The Use of the Bible in Two Selected Novels of Steinbeck

Abstract

The Bible has long inspired artists of every descriptions to portray our fallible human life. Many sections of the Bible are made up of narrative, it is natural that its influences will find their ways into a rang of literature. There are some novels that put biblical chapters into different contexts, and others use biblical themes without acknowledging the debt to the Bible. Steinbeck’s East of Eden is not the only novel to use the Cain- Able and prodigal son stories, Jeffery Archer also used the same theme in his Kane and Able. There are other themes inspired from the Bible that strongly bound up in human life, such as: building Soloman’s temple or Noah’s Ark, the stories of men’s and women’s betrayals ; Eve’s seducing Adam to eat from the forbidden tree; Abraham preparing to sacrifice his son, all these are common themes in English Literature.