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Roles played by religion in a society
Roles played by religion in a society
An essay on symbolism of the veil
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Every human is a born sinner, none of us are perfect. We have been known to keep secrets due to fear of rejection or even fear of being criticized. A great example of this can be found in the story “The Ministers Black Veil” which is about a minister who wears this black veil symbolizing secret and him hiding behind the truth. Even the people we look up to can make mistakes and sin like everyone else. “This veil that Mr. Hooper was wearing represents that everyone has something in their hearts that no one else knows about.” As time passed by and the minister still was wearing the veil the townspeople began to become very uncomfortable whenever in his presence. The simple reason behind this is the veil begins to make the congregation fear
“Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” by Jonathan Edwards and “The Minister’s Black Veil” by Nathaniel Hawthorne are both 1700s Puritan works of literature with similarities, as well as differences, from their theme to tone and to what type of literary work they are. Edwards and Hawthorne are both expressing the topics of how people are all sinners, especially in regards to their congregation and that questions their congregation’s faith.
History has underrepresented females throughout countless centuries. In contrast, Hawthorne allows them to take on essential roles in “Young Goodman Brown,” “The Minister’s Black Veil,” “and “The Birthmark.” The way he presents them distinguishes his stories from others at his time. He proves all of his female characters almost flawless, deeply connects the male protagonists to them, and uses them to reveal the males’ hidden sides.
The townspeople in the Ministers Black Veil are the important for finding out the theme. First off they are appalled at Mr. Hooper and criticize him for wearing the black veil when he himself says “everyone wears a mask.” One important character in the story is Elizabeth she is Mr. Hooper’s girlfriend. She wants Mr. Hooper to take off the veil, but he refuses to do so and she leaves him. I think he doesn’t want to take off the veil, because he knows ...
The Minister's Black Veil begins with a young pastor, Mr. Hooper, arriving at church with an ugly black veil covering his face. The people are all dismayed, and wonder why he is wearing a black veil. They are further dismayed and confused, when he refuses to take it off--ever. There is only one person who is not horrified by his black veil--his wife-to-be, Elizabeth. She comes to him and says, "there is nothing terrible in this piece of crape, except that it hides a face which I am always glad to look upon. Come, good sir, let the sun shine from behind the cloud. First lay aside your black veil: then tell me why you put it on." (Heath 2143) Mr. Hooper smiles and replies, "There is an hour to come when all of us shall cast aside our veils. Take it not amiss, beloved friend, if I wear this piece of crape till then." (Heath 2143)
...one is moss-grown, and good Mr. Hooper’s face is dust; but awful is the thought, that it mouldered beneath the black veil” (1006). The message behind the black veil was meant to remain a secret, which Mr. Hooper never revealed with anyone, not even himself. It is possible to consider that Mr. Hooper felt the public did not deserve to know the truth because his society was too judgmental. They chose to spread lies and failed to respect one’s personal wishes. Perhaps the black veil’s meaning was misconstrued and it symbolically represented the ugliness his society placed upon himself. He chose to standout rather than blend in with the conventional social norms. The truth of the matter is Mr. Hooper considered himself normal, while he felt the towns’ people would not dare to step outside of their own religion and experience life in a different way.
Mr. Hooper, before the wearing of his veil, was a very likeable man in his community. His speeches were often given praise and he was on very amiable terms with his neighbors and townspeople. After Mr. Hooper starts wearing his veil, people do not treat him the same way. Elizabeth, who was happily engaged to him, is undergoing some second thoughts.
... Mr. Hooper and his wearing of the veil mirror the true nature of humans around him. Only when the true nature of life and the freedom of truth are observed can the veil be lifted.
The story “The Minister’s Black Veil” is symbolic of the hidden sins that we hide and separate ourselves from the ones we love most. In wearing the veil Hooper presents the isolation that everybody experiences when they are chained down by their own sins. He has realized that everybody symbolically can be found in the shadow of their own veil. By Hooper wearing this shroud across his face is only showing the dark side of people and the truth of human existence and nature.
He knows that everyone else should be wearing a black veil because they are all hiding their secret sin as well. Mr. Hooper feels that his secret sin is a very evil thing and he doesn't want anyone else to know about it. The people in his congregation don't understand why he has to cover his face like that and they treat him a lot differently now just because he has the veil over his face. Mr. Hooper doesn't understand why his people would treat him any differently because he hasn't changed at all as a person, he has just changed his appearance somewhat and people shouldn't judge one another on their appearance, they should be judged on their inward qualities. Mr. Hooper feels that he is doing what is good by shielding the world of his sin and part of the problem his congregation has is that they too have a secret sin and they don't want to own up to the fact that they do and admit it.
Hooper delivers his sermon, which is about how everyone has a secret sin that acts as a barrier between themselves and the others around them, with a black veil covering his face, “each member of the congregation, the most innocent girl, and the man of hardened breast, felt as if the preacher had crept upon them, behind his awful veil, and discovered their hoarded iniquity of deed or thought.” (106). The message of his sermon, paired with the veil, causes the townspeople to feel as if Mr. Hooper can see their individual secret sins and expose them to the public, which, in a Puritanical society, makes one vulnerable to public punishment or ostracism by the community. Due to their fears of having their Christian facades shattered and their subsequent sinful natures revealed, the townspeople alienate the minister. This reflects hypocrisy in the sense that their fears come from knowing they are essentially living double lives, which causes more hypocritical behavior to arise in the form of treating their minister in quite the opposite way one should treat a human being, especially one who serves the church in such a high position. Furthermore, on his deathbed, Mr. Hooper points out the townspeople’s hypocrisy when he exclaims, “Why do you tremble at me alone? Tremble also at each other. . . .I look around me, and, lo! on every visage a Black Veil!” (118). Through this exclamation, he is trying to urge the townspeople to reveal their secret sins and stop hiding under a
Kiara’s extensive work in the fashion industry has prepared her to design veils for the beautiful brides to be, with a touch of whimsy and dedication to the craft. Having worked in wholesale showrooms and as a corporate executive for a clothing manufacturing, she is venturing out on her own to bring her style to the public.
The main character in the story is Mr. Hooper. He is a minister trying to teach the people of his parish. He comes to mass on Sunday wearing a black veil over his face, and the parishioners begin to wonder. They begin to make conclusions as to why he is wearing the veil, but no one actually comes up to question him. He would give his sermons in the same style as usual, but with the veil on it seemed to have more of a powerful effect. “Such was the effect of this simple piece of crape that more than one woman of delicate nerves was forced to leave the meetinghouse” (Hawthorne, Minister’s 275). The subject of the sermon was about secret sin; how we hide from them from the ones we love most. We try to forget about them and move on with our lives, but we forget that God can see those sins (Hawthorne, Minister’s 275). That reason why Mr. Hooper wore the veil; so that people could realize that everyone wears a veil, and that we all are hiding behind it. But the people didn’t get it. They assumed that Hooper was trying to hide from his sins. Everyone in the village began to avoid him; children ran away from him if they saw him. All the resentment began to encumber Mr. Hooper; his fiancée even left him because he wouldn’t take the veil off. Mr. Hooper was on his deathbed when he finally revealed why he was wearing the veil, but even then he didn’t take the veil off. Mr. Hooper’s last words were, “Why
From the beginning of the story, Mr. Hooper comes out wearing a black veil, which represents sins that he cannot tell to anyone. Swathed about his forehead, and hanging down over his face, Mr. Hooper has on a black veil. Elizabeth urged, “Beloved and respected as you are, there may be whispers that you hid your face under the consciousness of secret sin” (Hawthorne 269). His fiancé says that in the black veil there may be has a consciousness of secret sin. Also, he is a parson in Milford meeting-house and a gentlemanly person, so without the veil, Hooper would be a just typical minister, “guilty of the typical sins of every human, but holier than most” (Boone par.7). He would be a typical minister who is guilty of the typical sins of every human without the black veil. Also, Boone said, “If he confesses his sin, the community can occur” (Boone par.16). If he confesses his sin about the black veil, all of the neighbors will hate him. Last, he said, “so, the veil is a saying: it is constantly signifying, constantly speaking to the people of the possibility of Hooper’s sin” (Boone par.11). Mr. Hooper’s veil says that he is trying to not tell the sins about the black veil. In conclusion, every people have sins that cannot tell to anyone like Mr. Hooper.
These words aptly put the reason for his veil and secrecy around the reason for donning a veil “But that piece of crape, to their imagination, seemed to hang down before his heart, the symbol of a fearful secret between him and them.” The veil makes him remote and distant and unapproachable so that people can no longer talk freely with him or ask him questions which are intrusive. so another purpose of the veil can be to keep people at arm’s length and avoid detection of the true sins of the Reverend. The question of the veil also shows the inherent wickedness in the Puritan society as the townspeople gossip about the reason for the veil and attributed it to dark reasons.They ignore The Reverend in happy times and call him only in times of need. Even though the Minister was always present for the townspeople they never return this favor and are unfair to him. Christianity preaches that only God can decide who is worthy of punishment and is actually a sinner but we can see the townspeople acting as judge,jury and executioner in this story. This shows the hypocrisy of a puritan society as they ostracize someone without any such evidence of a crime only based on assumptions. Reverand Hooper had never expressly accepted or denied committing any sin however this does not stop the townspeople from gossiping about it and believing him to be a sinner. They ironically engage in sins of backbiting and ridiculing a person and superior to the Reverend and judge him making them guilty of the sin of pride. The veil symbolises something dark and evil.It may be a symbol of the darkness inside a person’s own soul or of a viel that a person wears between himself and his Lord to hide his shame and guilt. The author shows the effect of the veil on the person in the words that“The black veil, though it covers only our pastor 's face, throws its influence over his whole
In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s, “The Minister’s Black Veil,” the story is told of the isolation of a man draped with a black veil over his face. At the beginning when the minister, Mr. Hooper, and his veil first appeared in church, it took only a few seconds for the townspeople to describe Hooper in censorious terms such as mad and awful. He was not asked any questions to explain himself. Rather, these people turned on him immediately and were convinced that the veil was hiding something. The veil being black symbolizes a sense of mystery and darkness in the minister. Hawthorne described how the veil was like that of a sinful secret between Hooper and the townspeople. This secret was never revealed, which only further alienated Hooper. Despite the astonishment others felt towards him, Mr. Hooper acted very casually and did not seem to notice the fear of the churchgoers. After the services, Hooper greeted the churchgoers as he usually would by paying respects to the elderly and putting his hand on children’s heads. These indiscreet actions in no way relieved the feelings toward Hooper. Hawthorne, though, stated that maybe the congregation was as fearful to Hooper as he was to them. Rega...