EA Super Star
1/1/09
English
Block G
“Temporary Relief or Eternal Doom”
Man-Made versus Divine Law
Laws are made to protect people and to maintain order.
But what happens if the law does not protect people?
if the law goes against one’s beliefs?
What
If the people do
not believe in the laws, then the laws lose their value.
In Sophocles’ Antigone, the title character chooses to
follow the laws of the gods and face the earthly
consequences.
Muhammad Ali also decided to stay true to
religious law as seen in The Greatest. According to both
Antigone and Muhammad Ali, it is acceptable to break the
law if it goes against one’s spiritual beliefs.
Those who are deeply spiritual often believe that the
supreme being, be it Allah, God, Zeus, follows divine law,
which supercedes man-made law.
When that is the case, then
the followers place more value on divine law as opposed to
the law of the lands.
In Antigone, Antigone decides to
break Creon’s edict that no one shall bury Polyneices.
Antigone firmly believes that her brother deserves a proper
burial so that his spirit can rest peacefully for all
eternity.
Antigone willingly breaks the law to bury her
brother, telling Creon, “Human laws are frail.
Divine laws
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live in truth” (27).
She argues that she ultimately has to
honor the gods because their laws are what matters, whereas
Creon’s law does not hold up.
Although Muhammad Ali never outright attacks the
validity of the laws to those whom created them, he too,
challenges the need to follow a man-made law.
During the
Vietnam War, Muhammad Ali, a newly converted Muslim,
attempts to gain “Conscientious Objector status” and avoid
being drafted to the war (Myers 59).
This status allows
people to avoid participation in military service because
of their religious beliefs (59).
He argued that in
Islam, the only acceptable war is in defense of the Muslim
faith.
Although he was denied CO status, he refused to
join the draft, as it was a law required by man, not by
Allah.
It is because these laws directly oppose their
spiritual beliefs that Antigone and Muhammad Ali choose to
break them.
Antigone explains to Creon why she decided to
break the law to bury Polyneices:
It was not god’s law.
Zeus made no such law. Nor did
Justice
who lives with the gods below earth make it a practice
for mankind.
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You are a mere mortal.
And what you decree is as
nothing in the
Face of the laws of god unwritten and beyond truth…I
am not afraid
of any man.
Man’s power means nothing.
I am afraid
of the anger
of the gods.
And therefore I have kept their laws.
(26)
Antigone makes it clear that Creon’s law violated the laws
of the gods.
She would rather suffer the man-made
consequence as a result of violating this law than deal
with angry gods in eternity.
She cannot obey a law that
contradicts her spiritual beliefs.
Similarly, Muhammad Ali refused to step forward when
his former name “Cassius Clay” was called during the army
induction ceremony (Myers 61).
He would not participate in
a war that was not in defense of Islam.
He argued that,
“Freedom means being able to follow your religion, but it
also mean carrying the responsibility to choose between
right and wrong” (61-64).
Ali believed that part of the
freedom of being an American was the right to follow one’s
religion.
When the time came for him to choose religion or
law, he remained true to his faith and avoided the draft,
thus breaking the law.
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What was it about these laws that made them so hard to
follow?
Not only were they man-made and in opposition to
both Antigone’s and Ali’s spiritual beliefs, but they were
also dehumanizing.
These laws lacked the positive
qualities that human beings should have.
In the case of
Antigone, Creon created a law that denied Polyneices the
burial that all human beings deserve, as a part of Theban
custom.
Antigone claims that she has honored her brother
because in death “all men are equal” (28).
She challenges
Creon’s claim that he was a traitor to Thebes and killed
Eteocles, his own brother.
Antigone argues that regardless
of what he did, all people deserve a proper burial.
It is
a basic right.
In The Greatest, Ali argues a much different point.
As an African American in a racist country, he suggests
that it is illogical to fight in Vietnam, “Why should they
ask me to put on a uniform and…drop bombs and bullets on
brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in
Louisville are treated like dogs?” (61).
He knew that he
was denied CO status because of his affiliation with the
Nation of Islam, a militant African American organization,
even though going to war would clearly violate his
religious beliefs.
Obviously there were racist practices
involved with the draft board.
It made no sense for him to
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fight for a country that mistreats him. Additionally, he
was being asked to kill other people of color when he and
his people were being mistreated in America for being
black.
There is no humanity in that.
The truth is that laws are needed.
If there were no
laws for people to follow, chaos would ensue.
However,
there should be instances where laws can be broken.
Especially, when those laws challenge one’s religious or
spiritual beliefs.
For Antigone and Muhammad Ali, they
found the laws to be flawed.
They did not place as much
value on the man-made law as they did on their spiritual
laws.
They should have that right.
Although both suffered
consequences for breaking the law, many people supported
their decision to break the law.
After all, one’s time on
earth is limited, but eternity is forever.
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