Abstract
This latest volume in Jeremy Begbie’s contribution to the dialogue between theology and the arts aims to unpack, critique and rearticulate a concept of transcendence. ‘For many,’ Begbie notes, ‘the arts powerfully signal realities exceeding what we can know and tell’ (p. 1). It is this phenomenon of excess, of an experience in the arts that often propels us ‘beyond’, that he seeks to address, and redress, in the light of Trinitarian faith.
Begbie begins with some contemporary ways in which art and transcendence are being spoken of together: unpacking paintings, film, music and architecture, and the theological aesthetics of David Brown and George Steiner. It is a varied and fascinating diet, from which he identifies key assumptions about the arts as ‘harbingers of divine transcendence’ (p. 37): that transcendence is (1) discovered at our limits of representation, (2) best understood in generalized ideas of God’s activity, (3) apprehended through an innate human capacity, and (4) can be spelled out in unitarian terms, unfazed by a Trinitarian account of God. The book then takes a step backwards to explore the theme of the sublime, which lingers behind much of the previous discussion. We journey through Kant’s important account of the sublime(s) and its persistence and revision in Romanticism (from Friedrich to Turner to Wordsworth to Beethoven), before drawing on recent theological contributions by Graham Ward, John Milbank, Nicholas Wolterstorff and Rowan Williams – essential interlocutors for such a subject – creating a very rich conceptual engagement.
At this halfway juncture in the book, Begbie tries to construct a new direction in the conversation on transcendence and the arts in the light of his pervading critiques thus far. What account of transcendence emerges, he asks, if the starting point is a scriptural and doctrinal account of God as Trinity? From Johannine and patristic texts, Begbie explores how Trinitarian doctrine offers distinctive ideas about otherness, relationality, presence and gift, which transform how we understand transcendence. This is a dense chapter, and one that seeks to reset the conversational starting point. There is at play a methodological twist – for many artists and aesthetic theologians, the arts are a powerful springboard to considering the divine, while in Begbie’s approach it is the revealed truth about God’s own life that compels us into artistic enterprise.
Begbie’s final task is to elucidate his vision for the transcendent potential of the arts in the light of his Trinitarian reshaping of the concept of transcendence. By this point, the specific avenues of the earlier chapters seem sadly rather distant, having been distilled into more generalized notions and assumptions. Here in the book, for those well acquainted with Begbie’s broader works, there is little new in what is offered, although the final chapter does provide a helpful compendium of many of his finest contributions and most distinctive insights with regard to the dialogue between theology and the arts.