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myth on the struggle of good vs. evil?
cooljammer00
HeySmall Christmas-Man!Registered User regular
HeySmall Christmas-Man!Registered User regular
I have an english assignment, and it is to "find a myth/legend that attempts to explain the lifelong fight between good and evil"
It doesnt have to be a European story. It could be asia or anywhere, but I cannot for the life of me think of one.
It doesnt have to be a European story. It could be asia or anywhere, but I cannot for the life of me think of one.
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-Adam and Eve
-Prometheus and the gift of fire
Greek mythology also presents Pandora, which could probably be considered applicable. Maybe Milton's Paradise Lost would count...
edit: beated.
well that's actually the book we're reading, so I dont think that'd be okay.
i think this has to be a myth "explaining" the struggle. That aslan stuff is all good, but does it explain the struggle?
How would Prometheus and Adam and Eve work as good vs. evil?
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If you have the time, read about "Zoroastrianism", and its main deity called "Ahura Mazda".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoroastrian
Quote:
In the originally Persian religion of Zoroastrianism, the world is a battle ground between the god of good, Ahura Mazda, and the god of evil, Angra Mainyu or Ahriman. The final resolution of the struggle between good and evil was supposed to occur on a day of Judgement, in which all beings that have lived will be led across a bridge of fire, and those who are evil will be cast down forever. In Iranian belief, angels and saints are beings sent to help us achieve the path towards goodness.
How much land does a man need?
Actually, it's an excellent idea to reference material you are learning in class and contrast it with the piece you select. It shows that you've not only been following along to Beowulf, but you can apply the themes learned from that piece to another.
Like Thanatos said, does the assignment want this to be something from classic works? If not, don't overlook Star Wars. Discussion of Star Wars actually came up now and then in my Tolkien studies class.
For something more suited to the "myth/legend" part of the assignment, consider Arthurian legends. You know, Knights of the Round Table! We're talking about a group of knights banded together by a moral code in the name of fighting, you guessed it, evil. A solid choice for familiarity and ease of resources via internet.
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If I can pull it off, I really would use it. but i dont think i can.
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Exactly what I was thinking, more specifically the Morgana/Merlin relationship.
Satans..... hints.....
Blanket already pointed out one aspect of the Arthurian legends you could use. Such stories are going to be a surefire home run for your assignment.
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If you require proof, simply google "Joseph Campbell" and "Star Wars".
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Oh! That's excellent! Thanks so much for pointing this out.
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In Genesis, the long name for the Tree of Knowledge is the "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil." Ideas of how knowledge leads to the ideas of good and evil, and how evil is man's "punishment" for knowledge, can be teased out of lines 9-24:
"But the LORD God called to the man, and said to him, "Where are you?" 10 And he said, "I heard the sound of thee in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself." 11 He said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?" 12 The man said, "The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate." 13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this that you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent beguiled me, and I ate." 14 The LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, cursed are you above all cattle, and above all wild animals; upon your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. 15 I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel." 16 To the woman he said, "I will greatly multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children, yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you." 17 And to Adam he said, "Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, 'You shall not eat of it,' cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life; 18 thorns and thistles it shall bring forth to you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. 19 In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return." 20 The man called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. 21 And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins, and clothed them. 22 Then the LORD God said, "Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever" -- 23 therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken. 24 He drove out the man; and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life."
Prometheus, meanwhile, functions on a similar kind of level. Because of Prometheus's actions,
"The first mortals lived on earth in a state of perfect innocence and bliss. The air was pure and balmy; the sun shone brightly all the year; the earth brought forth delicious fruit in abundance; and beautiful, fragrant flowers bloomed everywhere. Man was content. Extreme cold, hunger, sickness, and death were unknown. Jupiter, who justly ascribed a good part of this beatific condition to the gift conferred by Prometheus, was greatly displeased, and tried to devise some means to punish mankind for the acceptance of the heavenly fire.
With this purpose in view, he assembled the gods on Mount Olympus, where, in solemn council, they decided to create woman; and as soon as she had been artfully fashioned, each one endowed her with some special charm, to make her more attractive... Their united efforts were crowned with the utmost success. Nothing was lacking, except a name for the peerless creature; and the gods, after due consideration, decreed she should be called Pandora. They then bade Mercury take her to Prometheus as a gift from heaven; but he, knowing only too well that nothing good would come to him from the gods, refused to accept her, and cautioned his brother Epimetheus to follow his example. Unfortunately Epimetheus was of a confiding disposition, and when he beheld the maiden he exclaimed, " Surely so beautiful and gentle a being can bring no evil !" and accepted her most joyfully."
You probably know the end of that one.
As long as you're doing Beowulf, you could definitely tackle other aspects of old mythology, either as they appear in the Old English legends or in the Modern English reimaginings. I'd bet that Sir Gawain and the Green Knights or The Tragical History of Dr. Faust would work pretty well.
God said, "Here it is. Everything. All is perfect, because there is no sin, and no evil, because, c'mon, you dont even know what that word means. There is only goodness here."
Man, however, in its free will became curious. They had everything they could want, a literal paradise. But between the deceit of the serpent, and their own curiosity, and arguably a desire to better themselves.
Then they learned what evil was, and became susceptible to it, vulnerable to it, and if you take the story literally, as the creation of man, caused the indulgence in it.
I think its also worth pointing out that in verse 9, it mentions the tree of life. Then it doesnt mention it again until 3:22, when They set the Cherub to guard to the entrance to Eden, and the tree of life, which would grant them eternal life.
So, even though a tree who's fruit would grant eternal life was right next to the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they chose the latter.
The Hebrew words could also be translated as the "Tree of Conscience" - which may be a semantic difference, but could also add a lot of depth to the interpretation of the story.
The "Good vs Evil" polarity seems very popular in middle eastern (monotheistic) religions like Judaism, Christianity and Islam wheras most polytheistic religions seem to have a more complex view of the subject that leaves it less clearly defined. As an example, the Classic myth of Zeus and the Titans is more about order and structure vs chaos and breakdown than it is about Good vs Evil. Abraham's God, on the other hand is obviously very clearly supposed to be identified with "good" and Lucifer/Satan with "evil".
Man is created in blissful ignorance by a God who fashions himself a benevolent dictator. They are allowed paradise as long as they choose to remain ignorant, docile, and obedient. They are domesticated animals. They are nothing more than God's pets. But people, being people, are curious. They do not have the nature to be domestic animals. And they have a mechanism by which they can raise themselves out of ignorance: the fruit of the tree of knowledge.
God says "oh, hey, don't eat that fruit." And man says "um why?" And God says "because I said so." God does not want his pets asking questions. He doesn't give them a legitimate reason, except to say "it's gonna be bad for you." He doesn't explain WHY it would be bad. He just explains that he said so, and that's that. He's God. You're not. He's the boss, you're the servant. Forever.
But then the serpent comes along and says "you know what, that God sounds pretty full of shit, huh? He thinks he's all big and bad because he has all the secret knowledge and expects you to just put up with that and be his pets. Don't you want to know what this big secret is?" And sure enough, Man does. And man falls as a result. Which is completely unfair, because God obviously has knowledge of evil but doesn't suffer it.
God is a real asshole in this story. Man's first sin was not hate, nor jealousy, nor adultery, nor even negligence. Man's original sin was curiosity, asking questions, not wanting to be ignorant, and disobeying a completely arbitrary order that was given out without any logical justification other than "I said so."
The lesson of this story is a dark one: God demands blind obedience. Attempting to better yourself and become less ignorant will only result in suffering. Asking questions is bad. You had it better when you were nothing better than God's puppy dog.
Funny enough, many religions think this attitude is really a reasonable idea even today.
This is not a story about good vs. evil. At least, God in this story certainly isn't good, and his motives are petty. And the serpent, simply raising man out of ignorance, isn't necessarily evil.
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What about Unbreakable? Mr. Glass, the purple, big headed evil guy who find a reluctant superhero in David Dunn. Comics being a take on historical storytelling, etc...
also, on the subject of God, he promised never to flood the earth again, right? (we read it this year and I could swear he said that) yet that Bruce Almighty sequel is coming out and it's based on a great flood. I dunno....is the morbidity of murdering millions of sinners funny? People are gonna die.
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The fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah
Another maybe more palatable work would by Homer's Odyssey. It's a nice epic poem, well known, and it seems to be less ambiguous about the concepts of good and evil than The Illiad.
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Plus it was fun, so unless your teacher is a complete cockmonger the two best tales of Good Vs Evil from the past century were Lord of the Rings and Star Wars. Go to town.
The Garden of Eden isn't a good example to use period, regardless of what you personally think of Jesus. There's no struggle involved and good vs. evil is only tangentially related to the events of the story.
Listen to this person. Zoroastrianism was highly influential on Western and Middle Eastern notions of good and evil. Like Zoroastrianism, Fantasma's post deserved more attention than it got.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Man that Fred guy was an ass.
You would be too if Barney kept stealing your Fruity Pebbles.