With characteristic bravado, Percy Bysshe Shelley declared, “Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” If we expand the definition of the word poet to incorporate everyone from songwriters to filmmakers, we are able to definitely grant that artistic expression plays a key role in shaping a culture—some extent definitely not lost on the apostle Paul. On occasion, Paul drew from pagan poets, amongst them Epimenides, Aratus, and Menander. While we are able to stress that he did so in an effort to bolster the credibility of the gospel for those outside the church, we’d also do well to acknowledge that he selected these quotations for his or her beauty and vitality. In Acts 17:28, as an illustration, he seizes on the vivid phrase “in him we live and move and have our being” to explain the connection between God and humanity. Was this simply a ploy to attain points together with his pagan audience, or did Paul also relish the felicity of expression?
Eugene Peterson used to say that they must teach courses on literature in seminary. The reason for that is that the celebrated poets of a given age capture the richness and complexity of human experience in a fashion unmatched by any textbook. In this sense, James Joyce’s Ulysses was revelatory for Peterson in disclosing the epic proportions of a daily day, built because it is on the architecture of Homer’s Odyssey. The suggestion may sound outlandish to a few of us, however it’s not foreign to Scripture. Indeed, Paul’s habit of drawing on the humanities is removed from an isolated incident. Recall that the Lord calls Bezalel and Oholiab, two exquisite craftsmen endowed with wisdom and skill by the Holy Spirit, to steer a team of artists in designing the sacred spaces and instruments of Israel’s worship (Exodus 31:1-11). We would also do well to acknowledge that a full third of the Old Testament constitutes poetry.
Despite the Scriptural precedent, nonetheless, in my experience, artists often feel sidelined in our churches, viewed as intriguing curiosities at best and vain distractions at worst. How did we reach this strange impasse? Given what we’ve seen, we are able to say with confidence that suspicion of the humanities has no place in God’s word.
Strange as it might sound, the humanities face an identical challenge within the eyes of many believers as do the natural sciences. In short, each meet with frequent scrutiny because each have been used as substitutes for religion. If the natural sciences generally tend to boast that they will offer a comprehensive explanation of reality that excludes God, artists have, now and again, claimed to be divine creators in their very own right, drawing on the infinite storehouse of the imagination. To make matters worse, this idolatrous ambition is commonly supported by modern men and girls who view organized religion as outdated and moribund. For William Wordsworth or Ralph Waldo Emerson, a lovely cathedral could also be not more than a museum, however the human heart holds all the guarantees of true spiritual renewal. These spiritual nomads would counsel us to look to our inner divinity for deliverance.
In his celebrated essay “On Fairy-stories,” J.R.R. Tolkien offers a direct riposte to this vision of the artist. Whereas God creates from nothing (ex nihilo), human beings harness the materials of the created order to do their making.[1] When the artist puts paint on canvas, as an illustration, she is using the tools and techniques of a world independent of her will to depict scenes and pictures (regardless of how abstract) that she first received as a present. The argument is just not that there is no such thing as a such thing as human originality or creativity but fairly that human beings cannot make what they’ve not first received. Human creativity is qualified by the incontrovertible fact that we’re makers within the secondary sense. This is just not true of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who existed in a state of perfect, self-sufficient unity and harmony before He brought the created order into being. God is thus the creator within the primal sense, and human beings are “sub-creators,” in response to Tolkien. Another strategy to make the identical point is to acknowledge that we’re creatures—men and girls who’ve a Maker.
Ekstasis Magazine recently put together a thought-provoking post titled, “a working theory of culture”:
Story: The shaping emotive & narrative principle that we live by individually & societally.
The Arts: Expression of story, delivered to life through literature, art, music & more.
Culture: Shared practices and artifacts that reflect these artistic expressions.
Atmosphere: Prevailing aesthetic environment that influences our cultural attitudes.
Desire: Impulses which might be formed by an emotional climate, driving one toward motion.
Action: Individual and collective movement that propels desire into activity.
Admiration: The approval of actions forms the feedback loop of what society values.
Narrative: The communication of links between atmosphere, desire, motion & admiration.[2]
The dynamic captured by this theory of culture forms a big complement to Shelley’s claim about artists being the unacknowledged legislators of our age. Though we may quibble over the precise connections between each of those parts, we are able to grant that artists play an indispensable role in shaping our culture. Practically speaking, these men and girls provide us with deep insight into the hopes, longings, and fears of our moment. But in fact, they do far more: The work of artists must be received first as a present fairly than an instrument of cultural evaluation. No doubt, a few of the concerns that immediately present themselves here should do with the present idols of our age, lots of them centered on human identity and sexuality. How will we strike a balance between appreciating the gifted men and girls who’re contributing to our cultural scene while resisting a few of the more idolatrous expressions? Though there isn’t an ideal formula for this type of discerning engagement, we are able to turn to Paul once more for wisdom on the matter. When he highlights the spiritual longings on display on the altar to the unknown God, he doesn’t simply linger in ambiguous territory. Instead, he moves from the altar to a proclamation of Christ and His resurrection. It’s a dangerous maneuver, and he loses some members of his audience, but that is at all times the case once we counter the idols of a given age with the person of Christ. We should be willing to take that very same risk.
Another query arises on this context. Are there Christian artists in these fields who’re capable of challenge the idols of our age? To be certain, there are, however it’s my prayer that we are going to see more. My query for all of us is, Are we encouraging the artists in our midst? Why don’t we start with those in our churches?
Photo Credit: Unsplash/Elena Mozhvilo
[1] Tolkien On Fairy-Stories ed. Verlyn Flieger and Douglas A. Anderson (New York: HarperCollins, 2014).
[2] Ekstasis Magazine. “A (working) theory of culture 🌀Story ⮕ The Arts ⮕ Culture ⮕ Atmosphere ⮕ Desire ⮕ Action ⮕ Admiration ⮕ Narrative ➟ What do you think that?” Instagram, 10 July. 2024, https://www.instagram.com/p/C9KmMIrIMca/?img_index=2
Kenneth Boa equips people to like well (being), learn well (knowing), and live well (doing). He is a author, teacher, speaker, and mentor and is the President of Reflections Ministries, The Museum of Created Beauty, and Trinity House Publishers.
Publications by Dr. Boa include Conformed to His Image, Handbook to Prayer, Handbook to Leadership, Faith Has Its Reasons, Rewriting Your Broken Story, Life within the Presence of God, Leverage, and Recalibrate Your Life.
Dr. Boa holds a B.S. from Case Institute of Technology, a Th.M. from Dallas Theological Seminary, a Ph.D. from New York University, and a D.Phil. from the University of Oxford in England.
