The Robe

The Robe

Introduction

“The Robe” is the fiction story written by Lloyd C. Douglas. The whole story in this book is centered on the Jesus. The fiction created in this story by giving Robe the power of good and evil. This book has the capability of changing one's mind regarding spirituality. There is plot, emotions, and nuances in characters that make the reader take an interest in reading this book. Douglas put great effort in writing this historical fiction. It is not necessary that each historical fiction book would admire by the readers. Douglas tried hard to make the characters alive in this historical fiction in order to attract readers.

Discussion

Lloyd Cassel Douglas was born at August 27, 1877. He was an American minister. He was among famous authors of his time. Although, he did not start to write any novel until he was 50. He received his A.M degree in 1903 and then, he was ordained in the Lutheran Ministry. He was also the director of religious work of University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 1911 to 1915. After 1915, he became the minister of “The First Congregational Church”. His works were the masterpieces of that time. Majority of his contribution reflected the religious perspective of his life. He has written novels in different religious tones. “The Robe” brought much success to him. Around two million copies of this book sold without any reprint edition. His last book was the biography written by himself as Time to Remember. This book reflected all his life through childhood, education and ministry periods.

Douglas received around 100 letters per week from his fans because he had become popular after starting writing novels. One of letters from his fans became the inspiration to write such a historical fiction as “The Robe”. Douglas began to work on the novel when Hazel McCann who was the department store clerk asked Douglas about Christ's garments after the crucifixion. The idea came in the mind of Douglas when he heard from the Woman in Ohio that if he had ever heard the about the Roman soldier, who had won the Jesus' robe through a game of dice.

Spiritual Content

In this book, the whole story is revealed around “Jesus”. There are many stories found related to Jesus in this book. Many of these stories may be true or may not true. Biblical stories are delivered from Demetrius' or Marcellus' perspective. Some parts of the story are not very clear to readers, and readers are confused after reading those parts. In this historical fiction, there are good dialogues but few dialogues show disrespect such as the dialogue between Marcellus and another Roman, Jehovah is greatly insulted. This showed the Roman behavior towards Jews. Some parts of the book are not clear like Douglas says at one location that someone as old as Jehovah, and just as cross". The theology of this historical fiction is not very clear, but it reflected that Jesus is the Divine Son of God. The moral of the story tends ...