Show I P Passion Play at Ob r mm g u To thousands the little valley of the I Ammer in the heart of ot the Bavarian I Highlands will be a apiece place of interest interesting interesting ing pilgrimage this year for there the regular Decennial production of the j Passion Pas lon Play to last Jut twelve weeks 1 Ili being enacted in h n accordance with a 8 avow avow vow given in the sixteenth century Probably 50 Americans alone will vest fie te t e quaint village in the lap of the towering mountains mount l 8 this season sea on ona and a nd many and divers will be the im T received Nothing could be more idyllic more conducive to the reverential mood than the pastoral pa oral sWeet of the Ammer valley with its dotting of t quaint homes pomes its church Sr sires Ires and the SIO hat imposing building Where wh re the Passion Play is i a given There for tor hundreds of or years a thoughtful reverential people have hae eked out an humble existence exl by bythe bythe bythe the ck est of economy and with much severe Be set ere religious discipline Not snore more Ore than 1110 souls comprise this little a gr and the election of o the th principal parta il b play which ch hu hass made the known throughout the die Christian Chr tin words w Is s par pat paramount paramount amount to all other problems of life Ufe among mong them Small lives Uve indeed they live compared with the careers ca of the outer worM but the very narrowness a has hu contributed to the making makinI of ot a concrete type such as may maybe may maybe maybe be fOULd only in purely religious com coin communities Communication with the v world orld a a large has not been considered of lent importance to ro warrant any enterprise in that direction though prou p with ie ae e increased ed interest which the whole Christian world dis displays displays plays lays in the Passion Play it will not be bt long before this isolated and al almost most ost mediaeval community will be reached by a steam railroad or even eveR perhaps by a trolley line Une High Ideals IdEM s Th The parish pariah priest I r wae the first to bring out of its mediaeval U grotesqueness grote quene the beauty and mystery of the Passion Play Before his hia time the rendering of the divine tragedy was Aas as nothing more than an outdoor ceremony For nearly Jearl two score years the priest labored to the end of making the Passion Play an observance of ot great gnat Importance in the religious world lie He had a keen dramatic instinct and being a very sincere Christian he realized re realized realized at once possibilities there were ere not only in the play as handed down from early arly times but also inthe in inthe Inthe the native talent of the yokels woodsmen woods wood woodsmen woodmen men and hi artisans of the vale eliminated the vulgar buffoonery v with ith w which hi h the early play splay was we burdened substituting lines of 1 great force and beauty as well as sit situations situations situations of ot high artistic merit To him Is due the beautiful humanizing of the personality of the Savior and the vi xi of the apostles which characterise char characterise the Oberammergau performances perform performances performances ances The participants in the play are men chosen not alone for their his histrionic histrionic of ability In order to be they must be of unimpeachable char character character character acter and entirely worthy to fill any exalted role From the th time when they appear in the chorus as little children in robes of many man hues the spirit of the Passion Play rules them entirely Later they assume the more difficult parts and tind from among the apostles of this thia year ear may be chosen hosen hm en the Chris Christian Christian I tian of ot a decade hen hence 1 Through all these ten years yeal a m t accurate and intimate study of the Scriptural situations the costumes and I manner or oi of New Testament times the character of the personages and th their thIr ir personal appearances based on the paintings of the old masters is made under careful guidance guldan e and the re rehearsals rehearsals are long Jong and arduous caused it to be record recorded I Id ed d that he undertook the production for th the Jve i jve of o his Divine Div ne Redeemer I and with only om OtH object t in sir view namely the evangelization of the 1 world He made the th representation of o the di divine me passion as dictated by bythe bythe bythe the entire Scriptures bringing it with within withIn within in human scope and typifying mg in the person of the Divine man the supreme Godhead Bit Bat whether the followers of have carried out the spirit of o his injunction never allowing the material to superimpose Itself upon the he hf spiritual is a much mooted point Many devout men who have seen the latest rendering affirm that all the glory and purity of the early representations have been retained unde undefiled undefiled undefiled filed by the modern spirit of commercial commer commercial cial enterprise Others are aN convinced that the Passion Pa slon Play must inevitably fall into the hands of or the speculator and the mountebank and that the he natural na natural natural tural love for gain in the human heart will wID eventually eradicate the more mort solemn sol solemn solemn and reverential spirit s irit without which the Passion Play Pay i becomes mere merely merely ly Iy a theatric and dan dine serous us assumption as assumption ump tion of holy things t hl bare i ends One of these t holding the nr n a point of or view Mew Is Dr Robert Collyer whose w ex expressed e pressed convictions are herewith given riven Dr Collyer on the Passion Pardon Play It te is a sad Rad commentary on the times that with the universal unie al popularizing of I a and aad sacred observance the worldly spirit should thrust itself in inand inand and vulgarize ze It I can regard the thet present t production tIO of the Passion Poa Play at Oberammergau ne as nothing short of a perversion 1 1 1 I 1 I I I 1 I Time was when this simple and beau beautiful beautiful beautiful rendering of the profoundest tragedy trag tragedy tragedy edy known to man was in the nature I of a noble religious observance some something thing to be seen revered and remembered remembered remembered and to the simple peasantry of ot Bavaria a mighty instrument for moral and spiritual betterment But with withe each e h repetition the ancient spirit that characterized it faded into the light of Common day Now like everything every everything evet thing else el e we treasure more or less it itis ItIs ItIs is slowly but thirsty surely becoming sub subservient servient Se l rit to commercial comm lai uses This ie is l deplorable de but it is beyond gainsaying A touching and inspiring rite has hu been vulgarized by the ex extraneous extraneous extraneous and the commercial it has been made a sightseers spectacle like Vesuvius and the worlds fair a vantage to t the innkeeper and the purveyor of bf souvenirs A 31 Glorious Gl V 1 gf ts Rite Kite Kiter r p People 1 toJ removed f fr from hn the scenes and local spirit can an can hardly realize how in insular Insular insular sular and concrete the Quaint peasant folk of Oberammergau are and how necessary is ts the symbol tp their devout rives lives For the most part the practical talents of or the players are displayed in inwood inwood wood w od carvings of exquisite workmanship workman workmanship workmanship ship particularly crucifixes and other religious tokens in which they are pe expert as u if the trying work had sharpened their wits Morally and spiritually they the are fitted for their great gr at undertaking and to be thought worthy worth of a place even in the chorus of the Passion Pa slon Play is to them a 8 mark of the tl highest merit In ors y ars rs and years of toil toll over their religious symbols laboring to bring out more clearly the divine features fa familiarized familiarized familiarised by the old masters these simple folk tolk become imbued with deep reverence reveren e From the time that one brought the plague plaue into the valley vallET and divine intervention ion prevent prevented ed its ita utter depopulation m gratitude for tor which the th peasants vowed to play the Passion Play tragedy once every ten vears the play has occupied the thoughts thou of It contained their very souls and the decennial rendition of th tha beautiful ceremony was 8 an honest and sincere outpouring of spirit a glorious ious iou rite It became a part of their very life uniting them in common bonds of or Christian brotherhood It made peasant integrity stronger the hardy bardy Bavarian varlan stock fuller in life and purpose For the applause of the world work they cared little for the respect r of their brethren in the faith and the con consciousness of a duty well performed they eared cared much It was WaB was as much an observance of penitence and praise as prayer and anel thank offering White they were performing their humble rites these peasant folk be became became came transformed They became ded spirits The flesh was lost in inthe Inthe inthe the glory of the souL BOuL They were no noI longer Mayer and Lechner and the theother I other townspeople but Christ and Judas and the apostles apo For the time Being they are living moving and having their being in the reflected light of ot the sublime prototypes I have haye have seen een a few great actors thus embodied d in la their Forrest in Macbeth for instance and the effect was elec ele electric Question of the Box Office a l the t e play the fort fortt that t Lt they are Me human and that there is IB a very human audience con com Ci composed posed po d of or one tenth reverential Bavarian Bavar Bavarian BavarIan ian Yolk anti and tourist watching them But the mood is changing More and more the box of office flee fice consideration enters enten the equation Such and such photographers are given Delusive cJu lve right to make pictures and are arrested at sight Such SucU and such translators tra are al at allowed lowed to put the words of the text into many tongues such luch and such publishers publish ers era ns have exclusive rights to publish the same and the stenographer caught pencil in hand suffers arrest and his notes ROtes ire are e confiscated Ever aver the peep peephole peephole peephole hole m in the curtain ever the material gain n It requites requires only the presence pre ence of a few illustrious critics of the drama with trenchant next nest morning reviews of play and players to bring something almost di 2 down to the level of the marionette it has hu not yet come cometo to this but the end is inevitable The commercial al spirit which encompasses our Cherished institutions In and the love of ot money which is 18 the root of at all evil t as much touch and more today than Ulan ever in the elder time will wm eventually bring bra the Passion Play of or Oberammergau Oberammergau Oberammergau and its many imitators to the level lev l of successful spectacular enter enterprises s When Wb n it becomes a matter of trad trading tradIng trading ing upon things sacred and holy for private te ends I see the end at hand This will be a successful year jear in the little valley vaney of the Ammer The new Chris Chriss as is will build himself a more 6 comfortable chalet St fit John ohn T will in increase increase crease his herd Judas and Herod will open another inn fer for the dispensing of Bavarian bock and clans will be laid for Ute the ensnaring of the meted and re ted d red tourist I F t tI i N 9 n t t tI I I x i a V Vi Vi I kl 1 t i i L W 1 0 t I II 1 1 JN il THE CHURCH ARO ARD j MODERN TOURIST AUDIENCE AT OBEE A I particularly the the American A i n on one e in 1910 But the ancient spirit will iU have passed away and what was once a devout religious affair will have de descended descended descended to the merely histrionic Such Is the disintegrating influence of gold I I for far the golds sake sak Such are the cor corrosions corrosions of mere commercialism Personally were I a mile of the theatre I should slot not ot take the trouble trou trouble trouble ble to pay it a visit For sublime and yet human an living diving as the Ober Am make the scenes of the di dl divine vine Ine passion I prefer pr fer the blessed pic picture picture picture ture which has liv d in my heart these many years an inspiring i presence prE ence in youth and an abiding comfort in to age conjured by the Holy Spirit of the ful fl ness flees of the of the ages the Divine Word ROBERT COLLYER |