Feb 28 2010
God the Puppet Master
What drives a man to give up a normal life on land to pursue a whale at sea? Is it revenge? A power struggle? An insane madness that does not cease? Or perhaps it is something else entirely different, something divine. For Captain Ahab, the desire to destroy the white whale does not seem to come solely from revenge; it also comes from God. In Chapter 132 “The Symphony,” Ahab reveals what he believes is the real source of his quest to kill the whale:
Is Ahab, Ahab? Is it I, or God, that lifts this arm? If the great sun moves not of himself, but is as an errand-boy in heaven; nor one single star can revolve, but by some invisible power; how can this one small heart beat; this one small brain think thoughts; unless God does that beating, does that thinking, does that living, and not I (521).
In what seems to be a radical departure from the confident Captain of previous chapters, Ahab shows a side of him that seems uncertain of his own free will. Is Ahab fighting God because God makes Ahab do it, or is this God fighting Himself? Ahab paints God as a sort of puppet master, a being that plays an active role in the lives of its creations and makes them do what it wants. This type of Christian God seems to derive from Calvinism, a branch of Christianity that did not believe that people could have a personal relationship with the divine. Calvinists also believed in predestination — God controlled their lives and ordained before a person’s birth whether or not he or she was to be saved or damned. It is interesting that throughout the novel, Ahab seems to be fighting against God by forging his own destiny, but now he questions whether it was Ahab or God who controlled his fate.
This depiction of God as a puppet master is not entirely surprising, however. Given the time period and Melville’s own religious beliefs, this image of God is almost to be expected. The fact that it appears so late in the novel is, however, of interest. Perhaps Melville does this to show that we can never truly escape God no matter how hard we may try. We are all simply puppets on God’s strings. Still, there is something to be said about Ahab’s humbling speech; the idea of a God that literally controls every aspect of one’s life (from breathing to thinking) is a disturbing yet comforting thought. On the one hand, to imagine a being that directs your life, that “lifts your arm,” suggests that one literally has no control whatsoever over one’s life. On the other hand, it also means that one is not accountable for one’s actions, which could be an excuse for otherwise inexcusable or unexplainable behavior.
Ahab’s statement also raises a thought: if Ahab is pursuing the white whale (which could be viewed as God or a symbol of God) and he is doing this because God wills it, does this mean that God is fighting Himself? And if this is so, then why? To be honest I don’t have answers to these questions; I can only speculate that Melville is challenging his readers to consider all possibilities. One thing is certain: Ahab commits completely to his cause to destroy Moby Dick, no matter how foolish he believes it to be in the end. Whether this is an act of God or out of Ahab’s free remains a mystery.
2 Responses to “God the Puppet Master”
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I want to respond to your question about why God would be fighting himself. I think the way to look at this conflict in a way to have it make sense is to think of the conflict between Ahab and the Whale Moby Dick as a metaphor for God’s control over Ahab’s life and his chosen destiny for Ahab. In this way, God is not calling Ahab to do battle with him, but instead God is pulling Ahab to him so that he may deal out his divine judgement. With a Calvinist lens as our chosen starting point, that would make Ahab helpless in altering the plans of God. Because of this Ahab never actually fights Moby Dick/God, he is simply being called to the beast so that he may meet his end.
With this in mind, the two possible scenarios make more sense. Ahab either has free will and is about to enter a battle with God to prove that he is his own man, or Ahab does not have free will and God is calling to Ahab so that God may deal him his end.
I think what this post gets at is something I’ve been examining in depth. Calvinist determinism illustrates a kind of severely imperfect free will, so that man does essentially have the power to make decisions, but not as they ultimately affect him or his entry into grace. Personally, I see Ahab’s conflict with the whale as being representative of the struggle of man’s free will against his destiny. Like we’ve said in class, there’s the idea that all Moby Dick’s evil is just a projection by Ahab onto nature, and every indication we’re given speaks to this. The whale, a beautiful, mystical creature, is rendered terrifying and ferocious by Ahab’s fear and desire for revenge. Thus, I don’t necessarily think God is calling Ahab to his end, but rather that Ahab spells his own end by toying with another of God’s instruments.