Creating a Character Analysis

Questions to Ask

I have adapted these questions from a web site that teaches character study to secondary school students in the United Kingdom. Try these, or create your own list of questions to pose to the data you collected as you found references to your character in the New Testament. As you ask these questions, a picture emerges of your character.

• What Are Your First Impressions of the Character?
• What Does the Character Think of Himself/Herself?
• What Do Others Think of the Character?
• What Does the Character Think of Others?
• Does the Character Change? How?
• What Are the Character's Motivations/Problems/Needs?
• What General Background Do You Have on the Character

How Do You Know What You Know?

Generally, four sources of information within a text help us make judgments about questions in the list above:

1. What the character says.
2. What the character does.
3. What others say about the character.
4. How others act around the character.

Example: The Prodigal

In a story, you usually have some information from each of these four sources. For example, if you were studying the younger son in the Parable of the Prodigal, you would have:

1. Information from the speeches the son makes to his father and himself.
2. Information about the son behaving in certain ways, both at home and in the far country. The storyteller (Jesus, in this case) often provides you with a particular viewpoint on what the
3. Information from the elder son and the father about the younger son.
4. Information from the responses of the elder son and father to the younger son's return (one runs to meet him; the other refuses to attend the party).

Is the prodigal's repentance real?

As you proceed with character analysis, ask yourself how you know what you think you know about the character. For instance, is the "repentance" of the younger son honest or feigned? How do you know? On what do you base your judgment of his repentance? Is he a "user" from start to finish in this parable, or does he really change? Would different characters within the story answer that question differently?

In a story within a story, as this parable is (it occurs within a story about Jesus' conflict with scribes and Pharisees), you have one other source of information for your character analysis. Look to the wider story. In the case of this example, might your answer to the question of whether the prodigal's repentance is real be informed by what you think Jesus is trying to teach with the parable?

Next: God as a Character?