ABSTRACT
Transgressive language in the biblical plays not only defines the characters who use it, but in doing so prompts responses to those characters from the audiences. These responses serve the social and religious purposes of the plays and direct attention to areas of social and religious dissent in medieval society. This chapter looks at the way transgressive language prompts audience responses which challenge socially disruptive conduct; and shows how that language prompts responses which challenge the audience as a whole to reflect upon its orientation towards sin, guilt, and its Christian faith. It will, however, become apparent that the functions of transgressive language in many biblical plays are so complex that they seldom fit neatly into these groupings. The cycles of biblical plays purported to assert such a hierarchy against the process of change. They also provided a means of bonding an unstable population through an act of celebration which took the form to illiterate and literate spectators.
