The following interesting and informative question-and-answer is written by Merle Meeter, teacher of English at Dordt College in Sioux Center, Iowa.
1. Q. What is romanticism?
A. Romanticism is a religiously held view of life that tends to absolutize individual, subjective, emotional responses to one’s natural and human environment; moreover, it tends to remove all inhibitions on the imagination and to deify the artist as a godlike creator of meaning. Prominent among the romantics are Goethe, Rousseau, Keats, Shelley, Hawthorne, Melville, and Steinbeck. Instead of the True and Self-existent God of the Scriptures and Christ His Son, the only Redeemer, the romantic ascribes autonomy or ultimate authority to his feelings, his heart , his innately good nature, his mystically “enlightened conscience,” and to a vague and impersonal pantheistic life force—which, predictably, cannot call him into Judgment for violating its will. Romanticism is, finally, a heart-idolatry that despises the inscripturated commandments of God (see Jeremiah 17:9; Job 31:26–28; and John 14:15). It is also at the root of the social gospel.
2. Q. What is naturalism?
A. Naturalism is another religious-philosophical world-and-life view that rejects the Triune, Sovereign God and His Holy Scriptures. It is romanticism angrily disillusioned and gone to seed. The utopian delusion of man as his own creator, meaning-giver, and redeemer has failed, so the naturalist—like the romantic unwilling to acknowledge his sinfulness and need for reconciliation with God in Christ—blames two external factors for his misery: heredity and environment. He maintains that the individual is a victim of cosmic or historical or social or biological forces. Man, therefore, has no freedom of will (and, hence, no accountability), for he is merely a product and puppet of determinism. Naturalism tends to emphasize the sordid, the bestial, the revolting; but it is polemically, even vehemently, humanitarian. Ironically, however, there can be no genuine love for other men where God is not loved above all (see 1 John 4:7–21). Preeminent among the naturalists arc Zola, Maupassant, Chekhov, Dreiser, Crane, Norris, O’Neill, and Hemingway.
3. Q. What is existentialism?
A. Existentialism is also a major philosophical-religious world view, and it is, in turn, a reaction against deterministic naturalism. “Existence precedes essence,” says the existentialist, who maintains that man is what he makes of himself. Man is to be active, engaged, becoming, always striving for authenicity (and against others: “Hell is other people!” says Sartre, trying to shift the blame) by taking the anguished leap of faith into the unknown. Man’s essence is anxiety, struggle, terror, absurdity, for, according to the existentialist, God is either the inscrutable wholly-other, the hidden God, or there is no Creator-God nor revelation of His will. This faith in the void, which comes out of Kierkegaard and Kant, has been popularized by such writers as Sartre, Kafka, Camus, and Karl Barth. The latter has done much to make the Scriptures appear merely existential, subjective, and actualistic: that is, the Bible is not the Word of God, but the Word of God is contained in the Bible or the Bible becomes the Word of God when one believes it. This heresy, of course, denies the inerrancy and infallibility of the Scriptures and, therewith, also repudiates its divine inspiration and authority. Existentialism is a cul-de-sac (a blind alley) that has proved even more suicidally nihilistic than naturalism, as the black humorists, such as Kurt Vonnegut and Thomas Pynchon, have demonstrated (see John 18:38a; II Timothy 3:7; and Isaiah 57:20–21).
4. Q. What is realism?
A. Classicism and neo-(new)classicism aspired to present the universal, the typical, the objective, the orderly, the restrained, the reasonable, whereas romanticism revolted against the imitation of classical models and archetypes by stressing the unique, the exotic, the subjective, the eccentric, the exuberant, and the intuitive. But realism refused both alternatives in the attempt to show everyday life and the natural world exactly as they are—that is, empirically, positivistically, non-metaphysically, unspiritually. Stendahl called it “Carrying a mirror along a roadway.” In its emphasis on brute factuality, however, realism refused to ackncwledge that all facts are God-ordained, God-created facts, and that all things work together for the good of His elect (repentant Christ-believers) and according to God’s eternal plan for His own glory. That is, the “realism” of Balzac and Flaubert soon degenerated, even more, into the realistic-naturalism of Darwin, Ibsen, and Strindberg, or it was transmuted into such more attractive variants as the mystical humanism of Tolstoy, the self-redemptive psychologism of Dostoevsky, and the colloquial-ironic social commentary of Twain, Salinger, Updike, and De Vries.
5. Q. What is Christian realism?
A. Christian realism is an attempt to see things truly, as Cod enables us to see them in the verbalized light of the Scriptures, and to present selected aspects of His creation and of human relationships in harmony with the Biblically-revealed mind of Christ. That means that the Bible must be accepted, totally, as the Word of God—inerrant, infallible, authoritative, living, vitalizing, directing, as the only absolute rule for our faith, thought, and action under the cosmic Lordship of our Crucified and Resurrected Savior Jesus Christ. For He is the Word Incarnate, the Creative and Redemptive Word, in Whom all things cohere, consist, hold together, have their meaningful interrelationship (see John 1; Ephesians 1; and Colossians 1). Christian realism also understands and objectifies God’s creation as presently fallen under the curse of man’s sin (through Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden) and awaiting, with mankind, its completed restoration and reconciliation with the Father which Jesus secured by His blood atonement on the Cross of Calvary. Moreover, Christian realism emphasizes the Biblical truth that without the regeneration worked by the Holy Spirit, without repentance, faith, and conversion which come only through hearing the Gospel preached, there is no salvation and no possibility of a Christian witness to the world—either through evangelism, which is primary, or through social institutions, which is secondary but also mandatory for every person who wishes to be an obedient child of God (see Matthew 28:19–20; Mark 16:15–16; II Corinthians 10:5; and I Corinthians 7:20). Contemporary Christian realists most nearly approaching this Biblical standard are Grace Irwin, Rudy Wiebe, Elisabeth Elliot, and Ken Anderson.
6. Q. Do all writers reveal their faith-commitment in their works?
A. In a short story, play, novel, or major poem (say a page or more), the imaginative author will express his philosophy of life, either implicitly through setting, tone, plot (view of destiny)—or explicitly, through direct statement or dialogue. For out of the heart are the issues of life, and significant literature will be “sincere,” radiating from the heart. (If it is insincere, the astute reader will soon detect the inauthenticity—or the ironic employment of a persona, a spokesman.) However, it is not always easy to determine an author’s ideological-religious stance, especially if one has done little reflective reading or if he is ignorant of literary movements and of other works by the writer under study. I have not yet read a Biblical-Christian work of literature by a non-Christian—unless it be “Seven Stanzas at Easter,” an ecclesiastically-commissioned poem by John Updike, whose sensual novels give no evidence of Christian commitment. (And why should the unbeliever labor to adore the Christ Whom he hates?) But, on the other hand, not every Christian author succeeds, spontaneously, in writing Christianly, for the idolatrous influences of the world are myriad and mesmerizing; therefore, Christ-glorifying art demands constant, prayerful, self-conscious, God-conscious effort under the tutelage of the Word and the Spirit. Consequently, Scripture warns us to discern (try, test, prove) the spirits to see whether they are, indeed, of God—and where (see also Ephesians 6:10–18; and I Corinthians 2015–16).
7. Q. How important is style, formal beauty, in literature?
A. Jesus tells us to be perfect as our Father in Heaven is perfect. This command applies also to our literary expression. When God gave Moses intricate plans for building the tabernacle (according to the pattern He showed him on the Mount), He also gave His Spirit of wisdom and understanding and the knowledge of all cunning craftsmanship to Bezaleel and Aholiab, who became the head architects of God’s abode in the wilderness. Its structure, you recall, was beautiful. The Christian artist may not be content with giving anything but his best to the Master; therefore, he works assiduously to learn the techniques of literary art and communication that are in harmony with the relevant and normative Biblical principles, such as truthfulness, simplicity, clarity, order, propriety, coherence, charity, and holiness. Although alienated from Cod, some non-Christian authors have embezzled elements of truth for their own apostate and ego-gratifying purposes. From these pagan-spirited artists (as well as from competent Christian word-artificers), the aspiring Christian author may take instruction. But he must beware of appropriating any implicit God-rejecting attitudes and integral denials of Christ as the Way, Truth, and Life when he attempts to abstract the stylistic beauties that appear so worthy of emulation. “For other Foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ . . . and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire” (see I Corinthians 2:10–23).
8. Q. What are the principal norms for Christian poetry?
A. Poetry should be primarily praise to God, like the Psalms of the Bible, whether it deals with human relationships, some response to God’s creation, prayer of adoration, petition, thanksgiving addressed to God, or a reflection on some experience of life. Rhyme may prove a happy adjunct to poetry—if it is not forced or too predictable, but it is not an essential. Word music—alliteration and assonance, however, is a requirement, as is some pattern of rhythm (not necessarily metronomic). The language of poetry should be idiomatic and economical even when it is metaphoric (or symbolic); and the meaning of the imagery, even if multiple, should be coherent, significant, and clear. Poetry is verbalized song composed in memorable utterance segments called verses. Its purpose is to rejoice the heart of man, through its unique mode of edification, and to recite praise, in the Holy Spirit, as homage to the Almighty Creator God and to His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
1. Q. What is romanticism?
A. Romanticism is a religiously held view of life that tends to absolutize individual, subjective, emotional responses to one’s natural and human environment; moreover, it tends to remove all inhibitions on the imagination and to deify the artist as a godlike creator of meaning. Prominent among the romantics are Goethe, Rousseau, Keats, Shelley, Hawthorne, Melville, and Steinbeck. Instead of the True and Self-existent God of the Scriptures and Christ His Son, the only Redeemer, the romantic ascribes autonomy or ultimate authority to his feelings, his heart , his innately good nature, his mystically “enlightened conscience,” and to a vague and impersonal pantheistic life force—which, predictably, cannot call him into Judgment for violating its will. Romanticism is, finally, a heart-idolatry that despises the inscripturated commandments of God (see Jeremiah 17:9; Job 31:26–28; and John 14:15). It is also at the root of the social gospel.
2. Q. What is naturalism?
A. Naturalism is another religious-philosophical world-and-life view that rejects the Triune, Sovereign God and His Holy Scriptures. It is romanticism angrily disillusioned and gone to seed. The utopian delusion of man as his own creator, meaning-giver, and redeemer has failed, so the naturalist—like the romantic unwilling to acknowledge his sinfulness and need for reconciliation with God in Christ—blames two external factors for his misery: heredity and environment. He maintains that the individual is a victim of cosmic or historical or social or biological forces. Man, therefore, has no freedom of will (and, hence, no accountability), for he is merely a product and puppet of determinism. Naturalism tends to emphasize the sordid, the bestial, the revolting; but it is polemically, even vehemently, humanitarian. Ironically, however, there can be no genuine love for other men where God is not loved above all (see 1 John 4:7–21). Preeminent among the naturalists arc Zola, Maupassant, Chekhov, Dreiser, Crane, Norris, O’Neill, and Hemingway.
3. Q. What is existentialism?
A. Existentialism is also a major philosophical-religious world view, and it is, in turn, a reaction against deterministic naturalism. “Existence precedes essence,” says the existentialist, who maintains that man is what he makes of himself. Man is to be active, engaged, becoming, always striving for authenicity (and against others: “Hell is other people!” says Sartre, trying to shift the blame) by taking the anguished leap of faith into the unknown. Man’s essence is anxiety, struggle, terror, absurdity, for, according to the existentialist, God is either the inscrutable wholly-other, the hidden God, or there is no Creator-God nor revelation of His will. This faith in the void, which comes out of Kierkegaard and Kant, has been popularized by such writers as Sartre, Kafka, Camus, and Karl Barth. The latter has done much to make the Scriptures appear merely existential, subjective, and actualistic: that is, the Bible is not the Word of God, but the Word of God is contained in the Bible or the Bible becomes the Word of God when one believes it. This heresy, of course, denies the inerrancy and infallibility of the Scriptures and, therewith, also repudiates its divine inspiration and authority. Existentialism is a cul-de-sac (a blind alley) that has proved even more suicidally nihilistic than naturalism, as the black humorists, such as Kurt Vonnegut and Thomas Pynchon, have demonstrated (see John 18:38a; II Timothy 3:7; and Isaiah 57:20–21).
4. Q. What is realism?
A. Classicism and neo-(new)classicism aspired to present the universal, the typical, the objective, the orderly, the restrained, the reasonable, whereas romanticism revolted against the imitation of classical models and archetypes by stressing the unique, the exotic, the subjective, the eccentric, the exuberant, and the intuitive. But realism refused both alternatives in the attempt to show everyday life and the natural world exactly as they are—that is, empirically, positivistically, non-metaphysically, unspiritually. Stendahl called it “Carrying a mirror along a roadway.” In its emphasis on brute factuality, however, realism refused to ackncwledge that all facts are God-ordained, God-created facts, and that all things work together for the good of His elect (repentant Christ-believers) and according to God’s eternal plan for His own glory. That is, the “realism” of Balzac and Flaubert soon degenerated, even more, into the realistic-naturalism of Darwin, Ibsen, and Strindberg, or it was transmuted into such more attractive variants as the mystical humanism of Tolstoy, the self-redemptive psychologism of Dostoevsky, and the colloquial-ironic social commentary of Twain, Salinger, Updike, and De Vries.
5. Q. What is Christian realism?
A. Christian realism is an attempt to see things truly, as Cod enables us to see them in the verbalized light of the Scriptures, and to present selected aspects of His creation and of human relationships in harmony with the Biblically-revealed mind of Christ. That means that the Bible must be accepted, totally, as the Word of God—inerrant, infallible, authoritative, living, vitalizing, directing, as the only absolute rule for our faith, thought, and action under the cosmic Lordship of our Crucified and Resurrected Savior Jesus Christ. For He is the Word Incarnate, the Creative and Redemptive Word, in Whom all things cohere, consist, hold together, have their meaningful interrelationship (see John 1; Ephesians 1; and Colossians 1). Christian realism also understands and objectifies God’s creation as presently fallen under the curse of man’s sin (through Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden) and awaiting, with mankind, its completed restoration and reconciliation with the Father which Jesus secured by His blood atonement on the Cross of Calvary. Moreover, Christian realism emphasizes the Biblical truth that without the regeneration worked by the Holy Spirit, without repentance, faith, and conversion which come only through hearing the Gospel preached, there is no salvation and no possibility of a Christian witness to the world—either through evangelism, which is primary, or through social institutions, which is secondary but also mandatory for every person who wishes to be an obedient child of God (see Matthew 28:19–20; Mark 16:15–16; II Corinthians 10:5; and I Corinthians 7:20). Contemporary Christian realists most nearly approaching this Biblical standard are Grace Irwin, Rudy Wiebe, Elisabeth Elliot, and Ken Anderson.
6. Q. Do all writers reveal their faith-commitment in their works?
A. In a short story, play, novel, or major poem (say a page or more), the imaginative author will express his philosophy of life, either implicitly through setting, tone, plot (view of destiny)—or explicitly, through direct statement or dialogue. For out of the heart are the issues of life, and significant literature will be “sincere,” radiating from the heart. (If it is insincere, the astute reader will soon detect the inauthenticity—or the ironic employment of a persona, a spokesman.) However, it is not always easy to determine an author’s ideological-religious stance, especially if one has done little reflective reading or if he is ignorant of literary movements and of other works by the writer under study. I have not yet read a Biblical-Christian work of literature by a non-Christian—unless it be “Seven Stanzas at Easter,” an ecclesiastically-commissioned poem by John Updike, whose sensual novels give no evidence of Christian commitment. (And why should the unbeliever labor to adore the Christ Whom he hates?) But, on the other hand, not every Christian author succeeds, spontaneously, in writing Christianly, for the idolatrous influences of the world are myriad and mesmerizing; therefore, Christ-glorifying art demands constant, prayerful, self-conscious, God-conscious effort under the tutelage of the Word and the Spirit. Consequently, Scripture warns us to discern (try, test, prove) the spirits to see whether they are, indeed, of God—and where (see also Ephesians 6:10–18; and I Corinthians 2015–16).
7. Q. How important is style, formal beauty, in literature?
A. Jesus tells us to be perfect as our Father in Heaven is perfect. This command applies also to our literary expression. When God gave Moses intricate plans for building the tabernacle (according to the pattern He showed him on the Mount), He also gave His Spirit of wisdom and understanding and the knowledge of all cunning craftsmanship to Bezaleel and Aholiab, who became the head architects of God’s abode in the wilderness. Its structure, you recall, was beautiful. The Christian artist may not be content with giving anything but his best to the Master; therefore, he works assiduously to learn the techniques of literary art and communication that are in harmony with the relevant and normative Biblical principles, such as truthfulness, simplicity, clarity, order, propriety, coherence, charity, and holiness. Although alienated from Cod, some non-Christian authors have embezzled elements of truth for their own apostate and ego-gratifying purposes. From these pagan-spirited artists (as well as from competent Christian word-artificers), the aspiring Christian author may take instruction. But he must beware of appropriating any implicit God-rejecting attitudes and integral denials of Christ as the Way, Truth, and Life when he attempts to abstract the stylistic beauties that appear so worthy of emulation. “For other Foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ . . . and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire” (see I Corinthians 2:10–23).
8. Q. What are the principal norms for Christian poetry?
A. Poetry should be primarily praise to God, like the Psalms of the Bible, whether it deals with human relationships, some response to God’s creation, prayer of adoration, petition, thanksgiving addressed to God, or a reflection on some experience of life. Rhyme may prove a happy adjunct to poetry—if it is not forced or too predictable, but it is not an essential. Word music—alliteration and assonance, however, is a requirement, as is some pattern of rhythm (not necessarily metronomic). The language of poetry should be idiomatic and economical even when it is metaphoric (or symbolic); and the meaning of the imagery, even if multiple, should be coherent, significant, and clear. Poetry is verbalized song composed in memorable utterance segments called verses. Its purpose is to rejoice the heart of man, through its unique mode of edification, and to recite praise, in the Holy Spirit, as homage to the Almighty Creator God and to His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.