Rime of the Ancient Mariner

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner A parable is a story that is told to teach lessons or principles. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge can be seen as one. The story is very similar to The Parable of the Wedding Banquet in the Bible by Saint Matthew, narrated by Jesus Christ. The Ancient Mariner is quite similar to Jesus Christ, the teacher, but also the student. The crew turns on him as soon as things turn bad, similar to how some of Christ's followers lost faith when he didn't perform a miracle during his crucifixion. He is a student because in order for him to gain salvation, he needs to understand why he was punished and teach others from his example to atone for his sins. The parable in the bible elaborates to not belittle Christ's sacrifice and his offer to deliverance and to not neglect preparation for heaven since heaven is already prepared for you. The story beings with “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding. The king invites many people but the first ones ignore him, or killed his servants. The later ones are unworthy of being there. “For many are invited, but few are chosen.” The albatross could be an invitation to good fortune since it is considered a good omen. However, the ancient mariner rejects this invitation by killing off the bird for no apparent reason, just like how the king's servants gets killed. He gets punished for it just like the invited who kills the king's servants. The rest of the crew did care about the bird at first but then became indifferent to its death so they are still unworthy of being invited. The Ancient Mariner is akin to Jesus. He attracts the attention of a nearby wedding guest and proceeds to tell his parable, intending to preach. The mariner differs from Jesus because he is a character of his own parable and he learns his own lesson that is being taught. He is overconfident they would go through the ocean without any problems and shoots the albatross, a symbol of good things to come. The bird was a blessing that seemingly appear out of thin air. At this point, he is like the people who were invited in the parable of the wedding banquet. He didn't give any care about the bird which the sailors knew were a good omen. At the end of his parable, he says farewell to the wedding guest and “To thee, thou Wedding- Guest! He prayth best, who loveth best. All things both great and small; For the dear God who loveth us, He made and loveth all.” The moral of this parable is to love and admire all things that God made, big or small, or man or animal. God created life to be savored, but the Mariner ignores that and endangered his crew by killing the good omen. Thus, he committed mass murder by proxy and was punished. The sea becomes his prison. He drifts along with the albatross around his neck until he realized how great the living creatures were. “O happy living things! no tongue their beauty might declare: A spring of love gush'd from my heart, and I bless'd them unaware: Sure my kind saint took pity on me and I bless'd them unaware. The selfsame moment I could pray; And from my neck so free The Albatross fell off, and sank like lead into the sea.”
Then the necklace snapped off and the bird joined the creatures in the sea which he used to believe were disgusting. Since the bird is a good omen and fell into the water, the sea creatures can now be considered good omens. The mariner realizes this as he gazes into the water, causing the bird to fall. The mariner is more like Jesus when the crew turns on him. The crew can also represent all of humanity and sheep. They followed their Jesus to the end, but betrayed him when things become horrible. Killing the bird at first brought some good signs, and the crew were pleased, but then everything drastically worsened. Jesus did miracles and made people joyous, but didn't when he was condemned to crucifixion. They turned on the ancient mariner and blamed him for everything happening. Christ ended up suffering on the cross before he went to heaven. When he died, many lost faith in him. Only when he was resurrected that his followers learned that he died for them and will come back when it is time. The mariner is cursed to suffer at sea until it was time for him to return and spread the lesson he learned. The mariner is both the teacher and the student in his parable. While Jesus didn't need to gain forgiveness, the mariner has to go teach as many people as he can in order to relieve himself of the trauma he has caused by killing the albatross. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a parable because the mariner wanted to teach that you should appreciate all creation. The albatross was a blessing of God and a good omen to the sailors, but he killed it with no warning. The crew turned on him, but as soon as things turned a bit better, they didn't care for the bird. Eventually everyone was killed but the man cursed with the body of the albatross. He drifted in the sea until he gained forgiveness from the spirits for killing the bird and learned to appreciate the creatures at sea. The mariner is similar to Christ because he is playing the role of the teacher, but he also plays the role of the student.