A Commentary on Man's Faith and Guilt

A detailed Summary of A Commentary on Man's Faith and Guilt

A Commentary on Man's Faith and his Guilt

Archibald MacLeish raised many thought provoking questions in the play J.B.. The Book of Job had already asked some of these questions, while others were very original and insightful. MacLeish offers many powerful thoughts on the relationship between man and God, some of which are disturbing to consider.

Nickels lost his faith in both God and man. He believes that the purpose of life is merely to survive and not to live. Nickles says,

There must be thousands!... Millions and millions of mankind burned, crushed, broken, mutilated, slaughtered, and for what? For thinking! For walking around the world in the wrong skin, the wrong shaped noises, eyelids: sleeping the wrong night wrong city- London, Dresden, Hiroshima. (MacLeish, 12)

In fact the only thing that Nickels did have faith in was that J.B. would curse God if tested. Mr. Zuss, on the other hand, has complete faith in humanity and J.B. He knows of J.B.'s strength and his ability to love God. In short, Mr. Zuss has faith in J.B.'s faith. However, J.B.'s faith in God is ill founded. J.B.'s faith in God is based on the fact that he believes God to be just, but is God really just? If he is then why does J.B. suffer so?

Then there is Zophar's argument, which I find to be the most interesting of the three. Zophar argues that it is man's guilt that makes him human. He believes that it is guilt that separates us from the mindless beasts, for animals are incapable of sin. This seems to be a perversion of the truth. It is man's ability to distinguish between sin and piety that makes him human, not his ability to practice the former. Zophar also contests that it is God's fault that sin exists. He feels that God created man with a predisposition towards sin. Zophar responds to J.B.'s questioning thusly, "...Man's heart is evil! ...Man's will is evil. Your fault, your sin, are heart and will: the worm at heart, the willful will corrupted with its foul imagining." (MacLeish, 126). Yet there is one argument of Zophar's that I do agree with, that the beginning of mankind can be traced back to the fall of man. For it was at this moment that man acquired the ability to distinguish between good and evil and it is this knowledge coupled with our free will that makes us human. If man simply acted on instinct what would be the point of life. We would have no control over are actions, we would be automatons only concerned with the thought of survival. Would there even be religion? Would we have the time or the desire for it?

Eliphaz suggests that guilt is a "psychophenomenal situation". He says that our ignorance causes our guilt and that we are all actually victims of our guilt because of this. Many immigrants who come here are often ignorant of the finer points of the American justice system. As a result of this they are frequently penalized for car

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Approximate Word count = 1110
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English