What are people saying about the Edinburgh Passion Play?
Free performances of Passion Plays are taking place around the UK this Easter. What are people saying about them? Feature articles in The Tablet and The Scotsman focus on the Passion Play in Princes Street Gardens in Edinburgh.
‘The Edinburgh Easter Play takes on Adolescence, toxic masculinity and Andrew Tate’ by Susan Mansfield for The Scotsman.
The Edinburgh Easter Play has been performed in Princes Street Gardens in Edinburgh for 20 years and each year Director Suzanne Lofthus has a new theme: “We are always looking for ways the story speaks to contemporary life – and there are always fresh ways it addresses the moment.”
This year Suzanne worked with Dr Shadaab Rahemtulla, a Muslim and senior lecturer in Islamic Studies and Helen Bond, Professor of Christian Origins at Edinburgh University’s School of Theology. Dr Rahemtulla and Professor Bond became consultants on the script, which focusses on issues of masculinity.
As one example from the new script, Martha scolds her sister Mary for listening to Jesus instead of helping her with the housework. In a new, surprising move, Jesus offers to lend a hand. The disciples are shocked to find him making bread – which they think is “women’s work”. The rest of the disciples and followers of Jesus are equally shocked and respond with hisses and boos.
Lofthus says: “This is something Shadaab suggested, it’s one of my favourite scenes. I thought at first Jesus would say his mother had taught him how to make bread, but I realised that it would work better if he was rubbish at it – Martha has to show him what to do.”
Dr Shadaab Rahemtulla, a Muslim and senior lecturer in Islamic Studies at Edinburgh University’s School of Theology was in the audience at the 2024 play.
“Jesus is a major prophet in the Islamic tradition so I thought that would be a wonderful things to see, especially in Ramadan,” he says. “I loved it. I was struck by the impact that it has within a public setting. I was surrounded by over 600 people watching the play and that really got me thinking about the social consequences of how we relate stories, in particular stories that carry a lot of religious authority.
I’m really interested in questions of masculinity and in my own research I have explored the masculinity of Prophet Muhammad. When I was watching the play, I was struck by the way in which Jesus related to his masculinity. The 2024 play focused on the women in the Gospel narratives, but it also got me thinking about the men in the narratives, how they related to the women but also how they related to each other.
In society, young men and boys in particular are being bombarded with toxic images of what it means to be a man, that to be a real man you have to be strong, even cruel, you have to be deeply competitive, you cannot be vulnerable, you cannot express your emotions and be in a real egalitarian relationship with those around you.
‘Behold the Man’ by Joanna Moorhead for The Tablet
The choice to focus on masculinity is described as a ‘serendipitous choice’ in the wake of the discussions about the Netflix series Adolescence. When the decision was taken to look at the role of men, Lofthus sought the help of Dr Shadaab Rahemtulla, a senior lecturer in Islamic studies at Edinburgh University. He specialises in liberation theology and its roots in the texts of both Islam and Christianity, and his work has involved looking at the gender
roles of the characters in the sacred writings of both faiths.
“I could see straight away that this was a good opportunity to explore something important,” he says. “I was at the Passion Play last year in the centre of Edinburgh, and there were hundreds of people watching, including many families. And it’s increasingly clear how much we need to think about the role of boys in our families – not only Adolescence, but also the intervention of Gareth Southgate and even Keir Starmer talking about it, underlined how important it is…And when we look at Jesus – who is of course a major prophet in the Qur’an – we see he’s someone
whose character encapsulates so much of what we want to say. Jesus is committed to helping others, he’s a healer, he mixes with
and humanises people who are considered barely human. He has a very strong compass on all this, and we realised that bringing these out in the play would encourage our audience to think about these things.”
You can read the full article in The Tablet here.
