Religion vs. Spirituality

            When reading The Moonstone you quickly begin to see (or at least you should be seeing) plenty of things throughout that could be seen as opposites or juxtapositions; subjective knowledge vs. objective knowledge, belonging vs. otherness, men vs. women, and the list could go on. However, one of the juxtapositions that really caught my eye, especially in the end of the story, is the idea of religion vs. spirituality. In the novel this drastic difference is portrayed by Godfrey Ablewhite and Miss Clack for religion and the Indian trio for spirituality.

            Despite Miss Clack constantly referring to Godfrey as her ‘Christian hero’, throughout the novel we see that he simply cannot fill those shoes. In the beginning we are led to believe that he is at least an okay guy; he is well educated, a philanthropist, helps lead women’s charity groups, and may actually really love Rachel (though we know we were all rooting for Franklin). The evidence against him culminate throughout the novel as we see that the charities he is helping with are not that charitable, he has been embezzling money from a boy he has care over, he wanted to marry Rachel for the money, and to top it off, he is the one who truly stole the Moonstone! He uses his ‘Christianity’ as a cover for all the deplorable things he does. If he were not involved as he was, he would not have the opportunity to misuse the amount of trust placed in him.

            Miss Clack seems to be more consumed with religion and gossip than anything spiritual. She makes sure that she always attends church. She always leaves obnoxious pamphlets all over her friends’ and family’s homes in an attempt to save their immortal souls. She has no drama in her life and enjoys snooping into others at any given moment. She also makes sure that she helps out with charities, even though her main one is not that charitable. All the children have plenty of pants (too many actually), but the men have none and have to spend more money that they do not have to buy more, or miss work because they have no pants. Then we top that wonderful character off with a plentiful helping of piousness.

            At the end of the novel when we get to see the true sacrifice that our Indian trio went through is when we get a real picture of real spirituality. These men sacrificed their rather important stations in their society to act as performers to get closer to the precious relic. They sacrificed the comforts of their homeland. These misfortunes they whole heartedly accept for the good of their religion. Self-sacrifice was a necessity for the good of their religion. Now they will have to part ways and wander the land as pilgrims for the rest of their days, even though they succeeded in their quest. They were well aware of the consequences when they set out for the moonstone. None of this mattered. Could we ever see Godfrey or Drusilla (Miss Clack) ever going to these lengths for something spiritual, even though they parade themselves around as such spiritual people?