The views expressed in this article are of the author only and do not necessarily represent those of the Center for Pastor Theologians.
East of Eden
John Steinbeck
Penguin (1952). 640 pp.
Some books regarded as great in their first years quickly fade in significance as their cultural moment passes. This has not been the case with Steinbeck’s East of Eden. Since its publication in 1952 it has firmly established itself in the Western canon, and it will continue to be read and pondered for centuries to come. The reason is that, while telling a story set in early twentieth-century California, it purports to display the universal condition of humanity. The underlying mythos of the book is the account of Cain and Abel in Genesis 4, and what one of the characters says about that biblical narrative might almost be said of Steinbeck’s novel: “it is everybody’s story ... the symbol story of the human soul.”
For Steinbeck the universality of the Cain-Abel story consists in the deep need every son has for the father’s affection, the corresponding fear of rejection in favor of one’s sibling, the anger that results at perceived slights, and the immoral acts and deep feelings of guilt that follow. This is the basic plot of the story that is told in two iterations: first in the lives of brothers Adam and Charles, and subsequently n the lives of Adam’s twin sons Aron and Cal. In each case, the “A” is granted favor arbitrarily, while the “C” acts out in restless despair. However, in this world there is no purely innocent victim. Being the recipient of both the father’s arbitrary favor and the brother’s envious anger can enervate one’s moral agency. The death experienced here is not necessarily literal, but rather spiritual.
The “sin crouching at the door” of these Abels and Cains is represented by Cathy Ames, who comes crawling up, broken and bruised, onto the porch of Adam and Charles Trask. After becoming Adam’s wife during her convalescence, and giving birth to Cal and Aron in California, she runs away and takes on a new identity as a sadistic and vindictive whore in the town of Salinas. While intensely seductive, she is at the same time a monstrous character who deceives, manipulates, and murders simply because she can. She makes no sense to anyone else, nor to herself. Cathy is believable only as an antisocial psychopath, and some early literary critics saw her character as either a jab at Steinbeck’s former wife or a display of general misogyny. These are, however, missing the point. Steinbeck intends Cathy to be taken symbolically—as the personification of evil. She is inexplicably alluring, a self-destructive force of chaos to which humanity turns in its restlessness.
While East of Eden is a description of the tragedy of human spiritual and social life, it is not all darkness. The climax of the book is the realization that there is a possibility of triumphing over evil. In this regard the story of Adam’s neighbor and friend, Samuel Hamilton is important. The lives of Samuel and his children are marked by the same struggles that beset the Trask family, but somehow their story is one of an overarching joy and fulfillment. This possibility that Samuel represents in an exemplary fashion is stated explicitly by Adam’s wise Chinese servant, Lee. After wrestling intensely with the interpretation of Cain-Abel story, Lee has the epiphany that the Hebrew word timshel means neither a simple command that “you must” rule over sin, nor a prediction that “you will” rule over sin. Instead, it is the giving of permission—“thou mayest” overcome sin.
The all-important concept of timshel invites further reflection as to what, precisely, it means to have permission to rule over sin. On the one hand, the notion of permission is meant to thread the moral needle between the errors of total freedom or total determinism. The former is a naïve denial of the reality of human existence, while the latter can lead only to despair. By contrast “thou mayest” is a call to responsibility even in the face of our thrownness into a world of chaos that seems to have invaded our very selves. At the same time, permission is not merely a call to responsibility, but also the granting of power to triumph over both one’s wickedness and one’s victimhood. The question these Cain-Abel narratives provoke the form this power takes in one’s life, and how it is attained.
One suggestion as to how one receives this permission is provided in the closing scene as a Cain (Cal) finds renewal by acknowledging his violence and seeking forgiveness from Abel or his representative. An Abel (Adam) finds redemption by granting forgiveness and extending blessing to a Cain. Seen from a wider angle, East of Eden attests to the power of narrative itself to transform. It is through stories that one can experience moral change and redemption in time. Finally, since the novel is structured around a foundational biblical text, it invites deep reflection on how it is that the gospel provides permission and renews moral agency in the midst of a fallen world. In these ways, the story generates almost endless possibilities for theological reflection leading to spiritual formation.
Matthew Wilcoxen (PhD, Charles Sturt University) is the Rector of St. John’s Anglican Church in Darlinghurst, Sydney, Australia. He is a member of the St. Peter Fellowship of the Center for Pastor Theologians.
