Comparing the Heroes in The Dream of the Rood and Beowulf Essay

TheHeroes in The envisage of the Rood and Beowulf In The Dream of the Rood, the poet has added elements of the idealized heroic verse end (as exemplified in Beowulf and The Battle of Maldon) to the crucifixion. He has also eliminated details of the narrative that tend to render messiah as a figure of pathos, in order to further Christs identification with the other glorious warriors Anglo-Saxon poems. When a hero meets his death, for example, he is usually surrounded by faithful retainers (as is Byrhtnoth) or at least one steadfast companion, such as Beowulfs Wiglaf. The credo clearly states that Jesus died ignobly, in the approximately humiliating fashion possible, and that his disciples unplowed themselves from Golgotha in order not to be implicated aboard him. The crowd mocked Christ with fake veneration. The poet must realize, however, that his audience will not accept a Lord who did not die a glad death, and was not universally lamented. He says instead that all crea tion wept, bewailed the kings death -- Christ was on the cross. After Jesus is taken down, the poet asserts that a enter was carved for him of bright stone, and that the soldiers sung a dirge for him in the eventide. Men came from afar, hastening to the prince. 165 The rood extols upon Christs shining beauty as he died. very(prenominal) noble, but theres little biblical support for this account. Also rooted in the heroic tradition is the subsequent gold-plating and raising of the cross. Just as Beowulf asked that a bright mound be erected in his honor, and the gold in the dragons cave becomes as a monument to him, so do the disciples unearth and deck the rood. The idea of God himself lacking a proper gold-drenched headstone was unthin... ...e most such works, it tries to convince heathens to convert by co-opting the extant value system. Christ emerges as a powerful king who will stoically ingest for us, and reward us, for the price of our piety. Sources Cited and ConsultedHe aney, Seamus, trans. Beowulf A New Verse Translation. New York Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2000. Mitchell, Bruce and Fred C. Robinson (eds.). The Dream of the Rood or A Vision of the Cross. A Guide to one-time(a) English, 6E. Oxford Blackwell Publishing, 2002. 256-263.OKeeffe, Katherine OBrien. Heroic values and Christian ethics. The Cambridge Companion to Old English Literature. Ed. Malcolm Godden and Michael Lapidge. Cambridge Cambridge University Press, 1992. 107-125.Wheelock, Jeremy I. The intelligence Made Flesh Engel Dryhtnes in The Dream of the Rood. English Language Notes. establish 2000, Vol. 37 Issue 3 1.