The Story of the Innumerable Company, and Other Sketches. David Starr Jordan

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      The Passion Play at Oberammergau has been characterized as a relic of medieval times—the last remains of the old Miracle Play. This is true, in the sense of historical continuity, and in that sense alone. The spirit of the times has penetrated even to this isolated valley, and its Passion Play is as much a product of our century as the poetry of Tennyson. Miracle Plays were shown at Oberammergau and in the town about it more than five hundred years ago, but the Passion Play of to-day is not like them. The imps and devils and all the machinery of superstition are gone. Harmony has taken the place of crudity, and the Christ of Oberammergau is the Christ of modern conception. The Miracle Play, dead or dying everywhere else, has lived and been perfected at Oberammergau.

      It has been pre-eminently the work of the Church of Rome to teach the common people, and to train them to obedience. In its teaching it has made use of every means which could serve its purposes. Didactic teaching is not effective with tired and sleepy peasants. Sermons soothe, rather than instruct, after a week of hard labor in the fields. Hence comes the need of object-teaching, if teaching is to be real.

      Images have been used in this way in the Catholic Church—not as objects to be worshiped, but as representations of sacred things. Paintings have served the same purpose. The noblest paintings in the world have been wrought to this end. It was in such lines alone that art could find worthy recognition. In like manner, processions and "Passion[1] Plays" have served the same purpose.

      The old Miracle Plays were grotesque enough—made by common people for the instruction of common people. Even amid the pathos of divine suffering the peasants must be amused. Care was taken that the character of Judas should meet this demand. So Judas was made at once a traitor and a clown. His pathway was beset by devils of the most ridiculous sort. And when at last he hung himself on the stage, his body burst open, and the long links of sausages which represented intestines were devoured by the imps amid the laughter and delight of the peasant audience. Now all this has passed away. Wise and learned men have taken the play in hand, and have left it a monument to their piety and good taste. Everything grotesque, or barbarous, or ridiculous has been eliminated. All else is subordinated to a faithful and artistic representation of the life and acts of Christ. Stately prose and the language of the Gospel narratives have been substituted for doggerel verse. As a work of art, the Passion Play deserves a high place in the literature of Germany.

      One striking feature of the Passion Play is the absence of superstitious elements. Beyond the dominating influence of the purpose of God, which is brought into strong prominence, there is almost nothing which suggests the supernatural or miraculous. That little even is forgotten in the intensity of human interest. The Devil and his machinations have vanished entirely. One sees in the religious customs of the people of Oberammergau few of the superstitions common among the peasant classes of other parts of Europe. In his little book, "Oberammergau und Seine Bewohner," Pastor Daisenberger says: "Superstitious beliefs and customs one does not find here." Even the ordinary ghost-stories and traditions of Germany are outworn and forgotten in this town.

      In 1634, so the tradition says, the black death came to Oberammergau, and one-tenth of the inhabitants died. The others made a vow, "a trembling vow, breathed in a night of tears," that if God should stay the plague, they would, on every tenth year, repeat in full, for the edification of the people, the Tragedy of the Passion. Other communities might build temples or monasteries, or could undertake pilgrimages; it should be their duty to show "The Way of the Cross." When this vow was taken, the pestilence ceased, and not another person perished. This was regarded by the people as a visible sign of divine approval. Thus every tenth year for nearly three centuries, ever since the time when the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock, with varying fortunes and interruptions, the Passion Play has been represented in Oberammergau.

      The play in its present form is essentially the work of Josef Alois Daisenberger, who was for twenty years pastor of the church at Oberammergau. In this town he was born in the last year of the last century, and there he died, in 1888, revered and beloved by all who came near him.

      "I wrote the play," Pastor Daisenberger said, "for the love of my Divine Redeemer, and with no other object in view than the edification of the Christian world."

      The first aim of the Passion Play has been the training of the common people. To its various representations came the peasants of Bavaria, Würtemberg, and the Tyrol, on horses, on donkeys, on foot, a long and difficult journey across mountain-walls and through great forests. It was the memory and inspiration of a lifetime to have seen the Passion Play.

      About forty years ago the tourist world discovered this scene; and since then, on the decennial year, an ever-increasing interest has been felt, an ever-growing stream of travel has been turned toward the Ammer Valley. All, prince or peasant, are treated alike by the simple, honest people, and the same preparation is made for the reception of all. The purpose of the play should be kept in mind in any just criticism. To have the right to discuss it at all, one must treat it in a spirit of sympathy.

      We came into Oberammergau on Friday, the 1st day of August, 1890, to witness the performance of the Sunday following. The city of Munich, seventy miles away, was crowded with visitors, all bound to the Passion Play. The express-train of twenty cars which carried us from Munich was crowded with people from almost every part of the civilized world.

      At Oberau, six miles from Oberammergau, at the foot of the Ettal Mountain, we left the railway, and there took part in a general scramble for seats in the carriages. The fine new road winds through dark pine woods, climbing the hill in long zigzags above wild chasms, past the old monastery of Ettal, and then slowly descends to the soft Ammer meadows. The great peak of the Kofel is ever in front, while the main chain of the Bavarian Alps closes the view behind.

      Arrived in the little village, all was bustle and confusion. The streets were full of people—some busy in taking care of strangers, others sauntering idly about, as if at a country fair. Young women, in black bodices and white sleeves, welcomed the visitors at the little inns or served them in the shops. Everywhere were young men in Tyrolese holiday attire—green coats, black slouch hats, with a feather or sprig of Edelweiss in the hat-band, and with trousers, like those of the Scottish Highlanders, which end hopelessly beyond the reach of either shoes or stockings. Besides the rustics and the tourists, one met here and there upon the streets men whose grave demeanor and long black hair resting on their shoulders proclaimed them to be actors in the Passion Play.

      On Sunday morning we were awakened by the sound of a cannon planted at the foot of the Kofel, a sharp, conical, towering mountain, some two thousand feet above the town, and bearing on its summit a tall gilded cross. It was cold and rainy, but that made no difference with the audience or the play. At eight o'clock, when the cannon sounds again, all are in their places, and the play begins. It lasts for eight hours—from eight o'clock in the morning to half-past five in the afternoon, with a single interruption of an hour and a half at noon. The stage is wide and ample. Its central part is covered, but the front, which represents the fields and the streets of Jerusalem, is in the open air. This feature lends the play a special charm. On the left, across the stage, over which the fitful rain-clouds chase one another, we can plainly see the long, green slope of Ettal mountain, dotted from bottom to top with herdmen's huts or châlets, and on the summit a tall pine-tree, standing out alone above all its brethren. On the other side appear the wild crags of the Kofel, its gilded cross glistening in the sunshine above the morning mists. Swallows fly in and out among the painted palm-trees, their twitter sounding sharply above the music of the chorus. The little birds raise their voices to make themselves heard to each СКАЧАТЬ