Actually,
the History of Christian Drama started as long as the world began and if we
want to tell the story of Christian Drama you can imagine that all the book of
this world can never contain the outcome from Genesis to Revelation. To learn
more about this refer to my write up on Origin of Christian Drama and Film.
Now
let's take a brief look on what has happened in Christian Drama World after
Bible time. I categorized this into three major period of time, namely;
i.
Medieval Period
ii. Puritan
Period
iii.
Modern Age
MEDIEVAL
PERIOD: During this period of time Churches in Europe frequently performed what
they called Mystery Plays. It is about retelling different stories of
the Bible. This can also be referred to as Liturgical Plays because
it was totally based on everything pertaining to Church mode of worship which
was developed totally on presentation of Bible stories in churches accompanying
by hymns and other kind of Christian Religious Songs. As the drama became more
popular in those day it became more secular as well because many un-church
people and non-clergy also showed interest and began to participate, this lead
to its movement from the church by the year 13th or 14th century, which was
later took over by the guilds, each guild, each guild took upon itself a
particular piece of scriptural history and is why it was called Mystery Play
through guild control.
According
to Wikipedia:
"The
mystery play developed into a series of plays dealing with all the major events
in the Christian calendar, from the Creation to the Day of Judgment. By the end
of the 15th century, the tradition of acting these plays in cycles on festival
days (such as the Feast of Corpus Christi) was established across Europe."
During
this same medieval period, Mystery Play was developed into what was called
Morality Play. these were allegories in which the protagonists represented or
personified various moral attitudes and this promoted the effects of
living a life of virtue and good character worthy of emulations.
PURITAN
AGE: During this age that fell between sixteenth and eighteenth century, the
work of drama or theater was generally seen as wicked, ungodly and unscriptural,
this made church of God made serious attempts to do away with it and pronounced
it illegal.
Wikipedia
has it that in the United States around eighteenth century the condemnation of
drama or theater was widely spread which led President Timothy Dwight IV of
Yale College to declare in one of his "Essay on the Stage" that
"to indulge a taste for playgoing means nothing more or less than the loss
of that most valuable treasure: the immortal soul."
Imagine
the meaning of that sentence deeply. The essay simply waged severe war on
drama or going to the theater. The man said in another words that to get
yourself involve in drama or theater going was like playing with your eternal
and invaluable soul meaning that doing so would lead you to hell.
MODERN
AGE: The twentieth churches now rediscovered the use of theater as a kind of
unique form of outreach to win soul for Christ: most especially evangelicals.
In
Britain during this period it was illegal for any human actor to portray a
divine personality on stage, this place a severe restrictions on Christian
theater. Does it possible for Christian Drama ministers to act without
presenting God, Jesus or Angel?
Wiki
then has it that; in 1941/1942 there was a ground breaking radio drama called
'The Man Born to Be King" that destroyed the ban by including Jesus as
character and even given him ordinary speech rather than biblical language. The
law didn't cover Radio Portrayals
then. Though the piece drew a lot of complaints, but there was nothing anyone
can do, that was how that barrier was broken. See how God used the weak thing
of the world to cause breakthrough in the world of Christian Drama.
The
play of T. S. Eliot called Murder in the Cathedral explore Christian theme of
martyrdom and sacrifice; brought into lime light what has happened in the
church history.
Many plays
were also produced explaining Christian subjects, remarkably revealing Jesus
Christ Superstar and the Gospel or Godspell. This brought many churches again
to be turning to the use of drama as a means of reaching out to others about
their faith in Christ. And small Christian theater began to spring up in
Britain and America. Heaven’s Gate, Hell’s Flames were used for evangelism and
a company called Covenant Players was founded 1963 for the purpose of producing
Christian plays written by its founder.
The same way Truth Star Productions’ ICT Research Institute was founded in
Nigeria for the purpose of online and offline research and to produce Christian
movie across the earth apart from its own ministry’s film; The Pillar and
Ground of the Truth (PGTM) Films in 1990. During this twentieth century as well
in Nigeria we have many hero of drama, those who supposed to be called pioneers
of Christian drama, Duro Ladipo, Hubert Ogunde, Moses Olaiya, etc. I learnt
that most of them began their theatre career in the church but later end up in
the secular. We also thank the Almighty for raising the real pioneer of Christian
drama; Mount Zion Faith Ministry in 1985. The Pillar and Ground of the Truth Ministry
in 1990, EVOM World Network, and others for the propagation of the gospel
through drama, theatre and home video films.
