Literature
During the history of Christianity it has had the moments of glory and the moments of sadness. The beginning of a new age, which we call Anno Domini, and which symbolizes the new era, that had to bring love and mercy in this world is considered to be the beginning of new Christianity, Christ’s appearing and his teachings which were different from the Old Testament and based on pure love.
The birth of Christ, His Crucifix and other religious events served as inspiration for many poets and writers. People found their afflatus in God’s glorifying and that’s why there are a lot of examples of religious literature. One of such examples is The Dream of the Rood. In this poem we may state the existence of two main characters – the poet and the Cross, on which Christ was crucified.
In my opinion, the attitudes of the dreamer and the Rood are different. The Rood is a participant of the events which took place in Jerusalem near two thousand years ago. He was a witness of God’s death and his Rising. The poet-dreamer is the representative of the society which lived long time after that sacred event. I would say that the Rood is the teacher and the poet is a student, who has to bring the wisdom of the teacher to other people, who lived there and who forgot Christ’s teachings and fell into sins.
Throughout the whole poem both the dreamer and the Cross undergo certain changes. At first we may see the Cross in its initial stage – when it was a tree, a beautiful tree whose roots were vigorously ruined by the enemies. Then it became a beautiful cross, embellished with precious gems. But it was all covered with blood in some time. When the Christ was crucified the Rood was crucified as well, it felt all the pain and sufferings of the Savior. And when His Rising occurred, the Cross was beautiful again, in silver and gold, as was the Savior. And it was glorified. As for the poet, at the beginning he was a little bit skeptical about the dream he had, he didn’t believe the words he heard. But then we see the change in the dreamer, he realized the sinful life he and all people around had. Hearing about the sufferings of God, who was perfect and sinless and who devoted his life to the mankind in order to save them, the poet understood his mistake, he changed in his soul and heart, he knew he needed to be with God and tell people to be with God too.
The Rood and the poet interact in the form of dialogue and through words the first influences the second. There may be seen three parts in this poem: epilog – when the author tells about the dream, second part – the story of the Cross, and the ending – where the consequences are made. Interaction in the second part makes the structure of the poem logical and contributes to the logical course of events and their description through the structure.
Works Cited
Hamer, Richard (transl.). “The Dream of the Rood”. EnglishOx.Com. Retrieved from http://www.english.ox.ac.uk/oecoursepack/rood/translations/hamer.html
