RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Religious Dramas
divine protection or to deprecate threatening calamity, while occasionally indulgences were attached to such presentations. While the educational purpose, already noted, was frequently stressed, there are only rare allusions to the moral influence of the plays, although it is once remarked that sinners would be terrified by the tortures of the damned or of those in purgatory represented on the stage. The cycles dealing with the saints often advocated openly the veneration of their heroes, and the Passion plays were designed to awaken a living sympathy with the agony of Christ and to call forth the grace of tears; while the plea was also advanced that man needs amusement, and that the religious drama was better adapted for this than many other forms of enjoyment. There is scant trace in the Middle Ages of the modern scruples against the dramatic representation of sacred themes, and the attitude in general toward them finds its modern counterpart in the Oberammergau Passion Play.
Not only was the medieval playwright gifted with scanty dramaturgic art, but the length of time and the number of roles at his disposal led him into prolixity and unessential details. In the psychology of the leading parts and in the evolving of motives, he was mainly dependent on the theologians, especially those of the contemplative school who 5. Literary had pondered long upon the Passion. Style; From these sources are borrowed such Corpus pathetic scenes as that in which the Christi Virgin intrusts Christ to the care of Plays and the traitor Judas, and also scenes of Moralities, horror. The greatest originality is displayed in comic scenes, although the wit here was of a breadth that sometimes caused the clergy to interfere. Thus, in the scene of the crucifixion, the Jews executed a grotesque song and dance with exaggerated caricatures of contemporary Jewish characteristics; and the beggars and cripples on whom the saints worked miracles likewise came in for their share of satire. In criticizing medieval religious dramas, however, it must be borne in mind that their authors did not aim at literary style, but only at the conversion from narrative to drama of their Biblical and legendary themes. Yet even the weakest plays mirror forth the thought of their time; and the uniformity of development in various countries likewise finds its explanation in the common source, the Latin literature of the Church, as well as in the uniform religious conditions prevailing throughout Western Christendom, not in international communication.
International communication did, however, have some part, and the people here most concerned were the French, among whom the religious drama, here called " mystery," attained its richest and highest development, aided by dramas of the legends of the saints, especially those in which their intercession aids those who venerate them, these dramas of the saints being specifically termed " miracle plays." Yet another form of religious drama was evolved from the Corpus Christi processions dating from the latter part of the thirteenth century. Here it became possible to represent the entire history of the world, the division of the presentation between
the various gilds and parishes heightening the magnificence of the whole, especially as the different scenes were given at designated places along the route. This form of drama reached its zenith in England, as in the " York plays," Spain not coming to the fore until much later. The older Latin liturgical dramas still lingered on, though steadily declining until they disappeared altogether, except for a few modern attempts at revival.
In addition to plots taken from the Bible and legend, the later Middle Ages developed the allegorical drama, or " morality." The idea of a conflict between the virtues and the vices was, indeed, no new one, but the first dramas built upon such plots date from the last decades of the fourteenth century, and reached perfection only in the fifteenth century, especially in France, the Netherlands, and England. To this category belongs, for esample, the English Everyman, showing how each one, in his progress to the judgment of God, is deserted by kindred, wealth, and friends, only Good Deeds clinging to him. A variant of the moralities was afforded by the dance of death, apparently first devised by a preacher, probably a Franciscan, to illustrate the power of death over all classes, each of which, represented by a character appropriately costumed, holds dialogue with death before passing to the grave.
The spread of the Reformation naturally affected
the religious drama. The adherents of the ancient
faith redoubled their zeal in France in
6. Early the production of mysteries, but the Protestant civil authorities no longer were as fav-
Attitude. vorable as in the past; many points, such as the coarse jests of the comic scenes, were now regarded as exposed to Protestant attack; the Roman Catholics themselves, under the literary influence of the school of Ronsard, came to regard the medieval drama as barbarous and devoid of style; and there was apprehension of the faulty presentation of the doctrines of the Church. The attitude of the Calvinists was at first not unfavorable to the religious drama, but about 1570 the position changed, and the synods of Nimes (1572) and Figeac (1579) condemned them. In German Switzerland the Protestants took delight in religious dramas until late in the sixteenth century, and Luther, at least once supported by Melanchthon, expressly approved them if presented reverently and without unseemly levity. The numerous German dramas now written were modeled largely on Terence and on the Latin school-plays based on the Bible; and the best specimen of this type, the Acolastus of Gnapheus, based on the parable of the prodigal son, was produced in 1529, while an English translation was published by John Palsgrave in 1540. The Protestant religious drama likewise mingled polemic elements in its plots, the priests of Baal in Old-Testament plays being favorite covers for attacks on the Roman Catholic clergy. This spirit, however, was especially manifest in the moralities from the earliest decades of the Reformation period. An entire cycle of French moralities represent sick faith seeking assistance in vain from a scholastic theologian, and find healing only from Text of Holy Writ; or permit Simony and Avarice
Religious Dramas fteligious Pedagogy