Harvesting the Drama Metaphor for Biblical Theology – Review of The Drama of Scripture

Following on from yesterday’s post about ‘harvesting the drama metaphor’, here’s the first book review on Craig G. Bartholomew and Michael W. Goheen’s The Drama of Scripture (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2004).

Biblical Theology (the term has many different usages, but here is used to denote the central or key theological message that comes from considering salvation history as presented in the OT and NT Scriptures) has had its long history, with its own ups and downs among the scholarly community. But for the last 30 years or so, Biblical Theology has received new attention and focus, especially from the likes of scholars like B.S. Childs and Australians William Dumbrell and Graeme Goldsworthy (see C.H.H. Scobie’s article ‘History of Biblical Theology’ in New Dictionary of Biblical Theology). Several proposals have been suggested for the center theological message - ranging from Covenant (Dumbrell) to the Kingdom of God (Goldsworthy, Vaughan Roberts) to the story of Israel (C. Marvin Pate, J. Scott Duvall, J. Daniel Hays et. al.).

Enter The Drama of Scripture. In one sense, this book does not suggest anything radically new – it sees the central theological message to consist in Covenant (OT) and Kingdom (NT). Likening the whole book of Scripture to a grand cathedral, Bartholomew and Goheen (abbreviated henceforth as B&G) sees ‘covenant and kingdom to be the double door of the same main entrance to the scriptural cathedral, evoking the same reality (p.24)’. But what is new is the way B&G casts the whole exercise of biblical theology against the backdrop of the drama metaphor – biblical theology is understanding God’s ‘meta-drama’ of which we have been graciously invited through his grace to be a part of now, i.e. we are actually in this drama NOW. For a fitting participation, two things are needed – to know the story that has gone before us, and to know how this story is going to end.

B&G begin with an introductory chapter where they outline the importance of stories or grand narratives to understanding who we are and hence what we are to do. Following the lead of missiologist Leslie Newbigin and philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, they argue that we can only answer the question ‘what am I to do?’ if we can answer the prior question, ‘Of what story do I find myself a part of?’. In another words, the grand narratives or stories which seek to explain the way the world actually is affects us, regardless of whether we are conscious of it or not. In this regard, following the lead of N.T. Wright, they argue that Christianity offers a story which is the true story of the whole world. Adapting the basic structure provided by Wright, they argue that God’s story can be thought of as a story (or drama) with six acts -

Act 1: God Establishes His Kingdom: Creation
Act 2: Rebellion in the Kingdom: Fall
Act 3: The King Chooses Israel: Redemption Initiated
Act 4: The Coming of the King: Redemption Accomplished
Act 5: Spreading the News of the King: The Mission of the Church
Act 6: The Return of the King: Redemption Completed

B&G suggest that we live in Act 5, and a large part of the drama in Act 5 is ‘missing’ or is being filled out right now; and it is for the actors (us) to improvise a suitable scene, preparing for the conclusion God has revealed, toward which our play must move (p.26).

In the rest of the chapters, B&G go through key events and their theological motifs from each of these Acts. They provide quite an adequate and good coverage of these events and their theological interpretation within each of these acts, sometimes providing rather interesting reflections. The theme of Kingdom connects these events and theological subthemes somewhat loosely as compared to another Biblical Theology book like Goldsworthy’s According to Plan; and so in this sense this book complements Goldsworthy’s earlier work. It is in Act 5 that B&G pick up again on the drama metaphor – this is where we join in and become part of the drama – by being part of the church. The church is the ‘sphere’ or ‘location’ by which we are drawn by God’s grace to participate in His story, His drama. And the main direction in which the church plays out its role in this drama is in continuing the mission of Israel, Jesus and the Early Church – a mission which belongs to God Himself; a mission which consists in nothing less than His Kingdom extending to the entire New Creation itself. In another words, ‘mission’ here is not just reduced to evangelism or cross-cultural missions, but

“[...] when we grasp that the salvation of the kingdom restores the creation, and all of it, we see that witness to God’s kingdom is as wide as creation. Witness will mean embodying God’s renewing power in politics and citizenship, economics and business, education and scholarship, family and neighbourhood, media and art, leisure and play. It is not just that we carry out evangelism in these areas of life. ]...] It means that the way we live as citizens, consumers, students, husbands, mothers, and friends witness to the restoring power of God.” (p.201)

B&G follow on in a unique way by citing the stories of three individuals whose lives have been affected by this bigger meta-drama of which they have come to be a part of – a businessman; an ecologist; and a student and her friend, who is an agriculturist. In all this, eschatology plays an important role. “As we are pushed forward in our mission by the impetus and forward movement that we saw in Jesus’ own words and works while he lived among us, we are also pulled forward by hopeful expectation of the future kingdom to be revealed when Jesus returns.” (p.206)

I conclude by providing three comments on this book. To begin – and here, it is a positive point - I have to admit very frankly that I am attracted to B&G’s way of casting Biblical Theology against the backdrop of the Drama Metaphor. Not that I have not benefited from Goldsworthy’s earliest books – God alone knows how much I have benefited and grown in my love for Him and His Word through the works of Goldsworthy – but is always very hard to run away from the thought that says ‘I have understood Biblical Theology when I have understood the Kingdom of God and how it is played out in every stage of salvation history... or I have understood Biblical Theology when I have understood the covenants’. In another words (epistemologically), Biblical Theology seems to be a discipline that is very much locked up in the realm of knowledge, and we have to take that deliberate and extra step in applying Biblical Theology in our lives. Another way of recasting the scenario, how many of us when teaching Biblical Theology in our churches end up teaching the main themes in the Bible – Kingdom of God, covenant – with the result of our participants walking out of the seminar feeling they have understood biblical theology because they have understood the concepts, but feeling deep within that missing gap in terms of seeing how this impacts their lives? But here, with the Drama Metaphor, Biblical Theology becomes a lot more ‘alive’, it seems to have grown ‘feet’ – biblical theology now no longer has to do exclusively with knowing; but more of knowing for right living, right participation in God’s drama of which we find ourselves involved in. What was previously disjoined as a two-stage process now becomes joined.

But this is also where the second comment comes in – I feel B&G could have gone a lot further in developing the Drama Metaphor and how this particularly affects the way we understand Biblical Theology. The chapters covering Acts 1-5 (up to the early church) are almost written like a survey of key events or themes and their theological significance (sometimes following the chronology of salvation history e.g. for the OT bits; and others following major topics or headings – e.g. the miracles, parables and journeys of Jesus); but little is drawn out as to how these events affect our living now – or to carry on the drama language – how these events affect our improvisation in God’s drama now. Rather B&G wait till the end before showing us how the whole story affects us in the broad way outlined above. Even in the above broad outline, I think an important area is missing – that of ethics. Of course I can be quite rightly accused of being overly harsh in my comment – afterall, B&G didn’t set out to write a systematic theology or doctrine textbook – but here’s where the point hits home: perhaps a better way forward in considering biblical theology (especially against this drama background) is via a ‘doctrinal’ approach, i.e. as we move along salvation history with its key moments, highlight key doctrines that arise which affect our living (or improvisation) now. In another words, Biblical Theology almost becomes like a bridge discipline to bring out doctrine or systematic theology from our biblical studies. Afterall, if biblical theology is understanding the whole drama for a fitting participation now, then as Vanhoozer suggests in the Drama of Doctrine, doctrine could be the very thing or the very connector which provides direction for that fitting participation. Exciting ideas; but all for another time, another place, another post.

My third comment – and I have to admit here it is a disappointment – is the almost complete silence on the theme of Jesus’ substitutionary death and atonement for our sin. Instead, the Christus Victor view is presented as the almost exclusive theological view of Jesus’ death and the defeat of God’s enemies. This is surprising considering that the doctrine of sin is well explained in the chapter describing Act 2 – sin is presented as the problem. Jesus’ substitutionary atoning death gets a slight mention in the section describing Paul; but other than that, is almost silent in the rest of the chapter, especially the chapter concerning the person and work of Jesus. While I can be accused of importing my ‘theological framework’ into the equation here instead of considering the message of the person and work of Jesus as it actually arises out of the Scriptures, I think it is hard to deny that the suffering servant of Isaiah played a vital role in Jesus’ understanding of his own death and his mission (for a good exploration of this theme, refer to Peter Bolt’s The Cross From a Distance (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2004)). Surprisingly, the suffering servant is not even mentioned in the section describing the prophets – a somewhat glaring omission.

Overall, I would recommend this book – not as a first book on Biblical Theology, but nonetheless a very good complement to go along with some other more established Biblical Theology books like Goldsworthy’s According to Plan (Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 1991), or my personal favourite, Vaughan Robert’s God’s Big Picture (Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 2001).