ipl-logo

Faith And Religion In Athol Fugard's Road To Mecca

934 Words4 Pages

In Athol Fugard’s Road to Mecca (1985) there is differing views between the three characters (Miss Helen, Dominee Marius Byleveld and Elsa Barlow) on faith and spirituality. This essay will be examining Miss Helen’s standpoint on faith and spirituality as well as where she finds spiritual comfort, in contrast to that of Marius’s faith and spirituality and where he seeks comfort. Elsa’s standpoint on these topics will also come under analysis as the essay unfolds.

Let’s begin with Miss Helen, upon the beginning of the play the scene is set for us with a description of her house and where it is situated “The living room and, leading off it, the bedroom alcove of a house in the small Karoo village of New Bethesda. An extraordinary room by virtue of the attempt to …show more content…

Marius’s faith and spirituality lies very deeply with his religion (Christianity) and thus he has great faith in God and sees God as salvation and the bible as means to get there. This is seen when Getruida wants to open up a liquor store but Marius does a sermon bout the evils of alcohol in an attempt to get the people to rally against the proposal.
“ELSA: Booze in New Bethesda?
HELEN: If you want to put it that bluntly . . . yes.
ELSA: Now that is headline material! Good for old Gerty. I always knew she like her sundowners, but I never thought she’d have the spunk to go that far.
HELEN: Don’t joke about it, Elsie. It’s a very serious matter. The village is very upset.
ELSA: Headed, no doubt, by your old friend Pastor Marius Byleveld.
HELEN: That’s right. I understand that his last sermon was all about the evils of alcohol and how it’s ruining the health and lives of our Coloured folk.”
(Fugard 2003, Act

Show More
Related

  • Faith In Alfons Ayer's Parallel Journey

    1307 Words  | 6 Pages

    Faith is having absolute loyalty and trust towards a tremendous power in their growth. In the biography Parallel Journeys by Eleanor Ayer, Alfons Heck is a strong supporter of Hitler, but his relationship decreased. The memoir Night by Elie Wiesel, a Jewish holocaust survivor, has a wavering relationship with God that also decreases as time continues. Both Heck and Wiesel are devoted to their God’s at first; however, Wiesel is confused with his faith, while Heck continues to follow Hitler. In the end, each boy feels betrayed by their leaders.

    Read More

  • The Sarajevo Haggadah In Geraldine Brooks People Of The Book

    826 Words  | 4 Pages

    In Geraldine Brooks’ novel People of the Book, the Sarajevo Haggadah takes the reader on a journey through history. The Haggadah introduces the reader to a multitude of characters living in very different times. Brooks’ characters all have different places in the Haggadah’s journey; the characters connect with the book in dissimilar ways. Each character’s interaction with the Sarajevo Haggadah shows the reader a hidden meaning or key quality of that character. Serif Kamal’s actions involving the Haggadah display important aspects of his character: his courage, heroism and selflessness.

    Read More

  • Blessed Charles The Good Analysis

    1894 Words  | 8 Pages

    The journalist argues that even though the entire society wasn’t satisfied by his religious ruling, people should still appreciate the peace and resources that he provided to the needy people. With so much knowledge about Christianity and being devoted, Jacob provides a strong perspective about Charles’ religious life because he is very religious himself as he explains praying to the Holy Rosary has made him appreciate the kind acts that Charles has shown as the Count of Flanders. Moreover, White provides a lot of evidences by using quotes in the Holy Rosary that supports why Charles refers to Holy Scriptures while ruling Flanders. Throughout this article, I found White’s analysis of Count Charles’ religious life really useful because he provides good examples of why religion has made a big impact to governing a society and how religion can change people’s perspective into believing certain

    Read More

  • Night Elie's Journey Analysis

    651 Words  | 3 Pages

    The heart wrenching and powerful memoir “Night” by Elie Wiesel depicts Elie’s struggle through the holocaust. It shows the challenges and struggles Elie and people like him faced during this mournful time, the dehumanization; being forced out of their homes, their towns and sent to nazi concentration camps, being stripped of their belongings and valuables, being forced to endure and witness the horrific events during one of history’s most ghastly tales. In “Night” Elie does not only endure a physical journey but also a spiritual journey as well, this makes him question his determination, faith and strength. This spiritual journey is a journey of self discovery and is shown through Elie’s struggle with himself and his beliefs, his father

    Read More

  • Spiritual Change In Night By Elie Wiesel

    726 Words  | 3 Pages

    Screams of anguish, the smell of burning flesh, corpses lining the crimson soil—these are only a few of the horrors one would face as a Jewish prisoner in a concentration camp at the time of the Holocaust. Eliezer Wiesel, author of the memoir Night, has witnessed all of this, at the young age of 15. Over the course of the catastrophe, Eliezer shows drastic signs of spiritual change before, during, and after being held prisoner at the camps of death. Prior to the incident, Elie’s faith in his God was very strong. He describes bringing his needs to his father as, “One day I asked my father to find me a master who could guide me in my studies of Kabbalah,” (page 4).

    Read More

  • Theme Of Sin And Atonement In The Kite Runner

    1237 Words  | 5 Pages

    Aarushi Bellani Ms. Kanika Dang Thesis Paper 8th November 2015 Portrayal of Sin & Atonement in Khaled Hosseini’s ‘The Kite Runner’ “Our English word “atonement” explains well the theology behind such restoration, for it suggests that God and humanity can relationally be “at one” again,” suggests Ed Stetzer in his blog on Christianity & the Old Testament. This concept of sin and atonement can be seen to occur frequently in the novel ‘The Kite Runner’ by Khaled Hosseini through the course of the protagonist, Amir’s life.

    Read More

  • Night By Elie Wiesel Theme

    1010 Words  | 5 Pages

    Theme Analysis Essay: Having and Losing Faith In God Freedom of religion is a fundamental human right that protects all people. Religions faith can be tested under certain circumstances, which can falter the relationship one can have with their God. In the memoir Night, by Elie Wiesel, the author creates the universal theme that religious faith is questioned and challenged during traumatic events. Throughout the story, we see many relationships with God scarcely survive, and some completely fail entirely. For the duration of the memoir, Wiesel uses plenty of narrative elements to help convey this theme.

    Read More

  • Examples Of Rhetorical Questions In Night By Elie Wiesel

    672 Words  | 3 Pages

    Faith Fading with Hope People look to God as the pinnacle of motivation, where people “find rest in God alone, [their] hope comes from him” (Scriptures). When severe calamity and hardships are presented to humans, their faith that their God will protect them weakens. When Eliezer Wiesel, a survivor of the Holocaust and author of the memoir Night, faces the Nazis’ dehumanizing acts that strip him of his faith, the development of how a once “former mystic” turns into a hopeless corpse is presented to the audience (Wiesel 67). Throughout this account, Wiesel implements rhetorical questions as a way to emphasize the theme that when people lose faith, they are not only losing their God, but they are losing their hope for survival.

    Read More

  • Religion: Fieldwork Analysis

    991 Words  | 4 Pages

    The religion I choose to observe for my fieldwork project is Catholicism. In order to complete the fieldwork assignment required for this paper I attended St. Lawrence Church on 5225 N. Himes Avenue in Tampa, FL. One of the reasons I chose to observe Catholicism for my fieldwork project is because it is a prominent religion throughout the world. In addition to the US, Catholicism is widely supported within Europe and Latin American countries. Another reason I chose Catholicism is because I found it to be relatively different from my own religion, Hinduism.

    Read More

  • Elie Wiesel Faith

    1230 Words  | 5 Pages

    Faith is such an important part of life. It is the drive, the motive to live, to breathe, to feel. When faith is lost, so is the reason to exist; life is lost in oblivion. Faith is a truly powerful weapon and as the story of Eliezer 's life during the Holocaust is played out through this book, a first-hand perspective is gained of what someone can do to cause questioning of faith and how people respond, whether by strengthening faith or losing it entirely. Eliezer is hit with every hard trial imaginable within a year of his life and eventually withers and hardens into this completely new person than the boy he was when he first stepped into that cattle car expelling him from Sighet, his home, and life.

    Read More

  • Elie Wiesel Symbolism And Metaphors In Night

    517 Words  | 3 Pages

    Losing faith is like clearing off a foggy windshield. The true pain and suffering of the world are revealed. During the Holocaust, the SS would often force prisoners to witness the deaths of fellow prisoners, to scare them into obeying the SS and to show the prisoners what would happen to them if they did not follow orders. In the memoir Night, Elie Wiesel uses symbolism and metaphors to show the theme that suffering will weaken religious faith.

    Read More

  • Elie Wiesel Faith In Night

    979 Words  | 4 Pages

    Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.” Having faith in a higher archy is a prelevant theme in the memoir Night by Elie Wiesel. Set during the Holocaust, a time of extermination of the Jews, Wiesel’s faith in his god wavers as he describes the situations he endures. One will notice as Wiesel’s faith decreases his identity goes downhill. Although, changing views in religion can affect more than just one’s identity, Wiesel explains his faith in god has a huge impact on his personality to prove one’s religious aspects can affect the way they choose to live their life.

    Read More

  • The Babadook: Film Analysis Of The Film

    769 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Babadook, directed by Jennifer Kent, is a film representing a person's life when they deny their past and do not face grief. One of the most important scenes in the movie is the basement scene when Samuel ties his mother up and forces her to face the Babadook. This scene shows that eventually a person will be forced to face grief, even if they do not want to. The scene takes place in the basement of Amelia and Samuels home because it was the forbidden room of the home. Down in the basement is where the husband's belongings were kept, therefore the basement represented how deep down they had to face the root of the problem.

    Read More

  • The Neo-Marxist Criticism In James Joyce's Araby

    1102 Words  | 5 Pages

    In October 1905, James Joyce wrote “Araby” on an unnamed narrator and like his other stories, they are all centered in an epiphany, concerned with forms of failures that result in realizations and disappointments. The importance of the time of this publication is due to the rise of modernist movement, emanating from skepticism and discontent of capitalism, urging writers like Joyce to portray their understanding of the world and human nature. With that being said, Joyce reflects Marxist ideals through the Catholic Church’s supremacy, as well as the characters’ symbolic characterization of the social structure; by the same token, psychoanalysis of the boy’s psychological and physical transition from one place, or state of being, to another is

    Read More

  • I Saw Ramallah Analysis

    1909 Words  | 8 Pages

    Introduction The novel as well as the short story proclaimed a literature of the oppressed that extended hope to those who have none. This can be seen in three key dimensions of the Palestinian novel. First, there is a beautification of the lost homeland of Palestine. Palestine is portrayed in literature as a paradise on earth.

    Read More

More about Faith And Religion In Athol Fugard's Road To Mecca

Open Document