1: Daniel could be very flexible in taking the learning and language of the Chaldeans, Daniel and his three friends even could take the names with the paganish implications. But they were so restrict in their daily eating matters to show their unchangeable faith toward Jehovah God! The reasons why I tried to present so many examples like the above, no matter from the Biblical Narratives or church members’ practices are not so shallow nor superficial as their literal meanings. It’s related to the thoughts of DT or DTM! In a word, DT’s thoughts are more than concrete in the Evangelical belief, but the practical and applicational ways are very flexible in order to convince more people to follow the true God and Jesus Christ! Therefore, either Postconservative or Postliberal is not mattered, but the motivation of appropriating these stance matters. As long as the approach can convince certain groups of people, although we prefer using the conservative approach to preach, we would like to drop it and take the other kind or aspect of approach to preach in order to gain some more people to the Lord and the Church! I dislike to argue with something not that important before God, actually, to Him, all these approaches means not that great until He gains His children and the chosen ones that matters to Him, isn’t it? Since theology involves more than the Biblical Scripture, the traditional Church practices and the modern thoughts…etc. which means doing theology is to integrate all these aspects and to form an understandable system that enable us to reach God’s will and eternal goal. I personally think that we should never grasp too many things in hands, but lose the major thing that matters which is God Himself! Thus, to present all kinds of ways or approaches of theology is good and encourageble, as long as the major goal is been laid hold always. I honor many XT’s approaches, that’s because of their labor and input draw at least someone to pursue God. But if you asked me which approach is the best, I will surely present DTM/DT for you! Because DTM/DT can spout out more Dramatic narratives for people to know God and love God! And this is the major purpose that theology and the theologians should do, not just arguing with one another without targeting the right object! C. WHAT ARE THE MAJOR THOUGHTS OF DT? I have disclosed many thoughts of DT/DTM along with both Vanhoozer and Lindbeck’s thoughts and accomplishments; DT/DTM appropriates many positive notions from them. Here we will just summarize the thoughts of DT more organized in three major points: i. Either or & neither nor of the NT or XTs; ii. Interpretation based upon God’s Economy; iii. Core value is the Bible, application and explanation is DT/DTM. i. Either Or & Neither Nor of the NT or XTs The subtitle seems so strange in grammar; however, it does express my thoughts over DT/DTM. Yes, either or the NT or XTs’ considerations and approaches and neither nor their notions may or may not be the thoughts of DT/DTM. As I have explained the reason why we did not reject the thoughts of XTs at the above point, here I won’t repeat the reasons. ii. Interpretation Based Upon God’s Economy Like most of XTs, DT/DTM has also its own focused central line or specific presumption or presupposition. To assume God’s action toward man is based upon a dramatic plan, we should have some supporting scriptural verses to advocate our view. I have studied many years of Biblical Scriptures; one of the best words studies is concerning the Greek word oikonomia (Economy in English), which means plan or administration occurs throughout the New Testament (1 Timothy 1:4; Ephesians 1:10; 3:2; 3:9; 1 Corinthians 9:17; Colossians 1:25). Many Christians are unfamiliar with the application of the word economy in relation to God. But I think this term could represent the central thought of DT/DTM. Oikonomia is a compound of two nouns: oikos, which means house, and nomos, which means law. Hence, the definition of God’s economy is God’s household administration, God’s household management, or arrangement. In brief, God’s economy means God’s plan, which divine plan is the subject of the Bible, the meaning of human life, and the desire of God’s heart. God’s plan is to dispense Himself into His chosen and redeemed people as their life and life supply in order to gain a corporate expression for God, consummating for eternity in the New Jerusalem, which is at the end of the entire Bible. The thoughts of DT/DTM is based upon the Economy of God. To interpret the divine drama with this God’s plan. The best way to describe the entire drama of God is to take advantage of God’s economy. For I have read many divine titles about this term, but so far it seems only been interpreted by a Christian publication called Living Stream Ministry. Thus, I welcome more scholars to exam if their theology or interpretations are acceptable to the mainline church. If we believed God’s action is based upon His speaking (speech-act theory), and His plan is to demonstrate a great universal divine drama for God and man (God’s economy). Then we can surely establish a completed structure for DT/DTM. Dramatic Theology (DT) is a theology that focusing upon God’s plan (God’s economy) and His divine drama with God and man. The thoughts of DT are mainly focused on what is God’s dramatic plan? Who are the characters of the divine drama? How does God accomplish His entire goal and drama? How did God arrange the characters showing/appearing at the stage? What is the background setting by God? When does God and His characters show up and unto the climax? Where God and man meet together? Which part they worked together for good? And whom they defeated together…etc all these kinds of theological questions. iii. Core Value is the Bible, Application and Explanation is DT Our major concept and core value is still with the Bible authority, which is precritical and based upon the evangelical faith that we had when we believed into Him. You might say that’s experiential/expressive, but you might also quote them as the cognitive/prepositional. No matter what view you are talking about it, it’s just different descriptions concerning the route of believing pilgrim. I don’t think that’s a big issue at all, when you trace back your own route of believing process, can you clearly distinguish which part of the believing elements are cognitive, which part are more experiential? I doubt anyone can tell that very precisely, for we have always both the objective truth outwardly and subjective truth inwardly to balance our believing pilgrims. Therefore, the core value of the thoughts of DT/DTM is the Biblical authority, the principle of sola sceriptura. But we insist the application and explanation of DT/DTM should be very practical and flexible in order to gain all kinds of people through this theology. I think theology has its own goals, which is not just an academic reason, but also the obedience of Christ Great Commission to gospelize all the nations. That’s why AsT (Asian Theology), FT (Feminism Theology), LT (Liberation Theology)…etc. existed and benefited certain groups of people for their specific needs. DT/DTM has also its own goals, which is to accomplish God’s economy, God plan and God’s divine drama by applying its own dramatic explanation to draw more audiences to be the core characters to satisfy God’s desire and His eternal needs! If our explanation and application is exclusive, and giving no ground for the other XTs; their inputs and labors will be regarded as incompatible and invalid to all our advocators. Then the ecumenical goal will never be possible in God’s own drama, at least we should all confess that God desire a oneness among His own chosen ones, no matter how fallen their conditions are. I believe the divisions among the churches and believers should be under His plan in order to gain more people to believe into Him; maybe their teachings (doctrines) and practices won’t be the same, but these practices can save certain kinds of people in certain kinds of environment. We better leave the final judge to the Lord, and do our best according to His Spirit (the Comforter), because He is the real Director to arrange all the dialogues among the characters, and He is the final decision maker to arrange the background settings for us, therefore we can follow His direction to present what He wants us to do and say…etc. Praise the Lord! V. SIMPLE MODEL OF DRAMATIC THEOLOGICAL METHOD (DTM) The following is a simple model of Dramatic Theological Method (DTM). The reason why I said “simple”, because there could be better models to interpret the Bible and the theological issues. I just to modify Vanhoozer’s “The Drama of Doctrine” as a basic model to present how DTM looks like practically. We can definitely discover many other dramatic theories as its more complicated model to interpret the different locus and scenes. A. DIRECTOR—GOD First of all, we should be very clear there should be a certain director for a drama; at least a final decision maker to decide what the drama should go. This divine Director is God Himself in the DT/DTM! I don’t think we should explain too much for this point. Although the modern drama could allow several directors for certain drama, the majority of dramas still have only one best director to make the decisions and take the responsibilities finally! I am not sure if any postmodernist will argue with DT/DTM about the numbers of directors, but I am sure there should be no doubt at the function of the director. The function of the Director is just the closest description matching God in the entire dramatic theory. Although the modern dramatic director could only arrange and direct the characters and the script how to act themselves, but the real God can even create all the creatures and environments for all the characters. Thus, we are just taking advantage the metaphor for the explanation to the readers, but not limited by it’s own interpretations. B. SCRIPT—Bible Vanhoozer does present a entire part of the Script in the second section of “The Drama of Doctrine”. It tackles a variety of issues that concern the relationship of Scripture (the canonical script) and tradition (church practices and performances) in order to address the question “Whose direction counts, and why?” Scripture is a theo-dramatic criterion that indicates how to go on following Jesus Christ. Vanhoozer reclaim the principle of sola scriptura while recognizing the role of the Holy Spirit and the church’s cultural and historical context in the development of doctrine. I think his point of view is acceptable, since we have God as the final Director; we surely have the common script for us (his divine dramatic characters) to follow up. Obviously Bible is the right Script that given directly through our Mighty God! Concerning this kind of script, as we knew some drama was written by its director, but not necessary for all scripts! Actually, the third party, the playwright or dramaturge, or scriptwriters wrote many scripts instead of their directors. But no matter who created that script, no matter who was the real scriptwriter, but the function of a script to the drama is very definite! As you have seen, DT/DTM is not bothered by many practical situations, but focusing on the “function” of certain metaphors, as long as that metaphor could explain or be applied for the explanations or applications for DT/DTM. Many theologians concerned too much about the historical criticism of the script (Bible); they might pay a lot of attentions upon the historical orders concerning certain events such as the Synoptic problems. They concerned so much about the possibilities of historical events, and they want us to distinguish “the Historical Jesus” or “the Believed Christ”…etc. Many theologians might focus on certain parts of this Script, and make them big issues for their academic studies like different XTs. Well, I appreciated their labors, at least we can be clearer about the facts and different aspects of this unique divine Script. Nevertheless, DT/DTM will only focus on the entire Script was according to the Director’s (God’s) heart’s desire and His own plan (God’s economy). And the entire drama will be carried out according to His dramatic plan. Some criticisms might be generated concerning the separation between the scripts and directors according to the modern dramas’ real condition. But I would like to say this: it depends mainly on who is the final director! A good and famous director would never choose a script easily. Most of these qualified directors consider their scripts very seriously or they will modify the scripts according to their inspirations timely, isn’t it? Do not mention the very unique Script (Bible) of the universal divine Drama (according to God’s economy). The very Director (God) surely paid His entire attention upon this Script. He made this Script up for taking more than 1500 years! He is the best Director of all! And this Script is also the best Script of all! C. DRAMATISTS AND INTERPRETERS If you compared with Vanpooler’s model or plot concerning this theo-drama with mine, you will discover the contents of the third and fourth parts of his model are quite different from DT/DTM. His new metaphor (dramaturgy) was presented with which to conceive the work of a theology that is simultaneously attentive to the canon and to the contemporary context in its efforts to direct believers in the way of Jesus Christ. Well, I reviewed and reconsidered this metaphor so many times, and concluded and modified it to be the DRAMATISTS AND INTERPRETERS as my third metaphor. And there should be composed with the following key men as its detailed explanations. i. Bible Human-Spirit Writers ii. Prophets iii. Apostles iv. Coworkers, Teachers and Pastors v. Church Leaders and Elders i. Bible Human-Spirit Writers The very first group of the Script dramatists and interpreters are the Bible Human-Spirit Writers (BHSW). It’s a new created term, for I wanted to express the physical writers of the Scriptures although they outwardly were the common human beings, but were directed inwardly by the unseen Holy Spirit, therefore they were the Bible Human-Spirit writers (BHSW) as the original dramatists and interpreters in the world. This group of people was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write down God’s plan and Words in a written way. Our Director directs all things in His divine drama, even He wrote His own Script through His divine dramatic staffs (the BHSW). Praise the Lord for His multifarious Wisdom in this DT! ii. Prophets The second great group of people as the dramatists and interpreters for the Director and the Script is the prophets. Several famous prophets were also participated with the BHSW; but many prophets were just mentioned by the Director to do their own interpreting works for His purpose. Some stories could be written within the original Script as a pattern to the other prophets to come. As prophets, they have to follow the same steps of the BHSW, to coordinate with the Holy Spirit in interpreting the Script for the ultimate Director for their contemporary people (characters of the Script) how to behavior themselves according to the arrangement and Director’s administration (not according to their knowledge of good or evil). Thus, DT/DTM can explain many sceneries may content something that we don’t understand; for example, our Director request us (Israelites) to kill all the Canaanites, so you will see the series sceneries of the destruction of Jericho, Ai, Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and Eglon…etc in the book of Joshua. Sometimes you might argue with the Director’s arrangement, “Why You allow or arrange certain character died so soon, even when we are still praying for him/her?” Well, you never know how dramatic result will be appeared later on, for only One Wise Director arranges the final plot, although the dramatists and interpreters did tell us the principle of His dramatic plan. But after all, they are just the dramatists/interpreters, they are not the Director who can make the final decisions! However, we may honor the absoluteness of the Director’s authority and just listen to Him passively, but He still granted us some speech right for us to participate of His masterpiece (divine drama) through the format of all kinds of prayers. DT/DTM can interpret many phenomena in the Bible or difficulties such as the Passion of Christ and Suffering Theological issues. Without a higher and better dramatic arrangement of the Director, who can really appreciate His masterpiece among all of us (characters), isn’t it? iii. Apostles I purposely point out the Apostles as another group of dramatists and interpreters for the Director (God) and the Script (Bible), that’s because it’s too obviously fact, even without any further explanation. However, DT/DTM can apply the function and understanding concerning the dramatists/interpreters on the Apostles, they are the sent ones by God (literally), but what they are doing is still very similar to the other dramatists/interpreters. Like the Apostle Paul, he who wrote so many scriptures as the fundamental doctrines of Christian; at the one hand, he is one of the BHSW to write the Bible; at the other hand, he is also an apostle (even not among the 12 Apostles) who interpreted the Word of God (the Script) to his contemporary gentiles that they may repent and accept the belief of the Jesus Christ. Here we see something that NT did not cover! NT can always focused upon the Biblical Narratives only; NT can never cover well the prepositional writings like the Epistles. But DT can handle this part very well. Can you image these prepositional style writings such as 1, 2 Peter, as a longer dialogue of the Apostle Peter arranged perfectly by the Director? Without Peter’s recommends toward the Apostle Paul, 2 Pet 3:15-16, “And count the long-suffering of our Lord to be salvation, even as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given ,to him, wrote to you, As also in all his letters, speaking in them concerning these things, in which some things are hard to understand, which the unlearned and unstable twist, as also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.” Can you image how many arguments might be generated by Paul’s Epistle in Gal 2 that apostle Paul rebuked Cephas (the apostle Peter) before all that he was not walking in a straightforward way in relation to the truth of the gospel. You might say, “Who are you, little Paul? Don’t you know our brother Peter who has followed the Lord Jesus Christ for more than three and half years of His ministry on the earths? Where were you then? How dare you are to rebuke him before so many people, and even recorded in your epistles?” Well, this is based upon the wonderful Director’s (God’s) multifarious wise arrangement in His complete Script (Bible), not just the BN (Biblical Narrative). As we know, all the apostles are also ones of the characters for the Director (God) to use in His divine drama, without these kind of deeper conversation (dialogue), can we fully understand what’s going on within the character’s inner being? We have heard so many monologues in several dramas; I think the epistles’ functions are quite similar like that. The more the apostle could present (talk) in the Script (Scriptures), the more relative importance that the Director wanted him to be or do. Based upon our natural thinking, we might keep more dialogues for those who followed Jesus Christ in the Scriptures after the Acts. However, our God has His own ways of arrangement, He immediately put so many writings of Paul right after the Acts, until we almost forgot the other apostles, finally, we see James’ appearing again, then Peter, John and Jude, closing the divine drama again by the Apostle John whom the Lord loved so much when He was incarnated. Don’t you think this is still one part of His great and unique dramatic Script? I believe so! That’s why DT/DTM can handle so many dramatic formats, no matter the classics like the Pentateuch; the historical drama like Joshua to Esther; or the poetic for mat like Job to Song of Songs; and the prophetic format from Isaiah to Malachi in the Old Testament. DT can also handle the entire New Testament just like what I have disclosed above. Praise the Lord for DT/DTM can interpret almost every single scripture according to God’s dramatic plan, His economy! iv. Coworkers, Evangelists, Pastors, Teachers, Church Leaders and Elders As we have mentioned DT/DTM is not just a exegesis tool for the Bible’s interpretation, but it is furthermore a theological tool/method to solve many theological issues. We knew the Bible has been written without any further change, but the drama of God is still going on, for He is now the heavenly Director to continue his dramatic plan, generation after generation, scenery after sceneries. How to consider and explain the Church history or church traditions? How to understand the best ways for the current coworkers, teachers and pastors? How can we take advantage of DT/DTM to interpret these issues? Since the Script (Bible) has been accomplished, how could we (the following characters) join Him and act/behavior ourselves according to the living God (the Director)? Actually, if we read the Script carefully, the answers are already there, for all the BHSW wrote the Script not just for their contemporary people (characters), but many of their writings were also for the ones to come, the Script accepters could be the Israelites in the Old Testament, or the general believers in the New Testament time; even both and the world. I will spend more time and spaces to discuss these items in the next part of the model of DT/DTM—Performance, for the issues are more related to that portion. Here we just briefly discuss the roles of other different characters like the Coworkers, Evangelists, Pastors, Teachers, Church Leaders and Elders. NT cannot handle these issues at all, for their base is within the Biblical Narrative (BN), and they even rejected the prepositional texts or presentation from the Bible. They have no further disclosures related the rest parts of the Biblical Scriptures, therefore, I could only name NT as a partial solution theological approach. It’s good for them (the Narrative theologians) to re-emphasize the importance of the BN; but to be named a complete solution for interpreting the theological issues; I don’t think NT can make it according to the Yale School’s current presentation. Their best solution or approach is to join with DT to reconsider the entire Bible as a masterpiece of God’s dramatic plan, then NT could have some more spaces for discussion. Otherwise, just to dig into certain matters like the cooperated readings or searching the public characteristics of Jesus at the end of Hans Frei’s researches, I could not see how much value these could be for the NT, honestly. Many so-called great theologies if missing the core value to the entire Christian, I will consider it’s just a literal game without too much weight in the theology. At least, I am not touched by their complicated layout if not so much BEEF within, correct? However, DT/DTM can solve many difficult theological issues even the prepositional style of scriptures like the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians…etc. DT/ DTM can even accompany with the historical information to improve the explanation of these parts of dramatic stories; not necessary to be limited within the Script, as long as the history is real and infallible, DT/DTM can still take advantage of it. The reason why I mentioned these until this point is because of “Coworkers, Evangelists, Pastors, Teachers, Church Leaders and Elders” are all characters of this entire divine drama, but their individual names may never be shown in the Script. Yes, we might say Timothy as the coworker of Paul, and both were the coworkers of God. And Eph. 4:11 does mention many church builders like the apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds (pastors) and teachers. In Act 6:1-6 mentioned the seven well-attested men full of the Spirit and of wisdom to be appointed to serve the tables, such like Stephen, who became the first martyr in the church; like Philip the wonderful evangelist was also one of the Seven deacons who did a great gospel job in Samaria (Act8: 4-40) and also baptized the Ethiopian eunuch, a man in power under the queen of the Ethiopians. Well, among these seven deacons, we can only know the further narrative stories about these two, our great Director purposely arranged this way that we can be very sure that there are many characters (many apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds/pastors and teachers…etc.) worked very much for the Lord in history, but the Script may not keep any record for them. Same as the other “Coworkers, Evangelists, Pastors, Teachers, Church Leaders and Elders”, the Script may not mention any individual name for them, but the patterns and what should they behave themselves had already recorded in the Script. DT/DTM helps us (characters of the divine drama) to follow the same patterns to behave ourselves in our daily living. I will say this: Our characters in the divine drama are always corresponding with our working roles/functions in our life! Are you working as the coworkers? Or are you behaving yourself as a Church leader? No matter who you are or what status you position now in the divine drama, just be like what the Script describes! To be like an elder, work as an elder! To be like an Evangelist, work as an Evangelist! I believe this is the very principle set by the Script and the Director! Therefore, all the divine characters still act as what they are according to the Director’s arrangement, and they might have many different roles within one character. Just like the apostle Paul, who was one of the BHSW, apostles, coworkers, great Evangelists, shepherds and teachers. The apostle Peter was also one of the BHSW, apostles and elders. Of course, we are all the chosen ones of God, or Children of God. We are also members of the Body of Christ, and part of the cooperated Christ. All the members in different church history behaved themselves according to the likewise principles in the same Script! Even the coming ones like the overcomers, the man child and the negative role like the anti-Christ, the fallen angels…etc. are all acting according to God’s dramatic plan. Trust me, all the final Biblical narratives in the Revelation will be carried out according to the time of the Director. He will definitely present the final New Jerusalem before the entire universe! Let us discuss more in the following points. D. PERFORMANCE Finally we come to the last part of the simple model of DT/DTM—Performance. Vanhoozer in his “The Drama of Doctrine” mentioned, “Performance” suggests that we are in the realm not of propositions only but of action. And to speak of action is to emphasize the role of the actor: “Even in the theatre we do not speak of how well the scenery or the costumes performed.” I also agreed with his points: “Theology as an exegetical scientia helps us understand the cross of Christ in terms of the broader theo-drama; theology as a practical sapientia directs us to perform the atonement by appropriating our identity in Christ and by engaging in practices that participate fittingly in Jesus’ saving work. Jesus’ death and its aftermath are the high point of the theo-drama. And the church participates fittingly in the theo-drama when it becomes a theater of reconciliation, a display of divine and human forgiveness, a spectacle of God’s love for the world. Therefore, the model of Performance is related both God (Christ) and man (the world), not just the named characters written within the Script (Bible). i. Israelite History I will say this: the entire history of the Israelites is one part of the performance of the divine drama. Actually, when I say the Israelites, I did not mean or emphasize on the “race” of Israel, but the “chosen” race of God! God so loves the world, but only the “chosen” ones as the representatives to be His counterpart! It’s very easy to comprehend and understand the reasons bout this and the following items: Historical Church, Church in the Modern World for these “Histories” are either obviously recorded in the Script or we can observe in our ages. Nevertheless, “Eschatological Church, and Final Ages—Seven Seals, Seven Trumpets, Seven Bowls, New Jerusalem” although recorded in the eschatological scriptures like the Revelation, but it’s not easy to realize their factual “performance”. We will spend sometime to “interpret” each one of them according to DT/DTM. First of all, we have seen the entire Old Testament except the first 10 chapters of Genesis covers the major Israelites history. The rest 40 chapters of Genesis cover the story from Abram to Joseph; the Pentateuch describes a great detailed story/history about the entire Israelites. Have you ever seen the movie, “Moses” or “The Prince of Egypt”? If you did, you can never deny the story of the Pentateuch is a great dramatic performance! I personally like the new way of dramatic interpretation of “The Prince of Egypt”, there is a suffering start of the Israelites who cried out to the Lord and waiting for their salvation. Then, the baby Moses’ mother used the papyrus basket to hide him until the appearance of the daughter of Pharaoh to draw him out of the water. Moses grew up with learning so much palatial knowledge, then he tried to help his brothers (the Israelites) with his own hand, however, they were not appreciated his help; so he fled from Pharaoh to dwell in the land of Midian, and married Zipporah the daughter of the Midian priest. Then God heard the groaning of Israelites, He purposely met Moses and assigned him to rescue the Israelites from the hands of Pharaoh. Finally, passed through the ten plagues of punishments toward the Egyptians and Pharaoh, the Israelites ran out of Egypt and crossed the Red Sea; God defeated all their enemies before their eyes, they praised God with all kinds of admiration… well, I can continue to illustrate for you, but it’s not necessary to do more. Don’t you feel the narrative above, which I presented, is a great portion of drama? You can see all the major elements within what I demo, there are characters, there is a specific background setting, and there is a climax such like the Red Sea crossing scenery…etc. Likewise, the other Israelite historical stories like Joshua, Judge, and Ruth…and so on, all are great dramas from different “episodes”. Even some poetic Scriptures like the Job and Song of Songs, you can image they could also be parts of the divine drama easily. Some theologians insist there is no one certain line to “systematize” the entire Bible, or connected the different Scriptures. Well, to my view, it is difficult to “link” all the different materials within certain kind of proposition, such as God’s Love, or God’s Righteousness, or even Christ’s Redemption and Salvation…etc. For you can easily figure out some other parts from the Bible are not fully according to that specific prepositional line. However, if you tried to take advantage of DT/DTM, as what I have disclosed ahead, all the different kind of modes can be used as part of His divine drama. For example, the prophetic Scriptures could be viewed as certain character’s long voice-over. A poetic mode like the Psalms, the Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, could also be narrated by the BHSW as their personal expression to their God! I believe the Director really love His characters express their love to Him, so He could not but join sometimes with these lovely characters. You might image the entire Bible as a divine Romance between God (the Director) and men. God is the main leading man in this romance, but the cooperated chosen ones are the premiere in the drama. This chosen race in the Old Testament mainly appeared as the Israelites, their story in the drama might be concluded as the Israelites History. Sometimes when the relationship between this “couples” was good, the Israelites history was in a good “shape” or better condition. Otherwise, the Israelites could be in a big trouble. We can see many examples in the Old Testament, including the Judges and the Kings. Whenever the husband does not care for the wife, will the wife be ok still? At least at the age of the ancient time, there is no woman can live without man’s protection or care in general. I think the love story won’t be always so smooth, sometimes certain condition could be tragedy, but sometimes it could be a comedy happy ending. Sometimes it could an epic romance; sometimes it could be an ethical love teaching…etc. Only if you had the same wisdom like our wonderful Director, you can image what the drama could be presented. Praise the Lord for the Script about the Israelites History that we can learn so many vivid lessons from their stories. ii. Initial Church Let us come to the New Testament age to see how the divine drama goes. I take the Initial Church as the cooperated entity (the character) to discuss the model of DT/DTM. As we have seen that God as both the major leading man and the Director. And the entire Bible can also be viewed as a divine romance between God and His chosen people; the two Testaments can be actually viewed as two marriage covenants between God and His counterpart (His chosen ones, the Israelites in the Old Testament, and the Church as the continual genuine Israelites in the New Testament). See, we can easily match the entire drama with all major roles. However, maybe some criticisms will criticize why God needs two marriage covenants instead of one? Actually, they are right! God original desire was only one-marriage covenants with the Israelites, however, the problem happened to His counterpart, from Exodus to Malachi, you could see all kind of violations and disobediences among the Israelites toward God. Israelites should listen to their own Husband Jehovah God’s Words! But they kept falling from their commitment of the first covenant! Thus, God needs to execute His own righteousness in the first covenant. A righteous husband has to “teach” or “direct” his unrighteous wife in order to express his own righteousness! If an unrighteous wife had some other men (i.e. to follow some other gods), can the righteous husband (God) just do nothing to her? If he (God) loves her (the Israelites) so much, but he is so righteous; how could he do to balance his marriage relationship? If you were the Director, can you create some stories to express the Husband’s Righteousness still, but also recovered their marriage life? How could make it? “Redemption” is the very answer arranged by this Director to do to His beloved! On the one hand, God became a man (John 1:14), passed His 33 and half years of human beings “test” in order to show his own understandings and mercy toward his wife (the Israelites), but He took the “punishment” according to the first covenant to replace His wife to be put on the cross and died for her in order to accomplish all the righteous requirements of that covenant. Not only so, meanwhile the resurrected Husband renewed another new covenant for His wife! Not only this Husband passed through the death unto resurrection; but the cooperated new man, the church also put off the old man (his former manner of life) and put on the new man, which was created according to God in righteousness and holiness of the reality. If you compared with the meaning of baptism, you will discover that the wife (the new man) should pass through the same steps like Jesus Christ did. Both have to pass the procedures of death and resurrection. Amazing for the divine arrangement of this Director. Now the first covenant was completely invalid, because both signers were passed (died). However, this is a divine romance, our Mighty Director (God) always has His own solution and surpassing power in this universal incredible marriage life! He first arranged the surprising death of the Husband and wife, then using an incredible plot/scenery of resurrection to turn and change the entire drama to be a new one! Praise the Lord’s (the Director’s) wisdom to balance His first marriage life and shows both His endless love and righteousness toward His wife! And the Church as His wife’s new name, some new “chosen” ones may include some other “races” beside of the Israelites. Because these “chosen” ones were all willing to commit the second and new covenant, they were the new signers. They agree to obey this new covenant to be with and follow their Husband. Therefore, we can easily realize the Initial Church is also participating well within this great performance of God’s divine drama for the clear record in the Script. iii. Historical Church and the Church in the Modern World Now we come to the historical church and the contemporary church, the church in the modern world. Some scholars might regard the entire church as one entity to perform according to the Script. Some other scholars might argue with that view of point, for the historical church and the church in the modern world both have no clear literal record in the same Script (the Bible). For example, you cannot find any “Catholic” Church in the Bible, neither can you find any “Liberal” or “Evangelical” Church in the Script. Although some denominations might argue with that, they always consider they are the very orthodoxy church after the initial church. Otherwise, they would not dare to declare God is in their church. Think about this, if you were not too sure your church has God or not, will you stay there simply because of this uncertain faith? Absolutely not! Only when you are so sure you can meet with God in your local church, then you could continue to follow that church! No God, no church! However, since that is the case, why there are so many divisions among the churches? In the past 20 centuries, how many new churches with a new name appeared and disappeared? How many movements generated among the churches and developed and enlarged and losing their momentum? Why the Director allowed this kind of situation happened after the initial church? And why He arranged this way of performance? Is this situation a normal performing or out of control? See, all these issues of the performance are great theological issues, there are so many arguments arose among the historical churches and the churches in the modern age. Of course, we fully understood it’s not a simple question, and we cannot expect a quick answer from this dissertation. But what I want to say is that if you used DT/DTM to interpret all these situation along with many written prophecies in the Script, you might find some route to answer it. The reason why I put the existed church issues here is to expose XTs could generate more new church moves or movements because of their new thoughts. Their ways of interpreting the Bible quite often uplift their own thoughts and despite the others’. DT/DTM is not another XT to do the same way, although it’s still very obviously that DT/DTM supporters might despise some other XTs by criticizing them. The purposes and functions of DT/DTM are not to compete with the other XTs, but to present our all-inclusive suggestions as the new interpreting method to reveal all the theological issues and to provide another solution to unlock all these answers. As we knew, the historical church and church in the modern world are both difficult theological issues to be integrated and interpreted. I don’t think any XT so far did a good job yet. Nevertheless, DT/DTM provides our solution for this, let me simply present as below: Although the new marriage between God and the church initially was so great, but there hidden so many little problems and issues within the new marriage life. The Husband with a great, perfect and wonderful nature and attribute such as love, light, holiness and righteousness; but the new bride still maintain her sinful nature and fallen attributes, even she loved the Husband, and would like to be baptized to die with Him, and resurrected with the great Husband. Can you image a real marriage life for this new couples? How hard to keep such a pure and great love? You can easily discovered so many divorced couples around you in this modern age. Actually, according to the Script, our Director does present His own ideal marriage picture in Ephesians chapter 5. Let’s just illustrate one classical portion for the readers, “Wives, be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord; For a husband is head of the wife as also Christ is Head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the Body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also let the wives be subject to their husbands in everything.” Did the historical churches in different ages follow this Script? Sometimes, yes; sometimes, not! Whenever a wife (the church) is subject to her own husband, and the husband does love his own wife as Christ so loved the church and gave Himself up for her that He might sanctify her, cleansing her by the washing of the water in the word, that He might present the church to Himself glorious, not having spot or wrinkle or any such things, but she would be holy and without blemish. As you could see here in the Script, our Director has His own standard of marriage life. He wants to marry a wife and present her to Himself glorious, not having spot or wrinkle or any such things, nothing defects with the oldness and any natural life. As Eve came out of Adam, the Church also comes out Christ; therefore, as Eve and Adam shared the same life and nature, Christ and the Church should also share the same life and nature! How glorious it is! But when we exam if the historical church and the church in the modern world does share the same life and nature of Christ yet? When certain time, the church having an big revival, you could see God’s expression, how glorious it was; but some other times and from different localities, the church still needed to be sanctified, and cleansed by the washing of the water in the word in order to be present gloriously to God Himself! If we viewed the church history in this way, we might have some clues to solve the current difficulties with the angles of DT/DTM. Because these issues are not our major points in this dissertation, we cannot spend too much time on these this time. Our goal is to set up a kind of useful model or solution for the general theological issues, that’s why we do our best to present different cases or conditions to present the DT/DTM’s general issue-solving ability. Actually, if we have enough time, I believe we can use the same model of DT/DTM to solve and explain many theological issues easily, because I do believe DT/DTM is the way of our Director’s (God’s) masterpiece in the entire universe! Since we have discovered the principle of the wonderful author of the Script (the Bible) is based upon the way of the divine drama. We can use the logic of a playwright to interpret many difficult issues with some dramatic reasons, which is the point of DT/DTM! iv. Eschatological Church Now we are trying to touch something other XTs seldom to involve. Actually these need more time and space to dig into; here I am not trying to do the eschatological DT for the readers. I am just trying to present the model of DT/DTM having the capacity to handle the eschatological matters as well. When we mention any eschatological matters in the Script, for the exact and real situation is not yet coming. We might consider these parts are those not-completed-acted or on going portion of the Script, but the sceneries will come true one day according to the Director’s timing. Many dramas may tell the audiences the last things (the ending) first in order to increase the expectation and imagination, for example, the audiences and readers might have a thought about “how could the couples come together finally, since their backgrounds are so different now?” Actually, many theologians all considered the Song of Songs describes the relationship (love story) between God and man (His chosen ones). In the very beginning, we shall see the “King” drew the “black country girl” for love. Finally, they became great counterparts. Obviously, the country girl was transformed; she did not have any name between chapters 1 to 5, until at the end of chapter 6, her name appeared as “Shulammite”, if you read the Hebrew Bible, you will easily point out, this name actually is a feminine form of “Solomon”, derived from the root meaning peace! The use of this name here indicates that at this point the country girl has become Solomon’s duplication, counterpart, the same as Solomon in life, nature, expression, and function, as Eve was to Adam (Gen. 2:20-23). This signifies that in the maturity of Christ’s life the lover of Christ becomes the reproduction of Christ, the same as He is in life, nature, expression, and function (but not in the Godhead) to match Him for their marriage (2 Cor.3:18; Rom. 8:29). It’s so beautiful a great happy ending of the entire Bible! However, now we (the Church) are still in the transformation process, you might easily discover some parts of the church are still “black”, and not so good at this moment, but I guarantee you, someday the church will be perfected and become a great bride adorned for her Husband! To this point, you might use DT/DTM’s logic to image the eschatological church at the Revelation. In Rev. chapters 2 to 3, there are seven local churches in Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea. Many exegetical books have different interpretations for these local churches, with DT/DTM, we do have our own interpretation with our own view. However, it’s not the time for us to develop this part yet. As I have mentioned beforehand, our goal is to demo that DT/DTM can still function well in the eschatological theological issues and questions. All these eschatological records are just like what I said earlier, the Script playwright tried to present some ending stories earlier in order to direct the audiences where they will be or become! In the courses of MBA (Master of Business Administration), there is a very famous theory called, “Target Management”; the business administrators should have a goal setting for each department that they will try to visualize the goal into their mission statement or describing the future of their organizations. I believe our great Director has His own plan and intention in present the Script with so many eschatological records! v. Final Ages—Seven Seals, Seven Trumpets, Seven Bowls Now we jump into some interesting zone in the Bible: the final ages, actually, maybe I should say the “Final Years” instead of “Final Ages” in this subtitle. When I was still a little boy, I usually liked to open the final parts of Bible, for I believe God had arranged the world final ages in the final part of the Bible. However, even I can read every single word there in the Revelation, I cannot understand so many symbols like the four colors horses (white, red, black and pale); the seven seals, trumpets and bowls; the war at Armageddon; the imprisonment of Satan and the millennial kingdom…etc. The more I read, the more images appeared to my head, but I still have no clues for their real meanings. Have you ever had such an experience like what I did in my childhood? I am sure even now there are still so many readers having the same experience like me. Is there any way to unlock these final things? Praise the Lord, we have DT/DTM nowadays, so at least we can image these final things as the pre-disclosed portion of the entire Script for man to pass and experience. Whenever we read the final judgment of the great white throne, we should know at least the unbelieving dead would be still judged in Rev. 20:12, so as the demons in Rev. 20:13. And we can foresee the destiny of Stan is in the lake of fire in Rev. 20:14-15! Hallelujah! If we obeyed His words and trust in Him with our faith, we can pass all these tests and get the final awards! We can also see so many human dramas operate the similar path, there are always a good guy, let’s say a prince (Christ) tried to save his lover, another princess (the chosen ones); he experienced so many difficulties (death) and routes (resurrection), and defeated their enemies (the punishment or judgment of the evil ones); and finally get his beloved and marriage her to have a happy ending (the New Jerusalem). Therefore, we can image and interpret all the final things like the seven seals, seven trumpets, and the seven bowls as the darkness before the dawn, the catastases before the happy ending! Is it wonderful interpretation for these difficult scriptures? Maybe when we have enough time to get into the details of these final things, we will unlock and realize more of them. But at least we get the entire picture of its position and its major function and meanings already! Praise the Lord for His multifarious wisdom hidden in the DT/DTM! vi. New Jerusalem Finally, we come to the happy ending part of this divine drama! You might be not that clear how happy I am now! Because I really don’t think I could finish this DT/DTM until now! Without a great ending, all the audiences might feel something missing no matter how good a drama is in its initial and middle parts. Same as my dissertation, not to mention the unique Bible! Of course, our great Director knew that if the Old Testament ended in Malachi, the New Testament ended in Jude, what kinds of feeling will the audiences have. Thus He used John the apostle’s mending ministry and his writings (The Gospel of John, his three Epistles and Revelation) to complete His great divine drama! Here I quoted a footnotes that I really like: John’s ministry was… to consummate the entire divine revelation of both the Old Testament and the New Testament, of both the Gospels and the Epistles. In such a ministry, the focus is the mysteries of the divine life. John’s Gospel, as the consummation of the Gospels, unveils the mysteries of the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. John’s Epistles (especially the first), as the consummation of the Epistles, unfold the mystery of the fellowship of the divine life, which is the fellowship of God’s children with God the Father and with one another. Then John’s Revelation, as the consummation of the New Testament and the Old Testament, reveals the mystery of Christ as the life supply to God’s children for His expression and as the center of the center of the universal administration of the Triune God. New Jerusalem, many Christian thought it describes the condition of the “Heaven” that we Christians will go and dwell there with God! But according to the principle of DT/DTM, I won’t think that’s the best interpretation. The reason is very simple, if the unique divine drama ended with so routine and tenuous, it cannot be out of the hands of our multifarious wise Director’s true ending meaning. Many good writers all know the best and attractive beginning and exciting-expected ending are most important parts in their writings. Can New Jerusalem be interpreted so ordinary and prosaic? Definitely not! Well, the best interpretation concerning the New Jerusalem that I ever read is from the Living Stream Ministry; this ministry has published many titles related to the topics concerning the happy ending, New Jerusalem. I read and enjoyed the hidden revelation within every symbol from within the New Jerusalem. From Rev. 21:1 to 22:21, there are so many items and symbols written in the Script, without using DT/DTM to interpret them, it’s really a hard job for man to image what’s the true and real meanings concerning each item. Let me close this dissertation in this way in order to corresponding to the former parts: New Jerusalem in the last two chapter of the Revelation as the final ending of the entire Bible, harmonized with the records of the Garden of Eden in the very first two chapters of Genesis. Both contain four things: 1. The tree of life as the center (Gen 2:9 cf. Rev. 22:2) 2. The river flowing to reach the four directions (Gen.2: 10 cf. Rev. 22:1) 3. Three kinds of precious materials (Gen. 2:11-12 cf. Rev. 21:11-14, 18-21) 4. A couple (Gen. 2:18-25; Rev. 21:9-10) If you think that’s just a meaningless accidence, I will criticize you are disqualified to discuss with any theological issues. It’s so obvious evident to exhibit the multifarious wisdom of the Director’s surpassing divine arrangements. If you still could not catch it, what can I say about you? Just like some awarded classic movies are so great and wonderful, but when you finished watching, and having no feeling of them, what can we say? Likewise, the choreographed dramatic arrangements of the Script that directed by the heavenly Director are given to all of us. But not everyone could appreciate and perceive it! Mark 8:17b t 18 Jesus said, “Do you not yet perceive nor understand? Do you have your heart hardened? Having eyes, do you not see? And having ears, do you not hear? And do you not remember?” What shall we say, even Jesus sighed out His disciples? Anyhow, in brief, New Jerusalem as the final but greatest sign in the entire Bible! It signifies the composition of the totality of God’s redeemed saints throughout the generations, who have been regenerated, transformed, and glorified. It’s not a material, lifeless city but a corporate living person as the bride, having Christ, such a wonderful person, as her Husband! VI. Conclusion Praise the Lord for His sufficient grace and mercy to me that I could come to the conclusion of my Th.M. dissertation. This is really a great and long-term journey that I have been through. The journey through the entire Bible (the wonderful divine drama of the almighty Director) is indeed a great joy to me. I love reading His Script, and desire to be one part of the characters of it; I would like to follow my great Director’s arrangement to finish my own course in order to please our marvelous Husband and having a mutual dwelling abode (the New Jerusalem) with Him in eternity. I really appreciate the chance to disclose DT/DTM to all the readers. I confess my shortage of knowledge and utterance, but I really expect DT/DTM can be applied to many more theologians and believers that His happy ending scenery can be accomplished sooner! May the grace of the Lord Jesus be with all the saints. Amen! APPENDIX BIBLIOGRAPHY CURRICULUM VITA
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