Fear releases evil in the heart of man. In William Golding's novel, Lord of the Flies, British schoolchildren become castaways on an uninhabited island. While the boys live on the island, rumors of a beast circulate, bringing the boys' inner ferocity to light. The boys' moral degradation becomes even more evident when they are compared to Simon, a pure soul who, despite suffering from epilepsy, climbs a dangerous mountain to discover the truth about the beast. Religious symbols, such as Simon, the Lord of the Flies, and the setting, show that when good and evil collide, fear and ignorance become dangerous enemies of reason. Simone emerges as a Christ figure who faces his fears and inner evil and, by doing so, becomes stronger spiritually than the rest of the boys. Despite his physical weakness, Simon displays tremendous personal courage and purity, qualities often associated with Jesus Christ. Like Jesus Christ, Simone offers himself from the beginning as a helper and helper, especially towards the younger children. Simone often leaves the others to go off alone after a hard day, although he often stops to help the little ones by “[finding] for them the fruit that [they cannot] reach, [plucking] the most beautiful from the foliage, [relaying] them to hands outstretched without end” (55), similar to Jesus feeding the hungry throughout the Bible. Simon's courage in the face of his own fear and evil nature leads him up the mountain to discover the truth about the beast. Before he can face the beast, however, Simon must face his fears and defeat the evil within him. He does so, denouncing the Lord of the Flies' authority, his inner evil, and labeling him only as a "pig's head on a stick" (147). After waking up, although he "[staggers] a little... in the center of the paper... a scene of beauty represents the place of meditation of Jesus. As such, its destruction ends all hope of reason on the 'island until the arrival of a ship whose naval officer rescues Ralph and appears in bright, shining white robes. This evokes the image of angels, the original warriors of Heaven who protect the righteous and punish the wicked Golding uses religious symbolism to illustrate his idea of humanity's inner evil and its connection to fear, particularly the links between biblical references and Simon, the Lord of the Flies and the Island of Fear. ignorance opposes sound logic and reasoning and causes the growth of evil within a population that Golding wants readers to understand their evil, so they can fight it and repress fear and ignorance evil exists in human hearts, and by facing it, a human being can preserve the true purity of the soul.
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