Naming the Spirit: Pneumatology Through the Arts. (David O. Taylor & Daniel Train, editors) - Review
What does the Holy Spirit have to do with the arts and
culture? It’s possible that there is a strong connection between the Spirit and
the arts. Of course, when it comes to defining the person of the Holy Spirit, there
are many definitions. After all, the Spirit is like the wind that cannot be
tamed. Using that metaphor, like the wind, it can be tapped into but not
controlled. Perhaps something similar could be said about the arts, at least in
terms of the variety of definitions. The arts include paintings and sculpture,
but also film, photography, writing, and more. So, might it be possible to
consider the nature of the Holy Spirit (pneumatology) through the arts? That is
the premise of Naming the Spirit.
Naming the Spirit: Pneumatology
Through the Arts offers the reader a series of essays edited by W. David O.
Taylor, Associate Professor of Theology and Culture at Fuller Theological
Seminary, and Daniel Train, an assistant professor of theology and the arts at
Duke Divinity School. The book features a foreword by Amos Yong, a Pentecostal
theologian and professor of theology and mission at Fuller Theological Seminary.
As Yong reminds us, the essays we find in Naming the Spirit" help
us "experience the beautiful as pneumatized" (p. xiii). That is what
we find in this collection of essays: a reflection on various forms of beauty
that reveal something intriguing about the Holy Spirit.
Taylor and Train have brought
together a series of essayists, who have been charged with reflecting on the
work of the Holy Spirit through the lenses provided by the arts. This project
is part of a larger movement within the discipline of theology to engage with
the arts. In this case, the editors and the essayists they engaged to participate
in this project seek to “pursue a doctrinally rigorous engagement of the arts.
Such an engagement, we believe, is best done when informed by the full
resources of church tradition and scriptural imagination, while also critically
attentive to the unique challenges of the Christian faith in our contemporary
times and grounded in the real-world concerns of our neighbors” (p. 3). When it
comes to defining the arts, the essayists remind us that art is more than
paintings and sculpture. Therefore, as I noted above, the essayists reflect on
pneumatology through forms of art and culture that range from paintings to
music to film to landscape architecture. As the editors note, they
"invited the contributors of this volume to focus on the doctrine of the
persona and work of the Holy Spirit and to explore how such a doctrine might
both illuminate and be illuminated through a work of art." With that in
mind, each of the essayists was asked to choose one of the names of the Holy
Spirit and then bring that name or concept into conversation with a
"particular form of art" (pp. 3-4).
Appropriately, I suppose, the first
essay, which is authored by Steven Guthrie, focuses on "The identity of
the Holy Spirit and the Posture of the Artist." This chapter provides the
foundation for what is to come by connecting the Holy Spirit with the work of
the artist, whatever art form that might involve. The keyword spoken of here is
the Greek word pneuma and the Hebrew ruach, which can also be translated
as wind and breath. However, the focus here is on the Spirit (pneuma/ruach)
as the “life-giving breath of God.” As such,
Guthrie reminds us that as the breath of life, the Spirit is ubiquitous. That
is the Spirit is “within us and around us, preceding and following, the source
and supply of all that is, the life of God, given to creation that it might
live, sustaining all that breathes, by God’s own divine breath” (pp. 17-18).
With Guthrie’s reminder as to the nature of the Spirit, we move to Chapter 2, which
is authored by Jonathan Anderson. He adds another level to the discussion by
imagining the outpouring of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost and its
influence on the way the arts are understood. This chapter does include images
and reflections on them, allowing us to consider the visual nature of theology,
especially pneumatology.
With these opening chapters laying
a foundation for further reflection, the remaining essayists pick out images of
the work of the Holy Spirit and engage them through specific forms of art,
including music, film, poetry, and landscape architecture. What we discover
here is a rather nuanced and fulsome encounter with the Holy Spirit. Thus,
Christina Carnes Anandias explores Basil of Caesarea’s understanding of the
Trinity, which develops more fully the doctrine of the Holy Spirit in his book On
the Holy Spirit, through the lens of Olafur Eliasson’s piece titled “Beauty.”
There is an essay by Erin Shaw and Taylor Worley titled “The Spirit of Shalom”
that reflects on the idea of kincentricity through contemporary Native art. There
are several essays that reflect on the intersection of poetry and pneumatology,
as well as essays about music, including Black spirituals and Charles Wesley’s
hymns. Finally, there is an essay about the art of landscape architecture. The
message that one finds relayed through these essays is that in the diverse
expressions of artwork, one can better understand the fuller dimensions of the
person of the Holy Spirit.
Collections of essays are difficult
to review because each essay is different in scope and focus. The two
connectors here are the theological category of pneumatology and the diverse
nature of art, whether paintings or landscape architecture, poetry, or music.
One of the benefits of a book like this is that it underscores the premise that
humanity shares in the creative nature of God, through the life-giving breath
of God (the Holy Spirit). Too often in history, we have failed to acknowledge
the creative potential intrinsic to humanity and how this creative potential
can help us better understand the nature of God. As with any collection of
essays, some essays will be of greater interest to a reader than others. That
is to be expected and welcomed. It is important to know going in that this is
not a book about painting and sculpture, though they are included in the
conversation. This is art writ large. As readers engage with the essays found in Naming the Spirit, they
will gain a fuller understanding of the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, but also
how art reflects the presence of the Spirit in the world.
Copies of Naming the Spirit can be purchased at your favorite retailer, including my Amazon affiliate and Bookshop.org affiliate.
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