Beowulf is a complexity to say the very least. This is one of the few recorded narratives that contains two clashing themes. The main reason why this happens is due to the small matter of two authors helping create the final product we have before us. The scop’s purpose when originally orally told was to inform society about its collective beliefs and its shared history. Hundreds of years later a Christian monk recorded this oral epic onto text with noticeable alterations to fit his purpose of spreading Christianity’s beliefs and values to society. This gap between the two author’s purposes is made even more blatant due to the egregious amount of time between the original oral poem and the altered version of the poem that was recorded by the …show more content…
The scop taught people about how to become a good king, how to stay a good king, how to gain your fortune, and how to follow the Heroic Code. When the scop taught those how to be a king, how to become apart of the Comitatus, it gives the impression that the people he would be telling this too had a lust for status. Lusting for power is a clear contraction to the Bible and the messages of Christianity as a whole. After Beowulf had slain the beast, his Comitatus had received rewards as well as the narrative says, “The chieftain went on to reward the others: / Each man on the bench who had sailed with Beowulf / And risked the voyage received a bounty , / Some treasured possession. And compensation” (ln.1049-1052). Despite the Comitatus not actually doing anything to Grendel during the battle, they still received a hefty reward for simply being his Comitatus and sailing with him. This shows that you should be actively striving to gain the Comitatus position. This is not only encouraging lust for power, but as well as encouraging the means to gain this