William
Blake continues his revolution against orthodoxy in matters dealing with the
nature of God’s justice. He redefines the Old Testament God, known for
vengeful judgment, as the God of merciful judgment. He shows that vengeance
leads to an endless cycle of destruction, while mercy allows Heaven to descend
upon the earth. Blake also places Jesus in the eternal position of God and states
that God has always been a God of mercy. With this affirmation in place, Blake
states that the sins of humanity, past, present, and future, are forgiven without
further question. He says that in true Christianity, Good and Evil as contraries
are united and both Good. This is because all action leads to a larger understanding
of the Spiritual reality. In this light, Blake also condemns morality and religious
law as anti-Christ. He suggests that the religious orthodoxy and the religious
authorities that enforce morality and law must be destroyed in order for the
whole of humanity to realize Heaven. In fact, he writes that the accuser, Satan,
is eternally damned for tempting humanity to accuse people for their acts. Yet,
those who accuse, and the accused themselves, are forgiven when they accept
God’s eternal forgiveness. Thus, it can be seen that Blake generally has
an unorthodox view of Christianity and the doctrine of forgiveness that Jesus
promulgates.In the “Ghost of Abel,” Blake assigns the role of the New Testament God to Jehovah, the Old Testament God who dealt with Cain and Abel. Jehovah is generally known as a God of vengeance: “He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 19:24); he slew Er and Onan (Gen. 38:7,10); he hardened Pharaoh’s heart so the plagues might continue (Exod. 9:12)…. ‘I make peace and create evil’ (Isaiah 45:7), ‘shall there be evil in a city and the Lord hath not done it?’ (Amos 3:6)” (Damon, ABD 205). In “The Ghost of Abel,” Blake assigns merciful justice to Jehovah’s nature. In fact, Jehovah Elohim, mentioned throughout the poem, means “merciful justice” respectively (Damon, ABD 205). This designation is in agreement with “Jesus’ description of him as a loving Father of all [who] … was no longer the God of vengeful Justice but the God of Mercy” (Damon, ABD 205). In response to the death of Abel by Cain’s hand, Jehovah says, “Lo I have given you a lamb for atonement instead/ of the Transgres[s]or, or no Flesh or Spirit could ever Live” (Blake 269). Here, Blake writes in the Eternal Now of Imaginative Vision. Jehovah refers to a “lamb for atonement,” or Jesus Christ, who has taken the place of “the transgressor,” or those who sin. In this way, “Christ is, for Blake, as for most traditional Christians, the redeemer” (White 191). However, Blake’s use of Christ in an Old Testament setting is fully nontraditional. Blake writes under an imaginative suspension of disbelief so that he can show the way that Jesus eradicated Vengeance. It is not important that Jesus had not yet come when Abel was slain. Blake, through implication, refers to the eternal existence of Jesus. Hagstrum writes that “Blake’s Christ regularly seems to replace the Father until he has been truly softened into a loving and forgiving Jehovah” (132). Thus, the doctrine of forgiveness that Jesus promulgated is put to use in the situation between Cain and Abel. Jehovah, or God, takes on the eternal form of Jesus in this work, and issues His merciful justice by suggesting that Cain be forgiven for his murder of Abel.
In “The Ghost of Abel,” Blake is careful to point out the ridiculousness of vengeance while he upholds the idea of forgiveness and merciful justice. Damon writes that “Injury the Lord heals, but Vengeance cannot be healed” (ABD 433). After Abel has been slain by Cain, the ghost of Abel enters the scene and says, “I am the Accuser and Avenger / Of Blood[.] O Earth Cover not the Blood of Abel” (Blake 268). Here, Abel becomes the accuser, or one with Satan. Correspondingly, later in the work Satan actually speaks on Abel’s behalf (Blake 269): “Satan enters, not into Cain, but into the ghost of Abel as it cries aloud for vengeance” (Beer 42). For, according to Blake, Satan is the only accuser. When Jehovah asks Abel what kind of vengeance he desires, Abel replies, “Life for Life! Life for Life!” (Blake 268). This statement is in line with the Old Testament ‘Eye for Eye, Tooth for Tooth’ aphorism (Ex. 21:24). For Blake, this is a doctrine of accusation, punishment without forgiveness, intemperate judgment, and incorrect pride. In the line, “O Earth Cover not the Blood of Abel,” Blake illustrates the Old Testament sacrificial ritual; that by the sacrifice of Cain’s life, Abel’s life will be memorialized. Blake does away with this type of thinking in Jehovah’s response: “He who shall take Cains life must also Die O Abel” (Blake 268). This is to say that the type of memorial that Abel asks for would lead to an endless cycle of destruction. For, if Cain’s life was taken for killing Abel, then the killer of Cain must also die and so on. Blake decrees this type of pointless destruction the work of Satan, and against the will of Divine mercy, God Jehovah. Blake calls for an end to the “Elohim [Judgment] of the Heathen” who desire vengeance for sin (Blake 270). He says that this way of thinking must burn in “Eternal Fire” (Blake 270). This is a Spiritual fire, and “Spiritual fire consumes nothing but errors” (Damon, ABD 138). What is left is the true Spiritual essence that is not consumable. Only then, he says, will humanity sit in “the Firmament by Peace Brotherhood and Love” (Blake 270). Thus, Blake concludes “The Ghost of Abel” by condemning vengeance as the ploy of Satan and affirming mercy as the true justice of God. He says that only under merciful justice, or the forgiveness of sins, can humanity live in heaven with peace, love, and brotherhood.
Blake denounces vengeance for mercy in “The Everlasting Gospel” as well, but this time it is Jesus, not Jehovah, who is the forgiver. He uses the incident where the adulterous Mary Magdalene is just about to be stoned for her sin to make his point:
"Mary Fear Not Let me see
The Seven Devils that torment thee
Hide not from my Sight thy Sin
That Forgiveness thou maist win
Has no Man Condemned thee
No Man Lord! Then what is he
Who shall Accuse thee. Come Ye forth
Fallen Fiends of Heavenly birth
That have forgot your Ancient love" (Blake 513)
Here, it is clear that those who accuse shall be condemned, not the accused. In the passage, he clearly suggests that vengeance of any kind is the tool of fiends. Yet, the accusers, thou fallen, are of Heavenly birth, and can be forgiven along side of the woman who has committed adultery. It is only Satan that suffers eternal death; the “possibility of salvation of a person in the state of Satan seems indicated [in ‘the Ghost of Abel’]” (Damon, ABD 358). Blake also suggests that people who sin should not hide themselves in shame. He says that shame is a form of doubt in God’s gift of forgiveness given through Jesus. Blake proclaims the “Ancient love” of God and humanity in this passage. He says that in Jesus, God is a forgiver of sins. There is no room for vengeance with this realization, only mercy. According to Damon, “’The Everlasting Gospel’ signified to Blake the essential ethics of man, which always existed but was first formulated by Jesus. Its basis is the Forgiveness of Sins; its opposite is the conventional system of moral virtues, which are based on the Punishment of Sins” (ABD 133). In this passage, there is no concern for the sin committed as there is in orthodox Christianity; there is only a release of divine mercy that brings all people back into the light of their “Heavenly birth.” Elsewhere in the same poem, Blake writes, “If you Avenge you Murder the Divine Image and he cannot dwell among you[;] because you Murder him he arises Again and you deny that he is Arisen and are blind to Spirit” (Blake 792). Thus, the accuser, the avenger, and the doubter will have no access to the Spiritual world, unless they give up their ways and believe in the forgiveness of sins.
Some of the lesser-known sections of “The Everlasting Gospel” contain Blake’s most direct affirmations of his forgiveness doctrine. In the introduction to these sections, he writes, “What did Christ Inculcate[?] Forgiveness of Sins[.] This alone is the Gospel and this is the Life and Immortality brought to light by Jesus” (Blake 792). Here, Blake insists with total vehemence that Christ’s most important message was the forgiveness of sins. Indeed, it can be said that “the incarnation of Jesus is an act of forgiveness in the deepest sense because it accepts completely the fallen world while at the same time transforming it through the resurrection [into the new world of Spiritual revelation]” (Smith 169). Although this message is present in the orthodox church, Blake would say that it has been twisted. In his own more heterodox message, he writes,
"It was when Jesus said to Me
Thy sins are all forgiven thee
The Christian trumpets loud proclaim
Thro all the World in Jesus name
Mutual forgiveness of each Vice
And oped the Gates of Paradise" (Blake 793)
The difference between orthodoxy and this verse is that Blake proclaims, by implication, the forgiveness of all sins. Erdman supports this claim further when he suggests that Blake meant to write ‘men’ instead of “Me” in the first line of the passage above (PPWB 793). By men, of course, Blake meant humanity at large. Thus, Blake is saying that when all of humanity forgive each other’s transgressions in Jesus’ name, they are living in the Kingdom of Heaven, or “Paradise,” in the present. Accordingly, “the maximum of liberty is obtained by the granting of mutual forgiveness” (Kiralis 105). This is also evident in Blake’s affirmation that the forgiveness of sins is “the Life and Immortality” (Blake 792).
Soon after Blake exhibits God/Christ’s forgiveness of sin, he exhibits the way in which the Law and religious tradition have hidden the truth of God’s mercy. Accordingly, “Blake was emphatic that human happiness should never be sacrificed to the traditional rules; the individual should always be considered first” (Damon, ABD 90). At the same time, he illustrates how humanity, under the pretense of morality and righteousness, has condemned the human person and his or her free actions in the Spirit:
"Twas Covet or twas Custom or
Some trifle not worth caring for
That they may call a shame and Sin
Loves temple that God dwelleth in
And hide in secret hidden Shrine
The Naked Human form divine
And render this a Lawless thing
On which the Soul Expands its wing" (Blake 513-4)
Blake is quick to say that “Custom,” or the Law of religious orthodoxy, is a “trifle not worth caring for.” He implies that the orthodox religious have committed a blasphemy against God by condemning the temple of God, or humanity, for sin. Hamblen writes, “The power which really repudiates the life and the thought of Christ was assuming his name…. Instead of impersonating Christ, the Christian moral system, indissolubly allied to the religious system, is anti-Christ” (390). In fact, Blake says that this religious authority has hidden the true essence of humanity, “the Naked Human form divine,” so well that humanity cannot even find God within themselves. Blake calls for an end to such blasphemy against the “Human Form Divine” (Blake 13), for it is causing the Soul to be grounded in the material world of death. He implies that only in the light of God’s mercy, under the doctrine of the forgiveness of sins, can humanity be free to live in the Spirit. In another section of “The Everlasting Gospel,” Blake writes “If you forgive one another your Trespasses so shall Jehovah forgive you That he himself may dwell among you” (Blake 792).
Blake clarifies his aversion to morality and the accusation of sins in another obscure verse of “The Everlasting Gospel.” Here he claims that it was the love of law and morality that crucified Christ:
"The Moral Virtues in Great fear
Formed the Cross and Nails and Spear
And the Accuser standing by
Cried out Crucify Crucify
Our Moral Virtues ne[v]er can be
Nor Warlike pomp and Majesty
In the Accusations of Sin" (Blake 793)
The “Moral Virtues,” or the religious authorities that enforced them, were in “Great fear” of Christ because He was undermining their authority by forgiving sins. According to Blake, this is why they crucified him. They are, in effect, “attacking forgiveness and protecting Law” (Beer 283). He goes on to say that neither “Moral Virtues” nor “pomp and Majesty” can exist if men and women accuse each other of sin. For, “Progress comes only from the ‘forgiveness of sins’” (Frye, FSSWB 298). In the same light, humanity can only experience the majesty of God by forgiving others’ sins. In fact, forgiveness becomes the only moral virtue that Blake deems important. Beyond this, he says that the Christian church of his own day is not what Christ intended: “If Moral Virtue was Christianity / Christ’s Pretensions were all Vanity” (Blake 793). He suggests that the orthodox Christian authorities have taken over right where the orthodox Jewish authorities left off when they crucified Christ. In an annotation to Watson’s An Apology for the Bible, Blake writes, “The laws of the Jews were (both ceremonial and real) the basest and most oppressive of human codes. And being like all other codes given under pretense of divine command were what Christ pronounced them[:] The Abomination that maketh desolate, i.e. State Religion which is the Source of all Cruelty” (Blake 607). Yet, in his own day, Blake “believed that Jesus was blasphemed more by Christian corruption and the hideous cruelties of religion than by almost anything else…. Blake was also a professed soldier for Christ, fighting corruptions in Christianity and cruelties in all religions and attempting to restore belief in the ‘simple humanity of Jesus’” (Hagstrum 132). He indicates the need for humanity to recognize this idea so that it can move back to the doctrines of forgiveness given by Christ.
Blake more specifically refers to the distinction between good and evil as the foundation of morality in “the Laocoon.” It is clear in the following verse that Blake sees this morality as an evil concept:
"Evil
Good and Evil are
Riches and Poverty a Tree of Misery
Propagating Generation and Death" (Blake 270-1)
Here,
Blake says that the very separation of good and evil into opposing concepts,
the foundation of morality, is evil. Damon writes that “Morality, or the
division of the universe into Good and Bad, was an artificial and acquired classification
for the world; and this classification was in itself the cause of the original
Fall, the eating of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil” (WBHPS 36).
Only when the concepts of good and evil are married are they good. In other
words, the ideas are married when acts normally seen as either good or evil,
are both seen as good by one who lives in imaginative vision (Blake 594). He
says that separating good and evil into opposing concepts has contributed to
the unequal living conditions that humanity endures. This may be because those
who proclaim themselves good oppress those whom they call evil, leaving themselves
with wealth and power. Consequently, a “Tree of Misery” has sprouted.
In other words, misery has grown larger; it has become more and more of a problem
that has branched into a multitude of new problems. By implication, Blake reaffirms
his idea of Christianity as having no distinctions of good or evil because of
the Divine mercy that forgives sins. Accordingly, Blake’s Jesus “does
away with the curses of the moral law, the contentions of ‘good’
and ‘evil’” (Beer 285). Later in the same work, he writes:
“All is not Sin that Satan calls so[;] all the Loves and Graces of Eternity”
(Blake 272). Here, Blake implies that sin, as it is known in orthodox religious
tradition, leads to a grace by God. Perhaps this is how he can write, in an
annotation to Lavater’s Aphorisms on Man, that “Active
Evil is better than Passive Good” (Blake 581). As discussed in Chapter
One, Blake always prefers action to inaction. In this statement, Blake also
shows his idea that there is no distinction between good and evil. Thus, evil,
or sin, can actually be a positive thing; for, it allows humanity to experience
the love of God in his divine mercy and forgiveness. Josephine Miles writes
that active evil “can be regenerated into good … Its vigor, in experience,
leads innocence to wisdom” (94). In this way humanity can learn to live
and practice love, mercy, and forgiveness in daily life, allowing for the peace
of Heaven to ensue. Perhaps this is what Blake meant in “The Divine Image,”
when he described mercy, pity, peace, and love as both Divine and Human attributes
(Blake 12-13). Beyond this, a person can use evil, to understand its contrary
good. It is in the understanding of both that a person reaches Truth. According
to Damon: "There is negative work in the process of salvation which is hardly less important. To acquire Truth, one must cast out Error. Error consists of all illusions, Prohibitions, and Negations, which of their very nature have no real existence. A Contrary, as Blake warns us, is not a negation, but a positive thing. Contraries must be reconciled; for if one contrary is rejected, the dominion of its fellow ensues, and Truth is divided." (WBHPS 151)
Thus, Blake calls for a balance between what is conventionally known as good and evil, or morality and immorality, so that a greater understanding of Truth can be reached. He says that if one is held more important than another, than ignorance results. A person living in the Spirit, who intends good, will always reach good, according to Blake, whether his act is moral or immoral.
In
his “A Vision of the Last Judgment,” Blake describes the way in
which accusers are destroyed for their doubt in God. He writes, “The Last
Judgment[;] when all those are Cast away who trouble Religion with Questions
concerning Good and Evil or Eating of the Tree of those Knowledges or Reasonings
which hinder the Vision of God turning all into a Consuming fire” (Blake
544). Here, Blake says that it is those who accuse others of sin that should
be afraid of receiving Divine punishment. Yet, these individuals themselves
are not in danger, only the ideas that they hold close to their hearts. Damon
writes, “Nothing that really exists can be destroyed, only the unrealities
of moral judgments, cruel laws, the church of this world, kingships, and the
‘States’ through which individuals pass” (ABD 235). So the
essence of these accusers, although it is severely impeded and hidden, is God
and will not be in danger of being consumed in fire. It is the identity, or
state, these accusers have assumed that will be consumed and destroyed in a
“Last Judgment.” Thus, “we should take people for what they
really are, [the Eternal Human] distinguishing the individual [the essence]
from the state he may be in” (Damon, ABD 141). In the same work, Blake shows how Christ comes again to forgive the accused not the accuser. Yet he separates the accuser from the man or woman doing the accusing:
"Christ comes as he came at first to deliver those who were bound under the Knave not to deliver the Knave[.] He comes to Deliver Man the [Forgiven] <Accused and> not Satan the Accuser[.] We do not find anywhere that Satan is Accused of Sin he is only accused of Unbelief and thereby drawing Man into Sin that he may accuse him. Such is the Last Judgment a Deliverance from Satans Accusation[.] Satan thinks that Sin is displeasing to God but he ought to know that Nothing is displeasing to God but Unbelief and Eating of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil[.]" (Blake 553)
Satan is the accuser who can never be redeemed; the person accusing is living in a state of darkness, or a state of unbelief that can be transcended, where he is actually going against God. This is the “Sin” that Satan attempts to draw man into. It also becomes the only true sin that one can commit for Blake, because it is an action against God. To accuse is to promulgate morality, or “Knowledge of Good and Evil,” while disbelieving at the same time. The act of accusing is not acceptable for Blake and must be burnt up in a “Last Judgment.” God is merciful justice, He is Love, He is forgiveness; thus, to accuse is to disbelieve and to go against God. Again, it is the accusing nature that must die; the essence of the accusing individual can live on. More importantly, however, Blake writes that Jesus comes to deliver those who are being accused of sin. In an annotation to Watson’s An Apology for the Bible, Blake writes, “Christ came not to call the Virtuous” (Blake 609). Christ “comes” in the Eternal Now, or the present, to forgive those who have been accused of being immoral. He “comes” to “deliver” these people from oppressed states of mind, or shame, so that they can live in the light of God. Jesus’ Spiritual contribution to humanity was “just the opposite of the enforcement of moral law – namely, Forgiveness of Sin; for, by this attitude of man towards fellow man the Divine Image in each human being is enabled to reveal itself” (Hamblen 389). In other words, Jesus is the essence inside of the accused that awakens them to a Spiritual life.
Furthermore, any individual, even an accuser, can turn towards God after receiving what Blake would call a Last Judgment. A person must accomplish such a feat in his or her mind: “What are all the Gifts of the Spirit but Mental Gifts[.] whenever any Individual Rejects Error and Embraces Truth a Last Judgment passes on that Individual” (Blake 551). This individual can then live in the light of God by coming to an understanding of the love involved with Divine mercy. Since he has experienced Divine mercy, he can then be merciful towards other people. Charles Gardner writes, “Blake believed that the real self was made in the image of God, and therefore it must be loved, reverenced, and obeyed. The recognition of the same divine principle in others enables one to love one’s neighbor as oneself” (qtd. in White 32). Still, for Blake, a person can only truly love himself as God, after he has accepted the idea that his sins have been forgiven. Only then can this person easily forgive the sins of others and take part in the Kingdom of Heaven.
Although much of Blake’s heterodoxy can be found Biblically accurate according to unorthodox interpretations of the Bible, there is one area of his belief in which he even strays from possible interpretations of the Bible. In one section of “The Everlasting Gospel,” he says that Jesus must have sinned himself in order for Him to do away with condemnation:
"If he intended to take on Sin
The Mother should an Harlot been
Just such a one as Magdalen …
Or what was it which he took on
That he might bring Salvation
A Body subject to be Tempted
From neither pain nor grief Exempted
Or such a body as might not feel
The passions that with Sinners deal" (Blake 794)
Here, Blake suggests that Jesus was not born of a virgin, but of an adulteress, so that he could more effectively promulgate his message of forgiveness. Furthermore, Blake expresses the idea that Jesus had to live like a human and sin like a human so that he could take on what was thought to condemn humanity to hell. He implies that only by taking on sin in this way could Jesus effectively save us. Hagstrum writes, “Blake apparently craved an experienced rather than an innocent savior. Forgiveness always difficult, becomes truly sublime when it first encounters and then pardons the guilt of [sin] … it is precisely at the point where mercy meets bodily sin that the spirit of Jesus is most fully revealed” (142). Yet, the liberties that Blake takes here are against the Bible’s message that Jesus was free from sin. It is in these beliefs that Blake really strays from the doctrines of orthodoxy. However, it is also in these beliefs that Blake can exhibit God’s mercy effectively. He shows humanity that God is not concerned with morality and has thus opened up the Kingdom of Heaven for all. Frye writes, “Heaven is not a place guarded by immigration officers interested only in passports and certificates, nor is it the higher class to which we are promoted by passing an examination showing what we have learned in this world. Heaven is this world as it appears to the awakened imagination, and those who try to approach it by way of restraint, caution, good behavior, fear, self-satisfaction, assent to uncomprehended doctrines, or voluntary drabness, will find themselves traveling towards hell” (FSSWB 83). Heaven is for the free-Spirited person who knows his essence is God and doesn’t let any human law get in the way of his path towards his full potential.
There is only a small amount of Blake’s writings that stray from Biblical interpretation, although much of it strays from Christian orthodoxy. In reality, most of his doctrines on forgiveness can be found to be Biblically accurate according to unorthodox analysis. However, a friend of Blake named John Linnell:
"...was not happy with his pronouncements on matters of religion; he said, some years after Blake’s death, ‘with all the admiration possible it must be confessed that he [Blake] said many things tending to the corruption of Christian morals, … occasionally indulging in the support of the most lax interpretations of the precepts of the scripture.’ It is clear that Linnell is not referring here to Blake’s visions, in which he seemed to share some faith, but rather in his general views on the subject of good and evil." (Ackroyd 325)
Yet, Blake’s pronouncements on the subject of good and evil are, in effect, good news. It is true that Blake’s views on forgiveness and Divine mercy are fully heterodox, but it is hard not to see some truth in them. It is not proper for a person to intend evil when he or she acts. But, Blake did not stray from this idea. He said that evil might result from good intentions. He differs from orthodoxy when he says that this is always a good thing. For, Divine forgiveness allows one to learn from mistakes made and not receive punishment for those mistakes. It allows for greater understanding and subsequently greater love in human society. Blake says that with forgiveness as the only rule, nothing but happiness will result. In this reality he proposes, Heaven seems a lot closer, if not present.