Revisionist Theologies of Salvation

What unites revisionist theologies of the cross is the rejection (sometimes with qualification) of the idea of vicarious substitution and the Anselmian analysis of its rationale. They all reject or reinterpret the doctrine of “original sin.” They propose an “existential” interpretation of the cross, and relate it to the imperative for human liberation. These ideas are in continuity with liberal theology of the nineteenth century. What is more specifically novel is their reliance on critical biblical studies and above all their acceptance of contemporary science, especially its account of human evolution.

The Theological Mediation

This chapter examines late modern reappropriations of the classical theology of the cross. In continuity with medieval and Reformation theology, these hold that Christ’s suffering was a divinely willed redemptive act, in vicarious satisfaction for human sin. The neo-orthodoxy of Karl Barth, in line with the Reformed tradition, emphasizes election and covenant. The theme of divine kenosis, found in nineteenth century German an English thinkers, is taken up into Orthodox trinitarian soteriology by the Russian theologian Sergei Bulgakov, with strong attention to Patristic dogma. Hans Urs von Balthasar stresses Christ’s “descent into hell” as the central symbol of the divine entry into the lost human condition. Jürgen Moltmann sees the suffering of God as the only possible theological response to the horrors of the twentieth century, especially the Holocaust.

The Passion in Film

In general film treatments of the Passion fall into a few categories or types. Obviously, these categories are general characterizations of approaches, and may sometimes overlap. (1) During the first fifty years of the genre’s existence, most “Jesus” films took a traditional religious approach, being more or less faithful to the Gospels. (2) In the latter part of the twentieth century films increasingly attempted to treat the Passion as a realistic narrative. (3) Others deal with the Passion as a historical narrative that also functions as a “myth” with universal significance. (4) The story of Jesus’ crucifixion may be combined with explicitly fictional elements. (5) The Passion is also represented in a theatrical context. (6) In a number of films the Passion of Christ figures as a secondary element in a story about another figure or event. (7) Finally, there are films not about the Passion itself but about portraying the Passion.

The Cross in Music

Like art, music proliferated in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Although only a very small part of that output consisted of religious music, and even less of sacred music that involves the cross, the field is still too large to be covered with depth or completeness in this study. The goal of this chapter is simply to provide a necessarily incomplete survey, with special attention to views of salvation and the place of the cross in it. The purview will be restricted to liturgical and concert music, for the most part leaving aside popular music both inside and outside institutional religion. Attention will focus largely on the texts that composers have set and the ways in which their music augments the theological and religious meanings indicated or implied in them. The chapter deals with music of the Passion written after 1900.

The Cross in Spirituality

Spirituality may be based on an explicit conceptual theology; or it may be relatively unreflective on the conceptual level. It operates primarily not on the conceptual but on the aesthetic or imaginative level. It symbolically mediates and expresses a relation to God and to the world, and implies a certain intellectual (but not necessarily conceptual) formulation and certain modes of acting, both religious and secular. The traditional spirituality of the cross, involving appropriating Christ’s sacrifice and joining with his suffering, was strongly represented in a number of twentieth-century figures, including several stigmatics, people who showed the signs of Christ’s crucifixion on their bodies. At the same time, liberation theologies stress, solidarity with those who suffer “the cross” in our own times, and include a spirituality of social reform.

Conclusion

Most of this book consists in the exposition of others’ images and ideas. In this last chapter, the purpose is more personal: by way of commentary and expansion it will offer thoughts and views regarding a few of the major themes that have been treated in the art and theology of the cross. It first considers the relation of theology as concept to theology as image. This issue underlies many of the conflicts that seem to arise in the confrontation of theology with religious practice. The question of suffering in God is an example. The final section attempts to present elements of a possible contemporary spirituality of the cross.

The Cross in Modern Visual Art

This chapter looks at treatments of the cross in “fixed” images: painting and drawing, sculpture, and photography. The first part examines the cross in its traditional religious setting. Among the major artists covered are Maurice Denis, Georges Rouault, and Salvador Dalí. The second part surveys the use of the cross in secular settings. The crucifixion of Jesus here becomes a metaphor for the unjust sufferings of others: humanity in general; the artist; the Jewish people; persecuted groups like women or blacks; victims of political and social injustice; those oppressed by the church. The crucifixion also becomes an established artistic genre, without a particular message.