Understanding Grace: A Literary Analysis of The Parable of The Prodigal Son, Lecture notes of English Philology

Download Understanding Grace: A Literary Analysis of The Parable of The Prodigal Son and more Lecture notes English Philology in PDF only on Docsity! 314 Widya Warta No. 02 Tahun XXXIX/Juli 2015 ISSN 0854-1981 THE PARABLE OF THE PRODIGAL SON: THE IDEA OF GRACE Johan Kristanto Program Studi Sastra Inggris – Fakultas Sastra Universitas Katolik Widya Mandala Madiun ABSTRAK Artikel ini bertujuan membahas penggunaan simbol the son and the father dan konsep rahmat (grace). Teori yang digunakan adalah teori karakterisasi, teori simbol, dan teori rahmat (grace). Sociological approach akan diterapkan dalam menganalisis data karena data yang ada membahas tentang karakter dan simbol yang merupakan refleksi dari kehidupan masyarakat pada waktu itu. Teknik interpretation dan explication digunakan untuk menemukan makna dari perumpamaan tentang Anak yang Hilang itu. Hasil analisis dari kisah perumpamaan Anak yang Hilang disimpulkan bahwa the son and the father menyimbolkan pendosa yang bertobat dan Allah Bapa yang siap mengampuni pendosa yang bertobat itu. Kata kunci: grace, character, characterization A. Introduction 1. Background of the Study Nowadays our world has become rougher. Extreme crimes happen almost everyday; parents torture their children, children kill their parents, and violence spreads widely. Not only does terrorism become a main issue, but also gun shooting in school no longer an impossible matter. Leaders, who are supposed to protect people, choose to satisfy their own interest and even sacrifice their own followers. There is a huge rage coming out of human’s heart. This is the age where ‘grace’ is the most unimaginable concept ever existing. Trapped among our sorrows, we scream “where is grace?” To satisfy our curiosity, we travel among dictionaries and encyclopedias but they give us flowery and beautiful description about grace. As a result, we degrade the precious grace in our daily life. Grace is no longer a free-gift, without effort, and contains the essence of love. Among thousands of English literary heritages, there is one extraordinary inheritance left in modern society, the Bible. Since the earlier age of its existence until intellectual era today, the Bible has become a controversial text. It is very famous, strong and controversial that war of the words and war of the worlds are fighting on it. It is not only a scripture limited for Christian faith but also a rich literature containing great ideas from the ancient past. It is a fact that the Bible is a basic masterpiece in western philosophy and literature. Vorst admits the importance of the Christian Scripture in western culture: Johan Kristanto The Parable of The Prodigal Son: The Idea Of Grace 315 “This scripture has played such a prominent role in world events past and present to know the New Testament and the patterns of its use to have a key to the understanding of Western culture as well as Christianity itself (1988).” In general, the Bible is divided into two main parts, the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Old Testament is actually a scripture for Judaism. The Jewish Bible is a foundation for Christianity. This paper deals with a specific part of the Gospel of Luke. He wrote Jesus’ parable about The Prodigal Son. Understanding the concept of grace revealed in the parable, hopefully will answer the questions disturbing our mind. 2. Problem Limitation This research focuses on the symbols used in the parable The Prodigal Son. The analysis concerns the use of symbols as reflected on the parable. The writer interprets the symbol and the characters of the father and of the prodigal son. 3. Problem Formulation The question of the research can be stated as follows: a. What are the basic elements of The Prodigal Son as a parable? b. How do the son and the father symbolize “receiver and giver of grace”? 4. Research Goal The objective of this study is to understand the use of symbols used in the parable of The Prodigal Son and to find out the concept of grace manifested in the story. The first aim is to find out how the character of The Prodigal Son symbolizes the receiver of the Grace. The second aim is to understand how the character of the father symbolizes the giver of the grace. Then, the last aim is to analyze and to conclude what the grace is. B. Theoretical Review 1. Theory of Character E. M. Foster helps us to understand the two poles of dualism in characters of a literary work. His Aspects of the Novel explains that there are two kinds of characters presented in a work. They are: a. Flat Character This is a kind of character with no changes of his personality from the beginning to the end of the story; the character is built upon one single idea. b. Round Character This character has certain development, certain changes of personality along the story. Regarding these two different kinds of characters, typical judgment toward a character could be made by considering in detailed description of the character. A flat character will have the similar personality in the whole story, while a round character owns his character development related to events which happened in his life. 318 Widya Warta No. 02 Tahun XXXIX/Juli 2015 ISSN 0854-1981 As a genre of literature, parable differs from the other genre that is often confounded with parable; that is fable. R. C. Trench explains: Some have confounded the parable with the Aesopic fable, or drawn between them only a slight and hardly perceptible line of distinction. But the parable is constructed to set forth a spiritual; truth; while the fable is essentially of the earth, and never lifts itself above the earth. The fable just reaches that pitch of morality which the world will understand and approve (1948). Therefore, parable is a different from fable. In Concise Dictionary of Literary Terms, Scott supports the idea to differentiate parable from fable. It says that a parable always teaches by comparison with actual events, and thus differs from fables (1999). As The Prodigal Son is a literary work, there are some basic literary elements which need to be analyzed. The first one is the characterization. In this parable, there are three main characters. They are the father, the younger son, and the elder son. The younger son is the character that is called with the title of the parable, the Prodigal Son. Besides these three main characters, there are some other characters playing unimportant roles. Their roles give almost nothing to the chain of the plot. In fact, their characters are mentioned only once or twice in the whole story plot. They are the servants, the owner of the swine, and the prostitutes. The second literary element is the setting. There are two kinds of settings in a literary work; the setting of time and the setting of place. The story of The Prodigal Son is set in an ancient era. In Family Encyclopedia of the Bible, Gooding explains the setting. It is about 2000 years ago, around the turning point from BC era to AD era. Therefore, things used for living at that time are different from today’s equipment. Life for human beings 2000 years ago is harder than the modern era. As the life setting pictured in this parable is completely different from our era, there are lots of different functions of action and lifestyle contained (1978). Since this Prodigal Son is a parable, the meaning contained inside can not be perceived directly. There are lots of symbolisms hidden in the story. Regarding that symbolism can be revealed in the characters, actions, things, etc; therefore each detail in this parable is very significant to the meaning. In An Introduction to Fiction, Robert Stanton suggests: “approaching symbols by comparing the detail to its context, looking for the element suggested, resembled, or repeated in the scene (1965). Therefore, to be able to analyze the hidden meaning of the symbols in this parable, the intrinsic details need to be observed, especially those that are repeated; they are the character of the father and the prodigal son. 1. The Son The parable of The Prodigal Son is started with a short verse. It is said that Jesus told there was a man who had two sons. There are three characters mentioned here; a father, a younger son, and an elder son. In fact, through the whole story, only these three characters play important role to the plot. Among these characters, the younger son is the character in the lowest status according to the Jewish culture, the head of a family is the father. Sons have no rights at all in taking decision. At that moment, Johan Kristanto The Parable of The Prodigal Son: The Idea Of Grace 319 children could be sold as a slave whenever their father wanted it. This is a very inhuman action nowadays; however it was not surprising for the Jews at The Prodigal Son’s era. Compared to the elder son, the younger son deserves less rights of inheritance share. In Jews tradition, if a father has two sons, he will divide his wealth into three. The elder son will get two shares of the three, while the younger son only gets one share. Therefore, he gets only one third of the father’s property. It does seem unfair in modern law of inheritance share, but this is proper law for the Jews. This reality is supported by R.C. Trench in his Notes on the Parables of Our Lord: “The portion, according to the Jewish Law, would be the half of what elder brother would receive (1948).” The younger son in the parable of the Prodigal Son was a son with no respect for his own father. M. J. Murphy mentions in his Understanding Unseens: An Introduction to English Novel for Overseas Students that characters can be described through some ways. One of them is through the speech of the character, what the character says can be a clue to his personality. It is written in the verse 12 that the younger son said to his father to give him the share of the family property which becomes his part. From his statement, other meaning could be derived. This is not just a usual asking from a son to his father. There is rudeness contained in it. Inheritance is shared after the death of the parents. In The Bible Knowledge Commentay, Walvoord explains:”Normally an estate was not divided and given to the heirs until the father could no longer manage it well (1983).” The younger son was asking for his share, but deep inside his heart he doubted his father’s capability in managing the house. In his mind, the younger son thought the one who could decide the best choice was he himself, not his father. His statement to ask for money was a protest against his father’s authority. The younger son no longer had respect for his own father. By asking for the inheritance to his still- living father, he actually was saying that his father had been ‘dead’ for his heart. What happens next to The Prodigal Son is described by Trench as “fall within fall” (1948). In the verse 14, the disaster came for the Prodigal Son: “And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want. (Luke 15:14).” The Prodigal Son had enjoyed his fortune in a terrible way. Now all he had had vanished. The money he once had went away with the prostitutes he had slept with. The Bible said that he had spent all. Not just a part of or almost all, but unfortunately he had spent all of his money. Not a single coin was left for him to be his capital facing new days. Because of his own choice, the Prodigal Son had nothing. Unexpectedly, a great starvation destroyed that country. News about damaged harvest became the headline news, inflation caused high prices, life got harder, and everything was tough for the Prodigal Son. This careless young man was left alone without family, without friends, and without money. In such a climax difficulty, he lost his self esteem. Even, he was considered unworthy by other people. 320 Widya Warta No. 02 Tahun XXXIX/Juli 2015 ISSN 0854-1981 He tried to do some work for his living, but what he got was another misery. Trench describes this as: The prodigal began to be in want, was, no doubt, a summon to him to return home, but as yet his confidence in his own resources was not altogether exhausted. He went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, hoping repair his broken fortunes by his help. And here we see a fall within a fall. He, who begins by using the world as his servant to minister his pleasures, ends by becoming its slave (1948). This new master told him to do the worst job he could ever imagine, feed the pigs. The poor Prodigal Son tried to ask for some compassion from the stranger, but he got more disaster. At that time, in hunger he had no longer power of decision on himself. Trench says: Sinful man finds no love, no pity from his fellow sinner. This new master dismisses him from his sight, and sends him to the vilest employment, to feed swine. We know that it was even accursed in the eyes of a Jew (1948) Summing up the whole characterization of the Prodigal Son, he was a man with bad qualities that gets worse and finally meets the worst point through the whole plot of the story. His over bad role symbolizes the position of a sinner in front of God. In Him, there is no single quality at all in which he might deserve grace. Then, in this deep valley, the Prodigal Son remembered his father. 2. The Father The character of the father in the parable of The Prodigal Son is a 180 degree opposite in the contrary of the character the Prodigal Son. While the character of the Prodigal Son is the character with the lowest status, the character of the father is the character with the highest status. In Jewish family, a father plays an important role as the head of the family. There was no wife or mother mentioned in the parable of the Prodigal Son. It is not surprising since in Jewish tradition women tended to play lower role than their husbands. Whenever husband and wife have different opinion about something, the decision was taken from the husband’s opinion. Even if there were a mother in the parable of the Prodigal Son, the father still became the character with the highest status. The absence of the character of mother here makes the character of father occupy ultimate ruler position. From the economic perspective, the character of father in the parable of the Prodigal Son was a rich man. This conclusion was taken from what the Prodigal Son thought. As it is written by Murphy: a character might be understood from the opinion of the other characters, the Prodigal Son’s thinking gives us a reflected image of the father: “And when he came to himself, he (the Prodigal Son-writer) said, how many hired servants of my father have bread enough and to spare… (Luke 15:17).” Briefly speaking, the father in this parable was not only the character with the highest status in his family, but he is also the character with the highest status in the society. As the highest status character, the father occupies the position of God as the most ultimate character in the universe.