“…children sitting in the markets, and calling unto their fellows, and saying, ‘We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented.'”
Mt. 11:16-17
“…a certain man of the sons of the prophets said unto his neighbour in the word of the Lord, ‘Smite me, I pray thee.’ And the man refused to smite him. Then said he… ‘Because thou hast not obeyed the voice of the Lord, behold, as soon as thou art departed from me, a lion shall slay thee.’… Then he found another man, and said, ‘Smite me, I pray thee.’ And the man smote him, so that in smiting he wounded him. So the prophet departed, and waited for the king by the way, and disguised himself with ashes upon his face.
And as the king passed by, he cried unto the king: and he said, ‘Thy servant went out into the midst of the battle; and, behold…’ And the king of Israel said unto him, ‘So shall thy judgment be; thyself hast decided it.’ And he hasted, and took the ashes away from his face; and the king of Israel discerned him that he was of the prophets.”
1 Kings 20:35-41
.
.
Order of Contents
Articles 4+
Westminster & Divines 2
History 10+
Latin 2
Lawfulness of 5
Acting Doesn’t Break 9th Commandment 2
Biblios 2
.
Articles
1500’s
Bucer, Martin – pp. 349-52 of ch. 54, ‘Honest Games’ in On the Reign of Christ, bk. 2 in Melanchthon & Bucer, ed. Wilhelm Pauck (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1969)
“Youth could also perform comedies and tragedies, and by such means a useful form of entertainment, honorable and contributing toward an increase of piety, may be staged for the people; but it will be necessary that devout and wise men experienced in the Kingdom of Christ compose these comedies and tragedies, in which there may be presented on the stage the plans, actions and events of mankind, whether common and ordinary as it occurs in compedies or unique and eliciting admiration as it is characteristic of tragedies. All this will contribute toward a correction of morals and a pious orientation to life (Aristotle, Poetics II, 1448a).
…
It must be observed, however, that when in both kinds of poetic material, comic and tragic, the activities and sins of men are described and actively presented to be seen with the eyes, it should be done in such a way that although the crimes of reprobate men are related, yet a certain terror of divine judgment and horror of sin should appear in these things, and a shameless daring and an exultant delight in crimes should not be expressed. It is better here to take something away from poetic fitness rather than from the concern for edifying the piety of the spectators, which demands that in every representation of sin there be felt the condemnation of one’s conscience and the horrible fear of God’s judgment.
But when pious and good actions are shown, they should express as clearly as possible a happy, secure and confident sense of the divine mercy, but moderate and diffident as regards the self, and a joyful trust in God and his promises, with holy and spiritual pleasure in doing good.”
Vermigli, Peter Martyr – ‘Of Plays & Pastimes’ in The Common Places… (London: Henrie Denham et al., 1583), pt. 2, ‘The Eight Precept’, pp. 524-28
“But now to conclude, me thinks that those kind of [stage] plays, which serve for refreshing of men’s strength, are not utterly to be forbidden.” – p. 527
Rainolds, John – The Overthrow of Stage-Plays, by the way of controversy betwixt Dr. Gager and Dr. Rainolds, wherein all the reasons that can be made for them are notably refuted… Wherein is manifestly proved that it is not only unlawful to be an actor, but a beholder of those vanities. Whereunto are added also and annexed in the end certain latin letters betwixt the said Master Rainolds and Dr. [Albericus] Gentiles… concerning the same matter ([Middleburg: Schilders] 1599) 190 pp. ToC
Rainolds (1549–1607) was an English academic and churchman, of Puritan views. He is remembered for his role in the Authorized Version of the Bible, a project of which he was initiator.
Baxter: “The primitive Christians and Churches were commonly against them: Many canons are yet to be seen by which they did condemn them. Read but Dr. John Reignolds against Albericus Gentilis and you shall see unanswerable testimonies from councils, fathers, emperors, kings and all sober antiquity against them.” – Christian Directory (1673), p. 878
.
1600’s
Baxter, Richard – Question 114, ‘Whether Stage-Plays where the Virtuous & Vicious are Personated, be Lawful?’ [Yes] in A Christian Directory… (London: White, 1673), pt. 3, ‘Christian Ecclesiastics’, pp. 877-78
Outline
“As I am not willing to thrust any man into extremes, nor to trouble men with calling those sins which God has not forbidden; So I have reason to advise men to go in doubtful cases on the safer side; much more to disuade them from undoubted sin, and especially from great and multiplyed sins:”
1. It is not absolutely unlawful to personate another man, nor does the Second Commandment forbid such living images in this extent.
2. To personate good men in good actions, is not simply unlawful.
3. To personate a bad man, in a bad action, is more dubious; but seems not to be in all cases unlawful.
4. I think it possible to devise and act a comedy or tragedy which should be lawful and very edifying. It might be so ordered by wise men.
5. I think I never knew or heard of a lawful stage-play, comedy or tragedy in the age that I have lived in: And that those now commonly used, are not only sins, but heinous aggravated sins, for these reasons:
1. They personate odious vices commonly viciously, that is:
1. Without need, reciting sinful words, and representing sinful actions; which as they were evil in the first committing, so are they in the needless repetition.
2. Because they are spoken and acted commonly without that shame and hatred, and grief which should rightly affect the hearers with an abhorrence of them.
2. There are usually so many words materially false (though not proper lies) used in such actings of good and evil, as is unsavoury, and tends to tempt men to fiction and false speaking.
3. There are usually such multitudes of vain words poured out on the circumstantials as are a sin themselves, and tempt the hearers to the like.
4. They usually mix such amorous or other such ensnaring expressions or actions, as are fitted to kindle men’s sinful lusts, and to be temptations to the evils which they pretend to cure.
5. A great deal of precious time is wasted in them, which might have been much better spent to all the lawful ends which they can intend.
6. It is the preferring of an unmeet and dangerous recreation, before many fitter: God having allowed us so great choice of better, it cannot be lawful to choose a worse.
7. It usually best suits with the most carnal minds and more corrupts the affections and passions, as full experience proves.
8. The best and wisest persons least relish them, and are commonly most against them.
9. Usually there is much cost bestowed on them which might be better employed, and therefore is unlawful.
10. God has appointed a stated means of instructing souls, by parents, ministers, etc. which is much more fit and powerful: Therefore that time were better spent.
11. It seems to me a heinous sin for players to live upon this as a trade and function, and to be educated for it, and maintained in it. That which might be used as a recreation, may not always be made a trade of.
12. There is no mention that ever such playes were used in Scripture times by any godly persons.
13. The primitive Christians and Churches were commonly against them.
14. Thousands of young people in our time have been undone by them.
15. The best that can be said of these plays is that they are controverted and of doubtful lawfulness.
“Upon all these reasons I advise all that love their time, their souls, their God and happiness, to turn away from these nurseries of vice and to delight themselves in the Law and ordinances of their Savior, Ps. 1:2-3.”
.
1700’s
Witherspoon, John – A Serious Inquiry into the Nature & Effects of the Stage. Being an attempt to show that contributing to the support of a public theater is inconsistent with the character of a Christian (1757) in The Works of John Witherspoon (Edinburgh: Ogle, 1815), vol. 6, pp. 38-128
.
On Westminster & Westminster Divines as Only Necessarily against Lascivious Stage Plays
Order of Contents
Intro
Westminster
Divines 2
.
Intro
Some take theater and acting to be inherently immoral. Westminster does not teach this. Where Larger Catechism #139, on the sins forbidden in the 7th Commandment, addresses stage-plays, it qualifies the kind prohibited as “lascivious”:
“The sins forbidden in the seventh commandment… are… all… lascivious songs, books, pictures, dancings, stage plays…”
If stage-plays are not here qualified in the series by “lascivious”, then all books (unqualified) were prohibited by Westminster, which is absurd. At the very least the syntax of the catechetical phrase allowed for divines who did not take all stage-plays to be immoral to affirm the proposition. This allowance must be considered part of Westminster’s original historic intent.
In the footnotes Westminster provided for the phrase, none of them speak of drama or acting (though there are many such verses in the Bible), but only of lascivious actions.
The quotes below are instances of Westminster divines prohibting not all stage-plays, but only those, or elements of those, of a certain immoral kind.
.
Westminster Larger Catechism #139
“The sins forbidden in the seventh commandment… are… all unnatural lusts;[q] all unclean imaginations, thoughts, purposes, and affections;[r] all corrupt or filthy communications, or listening thereunto;[s] wanton looks,[t] impudent or light behaviour, immodest apparel;[v]… idleness, gluttony, drunkenness,[e] unchaste company;[f] lascivious songs, books, pictures, dancings, stage plays;[g] and all other provocations to, or acts of uncleanness, either in ourselves or others.[h]
[q] Rom. 1:24,26,27. Lev. 20:15,16.
[r] Matt. 5:28. Matt. 15:19. Col. 3:5.
[s] Eph. 5:3,4. Prov. 7:5,21,22.
[t] Isa. 3:16. 2 Pet. 2:14.
[v] Prov. 7:10,13.
…
[e] Ezek. 16:49. Prov. 23:30-33.
[f] Gen. 39:10. Prov. 5:8.
[g] Eph. 5:4. Ezek. 23:14-16. Isa. 23:15-17. Isa. 3:16. Mark 6:22. Rom. 13:13. 1 Pet. 4:3.
[h] 2 Kings 9:30 compared with Jer. 4:30 and with Ezek 23:40“
.
Quotes of Westminster Divines on Lascivious Stage-Plays
Order of
Byfield
Gouge
.
1600’s
Richard Byfield
A Candle Lighted at the Lamp of Sacred Scriptures, or a Catechism… (London, 1627), no page number
“Q. What else is condemned [in the 7th Commandment]?
A. The occasions of uncleaneness, as idlenes, pride and fulness of bread, prattling and gadding from house to house, lascivious dancings, books, songs, pictures, and stage-plays, the companying with fornicators, the resorting to lewd houses, the maintaining of stews [whore-houses], the making light of others’ fornication, and the not marrying when we have not the gift of continency.”
.
William Gouge
A Learned & Very Useful Commentary on the Whole Epistle to the Hebrews (London, 1655), ch. 13, §47. Of Remedies against Whoredom, Adultery & Other Sins of Uncleanness, p. 38
“3. As a pot is cooled by pulling away fuel from the fire: so lust [is] by removing occasions, which are such as these:
…
3. Immodest spectacles: lascivious representations on a stage, wanton places, amorous books, etc.
.
History
On Puritanism
In England
General Articles
1800’s
Fleming, William H. – ‘A Study in Much ado about nothing. III. The Puritan opposition to the theatre’ & ‘IV. The Literary Warfare’ in Shakespeariana, vol. 6, no. 65 (May, 1889), pp. 193-220
.
1900’s
Daniels, R. Balfour – ‘Shakespere & the Puritans’ in The Shakespeare Association Bulletin, vol. 13, no. 1 (Jan, 1938), pp. 40-53
“Yet in spite of Shakspere’s awareness of the social, political and religious movements of Elizabethan England and his knowledge of the feelings of the populace, it has been alleged that he knew nothing of the popular tendencies of Puritans… it is possible to discover his
attitude toward the impending religious and political strife.” – p. 40
“Yet, with all his serenity, unlike the violence of his contemporaries, Shakspere showed in no uncertain way his dislike of the Puritans and their growing power.” – p. 53
Morgan, Edmund S. – ‘Puritan Hostility to the Theatre’ in Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 110, no. 5 (Oct. 27, 1966), pp. 340-47
.
2000’s
Diehl, Huston – ‘Disciplining Puritans & Players: Early Modern English Comedy & the Culture of Reform’ in Religion & Literature, vol. 32, no. 2, Faith & Faction: Religious Heterodoxy in the English Renaissance (Summer, 2000), pp. 81-104
McGee, C.E. – ‘Puritans & Performers in Early Modern Dorset’ in Early Theatre, vol. 6, no. 1, Special Volume: Performance, Politics & Culture in the Southwest of Britain, 1350–1642 (2003), pp. 51-66
Yachnin, Paul – ‘Reversal of Fortune: Shakespeare, Middleton & the Puritans’ in ELH, vol. 70, no. 3 (Fall, 2003), pp. 757-86
.
Book
Thompson, Elbert N.S. – XX. The Controversy Between the Puritans & the Stage in Yale Studies in English PhD diss. (NY: Henry Holt & Co., 1903) 280 pp. ToC
“Despite inaccuracies and the author’s ultra-puritan sympathies, this book, the only monograph covering the whole ground, should prove of great service to the student. A useful review of it by W. W. Greg appeared in MLR. I, 1906 [pp. 143-45].” – Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature 1.513
.
On the 1500’s
Article
Ringler, William – ‘The First Phase of the Elizabethan Attack on the Stage, 1558-1579’ in Huntington Library Quarterly, vol. 5, no. 4 (July, 1942), pp. 391-418
.
On the 1600’s
Article
Bawcutt, N.W. – ‘Puritanism & the Closing of the Theaters in 1642’ in Medieval & Renaissance Drama in England, vol. 22 (2009), pp. 179-200
.
In Scotland
Article
Thompson, Elbert N.S. – pp. 149-50 in XX. The Controversy Between the Puritans & the Stage in Yale Studies in English PhD diss. (NY: Henry Holt & Co., 1903), ch. 14
.
American History
On the Late-1800’s to 1900’s
Berry, John M. & Frances Panchok – ‘Church & Theatre’ in U.S. Catholic Historian, vol. 6, no. 2/3, American Fiction & Catholic Culture (Spring – Summer, 1987), pp. 151-79
.
Latin Articles
1600’s
Voet, Gisbert – Select Theological Disputations (Utrecht, 1667), vol. 4
24. Second, ‘Of Comedies’ 356
25. Another Part 367-85
.
On the Lawfulness of Theater
Quotes
Order of
Vermigli
Stubbes
Sanderson
Baxter
Collier
.
1500’s
Peter Martyr Vermigli
The Common Places… (London: Rowe, 1583), pt. 2, ch. 12, 8th Commandment, ‘Of Plays or Pastimes,’ p. 527
“But now to conclude, me thinks that those kind of [stage] plays, which serve for refreshing of men’s strength, are not utterly to be forbidden.”
.
Philip Stubbes
Intro
Stubbes (c. 1555 – c. 1610) was an English pamphleteer of the puritan persuasion (as is clear from Thompson, Controversy, pp. 83-84). His 208 page Anatomy of Abuses (1583) “was deservedly the most popular and influential book of its kind ever written”. 6 pages of it treat of stage plays: ‘Of Stage-Plays & Interludes, with their wickedness’. Thompson gives a sketch of Stubbes’s outlook.
.
On Stubbes’ Outlook
Elbert N.S. Thompson, XX. The Controversy Between the Puritans & the Stage in Yale Studies in English PhD diss. (NY: Henry Holt & Co., 1903), pp. 81-82
“The Anatomie of Abuses probably carried additional weight with a certain class, because in its attitude toward the drama it took in the first edition a liberal position. The preface of that edition was careful to explain that its author did not condemn all plays.
‘Who seeth not,’ it read, ‘that some kind of playes, tragedies and enterluds, in their own nature are not onely of great ancientie, but also very honest and very commendable exercyses,’ containing matter ‘both of doctrine, erudition, good example, and wholsome instruction; And may be vsed, in tyme and place conuenient, as conducible to example of life and reformation of maners.’
In thus commending ‘honest & chast playes’ as a Godly recreation of the min,’ and as a ‘good example of life,’ Stubbes advanced close to Lodge’s position. Yet, strange to say, in all subsequent editions this explanatory preface was left out.”
.
1600’s
Robert Sanderson
Bishop Sanderson his Judgment in One View for the Settlement of the Church in Reason & Judgement, or, Special Remarks of the Life of the Renowned Dr. Sanderson… (London: Marsh, 1663), pp. 75-77 Sanderson (1587–1663) was an Anglican bishop, theologian and casuist.
“And I dare say, whosoever shall peruse with a judicious and unpartial eye most of those pamphlets, that in this daring age have been thrust into the world against… (…things of lesser regard and usefulness and more open to acception [exception] and abuse, yet so far as I can understand, unjustly condemned as things utterly unlawful, such as are lusorious lots, dancing, stage plays and some other things of like nature), when he shall have drained out the bitter invectives, unmannerly jeers, petulant guirding at those that are in authority, impertinent digressions, but above all those most bold and perverse wrestings of holy Scripture, wherewith such books are infinitely stuffed, he shall find that little poor remainder that is left behind to contain nothing but vain words and empty arguments.
For when these great undertakers have snatched up the bucklers, as if they would make it good against all comers, that such and such things are utterly unlawful, and therefore ought in all reason and conscience to bring such proofs as will come up to that conclusion: Quid dignum tanto? very seldom shall you hear from them any other arguments than such as will conclude but an inexpediency at the most, as that they are apt to give scandal, that they carry with them an appearance of evil, that they are often occasions of sin, that they are not command[ed] in the Word, and such like.
Which objections, even where they are just, are not of force (no not taken altogether, much less any of them singly) to prove a thing to be utterly unlawful. And yet are they glad many times, rather than sit out, to play very small game and to make use of arguments yet weaker than these and such as will not reach so far as to prove a bare inexpediency, as that they were invented by heathens, that they have been abused in Popery and other such like. Which to my understanding is a very strong presumption that they have taken a very weak cause in hand and such as is wholly destitute of sound proof.”
.
Richard Baxter
A Christian Directory… (London: White, 1673), pt. 3, ‘Christian Ecclesiastics’, Question 114, ‘Whether Stage-Plays where the Virtuous & Vicious are Personated, be Lawful?’ [Yes], pp. 877-78
“As I am not willing to thrust any man into extremes, nor to trouble men with calling those sins which God has not forbidden…
1. It is not absolutely unlawful to personate another man, nor does the Second Commandment forbid such living images in this extent…
2. To personate good men in good actions, is not simply unlawful…
3. To personate a bad man, in a bad action, is more dubious; but seems not to be in all cases unlawful…
4. I think it possible to devise and act a comedy or tragedy which should be lawful and very edifying. It might be so ordered by wise men…
5. I think I never knew or heard of a lawful stage-play, comedy or tragedy in the age that I have lived in: And that those now commonly used, are not only sins, but heinous aggravated sins, for these reasons:”
.
1700’s
Jeremy Collier
A Letter to a Lady concerning a New Playhouse (London: Downing, 1706), p. 4 Collier (1650-1726) was a non-juror, Anglican bishop and theologian who was a leader in opposing theaters in England, working for their removal.
“…I do not now affirm that it is absolutely and altogether unlawful ever to go to see a play.”
.
Acting Doesn’t Inherently Break the 9th Commandment, ‘Though shalt not bear false witness.’
Quotes
Order of
Ames
Baxter
.
1600’s
William Ames
The Marrow of Theology, ed. John D. Eusden (Baker, 1997), bk. 2, ch. 21, ‘Telling the Truth’, p. 326
“20. Irony, stories, jests, repetitions of false things and the like are not lies for they are not testimonies. They are not testimonies because they are not confirmed by the credit and authority of the speaker.”
.
Richard Baxter
A Christian Directory… (London: White, 1673), pt. 3, ‘Christian Ecclesiastics’, Question 114, ‘Whether Stage-Plays where the Virtuous & Vicious are Personated, be Lawful?’ [Yes], p. 877
“1. It is not absolutely unlawful to personate another man, nor does the Second Commandment forbid such living Images in this extent. I pass by the instance of the woman of Tekoah, 2 Sam. 14, because the bare history proves not the lawfulness. But Paul’s speaking as of himself and Apollos the things which concerned others, was approvable: And as Christ frequently taught by parables, so his parables were a description of good and evil, by the way of feigned history, as if such and such things had been done by such persons as never were. And this fiction is no falsehood; For the hearer knows that it is not meant as an historical narrative, but a parable; And it is but an image in words, or a painted doctrine. And if a person and action may be feigned by words, I know not where it is forbidden to feign them by personal representation. Therefore to personate another is not simply a sin.
2. To personate good men in good actions is not simply unlawful: because: 1. It is not unlawful as it is personating, as is showed: 2. Nor as lying: Because it is not an asserting, but a representing; nor so taken.
3. To personate a bad man in a bad action, is more dubious; but seems not to be in all cases unlawful. To pass by David’s feigning himself mad (as of uncertain quality) it is common with preachers to speak oft the words of wicked men, as in their names or persons, to disgrace them: And Prov. 5:11-12, etc. comes near it. And whether Job be a history, or a dialogue personating such speakers, is doubted by the most learned expositors.”
.
.
Bibliographies
Articles
1800’s
Malcom, Howard – ‘Stage Plays’ in Theological Index... (Boston: Gould & Lincoln, 1868), p. 434
.
1900’s
Wilson, J. Dover – III. ‘The Puritan Attack upon the Stage’ in The Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature ed. F.W. Bateson (NY: Macmillan Co., 1941), vol. 1 (600-1660), Renaissance to the Restoration (1500-1660), ch. 3, ‘The Drama’, pp. 507-13 See also the whole of ch. 3, ‘The Drama’, pp. 487-663 ToC Vol. 2 of The Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature (1660-1800) does not have a section on the the critique of theater.
.
.
.
“Thou also, son of man, take thee a tile, and lay it before thee, and portray upon it the city, even Jerusalem: and lay siege against it, and build a fort against it… Moreover take thou unto thee an iron pan, and set it for a wall of iron between thee and the city: and set thy face against it, and it shall be besieged… This shall be a sign to the house of Israel.
Lie thou also upon thy left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it: according to the number of the days that thou shalt lie upon it thou shalt bear their iniquity. For I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days… and thine arm shall be uncovered, and thou shalt prophesy against it. And, behold, I will lay bands upon thee, and thou shalt not turn thee from one side to another, till thou hast ended the days of thy siege.”
Eze. 4:1-8
“And the Lord sent Nathan unto David… and said unto him, ‘There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor. The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds… And David’s anger was greatly kindled against the man… And Nathan said to David, ‘Thou art the man.'”
2 Sam. 12:1
“Beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good. He that doeth good is of God: but he that doeth evil hath not seen God.”
3 Jn. 11
.
.
.
Related Pages
On Lots, Gambling, Dice, Games & Using Free & Contingent Causes
On the Ethics of Material Cooperation with, & Associations with Evil