Frankenstein can been thought to be subversive in its religious proclivity, even when its hidden religious agenda was not clearly pointed out. The most common thought is that the novel was created as a side by side of Genesis, mocking the belief that there is a supreme Creator. But, A very different suggestion came from Leslie Tannenbaum in 1977 when he argued for the novel’s references to the book, Paradise Lost. This argument shows the Paradise Lost, works in a parallel with the book , Frankenstein, to show Victor Frankenstein’s many failures as a creator in a difference with Milton’s more perfect Creator. Tannenbaum’s opinion was apart of a larger assessment of the novel’s meaning performed in the 1970s, mainly by the feminist and the psychoanalytic critics, who believed that presented in the novel is a subtle but consistent protest battling the author’s father, William Godwin, and of her husband, Percy Shelley. This assessment looks at Victor Frankenstein as a combination of Godwin and Shelley, and the monster as a sympathetic and relatable representation of the author, the victim, to her home situation. The book is then looked at as inquiring how it is possible for a man like Frankenstein, Shelley or Godwin can be considered by other people and themselves to be the gracious contributors of their species and can with the strong morals and pure intentions, bring hurt and destruction to those people around them as the result of an experiment with human life.
Since the “Miltonic religion” and “Godwinian philosophy” show extreme mutually incompatible view points of the nature of humans, one is left to wonder of which thought process the novel’s intent is mainly geared towards. That Milton’s system is created to show the deficiency of Godwin’s leads you to believe one single answer; that the “Miltonic” belief is accepted by a homicidal lunatic proposes another answer. The religious debatability is only one side of a larger argument that has been presented from the opinions of the hidden meaning behind this novel. The devotion to Godwin of a book now largely seen as assimilating an uproar against Godwin’s type of radicalism implies, as U. C. Knoepflmacher has seen, the “conflicting emotions of allegiance and resentment” (p. 92) that always made a character of Mary Shelley’s relationship with her father. This conflict between the two is one way of counting for the opposing patterns found in the novel’s concept. By making a monster the component of the religious system that took a radical stand against her father’s views, she created an interesting way to express herself and question the “Godwinian order” without directly confirming the Christian alternatives, which leaves it’s true meaning in question. What I see in this novel is that the confused Christian faith of the Monster is used as a pawn by Mary Shelley to question Christianity and the ideas that her father and her husband had created as a alternate.
When a person starts to read Frankenstein to find is underlying religious meanings, what can be viewed is the absent role that the supernatural or higher powers play in the main plot of the story. Judith Wilt has made apparent the religious parallels found between the book and “God-haunted Gothic tradition” (p. 32), but by looking more closely at the underlying religious imagery, it begins to become apparent that it is just there for an extra flourish and has no substantial meaning towards the book itself. Neither the Devil or God play a role in the story of man’s sinfulness and corruptness, it is just man, making his own decisions and facing the consequences for those decisions. There is no answering to a higher power. The loss of the supernatural presence is not a surprising factor in a novel coming from the Mary Shelley. What is odd is that on the rare and small occasions when Christianity is seen in a glimpse, it is not hated on or looked down upon as someone would think it would be. It’s actually the opposite, Christianity is viewed in a positive, uplifting light. Possible worries pertaining to the book’s appeal would have helped along caution in religious editorializing, but it would not count for, let’s say, the pitying attitude towards of Justine Moritz’s Catholic beliefs, since in English Gothic fiction Popery was always open to talk about. The religious beliefs and piety of Justine’s beliefs, recorded without criticism by Frankenstein, are appealing enough to reverse the negative impressions put off by the priest who intimidated her with “disfellowship and brimstone” for continuing to withhold her purity. Her beliefs brings comfort and calming to “the saintly sufferer” (Victor’s phrase) as she waits for her execution, a calmness that is in extreme difference with Victor’s own crippling anxiety.
Though Victor’s personal religious beliefs are never explained or revealed, it is very apparent that he is not a Christian. M. Krempe makes a joking comment that Victor Frankenstein “believed in Cornelius Agrippa as firmly as in the gospel” (p. 68) this plays a part only to show us the emptiness of any other suggestion that he had faith in the gospel at all. In fact, although he talks about himself and Elizabeth as two children sent from heaven and for a moment exclaims “Great God!” — and although he tears apart the Christian taunting tradition to seek out terms of abuse with which to rebuke his creature, it becomes very apparent that early on, Victor is not a theist in any conventional sense. The revision made in 1831 allows him to take part in some short “metaphysical meditations” in the Ravine of Arve (Rieger, p. 248), where, just like Shelley, he finds a small glimpse of a higher power, but seen in the edition from 1818, and as a general rule in 1831, he shows a scientist’s interest in small different causes that led up to a reaction, over a philosopher’s concern for the more important and larger ones. At the same time tho, he is seen to have some sort of superstition, like his belief that a good and an evil were continuously trying to take over his agenda. (p. 45). The small amount of thought out metaphysics could be to blame in part for Victor’s carelessly irresponsible creation of a living somewhat human being without thinking of the consequences of his actions. In contrast, Victor’s monster, from the very beginning of his life, presents a strengthened metaphysical curiosity. He gives himself early on to a hard catechetical questioning: “Who was I? What was I? Whence did I come? What was my destination? These questions continually recurred, but I was unable to solve them” he says (p. 128). The answers he was looking for are found when he comes across the writings of, Paradise Lost. He thinks of the writings as a revelation or a “true history” as he likes to call it (p. 129), not just about the events that took place in the book of Genesis, but also the plan for redemption and even the evolution of the Christian doctrine as talked about in Michael’s prophecy to Adam in Book XII of Paradise Lost. Milton’s words give The Monster a set of religious beliefs and something to believe in.3 The Monster doesn’t just become a theist but what some would go as far as to call him a Christian, since he accepts the core beliefs of the Christian faith. The Monster had already heard the negative critiques and comments towards Christianity, before in the book, when he listened in as Felix DeLacey read and offered small explanations of Volney’s Ruins, which goes through and discusses in detail the Christian “crimes”(pg. 177-181). Then when the Monster has accepted the religion of Paradise Lost or Christianity, he’s doing it while already having heard all of the negatives and terrible things being said about it. He purposely loves the Miltonic world-view over the idea of modern day”philosophy,” which is what Mary Shelley has tried to connect him to.
Victor’s, Monster’s Christian beliefs and thoughts significantly effect how he is viewed. While Mary Shelley did not intend fo this to happen, the frame of reference coming from the Christian views, that she put the Monster into is what’s to blame for a lot of the audiences sympathetic and understanding response to him. His Christian beliefs make the reader relate to him more and feel more understanding towards his struggles. They are able to sympathize with him and his life more, being his beliefs cause him to be more human like. Milton’s Paradise Lost, gives the Monster values and a standard to be able to tell right from wrong, which he applies when scolding at his uncaring creator, reminding him many many times of his Christian duties of giving and kindness required for the less fortunate. It would not be thoughtlessly wrong to say that the Monster is a far better Christian than his creator was. The perfect standard of “benevolence” that Victor says is his main motivating principle and which is such a problem in its outcome compares to be less liked with the actual charity shown in the Monster’s humbled and anonymous services done for the DeLacey family. “Humble” is another Christian virtue that can be made into a justifiable claim for the Monster. With the Monster following the teachings of Paradise Lost, he seems to have learned a lesson or two about the man’s place in the orders and ways of things, that makes him unlikelier than Victor to fall to the sin of arrogance, or better known as, the sin of pride. The Monster’s humility can be seen the best in an attitude that was extremely characteristic of a Christian’s consciousness — a sense of sin. While the Monster’s Christian beliefs did not prevent him from becoming a criminal or a murderer, they do cause him to own up and acknowledge his own sins and wrong doings and the apparent sinful natures that have led to their solution. The Monster’s understanding and acceptance of moral responsibility is a very refreshing contrast when paired with Victor’s nearly unbreakable innocence. Frankenstein’s unwillingness to own up to any of his serious moral faults is one of the things that causes him seem less human like than his creation. When the Monster completes his actions out of rage and frustration, he acknowledges his wrong doings and his feelings of revenge to be wrong and “hellish.” Robert Walton calls him to be a “Hypocritical fiend!” but the Monster is not in the slightest any sort hypocrite. He openly confesses what he calls “the frightful catalogue of my sins” (pp. 220-21). But despite his eagerness and willingness to confess his sins and repent, there is no religious ending, and there can be no salvation for his. The oddest aspect of the Monster’s faith in Christianity is his realization that, although he can accept the Christian faith, the faith is somewhat irrelevant to him because nowhere in Paradise Lost can he find any similarities or parallel for his situation: “I often referred the several situations, as their similarity struck me, to my own. Like Adam, I was apparently united by no link to any other being in existence; but his state was far different from mine in every other respect. He had come forth from the hands of God a perfect creature, happy and prosperous, guarded by the special care of his Creator; he was allowed to converse with and acquire knowledge from beings of a superior nature, but I was wretched, helpless, and alone.” (p. 129).
And when he learns from the reading of Victor’s notebooks how he was created, the contrast becomes even more painful for him. He says to Victor: “God, in pity, made man beautiful and alluring, after his own image; but my form is a filthy type of yours, more horrid even from the very resemblance. Satan had his companions, fellow devils, to admire and encourage him, but I am solitary and abhorred.” (p. 130).
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