Wealth In Juan Jose Arreola's If Not Higher

Through the long, and complicated course of history, religion and the different aspects on it have been key to the way the world is today. Several people have different opinions on different cultures and populations, and how these conflicts affected, them; these people also include their own personal opinion. A couple of them, are authors, which use a made up situation, to express their opinions on the matter of religions, and the changes they have had trough time. Three stories, which are told in different countries with different beliefs, all achieve the same result, though the setting and means by which they accomplish it is unique for each story. If not Higher, by I.L Peretz, a Jewish story in the late 1800’s, contrasts the different
The author uses an experiment, in which he goes to great detail into, in order to distract, and make his point more subtle, but intriguing. Wealth is something that appeals to almost every human being in this earth. Arreola shows the conflict between Christian morals and the modern world perception of wealthy. While before wealth wasn’t thought of by money as much before, the world, and people depend on it these days. Arreola keeps poking at this problem by writing, “The total capital necessary cannot be known until the predictable end […] the subscribers should pay out the investment quotas patiently over the years.”(157). this shows that the author is trying to specify that the money invested into this (most likely to the rich people) is uncertain, although it is definite it will be expensive. The author expresses his opinion on this matter when he mentions, “But the possibility of a failure is even more attractive”(158) This is very interesting, since he is saying that even if the experiment fails, the people will go to heaven, because the wealth of people will have been lost, due to all the money invested in the experiment. Finally the author uses symbolism to show his outlook on Gods quote. The experiment represents this whole process, since the camel, which
All throughout the story, Gunga Ram believes that there is a snake that drinks the milk that he puts out every day as an offer, in return for sanctuary from the extremely venomous fangs of the snake. The young teenagers obviously think this is just superstition, and nothing else. They claim “‘You are a stupid old Brahmin’, I Said. ‘Don’t you know snakes don’t drink milk?”(77). the author adds to the notion of the Brahmin being full of superstition by describing several of the rituals that the Brahmin preforms. “Every morning he smeared his forehead with a V mark […] to him, all life was sacred.”(77). Thea author is describing these events in a negative connotation, because it is believed that the old Brahmin, like all old religious traditions, are no longer useful to the faith. However, when the snake gets captured and “killed” by the boys, the saucer full of milk is still full since there is no Kala Nag. This is when one can start to wonder, if this is really superstition after all, or if the old Brahmin is wise, rather than superstitious. Next, a big turn of events happens when in the middle of class, the capture of Kala Nag turns sour. The supposedly dead snake escapes in class, but when Gunga Ram shows up offering him some milk, the snakes kills him anyways. This shows an interesting point of view