Analysis Of Inherit The Wind By Jerome Lawrence And Robert E. Lee

Karl Marx once said, “Religion is the opiate of the people.” The play Inherit the Wind written by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, helps us as readers expose and learn from problems in our society. This play teaches us that arrogance of your religion could lead to your own demise, and the addiction to your religion could cloud your mind, as well as that these sort of religious problems are still prevalent in our society. Becoming arrogant about one’s personal opinions and beliefs can be destructive to the human nature of our society.
Arrogance in one’s own religion can be detrimental to societies as well as yourself. Arrogance can be seen explicitly from Mr. Brady as he is first introduced to the people of Hillsboro, saying “I am here to defend that is most precious in our hearts of all of us: The Living Truths of the Scriptures!” pg. 20. This scene Mr. Brady is addressing the crowd and from the beginning trying to win them over with his first impression and speech. The town of Hillsboro is already a town in which the people agree that they, as readers of the Bible, should take everything literally.
After Mr. Brady’s speech, his arrogance about him can later be seen in all of townspeople of Hillsboro. Like the townspeople’s minds becoming washed by Mr. Brady, some of these ideas are in a similar way in our society.
Arrogance begins to cloud your mind and take control of how you think and act.
This idea can be explicitly seen when Drummond asks, “How can they pass judgment on it if they don’t know what it’s all about?” pg. 81. Drummond accuses the jury of people, all of which are from Hillsboro, hearing the case of being ignorant towards the fact they do not know anything about Darwin’s theory of evolution. He doesn’t think that the trial will be fair because the people hearing the case are uneducated about one of the subjects of the case. In Karl Marx’s quote, mentioned above, he states that religion can become an addiction and take control of you. This is exactly what happens to the people of Hillsboro as they are involved with this case in their town. The people of Hillsboro are so short sighted and can only see the world and this particular case from their own
perception.
The problems of arrogance of religions, beliefs, and other personal issues are still predominant in our society today and as they were thousands of years ago. The stage directions at the very beginning of the play state, “Time: Not too long ago.” The authors convey the message that since the setting is “not too long ago”, this particular conflict is and always will prominent in our society. We have seen these particular conflicts thousands of years ago with the Crusades, in which it was a highly religious motive to start the wars. We can also see these conflicts today in the Arab and Israeli conflicts that are going on at this present time in which they are fighting over control of some pieces of land that hold very important religious purposes. The authors use these two conflicting views in order to give the readers something to relate to when reading this play.
Becoming arrogant begins to influence the ways in which you think about different views and opinions and it shuts you off from things with other importance. This play can help us learn from problems within our own society. Karl Marx said it best when he said, “Religion is the opiate of the people.”