Draft one of Revelation Essay

Revelations happen to everyone. A revelation is to realize some great truth about the world, to come to your senses so to speak. There are many kinds of revelations, you can have a slow personal revelation, which means you slowly relize something over a period of time, or you can have a spontaneous revelation which is a fast world view changing event. One repeated type of revelation is the trope revelation. A trope is an image, saying, sterotype, ect. that is repeated through out the world and throughout media. An example of a trope would be a mad scientist (tons of movies have a mad scientist character, such as professor frink from the simpsons) or a dumb fat sidekick (like the sidekick from the movie Hot Fuzz.) A revelation trope is a type of revelation that is repeated throughout media and stories such as the movie foxfire and even the bible.

Though the revelation trope can be seen in many different stories it always follows the same basic outline with the same basic requirements: “(1) The ignorant masses are in a (2) unacceptable/oppressive situation when a (3) prophet tries to (4) share the message (5) that connects the dots in a new way (6) and offers a vision of a redeemed world (7) but there is opposition to the message (8) drama ensues.” These eight steps/requirments are held true by various different pieces of art and literature that all follow the same outline for the revelation trope. These steps can be seen clearly in the movie “Foxfire”, which can be used to explain what each step/requirement is. (1) The ignorant high school students (mainly the girls) (2) are being oppressed and harassed by their teachers when (3) Boots (the main prophet character, played by Angelina Jolie) tries to (4) beat up this teacher who harasses them (5) and stand up together (6) so that they wont be harassed any more. (7) But some of the girls deny that any harassing is going on (8) they beat the crap out of their harassing teacher. Foxfire follows the revelation trope exactly, and is the perfect example of the trope.

The most well know revelation trope story is the story of Jesus, and the book of Mark. This story also follows the stages of the revelation trope: (1) The poor masses, the farmers, the oppressed, ect. (2) are being oppressed by the higher powers, Herod and his men, the high priests, ect. (3) Jesus (4) tells them about how to live (5) that reconnects all the teachings of religion in a new way (6) and offers a vision of the kingdom of god, which can be made here on earth by following Jesus and his teaching. (7) But the high priests do not like what Jesus is teaching, and believe Jesus is trying to usurpe their power (8) so they kill Jesus. The Book of Mark is the prime example of a revelation trope and also shows us features that aren’t obvious in other works. By looking at the book or mark we are able to see more patterns about the revelation trope emerge. For example John the Baptist is a the prophet who comes before Jesus and fortells of Jesus’ coming. This early prophet who fortells/is obsessed with the main prophet is a trend that arises throughout a lot of revelations trope stories.

Another place where we can see this early prophet is in the Matrix. The Matrix, like the Book of Mark, follows the revelation trope to the dot: (1) The entirety of the human race (2) is stuck in a computer program run by machines when (3) Morpheus (4) tells Neo that the world is a lie (5) and shows how everything Neo knows is fake (6) and shows Neo the real world, (7) but the machines try to stop him (8) and huge fight scenes occur. The Matrix is a special case. In the form written about Morpheus is the main prophet and the John the Baptist character (aka the early prophet) would be the first one, the original Neo, who broke the system and freed the first groups of people, but it can be debated that Morpheus is the early prophet and that Neo himself the main prophet. Either way this revelation trope still follows the same pattern and also has the same idea of an ‘early prophet’ as the book of Mark.

Another pattern that emerges originally from the Jesus story is the prophets sacrifice for spreading his/her message. Aside from the sacrifice overall of the negative reaction to his/her message the prophets family is often negatively affected by the prophets actions. In the gospel of Mark Jesus also faces family sacrifices: “31Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. 32 A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, ‘Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.’ 33 ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ he asked. 34 Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said ‘Here are my mother and brothers!’” Jesus in a sense renounces his family for the sake of his message, causing his family to make sacrifices for his actions. This sacrifice of family is faced by many prophets of the revelation trope, a prime example is An Enemy of the people, by Henrik Ibsen.

An Enemy of the People follows the basic formula of the revelation trope. The revealer is DR. Thomas Stockmann, who tries to share the message with the ignorant masses that the compact majority (the ignorant masses he is trying to spread the message too) is in fact always wrong on decisions, and that the few intellectuals are always right (himself). He reconnects the dots: the compact majority is not educated and cannot think for themselves, in a democratic system the compact majority makes decisions, the few intellectuals get drowned out by the majority of fools. And shows the idea of a society run by intellectuals. Unfortunatly the compact majority takes this as and insult and completely rejects him dubbing him an “enemy of the people,” and as a result him and his family come under attack by the town. This is where we can see the pattern of the family taking sacrifices for the prophets message. In Enemy of the people, the doctors family, after the message has been shared, gets fired from their jobs, kicked out of school, and discriminated against for the prophets message: Petra, the prophets daughter, gets fired from her job: “Yes. I’ve been given my notice.” Similar things happen to the prophets father, and sons. It is clear that the prophets family suffers from the reacting to the prophets message, but it brings up the question, is it worth it for a man with a family to try to share a message. According to Dr. Thomas Stockmann’s brother, the mayor of the town they live in, it is not worth it: “A man with a family has no right to be carrying on as you are. You have no right, Thomas.” A man’s family should always come before his own personal message. The mayor is correct in that fact that while a prophet can share his message, he must always look out for his family so they do not come under too much harm. While the mayor is correct, prophet figures tend to disregard this fact. Jesus disregarded his family for the sake of his message, and Dr. Stockmann never held back his case for the sake of his family (despite the fact that his wife tried to get him to stop).