Handmaid's Tale 2
Many of the principles of Gilead are based on Old Testament beliefs. Discuss Atwoods use of biblical allusions and their political significance in the novel. 'The Handmaids Tale' is a book full of biblical allusions, before Atwood begins the text an epigraph gives us an extract from Genesis 30: 1-3"And when Rachel saw that she bare Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister; and said unto Jacob, Give me children, or else I die.And Jacob's anger was kindled against Rachel; and he said, Am I in God's stead, who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb?And she said, Behold my maid Bilhah, go in unto her; and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may also have children by her."This principle from the Bible is used throughout 'The Handmaids Tale', the principles being that it is the idea of both assemblages that a women's duty is to have children and that it is acceptable for a man to be angry if a women can not produce a child. Both these beliefs show that in jointly the Bible and 'The Handmaids Tale', women are completely defined by fertility and are classed as 'walking wombs'. 'The Handmaids Tale' recreates the selected stanzas from the bible with Jacob, Rachel, Leah and the two handmaids. The tale is an
Passages from the Old Testament are modified to suit the teachings of the new regime. The handmaids use specialised greetings provided by the authoritative figures. In the Old Testament, Moses took his people through the land of 'Milk and Honey' in order to set them free. As only important members of the Government have access to the Bible, important meaning all male, they are able to put the Old Testament into new contexts. "Blessed be the fruit""May the lord open"These greetings are reinforcing what the Handmaids are there for, to reproduce. Atwood has used this as a place name in order to give the reader and the Handmaids a sense of hope, so that they may one day be set free also. , Aunt Lydia with the Karl Marx and Bible mix up). Gilead employs biblical quotation to endorse patriarchal interests, but it uses them very vigilantly and often inaccurately (I. All of the allusions mentioned are an example of how effortlessly power is occupied through language. Atwood, to coordinate with biblical references has employed a biblical name for the place where the book is set. Because the Old Testament states that women are solely child-bearers, they are used for sex in order that they reproduce. The fundamentalist Republic of Gilead is named after a place in the Old Testament, a mountainous region east of Jordan. "Gilead is a place of evildoers, tracked with blood"The evildoers mentioned are robbers and harlotry, the prostitution obviously occurring in Jezebel's, the local brothel in Gilead. The communal ethics of Gilead are based on the Old Testament, where patriarchal supremacy is justified as the commandment of God.
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