Prophet In Celluloid?
Cecil B. DeMille Autobiography (Prentice-Hall, 1959, 465 pp., $5.95) is reviewed by Richard C. Halverson, Pastor of Fourth Presbyterian Church, Washington, D. C., and Associate Executive Director, International Christian Leadership.
Was Cecil B. DeMille a “prophet in celluloid … who brought the Word of God to more people than any other man” … or “an apostle of sex, sin, and salvation, who used these commodities as a gimmick to sell synthetic religion” (Cue, Nov. 21, 1959)?
Probably neither, certainly not the latter. He was a man of conviction and vision who worked harder than most because of his conviction. He believed that the theatre, more particularly motion pictures, would get the right message to the most people most effectively.
(According to Y. Frank Freeman, vice-president of Paramount Pictures, DeMille films have been seen by more than four billion people, one and a half times the present population of the world. The latest release of “The Ten Commandments, which cost 13¼ million dollars to produce and grossed over 83½ million, has been seen by more than 98,500,000 people.)
DeMille exploited with unusual success the finest tool of mass communication ever possessed by man. He never pretended disinterest in the commercial opportunities. Nevertheless, he had a sense of calling which he shared with his father who, though trained for the Episcopal priesthood, never accepted ordination because he felt his ministry was to write for the theatre.
Describing the primitive circumstances under which they were forced to live while shooting the Mt. Sinai scenes of the Ten Commandments, he wrote, “the rigors seem well worth while. We are bringing to the screen of the world for the first time, in all their awesome grandeur, the very places where Moses talked with God and received the Law by which mankind must learn to live or perish” (p. 426).
DeMille sensed, as perhaps no other man, the potential power of motion pictures, and he was dedicated to the finest use of the medium. At the time of his death, he had projected an article for CHRISTIANITY TODAY, on the subject of the moral and spiritual responsibility of Hollywood. He detested commercialism and compromise. Speaking of the depression’s effect on the industry he wrote, “Some producers began to inject into their pictures more and more elements which caused the menace of censorship to rumble again. Perhaps they thought that it was the cheapest way to hold a dwindling audience. It was cheap, in every meaning of the word” (p. 298). He wrote, “The problem of morality in films remains. Despite the fact that the most successful pictures of all time have been films to which anyone could have taken his children without having to brainwash them afterward, there will always be a few producers who mistakenly believe that dirt will necessarily turn out to be pay dirt” (p. 240).
While working on “The Ten Commandments” in Egypt in 1954, DeMille had a heart attack. Ordered to complete rest for weeks, he was at work next day. “I did not tell the doctors what I was thinking,” he wrote (p. 429) “that if my motives in making the film were what I thought they were, I would be given the strength to finish it. I was 73 years old. That was a lifetime long enough for a man to have learned something of the ways and power of God; and long enough to make it not so very important if one’s greatest effort turned out to be his last.”
DeMille gives little evidence of an evangelical understanding of the Bible in his book or films. If he knew the Gospel, he did not communicate it, unless “King of Kings” be considered the exception. One wishes he might have had the perception to produce a distinctly Christian picture such as others have done with exceptional results in spite of ridiculously low budgets.
This fascinating story is not so much about one man as it is a chronicle of an era and an industry. It introduces the outsider to a most intimate view of the Hollywood which evangelicals tend to repudiate carte blanche. There are many more important books for the earnest Christian reader, but this well-written volume ought to challenge the evangelical who understands the motion picture to be a business, a science, an art, and a strategy by which the Good News of Christ may be told. God grant that Christians may find a way to exploit this exceptional medium with ever-increasing effectiveness. Communism will!
RICHARD C. HALVERSON
Unfolding World View
Not Disobedient unto the Heavenly Vision, by Harold Paul Sloan (Herald Press, 1958, 166 pp., $2.25), is reviewed by Harold B. Kuhn, Professor of the Philosophy of Religion, Asbury Theological Seminary.
It is only occasionally that an eminent pulpiteer is able, after formal retirement, to bring the thoughts which have been for a long time maturing in his mind into a readable compass. Dr. Sloan’s volume seeks to elaborate the impact which the initial starting point of Christian faith may have for the unfolding of a world view. The work assumes that there is a grand design in history which God unfolded “in its basics” in the incarnation and cross of Christ, and which is moving toward a triumphant fulfillment.
Not Disobedient unto the Heavenly Vision traces a series of questions which are pertinent “along the way”: human moral freedom, the origin of evil, the extent of redemption, the moral relative and the moral absolute, and the Christian understanding of the Person of our Lord. The author sees fit, for the sake of discussion, to leave more issues open than many others would do. Perhaps this is because his own grasp upon Christian essentials is so strong. Not all will agree upon some details of his metaphysics, and certainly not all will follow his venture at explanation of the question of eternal punishment. However, no one can read the volume without being stimulated to thought and to a deepened conviction at many key points in Christian theology.
HAROLD B. KUHN
Pitfall Of The Cliche
The Doctrine of Grace in the Apostolic Fathers, by Thomas F. Torrance (Eerdmans, 1959, 150 pp., $3), is reviewed by Lewis B. Smedes, Professor of Bible at Calvin College.
Almost every student has wondered at the big step he takes downward in evangelical perception when he takes the short step in time from the Apostles to the Apostolic Fathers. Even the non-specialist cannot fail to be impressed that the fervent moralism which pervades the writings of the Apostolic Fathers is markedly different from the Pauline doctrine of grace. Dr. Thomas Torrance of Scotland determined some years ago to find the key that would explain the Fathers’ failure to sustain the theme of grace so clearly taught by Paul. His thesis, published this year by Eerdmans, is that the Fathers failed to continue the theology of grace because they failed to find the center for their thought where the Gospel finds it, in the person and work of Christ. Torrance makes his point with historical scholarship and theological discernment. The point, however, is more than a footnote to theological history; it is a warning to theologians and preachers of every age.
The Apostolic Fathers were not ignorant of the meaning of Christ’s death. Clement wrote that Christ’s blood was “given on behalf of us.” Ignatius, in whom Torrance finds more Gospel than in most of his contemporaries, wrote that Christ “endured all His sufferings on account of us, that we might live in Him.” Barnabas spoke of the Lord giving himself to death for us that we might be cleansed by the remission of our sins. But, as J. N. D. Kelly observed (in his Early Christian Doctrines), these and like statements have the ring only of conventional clichés in the Fathers and fall short of being at all central to their thought.
To the Apostolic Fathers, Jesus Christ was primarily a lawgiver, whose death awakens in us a repentance for sin, which in turn motivates us to follow in his law of life. Jesus was for them also the giver of new knowledge by which we can find better the true way in which he urges us to walk. Grace was present in this setting, but primarily as divine assistance in man’s striving to follow the way Christ marked out for him. Grace was not the brand new relationship created by God for man in the event of the Cross. Hence, the Christian life was for the Fathers not so much a response to the declaration that God had reconciled the world to himself in Christ as it was a response to the imperative implied in Christ’s new law of life.
There were, writes Torrance, many factors that contributed to the Fathers’ failure to carry into the second century the clear message of grace that formed the heart of first century proclamation. One of these was the influence that Judaistic thought had on the Church in spite of Paul’s heroic efforts to stifle it. Another was the influence of the Hellenistic patterns of thought from which the converted Greek seemed never quite able to free himself. Both of these, having something religiously in common anyway, were unable to grasp the centrality of grace because they were unable to grasp the centrality of the person and work of Jesus Christ. It was not so much that they understood it and decided instead for Christian moralism. They never seemed to sense that they were teaching something variant from Paul’s doctrine. To them, the person and work of Christ always remained secondary to the divine teacher. Hence, grace was secondary to ethics, man’s humble acceptance of the Atonement was second in importance to man’s valiant struggle for obedience.
Dr. Torrance has without doubt read the Apostolic Fathers thoroughly and correctly. He has with this book made a genuine contribution to the historical study of theology. My only reservation is the fear that the truth of Dr. Torrance’s thesis about the Apostolic Fathers may contribute further to an already common evangelical assumption that there is little in any of the ancients to teach the children of today. Be that as it may, this book has a message for contemporary evangelical theology. When what is central to the Gospel becomes a conventional cliché rather than the determinative theme for all theologizing, we are likely to lose sight of the powerful truth hidden in the cliché.
LEWIS B. SMEDES
Roman Catholic Mirror
Protestantism by Georges Tavard, translated by Rachel Attwater (Hawthorn, 1959, 139 pp., $2.95), is reviewed by Earle E. Cairns, Chairman of the History and Political Science Department, Wheaton College (Illinois).
A growing literature indicates that Roman Catholics and Protestants are trying to understand each other. Protestants have interpreted Protestantism to Roman Catholics. In this book a Roman Catholic interprets Protestantism to Roman Catholics ironically, sympathetically, and accurately as a sincere but, from his viewpoint, illegal break with the infallible teaching of the Church guarded by bishops and the Pope (p. 7).
After a brief but helpful historical survey of Protestant groups in chapter one, essential differences between Rome and Protestantism are examined. Justification by faith and the authority of Scripture are not alien to the Roman tradition of subjective faith, but the examination of objective faith (doctrine) by Scripture is condemned. Greater differences exist in the views of the number and essence of the sacraments and the nature of the Church. Protestants err, he writes, in separating the spiritual priesthood of believers from the institution of hierarchy (p. 47). Chapters five through eight examine revivalistic Protestantism which puts Scripture or the inner light above the Church, liberal Protestantism which reduces the Gospel to pragmatic philanthropy, neo-orthodoxy which is a reaction from subjective liberalism, and Anglicanism with Protestant theology in an episcopal framework in which bishops are “fathers” rather than “teachers” (pp. 100, 105). Finally he suggests that these groups are being oriented to Protestant unity in the World Council of Churches alongside Roman Catholic unity (p. 131). Protestants must examine tradition and Roman Catholics scrutinize justification by faith as both face the problem of de-christianization of the masses.
Tavard will not admit that Protestantism is more than a split in the cultural and spiritual unity of Christendom (p. 133), and he ignores papal infallibility in a manner which seems to make Roman Catholicism only a deeper Anglicanism. Nevertheless, Protestants will profit by seeing themselves in this Roman Catholic mirror.
EARLE E. CAIRNS
Holy Land Guide
The Antiquities of Jordan, by G. Lankester Harding (Thomas Y. Crowell, 1960, 206 pp., $4.75), is reviewed by G. Douglas Young, Director of Israel-American Institute of Biblical Studies, Inc.
This is a fascinating double-duty book, half travelogue and half history and description of archaeological sites. Professor W. F. Albright says of it: “His book is by far the best guide to the splendid cities of Eastern Palestine—Petra, Gerasa, Philadelphia, and others—but it can be read at home with enjoyment and it contains a wealth of new material for the specialist and the student of Bible times.”
The geography, history, climate, and archaeological sites are described in detail. Thirty-one excellently-chosen plates illustrate the text. There are also 10 maps and site plans.
Particularly interesting are the chapters on Jerash, Petra, Jericho, and Qumran, the site of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The sound archaeological and historical references and the interesting horney autobiographical touches make the reading fascinating. Little is lacking in his description of the important sites. The description of Petra is beautifully done. The description of the community of Qumran with its numbered map makes a visit to the site very meaningful.
There is little to criticize in the book. Some would not agree with the dating of the destruction of Jericho in the thirteenth century. That is the typical view of most archaeologists today, however.
This is the kind of book that would make any trip to a part of the Bible Land more meaningful.
G. DOUGLAS YOUNG
Bright On Israel
A History of Israel, by John Bright (Westminster Press, 1959, 500 pp., $7.50), is reviewed by James L. Kelso, Professor of Old Testament History and Archaeology, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
John Bright’s A History of Israel will supersede all other works in that field. There is nothing else in condensed form that is as exhaustive and exacting as this book. The footnotes alone are a unique collection of the most important research data in this field whether published at home or abroad. Dr. Bright is one of the most brilliant scholars of the Albright school and is well qualified both as a linguist and archaeologist to handle the data involved. Lie insists on the historicity of the Old Testament, even in the Pentateuch, where scholars such as Noth will not yet allow Israel a true history.
The average reader should work his way slowly through this book because of the wealth of new data which is given, even though in highly condensed form. This is an interpretative history and the author insists that the Bible be read alongside his interpretation. The author is limited by space and must omit some features, but he tries to be consistent with the overall picture of each period.
The prologue of the book is an excellently condensed resume of the history of the ancient Orient up to about 2000 B.C. Then comes a detailed picture of the Near East out of which came the patriarchs. His conclusion is that the patriarchal narratives are truly rooted in history and that the patriarchs themselves are historical persons.
The periods of the Exodus and Conquest are illustrated with both Egyptian and Palestinian archeological data. A special chapter is devoted to the constitution and faith of early Israel which stresses the covenant concept. Beginning with the Kingdom phase of Israel, Bright follows something of the general pattern of other historians but always adds new material and often reinterprets earlier information. His archeological training enables him to handle this material well. If any reader thinks the theological emphasis is slighted in this history, let him remember that Bright’s book on The Kingdom of God has already stressed this feature. The closing chapters show something of the inter-Testament material which sets the stage for the New Testament and Christ.
At first reading one may be tempted to hurry through the book as a glance at the page ahead usually suggests green pastures. But all the while the reader will resolve to return and go over the data with closest scrutiny. The footnotes are virtually a syllabus for a graduate course in Old Testament history, and they cover the field magnificently. It is only after one has double-checked this cross reference material that he begins to appreciate the phenomenal labor, the fine judgment, and the gracious spirit of Professor John Bright. Scholars will naturally not go along with him at all points, but each will be the better for having worked with Bright. This is one of the few great books in the field of Old Testament study.
JAMES L. KELSO
Two Voices
The Prophetic Voice in Modern Fiction, by William R. Mueller (Haddam House, 1959, 183 pp., $3.50), is reviewed by Calvin D. Linton, Professor of English Literature, Dean of Columbian College, George Washington University.
Modern secular fiction, says Professor Mueller in this book, provides the perceptive reader with a rich and stimulating introduction to such great biblical themes as the Fall, Judgment, Suffering, Vocation, and Love. In the midst of a civilization made complacent by manifest technological victories, the literary artists, with remarkable acuteness, echo the Old Testament prophets and cry warnings of spiritual sickness beneath material health. (The word “prophetic” in the title denotes the prophet’s diagnostic role, not his predictive one.) True, the messages are oblique and cryptic; also true, the messages are often not in accord with biblical teaching; but for the reader able to search out the spiritual values beneath the allegory, the metaphor, and (above all) the symbol, there emerges what Professor Mueller calls a “rewarding dialogue between the Bible and the secular work.”
His purpose, then, is somewhat similar to that of Virgil in The Divine Comedy. He guides the Dante-reader through the nether and upper regions of six works of modern fiction (by Joyce, Camus, Kafka, Silone, Faulkner, and Graham Greene), and points out the spiritual meanings en route.
Professor Mueller, who teaches English at the Women’s College of the University of North Carolina, is a recognized scholar in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century English literature. His articles have appeared in publications ranging all the way from the Journal of English Literary History to Psychonalysis: Journal of Psychoanalytic Psychology. He is the possessor of what is clearly a deep Christian faith. Why, then, is the book not entirely satisfying?
There are, I think, two reasons. First, it seems to have been very hurriedly written (the volume’s dedication refers to it as the product of a “summer ‘vacation’ ”), with the usual consequences: loose logical linkage, repetitiousness, and a mixture of the overexplained and the underexplained. It reads almost as if it were an early draft of a dictated manuscript—dictated, it is true, by a learned and perceptive scholar. His organizational plan is clear and sensible (each of his six chapters is divided into three parts, one to summarize the work of fiction under study, one to summarize the biblical teaching on the theme, and one to show the relationship between the two), but the parts are not put together with coherence and unity. As a consequence, we have not so much the promised “dialogue” between modern fiction and the Bible as two monologues standing side by side. The third parts of each chapter, which should reveal the intermeshing, often point out little except that both voices have touched on the same theme.
The second reason why unqualified praise cannot be given is that Professor Mueller seems not to have decided to what group of readers he is writing. Generally he expects little knowledge of his reader, and this may be perfectly reasonable since the book is one of a series published for young college students under the sponsorship of the Hazen Foundation and the YW and YMCA organizations. It may be proper, therefore, to define fairly elementary terms (“prelapsarian,” for example), to explain simple biblical texts (we are carefully told that the naming of Peter is important because “the Greek word petra means rock”), and to re-tell, in words of one syllable, the story of Adam and Eve; but the tone is not consistent, and many difficult terms and concepts are left unglossed.
In sum, it is unfortunate that a book on so significant a theme, written by a scholar so notably qualified, has not received the benefit of the additional thought and work needed to turn a pleasant and often informative two hours of reading into a real intellectual experience.
CALVIN D. LINTON
Aid To Parents
The Child in the Christian Home, by Margaret Bailey Jacobsen (Scripture Press, 1959, 200 pp., $4.50), is reviewed by James DeForest Murch, Author of Christian Education and the Local Church.
Parental responsibility for the child’s moral and spiritual growth is a Judeo-Christian principle of major importance for our modern day. Because trustworthy Christian aids to an effective discharge of that duty are all too few, the Jacobsen book is thrice welcome. Soundly scientific in its assumptions and factual information, it is written in simple and practical language. It is applicable to the growing child’s intellectual, social, and spiritual capacities and will help establish durable Christian standards of individual and social life. The volume should be in every home.
JAMES DEFOREST MURCH
