The most famous trend in medieval theater, the grand pageant of Biblical history, began with a 6th century sermon attributed to St. Augustine (probably authored by someone else?). During the Middle Ages, this sermon grew into a typical presentation made around Christmastime. Literate medieval people would all have been familiar with it. The sermon was titled “Contra Judaios, Paganos et Arianos.” It calls on Jewish prophets of the past to bear witness to the coming of Christ. In the sermon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Moses, David, Habbakuk, Zechariah, Simeon and John the Baptist are asked to step forward and give their testimonies about the coming Messiah.
But wait, there’s more: Nebuchadnezzar, Virgil, and “the Erythraean Sybil,” the priestess of Apollo at Erythrae in Ionia! With Jewish prophets came any prophets who could be said to have hinted in that direction. Nebuchadnezzar chips in that in the fiery furnace where he sent in three men, he saw four walking in the fire. Virgil’s contribution is the line “iam nova progenies caelo demittitur alto,” “now a new lineage is sent down from high heaven.” The Sybil of Erythrae gave us a prophecy in Greek that spoke of the Last Judgment, while spelling out “Jesus Christ Son of God Savior” as an acrostic!
Because it presented this evidence in a dramatic way, it wasn’t long before it became a liturgical drama. The cathedral in Limoges presented a version that was a dramatic dialogue in Latin verse, improving on the prose original. So why not add and subtract prophets? Balaam was soon added, since the fact that his ass talked back is perennially dramatic and funny. At Rouen, Balaam was so much the chief character that the presentation was called Festum Asinorum. But what about Abraham, who was saved from offering Isaac by God’s providing a ram? Why not Abel or his father, Adam?
We don’t know at what point churches began typically having individual monks stand forward to “be” the prophets, giving their testimonies as short monologues. That’s the first step toward theater, and we only know that in general, it was happening between 900 and 1100. And then another step: the text found in Laon Cathedral included stage direction for an angel to block the way of Balaam’s ass. Rouen’s text tells them to construct a fiery furnace in the church nave, for Nebuchadnezzar’s story. what other props and sets were included for special occasions?
Le Jeu d’Adam (ca. 1175) appears to be an early next step, taking the play onto the church steps and giving Adam and Abel their own stories. After the play showing Eve, the apple, and the couple leaving Paradise, there was a shorter play in which Abel and Cain (“Chaim” or “Chaym”) act out fratricide. For the third act, the procession of prophets from the Sermon followed with short testimonies, not full plays. The first few are now in time order: Moses, David, Daniel, Habbakuk, Jeremiah, Isaiah…the manuscript cuts off partway through Nebuchadnezzar’s speech; but just before, Isaiah’s section had a troubling development.
The sermon was, after all, called “Against the Jews, Pagans and Arians.” So why not make it more dramatic still by having a Jew come out and argue with a prophet? (Why not a pagan or an Arian? I wonder, but they didn’t, only a Jew.) In this text, Isaiah proclaims that from the root of Jesse will come a flower. A Jew steps out and asks him sarcastic questions: “is this a fable or a prophecy? Are you sure you were awake? Maybe you are insane.”
It’s dramatic, it adds another figure on the stage. Hollywood loves this kind of thing too. And yet…you can see where this is going. As the Bible pageant tradition developed more and more into full plays about each story, the closing act often addressed the benighted Jews directly and vociferously. It didn’t end well, but more on that.
credit: Le Mystere d’Adam, by Paul Studer; Manchester University Press, Manchester, UK, 1918.