Transcendentalism In Moby Dick

Through his novel Moby Dick, it is obvious that during his life Herman Melville experienced conflicts in his religious beliefs, an understandable outcome stemming from the intellectual background of the nineteenth century. There existed during Melville’s time, a contradiction between the Calvinist theory of predestination, with its idea of inborn immorality and original sin, and Ralph Waldo Emerson’s concept of Transcendentalism, which emphasized the idea of inherent goodness and self-reliance. Critics have long debated Melville’s shared beliefs with Emerson and Transcendentalism and his faithfulness to the Calvinist religion. Moby Dick reflects the conflict between Calvinism and Transcendentalism as, through the characters and the biblical
references, Melville points out the incongruity in and harshly criticizes both the religion and the philosophy in order to portray his own religious confusions.
The archetypal name for the narrator is noteworthy as Melville intentionally from the first line, “Call me Ishmael” (18), casts a religious atmosphere on the narrative.
Ishmael, the narrator of the novel, is named after the biblical Ishmael who is the wrongly disinherited son of Abraham and Hagar (18). Both the biblical character and the narrator are portrayed as spiritual wanderers and outcasts. Ishmael tells his audience, “Whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the streets, and methodically knocking people’s hats off – then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball” (18). Ishmael admits he finds life on shore grim. Throughout Moby Dick there is “a symbolic opposition of land and sea, according to which the land stands for safety, security, conformity, orthodoxy, and so on, while the sea stands for the hidden, the secret, the half-known world where the other side of reality is shown and where alone one may find the full truth” (qtd. Romero). The sea is symbolically the realm of the Transcendentalist whereas the land seems to symbolize the realm of Calvinism. Melville, through saying that Ishmael felt a sense of doom on land where religious conformity was rampant, seems to be making a
bold statement about the constricting quality of Calvinism.
Calvinism held the view that man had to sin before he could be redeemed by God in order to attain spiritual insight. As the biblical Jonah escapes to sea to flee from God, it seems the parallel is made to Ishmael as he escapes to sea as well, as if fleeing from spiritual subservience. Ishmael, a religious man, seems to be strongly impressed by Father Mapple’s sermon, but right after decides to involve himself with the pagan ritual of worshiping an idol with Queequeg, a sinful harpooner. Ishmael’s vacillating religious beliefs between Father Mapple’s Calvinist doctrine and Queequeg’s idol worship seems to reflect the same uncertainty of Melville himself. Ishmael’s doubts are explicit when he, echoing the opinions of Melville, says, “Heaven have mercy on us all – Presbyterians and pagans alike – for we are all somehow dreadfully cracked about the head, and sadly need mending” (Melville 79). Despite his seemingly sinful nature, Ishmael is the only one who survives the quest even though there are much more devout sailors on board the Pequod. Melville seems to be making the point that event passionate piety to Calvinism will not always provide certain salvation. In the end, Ishmael doesn’t seem to be redeemed by God to gain spiritual insight; instead, he is saved by his pagan friend Queequeg’s coffin, an ironic attack on Calvinism by Melville.
Ishmael’s recollection of Father Mapple’s sermon of Jonah and the Whale helps to create an atmosphere of religious fear in the novel. The sermon foreshadows the tragic fate of Ahab and his crew who will eventually be annihilated by Moby Dick during their doomed quest. Father Mapple’s sermon argues that “if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in this disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists” (51), which validates Ahab’s deserving the punishment as he willfully, and almost too stubbornly, follows his desires and therefore, has disobeyed God. Melville also deliberately portrays Ahab in a satanic image as Melville describes him as being “nominally included in the census of Chrstendom, he was still alien to it” (126). Ahab’s namesake was the evil king, husband to Jezebel, who built shrines to pagan gods and disobeyed the Christian God’s prophets. As the king of Israel, he led his men into a fated battle and was killed along with his followers (78). This idea of Ahab deserving the punishment conforms to the Calvinistic theory of predestination but not to the free will of Transcendentalism.
However, Calvinists also believed in limited atonement, that Jesus only died for the elect and there is the preservation of salvation, once elected always elected no matter the circumstances. Yet, through tales told by fellow sailors of Ahab’s past life, he seems to have been one of the “elect” before the white whale took his leg as. Captain Ahab seems to have experienced a Christ-like resurrection, something that God must have willed, according to the Calvinistic theory of predestination. Elijah “the prophet” recalls “that thing that happened to [Ahab] off Cape horn, long ago, when he lay like dead for three days and nights” (87). Nevertheless, after his resurrection, Ahab becomes overwhelmed with the idea of revenge and pursues the whale, disobeying God and, in the end, is punished by God although he was seemingly one of the “elect”. This is a contradiction of the Calvinist doctrine, which Melville emphasizes. It seems that God desired Ahab to be brought back to life, following the Calvinist idea of predestination, but later disowns him as one of the “elect,” which goes against the Calvinist idea of preservation of salvation.
Melville clearly seems to attack the idea of the Calvinistic God through the relationship between Ahab and the whale. The white whale acts as a symbol of the God of Calvinism as the whale “did in the end incorporate with…half formed foetal suggestion of supernatural agencies” and is somehow gifted with “ubiquity” and “immortality” (153). The whale also exhibits an “infernal aforethought of ferocity that every dismembering or death that he caused was not wholly regarded as having been inflicted by an unintelligent agent” (153). The whale represents a malicious God of the Calvinist doctrine who “according to an infernal aforethought of ferocity: created the race of men in order to destroy the greater part of them, and as a means of doing so decreed the fall of Adam” (Herbert 1615). Melville argues that the Calvinistic God shows a subtle demonic side by damning the sinful in a cruel manner. Again the whale represents this as in the climax “the White Whale swam before [Ahab] as the monomaniac incarnation of all those malicious agencies which some deep men feel eating in them…That intangible malignity which has been from the beginning; to whose dominion even the modern Christians ascribe one half of the worlds… All that most maddens and torments; … all the subtle demonisms of life and though; all evil, to crazy Ahab, were visibly personified, and made practically assailable in Moby Dick” (Melville 155). The white whale, representing an angry God, shows a great hate and vengeful spirit of its own, but God punishes Ahab for his rage and vengeful spirit. Melville points out the hypocritical aspect of the Calvinistic God. At the same time, Melville conveys the dangers of Christian monomania. With the idea that Moby Dick represents the Calvinist God, Ahab has an exaggerated obsession with hunting it down, or finding salvation. This obsession ultimately leads to Ahab’s disgrace, which alludes to Melville’s association of Christian monomania with the downfall of devout Calvinists.
In addition, the fate of Captain Ahab demonstrates the consequences of Transcendentalism when it is taken too literally. His sinful character is the result of an excessively blind application of Transcendentalist ideas to his own urges and inclinations. Transcendentalist say that religious experience is within oneself and therefore, one should benefit from solitude. However, Ahab clearly does not benefit form this solitude as his isolation at sea is what continues to drive him mad with revenge. Transcendentalists also say that there is only good in the world and that since God has created everything in the world, everything must be moral. Yet, both Ahab and the white whale does not represent this ideal, and instead, Ahab follows the idea of anti-Transcendentalism that man has the power to choose between being moral and immoral, and Ahab seems to undoubtedly choose the immoral path that leads t his destruction. Melville creates Ahab character in order to embody the incongruities of both Calvinism and transcendentalism.
In contrast to Captain Ahab, Bulkington, though seemingly a minor character, seems to be the idealized, self-reliant Transcendentalist dedicated to the solitary search for truth.
Ahab is considered “Emerson’s transcendental philosopher turned satanic” (qtd Mahmoudi 155) while Bulkington is portrayed as a formidably strong man who prefers the open sea over the land, solitude over companionship, and intellectual freedom over dogma. Through Bulkington’s character, Melville concludes that it is possible to engage in a harmless Transcendentalist quest for free thought. When Bulkington is first introduced in the chapter titled “The Spouter Inn,” he said to be someone who “held somewhat aloof” (Melville 29), already portrayed as someone who is self-reliant. As stated previously, throughout Moby Dick there is the “symbolic opposition of land and sea” (qtd Romero), that the sea is symbolically the realm of the Transcendentalist, which Bulkington is constantly drawn towards. Bulkington epitomizes the Transcendentalist as he shuns conformity, security, and orthodoxy for the desire to gain knowledge and explore the unknown. Although Bulkington is also fated to die at sea with the crew of the Pequod, Ishmael considers his death much more noble, as it is during the search to find the full truth, and declare that the sea will transform Bulkington into a god, as he will be the god over himself obtaining ultimate self-reliance (Melville
97).
Moby Dick develops several points of contention between Calvinism and Transcendentalism, which Melville explores in order to portray his own internal conflict with the two. Melville examines both the Calvinist theories and Transcendentalist ideas through the characters and the biblical references in the novel. Throughout the novel, Melville points out the contradictory ideas in and harshly criticizes the theories of both. Ishmael portrays Melville’s contention with the religious subservience and uncertain salvation of Calvinism, Captain Ahab represents the contradictory and hypocritical nature of the Calvinist doctrine, and even Bulkington challenges the idea of extreme Transcendentalism. Ultimately, Melville seems to argue that both Calvinism and Transcendentalism provide beneficial elements only in moderation and extremity could lead to the destruction of one’s self.