The Idea of Mercy in Kingdom Come, The Road and How it Relates to the Divine and Humanity

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As eighteenth century poet and artist William Blake once wrote: "Where mercy, love, and pity dwell, there God is dwelling too." The three sensations commented on by Blake are prevalent with the 2008 graphic novel Kingdom Come and 2006 book The Road, but arguably the most interesting is the Christian concept of mercy within the story. The term 'mercy' comes from the Latin word 'merces' or 'merced' which translates as 'reward,' according to an online dictionary the contemporary meaning of the term: "compassionate or kindly forbearance shown toward an offender, an enemy, or other person in one's power; compassion, pity, or benevolence." It is my belief that through the expression of mercy, humanity cannot only better understand God, but their fellow humans as well and help achieve ulimate redemption with the divine.
In the story Kingdom Come, the superheroes of old such as Superman, Green Lantern, and the Flash are living in a type of self imposed exile after a disastrous nuclear accident in Kansas state. When Superman and the other heroes come back to stop the new breed of heroes, meta-humans, who are doing more harm than good, the threat of the end of the Earth looms overhead. The climax of the graphic novel comes when the Gulag, the prison built to house the non-cooperating meta-humans, has been destroyed. As the old superheroes clash with the escaped meta-humans, Superman battles Captain Marvel who has been brainwashed by Lex Luthor and has turned against his former allies and friends.
As the fighting rages on, another threat heads steadily closer to the sight of the small-scale war: a nuclear missile that was launched by the United Nations in response to the Gulag prison break. Superman recognizes two apparent choices i...

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...ne; after all, it is easy to react against those who have harmed you with rage and violence. However, to show mercy and compassion is something extraordinary.

Works Cited

Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy. N.p.: Barnes and Noble Press, 2008.

McCarthy, Cormac. The Road. New York: Vintage Books, 2006.

"Mercy." In Dictionary.com. Accessed February 23, 2014. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/mercy?s=t.

Perrin, J. M. "Mercy." In New Catholic Encyclopedia, 504. Vol. 9. Detroit: Gale, 2003. Accessed
February 22, 2014. http://go.galegroup.com/ps/
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Weid, Mark, and Alex Ross. Kingdom Come. New York: DC Comics, 2008.

"William Blake Quotes." BrainyQuote. Accessed February 22, 2014.
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/w/williambla124614.html.

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