My Religion is…Imposed?!The Dream of the Rood is an Anglo-Saxon poem that deals with the issue of converting people to Christianity by using Anglo-Saxon values and traditions to appeal to them; however, all these ideals were actually used to mask the Catholic Church imposition over others. The Catholic Church began converting people to Christianity after the fall of the Roman Empire; they sent preachers to Anglo-Saxons kings in order to spread Christian beliefs. In this poem, even though certain characteristics do coincide with the purpose of appealing Anglo-Saxons, the Church also makes use of those characteristics but to impose values and to make clear its status of superiority.
To begin with, Christian values were imposed through threatening menaces. Throughout the poem, there are constant references to the evil that men do and the consequences they may have due to their actions. For instance, the speaker described himself as a sinner in order to emphasize this idea that men, in this case the Anglo-Saxons, needed to be corrected and purified (this sounds like imposition). Moreover, when the rood was addressing the speaker, it menaced the human race with the final judgment; in other words, if they did not accept the Church ideals, easy, the Church would menace them with this idea of a judgment in which God himself would come down to punish each one of them directly. That is to say, if people did not change or became Christians, they would not be saved and enjoy the life after death this religion offered; as the same speaker says to himself: “And I wait each day / For when the cross of God … may fetch me from / This transitory life and carry me / To where there is great bliss and joy in heaven.” Briefly, the Church was giving a clear message: unless people convert, they would be doomed and would not enjoy the “benefits” of being Christians. However, this triggers another question, did Anglo-Saxons at the end became Christians because they believed in all those new ideas or because of convenience?
In addition, in this poem it is clear the abuse of power from the Church. As previously mentioned, people were intimidated by the Church’s menaces. However, those menaces came along with allusions to the power the Church had. For instance, Jesus is constantly referred to as a warrior; an enemy that if people did not become allies with, would punish them. Besides, the rood makes allusion to the power it has, but does not dare to use because that is God's will: “I durst not against God's word … Although I might / Have struck down all the foes, yet stood I fast.” Succinctly, the Church clearly states that they have a great amount of power that can be used at any time against people who oppose them…but clearly, who would oppose an institution that among their warriors has a rood who has so much power that God himself does not allow it to use? As mentioned, Anglo-Saxons were warriors, of course they would not fight someone or something they were aware was superior to them…again, imposition, abuse of power?
Finally, related to this idea of power is the fact that in the poem there is a clear reference to the Church’s interest in wealth, which corresponds to what is later seen during the Middle Ages. Throughout the poem there are several allusions to wealth and material valuable objects: Gold, metals, jewels, treasures, tokens, etc. These valuable objects were property of the Church, and even though they might have been appealing to Anglo-Saxons because they were also interested in these types of objects, those same objects were used as a means of control and to manifest the superiority this institution had (during the Middle Ages, the Church began to have a lot of economic power because they traded “salvation” for wealth). In other words, the same threatening ideas that appear in this poem are the ones that later on the Church used in order to manipulate and control people and to increase their economic power.
In brief, this poem can not only be interpreted as a didactic construction to convert people to Christianity; it can also bee seen as a poem that foreshadows the abuses that would appear in further periods of history, and that caused the separation of people from the Church and the increase of the demoralization of the English society due to all the abuses that were eventually denounced.
By Juan Manuel Rodríguez
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