The Study Of Christian Culture’s Influence On Mengjia Chen’s Poetry

When it comes to Crescent Moon School, people know Yiduo Wen and Zhimo Xu well for their moving poetry and great achievements in this filed, but only few people know Mengjia Chen, a representative poet for the late Crescent Moon School. Most researches about Crescent Moon School put the focus on Xu and Wen because of the reputable achievements they have made while little research has paid attention to Mengjia Chen. The intangible mystery fantasy of Christianity and the spirit of Christianity in Chen’s creation made him a distinctive poet, however, researches seemed to have paid little attention to these distinctive features.This essay is trying to investigate how the Christianity effects the Mengjia Chen’ cogitate style and how Chen expressed the influence of Christian culture through his poetry. By analyzing the "caritas"、"sense of original sin and confession" and "the attitude to death and life" in Christian culture to make a better interpretation why Chen persisted in writing love and nature, elaborate the evading consciousness and the courage of bearing sufferings that hide in his poetry, and speculate the fearless to death as well as the breakthrough to the reality and time while analyzing the consciousness of life that contains behind the speculation.This essay will mainly focus on Chen’s poetry, the deep relationship between Mengjia Chen and Christian culture will be illustrated in the introduction part, which also includes Chen’s Christian background, the mythological image and literary allusion mentioned in his creation and at the same time, the Christian culture affected more than his poetry style but his reflection on himself and nature through Christian’s culture spirit and the conscious awareness when handled life and reality problems by style and thought. This essay will consist of three sessions:Session one will illustrate the "caritas" in Chen’s poetry from three aspects. Firstly, deeply affected by "Bible’The Old Testament", Chen showed us an abundant love view in his poetry kingdom, and he expressed his brave love idea and the pursuit of love which unites the spirit and flesh by his regret to the love whose spirit and flesh are separated. Next, as Chen is a person that held the view that he must love everyone equally as well as love himself, he could put himself in the unfortunate’s shoes and hoped love could conquer selfish and hatred and go beyond nationality and wealth. Thirdly, Chen’s deep love to the nature endowed the nature he written free and spiritual, when talking about nature he is talking about himself, therefore he could transform from himself to nature freely when he focused on himself and nature. A poet’s spiritual ideal world could lie in the nature of poetry they written.Session two will analyze how original sin and confession expressed in Chen’s poem. Affected by the original sin and the omnipotence of god in Christian culture, Chen’s poem showed a mysterious fear of religious and tragic fatalism. Because of the limitation of time and personal environment, poets have no other choice but to create an ideal dream to release them which becomes an escape from the reality. As a derivative of original sin, confession is the core concept of humanity theory in Christian culture, and one could be forgiven only by confessing his sin. As for the specific behaviors, one would feel sacred when his moral behavior follows the religious ethics while if his behavior violates religious ethics one would be fear for god’s justice. The poet keeps interrogating his soul and reflecting on himself, burdens "the cross" which stands for misery conscientiously and walks to the battlefield with the responsibility to the whole nation.Session three will discuss how the Christian culture attitude to life and death influences Chen’s poem. The Christian culture claims man’s life is quite short, physically death is just a turning point of a new life, and this kind of death is filled with hope that comes back to the heaven, resurrection, and immortal, and finally turn to the hug of Jesus Christ. Thus death becomes fearless, just under the influence of this idea the sense of life in Chen’s creation gradually became complex and overcame the restrains of time and reality. The poet spends his whole life in pursuing the peace of mind, a state of back to basic and the state of pure human nature. That could explain why you could never find the fear and anxiety to death in his poem but the free life consciousness that beyond the reality. The meaning of death turns out to represent a feeling of national emotions because of the Christian redemption theory and the short life elapses from the linear time therefore becomes immortal as whole.The conclusion part will conclude the whole essay.