Sheol To Heaven Some Worthy Souls example essay topic

The novel 'Memnoch - The Devil' by Anne Rice is, at the heart of it, really a vessel for the author's own theological ideas. Having said that it is also a classy exit for a cult character, the author claims to have fallen in love with. Whether or not this is a pretentious excuse to stop writing about a worn out character, or not, I will not comment on. What I will comment on are these theological ideas in particular as Shakespeare put it in Macbeth "did heaven look on, and would not take their part?" or "how can God allow suffering?" which is argued throughout the text.

Fifth novel in 'The Vampire Chronicles' by Anne Rice (the most noteworthy of which 'Interview with the vampire' was made into a motion picture with Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise in leading roles) and also the last in the same series. It has a lot to live up to, and in my opinion uses and abuses that fact. Instead of writing what loyal fans are expecting, the author instead decides that it would be a perfect time for her to voice her view on some theological issues. The reasons for reasons doing this are unfathomable, perhaps she was trying to get noticed by theologians, or perhaps she was trying to explore how she felt about life and the afterlife, but whatever they were, they were selfish, and not what the fans had grown to expect.

What they or at least I had grown to expect was an escape from real world mysteries, where I could not have to think on major issues, and just enjoy a day in the life of a flamboyant anti-hero full of bravado and bluster, leaping tall buildings in a single bound. Clich'e maybe, but when he's not dressed in pyjamas with his underpants on the wrong side, it begins to feel fresh. Of course, not living up to expectations could have been quite deliberate in order to somehow filter out her true fans, from the ones who jumped on the bandwagon at the release of the film, of the original novel. But if this was the case, then I doubt she would have allowed a second film to be in production. This film is a combination of the second and third novels "The Vampire Lestat" and "Queen of The Damned" respectively. It features recently departed "R n' B" Singer Aaliyah, and takes it name from the latter of the two novels, "Queen of The Damned".

The plot is an uncontrollable beast... and as such it is hard to sum it up neatly, but what follows is an outline of its twists, turns, and notable events. Lestat, the hunter, is hunted himself by a mysterious "Stalker", who finally introduces himself as the Devil, whose real and preferred name is not Satan but Memnoch. The Devil lures Lestat by offering him a tour to Heaven and Hell. In fact, Memnoch takes Lestat in a journey through time where Lestat re-experiences the Creation, the great controversy between God and the Devil, and the Redemption itself. When God creates human beings, the angels, (and Memnoch particularly), journey to Earth out of curiosity to watch humans and occasionally to mate with human women (a story confusedly recorded in the Bible).

They also discover that humans are capable of violence, they suffer, die, and go to a sad place called Sheol, with an uncertain destiny. Memnoch the Devil pleads the case of humans with God and wins a chance for them to be admitted into Heaven. God authorizes Memnoch to take from Sheol to Heaven some worthy souls. Human beings being what they are, however, fewer than one out of a hundred souls in Sheol, when tried, are found worthy to join the angels in Heaven. Memnoch wants something to be done also for the other souls. Most of them, in fact, remain confused in the Sheol and may even become earthbound and dangerous for human beings like Amel, a spirit who forgets that he has once been human and ends up creating vampires (Lestat, thus, receives the final answer on how vampires originated, at least assuming that the Devil is telling the truth).

God's plan for redeeming the souls then unfolds, and what Lestat sees is very much the Christian history of salvation through the covenant with Israel and the incarnation of Jesus Christ. The Devil, however, insists that God's plan is all wrong. By coming in the flesh and allowing humans to crucify him, God has exalted violence and suffering rather than removing it from Earth as Memnoch had suggested. Besides, according to Memnoch, God incarnated without removing entirely his consciousness of being God, with the result that his experience of suffering is not complete. As a result, Christ's mission delivers many souls from the Sheol, but not all. Memnoch pleads again for those still in the Sheol.

This time God looks positively annoyed, and transforms Sheol into Hell, banishing Memnoch there as the Devil. Memnoch's Hell resembles more an unorthodox Catholic purgatory: it is not eternal and is a place where, tutored by the Devil, lost souls learn how they could eventually ascend to Heaven. Memnoch asks Lestat to remain in Hell and work with him. Unconvinced by Memnoch's story, and feeling the incredible sadness of the place, Memnoch escapes and lands back in Manhattan (where his journey had started) having, in the process, lost an eye and gained Veronica's Veil with the true image of Jesus Christ. When the veil is exhibited in St. Patrick's Cathedral the worst religious fanaticism erupts among humans and vampires alike (some of the latter commit suicide). Even Lestat starts behaving in a strange way, and older vampires confine him in a New Orleans orphanage.

There, he returns to his (so to speak) normal self, and eventually receives back his missing eye and a cryptic message of thanks from the Devil for a job well done, that leaves him wondering whether the explosion of fanaticism was not what the Devil was really after. When Lestat is told of the creation of the world, by Memnoch, Memnoch raises some interesting points on why God does not seem to think the humans are worth saving. He argues that as he designed and modelled them he knows how they function better than anyone, He did not make them to be almost immortal in that after they die, in that the soul was not meant to be something that felt and acted just like a human. But in the novel this is far from the truth, the souls, distraught by their deaths, and some possibly not realizing they where dead, create a sort of alternative earth, but its not so alternative, more an exact replica, they wish they where alive again. So God's preconception that what he created was inferior, and merely another life form, is in actuality false, in a large number of cases. But just as many of these souls eventually fade out, and become nothing, they lose all faith in what they once believed in, in life.

So he does not see why their life is of any importance, and worth saving, or influencing. In the novel it is hinted at, that perhaps God did not know his capabilities, that in creating something in his image, he was inadvertently creating something he could not understand fully. This is because god was trying to understand himself in creating the humans. So God did not fully understand why these people suffered, perhaps that they did suffer, and if they did it was insignificant to him, he considered them like all animals, and as such not important. So it is saying that God is ignorant of the truth.

This is put to him, and, after much hesitation, becomes man, which he was not aware he could, adding to the fact that he in trying to understand himself, as well as these people. As man, or rather Christ, God experiences life as a human, and eventually sacrifices himself, to save mankind. But in doing all this, he does this as a man, who knows he is God, not as a man. So he cannot fully understand how people suffer, and subsequently why this should not be allowed on his part. Eventually he allows the souls to enter heaven from shelf, and when in heaven they make it, a far superior place. But these souls are only allowed in after they have forgiven god, and understand his "love".

So god is not helping the suffering on earth. It could be said that this is because suffering is part of life, and only in death and forgiveness can you be truly happy and at peace, with god. Anne Rice's writing style is, meandering and repetitious, dull and boring at times. She draws back from controversy and yields to the desire for popularity. She falls in love with all the wrong parts of her work and tries to glamorize characters and situations that have no inherent appeal, and then she tries to belittle the potentially deep and meaningful areas of her work.

Such as, the Scene in "Memnoch", when Lestat draws blood, from Christ on his crucifix. Despite this, the books still hold appeal to me in that I adore her subject matter. She can create a beautiful, seductive atmosphere, and her ventures into historical romance are often thought provoking to say the least. The tale of Lestat's early years and mission to find his vampiric ancestors is the most engaging and intriguing thing he ever does (told in the second and to some extent the third novel). The misery Louis suffers throughout Interview with the vampire is intriguing and disturbing. These things keep me coming back to read Rice's work.

I know her novels will always transport me to a world of dark passions and decaying grandeur. In conclusion, I would say that although the novel is not what it could have been in terms of living up to the hopes of its fans, it is an interesting take on frequently tread ground, and although a lot of it is based on fiction, and "what if" situations, it raises some interesting points on why perhaps God allows suffering, and it suggests that it is because he doesn't understand our suffering, and never fully can do. I would wholeheartedly recommend this book. If you read the previous novels then all the better, you " ll understand the characters, and the history of their world up to this point. But this is not the greatest of advantages, and this book is as a good read as a standalone title as a finale.