Christian Symbolism In Sir Gawain And The Green Knight

Being merciful is showing God’s dealings with mankind and is a quality of God. Bertilak refers Gawain to being a knight worthy and has no equal. Bertilak exclaims that he was sent on this task to find Gawain and see what he is about. The revelation after the Bertilak spares Gawain’s life and knowing about the girdle all along leads Gawain to truly embrace his flaws and humility for the first time and in so doing to find atonement and a more stable base for Christian behavior than the rule-based chivalry of Arthur’s court. “Sir Gawain And The Green Knight” shows Christian ideas and shows behavior towards everyone.

“It certainly is my opinion that a book worth reading only in childhood is not worth reading even then” (qtd. in Root, Jerry, and Martindale, 90). Although arguments have been made that C.S. Lewis’s novel, The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe is purely a children’s book, the novel itself holds a deeper religious meaning due to its parallels with The Bible and the morals it supports. Lewis’s work depicts a strong Christ-like character and has many tools or situations that have strong biblical origins and influences.

This story follows how the narrator of Beowulf struggles between the Christian beliefs and values of the narrator and the Pagan activates done by the charterers in the story. The narrator however does say he believes that Beowulf would have been Pagan, but still thinks that the trust Beowulf has in God makes him a Christian. There are many references to God in this story. For example in Beowulf it states “Afterwards a boy-child was sent to Shield, a cub in the yard, a comfort sent by

This is also the case in the medieval poem Sir Gawain and the Greene Knight by an unknown author, in this poem, Sir Gawain represents an outstanding example of Christian knighthood and has to withstand worldly temptations to prove his faith in God, which he fails in the end. While researching about this topic, I found several examples of texts concerning with the religious symbolism in this poem. However, most of those articles I found were either quite long and encompassing, which gave them a lack of clarity (see Coe, for example), or they were focusing on a single aspect of Christian symbolism in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and looking at recurrences in other literature. As the poem is riddled with references to Christianity, I wanted to clarify the coherency and recurring nature of one theme in particular, which the Gawain poet elucidates throughout the

In a poem known as the Essay on Man, it claims, “Know then thyself, presume not God to scan, The proper study of mankind is Man.” This means that man should not bother to know God, but to know himself. The reason given for this belief is that man cannot know God so it is not profitable to gain knowledge of Him. Catholics also believe that man cannot know God but they go on to say that God reveals himself to us so that we can learn about Him. According to the Catholic Church, “It pleased God, in his goodness and wisdom, to reveal himself and to make known the mystery of his will.” Catholics also believe that Man’s purpose is to know, love and serve God saying, “God, infinitely perfect and blessed in himself, in a plan of sheer goodness freely created man to make him share in his own blessed life. For this reason, at every time and in every place, God draws close to man.

Both Beowulf and Redcrosse Knight epitomize the ideal saint in two separate periods, The Middle Age and The Early Modern Period. The tale of Beowulf demonstrates the impact of the spread of Christianity in the early Danish paganistic culture that values courageous deeds and boldness most importantly else. Beowulf's bravery is investigated in three separate clashes, those with Grendel, Grendel's mom, and the ocean creature. Redcrosse Knight, the hero of "The Faerie Queen," remains for the ethicalness of Holiness however he is the individual Christian battling against malevolence. Quite a bit of Beowulf is committed to verbalizing and showing the gallant code, which values quality, boldness, and devotion in fighters, neighborliness, liberality, political ability, and great notoriety in all individuals.

After Augustine converts to Christianity and he hears the child saying, “tolle lege”, Augustine is certain that God is speaking to him. A Christmas Carol is obviously a work of fiction and the ghosts serve as an interesting vehicle to give an interesting commentary about what it means to live a life of fulfillment. The reader is left with the comfort of feeling that they are clearly not as miserable as Scrooge was and pleased with the arc of the redemption narrative. On the other hand, Confessions is viewed as the first autobiography which implies that everything in the book happened. However, some of the events of Confessions are nearly as fantastical as the events of A Christmas Carol.

And from the resulting chaos, arose a man whose thoughts are of great value for the church to this day, Blaise Pascal. Pascal was found deeply rooted in the tradition of Augustine, but remained a committed Catholic. He spoke into a world filled with reformation induced confusion, and is remembered mostly for his wager. He argues we must wager on God’s existence, because we cannot know with certainty if he does or does not. Then he appeals to the reader to wager that God does exist, for it is the greater gain.

Beowulf, still keeping his faith in God, believes that God is punishing him for his wrong doing, and he is sorta right. (Death ln 16-19). Perhaps Beowulf realizes his mistake in trusting in the worldly things to keep him safe and secure, rather than God, but it is revealed to the reader that this is not the case. Against impossible odds, Beowulf chose to rely on his armor and weapons to keep him safe; however, these things failed him. (Death ln 89-90).

This "state of grace" is brought about through the work of Beowulf, who delivers the Danes from evil. To be sure, hero-worship is a fundamental part of the Germanic heroic tradition, but the infusion of religion and moralistic language edges this element of the story toward the messiah-worship of Christianity. This explicitly religious form of hero-worship begins with King Hrothgar's reception of Beowulf "Now Holy God has, in His goodness, guided him here...to defend us from Grendel,"