Mystery Play (redirected from Miracle, mystery, and morality plays)

mystery play: see miracle play.

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mystery play

Vernacular drama of the Middle Ages. It developed from the liturgical drama and usually represented a biblical subject. In the 13th century, craft guilds began producing mystery plays at sites removed from the church, adding apocryphal and satirical elements to the dramas. In England groups of 25–50 plays were later organized into lengthy cycles, such as the Chester plays and the Wakefield plays. In England the plays were often performed on moveable pageant wagons, while in France and Italy they were acted on stages with scenery representing heaven, earth, and hell. Technical flourishes such as flying angels and fire-spouting devils kept the spectators' attention. The genre of the mystery play declined by 1600. See also miracle play; morality play.

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mystery play

(in the Middle Ages) a type of drama based on the life of Christ

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Mystery Play (Elche)

August 14-15

El Misterio d'Elx, or the Mystery Play of Elche, is a medieval drama about the death and assumption of the Virgin Mary that takes place in August on the Feast of the Assumption in Elche, a town in Valencia, Spain. The first part of the play is performed on August 14, the day before the feast, and it deals with the death of the Virgin and the ascension of her soul to heaven on a throne, or araceli, carried by five angels. In the second part, performed on August 15, the Virgin is buried and the Gate of Heaven opens. The araceli descends a second time and takes the Virgin away. She is crowned at the heavenly portal while organ music plays, bells ring, and firecrackers explode.
The mystery play is performed from a raised platform in the sanctuary of the Church of La Merced. It is considered by many to be one of Spain's greatest religious dramatic survivals, and it is believed to date back to the early 13th century.

CONTACTS:
Valencia Tourist Office
Communitat Valenciana, Aptdo. de Correos 48
Burjassot, 46100 Spain
34-902-123-212; fax: 34-902-220-211
www.comunitat-valenciana.com

SOURCES:
FestEur-1961, p. 141
FestWestEur-1958, p. 203
SpanFiestas-1968, p. 164

Celebration days: Aug 14; Aug 15

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Mystery Play (Tibet)

January-February; last day of Tibetan year

Originally performed by a devil-dancing cult to drive out the old year along with its demons and human enemies, this annual dramatic presentation was known to Tibetans as the Dance of the Red-Tiger Devil and to Europeans as the Pageant of the Lamas or the Mystery Play of Tibet. Under Buddhist influence, it was seen as symbolizing the triumph of the Indian missionary monks, led by Padmasambhava ( see also Hemis Festival and Paro Tshechu), over pagan devils, and more recently, it has been changed to represent the assassination of Lang-darma, the king who tried to rid Tibet of Lamaism. Despite its many transformations over the years, however, the play continues to retain the devil-dancing features of its earliest form.
It is performed on the last day of the year in the courtyards of Buddhist temples or monasteries and continues for two days. A group of priests in black miters is confronted by one group of demons after another, which they manage to exorcize. On the second day, a dough effigy representing the enemies of Tibet and Lamaism is dismembered and disemboweled. Pieces of the effigy are thrown to the audience, who eat them or keep them to use as talismans. The play is followed by a burnt offering and a procession.
See also Losar

CONTACTS:
Office of Tibet
Tibet House, 1 Culworth St.
London, NW8 7AF United Kingdom
44-20-7722-5378; fax: 44-20-7722-0362
www.tibet.com

SOURCES:
DictFolkMyth-1984, p. 777 (c)

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Mystery Play 

a genre of Western European religious theater of the late Middle Ages (14th to 16th centuries). Mystery plays were most highly developed in France. They were based on biblical stories and written by priests, learned theologians, physicians, and jurists. Religious scenes alternated with comic everyday episodes. Presentations, which generally took place in the public square, were organized by town authorities and artisans’ guilds to coincide with town celebrations, usually days when fairs were held. Although they were supervised by aristocratic and church circles, mystery plays were a form of popular art in which piety constantly clashed with blasphemy, and religious mysticism with the realities of everyday life, which were introduced into the plays by the performers, most of whom were local amateurs.

Among the most vivid examples of the genre are Arnoul Greban’s Mystery of the Passion (mid-15th century) and the Mystery of the Siege of Orleans (presented after 1429). As the realistic and comic elements in the plays became stronger, clerical and secular authorities attacked the mystery plays, and in the 16th century the presentation of the plays was prohibited.

In the 19th century and the first half of the 20th, mystery plays were periodically presented in Oberammergau, Germany, and in Paris in front of the Cathedral of Notre Dame. The play Story of the Glorious Resurrection by Mikolaj of Wilkowieck (1962, People’s Theater, Warsaw) is distinguished by its ironic interpretation of medieval mystery plays.

Mystery plays developed in Iran in the tenth century, where they became part of the religious shahsey-vahsey procession. The taziyeh, a form of Persian tragedy, is derived from the mystery play.

REFERENCE

Istoriia zapadnoevropeiskogo teatra, vol. 1. Moscow, 1956.