The Religious Meaning in Waiting for Godot

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The Religious Meaning in
Waiting for Godot

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👉Name : Upasna Goswami
👉Roll no.20
👉Enrollment no. 4069206420220012
👉Sem : 2
👉Paper Name : The Twentieth Century Literature -2
👉Paper no. : 107
👉Paper Code : 22400
Submitted to : S. B. Gardi Department of English
👉Email: goswamiupasna339@gmail.com

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● Introduction
● Religious Imagery in waiting
for Godot
● Myth and Mythology
● God and Man
● Breaking Contract
● Repentance & Impression
● Waiting for Salvation
● Conclusion

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❖ Waiting for Godot (1952) is a conventional and remarkable play written
by the Irish author Samuel Beckett
❖ The play Waiting for Godot belongs to the theater of absurd and it is a
part of the modernist period of literature Existential philosophers and
play writers through their work depicted the problem of existence the
absurdity of life and the question of God.
❖ Waiting for Godot is one of the classic works of theater of the absurd.
❖ The play seems absurd but with a deep religious meaning This text tries
to explore the theme in four parts of God and man, breaking the
agreement, repentance and imprecation and waiting for salvation
● Introduction

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2. RELIGIOUS IMAGERY IN WAITING FOR THE GODOT
❏ The human necessity of unifying explanation of world has always been
satisfied by religion and creators of thephilosophical systems who made
the human life meaningful
❏ The natural desire to get to know and understand the
❏ world in its most hidden spheres was fulfilled by religious dogmas about
the existence of God, which guaranteed the
❏ meaningful contingency of human life.
❏ The play has very strong evidences of theory of existentialism, but still,
it can be related with religious interpretations.
❏ The main parts deals with a religious side of Waiting for Godot, and try
to figure if the play is religious or atheist depending on the religious
allegory presented in the play.

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Myth is a kind of story or rudimentary narrative
sequence, normally traditional and anonymous,
through which given culture ratifies its social customs
or accounts for the origins of human and natural
phenomena, usually in supernatural or boldly
imaginative terms
"Myths feature supernatural episodes that seek to
explain natural phenomena in order to give
humans some kind of special perceptions in a more
cosmic level."(11). It amplifies human culture and
society to a superhuman or godly level. Although myths
have such a nature, they are still accepted as
both true and sacred.
Myth and Mythology

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Vladimir: Has he a beard,
Mr. Godot?
Boy: Yes, sir.
Vladimir: Fair or… or
black?
Boy: I think it’s white, sir.
Vladimir: Christ have mercy
on us! (Beckett, 2006, P372)
In Waiting for Godot, both Vladimir and Estragon
on stage, and Godot, who is away from the vision
of the audience,
bear a certain symbolic significance. Relationship
between them suggests that of God and man.
Godot has similarities with God. The boy, a
messenger, in the play is from
Godot’s place and he is the only one who has seen
Godot.
God and Man

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Keeping promise is the theme in Old Testament and New
Testament. There are five agreements between God and
man and God would gradually complete the plan of salvation
for man if man follows the contract
They are agreement of Noah, agreement with Abraham,
covenant with Abraham, covenant with Moses, covenant with
David and new testament, that is, the covenant of Christ and
man.
The gift and the blessing from God can ensure man to live a
comfortable life.
But why man is reduced to waiting for salvation? It seems that
the two tramps are waiting for Godot to be saved according to
the promise, but Godot does not come.
Breaking the contract

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Estragon: You are it was this evening?
Vladimir: What?
Estragon: That we were to wait.
Vladimir: He said Saturday. (Pause) I think.
Estragon: You think.
Vladimir: I must have made a note of it.
Estragon: But what Saturday? And is it
Saturday? It is not rather Sunday (Pause.) Or
Monday? (Pause.) Or Friday?
Vladimir: It is not impossible.
Estragon: Or Thursday?
Vladimir: What’ll we do? (Beckett, 2006, p. 246)

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Human beings lose the protection of God and become
spiritually homeless. They talk nonsense, do funny
movements, but in their bottom of heart, they are longing
for the salvation by God. However, it is difficult to repair
the relations between the man and God.
God will re-test man for he needs man’s loyalty. Thuswhat
human beings need to do is to repent and pray.
God creates man according to what he is like, showing his
love to man. In Genesis of the Holy Bible, God says, “Let
us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them
have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl
of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over
every creeping thing that creepeth upon the
earth.”(Zeng, 1994, p.22).
Repentance and imprecation Estragon: what?
Vladimir: Suppose we
repented.
Estragon: repented
what?
Vladimir: Oh…We
wouldn’t have to go
into the details.
Estragon: Our being
born? (Beckett, 2006,
p. 240)

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Waiting is a process God added for man’s salvation. Suffering means tasting the
life. Human beings learn to loveothers in this process. In Act I, the two tramps
can be seen to have gaps and Lucky is victimized by Pozzoboy following Godot
lives a life with love.
But in Act II, the two tramps sincerely embrace, and Pozzo becomes
particularly dependent on Lucky.
Furthermore, the tramps’ help to Pozzo shows the fraternity among people.
Human beings are changing towards what God want them to be.
Although Godot does not come, hope is still there. The withered tree in Act I
has a few leaves in Act II.
Thus there are only a few leaves, after all, they are the embodiment of
life.Waiting for Godot expresses the living condition of the Western people who
have been out of contact with God and shows their effort to get rid of the
situation. Beckett expresses his sincere thought of human existence in the
play, which is seemingly absurd.
Waiting for salvation

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Samuel Beckett's play ―Waiting for Godot‖, we can observe it is closely tied to
existentialism ideology of the late modernism, not by what it says rather by
what it doesn’t say.
Perhaps the main thing among what it doesn't say is to scorn the religious idea
of waiting somebody who will come to help people at the end of the world.
However, its incompletion is due to the presence of the late modernist
existentialist ideology, which silences it at certain points to reveal the truth.
This essay shows that Waiting for Godot is an allegory about the faith in and
struggle for salvation and meaning.
Conclusion

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The Religious Meaning in Waiting for Godot - Ed.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1080326.pdf.
(PDF) Symbolic Analysis of Waiting for Godot: A Critical Comparison ...
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/338336975_Symbolic_Analysis_of_Waiting_for_G
odot_A_Critical_Comparison_Between_the_Bible_and_Quran_Symbols_in_Waiting_for_Go
dot.
Religious Mythology in" Waiting for Godot".
Saad, Haider Luaibi. "Religious Mythology in" Waiting for Godot"." ‫الرك‬2.25 (2017): 11-18.
Work cited

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