William Blake was an English poet born in 1757 in London. He wrote poetry that incorporated religious themes and imagery. His collections "Songs of Innocence" portrayed religion and childhood in a positive light, while "Songs of Experience" presented the bitter realities of life. Though Blake criticized the church of his time, religion remained central to his work. He believed that divine qualities exist within all people and that finding one's personal God was important. Blake used religious symbols and imagery in unique ways to convey moral lessons throughout his poetry, making him an influential religious poet.

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Assignment #1
Submitted to: Sir Ghulam Abbas
Submitted by: Mahnoor Shabbir
Subject: Romantic & Modern Poetry
Topic: Blake as A Religious Poet
Class: M.A (English)
Semester: 4th

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William Blake as A Religious Poet:
William Blake was an English poet, painter and paint maker. He was born on 25th Nov 1757 in
London. He was the baptized son of James Blake and Catherine. Blake was not even twelve
when he started writing serious poetry. He was a romantic poet but not a Lake poet. As most of
the poets who belong to romantic period are Lake poets. He puts modernity in his poetry in
addition to nature so we can conclude that he is a “modern poet” as well. He is a poet of man,
nature, society, humanity and modernity.
William Blake’s poetry has two parts.
 Songs of Innocence
 Songs of Experience
“Songs of innocence” is the first collection of his poems. These poems show the optimistic
approach of the poet. Here we can see the divine voice of childhood and purity of heart. The
imagery used in these poems is positive imagery and so these poems are the desirable poems. It
represents the joys of Blake’s early childhood. These are subjective poems.
“Songs of experience” is the collection of poems in which we can see the moral convictions and
the bitter realities of life. These poems are actually a collection of Blake’s own experiences of
life. These are more pessimistic and undesirable than the “songs of innocence”. The imagery
used in these poems is negative imagery. These have an objective outlook.
As for as Blake’s poetry is concerned, we can see ourselves that Blake has highlighted the
corruption of church in his times. Actually Blake presents a wide variety of contradicting views
on church. While going through his poetry, we can see all the images used for church and
religion. The theme of religion is central to both of his ‘songs of innocence’ and ‘songs of
experience’, which shows that Blake is a religious poet.
When we go through his poetry we can see that Blake has represented Jesus Christ in his poem,
‘The Lamb’ who was the Sacrificial Lamb. Another image of religion which Blake used is as the
Shepherd who is ‘watchful’ and constantly keep an eye on his sheep. Blake shows religion as a
thing which is present and ever present with the human beings. Shepherd is compared with God
as he can understand the voices of his folk i.e. his lamb. Here Blake has shared very beautiful
ideas. Firstly, God is always present seeking and protecting upon us. Secondly, man should sit
alone and try to find out his god.
Throughout the ‘songs of innocence’, a simple and childlike portrayal of religion is shown. There
is no any other theme in ‘innocence’ rather than ‘religion’ that church being ever present. Blake
says that true God is God of love, whom we never regard. Sometimes, Blake speaks like a
traditional Christian. In the marriage of Heaven and Hell he says:

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God only Acts, and is, in existing beings or Men.
This idea is so difficult to digest or grasp that God is within us. What Blake means is that there
are divine qualities in everyone, God is ‘best’ of each of us, and when someone behaves and
lives his life showing good traits he becomes god-like.
In the poem ‘And Did Those Feet in Ancient Time’, Blake has shown his strive for betterment
and battle against evil. As he writes in it:
Bring me my bow of burning gold:
Bring me my arrows of desire:
Bring me my spear: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire.
Here poet expresses his desire to get prepared for the battle against evil and eliminate it with the
help of passion and all kind of weapons. And he wants his transportation which is the fastest of
all i.e. the chariot of fire that carried god to heavens.
When we go through the ‘songs of experience’ we see the famous work of Blake named as ‘The
Tiger’,
Tiger! Tiger! Burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In this poem the poet seems to talk to the tiger and asking him about his creation and Creator. He
is totally amazed at such a wonderful and amazing creation with such a good symmetry in it.
Actually in asking all such things he is also praising the Creator of all the creations in the world.
This is also showing us the use of religious imagery in Blake’s poetry.
Blake does not only use symbols but he also give us moral lessons which are teachings of his
religion in a good manner. As we can see in ‘Auguries of Innocence’ Blake has referred to the
life after death, eternity and God at different points. But we can conclude that his interpretation
of god and the Bible is very much different from others.
A Truth thats told with bad intent
Beats all the Lies you can invent.
Under every grief & pine

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Runs a joy with silken twine.
He who Doubts from what he sees
Will neer Believe do what you Please.
If the Sun & Moon should Doubt
Theyd immediately Go out.
This is a small extract from Blake’s ‘Auguries of Innocence’. These are clearly showing the
spiritual approach of Blake. He is giving the religious sermon in a befitting manner. He is also
warning his reader that if he does not comply with these teachings, he is going to suffer and he is
also explaining that what sort of sufferings going to come upon a society as a whole, because of
the evils taking place in that society.
We can conclude it that morality, spirituality and religious theme goes side by side when we
study William Blake’s poetry. Blake sometimes goes beyond the teachings of Christianity but all
his poems are full of important moral lessons and humanity. His love for humanity can be seen in
both, ‘innocence’ and in ‘experience’.

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References:
 Songs of Innocence & Experience by William Blake.
 https://www.shmoop.com/auguries-of-innocence/
 https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/text/visions-william-blake