The Religion Influences In The Handmaid's Tale

The Religion Influences in The Handmaid’s Tale

Word Count: 1563

This purpose of this essay is to establish and explain connections between the Christian Religion and ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’. It is not attempting to point out flaws or discriminate against the religion.

Margret Atwood’s ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ is a dystopian novel, that centres around the themes of corruption, oppression, and theocracy. Told in the first person, the novel follows the female ‘Offred’ in her daily life/activities and past experiences in the newly founded “Republic of Gilead”. From my personal research, the events in the novel were influenced by negative situations that involved the American society prior to the 1980’s. These negative aspects of Gilead’s religious society in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ were drawn from similar issues facing the American public prior to the 1980’ s. These issues were based on religious concepts that were thought to greatly improve the American population's standard of living. The main ideas that influenced the creation of certain events and

The story of Adam and Eve serves as a tale on how mankind and womankind were created and placed on Earth. The story takes place in the Garden of Eden, and because the woman was deceived by the Serpent, both the women and the man were cast down to earth. The Serpent deceived the women by allowing her to eat the fruit from the forbidden tree, as she also influenced the man, God punished both. “Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” (Genesis 3:16 NIV) and that He allowed “Adam (to) named his wife Eve” (Genesis 3:20 NIV). It shows that Eve was a possession of her husband Adam. “The Lord God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him’. (Genesis 2:18) showing that the Christian religion views women to be possessions of men and that women are inferior to