This story focuses upon the perfection and valor of Sir Gawain throughout its entirety. But even Gawain, the pillar of morality and loyalty, fails in at least one regard. This points out man's inability to be perfect, his fallen state. If even one of the greatest among men can fail, so can all men. Also, it is interesting to note that Gawain does a wonderful job of resisting temptation, until his life is on the line. It is fear of death and love of self that leads him to his one failure. Could this transfer over to our lives? Perhaps the reasons behind our most glaring failures is an excess of self-love, or maybe in fact a fear of loss, be that of life, stature, or respect. Maybe I'm wrong, but most sins in my opinion could be pulled from these two categories: fear and pride. What do you think?
Saturday, April 8, 2017
Sir Gawain (Post for 4/11)
Sir Gawain and The Green Knight is one of my favorite readings from this semester. First off, I love the mysteriousness of it having no author, which just seems fitting due to the aura of mystery inside the tale itself. Also, I love reading anything Tolkien, who translated this edition. (He also wrote a killer introduction.) Anyway, this work has many themes throughout, my favorite being the human condition--namely, its imperfection.
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I agree completely Nate, that sin stems from those two things. Fear can lead someone to do the wrong thing when they know they could the right thing. And pride, well, pride is pride. Too much pride leads to bad decisions and other things. I also think that because even the greatest among us can fall, even goes more to show that we are all human and can fail. That is why we cannot rely on just human strength.
ReplyDeleteI have not seen quite yet what you are referring to in the story, but then, I have not gotten very deep into it, so perhaps I will.
ReplyDeleteYou're right about the theme of the imperfection of humans. Sir Gawain is someone depicted throughout as being as close to perfect as one can get, but he eventually does fall.
ReplyDeleteI mentioned something similar in my post. It is really cool to me that he fails and accepts the consequences. It makes the story that much more impressive to me. It really emphasizes Gawain's true amount of honor.
ReplyDeleteYou could honestly claim that all sin comes from excessive arrogance and pride. Even when acting from fear, one arrogantly claims that the situation that they find themselves in is more important than the decree God has made on the sin. In that situation, a person is acting as if God did not already know the situation ahead of time and would make a decree that did not apply in every situation.
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