Richard Viladesau - Böcker

Richard Viladesau's book takes a look at an inviting topic that has come into increasing prominence in a number of fields lately—including theology. Theology and the Arts explores, in a timely and engaging manner, several aspects of the relations between theology and aesthetics, in both the pastoral and academic realms. The underlying motif of this work is that beauty is a means of divine revelation, and that art is the human mediation that both enables and limits its revelatory power.Using examples from music, pictorial art and rhetoric, the five chapters explore different aspects of the ways that art enters into theology and theology into art, both in pastoral practice, e.g., liturgical music, sacred art and preaching, and in the area of systematic reflection, where, Viladesau contends, art must be recognized as a genuine theological text. A reader-friendly feature of this work is the addition, after the central chapters, of a discography of illustrative musical works and lists of internet sights of sacred art and art history resources-a virtual museum—that will complement the text. These enhance the value of this well-written, provocative text. Although aimed at undergraduate theology students, it will certainly capture the interest of art students, pastoral ministers and anyone who appreciates the arts.†

The Folly of the Cross is the fourth book in Richard Viladesau's series examining the aesthetics and theology of the cross through Christian history. Previous volumes have brought the story up through the Baroque era. This new book examines the reception of the message of the cross from the European Enlightenment to the turn of the twentieth century.The opening chapters set the stage in the transition from the Baroque to the Classical eras, describing the changing intellectual and cultural paradigms. Viladesau examines the theology of the cross in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and the aesthetic mediation of the cross in music and the visual arts. He shows how the aesthetic treatment of the cross widely replaced the dogmatic treatment in the post-Enlightenment era, and how this thought was translated into popular spirituality, piety, and devotion. The Folly of the Cross shows how classical theology responded to the critiques of modern science, history, Biblical scholarship, and philosophy, and how both classical and modern theology served as the occasion for new forms of representation of Christ's passion in the arts and music.

This book explores the role of aesthetic experience in our perception and understanding of the holy. Richard Viladesaus goal is to articulate a theology of revelation, examined in relation to three principal dimensions of the aesthetic realm: feeling and imagination; beauty (or taste); and the arts. After briefly considering ways in which theology itself can be imaginative or beautiful, Viladesau concentrates on the theological significance of aesthetic data provided by each of the three major spheres of aesthetic perception and response. Throughout the work, the underlying question is how each of these spheres serves as a source (however ambiguous) of revelation. Although he frames much of his argument in terms of Catholic theology--from the Church Fathers to Karl Rahner, Hans urs von Balthasar, Bernard Lonergan, and David Tracy--Viladesau also makes extensive use of ideas from the Protestant theologian of the arts Gerardus van der Leeuw, and draws insights from such diverse thinkers as Hans Goerg Gadamer, Wolfhart Pannenberg, and Iris Murdoch. His analysis is enlivened by the artistic examples he selects: the music of Mozart as contemplated by Karl Barth, Schoenbergs opera Moses und Aron, the sculptures of Chartres Cathedral, poems by Rilke and Michelangelo, and many others. What emerges from this study is what Viladeseau terms a transcendental theology of aesthetics. In Thomistic terms, he finds that beauty is not only a perfection but a transcendental. That is, any instance of beauty, rightly perceived and rightly understood, can be seen to imply divinely beautiful things as well. In other words, Viladesau argues, God is the absolute and necessary condition for the possibility of beauty.

As the success of Mel Gibson's film, The Passion of the Christ, has forcefully reminded us, the suffering and death of Christ have traditionally been seen as an appropriate focus for Christian devotion. Although the earliest Christians avoided pictorial images, the cross would soon become the dominant symbol of the faith. The first depictions of the Crucifixion were triumphalist, but over time more realistic images became common. Despite the horror of Crucifixion, however, we often find such pictures beautiful. It is an apparent paradox that some of the great monuments of Western art are representations of the brutal torture and execution of Christ. In this book Richard Viladesau seeks to understand the beauty of the cross as it developed in both theology and art from the early Christian era through the high middle ages. He argues that art and symbolism functioned as an alternative strand of theological expression-sometimes parallel to, sometimes interwoven with, and sometimes in tension with formal theological reflection on the meaning of the Crucifixion and its role in salvation history. In this, the first of an envisioned two-volume work, Viladesau focuses on poetry and the visual arts. The second volume will pursue the topic up to the present day and will draw primarily on music and film.

This is a sequel to Richard Viladesau's well-received study, The Beauty of the Cross: The Passion of Christ in Theology and the Arts from the Catacombs to the Eve of the Renaissance (2006). It continues his project of presenting theological history by using art as both an independant religious or theological 'text' and as a means of understanding the cultural context for academic theology. Viladesau argues that art and symbolism function as an alternative strand of theological expression--sometimes parallel to, sometimes interwoven with, and sometimes in tension with formal theological reflection on the meaning of crucifixion and its role in salvation history. Using specific works of art to epitomize particular artistic and theological paradigms, he explores the contours of each paradigm through the works of representative theologians as well as liturgical, poetic, artistic, and musical sources. The period covered by this new volume is one that was especially eventful for both theology and art, and thus particularly fruitful for Viladesau's project.

From the earliest period of its existence, Christianity has been recognized as the "religion of the cross." Some of the great monuments of Western art are representations of the brutal torture and execution of Christ. Despite the horror of crucifixion, we often find such images beautiful. The beauty of the cross expresses the central paradox of Christian faith: the cross of Christ's execution is the symbol of God's victory over death and sin. The cross as anaesthetic object and as a means of devotion corresponds to the mystery of God's wisdom and power manifest in suffering and apparent failure. In this volume, Richard Viladesau seeks to understand the beautyof the cross as it developed in both theology and art from their beginnings until the eve of the renaissance. He argues that art and symbolism functioned as an alternative strand of theological expression -- sometimes parallel to, sometimes interwoven with, and sometimes in tension with formal theological reflection on the meaning of the Crucifixion and its role insalvation history. Using specific works of art to epitomize particular artistic and theological paradigms, Viladesau then exploresthe contours of each paradigm through the works of representative theologians as well as liturgical, poetic, artistic, and musical sources. The beauty of the cross is examined from Patristic theologyand the earliest representations of the Logos on the cross, to the monastic theology of victory and the Romanesque crucified "majesty," to the Anselmian "revolution" that centered theological and artistic attention on the suffering humanity of Jesus, and finally to the breakdown of the high scholastic theology of the redemption in empirically concentrated nominalism and the beginnings of naturalism in art. By examining the relationship between aesthetic and conceptual theology, Viladesaudeepens our understanding of the foremost symbol of Christianity. This volume makes an important contribution to an emerging field, breaking new ground in theological aesthetics. The Beauty of the Cross is avaluable resource for scholars, students, and anyone interested in the passion of Christ and its representation.

The Wisdom and Power of the Cross is the fifth and final entry in Richard Viladesau's well-regarded series on the theology of the cross, from the historical crucifixion of Jesus to the present day. Continuing his analysis of theological history through cultural contexts, this volume correlates theoretical approaches with artistic representations, showing the relation of theoretical to imaginative approaches. The Wisdom and Power of the Cross examines modern and contemporary thought and images, which look at the cross in the light of modern historical and scriptural studies, science, and the novelties of modern and post-modern art and music.Viladesau here considers how the passion of Christ has been thought about by theologians and portrayed by artists in the modern world. Contemporary art and music reveal the lasting power of traditional images of the passion, as well as new possibilities for expression. The Wisdom and Power of the Cross surveys both traditional approaches to soteriology and revisionist theologies that take up the challenge of the meaning of the cross today, in light of critical historical studies and modern science, providing new understandings of traditional concepts like “original sin” and “redemption”. Through his in-depth exploration of the interweaving of aesthetic and conceptual theology, Viladesau once more deepens our understanding of the foremost symbol of Christianity and its role in salvation history.

The Baroque period was in some senses the beginning of modern Western scientific and intellectual culture, the early budding of the Enlightenment. In the light of a new scientific and historical consciousness, it saw the rise of deism and the critique of traditional forms of Christianity. Secular values and institutions were openly or surreptitiously replacing the structures of traditional Christian society. At the same time, it was a time of religious renewal and of the reaffirmation of tradition. In sacred art, it was the age of of Bernini, Rubens, Van Dyck, Velazquez, and Rembrandt; in church music, the period of Monteverdi, Scarlatti, Handel, Telemann, and Bach. The pathos of Christ's crucifixion - its power to evoke strong emotions of pity and compassion - was a central element in Baroque theology and spirituality. The sacred arts of the period reflect the centrality of this theme. Many of the works of the period retain their ability to move us emotionally and spiritually centuries later - even though the theology they represent has been challenged and frequently rejected. This volume traces the ways in which Roman Catholic and Protestant theologies of the period continued to proclaim the centrality of cross of Christ to human salvation. In a parallel movement, it illustrates how musical and artistic works of the period were both inspired and informed by these theologies, and how they moved beyond them in an aesthetic mediation of faith.

This book explores the role of aesthetic experience in our perception and understanding of the holy. Richard Viladesau's goal is to articulate a theology of revelation, examined in relation to three principal dimensions of the aesthetic realm: feeling and imagination; beauty (or taste); and the arts. After briefly considering ways in which theology itself can be imaginative or beautiful, Viladesau concentrates on the theological significance of aesthetic data provided by each of the three major spheres of aesthetic perception and response. Throughout the work, the underlying question is how each of these spheres serves as a source (however ambiguous) of revelation. Although he frames much of his argument in terms of Catholic theology--from the Church Fathers to Karl Rahner, Hans urs von Balthasar, Bernard Lonergan, and David Tracy--Viladesau also makes extensive use of ideas from the Protestant theologian of the arts Gerardus van der Leeuw, and draws insights from such diverse thinkers as Hans Goerg Gadamer, Wolfhart Pannenberg, and Iris Murdoch. His analysis is enlivened by the artistic examples he selects: the music of Mozart as contemplated by Karl Barth, Schoenbergs opera Moses und Aron, the sculptures of Chartres Cathedral, poems by Rilke and Michelangelo, and many others. What emerges from this study is what Viladeseau terms a transcendental theology of aesthetics. In Thomistic terms, he finds that beauty is not only a perfection but a transcendental. That is, any instance of beauty, rightly perceived and rightly understood, can be seen to imply divinely beautiful things as well. In other words, Viladesau argues, God is the absolute and necessary condition for the possibility of beauty.