'Rood And Ruthwell: The Power Of Paradox'

During the Eighth Century it was common that natural physical objects played a pivotal role in pagan worship. It is stated in Margaret Jennings article, “Rood and Ruthwell: The power of Paradox,” that in the Eighth century Christians admired the cross as a self-contradictory figure of Christ’s resurrection because “the instrument of defeat” the cross, “had become the instrument of victory.” Then after, the cross acquired supplementary spiritual meanings and mysteries at church ceremonies. In “The Dream of the Rood” the cross and the tree experience a great amount of sorrow and other feelings throughout the entire crucifixion, along with the vast amount of emotions. Victories, battles, and dying an honorable death also play an extensive role in the shaping of this poem. The poem clearly distinguishes Christ as not only a hero, but also a king, man, and a warrior-like figure. The Christ that is displayed in the poem settles to in a way fight with the cross, Christ gets right on the cross and faces his destiny head on. Many of the themes, for example triumph can be seen throughout the poem starting with the tree as it is transformed into the cross. The cross is portrayed as a natural object in a sense of a non-human part of the world that is yet figured as human. The cross reminisces on how it was …show more content…
It is a concise way of speaking about human experience, and it naturally drifts towards emotion. A good piece of poetry usually captures images distinctly and in an original, exhilarating way, while constructing together an complex sequence of themes like tension, complex emotion, sorrow and profound thought. The relationship between sorrow and poetry is the idea that poetry expresses things that could not be expressed literally; it is a form of expression. Poetry is a way to communicate with the human and gives voice to the