The Battle between Christian Virtues and Pagan Philosophies in Beowulf - Essay Example

“Bitter and battle-sharp:” The battle between Christian virtues and pagan philosophies in Beowulf Thence unspeakable offspring/all awoke: Ogres and elves/and spirits from the underworld; Also giants/who strove with God For an interminable season;/ He gave them their reward for that. (Beowulf ln. 111-114) When St. Jerome (354-420 A.D.) criticized the classics for not being Christian enough and Christian texts for not being readable enough, he adapted to literature a peculiarly Christian methodology that allowed the young religion to firmly entrench itself in the Western world. Why not shave off the inappropriate aspects of classical literature, add a moral lesson or two and call them Christian? Across Western Europe, Christianity was doing exactly that, transforming pagan gods into Christian saints, appropriating pagan holidays and dressing them up with Christian implications and reinterpreting local beliefs and customs through the lens of Christian ethics. In many ways, it was an inspired approach, and Christianity’s evangelical methods helped the religion seep across the West and take firm root among its people. Still, the marriage of Christian virtues and local tradition was not always a natural one, and Beowulf is one of the best examples of this battle between old and new ethics. Though Beowulf is considered the first Christian epic by many literary historians, one can also argue that Beowulf is the last stand of pagan faith in the North – a cautionary tale about the repercussions of adopting Christian values over the ones that had served the Northern leaders well in pre-Christian times. In fact, Beowulf might be read as a battle, not just between the hero and the three monsters of the tale, but between the traditional Norse values and the new Christian ethos. Like Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus or I Samuel in the Old Testament, Beowulf feels anachronistic – much of its content could easily be lifted and reset as the plot for a modern action film. The critical events of Beowulf center on violence – like a good action movie, the violence is the point, and the rest of the narrative is wrapped around it in a fairly gratuitous bow. (This may be one reason critics like W.P. Ker have classified Beowulf as second-class literature despite its historic significance.) This emphasis on violence is one of the most salient examples of the conflict between Christian virtues and pagan values in Beowulf. As Thomas Prendergast points out, Beowulf’s ostensible rejection of violence – an adoption of Christian pacifist values – it belied by the relish with which the poem describes the violence it contains: “For even as the work’s narrator cautions against the idolatrous seductions of violence, the work unfolds as an idolatrous memorialization of the pleasures of violence—a pleasure compulsively repeated in the very language of the text.” (Pendergrast 130) There is a hint of moral judgment when Grendel is described as … that damned creature, grim and greedy, / soon was ready, savage and cruel/ and from their rest seized thirty thanes;/ thence back he went proud in plunder (ln 120-124) Though Beowulf’s author uses Grendel’s violent nature as an indictment against the monster, he cannot help but glory in the magnificence of the violence wrought by Beowulf: … body-pain he felt, the awful ogre/ on his shoulder was a great wound apparent,/ sinows sprang asunder, bone-locks burst;/ to Beowulf was war-glory given;/ thence Grendel had to flee sick unto death (ln 815-820) It’s no coincidence that the writer says Beowulf has the “war-glory” in this passage – his violence is heroic, in ways that Manish Sharma argues may parallel the violence of the Old Testament God. Certainly, the violence embraced in Beowulf more accurately mirrors the bloody and battle-filled myths of the Norsemen than it does the pacific tendencies of the New Testament Jesus. Though the author identifies Grendel with Cain, the Biblical exile who was cursed by God for the murder of his brother in Genesis, one could argue that Beowulf himself is the true Cain in the poem: He destroys the monstrous Grendel, as the Church worked to destroy the monstrous violence of the Norse spiritual mindset. A foreigner and uninvited, Beowulf “saves” the Danes from Grendel only to assume authority of their political system and impose his own values on the Danes. What’s interesting, Joseph E. Marshall suggests, is that Grendel’s grave sin – that he does not know God – is the same sin that Beowulf and the Danes possess when they worship their pagan idols and make a demi-idol out of the dead Grendel’s severed arm. In other words, the difference between Beowulf and Grendel in the end is that Beowulf wins and thus becomes the author of the story and the arbiter of Grendel’s moral fate. Similarly, Beowulf pits the Christian notion of forgiveness against the traditional Norse values of vengeance, and here, Beowulf voices the Norse rather than the Christian ethic when he tells the grieving Hrothgar: Wise sir, do not grieve./ It is always better to avenge dear ones/ than to indulge in mourning. For every one of us,/ living in this world means waiting for our end./ Let whoever can win glory before death./ When a warrior is gone, that will be his/ best and only bulwark. (ln 1384–1389) The idea of vengeance was one that permeated the pre-Christian world, and though blood price, or wergeld — the value set on a certain person’s life based on his age and status — was established to help prevent the blood feuds that ravaged families and kin groups, revenge was an accepted part of Norse life. It might have been self-destructive, it was certainly expensive in terms of goods and lives and it rarely led to resolution, but to bypass revenge was to eschew honor, as Beowulf claims. The moral landscape, however, is not that simple. Grendel’s mother, who by the same right Beowulf himself asserts, seeks vengeance on those men who slay her son, is condemned for that very action, as Prendergast notes as an aside (Prendergast 140). Grendel’s mother loses her right to “avenge her son’s death” (ln 1278) because she is a monster, “a lady troll-wife” (ln 1258). Beowulf sends her to her death with heavenly approval, but it’s a troubling death and one that foreshadows a real problem with the forced imposition of Christian virtue. By Norse standards, Grendel’s mother would have every right to avenge the death of her son — arguably, as a Norse mother, she had a responsibility as well as a right to do so. J.R.R. Tolkien, whose work was inspired by Norse epics like Beowulf, argued that these contradictions demonstrated a revision of sorts, as a Christian author went back to him work to add “pagan touches” that would make it feel more authentic. It’s more likely, however, that the writer was wrestling with a genuine conflict: How did Christianity’s principles of forgiveness and reconciliation translate to the Norse principles of living? And would the Norse, like Beowulf, win the war to continue the traditions that defined them, or would their practices be defined as monstrous by the spreading ideals of Christianity and — like Grendel’s mother — slain for following the ancient codes of right and wrong behavior? Subversively, Beowulf hints that while Christianity may win the battle, it’s the stories like Beowulf’s that tell of daring men who shape their own morality that will live forever, not the Christian overtones that permeate them. When Hrothgar gently warns Beowulf of the fleetingness of life and encourages him to focus his energies on living with eternal life in mind, he adopts the principles of Christianity: O flower of warriors,/ beware of that trap. Choose, dear Beowulf,/ the better part, eternal rewards. Do not/ give way to pride. For a brief while/ your strength is in bloom but it fades quickly;/ and soon there will follow illness or the sword/ to lay you low, or a sudden fire/ or surge of water or jabbing blade/ or javelin from the air or repellent age./ Your piercing eye will dim and darken;/ and death will arrive, dear warrior,/ to sweep you away. (ln 1758–1768) In fact, though, Hrothgar is wrong. Beowulf’s eternal life comes not from his holy life but from the brave deeds that win him the hearts and memories of his countrymen. By following the Norse code of conduct, by offering violence and seeking vengeance, Beowulf gains the immortality of legend. As the forces of Christian ethics and pagan values battle together on the pages of Beowulf, the winner is clear — and even, according to St. Jerome, predictable. No Christian parable carries the imaginative power and memory-making incidents of Beowulf’s story. If Christianity wins the sociopolitical power of the Middle Ages, it bows before the literary power of paganism. Perhaps that is why Beowulf’s funeral elegy concludes not with the promise of divine life but with praise for Beowulf’s living exploits: Then around the mound rode/ the battle-brave sons of nobles,/ twelve in all, they wished to bewail their sorrow,/ to mourn their king, to pronounce elegy,/ and speak about the man; they praised his heroic deeds/ and his works of courage, exalted his majesty./ As it is fitting, that one his friend and lord/ honours in words, cherish in ones spirit,/ when he must forth from his body/ be led; thus bemourned/ the people of the Geats their lords fall,/ his hearth-companions: they said that he was,/ of all kings of the world, the most generous of men,/ and the most gracious, the most protective of his people,/ and the most eager for honour. (ln 3169-3183) Works Consulted Crossley-Holland, Kevin and Mitchell, Bruce, translators. Beowulf: A New Translation. London: Macmillan, 1968. Fehrenbacher, Richard W. “Beowulf as Fairy-story: Enchanting the Elegiac in The Two Towers.” Tolkien Studies. Volume 3. 2006. pp. 101-115. Marshall, Joseph E. “Goldgyfan or Goldwlance: A Christian Apology for Beowulf and Treasure.” Studies in Philology. 107:1. Winter 2010. pp. 1-24. Prendergast, Thomas A. “’Wanton Recollection:’ The Idolatrous Pleasures of Beowulf.” New Literary History. 30:1. Winter 1999. pp. 129-141. Sharma, Manish. “Metalepsis and Monstrosity: The Boundaries of Narrative Structure in Beowulf.” Studies in Philology. 102:3. Summer 2005. pp.247-279. Tolkien, J.R.R. "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics." Proceedings of the British Academy. 22. 1936. pp. 245–95 Read More