There have been times of misfortune for everyone, some large and some small. When these uncontrollable miseries fell upon people, they inevitably came to ask: do they deserve this suffering? If there is God, is He truly just and fair? Herman Melville, in his whaling novel, Moby Dick, speaks directly to these questions. Captain Ahab, having lost a leg to the infamous white whale, also loses his reverence and faith for God. He believes that God is an unjust monarch and he must end injustice by slaying the whale. However, the ego-bound captain has himself become the unjust king of the ship, bringing down all his crew along with his own downfall, while God has justly ruled, sparing those who follow His command. Melville conveys that God is just and fair, so by following his plan one will eventually earn the goodness he deserves; but if one concludes the contrary and becomes defiant to God, he deserves only punishment, which God also righteously gives.

Melville explains the reasoning behind the belief that God is unjust through Ahab and his obsession over killing Moby Dick, the white whale. Throughout the novel, the white whale has been a deified figure for all of the whalers. Whoever encounters it invariably falls into misery, so that with time it becomes the symbol of fatality. Those whom the whale passes sentence on, are marked with an indelible fear of it and the seas. Some others are awestricken by its unparalleled magnitude, speed, and heavenly intelligence, so decide to worship Moby Dick as their God. Captain Ahab neither fears nor worships, but hates, most desperately, the Leviathan. He explains this unnatural feeling: “How can the prisoner reach outside except by thrusting through the wall? To me, the white whale is that wall, shoved near to me……He tasks me; he heaps me; I see in him outrageous strength, with an inscrutable malice sinewing it. That inscrutable thing is chiefly what I hate.” (Melville, Moby Dick, pg. 259) So enormous is the whale, and so little is Ahab, that a mere thought of its figure diminishes Ahab’s own identity. Yet the almighty whale still takes his leg with just a flap of its tail; it is very much an inscrutable, unreasonable, and even careless judgement, for a case insignificant to the judge but momentous to the subject. This deeply insults Ahab, who reasons that if it is God, it is Him most condescending and unjust, to pass such sentence without a proper trial. To this God, he concludes: “thy right worship is defiance.” (Melville, Moby Dick, pg. 759) Ahab’s reasoning exemplifies that of many people when faced with misfortune, and among them, many chose, like Ahab does, to mute God’s orders and focus entirely on their own, which for the captain is to kill Moby Dick. This extreme focus on himself became the ultimate source of confidence for that he, Ahab, is destined to slay the Leviathan and by that all evil.

However, Melville then proves that Ahab’s belief and suffering are all results of his own illusion, not of God’s alleged injustice. First, he mistakenly considers himself a “prisoner” limited by the whale. This is tantamount to saying that the sky limits the earth only because the sky is above it. The reality is that Ahab is so insignificant; his encounter with Moby Dick does not make him less, but only helps him see himself truthfully. Yet his excessive ego, which protects his bloated self from the truth, like a balloon from a needle, distorts the mind to believe that Moby Dick is evil and therefore the cause of his suffering. The first mate on the ship, Starbuck, has questioned Ahab’s twisted goal: “Vengeance on a dumb brute! That simply smote thee from blindest instinct! Madness!” (Melville, Moby Dick, pg. 258) Starbuck points out that the whale is irrational, so it can’t have an intent nor be evil, but Ahab does not listen. To him, the act of seeking vengeance brings him at least to the equal level as the Leviathan, which satisfies his ego. Secondly, Ahab erringly believes he is destined and thus able to defeat Moby Dick. Even when events challenge his belief, he still holds it adamantly. For instance, Ahab always believes that the doubloon, an award for the first person to sight Moby Dick, is his, as directed by fate. However, one harpooner, Tashtego, sees the whale and calls it out before him. Maddened, he asserts without any basis: “Not the same instant; not the same–no, the doubloon is mine, Fate reserved the doubloon for me. I only; none of ye could have raised the White Whale first.” (Melville, Moby Dick, pg. 818) Still, he cannot acknowledge that it is not his destiny to catch the whale. Moreover, fate not only seems weak in supporting his goal, but also has it worked against his scheme. Few days prior to the sighting, Ahab’s compass breaks during the storm. Next morning, he discovers that his ship has been travelling the wrong direction for an entire night. This can be God’s invisible hand trying to stop Ahab’s self-destruction, but he does not listen. Even when all his navigational tools, the compass, the quadrant, and the log and line, breaks, he keeps sailing to his end. He is able to keep his blind faith in destiny by ignoring the dozens of bad omens that try to change his mind. Because of this faith, he is confident in his ability to kill Moby Dick, overlooking his ferocity and cunningness. Driven by these illusions which he has created and fallen in, Ahab finally confronts Moby Dick only to get himself killed, by the whale line attached to the very harpoon he himself darts. It is clear that each step Ahab has chosen to take leads him to his own death. He in every way deserves the torments along the way and to be at last killed literally by himself.

            Yet death and suffering of the sinner aren’t the sole part of God’s justice. Having done all that he can to kill Moby Dick and to end all evil, he becomes the only evil that haunts everyone around him; with all the power, he becomes an immoral and unjust ruler in other people’s lives. To pursue the whale, he leaves her young newly wedded wife at home for years, who has to live the undeserved life of a widow, even when he is alive. Later, when captain Gardiner, whom Ahab acquaints and has received direction from, pleas him to help search for the missing son, he cruelly refuses. At the end, almost all his shipmates die from the hunt, only because his selfish leadership. In seeking one justice, he destroys all justice. This is the ironic life Ahab has led, through which the divine justice is manifested: those who defy God only destroys goodness, therefore they do not deserve nor attain any goodness themselves.

            Moreover, Melville demonstrates that because God is just and fair, by following his plan one will eventually earn the goodness he deserves. Ishmael, the lone survivor of Ahab’s crew, has attained goodness in his life through God’s work. He contributes it to his ability to follow God: “For all have doubts; many deny; but doubts or denials, few along with them, have intuitions. Doubts of all things earthly, and intuitions of some things heavenly; this combination makes neither believer nor infidel, but makes a man who regards them both with equal eye.” (Melville, Moby Dick, pg. 570) These heavenly intuitions have led Ishmael to become happy. In the beginning, he appears depressed and lethargic with his life. But by intuitively following God to be on this whaling journey, he is able to acquaint his best friend and ultimately attain joy, even at times doing the menial jobs on the ships, such as squeezing sperm oil. Similarly, Captain Boomer of the Samuel Enderby, who also bears the loss of one limb from hunting Moby Dick, can live a jolly life by following such intuition. “He’s welcomed to the arm he has,” he says to Ahab, “since I can’t help it, and didn’t know him then; but not to another one. No more White Whales for me; I’ve lowered for him once, and that has satisfied me.” (Melville, Moby Dick, pg. 669) Two more times he then encounters the Leviathan and chooses not to attack, and both times it leaves his ship in peace. If he had been overtaken by his ego like Ahab, he and his crew would not have survived. Melville shows the justice in God’s work through the experiences of Ishmael and Boomer, as opposed the tragedy of Ahab.

            Through the story of Moby Dick, Melville reveals the universal truth that God is ultimately just and gives His people what they deserve. Following God will bring goodness and meaning into people’s lives, even after times of misfortune, while presumptuously disobeying Him to become self-dominant will invariably lead to self-destruction. This message relates directly to the present pandemic, which like Moby Dick, brought sufferings that were out of people’s control. But people can make the crucial choice, either following or disobeying God. Some is bloated because of their ego, so that they would not yield one bit of freedom even for the health of their community and their own. Others let their ego down, to follow intuitively the proper conduct. Amongst these two types of people, the former endured much more miseries than the latter, only to repeat captain Ahab’s monomaniacal hunt of Moby Dick.