Blake's The Marriage of Heaven and Hell Essay

The conception of Heaven and Hell is meant to provide a means of justice in the afterlife, C.S. Lewis has a different view than the traditional idea on what that may look like. In “The Great Divorce”, Lewis defends that God is just by writing about a just version of Heaven and Hell. First, I summarize a general image of the traditional Christian idea of Heaven and Hell and explain the issues that come with it. Next, I offer C.S. Lewis’s counter position on Heaven and Hell. Lastly, I assess Lewis’s conception, arguing that it does not escape the justice issue of the traditional image of the afterlife.

“Holy Thursday” wherein he bluntly, yet poetically says, “Is this a holy thing to see/ In a rich

times in the poem, by doing so, Blake is able to let the reader take

Hell is recognized as an extremely difficult doctrine for many to accept, due to its nature of opposing the very notion of a benevolent God. Although God grants the gift of mercy and infinite love to all, a soul can be damned to Hell due to the gift of free will and the rejection of God’s love. In the teachings and works of the Bible, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and St. Thomas Aquinas, the interpretation of Heaven and its counterpart Hell are found in their attempt to explain the contradictory essence of God’s altruistic love and the potential of eternal punishment. It has been clearly denoted that the Gift of God’s free will is the primary reason for one condemning themselves to Hell or entering the Kingdom of God in Heaven. God’s

For example, in “Infant Joy,” Blake demonstrates the child’s eye and sense of wonder that we find in the incorruptibility of infants. Blake presents a truly pure creature in the first stanza:

Allusion is also an important part of this poem because of the way the author uses it to connect to the outside works that may also encourage the reader to think in a certain way that goes along with the themes of the poem. The first allusion, found in lines 7 and 8, are to the Greek gods Icarus and Prometheus. This allusion requires the readers to think about gods and religion, which is a major part of the theme of this poem. Another allusion I see is in line 20, which refers to another one of Blake’s poems, “The Lamb.” This allusion is significant because the speaker asks, “Did he who made the Lamb make thee?” (20) And he wonders whether or not the same creator who made something so gentle and pure could also make such an evil animal. The allusion itself brings the reader to think about the other poems and to contrast the two completely

However, the poem has fluidity despite its apparent scarcity of rhyme. After examining the alteration of syllables in each line, a pattern is revealed in this poem concerning darkness. The first nine lines alternate between 8 and 6 syllables. These lines are concerned, as any narrative is, with exposition. These lines set up darkness as an internal conflict to come. The conflict intensifies in lines 10 and 11 as we are bombarded by an explosion of 8 syllables in each line. These lines present the conflict within one's own mind at its most desperate. After this climax, the syllables in the last nine lines resolve the conflict presented. In these lines, Dickinson presents us with an archetypal figure that is faced with a conflict: the “bravest” hero. These lines present the resolution in lines that alternate between 6 and 7 syllables. Just as the syllables decrease, the falling action presents us with a final insight. This insight discusses how darkness is an insurmountable entity that, like the hero, we must face to continue “straight” through “Life” (line 20).

A major theological problem exist as it related to Christ descending into hell to take the keys of death. Although the Apostle’s Creed points out that Jesus descended down into hel, His descent was not about suffering, but about a triumph victory over Satan. In order to ascertain the truth behind the afterlife, the validity of hell has to be established.

Blake begins the poem by stating that it is not possible to love another as much as yourself, and that thought is the highest of all human functions. This sets the stage for Blake's attack on religion's ideas of hierarchy and condemnation of rational thought. The next stanza describes the boy asking God, indicated by the capitalized "Father," how he could love him or another human more than a little bird picking up crumbs. The boy states that he loves God in and as much as a little bird. This echoes the naturalist ideas supported in the aforementioned poems. Blake seems to be saying that the proper way to worship and commune with God is by loving all natural beings, human and non-human. The priest, a symbol of organized religion that Blake so sharply critiques, overhears what the boy is saying and is infuriated by the idea that a person could worship God through nature, without ritual, politics, or human involvement, and that the boy dares use his mind to question what he has been taught. The priest makes the boy a martyr, preaching from his high pedestal of pomposity, and burns the boy, despite the cries of his family. The boy's curiosity and natural thinking have been squelched, and his imagination bound in iron chains. Blake closes the poem by asking if such

A popular characteristic in many of Blake’s poems is the inclusion of biblical allusions to convey meaning. In his poem “A Poison Tree”, Blake uses anaphora, diction, and symbol to allow biblical allusions that depicts the evil that man is capable to come into being. Anaphora is the usage of the same word or phrase at the beginning of every consecutive line. In stanza one, the word ‘I’ begins every line, and later on the word ‘and’ is used seven times to signify the start of some of the lines. The poem is organized in a way that immediately starts off using anaphora and since anaphora is mainly

William Blake lived during a time of intense social change; the American Revolution, the French Revolution, and the Industrial Revolution. These massive changes in society provided Blake with one of the most dramatic outlooks in the transformation of the Western world, the change from a feudal and agricultural society to one in which philosophers and political thinkers, such as Locke, championed the rights of individuals. In accordance with political changes, there were religious changes as well. Religion was another aspect of society that Blake opposed because of its organized practice. The practices of organized religion conflicted with Blake's view and adherence. Organized religion and the shadows it casts upon the natural world

Before being good or bad, human beings are just humans who have to live with their own nature, which they sometimes cannot control. Man can do good or evil but he always makes it with a unique purpose, his personal satisfaction, because it is simply in his nature. Thus, human beings aware of good and evil are confronted with conflicting choices but they never act against their will. The poem, “The Human Abstract”, written by William Blake reflects on these characteristics of human beings and demonstrates how they are unconsciously corrupted by their own nature in a selfish way.

Blake's poems of innocence and experience are a reflection of Heaven and Hell. The innocence in Blake's earlier poems represents the people who will get into Heaven. They do not feel the emotions of anger and

William Blake’s poetry is considered through the Romantics era and they access through the sublime. The Romantics poetry through the sublime is beyond comprehension and spiritual fullness. A major common theme is a nature (agnostic religion). In William Blake’s poem “The Tyger” he describes the tiger as a creature that was created by a higher power some time before. In Blake’s poem he questions, “What immortal hand or eye/ Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?” (Blake 22-23). He describes the tiger as a form of symmetry that can be seen as evil, yet have intriguing features such as those that make the tiger a beautiful creation. Blake also questions if that the higher being who created the tiger also created all else around the world such as a human being. Blake shifts his first stanzas from the tiger to the creator. Not only is he questioning who created the tiger, but he is also describing the beauty and evil of the world. The beauty that the Romantics believe in is nature and one evil seen through the world is materialism that distract humans from the beauty of nature 's gifts. He believes that people lose touch with spirituality when haven’t given to nature. Blake also illustrated his own works through

Some of William Blake’s poetry is categorized into collections called Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. Blake explores almost opposite opinions about creation in his poems “The Lamb” and “The Tiger.” While the overarching concept is the same in both, he uses different subjects to portray different sides of creation; however, in the Innocence and Experience versions of “The Chimney Sweeper,” Blake uses some of the same words, rhyme schemes, and characters to talk about a single subject in opposite tones.