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Running head: HEROES AND ZEROES
Nguyen 1
Heroes and Zeroes
Yen Nguyen Dang Hai
Troy University
Heroes and Zeroes
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HEROES AND ZEROES
1. The Book of job
The story in the book of Job goes down in the land of UZ. The narration is set in a
patriarchal era before the Israelites were led into Canaan, the Promised Land by Joshua and
Moses. The center theme of the story is nothing less than human beings suffering despite their
loyalty to their creator (Jang 302). The narration pulses with spiritual insight and moral energy
and outrage of the Christianity religion. “The Book of Job” have been rendered from the bible
into English literature works by eminent translators and scholars such as Stephen Mitchell.
Characters
The main characters in the narration consist of Job, his wife, his three friends, and a man
called Elihu. The story also depicts various supernatural characters namely, God, Satan, and
angels who are also significant characters in the story. The characterization of supernatural
characters in the story depicts the power that they possess which goes beyond human capability.
The minor characters in this story include but not limited to; Elihu- the Temanite, Bildad-the
Shuhite, and Zophar- the Naamathite (Hesselgrave). These minor characters play a very
significant role in developing the main characters of the story. They possess questions which
enable us to have an inner understanding of the main characters.
The main characters depict two opposing sides, the antagonists, and protagonists.
Protagonists are those characters who that align their behaviors to the moral social expectation or
even go beyond our expectation. In the other hand, antagonist’s characters are those who opposes
other characters in spite of the characters doing the right thing. I believe that in most scenarios,
the protagonist’s characters always emerge to be heroes while the antagonist characters add up to
zero.
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The hero in the narration
Job goes through a lot of suffering but turns to be the hero at the end of the day. From the
beginning, he holds onto his faith in his supreme creator despite all the storms that come in his
way with the objective of trying to shake his trust in God. I wonder if there is anyone else who
can stand even a bit of the challenges that job went through and still hold on to his/her faith. The
trials of Job’s faith began when the grounds men told him that he had lost all his possession to
rare catastrophes. Contrary to our expectation, Job replied by saying, “The Lord gives, the Lord
takes way” (Hesselgrave 124)This is a clear illustration of how strong his with was towards God
into an extent that bankruptcy was not a worry to him as long as his relation with God remained.
On top of that, he came down with a contagious disease which caused her a lot of trouble.
Do not forget that he had already lost his children and his wife was no longer on his side. By
summing up all this physical and emotional suffering, you realize the extent to which Job’s faith
was being tested. According to job, when all is gone, he believed that his hope and trust remains
unshaken. I don’t see how many of us would still hold on to their faith after being homeless,
starved, diseased, and sick.
The best part of Job’s heroism is undoubtedly illustrated when he made the right choice
even after his friends asked him to change his faith and possibly look for an alternative. “To
make the matter worse, his own wife asks him if he still holds on to his faith in God” (Denton
45). I can’t imagine any of us defiling our friends and companion’s opinions so as to continue
doing what we believe is right. Job put’s his faith beyond other things that may matter to us, such
as friend’s opinions and property. He doesn’t allow even the thoughts of her wife compromise on
his faith in God, a supernatural character who is not even scientifically proved to be existing.
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Through all this suffering, Job does not allow anything to compromise on his faith in
God. He stands on his hope until the tides of suffering come to an end. This is probably one of
the greatest heroes that I have ever read about. Outstanding in every aspect. I can’t image any of
us going through slightly similar circumstances and continue upholding the same faith in
someone who we can’t scientifically prove that exists or has power over us. Some of us would
even go to the extent of wishing for an instant death rather than going through such suffering.
We can evidently conclude that Job is a hero as depicted by the narration. It is the
consequences of Job choices which makes him a hero to be emulated. He made the right choices,
making him to be blames, devoted, and moral. He simply didn’t let it go when all odds were
against his hope in God. He is full of patience, humility, selfless and all the characters that we
expect to be bestowed by a hero. He was a truly heroic leader who continuous to inspire
Christians in their faith on God.
2. The Gilgamesh story
Plot of the story
The epic in the narration offers an overview introduction of Gilgamesh, a great king of
Uruk. This is probably the oldest narration that exists today. The story is set from an ancient
Sumerian society on the adventures of the historic kings who were depicted as the society heroes
(Haubold). The story is set in a male chauvinism society where women are considered and used
as pressure objects. Despite the literature being as old as it is, the development of the characters
in this work is beyond what we could probably expect from such an ancient work. The hero in
this literature work has become a minor profile of the popular culture in the world.
Characters
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The characters in this literature work can be categorized into two groups, the main and
the minor characters. There two main characters namely, Gilgamesh and Enkidu, as opposed to
other literature works, these two main characters do not seem to oppose each other in the
occurrence of events but become what is termed by the author as “soul mates”. The minor
characters are mainly dominated by the society gods who strive in developing the major
characters. These gods impact a lot of power and influence on who the two main characters grow
to become. Among other minor characters includes but not limited to the trapper, harlot, and the
people in the community.
Among the two main characters, I am going to depict and evaluate the extent to which
Enkidu was a hero in the society. According to the narrative,
“Enkidu was created to replace Gilgamesh who seemed to have failed to meet the gods’
standards. Gilgamesh was created in a supernatural way with the aim of preparing him to
be the hero who would restore the holy places which had previously been destroyed.
However, his arrogance grew boundless and the gods decided to create Enkidu in order to
replace Gilgamesh who seemed to be falling short of the gods’ expectations and favor as
a result of his pride and immoral practices”( Haubold 669).
With the creation of Enkidu, the gods thought that he could be the hero of the land
considering his physique abilities. The possibility of profiling him as a hero is first reflected by
his kindness as he protects the shepherds and their cattle when they are asleep. His humble
background can also allure us to thinking that he is an upcoming hero. At this extent, some of the
questions that lingers in our mind are, how long will he continue acting towards the society
expectations? Will he withstand the various storms he is likely to face? What will be the
consequences of his actions?
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In spite of a promising start, our expected hero instantly falls with the first temptation as
he allows himself to be seduced by a harlot. This marks the beginning of out doubt on the
heroism of Enkidu. “The Trapper was successful in setting up a snare on Enkidu who terribly
falls into the temptation by engaging into a week-long sexual initiation” (Haubold 554). This
goes against the social expectations towards the expected leader to whom the gods had high
hopes in for the delivering of the entire community. He is initiated to the good and evil of the
world and he makes poor choices in following the evil ways.
Enkidu accompanies Gilgamesh into a thriving journey to Lebanon. According to the
story, “Gilgamesh is disturbed by a series of prophetic dreams which Enkidu inaccurately and
naively interpreted as good omens” (Kline). The turn of events illustrates the impact of Enkidu
ignorance while interpreting the dreams. His naivety results into various devastating
repercussions which he could have avoided by giving the right interpretation to Gilgamesh. This
is a clear illustration of how careless Enkidu was and do not deserve to be called a hero at any
cost.
When the two enter the cedar forest, Enkidu bits of advices Gilgamesh to show no mercy
to the Humbaba who consistently plead for his life. The two brutally slay him and cut down the
mighty cedar trees which he had protected with his life over down the Euphrates civilization.
Enkidu goes to the extent of insulting the goddess by killing the “Bull of Heaven”. Ironically,
the people of Uruk goes on to celebrate the masculine capability and courage of their “hero”.
Finally, Enkidu who was depicted at the beginning to be a hero lies dying as a “zero
leader.” His immoral deeds and wrong bits of advice to the king are paid with an illness inflicted
by the gods (Kline 36). Like most of the men, Enkidu dies having achieved nothing but hatred
from the gods and the people as a result of his immoral deeds. It’s undoubtedly clear that Enkidu
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totally falls short of all hero’s characters that one must bestow before he can be termed as a real
hero in the society.
Comparison of Job and Enkidu characters.
The behaviors of the two characters are very diverse, a clear illustration of why one is a
hero while the other one sums up to zero at the end of each narrative. Job respect and trust his
God despite the tests that he comes across. This is contrary different with Enkidu who makes
wrong decisions all through the entire narrative and end up defiling the gods. It’s the
consequences of choices which makes the difference between the two characters, Job makes the
right choice and emerge to be the hero at the end but Enkidu failed to make the right decision
and ended up to being a “zero character”. The two characters had the opportunity to change their
destiny in order to emerge as heroes at the end. Job embraced the opportunity by pleasing God
and he finally came out as a hero whom the people were proud of. Enkidu didn’t seize his
opportunities from the day start, no wonder he finally died as a normal or a zero character.
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References
Denton, Allison. “Suffering in the Human Experience.” An Examination of the Book of Job and
King Lear (2016): 45-64. Vol. 2.
Haubold, Johannes. “Gilgamesh among Us: Modern Encounters with the Ancient Epic by
Theodore Ziolkowski (review).” American Journal of Philology (2014): 669-672. 135.4 .
Hesselgrave, Ronald P. I Know that My Redeemer Lives: Suffering and Redemption in the Book
of Job. Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2016.
Jang, J. E. “Developmental Mourning Process in Jobs Suffering.” Psychoanalytic Reading of the
Book of Job (2014): 302-331.
Kline, J. ” The Oldest Story, the Oldest Fear, the Oldest Fool: The Religious Dimension of The
Epic of Gilgamesh.” Jung Journal (2016): 10(2), 24-36.
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