Christianity and love versus r
Christianity and love versus rChristianity and Love versus the Reality
Many of us have an ideal picture of what our future looks like. It is a picture that is filled with hopes, dreams, happiness and loves. We do what we do now to complete our picture of the future as fully and as fast as possible. Many of us believe in God. We convince ourselves that God will guide us through problems, and when our time here on earth is completed, we will be called and enter another place where problems no longer exist. But, what would happen if we all die tomorrow! There will be no future! And what would happen if there was no afterlife! Then "death is final!" said Camus. Albert Camus conceives of the world in terms of incongruity and contrasts: man lives, yet he is condemned to die, death is the only definite destiny one can be sure to reach; most people live believing the existence of an afterlife, yet there has never been any proof of its actuality. Camus critiques in The Plague the ability of "Absolute Truth"- God's definition of our being here, to effectively guide the lives of the people of Oran, he thus challenges man to do the work that has hitherto assigned to God/Absolute Truth. Using the characters like Rambert and Paneloux, Camus questions the potency of romantic love and Christianity to guide mankind through the crisis the plague brings forth. Camus argues through the forming of the sanitary squads and the consistent battles Rieux puts up against the plauge, that in the life-threatening emergency, only the solidarity of each and every affected man can save one another.
Camus criticizes that God offers neither absolution nor justification for the presence of the harm, and believes Christianity and its entirety can indeed be dangerous. Father Paneloux tried to justify the presence of the plague by equaling sins with punishments at his first sermon. "If today the plague is in your midst, that is because the hour has struck for taking thought. The just man need have no fear, but the evildoer has good cause to tremble." (95) Camus metaphorically contrastes the wetted churchgoers with the soggy wet rat who was dying in front of Rieux. The rat escaped from the sewers to die in the streets. Now, in a reversal, the wet Oranians are leaveing the streets and going inside the church to escape the plauge. Camus also criticizes that the sermon only created confusion and guilt among Oranians when practical precaustions and courage are needed. To further criticize the legitimacy of Christianity, Camus created confusion and doubt for Paneloux (representing all Christians) of his beliefs by vividly describing the death of the innocent child: no God will allow innocent children to die. "..until my dying day I (Rieux) shall refuse to love the scheme of things in which children are put to torture." (218) Paneloux nevertheless refuses to decline to lose his faith, he thus believes "God had vouchsafed to His creatures an ordeal such that they must acquire and practice the greatest of all virtues: that of the All or Nothing." (225) For Paneloux, the only way for him to keep his faith was to believe everything. He refuses the help from the doctor and risks his life and puts himself at danger to believe all. "When an innocent youth can have his eyes destroyed, a Christian should either lose his faith or consent to having his eyes destroyed." His love of God overcame the love of himself.
Love conquers all! Plague conquers loves! Human solidarity conquers the plague. The plague puts any form of love at risk: the eternal delay of seeing one another caused by the quarantine of the town and the ultimate separation, death. The plague brings multi-layers of imprisonment to separate loved ones: it first makes Oranians the prisoner of their own town, and then in order to protect the others, they establish the quarantine isolation camp, the second imprisonment for the families of the infected patients. Ironically, lovers are separated because they love each other: Rieux separated from his wife because he loves and her wants her to recover well. Every life the plague took and every relationship the plague separated are all its victories. Though the plague triumphed again and again, Camus suggests that only the confrontation of the absurd (plague) could produce acts of human solidarity. Individuals that are involved become relational to each other. Only the togetherness of each and every person involved can challenge this human disaster. "Until now I (Rambert) always felt a stranger in this town, and that I'd no concern with you people. But now that I've seen what I have seen (the Oran's needs of help), I know that I belong here whether I want it or not. This business is everybody's business." (209-210) Camus implies that putting love as the first priority could be dangerous. Love can blindfold one's clear mind and therefore causes irrational actions. For example, Rambert's numerous attempts of escaping the town; he was even considering risking his life to be smuggled out of the town. He never considered the fact that his leaving the town may cause a greater catastrophe elsewhere and the possibilities of infecting his love ones.
Camus feels that man is his own savior and fashions his own values in terms of intelligence, persistent courage, and a belief in the absolute value of human individual. The plague separates the town from the outside world, it separates people from their loves. However it united the people who were once individualistic together. Camus uses the contrast of the individualism of each Oranian at the beginning of the novel with the sense of solidarity they have to fight the plague for their lives to criticize that nothing, not religion, nor love can unite and join everyone. It is only when death confronts everyone will identities become relational and individuals become solidarity. This solidarity is the only help Oranians can employ.