The Biblical Significance of Hagar and Milkman
I understand that this book has so much hidden meaning, and the amount of detail that you can get from reading between the lines is astounding. But regardless of that, this is such. a. weird. book. like what even. A mother who breast feeds her four year old son? A daughter who sucked on her dead father's fingers? First cousins who are kids who sleep together for 14 years? That's just messed up.
The concept of first cousins being together isn't so far out of the realm of possibility - Einstein married his first cousin. But I find it out that they were kids when they were sleeping together. The first time they sleep together, Milkman is a minor, while Hagar is an adult, that's very messed up. What I found extremely interesting however, is that Milkman gives Hagar money when he breaks up with her. Their relationship was focused a lot on the physical aspect of love - sex. This made it almost seem like Milkman was paying Hagar for sex, which reminded me of prostitution.
This piqued be into searching up who Hagar was in the bible. She was a concubine of Abraham, which basically meant that she was his mistress. A concubine is someone of a lower status than a wife, but it is also someone who the man has sexual relationships with. This parallels to Milkman being Abraham. Another thing that I found was interesting was that 14 year's after Hagar's son with Abraham was born, Abraham had a legitimate son with Sarah. So this 14 years parallel's with Milkman's and Hagar's relationship
The concept of first cousins being together isn't so far out of the realm of possibility - Einstein married his first cousin. But I find it out that they were kids when they were sleeping together. The first time they sleep together, Milkman is a minor, while Hagar is an adult, that's very messed up. What I found extremely interesting however, is that Milkman gives Hagar money when he breaks up with her. Their relationship was focused a lot on the physical aspect of love - sex. This made it almost seem like Milkman was paying Hagar for sex, which reminded me of prostitution.
This piqued be into searching up who Hagar was in the bible. She was a concubine of Abraham, which basically meant that she was his mistress. A concubine is someone of a lower status than a wife, but it is also someone who the man has sexual relationships with. This parallels to Milkman being Abraham. Another thing that I found was interesting was that 14 year's after Hagar's son with Abraham was born, Abraham had a legitimate son with Sarah. So this 14 years parallel's with Milkman's and Hagar's relationship
This shows the parallelism between the BIble and the novel Song of Solomon, which emphasizes the importance the author places on the Bible. In addition to this parallelism in the plot, the names of the characters correspond to biblical figures.
ReplyDeleteFirstly I totally agree with the fact that this book is weird. Like I-had-to-put-it-down-because-I-can't-read-it-anymore weird. Also I really like how you were curious about the relationship and discovered this connection, which is parallel and therefore, is no coincidence.
ReplyDeleteI think you did a great job connecting the reading directly to the bible and explaining how this novel plays off it. I also was never bored while reading your piece because your tone is very laid-back and humorous which is very relaxing and fun to read.
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