Show, Don’t Tempt: The Good and the Ugly
Some parts of life require more care than others to depict. Last week I covered the depiction of sins, particularly the lurid sins that make us wince: rape, adultery, murder, jaywalking. These sins, we concluded, are not wrong to write about, but we must nevertheless be careful that in writing about them we seek to discourage and not encourage, to warn and not to tempt. Writing must not merely be an excuse to fantasize about sin, to fantasize in anger or lust or self-pity (which is pride joined to laziness). In application, this course requires us to separate ourselves from the characters, to present the characters as sinful men without endorsing their sin. That was, to allude to a movie I’ve never seen, the ’bad’; today we’ll go over the good and the ugly- marriage and violence, specifically, though the lessons will be largely applicable to morally analogous acts-, as well as some general concerns relevant to the topic.
Marriage – The Good
To tell the truth, this is the topic that got me to write this first, as a result of reading Henry Van Til’s The Calvinistic Conception of Culture1, wherein he presents the idea that the depiction of marriage in art might be unwise, being a possible cheapening of the rite and relationship. He has a point. Some ‘art’ does cheapen or pervert marriage in the eye of the receptive audience (think of shows like The Bachelor, that cesspit of shallow modernist romance and divorce-preparation, for cheapness; think about the hundreds of depictions of homosexual affairs for perversion). Ultimately, though, the problem with such instances is not that they depict marriage but how they depict it.
That marriage is not outside the bounds of art to depict is clear. The Bible contain at least two marriage scenes (of a sort- I’m referring to Genesis 2 and Esther 2:15-18), even aside from the out-of-focus wedding at Cana (John 2:1-11). Even if these were set aside, it is hard to see where the sin could be found. The characters being married are not the author, are inside the story their own moral agents. Marriage itself is not sinful, but if it were, we’ve already delineated between depictions of sin and temptation towards sin. The line is definitely a bit blurrier for actors in a stage play or cinematic production, but even here we must remember that if a marriage ceremony takes place on screen, its real-world existence is as a sham knowingly perpetrated by all participants, a form without any meaning invested within it, as meaningless as a rehearsal wedding, as meaningless as a groom saying his vows to his best man in order to be sure he has them memorized2. To consider the ceremony’s form inextricable from its meaning, after all, runs into a basic problems: the lack of Biblical basis there-for, as all Christian marriage ceremonies are derived in principle and meaning from the Bible, but not truly in form3.
Marriage is, however, an important part of life. It reflects Christ’s relationship with His church, as per Ephesians 5:22-33. It provides the means for righteous families (Gen. 1:28, 4:1). It binds men and women together more tightly than bond of blood (Gen. 2:24; Matt. 19:5), so that we might say with truth that the blood of the covenant (marriage being a covenant, and covenants being traditionally represented with or sealed by blood, as per Genesis 15) is stronger than the water of the womb4. To disrespect this covenant or to mislead man in regards to it would be a grave offense, a leading of man into sin. In our writing, therefore, we must depict the morals of marriage righteously, not portraying sins- bigamy, abuse, neglect, abdication of leadership, marital strife, nagging, etc.- as good or beautiful.
Though these sins are not good or beautiful, being dissonant with the character of God, they are, in this world, true. Men do neglect their wives and their marital duties (Eph. 5:25-27). Women do nag their husbands contrary to wisdom (Prov. 21:9). Kings do marry multitudes, and paupers do treat multitudes as if they were married in the bed, though not in aught else. Feminism demands that woman become man, and sinful men agree, if only so they don’t have to do as much work. In our stories, therefore, we must show this sinful world, must not lie about the truth of what we show. Yet, just as we can portray murder and conquest and hate without guilt, so with these. These sins, like the others, must be portrayed in truth. By truth, we must mean not only the truth of the sin’s existence but the truth of their nature. In other words, we must not only call a spade ‘spade’ and an adulterer ‘adulterer’ but must accord to each their proper moral status, calling a sin ‘sin’.
Marriage does present or introduce a peculiar problem: the marriage bed. Sex and lust are a righteous part of marriage. Lust outside of marriage5, however, is invariably a sin. Christ warns us in Matthew 5:28, ““But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Even if the lust excited is towards fiction, the sin remains- simply because the woman does not exist does not render the lust less real, any more than the fictionality of a celebrity’s image reduces the sin of lusting after such. The sin is to lust outside of marriage6. Our depictions of the world, therefore, must never purpose to excite lust, for to do so is to tempt to sin.
Unfortunately for our peace of mind, however, physical beauty, particularly human beauty, is linked in our thoughts with lust7. Thus, any story which engages in description or depiction of human beauty will very likely, given a wide enough audience, excite some lust. That this is not a prohibition to such depictions can easily be seen by reviewing the Song of Solomon, as well as by remembering our duty to glorify Him with the beauty of His world, including the beauty of His image incarnate in man, and remembering our duty to tell the truth, of which physical beauty is a part, a relevant part very often, even outside romance (for instance, the charisma of a character might be founded in part upon his looks).
Our distinction, remember, is between depicting sin as sin and depicting sin as desirable. In this matter, applying the principle, we can then come to a conclusion: we may depict beauty, but not in order to excite lust. No part of the story may be calculated to tempt a person; any part which does tempt him (man being a creature given to temptation, going so far as to manufacture it himself where necessary) must be a part intended to accomplish a worthy purpose.
Violence – The Ugly
So that’s marriage done, and we’re on to a much more straightforward topic: violence. Violence is a part of our world, a consequence of sin and yet not always sin itself. God Himself engages in violence; in Isaiah 63:3 the person interrogated, clearly the Lord in light of verse 5 (in reference to Is. 59:16), states as a reason for the ruddiness of his clothing, “I trod them in my anger and trampled them in my wrath; their lifeblood spattered on my garments, and stained all my apparel.” This is an undeniably gory bit of imagery, and yet it is also the speech of the Lord God of heaven and earth. The question, then, is if there is a line and if so, where does it lie?
In this we must recognize that which violence is not in itself a vice, it is not inherently a virtue either. The moral content of it depends upon its purpose. So to, as with all the rest we’ve discusses in the past two weeks, does our depiction’s moral state rest upon its purpose. To glorify violence in itself would be wrong, for it deserves not to be glorified in itself, being worthy without purpose of nothing except the sadness of the implication of its existence, the implication of sin. To glorify violence done for evil purposes- murder, abortion, rape, torture- would be, as already established, sin. There remains only one form of violence which we may glorify: violence done in righteousness. This category, as we see, exists; even for man it exists. It is just to commend the violence of a man who defends his family and their inheritance from rapine and plundering.
So far this has been a simple enough reiteration of earlier principles. We are to depict that violence which is good as good, that which is bad as bad (an extension of the principles already iterated that I do not think needs explaining). Violence, though, presents for the author two pitfalls we must take care to avoid: undue indulgence in it, what we may call the masculine temptation, and undue flinching away, what we might call the feminine8.
The masculine temperament has an affinity, generally speaking, with violence. Boys like to tussle, and we tend to find that violence is, if not desirable, at least understandable. In others, indeed, it is interesting, even enthralling. Watching a war movie or reading military history or spectating an MMA match are all boyish joys, and not wrongly so. It is the man’s in-built nature and duty to protect his family, his home, and his calling (1 Sam. 17:26), in imitation of our jealous God (Ex. 20:5). In writing (and reading, if we extend this moral), this can lead to a temptation to dwell upon violence more than it warrants, to spend time being almost gleeful about the buckets of blood that are flying every which way. In an artistic sense, to indulge in this impulse is a demerit, causing the author to spend more time on an element than it warrants. In a moral sense, too, it is a danger, for it tempts him to glorify violence for violence’s sake, for enjoyment, two motives not proper to violence. In other words, this impulse tempts the author to depict violence-for-evil (or violence-for-violence) as desirable and thus tempt the reader to sin.
The feminine temperament, where not warped by a culture which desires its women to be men and its men women, as ours does, has a general disdain for violence. For some reason, watching two men beat the tar out of each other in a cage match does not tend to appeal to the female mind as it does to the male. Therefore, women, and men trained by a culture dominated by female sensibilities9, have an tendency to shy away from the depiction of violence. Now, this is perhaps easier to get by with. Unlike the masculine temptation, which is a sin of commission, this is in general a sin of omission. In many circumstances, some alteration of how the story is told will suffice. In others, however, you must consider whether you have harmed your story by not depicting violence sufficiently, whether artistically- perhaps the reader doesn’t understand the impact of the happenings upon the characters because you underplayed the violence- or theologically- perhaps an antipathy to violence has lead you to accidentally denigrate self-defense or some other righteous use of violence, perhaps even to condemn the judgment of God.
In all cases, we must be careful to calibrate our depiction of violence in kind and quantity in order to present the truth of the world, the character of God, and the beauty which He would have us make. Sometimes this means more, sometimes less, sometimes none, sometimes different.
Other Factors & In Conclusion
As I’ve alluded to over and over, we can’t leave sin out of our stories. God didn’t and so neither may we. It’s why characters have flaws, why Mary Sues10 are a problem. God made a world into which sin entered, and in reflecting that world we must reflect its sin or ourselves sin by lying. Yet we must not forget the statue for the fleck of dirt upon it. God is sovereign and triumphant. Our stories must reflect this reality also, carefully holding up the mirror of His goodness and character to the world and showing both its faults and His glory thereby. Thus we may avoid the twin ditches of ‘the world is perfect’ and ‘the world is too bad for God to save’.
One minor caveat that I haven’t managed to include anywhere else: age appropriateness. Telling the truth of the world doesn’t mean dumping everything that’s true on somebody. Some things- the occult- are true and yet are not good to know (Potter- Prov. 13:3). For children, particularly, vast swathes of the world are not yet revealed. They are not prepared in body or mind to understand them. To hide certain parts of the world from such is perfectly fine, though generally it’s better to hide those things behind reference or allusion or to evade their intrusion entirely is more artistically and morally safe than to twist reality so as to pretend their nonexistence12.
In sum, the standard we as authors must remember is this: we may depict sin, but we may not desire it; we seek that men understand it, but we may not seek that men desire it; we may write of it, but we may not write of it without cause. This is the standard which I applied to each of the four cases. From this standard, by combining it with the individual quirks of each case, a lot of different subtleties and nuances may be found, even, I warrant, some difficult sub-questions. The ultimate core, however, is the same, a basic application of Biblical principles on the nature of sin- conception of sin without desire is not itself sin (Is. 59:13)- and an understanding of the nature of art as a reflection of God’s art12.
God bless.
Footnotes
1 – Henry was the brother of Cornelius Van Til, of some fame and infamy in modern theological controversy. The book itself is good, if imperfect at points and necessarily, by virtue of the scope of the subject, far from the final word on the topic.
2 – Marriage vows aren’t magic formulae that render their speaker married to whoever happens to be listening; otherwise society would be a lot messier.
3 – The form is obviously derived from the principles, but many different forms can be derived from the principles without any moral difference between them, given differences in circumstances, culture, and personality. Do note that there is a semi-exception to this I’ll get to later: the marriage bed.
4 – I have never quite figured out whether the assertion that this is the full and original form of the proverb is apocryphal or not, but it hardly matters here.
5 – Distinct from, if confusable with, aesthetic appreciation.
6 – Here I will explain the exception I mentioned in note 3: the marriage bed. The physical acts which a man and a woman engage in righteously within marriage are not separable from their meaning, not truly. The Bible warns against becoming prostitutes, adulterers, or another brand of sexual sinner and provides no exception in these for ‘I didn’t mean it’ sex. To commit the act outside of marriage is a sin, and therefore to commit the act outside of the meaning of marriage is also a sin. Thus any actual sexual activity between actors should be simulated at most. This total prohibition does not cover culturally-invested gestures or those portions of life which might be tolerated in the presence of a child- kissing, chaste embrace, etc., given they are not inherently part of ‘knowing’ as the Bible puts it, though often corelative.
7 – I’m ignoring that eventually some part of your audience will find their lust aroused by some portion of any story, given enough time with enough people. You are not to blame, obviously, if a pedophile derives undue enjoyment from your children’s story (I assume that none of us are aiming for that end).
8 – Of these two, I admit to more familiarity with the first.
9 – Our culture- its emphasis on niceness, on emotions over logic, etc. are all more catered to the feminine sensibility. Any culture which cannot balance the two sensibilities will insofar as it does not balance them harm both. I will note that women most definitely have a capacity for violence; they’re just wired a bit differently on average and tend to treat violence differently. I’m a man, though, so I cannot pretend to fully understand the proverbial mystery of the female mind.
10 – See this article for more on Mary Sues.
11 –This is more my instinct than a carefully thought out theological or artistic position. As I don’t intend to write anything significant for children, I’ve never really spent a lot of time on this question.
12 – I discussedart as a reflection of God’s art in detail here.
