Topic > Religious Beliefs in Anglo-Saxon Society

Synthesis Essay on the Anglo-Saxons The Anglo-Saxons were a religious group of people as were other generations of people. Religion played a role in the lives of Anglo-Saxon people and is consequently reflected in their writings. Poems written by the Anglo-Saxons showed significant signs of religious influence including "The Seafarer", "The Wanderer" and "The Wife's Lament". Each writer of each poem gives their own testimony regarding God's influence on their situation. The Anglo-Saxons practiced their beliefs outside of religious institutions by writing about them in their poetry. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The Anglo-Saxons seemed to have related their daily lives to their religious beliefs, as shown in "The Seafarer." The poem is written by a man who loves the sea and is mentally drained from his home on earth. He understands the difficulties of traveling by sea but simply cannot stay away from it. "Having become so brave, or so graced by God, that he feels no fear as the sails unfurl..." The writer is not afraid of what the sea offers and links his courage to being graced by God. Religion could having motivated many actions among the Anglo-Saxons as they believed they were protected and therefore fearless. Being religious, the Anglo-Saxons had no competing ideals of evolution, instead pointing to God for everything. The writer goes on to talk about how God essentially created the Earth and life itself. “We all fear God. He turned the Earth, made it swing steadily in space, gave life to the world and light to the sky. Death comes upon fools who forget their God." Scientific beliefs such as evolution may have been non-existent to the Anglo-Saxons, as the writer of “The Seafarer” notes about how everyone fears God and how He gave life to the world. Religion played a key role in everything the Anglo-Saxons believed, from their daily activities to the basis of life itself. Anglo-Saxons often looked to religion and God in times of trouble to mediate the best from a bad situation. As shown in “The Wanderer”, the writer finds himself alone after the massacre of many people he once knew. With no one else to turn to, the speaker turns to his religion for comfort. “This solitary traveler longs for the grace, the mercy of God…” The speaker relies on God in his solitary travels to remedy the hardships he had just experienced. Anglo-Saxons believed in and supported God's impact on their lives despite what they had been through. The Anglo-Saxon people considered God and religion to be the reason behind everything they did. “It is beautiful to find your grace in God, the celestial rock where all our hopes rest.” The speaker goes on to state how giving one's life to God despite difficulties is positive because religion contains all the hope in the world. “The Wanderer” provides an example of one of the many inhabitants who may have found themselves in a lonely situation and who in turn turned to God. The Anglo-Saxon people strongly believed in religion as the only source of hope through hardships such as war. As argued by the speaker "The Wanderer", Anglo-Saxon religion sought during times of trouble. "The Wife's Lament" is a poem written by the "wife" of a man who is apparently himself in exile and the speaker seeks him out. The poem's speaker, however, is herself exiled and forced by her husband's relative to remain in the woods "in the earth's den." "Our demeanor was cheerful, often so.