“What art thou Faustus, but a man condemned to die” is a quote that summarizes Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus (Marlowe). Doctor Faustus is very different compared to the other plays that were made during the same time period. Seen as a didactic play, it has a level of religion to it. Most didactic novels during this time period were focused toward pleasing God, but Marlowe flips this whole agenda because the main character, Faustus, reverts his Christianity and joins the anti-religion which followed the devil for the purpose of getting magic (Snyder). Faustus is regarded as a religious tragic hero because he realizes he made the mistake of joining the anti-religion, attempts repentance, but pays the price for joining with damnation.
Act 1 starts the story off with the beginning of Faustus’ journey to religious hero status. Faustus is unhappy with his life. He wants more out of life, and by more, he means magic. He practices medicine, but is selfish and moving towards an inevitable death. From the beginning, Faustus’ attitude is very arrogant, and his attitude attributes to his downfall because he believes that he can fix all his problems himself. (Ornstein). Here we also meet the Good and Bad Angels who mess with Faustus’ mind when it comes to making decisions. His two earthly guides, Valdez and Cornelius, are there to begin his journey into the dark world. Doctor Faustus’ choice to pursue black magic is the beginning of the main plot of the story. This choice to pursue black magic is the choice that ruins his life, and leads to moments of dread and despair during the course of the story. Also during Act 1, we see the summoning of Mephostophilis, who becomes Faustus’ spiritual guide. Faustus is given 24 years of added life full of fame and fortune with Mephostophilis as his guide, in exchange for giving his soul up to the devil.
Towards the end of Act 1, we see Faustus begin to have doubt about crossing over into the anti-religion. Faustus’ doubts are normal. He is making a huge decision making a switch. He has to make the decision of continuing following God and being unhappy and join this new religion and have a better earthly life. He bases his decision off scripture and begins to believe that God does not love him and signs the contract, as well as Mephostophilis using devils to distract him about the thought of not signing the contract. Mephostophilis knows instantly that he would have problems with Doctor Faustus attempting to straying away from the religion, and works to keep Faustus distracted from repentance. Before Faustus can become a full member of the church, he has to go through tests. The tests are to help remove his doubts about joining the church. He gives blood to give back the soul that Christ took when he died on cross. After the sacrament, we see the beginning of Faustus’ despair. He also speaks with Mephostophilis about heaven and gives more insight about this anti religion. They believe that the true saints are tempted by Earth, not heaven. However, Faustus still wants to go to heaven, which is unusual since he just took a sacrament to an anti religion. However, he believes that he can turn away from evil by his own ways. He isn’t humble enough to ask for forgiveness from God. Fautus not being humble hurts him because it sinks him farther into the pit of no return. His many opportunities of repentance diminish as he continues to not revert back. Faustus also goes through a change. He has a human soul, but takes on the appearance of a spirit. This change can be a comparison to Christ, who was human and divine (Snyder). His transformation changes him to a satire of a man who doesn’t have his own soul, and is not fully free. He is bound to his immortality until his 24 years are over (Snyder).
Act 2 is the start of Faustus’ unhappiness with his decision. He curses out the devil and falls into a despair. The Good and Bad Angels both attempt to persuade him to either repent or not, but he doesn’t. Also in Act 2, he begins to have a view of a God being evil as well as loving. However, this is not unusual. Since Faustus has become ashamed to face God because of his sin, his mind is confused and ill. He has conflicting ideas swirling around in his mind, and is confused on what he should do. He realizes God is a spirit, and that God is all powerful and cannot be tricked by a man like himself. (Snyder). During the story, Faustus tries to repent and is caught by Lucifer, and then vows to “never look to heaven”. Faustus is gifted the vision of the seven deadly sins in order to further sway Faustus from the idea of repentance (Snyder). In didatic stories, the protagonist usually calls upon God when they feel helpless, and in Act 2, he starts feeling helpless. However, Lucifer is Faustus’ new “god” and he tries to compare his powers to God, and Faustus cannot see that even with the powers Lucifer contains, he cannot beat God.
Act 3 entails the morality feast. People usually believe that this story is, of course, a tragedy. However, they also believe it is a play about morality, and it is mainly because of Act 3 (Snyder). Faustus becomes wrapped up in the antics of sin, and participates in damaging activities. Here, he is just falling deeper into the sin he wants to repent against because he allows Mephostophilis to get the best of him. His intent was to view the wonders of Rome, but winds up participating in activities that don’t fit the character we grew to know. They tormented the Pope and other religious leaders. Of course, Mephostophilis would want to do this because the Pope is the head of a religion that he doesn’t agree with. Also in Act 3, Faustus somewhat realizes that the magic he wanted is not what he received. The black magic is fraud because it is full of trickery and not what he expected. He wanted prophesy and to have control over astrological and earthly elements (Theology). Faustus becomes indifferent about this anti-religion, but still cannot bring himself to repent because of his inability to be humble.
Act 4 is not a very significant chapter in showing his journey to a religious tragic hero. Here in this act, Faustus simply realizes his time is winding down. However, in the final section of Act 5 is finally where resolution happens. At the beginning, Faustus knows his time is coming. He even creates his will. During this time, we also meet Helen of Troy. Helen is basically the woman version of him. She represents an inverted view of wisdom. He needs her to fulfill his mortal desires, even though she is a demon (Nature). Then the Old Man enters, and changes the course of the plot. When the Old Man comes, he gives awareness to Faustus of his sin. The Old Man is very convincing to the point that Mephostophilis wants Faustus to commit suicide so that he does not repent. However, the Old Man stops him from committing suicide (Snyder). The Old Man is who Faustus really wants to be like. He wants to be a faithful servant of God, but he allows for deception to take him over. Faustus chooses Helen over his salvation, and orders for the Old Man to be tormented, but the Old Man is not disturbed because the devils cannot hurt him since he is of God. Faustus knows that God gives mercy, but feels like his sin is too great to repent. This is why he has it out for the Old Man because he knows he is faithful to Christ (Why Devils Came). Faustus reflects on the outcomes of his sinfulness, but becomes hopeless. He attempts again to repent, but is stopped by Mephostophilis who reminds him of the contract he made and to stop him from repenting, and Faustus obeys. On the last night of Faustus’ life, he is urged to repent by scholars, but does not because he feels as if he is too far in sin, and his repentance would not be accepted. At the end of the play, we see a mixture of morality, tragedy, and the inverted saint merge into one. Faustus knows he has little time left, and tried to find a way to not go to his fate. Here we see him finally seeing a chance at redemption. However, he has no hope which would be necessary for redemption from God. He now has to face his fate (Snyder). Faustus is killed off by devils, and during his death, he finally comes to the realization that he should have repented. This is when he achieves the status of a religious tragic hero because he dies, but died with a wanting to be changed back to Christianity. Faustus’ death is when his intellect is closed. He never wanted the truth and takes away his self-knowledge (Theology).
In retrospect, Faustus is a religious tragic hero because of his inability to be humble. First, he realizes that he sinned when he joined the anti-religion. When he realize this mistake, he falls into a state of despair. His mistake was when he rejected the faith of Christ. He becomes an unbeliever and falls into the hands of the devil. His attempts at repentance were always a failure because of his doubt, and he falls deeper into sin. He always wanted to be reverted back, but became doubtful and usually distracted by devils. Faustus only is a spirit temporarily, so he has room to repent (Why Devils Came). However, he pays the price for not repenting through damnation to Hell. His death gives peace in a way. He finally gets what he deeply wanted, which was to be free from the bounds of man. He is not peaceful because he does not repent, and will spend eternity in Hell. Faustus is a religious tragic hero out of pity. He was never confident enough to repent, which led to eternal damnation.