(now
BUILT
ENVIRONMENT AND BIBLICAL THEOLOGY
MAKING
CONNECTIONS: DISCERNING RELATIONSHIPS
MICHAEL POWELL
Doctor of Philosophy February 2003
2
- CONCEPTS AND MATERIALS
The
beauty of what you create comes if you honour the material for what it really
is. Never use it in a subsidiary way so as to make the material wait for the
next person to come along and honour its
character. (Louis Kahn)
2.1.
Purposes
The purposes of this Section are to explain the
concepts of `Built Environment' and `Biblical Theology' being used and to
describe briefly the materials to be studied, both particular and general.
2.2
Concept of Biblical Theology
The Bible can be seen as both:
1. A body of
literature to be viewed or listened to as a whole and to which a response can
be made in terms of such matters as authenticity, reality, relevance,
musicality, visual quality, dramatic power and poetic insight.
2. A set of
ancient texts representing more than 2000 years of history, resembling a site
ready for archaeological investigation, which is expected to show how various
layers were laid down at various times, and how the layers incorporate
artefacts, in the form of insights and facts, from various sources.
Viewed simultaneously from both these perspectives, the
Bible reveals an approach to life
based on a perception of God and of the nature of God's relationship to human
beings and to the world in which they presently live. Biblical Theology is,
therefore, what this dual-natured text has to say about this perception of
life
Note: This general and pragmatic use of the term `Biblical Theology' is
distinct from narrower and more technical uses
such as that of Childs (1992). For Childs, it is the Christological
interpretation of the canonical text, excluding all non-canonical material and
all the wider reflections of, for example, systematic or dogmatic theology.
This all-inclusive life includes all that human beings
have made and experienced in relation to built environments, from the barest
form of shelter to the most profound of insights into, for example, the
meaning of home or the suffering for ever associated with a particular
building or location.
2.3
Concept of Built Environment
Built Environments can be seen as both:
1. Work carried out by people at large, public bodies, private
organizations, trades, professions and individuals, in relationship with
others who may support or oppose it, or regard it neutrally. Such work may be
of a green-field nature, in which a
building
or whole city is built on virgin ground, or a process of adaptation of
something already in existence.
2.
The record of any area, from a densely built city to sparsely built
countryside, which incorporates, has incorporated, or is expected to incorporate
buildings and other structures, particularly those for human shelter,
occupation or other purpose. Within such areas, any particular building may be
regarded as itself a built environment. Such areas and buildings are lived in,
worked in or otherwise occupied by some people, while, at the same time, being
seen or visited by other people. The interaction between a built environment
and human beings can be short-lived or extend over generations and centuries.
Built Environments exist in relationship with other areas which, either
absolutely or by comparison, are undeveloped and unbuilt.
Viewed simultaneously from both these perspectives,
built environments reveal what human beings at particular times and in
particular places have needed, desired, made, valued and, sometimes,
destroyed. Built environments are embodiments of ideas and values, and mirrors
to human life.
The records of these activities, both already existing
and compiled as part of the work for this thesis, are, therefore, texts which
both tell a story and convey a meaning.
While
the emphasis is on buildings, associated infrastructure elements are also
included.
The term
'architecture' is used where it is natural to do so and not with any
particular implied meaning.
2.4
Particular materials - Built Environment
From the
outset, it was envisaged that Built Environment studies would be focused on
It was
thought that in Tasmania studies might include those of Aborigine and
traditional work, colonial buildings, convict work, the country houses and
estates owned by the National Trust of Australia and others, and contemporary
work such as housing developments on the northwest coast.
Studies
in
The second component is a network of historic villages,
now mainly residential but set in relatively open countryside, known
collectively as `the villages within the Borough'.
The third component is the town of
Of the present total Borough population of 155,000, 70%
live in the towns of
In this thesis
Aboriginal people first settled in
i n 1642 the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman landed on the
east coast, naming his discovery
Studies in
The Four
Western Rivers lie to the west of the Tamar and Launceston, from where they
were explored. The rivers run approximately north south. From east to west,
they are -e Rubicon, the
European settlement and development is considered
mainly in relation to this locality but in the case of the Aboriginal
dimension, a wider view is taken.
Flanagan (1997) captures the pathos of
Once
this weary pastoral land had been open forest through which blackfellas hunted
and camped and of a night filled with their stories of which one had no end:
that of their fierce war against the invading whitefellas. Then the surveyors
came with their barefooted convict track cutters and they gave the land
strange new names and by their naming and by their describing they announced
the coming of a terrible revolution. Where their indian-inked maps cut the new
country into neat counties with quaint reassuring English names such as
Cumberland and Bothwell, the surveyors' successors, the hydro-electricity
engineers, made their straight lines reality in the form of the wires along
which the new energy, electricity - the new god - hummed its song of promise,
its seductive false prophecies that Tasmania would one day be Australia's Ruhr
Valley.
(Flanagan
1997:21)
This area of
An important feature of
2.5 Particular materials - Biblical Theology
At the outset it was envisaged that
the work would include the study of a number of biblical texts and
commentaries on them. Those selected were:
Genesis chapters 1-11
Nehemiah
Psalms 8,19 and 48
John's Gospel chapters 1, 8-9 and 14-16
Ephesians 1:1-14, Philippians 1:5-11, Colossians 1:15-20 Revelation
chapters 20-22
The reasons for making this
selection were:
Genesis 1-11 is about creation in the sense of both beginnings and the
whole global picture; built environments are creations.
Nehemiah is about a major and significant building project to enclose
both
The selected Psalms reflect on creation in ways similar to Genesis and on
relationships.
John 1, 8-9 and 14-16 are, respectively, about the creative and
redemptive Word - the personified activity of God -, sight and light, and
relationships.
The hymnic materials from the Epistles emphasise the cosmic and inclusive
nature of creative and redemptive perceptions of the work of God
Revelation,
in contrast to Nehemiah, depicts a new Jerusalem.
This selection has been found to be an appropriate one.
There has been no need to modify it.
It has been found appropriate to include the prologue
to John's Gospel (Jn 1:1-18) with Genesis 1-11 because of its subject matter.
Partly because of their limited relevance to this thesis and partly to
facilitate its structure, materials from the Epistles have been combined with
the consideration of Revelation.
While it is important to read the texts as they stand,
a full understanding can only be obtained from the study of a range of
commentaries of various kinds, some giving deep scholarly insights and some
drawing out interpretations significant for present-day readers and
situations.
2.6
Adding general materials to the particular
While the kind of specificity considered above in
relation to both the biblical and built environment materials is vitally
important, it provides little in the way of context or of opening out to a
wider significance. From the beginning of work on the detail, there was -;zrong
pressure to bring in materials that would have a widening effect.
A
small corpus has been built up consisting, in the main, of contemporary and
readily -3ccessible texts. In the case of Biblical Theology, these have been
mainly practical in nature. while in the case of Built Environment, they have
been mainly philosophical.
2.7
Sources of texts
In the case of both Built Environment and Biblical
Theology, almost all texts used or consulted, whether particular or general,
are from Australian,