Between the Image and the Word: Theological Engagements with Imagination, Language and Literature

263 Pages·2013·1.343 MB·

by  Trevor Hart

Between the Image and the Word
Theological Engagements with Imagination,
Language and Literature
Trevor Hart
Between the Image and the word
ashgate Studies in theology,
Imagination and the arts
Series Editors:
Jeremy Begbie, duke University and University of Cambridge, USa
trevor hart, St mary’s College, University of St andrews, Scotland
roger Lundin, wheaton College, USa
what have imagination and the arts to do with theology? For much of the modern
era, the answer has been ‘not much’. It is precisely this deficit that this series seeks
to redress. For, whatever role they have or have not been granted in the theological
disciplines, imagination and the arts are undeniably bound up with how we as human
beings think, learn and communicate, engage with and respond to our physical and
social environments and, in particular, our awareness and experience of that which
transcends our own creatureliness. The arts are playing an increasingly significant role
in the way people come to terms with the world; at the same time, artists of many
disciplines are showing a willingness to engage with religious or theological themes.
a spate of publications and courses in many educational institutions has already
established this field as one of fast-growing concern.
this series taps into a burgeoning intellectual concern on both sides of the atlantic
and beyond. The peculiar inter-disciplinarity of theology, and the growing interest
in imagination and the arts in many different fields of human concern, afford the
opportunity for a series that has its roots sunk in varied and diverse intellectual soils,
while focused around a coherent theological question: how are imagination and the
arts involved in the shaping and reshaping of our humanity as part of the creative
and redemptive purposes of god, and what roles do they perform in the theological
enterprise?
many projects within the series have particular links to the work of the Institute for
theology, Imagination and the arts in the University of St andrews, and to the duke
Initiatives in theology and the arts at duke University.
Art, Imagination and Christian Hope
Patterns of Promise
edited by trevor hart, gavin hopps and Jeremy Begbie
An Introduction to Jean-Yves Lacoste
Joeri Schrijvers
Christian Theology and Tragedy
Theologians, Tragic Literature and Tragic Theory
edited by Kevin taylor and giles waller
Between the Image and the word
theological engagements with Imagination,
Language and Literature
trevor hart
University of St Andrews, UK
© trevor hart 2013
all rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
trevor hart has asserted his right under the Copyright, designs and Patents act, 1988, to be
identified as the author of this work.
Published by
ashgate Publishing Limited ashgate Publishing Company
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
a catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:
hart, trevor a.
Between the image and the word : theological engagements with imagination, language,
and literature / by trevor hart.
pages cm. -- (Ashgate studies in theology, imagination, and the arts)
Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-4724-1369-7 -- ISBN 978-1-4724-1370-3 (pbk) -- ISBN 978-1-4724-1371-0
(ebook) 1. Incarnation. 2. Imagination--Religious aspects--Christianity. 3. Language and
languages--Religious aspects--Christianity. 4. Theology in literature. I. Title.
Bt220.h24 2013
230--dc23
2013008987
ISBN 9781472413697 (hbk)
ISBN 9781472413703 (pbk)
ISBN 9781472413710 (ebk – PDF)
ISBN 9781472413727 (ebk – ePUB)
IV
Contents
Provenance of Chapters vii
Introduction 1
1 Between the Image and the Word 13
2 The Promise and the Sign 43
3 The Economy of the Flesh 75
4 The Grammar of Conversation 97
5 Cosmos, Kenosis and Creativity 119
6 Unauthorised Texts 139
7 Unseemly Representations 161
8 Unfinished Performances 187
9 Unexpected Endings 209
10 The Substance of Things Hoped For 229
Index 251
To my parents
Geoffrey Edward Hart and Julia Margaret Hart
and in memory of my grandmother
Winifred Elliott (1915‒2007)
Provenance of Chapters
With the exception of Chapter 1, the pieces in this volume are based upon or
contain some material from the following among my previous publications,
though most have been rewritten or expanded and developed for the sake of their
appearance here:
‘Calvin and Barth on the Lord’s Supper’ in Neil B. MacDonald and
Carl Trueman, eds, Calvin, Barth and Reformed Theology (Milton Keynes:
Paternoster, 2008), 29‒56; ‘Lectio Divina’ in Robert MacSwain and Taylor
Worley, eds, Theology, Aesthetics and Culture: Responses to the Work of David
Brown (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 126‒40; ‘Migrants Between
Nominatives’ in Theology in Scotland 6:2 (1999); ‘Tolkien, creation and creativity’
in Trevor Hart and Ivan Khovacs, eds, Tree of Tales: Tolkien, Literature and
Theology (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2007); ‘Poetry and Theology in
Milton’s Paradise Lost’ in Nathan MacDonald, Mark Elliott and Grant Macaskill,
eds, Genesis and Christian Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012), 129‒39;
‘Cain’s Byron: A Mystery – On the Inscrutability of Poetic Providence’, The Byron
Journal 37:1 (2009), 15‒20; ‘Goodly Sights and Unseemly Representations:
Transcendence and the Problems of Visual Piety’ in Stephen C. Barton, ed.,
Idolatry: False Worship in the Bible, Early Judaism and Christianity (London:
T&T Clark, 2007), 198‒212; ‘The Sense of an Ending: Finitude and the Authentic
Performance of Life’ in Trevor A. Hart and Steven R. Guthrie, eds, Faithful
Performances: Enacting Christian Tradition (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007), 167‒86;
‘Unexpected Endings: Eucatastrophic Consolations in Literature and Theology’
in Trevor Hart, Gavin Hopps and Jeremy Begbie, eds, Patterns of Promise: Art,
Imagination and Christian Hope (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012).
Chapter 4 was previously published as ‘Imagination for the Kingdom of
God? Hope, promise, and the transformative power of an imagined future’ in
R.J. Bauckham, ed., God will be all in all: The Eschatology of Jürgen Moltmann
(Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1999) and is reproduced by kind permission of T&T
Clark, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.
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Introduction
The central contention of Christian faith is that in the incarnation the eternal Word
or Logos of God himself has taken flesh, so becoming for us the image of the
invisible God. In a wholly distinct but analogous manner our humanity itself is
lived out in a constant toing and froing between the economies of materiality and
immateriality. Imagination, language and literature each have a vital part to play in
brokering this hypostatic union of matter and meaning within the human creature,
making of the flesh more than, as flesh alone, it is or can account for. Through
a series of studies approaching different aspects of these two distinct dialectical
movements (in the incarnation, and in the dynamics of human existence itself)
this book pursues an understanding of each which will benefit from its deliberate
juxtaposition with the other, convinced that, while they are neither to be confused
nor mixed, within the Trinitarian economy of creation and redemption these two
occasions of ‘flesh-taking’ are nonetheless inseparable and indivisible.
Over the past 12 years, much of my personal research has been bound up
with the activities of the Institute for Theology, Imagination and the Arts in the
University of St Andrews. During that time I have found myself returning again
and again to certain core issues to do with the centrality of the imaginative as a
vital condition of so much in the distinctive texture of Christian faith and theology,
and of the wider human world against which such faith and theology stands out
for consideration. This book is the first of several that will appear in due course
arising directly from this period of consolidated and sustained attention, much of
it carried on in close conversation with colleagues and research students within the
Institute or during its regular conferences, colloquia and other events. The focus
for this particular volume is a cluster of issues arising at the intersection between
Christian theology, human language and literary imagination. Although most of
the pieces were originally written for and published in quite distinct contexts, I
have become increasingly aware of an identifiable convergence of concerns and
insights between them such that the organic whole which now exists is considerably
more than the sum of its originally individual parts. The provenance of the various
chapters inevitably results in occasional repetition of points, though I have sought
in the process of redrafting and expanding materials to reduce these to a minimum,
and to incorporate cross-references where possible to reinforce the overall unity
of concern and focus.
The theological themes attended to in the book include the nature of religious
language, the category of sacrament, redemption, the doctrine of creation,
theological anthropology and eschatology; but the central theme that holds the
entire collection together is the vital significance of the incarnation of the eternal