Daniel Deronda's early books focused on Gwendolen Harleth, who shines as a self-centered and domineering young woman. By allowing herself to be trapped by her marriage to Grandcourt, she develops a growing fascination with Daniel, an attraction that began when they met in the first pages of the book. Daniel's influence on Gwendolen causes her to evolve her ego and become a better woman, and Gwendolen eventually falls in love with him. Unfortunately for Gwendolen, Daniel realizes that despite his attraction to her, his love rests with the Jewish girl, Mirah, and Gwendolen's fate remains undecided. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essayEliot had started the novel with Gwendolen, and then described many scenes of Gwendolen's dependent relationship with Daniel, so naturally both the readers and the characters in the story. , can imagine a possible love story between the two. However, Eliot makes it clear in Book VIII that a romance with Gwendolen is incompatible with Daniel's discovery of his Jewish origins. Using language that equates marriage with a spiritual union, Eliot points out that Daniel's soul has a distance from Gwendolen's that precludes any satisfactory marriage between the two and, further, she suggests that for Daniel and Mordecai, Faithful Jewish characters, religion and marriage are closely linked. for they involve similar acts of union of souls. We first see the overt religious division between Daniela and Gwendolen at the beginning of Book VIII, when Mirah feels misplaced jealousy toward Daniel's relationship with Gwendolen, who has the appropriate rank and English knowledge that she lacks. Mirah believes that “the perceived attachment between Deronda and Madame Grandcourt” would certainly “end in their future marriage” (732). On the other hand, she simultaneously upholds the contradictory conviction that Gwendolen “seemed a different kind of being than Deronda, something alien that would disrupt her life instead of blending into it” (733). Aside from their personality differences, the aspect of Deronda's character that causes this alienation lies in her ties to Judaism. Although Mirah does not yet know his parentage, she already associates him with Judaism due to his continued interest in that religion and his potential role as a disciple of Mordecai. She concludes that “the relationship between Deronda and her brother” is “incongruous with any close connection with Madame Grandcourt” (733). Despite her initial misconception that Daniel and Gwendolen are in a romantic relationship, Mirah remains aware that a marriage between the two would not be in harmony with Judaism's hold on Daniel's life. While Mirah doubts Daniel's love for her, Daniel in turn doubts Mirah's love. love for him, even after discovering that he is Jewish. When arguing with a dejected Hans about Mirah, he says that he has "'very little hope'" of being Mirah's lover despite Hans's beliefs to the contrary (784). This suggests that the romantic depth of Daniel and Mirah's relationship remains unchanged even after his parentage is revealed, as he does not see himself as more attractive to her as a lover. However, the "newly discovered charter" of his "inherited right" gives him the potential and ability to marry Mirah, which previously would have been impossible even if they had recognized each other (744). . He knows that their relationship is no different outwardly, but “his relationship with Mordecai” brings him “a new closeness to Mirah” despite “no apparent change in his position toward her” (745). Afterhaving also learned of her parentage, Mirah also feels this "suddenly revealed feeling of closeness" because Daniel's Jewish birthright allows her to inhabit the same religious plane as Mirah and Mordecai, an intangible but important difference for her (751 ). Eliot's choice of spatial words like "proximity" and "position" contrast with the abstract ideas presented, but they allow the reader to justify the changes in Daniel's relationship with Mirah. Although they are no closer in love or space, their souls now live under the same God, a closeness that cannot arise organically because Jews can only be born, not created. Feeling closer to Mirah and Mordecai, Daniel's new ties of "love and duty" to Judaism prevent him from pursuing any impulse to love Gwendolen, which might have been a reality earlier in the history (765). When Daniel and Gwendolen first met at the casino, they were fascinated and occupied with each other, and their reunion intriguing, amid Gwendolen's problems with Grandcourt and Daniel's involvement with the Lapidoths , were a central point of the story. Daniel even admits that a year ago, "he would hardly have asked himself if he loved her", and he would have wanted to "save her from sorrow" and "complete the rescue he had started to the end." in this monitor”. redemption of the necklace” (765). However, the deepening connection Daniel feels with the Lapidoths makes him realize that he and Gwendolen differ on a fundamental level. The “strength of the bond” which binds him to his Jewish brothers “keeps him separated from her” (765). Once again, Eliot invokes a spatial distinction, according to which Gwendolen and Daniel are separate, or “separated.” Unlike the Jewish characters, Gwendolen does not believe in a crucial difference between Daniel's soul and her soul. After Daniel tells her about his Jewish parentage, she asks, “'What difference must it have made?… You look just as if you weren't Jewish'” (801-802). Gwendolen's view is that of the conventional English reader of the time, who would be expected to be unfamiliar with the necessity of unity in a Jewish marriage. They may be prejudiced against a Jewish-English marriage for other reasons, but they do not see the same fundamental difference as Mirah and Daniel. In fact, other characters, including Sir Mallinger and Hans, have the same view as Gwendolen: when they learn of Daniel's Jewish heritage, they continue to believe that Daniel will marry Gwendolen. In the end, Gwendolen and Grandcourt married out of necessity, and the Klesmers out of pure love, but Daniel and Mirah arrive at marriage in the wake of religious and romantic unity. In contrast to his distance from Gwendolen, when Daniel proposes to Mirah, he proclaims that they “can have neither sorrow, nor shame, nor joy apart” (792). The marriage between them is a true union of their souls, as Daniel desires to accept her fully into himself. Eliot emphasizes the theme that since marriage for Jews unites their souls, they must accept every part of each other, including evil. After Mr. Lapidoth steals her diamond ring, Daniel tells Mirah in his proposal that he will even consider her father his own, a belief that results from his complete love for Mirah. Mordecai also embodies this ideal of total acceptance after Mirah faces the loathsome return of their father. Mordecai tries to console her by saying that the good they have inherited allows them to "feel evil", which are two opposites that are "related to them", such as "'[their] father was married to [their] mother'" (743). Mordecai accepts Mr. Lapidoth's wrongdoing as necessary to his identity, as somethingwhich he inherited; Daniel accepts it as a necessary part of marriage to Mirah since it is part of Mirah's identity. Their faithful Jewish perspective views marriage not as blind love between two people, but as a conscious appreciation of good and evil, because both are the result of God's will. work. Eliot extrapolates this into sacred religious doctrine by comparing Mordecai's consoling speech to Mirah to "a rabbi transmitting the phrases of an ancient age" (743). In teaching Mirah to understand the religious significance of marriage, Mordecai is like the rabbi who said: "'the Omnipresent is busy making marriages happen'" and "by marriages was meant all the marvelous combinations of the universe of which the outcome is our good and our evil” (743). Eliot makes clear here that this perspective on marriage applies to all Jews throughout time, not just the characters in his story. Moreover, by specifying the distinctive nature of Jewish doctrine, it differentiates the views of Mordecai and Daniel from those of the typical Englishman. Although not an observant Jew, even Mirah's father recognizes the symbolism of marriage in accepting both good and evil in Judaism. When he begs to live with his children again, he turns to Mirah and leans on her faith in marriage and his respect for his mother. He says that Mrs. Cohen would have forgiven him because “thirty-four years ago, [he] put the ring on her finger under the Chuppa, and [they] became one” (777). Mirah then exclaims that he should stay, and Mordecai does not disagree with her, despite his vehement dislike for his father. Even though Mirah and Mordecai are not enthusiastic about their father staying, they give him the chance to experience his apology and his eventual path to forgiveness. He had wronged them greatly, even pushing Mirah to the brink of suicide, but the implication that their mother would have forgiven him causes the children to accept him a little longer. At one time, mother and father were "one," and children always hope that the enduring goodness of their mother's soul can outweigh the evil of their father's. Judaism not only brings Daniel closer to Mirah and further away from Gwendolen. , but also to find a higher meaning in one's own life. After discovering his parentage, Mirah "had taken her place in his soul as a beloved type - reducing the power of other fascinations" in Gwendolen, which he said tended "to arouse in him the enthusiasm of self-martyr pity rather than that of personal compassion.” love” (744-5). He felt a duty to Gwendolen that eclipsed any potential love he felt, and while aware that Gwendolen's "soul clung to his with passionate need", he realized that his own soul needed of “the closer communion” of “men of the same heritage”. » (765). The idea of ​​Daniel's "self-martyrdom pity" and his desire to help those in need is woven throughout the novel as he saves Gwendolen, Hans, and Mirah in one way or another. other, and he struggles with his inability to save Gwendolen from her marriage to Grandcourt. With the change of destiny in his relationship with Mordecai, he finds a new vocation, that of saving the multitudes of Jews in the diaspora. In the same way that his Jewish identity gives him the opportunity to marry Mirah, Daniel now has the ability to nurture his wandering soul toward a fulfilling vocation. Eliot describes many similarities between Daniel's marriage to Mirah and his new religious vocation. In the scene in which Daniel reveals his parentage, he enthusiastically tells Mordecai that they "'have the same people'" and that their "'souls have the same vocation'" (748). This moment of.