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Personification of the Seven Deadly Sins One of the characteristics of medieval English literature is its high allegorist. It also applies to the whole European literature of Dark Ages, as well. This is because Christian dogma could not satisfy peoples spiritual needs any longer, being unable to correspond to the realities of their everyday lives. It is not a secret that Church used to resist any attempts to translate Bible from Latin into contemporary European languages, as it posed the danger of people being able to learn about nonsense of Christianity on their own. The Vision of Piers Plowman is a good example of medieval narrator trying to adapt Christian notions of sin, redemption and virtue to his own convictions. In it, the poet (commonly referred to as William) falls asleep in the Malvern Hills and after this; he begins his symbolic journey through the wilderness, where he comes upon a tower of truth with deep dungeon inside and the sight of many people in the distance.
There he is approached by the lady, who tells him about the meaning of his dream. Apparently, the tower represents God and the dungeon is a personification of Devil, while fair lady is nothing but a Holy Roman Church. The poet begins to encounter allegorical characters of Conscience, Liar, Reason and many others. By interacting with them, author is able to come to certain moral conclusions.
Every of his vision is heavily affected by Christian symbolism and therefore, it is quite hard for us to interpret poets original intentions. Nevertheless, we can be positive, when it comes to interpreting authors ideas about Deadly Sins. It comes as quite a surprise that William Langland considers the gluttony as the worst of all sins and not the pride, as it described in the Bible: So for his Glotome and his great Sleuth he hath a grievous penance, That is weslaco whan he wake and wealth for code -- And som tyme for his sydney -- so he is never more Without mourning among and mischief to be (Vision Four, Passus XIV). We need to remember that it was a very turbulent time in England, when this poem was being written. There used to three famines in the beginning of 14 th century in Yorkshire area alone. Also, author was being influenced by the peasants riots, which were very common back than.
One of Williams visions involves encounter with the Greed. The psychological traits of this character point out to the fact that author was probably referring to the Catholic high clergy. Just like in our times, Holy Fathers in fourteenth century England were willing to share their riches with no one else, but God, who never demanded their declarations of income. It is a trademark of the whole poem that it is basically an anti-clerical piece, under disguise of highly pious work of medieval mind. In the end, narrator also refers to a Pride, the man who guards the gates of heaven. Even some Saints proved themselves as no match for him, while being confronted with a temptations to attain Earthly fame, because of their good deeds.
Prides arguments sound strikingly reasonable, in the scene where he argues with poet. Why deny itself a pleasure of being respected by people, while there is no guarantee that virtuous men will get into the Kingdom of Heaven, as only Jesus can decide that in the end? There are traces of Protestantism can be found in The Vision of Piers Plowman, because author bases his faith in God on the principle of grace rather then on the notion of covenant. The personification of Deadly Sins in this poem is affected by authors common sense more than by his knowledge of Christian dogmatism. He sees sin as something that contradicts the nature of men. Therefore, he justifies marriages, instead of being against them, like Jesus demanded.
It is also the reason for him not to even mention the sin of Lust in the poem, although modern Bible scholars point out to it, as something that will surely lead person to hell. The Vision of Piers Plowman is the poem of a man, whos focused on discussing the Earthly injustices, even though he shouldnt have paid much attention to them, if he was a real Christian Christopher Marlowe's The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus was written in the time, when cultural movement towards returning back to ancient Greek and Roman socio-political ideals was gaining more and more momentum, throughout the Europe. We now refer to it as the period of Renaissance. It has been noted by contemporary critics that Marlowe's Dr. Faust is essentially a Renaissance man, who had to pay a medieval price for sticking to its beliefs.
Marlowe tells us a story of scientist, who wanted to acquire more knowledge. After having realized that the conventional means of acquiring such knowledge set limits to his scientific horizons, he decided to make a deal with a Devil trading his soul, in exchange for promise to be revealed the true nature of things. Faustus understands that selling his soul to Devil represents a deadly sin, yet after having contemplated this for a while, he comes to the conclusion that the concept of sin is unnatural, therefore it can be trespassed: If we say that we have no sin, We deceive ourselves, and theres no truth in us. Why then despise we must sin? (Marlowe, 1. 4050) The sin has always been associated with evil and the embodiment of evil is Devil.
Therefore, we can say that the personification of sin in Marlowe's play corresponds to authors idea of opposing God, as the worst transgression. Dr. Faustus appears as being simply a weak person, rather then hardened sinner. The practical jokes he pulls on people, during his journey throughout the Europe, after being given magical powers, only make readers to feel even more sympathetic towards him.
According to Bible, even visiting bathroom is a sin, as it makes person unclean. Faustus rightly concludes that being a sinner is in his very nature and decides to take a full advantage of it. Christian tradition traces the origins of sin to the Adam and Eve, who had disobeyed Gods commandment not to acquire knowledge, by eating the fruit from the tree of Good and Evil. Isnt it because that they would discover that these two notions derive from the same source?
After having made a deal with Faustus, Mephistopheles tells him that there is only one thing that he will never be able to do for the scientist - to tell him who had created the universe. Here Devil acts just like God; he denies people certain knowledge under the threat of damnation. At one point, Faustus refers to seven Deadly Sins, such as: pride, envy, gluttony, lust, anger, greed and sloth. He asks Devil about whether all of them lead to the suffering in hell. In response, Mephistopheles says: whatever is natural, isnt disgusting. Although, Marlowe doesnt promote the idea of disobedience to God in his play, he nevertheless, tries to show us that sin only deserves damnation if it opposes itself to the laws of nature.
From this prospective, reader comes to the conclusion that without practicing some of the sins, the humankind wouldnt be able to progress. A sin of lust is nothing but a normal instinct, which is present in all living species. Envy, gluttony and anger are also nothing but normal subconscious reflections towards external factors of influence. Faustus acts in very reasonable manner.
He asks himself, why it would be a sin to strive towards attaining more knowledge, if God created man as curious being? Marlowe's hero simply breaks with conventional morality, which is based on the Christian theology. This automatically allows him to become a better man, to rise above the crowd. Yet, in the end Faustus ends up in hell.
It is very symbolic, as it represents the fate of those who tried to break out of Christian captivity during the time of Middle Ages, from social prospective. Many philosophers and political scientists recognize the fact that it is probably only the matter of another 50 - 100 years before Christianity will fully extinct. That is why we cannot seriously suggest that the concept of sin will continue to affect peoples lives in twenty first century. But it wont result in elimination of morality, as the governing principle of relations between people. Such morality is simply going to be based on the Renaissance ideals of health, beauty and intellect.
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