Religious symbolism is in almost every literature piece you could pick up. Sometimes, if you are not exactly familiar with religious symbolism you would not see them in a literature piece. In Lord of the Flies a novel written by William Golding, The Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve, the devil, and Christ himself are all shown throughout this novel. These biblical expressions are sequestered quite well, if you do not have a trained eye for the bible, you may need help finding them. Religious symbolism is a main theme in Lord of the Flies, not only in a character named Simon, but also in the island and Lord of the Flies himself. The translation of Lord of the Flies is Beelzebub, which further translates to a demon or the devil himself. As you see,
…show more content…
Much like Christ, Simon is kind. Simon “shoved his piece of meat over the rocks to Piggy, who grabbed it,” Simon knew Piggy was still hungry and put Piggy’s wants and needs before his (Golding 74). When Simon gives Piggy his food, this was closely related to Christ who cared for others throughout his whole lifetime. Throughout the novel, Simon is one of the boys who always seemed to never turn savage. While the other boys were off hunting pigs and letting their “tangled hair” grow longer, Simon was in the forest to meditate (Golding 77). Much like Christ, who spent forty days and nights in the desert meditating. Furthermore, Simon represents Christ because Simon dies as a martyr because he was coming back to tell the others the beast was a “collapsed corpulent figure” and was “harmless and horrible” (Golding 146, 147). Nevertheless, Simon was trying to essentially save man-kind, matching Christ when he also died. Another similarity is the way both Simon and Christ died. After a few weeks on the island, fear was taking over the boys and forcing them to believe that there was a “beastie” on the island. Simon did not believe this, so he went out to find what the beast was. After exposing the beastie was only a dead man hanging from a parachute in a tree, Simon descends the mountain to tell the others. When Simon gets there the boys are dancing and singing “kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood” (Golding 152). At that point the boys kill Simon with their bare hands much like the villagers killed Christ by nailing him to a stake and burning
Much like Christ, Simon is kind. Simon “shoved his piece of meat over the rocks to Piggy, who grabbed it,” Simon knew Piggy was still hungry and put Piggy’s wants and needs before his (Golding 74). When Simon gives Piggy his food, this was closely related to Christ who cared for others throughout his whole lifetime. Throughout the novel, Simon is one of the boys who always seemed to never turn savage. While the other boys were off hunting pigs and letting their “tangled hair” grow longer, Simon was in the forest to meditate (Golding 77). Much like Christ, who spent forty days and nights in the desert meditating. Furthermore, Simon represents Christ because Simon dies as a martyr because he was coming back to tell the others the beast was a “collapsed corpulent figure” and was “harmless and horrible” (Golding 146, 147). Nevertheless, Simon was trying to essentially save man-kind, matching Christ when he also died. Another similarity is the way both Simon and Christ died. After a few weeks on the island, fear was taking over the boys and forcing them to believe that there was a “beastie” on the island. Simon did not believe this, so he went out to find what the beast was. After exposing the beastie was only a dead man hanging from a parachute in a tree, Simon descends the mountain to tell the others. When Simon gets there the boys are dancing and singing “kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood” (Golding 152). At that point the boys kill Simon with their bare hands much like the villagers killed Christ by nailing him to a stake and burning