Anne's blog

After having seen “A Cradle Song” and “The Tyger”, I will based this time my analysis on my third chosen poem: “Jerusalem”.

I decided to work on it as well because it belongs to a different stage of William Blake’s life. It’s the last of Blake’s so-called prophetic works.

Blake conceived of and wrote the work as an epic poem and supplemented it with 100 illuminated engraved plates which illustrate the fall and subsequent salvation of Albion, the universal human.

While acknowledging the overall inscrutability of the poem, commentators also have considered Jerusalem to be a harrowing masterpiece that asserts Blake’s radical concept of how Divine Vision inspires imagination which, in turn, becomes the key to the spiritual redemption of humankind.

Jerusalem is divided into four chapters, each of which features twenty-five engraved plates that illustrate the narrative progression.

http://www.progressiveliving.org/william_blake_poetry_jerusalem.htm

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England’s mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England’s pleasant pastures seen?

And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark satanic mills?

Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!

I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England’s green and pleasant land.

ANALYSIS ONE

The sixteen lines, originally written as four-line stanzas, divide into two distinct parts. The first eight lines comprise four questions, each beginning “And”. The first of these pairs is:

“And did those feet in ancient time / Walk upon England’s mountains green?

And was the holy Lamb of God/ On England’s pleasant pastures seen?”

This refers to the ancient legend that, as a boy, Jesus of Nazareth was taken by his great-uncle, Joseph of Arimathea, on one of the latter’s trading visits to England. Although there is absolutely no evidence for this claim, it is just about possible that a metals trader from ancient Palestine, which Joseph could have been, made visits to Cornwall, which was a vital source of tin and other metals that were traded with various parts of the Roman Empire. Why would he not have taken his young great-nephew on such a trip? One can imagine young Jesus begging his parents to let him go and their eventual giving in to his entreaties.

So, if the boy Jesus did visit England, in Blake’s eyes that made England a special place by having been blessed by the “Countenance Divine”. It also made England a prime candidate for the building of “New Jerusalem”.

The fourth couplet of the poem reads:

“And was Jerusalem builded here / Among these dark Satanic mills?”

This refers not only to Jesus bringing “Jerusalem” with him, but to three words that have given rise to much speculation as to their meaning. It has long been thought that the dark Satanic mills must be the wool and cotton mills of the Industrial Revolution that was getting into full swing during Blake’s lifetime.

However, other explanations have been put forward. One is that the reference is to the “Albion Flour Mill”, that was close to where Blake had once lived. Another is that the mills are the grindstones of the Universities, or the Church, both of which were targets for Blake’s anger. Another thought is that Blake, who was living in Sussex at the time he wrote the poem, was referring to the many windmills that had been erected in the area to increase the flour supply during Napoleon’s blockade of Britain. Why Satanic? Because Blake had just read “Don Quixote”, in which the hero does battle with enemy knights who turn out to be windmills.

Whatever the explanation, Blake clearly has a negative attitude to the mills, and sees Jerusalem as a force of good that can defeat their evil.

The second pair of stanzas takes a very different turn. The questioning ends and, in its place, the poet becomes a man of action, determined to take up arms in the “mental fight” to build Jerusalem “in England’s green and pleasant land”. Reminiscence on past legend gives way to present resolve and future intention.

The third stanza comprises four commands to some person or persons unknown:

“Bring me my Bow of burning gold / Bring me my Arrows of desire

Bring me my Spear: O clouds unfold! / Bring me my Chariot of Fire.”

This is very powerful imagery that cannot be taken literally. It would, for example, be difficult to wield a bow and arrows and a spear at the same time! We find in the next stanza that Blake also intends to arm himself with a sword, so he will certainly have his hands full if attempting to control a fiery chariot along with everything else!

Of course, this does not matter, because the battle is not to be a physical one. As the fourth stanza makes clear, this is a “mental fight” to be fought in terms of intellectual persuasion, but with an unshakeable determination and sense of purpose. These are “arrows of desire” to be loosed, the desire being to build the new Jerusalem, by which can be understood the “Heaven on Earth” that could have existed when visited by “those feet in ancient time”.

One thing to note in the last but one line is the change from “I” to “we”. Up to this point, the fight has been a solitary one, with the only reference to anyone else being the imaginary servant who is going to appear with a chariot full of weapons. But now it is “till we have built Jerusalem”. Blake is conscious that it will take more than one person to win the battle, and so this becomes a call to others to follow his example and be led by him.

“Jerusalem” must therefore be seen as a rallying call to the people of England (and this is an “English” rather than a “British” poem) to make their country a fit place for the foundation of Heaven on Earth. It is in some ways a patriotic poem; for example, it suggests that England may already have been blessed by the presence of Jesus. However, it makes no claims that England is currently a great country or worthy of admiration by other nations. Satan is present in the land, in whatever mills we wish to visualise, and huge efforts will be necessary to create the desired situation.

“Jerusalem” is above all a poem of hope, saying that what once existed can exist again, but only through the strong efforts of its citizens. It is not a prayer, as it does not call upon God to make good things happen. That is why it has been accepted by many with no religious convictions as a suitable vehicle of expression for the desire for social change through human determination.

http://www.helium.com/items/1900927-analysis-of-jerusalem-by-william-blake?page=3

ANALYSIS 2

The poem traces the actions of three principal characters: Jesus Christ, the representation of humanity in its divine form; Albion, the universal human who initially denies that Christ is the source of the intellectual inspiration which will lead to his salvation; and Los, the poet-prophet who acts as Albion’s agent of redemption through the regeneration of his artistic imagination.

Blake’s final and longest epic in illuminated printing constitutes a recapitulation and summation of his multiple interests, ranging from his own mythology to biblical history, from sexuality to epistemology, and from the Druids to Newton. The cast of characters is vast, but Los (the artist’s imagination at work in the material world), Jerusalem and Albion (the female and male portions of divided humanity who must be reunited), the nature goddess Vala, and Jesus play major roles. The poem is divided into four chapters, each addressed to a different audience: the Public, the Jews, the Deists, and the Christians. Jerusalem concludes with a vision of human consciousness in a post-apocalyptic universe

In the first chapter, addressed “To the Public,” Blake outlines his poetic objective and presents the main characters in his mythological milieu. He then dramatizes the principal conflict in which Albion mentally rejects Christ’s invitation for union, dismissing Jesus as a “Phantom of the overheated brain.” In the ensuing chapters, Blake identifies three systems of error which prevent Albion from achieving spiritual redemption.

In Chapter II, addressed “To the Jews,” the poet takes to task the physically repressive elements of Judaism in which an initial celebration of humanity gradually becomes replaced by an emphasis on the negation of one’s physical being. This negation takes the form of emphasizing sin, retribution, and the defiled state of the human body.

In Chapter III, addressed “To the Deists,” Blake focuses on the mental degeneration of his contemporaries who have turned their backs on the divinity of Christ to pursue a worldly code of scientific rationalization for the existence of God, the implementation of a system of strict moral conduct, and an emphasis on material possession in lieu of spiritual reward.

In Chapter IV, addressed “To the Christians,” Blake vehemently criticizes this group for their corruption of the imagination by distorting a religion of love and forgiveness into one of sin and retribution. Further, this group replaces the Christian concept of brotherhood with an egotism and selfishness which diminishes their ability to imagine brotherly love and the divine union with Christ. Ultimately, though, Blake remains optimistic that all of these errors can be corrected. Indeed, Chapter IV concludes with an apocalypse in which Albion finally affirms the divinity of Christ. In the end, Albion is resurrected into the divine form of humanity in which all of his parts—body, mind, and imagination—are purified and reunited.

Major Themes

A principal theme in Jerusalem involves the universal human’s mental struggle between embracing spiritual salvation through the unrestricted use of one’s imagination and fragmenting one’s identity through abject submission to various worldly influences. In his poem, Blake identifies a number of factors which serve to negate the human intellect: Selfhood, or pride, envy, and a lack of awareness beyond meeting one’s own physical and material needs; the historical and cultural accretion of religious dogma, moral absolutes, and scientific analysis; and the Female Will, or sexual manipulation on the part of women. All of these divisive factors create systems of error which subvert the human intellect in its pursuit of spiritual divinity. Wholly embracing the power of the imagination releases the universal human from the corruptive temptation of the worldly realm and awakens his senses to the Divine Vision of spiritual regeneration.

We can see the uniqueness of William Blake in his emphasis on imagination. It is the concept of the universal human’s place in time and space. For Blake, both redemption and eternity are states of the mind. Time itself is nonlinear; instead it is a combination of simultaneous and chronological sequences of events. The acceptance of the limitless imagination awakens the universal human to the perspective that he has achieved eternal life. However, this mode of perception is more a mental and intellectual state than a physical resurrection. It involves a new awareness that one is a part of an infinity in which every moment in time occurs both simultaneously and continuously. Ultimately, one achieves an enlightened state of consciousness in which there is no concept of beginning and ending, only being. For Blake, this event is the apocalypse, or the Second Coming of Christ, in which Jesus bestows divinity upon the universal human.

Blake considers the poet to be a crucial agent in the union of humankind with Christ. Indeed, the poet is the prophet who can foresee the apocalypse and salvation and who acts as a guide to lead the universal human to the Divine Vision.

http://www.enotes.com/nineteenth-century-criticism/jerusalem-emanation-giant-albion-william-blake