lord of the flies: simon as a christ figure

The character of Simon in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies has often been viewed as the Christ figure of the novel. If you were to examine the actions of both Simon and Jesus, you would find a number of incidents that parallel each other.

One of the first things that Simon does that depicts a Christ-like action, is found in chapter 3 when he helps the littluns get fruit, “Simon found for them the fruit they could not reach” (Golding 56). During his lifetime, Jesus often aided the hungry, one example being when he turned 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish into enough food for thousands of people. Later in the chapter Simon finds himself in the wilderness. While there, Simon was calm and enjoyed the solitude of his surroundings; “He came at last to a place where more sunshine fell” (Golding 56). Right after Jesus’ Baptism God spoke to him and “the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God decending like a dove, and lighting upon him” (Matthew 3:16). The light that Simon encountered can also be seen as God speaking to him, which can help to explain why Simon seems so serene in the wilderness.

In chapter five, the boys begin to discuss the existence of a beast on the island. When asked what he thought about it, Simon replied with “what I mean is... maybe it’s only us” (Golding 89). The idea that the evil was not something to be feared in the jungle, but to be feared within themselves was not received wel...