That Time John Paul II Wrote a Play

The Old Testament struggled with articulating a theology of the afterlife during most of its formation. It initially came at the problem through the lens of justice. God is both good and just. Many people are neither. Sheol, the abode of the dead, is not heaven: it is the place to which all the dead go, a kind of shadowy (hence the word “shades”), inchoate existence. So, at first, the Old Testament tried to do justice in this world: God rewards the good with long life, health, and children. Only the bad die young (and suffer, which is why the Sanhedrin wanted a certain thirty-three-year-old to hang on a tree. It’s also why the first reaction of the apostles to the man born blind is “Who sinned? Him or his parents?”

As nice as that theory sounded, experience did not bear it out. Job and Qoheleth attest to that. At that point, it became a matter of faith. Since you weren’t there to counsel God when he laid out the world, trust him to do what is right and just, even if you don’t understand it.

Good advice, but not wholly satisfying.

The Old Testament finally began to shape a clear notion of the afterlife only with the Book of Wisdom, a book that was written maybe a century before Christ—i.e., at the very end of the Old Testament. Wisdom articulates an understanding of eternal life by starting with not justice (though its vision of reward and punishment is eminently just), but love. If what binds us to God is love, it assures us of life because God is faithful and would not let love aim for the futile. Love by its nature seeks to endure. Would God—who is Love—make that an illusion?

I mention this because it leads to a great film you should (re)watch: The Jeweler’s Shop. Based on Karol Wojtyła (Pope St. John Paul II)’s play of the same name, it’s “a meditation on the sacrament of matrimony, passing into a drama.” That’s often what happens to marriage, too.

The film version of “The Jeweler’s Shop” takes liberties with the play’s storyline. That’s largely due to two factors: the demands of a worldwide audience and the context of the original play. More concrete detail is needed to make the story clear to an audience of global viewers. And, although Wojtyła wrote “The Jeweler’s Shop” in 1960, I have the impression he remained under the influence of the “Rhapsodic Theater,” a theatrical form which accented the primacy of the word, in which he participated during the War. A word-focused play does not readily transfer to visual film.

“The Jeweler’s Shop” examines three marriages. Teresa and Andrzej deeply love each other. He dies shortly after their marriage, but not before they conceive a son, Krzysztof. Anna’s and Stefan’s love is initially more superficial and decays into a loveless marriage. They have a daughter, Monika. Krzysztof and Monika eventually marry, bringing to their marriage the baggage of their parents’ marriages, the marriages they have known.

The liberties of the film version of “The Jeweler’s Shop” do not, in the end, interfere with Wojtyła’s original storyline. The changes: Anna and Stefan escape World War II in Poland—in which Andrzej dies—by emigrating to Canada. They eventually sponsor Teresa and Krzysztof, where she carries on a profession as a pianist. Monika and Krzysztof are college-age: she an aspiring ballerina, he a college student.

The Jeweler, played by Burt Lancaster, symbolizes God. Fr. Adam, who is the first of the protagonists to be seen with the Jeweler, is clearly God’s representative. The young people—like the students Wojtyła used to take on hikes—fall in love, albeit with different motivations. Andrzej seeks someone who completes him. Stefan wants to impress Anna and would not necessarily have been bothered if she had slept with him. Andrzej grapples with the “crossroads” that the decision to marry Teresa involves; one gets the impression Stefan runs into or away from things most of his life. Watch how both men deal with women during the forest hike: Stefan ostentatiously “assists” them to descend a hill; Andrzej’s watchful eye is less focused on how she sees him than on what she needs.

I would highlight three scenes in the film: Andrzej’s proposal, Anna’s attempt to sell her wedding ring, and Krzysztof’s proposal.

Teresa and Andrzej walk the streets of Old Town Kraków when they both look at the rings in the Jeweler’s shop window. For a moment, their mutual gaze is reflected in the window along with the Jeweler looking at them—but only for a moment: God leaves room for our decision. Andrzej’s way of proposing marriage is unusual (but faithful to the text): “Will you be my life’s companion?” Before she answers, Teresa runs into an adjacent store, where she quickly buys white, high-heeled shoes. Upon returning to Andrzej, she makes clear that his question required her to “be as tall as you” to face the demands of a lifetime. But before she assents, she asks why he wants to marry her, and he makes clear that, while there were “many other choices,” grace made clear that this woman was she who completed him. Every word in that scene deserves reflection.

Much later, when Anna finds herself in a loveless marriage to Stefan, she tries to sell her ring. She takes it to a jeweler, who declines to buy it because he says it weighs nothing: “Your husband must be alive,” in which case neither ring without the other weighs anything, because they are not “the weight of metal, but the proper weight of man.” Shocked and perhaps angered, she rushes down the street, apparently ready to throw herself at any man who exhibits interest in her. A car trails her. The male driver invites her to “join him.” She reaches for the door handle, but, when she looks again, she sees not the man who flirted with her, but the face of Stefan, from which she recoils. Moments later, when she encounters Fr. Adam, he makes clear to her that “the Bridegroom could have no other face for you” and challenges her, despite her crushed faith, that love is not a moment, but a lifetime and can be rekindled.

Monika and Krzysztof labor under the heritage of their parents’ marriages. Krzysztof suffers from the lack of a male image at home and a mother whose fate was loneliness. Monika labors under the form of her parents’ loveless marriage. She initially repulses Krzysztof’s proposal, which—together with Anna’s encounter on the street—gets the elders talking. Krzysztof, while giving her space, also recognizes that life cannot be indeterminate: he proposes again, this time saying they should marry in Kraków, making clear that he will not leave her and that his having given her time shows he cares. But “time’s up.” “I want more,” says Monika—meaning more than what her parents have—but takes the risk of love and says, finally, “Yes.”

The play grapples with the fact that man is “poor,” with a limited life but a desire for love that lasts. For Wojtyła, the only way to resolve that paradox is to make a choice, to take a risk and, in freedom, pick love, which is what takes us to God. Because, as the Jeweler observes in the film’s final shot, as he closes the door of his shop (just as the Bridegroom calls time on the virgins), “the future depends on love.”