We spoke the first day of class about Melville\u2019s Protestant background contributing to the book\u2019s religious themes.\u00a0 Moby Dick is greatly concerned, my notes say, with the individual and his\/her relation to fate.\u00a0 In \u201cThe Monkey Rope,\u201d the chapter concerned with the cutting up of the now-deceased sperm whale, Ishmael supports Queequeg, who must balance on top of the whale, his feet in and out of the shark-filled bloody water, dissecting the beast.\u00a0 The monkey rope, tied around the waist of both Queequeg and Ishmael, is the support system; if one falls, the other will too.\u00a0 Ishmael notices at this moment that his fate is completely dependent on an outside source.<\/p>\n
I seemed distinctly to perceive that my own individuality was now merged in a joint stock company of the two: that my free will had received a mortal wound; and that another\u2019s mistake or misfortune might plunge innocent me into unmerited disaster and death. Therefore, I saw that here was a sort of interregnum in Providence; for its even-handed equity never could have sanctioned so gross an injustice. (341)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Ishmael\u2019s sudden discomfort with his lack of control \u2013 to him, a \u201cgross injustice\u201d \u2013 should really lead him down a slippery slope of realization that the monkey rope should be the least of his worries.\u00a0 After all, his most trusted friend on the ship, Queequeg, is attached on the other end.\u00a0 Ishmael\u2019s fate truly lays in the hands of Ahab, the crazed captain of the voyage.\u00a0 If Ahab\u2019s fate is doomed, there is nothing Ishmael can do to save himself.<\/p>\n
And, to this point, there is no reason for Ishmael to trust the divinity of his captain\u2019s fate.\u00a0 He has already reflected that Ahab is an alien to the Christendom to which he nominally belongs (171).\u00a0 Ishmael received a mortal wound to his free will the moment he stepped on the ship, sailing with a crazy captain, on a dangerous mission of vengeance, who is probably not guided much by Providence.\u00a0 This situation, as symbolically exemplified by the monkey rope passage, is not a good one for anyone \u2013 especially not a Protestant concerned with his fate.<\/p>\n
Melville, Herman. Moby Dick. New York: Alfred A. Knopf Inc., 1991.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We spoke the first day of class about Melville\u2019s Protestant background contributing to the book\u2019s religious themes.\u00a0 Moby Dick is greatly concerned, my notes say, with the individual and his\/her relation to fate.\u00a0 In \u201cThe Monkey Rope,\u201d the chapter concerned with the cutting up of the now-deceased sperm whale, Ishmael supports Queequeg, who must balance […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-487","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=487"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":490,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487\/revisions\/490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}