Religious Themes in Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

While not every scholar and critic fully accepts the theory that Robert Louis Stevenson (often known as "Louis" in reference works) was "obsessed" with religious themes and images, most scholarship focuses on why the author highlighted his characters as he did, and on the obvious juxtapositions within the text. Clearly, however, Stevenson did frequently allude to spiritual and religious themes — sometimes with subtlety, other times with stark language or even shocking imagery. The obvious themes of good versus evil are present throughout, but within those themes an alert reader can detect Stevenson's seeming rebellion against the dogma he was raised with. This paper points to those references and allusions and also provides background into Stevenson's troubled life, which is a vitally important key to understanding why he drew so heavily on spiritual and religious topics.

Raised in a strict Puritanical environment — his parents were devoted members of a Presbyterian congregation — Stevenson rebelled against their wish that he become an engineer. Calvinism was a philosophy that placed God's sovereignty at the highest possible position in society. God was all-powerful and absolute, according to Calvinist dogma, and everything had been predetermined by God. This belief system was apparently a turn-off for a creative writer with a wild imagination like Stevenson. No doubt the writer felt that the religious doctrines dominant among the nineteenth-century European middle class amounted to social repression. It seems likely that Stevenson was repelled by what he perceived as a kind of moral dichotomy — people simply did not live up to their high-minded religious standards — and the result of that disillusionment can be seen in the weirdness and depravity of Mr. Hyde.

In his childhood, Stevenson endured significant health difficulties. His mother Margaret, daughter of a Presbyterian minister, suffered from a respiratory problem that apparently passed to Robert. During his painful coughing spells, his mother would read stories to him in the early mornings. "Because many of the stories were about hell and damnation and were told when he was feverish, he was often tormented by nightmares" (Stefan, 1993). These experiences may well explain Stevenson's antipathy toward organized religion and his use of religious references as irony or protest throughout his work.

W.J. Dawson explains that there are novelists who possess "a religious sense, and those who are destitute of it" (Dawson, 1896). Those with a sense of religion and spirituality tend to "spoil their art by making it the abject vehicle of something they want to teach," Dawson explains (p. 2). In other words, novelists with a religious agenda risk becoming didactic. Those without any religious sense tend to "fail of the most difficult success, because when they come to the greatest episodes of life they lack spirituality" (Dawson, p. 2). Some degree of spirituality, in other words, is still necessary for this second category of writer.

As to Stevenson, Dawson places him in neither of these two classes, because Stevenson never professes that he has "anything to teach" and is not tempted toward didacticism. The one thing Stevenson focuses on is telling the story as thoroughly and as completely as possible — in, as Dawson explains, "a most perfect manner." And even though Stevenson does not fall into either category, his ethical views emerge clearly in his essays, and in his novels he proves himself a "moralist or nothing" (Dawson, p. 2). Indeed, Stevenson can "rarely escape the pressure of those profound and serious thoughts which constitute religion"; the "subtle element of religion" helps give his "great scenes" the power that has been recognized through the years (Dawson, p. 2).

Dawson asserts that it is not so much the plot of Jekyll and Hyde that holds readers "spellbound," but rather "the moral drama" the story brings to the fore. The mystery of "human sin" and the intricacies of "human motive" give the story its spiritual power.

On page two of the book, the lawyer Mr. Utterson states, "I incline to Cain's heresy…I let my brother go to the devil in his own way." This passage references Genesis Chapter 4; Cain killed his brother Abel, and God asked where Abel had gone. Cain replied in a demanding tone, "Am I my brother's keeper?" Like Cain, Mr. Utterson is rejecting the notion that he bears responsibility for others. Utterson would let fools create their own demise, he is saying. This passage on page two can also be read as foreshadowing of later events in the book, since Jekyll ultimately has to destroy Hyde in order to save the world from evil.

Utterson seems to embody a Christian perspective in his portion of the narrative. Some scholars believe that Utterson's name is itself a pun by Stevenson — after all, he is the last one to "utter" the story's central revelations. Utterson does not know that Jekyll is Hyde; he believes that Hyde has somehow appeared to punish Jekyll for his wild youth. "He was wild when he was young; a long while ago to be sure; but in the law of God, there is no statute of limitations" (pp. 19–20). The lawyer goes on to suggest that Jekyll may be punished for "some old sin, the cancer of some concealed disgrace" (p. 20). Once again, a strong religious theme runs through Stevenson's prose.