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The dream of the rood themes significance
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The dream of the rood themes significance
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When I saw the assignment in the beginning of the semester I was thinking that the material that we covered will not be appealing to me. In high school we covered, William Shakespeare Julius Caesar was not impressed then, and not much has change sing my time at South View High School. I was familiar with Dante infernos, Homer and the Trojan War. It was not until I was required to read “The Dream of the Rood” an Old English Poem, that of all the assignment we had to read this particular piece really resonated with me. I can remember seeing the movie “The Passion of the Christ” a movie that depicted the brutal crucifixion of Jesus Christ in 2004, I can remember thinking that this is an incredible way of telling the story of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Then I read the Dream of the Rood and it is an emotional and inspiring piece of work. …show more content…
I know the of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, I understand that he came to save the world, and the way He died the brutality of it had to be that way in order to fulfill prophesy. In the dream of the rood the writer say as Jesus is approaching the cross “He climbed on the high gallows, bold in the sight of many, when he would free mankind. I trembled when the Warrior embraced me, yet I dared not bow to earth, fall to the ground 's surface; but must stand fast” that offers me a different perspective of the crucifixion portraying Christ as strongly and boldly facing
After reading all four articles disregarding the one that is eight pages long I highly resonated with the article that used very descriptive imagery and wordy descriptions of analogical images that was named “Last Nights, Last Rites, and the Rain-Slick Road to Self-Destruction” by Thomas Osborne. “I like to describe long-winded stories that may or may not interest my audience,” in fact I am extremely similar to the author in this sense; and it is why I enjoyed and gravitated to the article at such a high level (Osborne 2).
Examining the texts of Aristotle’s “Nicomachean Ethics” and “Politics” side by side, one is bound to find parallels between his reasoning with regard to the individual and to the state. In “Nicomachean Ethics” Aristotle discusses happiness, virtue, and the good life on an individual level and lays out necessary provisions for the good life of a person. He maintains that virtue is a necessary element of happiness: a man will be happy if he has virtues of justice, courage, and temperance, each constituting a balance between the extremes. But this requirement of virtue for the happy life goes beyond the individual level, as we see it in “Politics”. There, Aristotle claims that man is by nature a “political animal” , and for that reason he can only achieve the above-mentioned virtues as part of a state. And since the city is formed by many individuals, the virtue of the state is constituted by the individual virtues of its citizens. It is therefore clear that fulfillment of requirements for the happy life of an individual, namely being virtuous and self-sufficient, is equally necessary for the state as a whole in order to be happy. We thus see that the virtue of a state is directly linked to the virtue of an individual, and that therefore the means of achieving the former will run parallel with those of the latter.
Many Anglo-Saxon poems use the characteristics of heroism and imagery, but it seems as though the way that the theme is treated in the story of the Crucifixion, is unique onlynto Christian poetry. Using a battle as a metaphor, Christ and the cross would be considered the warriors, “whose deaths are victories, and whose burials are preludes to the triumph of their Resurrections" (Huppe 278). In The Dream of the Rood, the story of the death, burial and resurrection of Christ is different from the accounts that we are so used to hearing in the Bible. In order to emphasize the enormous victory in the story of the crucifixion, the writer describes Christ as a young warrior who boldly goes in to defeat sin. This is a very common theme in Medieval literature. Where the warrior goes in to defeat a particular evil. The words that are used to describe Christ are “young warrior”, “the Lord of Mankind”, and “the Lord of
Christian influence is signified in the fact that the story reflects on Jesus’ crucifixion and the constant references to God, Lord Almighty, Heaven, and Mankind’s Creator. “The Dream of the Rood” is a major example of the influence of religion in works of literature.
Throughout the semester i only learned few new things but i did improve and solidify my skill of writing. Before my first year of college my skills have always undermined by other high school english teachers and with that came disappointing grades. I am writing this paper as a reflection of the semester and the progress i have made as a writer. I now understand many things that my high school teachers have done a poor job demonstrating and i am grateful that i decided to take my own route in my education instead of their syllabus. I entered the semester with anxiety that i would perform as i did before but i clearly outdid my own expectations by receiving top grades on my essays.
From the opening scene of “The Passion of the Christ”, director Mel Gibson establishes a foreshadowing of what this film encompasses. Appearing onto a black screen are white words, from Isaiah 53, “He was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; by His wounds we are healed” (Gibson, 2004, scene 1). Alluding to Jesus being the “He” this passage is referring too, a message is immediately established by Gibson to his modern day audience of Jesus being the “one who suffers” (Powell, 2009, p. 472), sent by God to fulfill this Old Testament passage. Depicting the last several hours of Christ’s life, the film distinctly portrays the abovementioned foretelling through grotesque, disturbing,
This is a subtle yet important distinction. The Rood tells the Dreamer, “Although I might have destroyed the foes, I stood in place” (cite poem). Later, the Rood also asserts, “. . . therefore I now tower in glory under heaven, and I may heal any one of those in awe of me” (cite poem). Here the cross, not Jesus, has the capacity to prevent the crucifixion as well as provide salvation and healing to any man who looks upon it. The Bible clearly has a markedly different take on that matter, which is shown when Jesus says to his disciple Thomas, “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (cite John 14:6). Although this difference between the Bible and “The Dream of the Rood” may not be as readily obvious as the others, it is perhaps the most glaring inaccuracy of all; as a matter of fact, the importance and power that the poem’s author bestows upon the Rood comes dangerously close to dwarfing the role that Jesus himself is given in the
The Dream of the Rood is a poem that illustrates the crucifixion, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ from the perspective of the cross. The illustration comes together in a dream. The rood or the cross communicates with the Dreamer, to give him hope in the future return of Christ and eternal glory. Additionally, the rood encourages the Dreamer to share his dream with others and point them to the cross. This poem is meaningful to me because it prompted me to reflect on the cross and what it represents. It is a symbol of God’s love and what He did on the cross, so we could be saved from our sins.
The image of Jesus nailed to a wooden cross by the palms of his hands and with a crown of thorns wrapped around his head is one that has transcended all time barriers. It has inclusive been replicated into figure form that is utilized in various ways but whose primary function is to serve as a constant reminder of the physical suffering endured by Jesus. In The Dream of the Rood however, the perception of Jesus Christ as not only the son of God and savior of mankind but also as a human with the capacity to feel pain, is subverted when through the perspective of a personified cross he is conveyed as a warrior in the midst of combat. The portrayal of Jesus in this way immediately evokes the image of an ideal stereotypical hero who is strong, courageous, and unrelenting in appearance. Nevertheless, it can be said that this type of hero is more inclined towards fantasy than it is based on reality because these idealized heroic figures have only ever truly existed in a fictional universe. The depiction of Jesus as a warrior thus, undermines forms of heroism that stem from explicit suffering that is not concealed but rather expressed by the individual.
The Dream of the Rood treats the death of Christ as the culmination of His glory. As the Rood itself speaks, "Disclose with your words that it is the tree of glory on which Almighty God suffered for mankind's many sins and the deeds of Adam did of old. He tasted death there; yet the Lor...
Throughout the poem, “The Dream of the Rood”, a theme develops that illustrates hope through the crucifixion. This theme of hope is developed by the heroic diction the writer chooses to use. Words such as “warrior” and “foes” characterized the crucifixion as a battle itself. Additionally, words like “triumph”, “strong and courageous”, and “great might” represent the victory of Christ and the Rood in the battle over death, creating hope. The overall concept is also emphasized through the imagery in the text. When the Dreamer first sees the Rood, he describes it as “gleaming in bliss, all plated with gold; precious gemstones”. As it continues, it becomes clear that as Christ suffered, so did the Rood. For example, the Rood shares how “They drove dark nails into me; the dints of those wounds can still be seen, open marks of malice;”.
In The Dream of the Rood, an unknown poet dreams of an encounter with a beautiful tree of which this poet calls the “rood,” or cross, on which Jesus Christ was crucified. The rood tells the poet how it had been forced to be the instrument of Christ’s death, describing how it, too, experienced the nails and spear thrusts along with the savior. The poet describes many similar elements to the Crucifixion of Christ, triumph, and depicts with the wider Western tradition to medieval culture.
Over the course of the semester, I feel that I have grown as a writer in many ways. When I came into the class, there were skills I had that I already excelled at. During my time in class, I have come to improve on those skills even more. Before I took this class I didn’t even realise what I was good at. This is the first class where I felt I received feedback on my writing that helped me to actually review my work in see what areas I lacked in and where I succeeded. Some of the skills I had shocked me as I didn’t think I had those capabilities in me.
Entering English Comp one, I had fears of what the class would be like. I realized that I had many weaknesses, but it was not till the end of the class that I learned my strengths.
Much like Benjamin Franklin believed, I feel that a person should take advantage of the time the person has in life with activities a person wants to do or needs to do. A person should not spend much time on activities the person does not want to do. Life is way too short to concern oneself with work or other activities one wants nothing to do with all the time. When possible, I try to forget about my responsibility and just let go of the ‘things’ that do not matter to me. I think a person should try to occupy oneself with something productive, worthwhile, or necessary at all times. Even though a person’s life is left up to a person to live, I cannot imagine thinking that I owe my time to society through working a job that I simply despise. I am a compassionate person, but I do not owe anyone anything regarding my time.