"The woman looked at the tree: the fruit would be good to eat; it was pleasing to the eye and desirable for the knowledge it could give. She so she took some and ate it; she also gave some to her husband and he ate it. Then the eyes of both were opened and the Lord God called the man and said, “What is this? What’s it going to be like, huh? " Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”? Get the original essay The answer is humanity's choice: to seek God or follow its own natural desires. and the truth doesn't matter. It is in the Bible and in Alex's world. Like Adam and Eve in the garden, the Lord asks Burgess's protagonist the same question that Moses asked his Israelites: I have given you the opportunity to choose. Choose for yourself today who you will serve (Joshua 24:15) Some may say that Alex's choices were all determined by the society in which he lived, but they were. are nothing more than any of the choices we, as humans, have freedom to make. At some point, the responsibility must lie with the person making the choice, not the person. situation The choices Alex makes compose his own version of biblical salvation history: the lawless sin of the lawless man, the sanctification that changes the outward actions but not the inner heart, the rebellion against that sanctification that leads. to death and final redemption through love. His story is the Gospel according to Alex. “There is none righteous, no, not one... All have deviated, all have degraded themselves equally. (Romans 3:12) Alex opens the novel as Kierkegardan's perfect aesthetic man. What's it going to be, huh? This will be, for a painful moment, the first stage of Kierkegard's man. Aesthetics is primarily concerned with one's own individual existence and the sensory experiences one can obtain through that existence. It's Alex. After raping the children, he says: "I stood there, dirty, nagoy and fair, fucked and faggot on the bed." (46) Moreover, because the aesthetic only cares about itself, it enjoys its solitude and secrecy. Alex, of course, is in spades. He locks himself in his room and moves away from his family. "I gave him a dirty drink, as if to say, take care of his and I'll take care of mine." (49) He is supremely individualistic. Rightfully so, so is everyone around him, the millicents, the governor, his parents. There is no communion in this world because they share no common beliefs or goals. The reason may be as simple as Alex says: "Evil comes from the self, from the one, from you or from a few strange people... what I do, I do because I love doing it . » (40) Later, when the government chooses to reform Alex, they follow this same rule, not because individualism is bad, but like Alex and F. Alexander, they wish to create their aesthetic world where their own individualism is the only one that exists. . This is why Alex hurts people, not only because he enjoys violence, but also because those he hurts don't serve his own purpose. Human society is his society, and as soon as someone ceases to serve that society, he ceases to serve any purpose in life (23). Alex is the first modern utility killer. Aesthetics alone finds itself in moral obscurity. “In the beginning…darkness covered the surface of the depths. » (Genesis 1:1-2) Darkness is the kingdom of aesthetic man. All of Alex's actions take place in the dark, literally and figuratively. They travel by night then reside in the den of iniquity, the Korona Milk Bar, "there was no law yet against the proud dome of the news(1) Moreover, just as Adam and Eve hid their sin from God with fig leaves, so Alex and his droogs use darkness and disguise to hide from their god, the government. They also do it with words. Not only is Nadsat a degenerative symbol of Western defeat in the Cold War, but it is Alex's attempt to cover up his depravity. aggression, he speaks of "in-and-out" and "tolchok." Like Adam and Eve's fig leaves, Alex's darkness and disguise are necessary to create the beauty he appreciates. Now the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful and they married the one of their choice” (Gen. 6:2) This beauty is what the aesthetic man seeks. Like the angels, Alex sees beauty and. he takes her. When he finds a woman, he performs the old "in-and-out" on whoever he pleases. When he fights with Billyboy's gang, their fight is like a waltz: push, parry, push, push and again first position (17). When he fights with his brothers, it's art in action, a dance "I counted odin, dva, tree, and I went ak, ak, ak. . . . So I rustled. . and I cut . (54) Like the builders of Babel who tried to build a “tower that reaches to the heavens” (Genesis 11:3), Alex too wants beauty just for his own selfish interest. Nevertheless, it is a beauty that, although detestable, is understandable in light of the world in which he lives. The government has removed all the true beauty, art, theater, literature, from the world. Alex's replacement is violence. It uses the same human passions, arousing the same emotions as art. This is why Alex continually destroys books, because they compete with his grotesque definition of beauty. “Then comes the blood, my brothers, truly magnificent.” Like Satan's beauty, under the cover of darkness, what seems beautiful is in fact a "horror show", a spectacle akin to the violent symphonies he adores. He describes his attacks as a masterpiece that he composed and orchestrated, with the screams of his victims as the chords, and the death of Catwoman, the crescendo. For the man who chooses to be a slave to his sin, believes that beauty is found in darkness: “Men loved the darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. » (John 3:18-20) “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator. " (Romans 1:25) It is because of the violence of the orchestra's music that Alex chooses Ludwig Van as his god: "Music has always sharpened me, O my brothers, and made me feeling like old Bog himself, ready to do with the old dealers and blitzens and vecks and ptitsas running away into my power ha ha. " (42). But what Ludwig Van brings in Alex is not complete satisfaction, but the promise of something greater, "the lovely air of happiness upon joy being a glorious spark like that of heaven." (46).The music is orgasmic and is his way of achieving happiness, but this happiness is only a spark of true ecstasy Alex and his droogs search through the old moloko, "Then the lights began to light. crack like atoms... and you were just going to be introduced to old Bog or God, when this was all over. You came back here and now kind of moaning. » (4) In seeking transcendent experience, they seek God, even though Alex refuses to accept that he does so, "You were not put on this earth just to come into contact with God." (4) It is as Paul says: “No one seeks God.” (Rom. 3:11). He is the race of the Israelites before the golden calf, exchangingGod versus something present, temporary and satisfying. Alex chooses the temporary over the eternal, a choice reflected in his attack on HOME, an attack symbolic of the sinner's choice to rebel against heaven. In HOME, F. Alexander, whose life sadly mirrors that of Burgess, writes of man's capacity to choose God, "a man... capable of gentleness... to ooze juicy at the last turn from the bearded lips of God". (21). But Alex “exchanged God’s truth for a lie, and he worshiped and served created things.” (Rom. 1:25). He prefers lies and this man's truth is of no use in his life. "In him was life, and this life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness understands it not." (John 1:4-6) The truth still exists, however. Alex and the State attack a man in an alley who sings about love, but both parties refuse to accept this light in the darkness because it interferes with their aesthetic. Their worlds cannot have love, because love means responsibility to others before oneself, the antagonist of the aesthetic. We must therefore arrest this man. However, no matter how many times they try to suppress, he sings the Song of Songs, the song of love. He sings until Alex attacks him and his blood flows: "One of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear, causing a sudden flow of blood." (John 19:33-34). He even sings imprisoned among true sinners: “They crucified him and the criminals, one on his right, the other on his left.” (Luke 23:33) His love is analogous to the love of God in Christ, a love that Alex seeks and resists in the first part. However, even if Alex does not choose God, He will still reveal Himself to him. Revelation is the only way to begin writing a gospel. Once Alex is redeemed from his slavery in prison or Egypt, the process of sanctification begins. The treatment administered to him is in accordance with Old Testament law. If the Israelites do not follow God's law, then: "The LORD will send upon you curses and confusion and rebuke in all that you do, until you are destroyed and come to a sudden ruin because of the evil you have done by abandoning him. " (Deut. 28:20). A similar destruction will come to Alex if he does not respect the law that has been implanted in him, illness will overwhelm him. Alex is forced to enter the second stage of Kierkegard's life , the ethical man He is a clock, with all his actions for the universal good, respecting socially accepted moral principles. But the ethical man is yet another disguise for Alex. His ethics are always selfish. he's still the aesthetic man, as the chaplain himself said after Alex's graduation: "He doesn't really have a choice, does he?" the fear of physical pain pushed him to this grotesque act of humiliation” (126) They tell him that he made his choice and all this is a consequence of his choice (127), but as the Israelites say. to Moses as they travel through the desert: “If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in Egypt, there we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you us! you brought out into this desert to starve all this assembly. » Alex knew no more than the Israelites about the choice he had made. They both choose to have faith in what can save them, but fail to understand what the object of their faith means. Furthermore, there is a difference between the two: although God can control their actions, He cannot control their thoughts. The State cando: “I thought about killing a fly and felt a little bit sick. » (129) God commands the Israelites to be like Him, but it is still within the realm of their lives to reject that choice, even if it means accepting punishment. Alex's sanctification does not allow him to choose, and the only way he can choose otherwise is to die. Fittingly, Alex's lack of freedom of choice is recognized only by himself and the chaplain, the only characters in the short story who believe in God. Prison Charlie asks inmates, “You have the right to be free, why would you choose this prison over freedom?” When Alex is “treated,” the chaplain realizes both the lack of sincerity of the procedure and the loss of freedom: “He ceases to be a criminal. He also ceases to be a creature capable of moral choice. (126) Alex is just a prisoner who desires this freedom and works hard to get it, "Sir, I did my best, didn't I... I tried, sir, isn't it...how about this new treatment that gets you out of prison in no time" (82) No one else in the prison is as eager as Alex. to be free to pursue that transcendent joy he has sought all his life. He does choose death because sanctification which changes a man's outward actions, not his inner motivations, is an unreliable and ultimately ineffective salvation. One of the reasons why he commits suicide is "When I desire to do good, evil is there with me". "Goodness is chosen", the chaplain philosophizes, "When a man cannot choose, he ceases to do so. 'to be a man'. (83) Therefore, what the doctors end up creating is a neutral man, incapable of loving, incapable of hating, incapable of doing good, incapable of doing evil. It is precisely this man that God rejects because this man is not really His child: “You are neither cold nor hot. If only you were cold or hot! Then, because you are lukewarm, neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out. out of my mouth." (Rev. 3:16.) Created man has a choice. When this choice is not exercised, then he has only lukewarmness. This inhuman being in which the State has created Alex is an angel, incapable of alternative unethical actions. Perhaps Lucifer was one of those inhuman beings, lacking the ability to act on his evil instincts while still being part of what he is. he considered life, he chose instead the eternal torment of hell When the chaplain wonders if God would have preferred good to choice, but his answer is found in the garden of Eden If God would not. not that we had a choice, there would have been no tree Like Lucifer and the first humans, the ability to choose is greater than forced heaven. This he realizes is best seen in Alex when, at the end of the second part, the punishment for not following the path of good is removed and he returns to his natural state. Before this happens, Alex is redeemed, literally redeemed, freed from the bondage of the state. The problem is that neither his first redeemer, the government, which uses him as a guinea pig, nor his second savior, F. Alexander, takes any responsibility for Alex. He must act for his redemption. These are the mechanisms behind a clock that does not believe in grace. What they robbed Alex of is something he slowly begins to realize in his redemption: love. When he returns to his parents, he cannot admit that rejection is painful because now that he is a better person, he expects those around him to treat him the same way. It's a form of love he's looking for, a form he didn't have before. Now he depends on the whims of others, he is forced toto be part of a community and he realizes that the only way to survive in that community is through love. But the law submitted to Alex does not require love, only obedience. In his redemption, he is not forgiven in perfect love, but must pay, literally with cats, for the wrongs he has committed. He seeks forgiveness, but in a society that does not know how to love others, no one can forgive him for what he has done. No one, of course, but perfect love. Unfortunately, Alex is not subject to the law of perfect love. It is under the one who seeks to change the soul, but only the actions. That is why the sins he committed must be paid for with his own red and red krovvy. His parents reject him, he is attacked by the elderly librarians and he is betrayed again by his friends. And when it appears that there is hope in F. Alexander, he turns around and does to Alex the same thing that Alex did to him. Because all these actions have at their heart: “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”. Revenge is not the path to redemption. The love Alex is looking for is. IN THE LIBRARY WITH OLD MEN. When everything else has rejected him, including his first three saviors, the symphony, the state, and F. Alexander, Alex has nowhere to turn but this perfect love. The only thing left to save him is unity with God, the unity of a creature with free will, with a being who can impose his laws on him like a clockwork orange. He has rejected this path before, but now his worldliness has failed him, and he turns to God or the Bog and everyone. His holy angels and saints (141). When all the rejections of salvation come together, F. Alexander plays the symphony that triggers the government reaction in him, he has no choice but to jump out of the window with the intention of joining them. He is arrested for two reasons. The first is that it is not his free choice to be in heaven. This is all just a lack of choice, and what is it if not another form of clockwork? This is precisely what the last two sections of the novel are about: when someone chooses the good because they have no other choice, their choice is not really good, and as with the apple of 'Eden, this forced choice is not what God desires either. . Furthermore, he cannot choose God in death if he has not yet chosen Him in life. Alex doesn't care about the rape and death of F. Alexander's wife, the news gives him the best night's sleep he's ever had. He was not redeemed or asked for forgiveness. “Then I say to you, Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.” (Luke 11:9-10) Alex doesn't knock, he waits until the door is open He still hasn't chosen God. HOME perfectly sums up this paradox. When Alex returns to his former victim's HOME, heaven. against whom he has chosen to rebel, he expects to be welcomed with open arms like the prodigal Christian son, the model of Christian forgiveness and love. Home is a place of peace, forgiveness and contentment, and Alex himself admits that this is what he is looking for at the moment: "I must not continue, however, because I needed help and kindness now (154) However, Alex does not reveal it." not the truth, does not confess his sins and does not ask for redemption He lies about his crimes, about technique and refuses to take responsibility for his own actions. Again, without choice he cannot achieve redemption: "If we say we are without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us... If we say we are not have committed no sin, we pass it off asliar. , and his word has no place in us. (1 John 1:8-10) F. Alexander, when he discovers the truth from Alex, also does not offer forgiveness. He's another Alex, incapable of forgiveness or redemption, another mechanical product of this dark city. Furthermore, he is as much the Aesthetic Man as the State and Alex himself, using Alex for his personal cause, first the article, then his revenge. He is as incapable of loving as Alex. HOME cannot be reached without repentance on the part of the sinner leading to forgiveness on the part of the host. Maybe if the truth had been told it could have been done. This is not, however, because Alex arrives HOME, once again, to darkness, the absence of light, the absence of truth, the absence of love. Without this love, forgiveness is impossible and redemption is a failure. This is why he jumps out of the window, seeking redemption, but cannot find it without his free choice or without love, "he who does not love does not know God." , because God is love. (1 John 4:8). He falls to the ground and "had this idea that my whole body or body was as if empty, as if it were dirty water, and then filled again with clean water." (172) This is his baptism, and the government, replacing God again, resurrects him in his rebirth. They give him conditional free will, provided he supports the government in its re-election efforts. With the return of his freedom, of his aesthetic self once again appreciating the evil in the world, Alex surrenders his soul to the devil. He and the government lie to each other and to themselves, and God has no place in a life that lies. This is why it is replaced again in Alex's life by Ludwig Van's violent symphony and the glorious Ninth. He has become an orange again, and as all men free to choose expect, it seems almost inevitable that, without love, he will choose "evil", God gave them to their vile desires, and to the degradation of their bodies which results” (Rom 1:24) So now what is it going to be? "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am but a clanging gong or a clanging cymbal. I may have faith enough to move mountains but if I have not love, I am nothing I can give all that I have to him who is in need, I can give my body to be burned, but if I do not. have no love, I will get nothing from it” (Romans 13:1-3) Keep in mind: this is just a sample. .Get a personalized essay now from our expert writers.Get a personalized essayAfter his many redemptions, aesthetic Alex once again sits at the Korona Milk Bar and watches everyone around him still trying to reach heaven, " All around were chellovecks far away on milk and vellocet and synthemesc and drencrom and other veshches that take you far, far away from this wicked, real world into the country to dump Bog and all his holy angels and saints "All that. All he does is watch and participate in this same repetitive, mindless game until he eventually gets bored and desperate. He doesn't buy old women drinks, not because he hates them, but because he no longer wants to abuse them in his own clever plans. He looks around and all he sees is the same degeneration as him. has lived his entire life, with nothing here that could be considered worthy of aspiration. Mozart, he said, did not write cal. He wrote heavenly music. This is the paradise that Alex has been yearning for since the beginning of the novella. One of the differences between this time and the first is that it is his free choice that he wishes. The other is that he chooses it out of love. The irony of the government taking away Alex's chance to be with God is.