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Brave New Globe Spirituality

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Spirituality

Chapter 3

"There was a thing, as I've said earlier, called Christianity."

[…]

"The ethics and philosophy of nether-consumption…"

[…]

"Then essential when there was under-production; but in an age of machines and the fixation of nitrogen—positively a crime against society." (3.200-4)

This statement is basically a less explicit grade of Mustapha'southward after merits that "God isn't compatible with machinery."

"All crosses had their tops cut and became T'southward. There was besides a affair called God."

[…]

"Nosotros have the World State now. And Ford's Mean solar day celebrations, and Community Sings, and Solidarity Services." (three.206-8)

Mustapha and the other World Controllers have tried to isolate what they consider the purpose of religion (condolement, community, rites) from the process of religion (suffering, questioning, striving, edification).

Chapter 5: Part 2

The President stood up, made the sign of the T and, switching on the synthetic music, let loose the soft indefatigable beating of drums and a choir of instruments—near-wind and super-cord—that plangently repeated and repeated the brief and unescapably haunting melody of the beginning Solidarity Hymn. Over again, again—and it was not the ear that heard the pulsing rhythm, it was the midriff; the wail and clang of those recurring harmonies haunted, not the mind, but the yearning bowels of compassion.

The President made another sign of the T and sat downward. The service had begun. The dedicated soma tablets were placed in the heart of the table. The loving loving cup of strawberry ice-cream soma was passed from hand to hand and, with the formula, "I drink to my anything," twelve times quaffed. And then to the accompaniment of the synthetic orchestra the Get-go Solidarity Hymn was sung. (5.two.12-three)

Is it possible that Dauntless New Globe is a critique of Christianity? In other words, does Huxley's parody highlight the possible mindlessness of certain religious practices?

"Orgy-porgy," the dancers caught up the liturgical refrain, "Orgy-porgy, Ford and fun, osculation the girls…" And equally they sang, the lights began slowly to fade—to fade and at the same time to grow warmer, richer, redder, until at last they were dancing in the crimson twilight of an Embryo Store. "Orgy-porgy…" In their blood-coloured and foetal darkness the dancers connected for a while to circulate, to beat and vanquish out the indefatigable rhythm. "Orgy-porgy…" Then the circle wavered, broke, fell in fractional disintegration on the band of couches which surrounded—circle enclosing circle—the table and its planetary chairs. "Orgy-porgy…" Tenderly the deep Voice crooned and cooed; in the blood-red twilight it was every bit though some enormous north**** dove were hovering benevolently over the now prone or supine dancers. (5.2.31)

The red lite is significant hither—it reminds united states of the cherry-red light in the embryo room, which means these "Solidarity Services" render participants infantile.

Alternate Thursdays were Bernard's Solidarity Service days. Afterward an early dinner at the Aphroditzeum (to which Helrnholtz had recently been elected under Rule Two) he took leave of his friend and, hailing a taxi on the roof told the homo to fly to the Fordson Customs Singery. The car rose a couple of hundred metres, so headed eastwards, and as information technology turned, there before Bernard'due south eyes, gigantically beautiful, was the Singery. Flood-lighted, its three hundred and twenty metres of white Carrara-surrogate gleamed with a snowy incandescence over Ludgate Loma; at each of the 4 corners of its helicopter platform an immense T shone crimson against the night, and from the mouths of xx-4 vast golden trumpets rumbled a solemn synthetic music. (v.ii.i)

The religious implications hither are clear; this is the World State'due south replacement for religious service. The fact that it ends up existence a narcotic-filled orgy is clear bear witness that spirituality has been utterly perverted in this new world.

Chapter 7

Lenina liked the drums. Shutting her eyes she abased herself to their soft repeated thunder, allowed it to invade her consciousness more and more than completely, till at last there was nothing left in the earth but that one deep pulse of sound. It reminded her reassuringly of the synthetic noises made at Solidarity Services and Ford'south Solar day celebrations. "Orgy-porgy," she whispered to herself. These drums beat out just the same rhythms. (vii.31)

Lenina is trying to comfort herself hither by recalling what's familiar to her, but she actually makes a rather important connection between the spiritual activities of the Savages and her own Solidarity Service back home.

Chapter 8

He opened the book at random.

Nay, but to live
In the rank sweat of an enseamed bed,
Stew'd in corruption, honeying and making love
Over the nasty sty…

The strange words rolled through his mind; rumbled, like talking thunder; like the drums at the summertime dances, if the drums could have spoken; like the men singing the Corn Song, cute, beautiful, then that you cried; similar old Mitsima saying magic over his feathers and his carved sticks and his bits of bone and stone—kiathla tsilu silokwe silokwe silokwe. Kiai silu silu, tsithl—just amend than Mitsima'due south magic, considering it meant more, considering it talked to him, talked wonderfully and just one-half-understandably, a terrible cute magic, about Linda; near Linda lying at that place snoring, with the empty cup on the floor beside the bed; about Linda and Popé, Linda and Popé. (8.40)

And now we add Shakespeare into that mix—null similar a little scrap of impassioned fiction to complicate reality farther.

And sometimes, when he and the other children were tired with too much playing, one of the quondam men of the pueblo would talk to them, in those other words, of the dandy Transformer of the World, and of the long fight between Right Hand and Left Hand, between Wet and Dry; of Awonawilona, who made a groovy fog past thinking in the night, and then made the whole world out of the fog; of Earth Female parent and Sky Father; of Ahaiyuta and Marsailema, the twins of War and Take chances; of Jesus and Pookong; of Mary and Etsanatlehi, the adult female who makes herself young once more; of the Black Stone at Laguna and the Great Eagle and Our Lady of Acoma. Strange stories, all the more than wonderful to him for beingness told in the other words and and so not fully understood. Lying in bed, he would think of Heaven and London and Our Lady of Acoma and the rows and rows of babies in clean bottles and Jesus flying upwards and Linda flight upward and the great Director of Earth Hatcheries and Awonawilona. (8.26)

This is an essential paragraph in Dauntless New World because it really lets u.s. into John'southward psyche. In his mind, there are vague or nonexistent barriers between the stories Linda tells about the civilized globe, Christian dogma, and the native faith of the Indians at Malpais.

John the Brutal

"Once," he went on, "I did something that none of the others did: I stood confronting a rock in the center of the mean solar day, in summertime, with my artillery out, similar Jesus on the Cross."

"What on globe for?"

"I wanted to know what information technology was similar being crucified. Hanging there in the sun…"

"Just why?"

"Why? Well…" He hesitated. "Considering I felt I ought to. If Jesus could stand it." (viii.69-73)

Much of John'south cocky-inflicted suffering is the product of his spiritual upbringing.

Chapter eleven

"Partly on his interest being focused on what he calls 'the soul,' which he persists in regarding as an entity independent of the physical environment, whereas, as I tried to bespeak out to him…" (xi.34)

While John'south various spiritual sources differ in dogma or effectively points, they can all concord on this: the existence of some immortal aspect of homo. This is why John never wavers in his belief that self-deprival is necessary; his concern is for the soul instead of the body.

John the Savage

A click; the room was darkened; and suddenly, on the screen in a higher place the Master'south head, there were the Penitentes of Acoma prostrating themselves before Our Lady, and wailing equally John had heard them wail, confessing their sins earlier Jesus on the Cross, before the hawkeye image of Pookong. The young Etonians fairly shouted with laughter. Yet wailing, the Penitentes rose to their feet, stripped off their upper garments and, with knotted whips, began to shell themselves, blow afterwards accident. Redoubled, the laughter drowned fifty-fifty the amplified record of their groans.

"But why do they laugh?" asked the Roughshod in a pained bewilderment.

"Why?" The Provost turned towards him a still broadly grinning face up. "Why? Merely considering information technology'due south and then extraordinarily funny." (11.54-half-dozen)

We argue in John's "Character Assay" that he'due south basically like a spiritual sponge. This is a great example; he sees the Penitentes abusing themselves in the name of God, so he does the same thing to himself at the end of the novel.

Chapter 12

"My young friend," said the Arch-Customs-Songster in a tone of loud and solemn severity; there was a full general silence. "Allow me give y'all a word of advice." He wagged his finger at Bernard. "Before it's too late. A give-and-take of good advice." (His voice became sepulchral.) "Mend your ways, my young friend, mend your ways." He made the sign of the T over him and turned away. "Lenina, my dear," he called in another tone. "Come with me." (12.34)

We were excited to signal out that the Curvation-Community-Songster is similar a religious figurehead—like a Key, maybe… until Huxley pointed it out himself in Chapter 17. Even so, now you know.

Affiliate thirteen

Lenina Crowne

"Then why on earth didn't you say and then?" she cried, then intense was her exasperation that she drove her sharp nails into the peel of his wrist. "Instead of drivelling away about knots and vacuum cleaners and lions, and making me miserable for weeks and weeks." (13.66)

Non only is this quote a reflection of the increasing tie betwixt sex and violence in the novel, but information technology's a clear hint that John is a big-fourth dimension Christ-figure. The quote as well suggests that Lenina drives this attribute of his grapheme.

Chapter 14

John the Savage

"Oh, God, God, God…" the Cruel kept repeating to himself. In the anarchy of grief and remorse that filled his mind it was the 1 articulate word. "God!" he whispered it aloud. "God…" (14.55)

John turns to God non just considering of Linda's decease, merely also because of the reaction to her death past others around him. It is this reaction that makes him realize how inhumane this community is, how "such people" alive in this "brave new world."

Chapter fifteen

"Don't have that horrible stuff. It'southward poison, information technology's poison."

[…]

"Poison to soul likewise as trunk." (15.20-two)

Soma poisons the body by dulling the senses, only how does information technology damage the soul? One possible explanation is to look at the fashion the drug alters a person'due south identity past stripping him of selection. Most chiefly, at least to John, it removes all possibility of suffering. Suffering, he believes, is the key to spiritual advancement and to being a human. In this way, soma is "poison to [the] soul."

Chapter 17

Mustapha Mond

"The gods are just. No doubt. Just their code of law is dictated, in the concluding resort, by the people who organize club; Providence takes its cue from men." (17.35)

Again, Mustapha represents organized religion as a purely invented social structure used to keep people in line. Since the Controllers have hypnopaedia and soma to maintain gild, religion but isn't needed.

"One of the numerous things in heaven and globe that these philosophers didn't dream about was this" (he waved his hand), "u.s., the modernistic globe. 'You can only exist contained of God while you lot've got youth and prosperity; independence won't take you safely to the end.' Well, we've now got youth and prosperity right upward to the end. What follows? Evidently, that we can exist independent of God. 'The religious sentiment will compensate us for all our losses.' But there aren't any losses for u.s. to compensate; religious sentiment is superfluous. And why should we go hunting for a substitute for youthful desires, when youthful desires never fail? A substitute for distractions, when we go on enjoying all the quondam fooleries to the very last? What need have we of serenity when our minds and bodies go along to delight in action? of alleviation, when nosotros accept soma? of something immovable, when there is the social order?" (17.20)

Mustapha's statement is incredibly relativistic—if God isn't needed by society, then God isn't in that location. He doesn't actually address the terrifying possibility that God is in that location—and really, really angry.

"No, I think at that place quite probably is [a God] […] "But he manifests himself in different means to different men. In premodern times he manifested himself as the being that's described in these books. At present…" […] "Well, he manifests himself as an absence; as though he weren't there at all." (17.22-6)

Ditto. (Encounter thought to a higher place.)

"…you know all nearly God, I suppose."

"Well…" The Savage hesitated. He would accept liked to say something about confinement, about night, about the mesa lying pale under the moon, most the precipice, the plunge into shadowy darkness, about expiry. He would have liked to speak; merely there were no words. Not even in Shakespeare. (17.2-3)

This is really the first time John is unable to wield Shakespeare as a weapon. Why? Could information technology be that God is the one thing he doesn't have a handle on? Maybe, merely consider this: John very much ties his spirituality to his solitude. An outcast since he was young, John found God in the times he was alone. For him, spirituality is intensely personal and alone. If he tin't talk about it, information technology may exist because it is simply not something that can be shared in words.

"Christianity without tears—that'south what soma is." (17.47)

This is a pretty explicit summation of what was previously subtle and nuanced. Mustapha said essentially the aforementioned thing—but with less obvious didacticism—in Affiliate 3.

"We are non our own whatsoever more than than what we possess is our ain. Nosotros did not make ourselves, we cannot be supreme over ourselves. Nosotros are not our own masters. We are God'southward property. Is information technology not our happiness thus to view the matter?" (17.20)

Mustapha holds this passage up as an interesting view into pre-Ford religious thought. In the context of the Globe State, nevertheless, it's rather articulate that the Globe Controllers have taken this sort of administrative function upon themselves.

John the Savage

The Savage interrupted him. "Merely isn't it natural to feel in that location's a God?"

"You might too enquire if it'southward natural to practice upwards ane's trousers with zippers," said the Controller sarcastically. […] Ane believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them. Finding bad reasons for what one believes for other bad reasons—that'due south philosophy. People believe in God considering they've been conditioned to." (17.29-thirty)

This is a nifty point—and it's passages like these that brand some scholars believe Brave New Globe is a critique of any sort of faith. Every bit readers, nosotros rebel confronting the notion of hypnopaedia because it seems to us like brainwashing; but from this point of view, religious doctrine isn't as well dissimilar.

"Do you retrieve that bit in Male monarch Lear?" said the Savage at last. "'The gods are merely and of our pleasant vices make instruments to plague us; the dark and vicious place where thee he got cost him his eyes,' and Edmund answers—you remember, he'southward wounded, he's dying—'Thou hast spoken correct; 'tis truthful. The bike has come full circumvolve; I am here.' What about that now? Doesn't there seem to be a God managing things, punishing, rewarding?"

"Well, does at that place?" questioned the Controller in his plow. "You tin can indulge in any number of pleasant vices […] and run no risks of having your eyes put out." (17.34-5)

Mustapha refuses to accept into account any formulation of divine justice or the afterlife. If in that location are no punishments during life, in Mustapha's mind at that place must exist no punishments at all.

"They say that it is the fear of decease and of what comes later death that makes men plow to religion as they advance in years. But my ain feel has given me the conviction that, quite apart from any such terrors or imaginings, the religious sentiment tends to develop every bit we grow older; to develop because, as the passions grow calm, as the fancy and sensibilities are less excited and less excitable, our reason becomes less troubled in its working, less obscured past the images, desires and distractions, in which information technology used to be absorbed; whereupon God emerges as from behind a cloud; our soul feels, sees, turns towards the source of all light; turns naturally and inevitably; […] Yes, we inevitably turn to God; for this religious sentiment is of its nature then pure, and then delightful to the soul that experiences it, that it makes upward to us for all our other losses." (17.20)

This would seem to be the way that John experiences religion; there are certain, key moments in the text where he obtains sudden resolve, where he claims sudden clarity or instantaneous revelation.

Chapter 18

When morning time came, he felt he had earned the right to inhabit the lighthouse; yet, even though there still was glass in most of the windows, even though the view from the platform was so fine. For the very reason why he had chosen the lighthouse had become virtually instantly a reason for going somewhere else. He had decided to live there because the view was and then beautiful, because, from his vantage point, he seemed to exist looking out on to the incarnation of a divine beingness. But who was he to be pampered with the daily and hourly sight of loveliness? Who was he to be living in the visible presence of God? All he deserved to live in was some filthy sty, some bullheaded hole in the ground. Stiff and nonetheless aching after his long night of pain, but for that very reason inwardly reassured, he climbed upwards to the platform of his belfry, he looked out over the bright sunrise world which he had regained the right to inhabit. (18.32)

John sees God in nature more than in any other place. His religion is a very personal and solitary internalization of the institutional behavior to which he's been exposed.

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