esther rodgers

Believing- Esther Rogers is told before her execution that if she believes in Jesus, she will be saved, which interestingly removes her from the whole dilemma of crime and punishment and places her problem in the larger realm of religion.  It is also contrary to the idea of God espoused in the introduction to Pillars of Salt, which argued that the judicial system saw itself as carrying out God’s will.  Here, a concept of religious right and wrong emerges as one drastically different form the one upheld by the justice system: believers are in the right, and non-believers in the wrong: “whoever believeth shall be saved” (101).  Her dying words express a sort of comfort in the fact that she has at last found religion, and thus hope, even while minutes away from certain death.

 

Mercy- Before her death, Esther is continually asking God for mercy, something that the justice system has already denied her.  She is so caught up with the idea that her belief in God will be her salvation that even though she admits that “my sins have deserved Hell”, she seems to expect a divine pardon, as “whosoever believeth on thee shall never dye” (107).  This obviously religious speech (and text in general), makes almost no reference to Esther’s guilt or innocence or to the fairness of her sentence or her trial: the religious aspect of punishment and redemption seems to become important only when hope of earthy redemption and mercy have failed.

 

Deserve- Esther repeats that she deserves both to die and to go to hell, although she dies asking God for mercy, something the public admires her for.  The question of what Esther “deserves” is another interesting difference between the two concepts of relationships between God and the judicial system: either the justice system is doing God’s work, what God would sentence criminals for if he could, or the justice system simply gives people what they “deserve”, not, as God would, something merciful, good, or kind.  This separation of goodness and justice, demonstrated by Esther’s appeal to God, is an interesting aspect of the vilification of the penal system.