Lars von Trier's Cinema

Excess, Evil, and the Prophetic Voice

Rebecca Ver Straten-McSparran

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000427844
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

This book offers a bold and dynamic examination of Lars von Trier's cinema by interweaving philosophy and theology with close attention to aesthetics through style and narrative. It explores the prophetic voice of von Trier's films, juxtaposing them with Ezekiel's prophecy and Ricoeur's symbols of evil, myth, and hermeneutics of revelation.

The films of Lars von Trier are categorized as extreme cinema, inducing trauma and emotional rupture rarely paralleled, while challenging audiences to respond in new ways. This volume argues that the spiritual, biblical content of the films holds a key to understanding von Trier's oeuvre of excess. Spiritual conflict is the mechanism that unpacks the films' notorious excess with explosive, centrifugal force.

By confronting the spectator with spiritual conflict through evil, von Trier's films truthfully and prophetically expose the spectator's complicity in personal and structural evil, forcing self-examination through theological themes, analogous to the prophetic voice of the transgressive Hebrew prophet Ezekiel, his prophecy, and its form of delivery. Placed in context with the prophetic voices of Dante, Milton, Dostoyevsky, O'Connor, and Tarkovsky, this volume offers a theoretical framework beyond von Trier. It will be of great interest to scholars in film studies, film and philosophy, film and theology.

1 Context Prophets and prophecy, Ezekiel, and the Spirit

DOI: 10.4324/9781003171928-2

If a correspondence exists between the prophecy of the biblical prophet Ezekiel and the extreme films of Lars von Trier, it certainly hides beneath surface disparities. Contrary to appearances, however, I suggest that an analogical relationship of content and concern lies between Ezekiel's prophecy and prophetic voice in the narrative and style of von Trier's films. Context brings clarity. In this particular case, the ancient past of the Hebrew prophets viewed through the lens of a theoretical, biblical, and historical context, discloses the potential for this analogical relationship, and establishes initial steps on the curious, winding path that connects Ezekiel's biblical prophecy to von Trier's disturbing films. These steps examine biblical prophecy, its source in revelation, and the historical/theological relationship between biblical prophets, prophecy, and post-canonical artist-prophets, contextually setting the stage for the comparative analysis in the following chapters.

Philosopher-theologian Paul Ricoeur's hermeneutics of interpretation provides a surprising theoretical framework for such an analysis. While his phenomenological roots and later hermeneutics—locating meaning in the symbols that emerge from their historical and cultural identity encountered by consciousness—are increasingly used in film studies, his uses of biblical prophecy within the deployment of his hermeneutics is less known. Ricoeur's hermeneutics of revelation concatenates biblical prophecy, the post-canonical artist-prophet in the Christian tradition, and the potential for a prophetic voice speaking through a work of art separate from the artist-prophet. Therefore, we begin by employing Ricoeur's hermeneutics of revelation to understand the origin of theological expressions of revelation within the faith of the Israelites, followed by an examination of the Hebrew prophets, Ezekiel, and a New Testament (NT)/early church understanding of prophets and prophecy. We then return to Ricoeur to consider how revelation and response function once the originary receiving communities are absent. His understanding of response to earlier revelation will extend to the uncommon role of five exemplary artist-prophets in the Christian theological and literary tradition.

Historically, the role of the artist-prophet reaches back to both ancient Greek and biblical sources. Here we explore this role within the Hebrew and Christian tradition and expand it to include the prophetic voice speaking through a work of art—regardless of the source. When the prophets Balaam and Jonah refused to comply with Yahweh's call to speak, Yahweh spoke prophetically to Balaam through his donkey and to Jonah through a great fish and a plant. This chapter provides the frame of reference for a cinematically expressed prophetic voice within the Christian tradition and its impact upon the filmgoer, here specifically through the films of Lars von Trier.

An underlying theoretical thread within this chapter comes from Ben Quash's pneumatologically driven understanding of maculation, that is, blemished, imperfect—maculate as the opposite of immaculate—developed in Found Theology: Imagination, History, and the Holy Spirit. It opens up the linkage between biblical prophecy and the Holy Spirit's ongoing work in history, whose activity in human lives binds together all revelatory acts in history into a unified narrative of divine revelation.

Paul's Ricoeur's hermeneutics of revelation

Ricoeur distinguishes between originary biblical revelation as prophetic discourse and post-canonical revelation in a manner helpful for understanding the artist as prophet and a prophetic voice through art. We begin with his description of revelation within the original receiving faith communities of the Israelites.

Revelation, in Ricoeur's view, presents a form of knowing distinct from scientific verification: it is made manifest. We perceive it in a different mode of perception, similar perhaps to music or poetry. The ecclesial magisterium, as he calls it, or church authorities, frequently co-opt biblical revelation, posited as authoritatively as if it were Godself, so that we understand it as something we must submit to, something to obey. Instead, Ricoeur posits revelation as that to which we open our imagination (Ricoeur 1977, 37). To explain this, he takes us back to the origin of theological discourse, to a range of discourses within Israel's faith and Christianity. This makes possible an encounter with revelation that is not propositional but “pluralistic, polysemic, and at most analogical in form, the very term revelation … borrowed from [prophetic] discourse” (Ricoeur 1977, 3).

Prophetic discourse is the starting point of Ricoeur's study of revelation, for it is pronounced directly “in the name of Yahweh,” with the introductory formula, “The word of Yahweh came to me, saying, ‘Go and proclaim in the hearing of Jerusalem’” (Jer 2:1). It is the originary and most significant for of biblical revelation. In it, Yahweh speaks directly to the individual prophet, creating a double author of speech, “the speech of another behind the speech of the prophet.”

The prophetic genre's central position is so decisive that the third article of the Nicene creed, devoted to the Holy Spirit, declares: “We believe in the Holy Spirit … who spoke through the prophets.”

(Ricoeur 1977, 3)

However, if prophetic discourse is the only source of biblical revelation, revelation freezes into the concept of the speech of another, the prophet, and never the other receivers. However, a second form of discourse, a form of revelation critical for establishing Israel's faith and early Christianity, is narrative discourse. Narrative, for Ricoeur, portrays events as if they emerge on the horizon of history, that is, the events tell themselves. He looks within the story to locate a means other than inspiration by which to account for revelation in the narrative and finds that Yahweh is, in third person, the ultimate actor among others. This allows a double actant and thus a double object of the story, leading to the character of the events told, such as Abraham's election, the Exodus, and in the NT, Christ's resurrection. “The idea of revelation then appears as connected to the very character of the events” (Ricoeur 1977, 5). These events generate a history in two ways: they found a community and deliver it from disaster. Thus, revelation is accounted for because it “qualify[ies] the events in question as transcendent in relation to the ordinary course of history.” A third discourse of revelation, prescriptive discourse (the Torah), discloses the ethical dimension of revelation directed toward holiness, reflected in Deuteronomy 6:5, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.” The Golden Rule in Matthew 7:12 given by Jesus reveals the significance of prescriptive discourse for the entire historical community of God. The fourth discourse of revelation, wisdom discourse, binds ethos to cosmos at their point of discordance in the midst of God's silence and unjust suffering, but reveals a possible hope in spite of—a design which is God's secret. Hymnic discourse, the fifth, presents itself as lyric discourse, hymns of praise, supplication, and thanksgiving, an “I-Thou” form of revelation.

The critical aspect of these forms of discourse is the first receiving community's necessary interpretation of their experience of revelation amongst themselves. Further, they must be formed into the generative poetics of a large literary work to provide a polysemic and polyphonic concept of revelation that may be passed on throughout history: Scripture. Although these scriptural discourses of revelation may interlace, they are still distinct, analogically bound together. By analogical Ricoeur means that revelation issues from the reference term prophetic discourse. Here,

Revelation signifies inspiration from a first person to a first person. The word prophet implies the notion of a person who is driven by God to speak and who does speak to the people about God's name and in God's name.

(Ricoeur 1977, 16)

The other discourses of revelation cannot be reduced to or interchanged with the double voice of the prophet. None of these analogical forms of revelation may be “owned” by knowledge: “The God who reveals himself is a hidden God and hidden things belong to him …. infinitely above human thoughts and speech” (Ricoeur 1977, 17).

Ricoeur's interpretation of God's revelation to humankind is, I believe, the best framework within which to consider original prophetic discourse as the source for understanding a revelatory and theological prophetic voice, after Scripture. We will return to Ricoeur's interpretation of this shift with the artist-prophets.

Context: Marks of the prophet and prophecy

Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the LORD's people were prophets, and that the LORD would put his spirit on them!”

(Numbers 11:24–29 NRSV)

A grasp of biblical prophecy is indispensable for equating the films of Lars von Trier with this tradition, even analogically. It requires an examination of the source of prophecy, the person of the prophet, the prophetic message, and its effect. It is crucial in this context to be clear that the originary source of Old Testament (OT) prophecy is the Holy Spirit who speaks through the prophet, choosing when, where, and how to speak, and what to say. The prophet chosen is the right person for that time and place but should not be understood as synonymous with the message, for the prophet understands his role as a vessel, not the source, of biblical prophecy. Prophecy is not merely the provenance of moral righteousness or purity as understood by the Israelites. With each prophet, God has something new to say.

A common definition of the prophet mentioned earlier states: “A wide range of persons with diverse associations were called prophets because each in some way claimed to be communicating a divine message” (Smith 1986, 986). Prophets and prophecy appear throughout the Bible, from Genesis 20:7 to Revelation 22:6, the last chapter of the biblical canon, and in most canonical books, with the exception of Leviticus, Ruth, Esther, Job, Song of Songs, and some of the shorter epistles. A sampling of people labeled as prophets in Scripture reflects the diversity of the individuals called prophets: Abraham (father of the Hebrews), Moses (political leader), Aaron (priest), Asaph, Heman, and Jeduthun (musicians), Balaam (foreigner), Deborah (judge), Samuel (seer, priest, advisor), Elijah and Elisha (miracle workers), OT classical prophets (speakers, poet writers), Huldah (early prophetess), and false prophets. The threads of unity that connect them do not come from a common task, social standing, or vocation. With such a broad testament, is it possible to generate criteria for the category “prophetic?”

To answer this question, I limit the category of the prophetic to the classical prophets who emerged over a 300-year period, seeking to establish criteria for the category “prophetic” by locating the consistent marks of the prophets and their message. Although many scholars are hesitant to define consistent marks even within this category of prophets, or even to list commonalities between their messages (Blenkinsopp 1996, 26–27; von Rad 1967, 101), an examination of the etymology of the term “prophet” and discussion of the classical prophets—particularly their call, delivery, and content of their message—offers clear resources for defining the prophetic category. I then examine the prophet Ezekiel to illustrate the marks of the prophet, whose prophecy will later be analogically compared to the films of Lars von Trier. Last, I consider how we might situate these criteria for the prophetic category in the larger biblical context through an analysis of the prophetic in the NT.

Compared to the ancient role of priest and law in the history of Israel, the voice of the prophet as commonly understood is comparatively recent, first heard in the ninth century BCE. through Elijah and Elisha (von Rad 1965, 6–7). In early Hebrew history the word ro’eh, meaning “seer” is used for the prophet. Its root word, ra’a, means to see, perceive, or understand, and “seer” is biblically used to identify one who inquires of God and to whom revelation is given. Ro’eh disappears from usage early, but its interchangeable word hōzeh (visionary) is common until the third or fourth century BCE. Hōzeh is then interchangeable with the traditional Hebrew term designating the prophet, na’bi, meaning “spokesperson.” The na’bi is considered the “mouth” of God. In Deuteronomy 18:18 NRSV, the Lord says, “… and I will put my words in his mouth (na’bi), and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him.” The prophet reports the word of God, proclaiming, “Hear the word of the Lord,” (Is 1:10; Hos 4:1; Amos 3:1), “Thus says the Lord” (1 Kin 20:13; 1 Chr 21:12), or by means of writing and sign-acts.

Although this language appears straightforward, the development of prophet and prophecy is so complex that it defies uniformity or the label of a movement (Blenkinsopp 1996, 27). Context plays a more important role in identifying a prophet or prophecy than does etymology, leading some to say that defining the terms or studying their etymology is unhelpful (Blenkinsopp 1996, 27; von Rad 1965, 5ff; Smith 1986, 986). At first blush, then, locating what makes a prophet a prophet appears discouraging if not illusory. Scholarship, however, is not a static enterprise. Prophecy arises as a religious category of study only in the nineteenth century with roots in early source criticism. What may generically be labeled “critical scholarship” of the classical prophets, seeking original words of the prophets through their historical and social context, has a complicated history (Barton, 1999, 348). The approach here is holistic, primarily a canonical approach to the prophets while still appropriating insight from critical scholarship, and an interpretive approach through poetic structures and conversation with contemporary culture.

The classical prophets

The height of prophecy and the golden age of the prophets occur with the classical literary prophets during a period of over 300 years, from mid-eighth through mid-fifth centuries BCE. Their prophetic activity emerges as a new phenomenon, strikingly different from the activity of past prophets, and coincides with the domination of three empires that rule the ancient Middle Eastern world: Assyria (Isaiah, Hosea, Micah, Nahum, and Zephaniah), Babylonia (Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Habakkuk), and Persia (Second Isaiah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi). These prophets interpret world shifts and political events through the lens of the relationship of Yahweh to Yahweh's people, connecting the subjection, exile, and destruction of Israel to the Israelites’ sins of apostasy, lust for wealth and power, and syncretism (Blenkinsopp 1996, 8). The prophets’ words, acts and signs, poetry, and speech offer the clearest picture possible of the profound relationship of Yahweh to Yahweh's people, and of Yahweh's choice to speak through humans (Heb 1:1).

The multiform messages and methods of the prophets reflect the nature of prophecy as an event, a word from God directed to a specific community of people for a particular moment in time, whether during the divided kingdom, in exile, or after returning from exile. This specificity of message, along with unresolved questions of text development, makes a unified message among prophets difficult to ascertain, resulting in caution among scholars. Using the broadest parameters, however, three similarities may be identified. First, the classical prophets always speak a special word as a word from God to a specific community: Obadiah's oracl...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half-Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• List of figures and table
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: The mechanism that unpacks the excess in von Trier’s cinema: Spiritual conflict
• 1. Context: Prophets and prophecy, Ezekiel, and the Spirit
• 2. The artist as prophet: Affinities in Dante, Milton, Dostoyevsky, O’Connor, and Tarkovsky
• 3. Aesthetics of prophecy: Narrative structures and prophetic themes
• 4. Aesthetics of image, sound, and style: Embodying the prophetic voice
• 5. Antichrist: Paradise lost: Our capacity for evil
• Conclusion
• Filmography
• Index