MALINIT, Camille Justine L.

PH103-G
The Plague

Philosophical Reflection of a Literary Work for Philosophy of Religion

Introduction
In a society that is ailing, one that was deeply challenged by a fatal
disease, Dr. Bernard Rieux was one of the few people in that society who
responded immediately. Evidently, he knew the gravity of the situation and he
expressed this concern despite the opposition and the cynicism he faced in
the presence of the board including Dr. Richard. When he did this, he proved
that he was dedicated to his vocation.
The word vocation, often associated with the word profession, must first
be differentiated. When one says vocation, it is more than just a job one takes
in order to make a living. Instead, it a state where what the society needs
intersects with the expertise of a person. Hence, in this case, in the time of
need for an intervention, not just medical intervention but an intervention in all
aspects of managing the plague, Dr. Rieux immediately saw that as a doctor,
he was obliged to do something to alleviate the plague. Here, one would see
that although situations like the plague could provoke the disbelief in a
religious sensibility, there is still an alternative, which says that it still makes
sense to belief in a higher being.
In the novel, having Dr. Rieux himself as the narrator of the entire book,
one would see that aside from spearheading the flow of operation in
managing the plague, he played a bigger role and that was being the absurd
hero. Of all the characters in the novel, he was the most aware. As a
consequence to this, he dealt not just with the technical aspects such as the
pathology and what could be done about the plague, but also the internal
question he had which were also reflected by the questions often brought up
by Tarrou. As the absurd hero, he had to shoulder the burden of confronting
the irrational and wild longing for clarity whose call echoes in the human
heart1. In this confrontation, he revolted by accepting this human condition.
This acceptance, however, did not translate to acquiescence and surrender

1
because doing to would mean giving in to the mortality of a person. By
acceptance, he knew that this this situation could lead to several endings,
some led to happiness, some to sadness or even to nothingness yet he
accepted this state. He did what he felt was necessary.

Exile and despair in the face of the plague

Upon seeing Oran, one might question why the plague would devastate
such a town that was so ordinary. Moreover, one would ask why a plague
would attack such a town that was not known for being one of those towns
infested with crimes and corruption. As the narrator said, he simply “couldn’t
believe that pestilence on the great scale could befall a town where people
like Grand were to be found, obscure functionaries cultivating harmless
eccentricities.2” At this point, one could catch a glimpse of what theodicy the
narrator as more likely to adhere to. In the meantime, one must first see the
magnitude of the plague in order to understand the sense of divine Dr. Rieux
had. This is not to say that the plague served as the switch that turned off the
belief of Dr. Rieux in a religious sensibility. The events that took place during
the plague are just a cross section or snapshot of the series of events that
might have lead to his religious disposition.
At this point, when the plague was taking its course, one would see how
this pestilence exiled the people in several ways. First, for the people who
caught the plague, they were put in a hospital to be treated. In addition to
that, they were not the only ones to suffer since their families were exiled in a
way as well. As a medical standard operating procedure, family members of
plague-stricken victims had to be quarantined and this was what happened to
M. Othon and his family, which was also true to other families. This is exile
because they were taken out of their homes, isolated in separate places, and
worst, they were forced to be without their loved ones. As for Rambert’s
situation together with other travelers that were unfortunately in Oran when
the plague struck, they were not allowed to leave town as to minimize the risk
of transmitting the disease. Similar to the locals of Oran, they were forced to
stay in a place and be with other people when they would rather be in their

2
homes with their loved ones. This is exile because they were coerced into this
situation, which they did not aim and definitely was not their goal.
At such moments, one would see that this exile entailed the collapse of
their courage, willpower, and endurance. Some of them felt like “they could
never drag themselves out of the pit of despondent into which they had
fallen.3”
Aside from being exiled through separation from family and loved ones,
exile could also take the form of poverty. People who are deep in poverty
never wanted to be in that situation. They never set being poor are their goal.
In the book, the plague aggravated this poverty because it provided an
avenue for the further widening of the gap between the rich and the poor. In
one of the chapter where Cottard and Rambert were talking about Rambert’s
possible escape from Oran, Cottard mentioned that he knew someone who
was hoarding goods which were intended to be sold during the peak of the
plague for a higher demand, hence the higher price. With arrangements like
this, poor people were either forced to give everything they had and be further
pushed towards impoverishment or starve. The poverty during the plague was
further evidenced by the fact that Dr. Rieux never ran out of people to dig the
graves, sanitize the coffins, and all similar dirty work even if people who take
on the jobs die. Despite the danger of contacting the disease, people still
signed up for the job because they needed the money. Indeed, the narrator
was right in saying that “poverty showed itself a stronger stimulus than fear,
especially owing to its risks, such work highly paid.4”
Aside from exile, the people were also burdened by despair and the most
evident kind of despair was brought about by their illness. For some, they
might have seen their illness as a closed door. As opposed to hope, which
entails a new beginning and something that allows the person to feel that
tomorrow is another day, despair makes the person feel that this illness
brought about by the plague is the end of her story. This means that when
she dies, the whole book of her life is closed off.
However, one could also look at this illness at a different perspective. As
for the case of Tarrou, his illness did not cause him as much despair
compared to the other people. When he was about to die, he did not show

3
any signs of loss or feeling that his death was going to be the end of his life.
Maybe, Tarrou was able to feel the fulfillment he was looking for in his search
for peace. In fact, as said at the last chapter of the novel when Dr. Rieux
revealed that he was the narrator, he mentioned that some people, Tarrou
being one of them, desired reunion with something they could not have
defined, but to them seemed the most desirable thing on earth and that
something was peace. Clearly, the disease he contacted was not everything
and it was not the end for him.

Dr. Rieux and the divine

Having specified a few of what happened during the plague, it now makes
sense to ask what sense of divine Dr. Rieux has, being the protagonist of the
novel.
When asked by Tarrou if he believed in God or not, Dr. Rieux bluntly
answered with a “No.” As mentioned earlier, the plague was not necessarily
the reason why Dr. Rieux was an atheist. In fact, even before the plague, he
was already an atheist. Throughout the novel, the narrator has been hinting
that Dr. Rieux did not believe in a religious sensibility.
One of the believers in the novel was the Jesuit Father Paneloux. At the
early stages of the plague, Father Paneloux gave a sermon, which compared
their situation to what happened in Exodus. In this setting, the people were
being punished for disobeying God. Initially, it would have been easy to
assume that Father Paneloux was leaning towards retribution. What this
doctrine implied was that the good people will be rewarded and the bad
people will be punished. Hence, this was similar to saying that the people who
were struck by plague were being punished for something they have done.
However, as the plague progressed and Father Paneloux himself caught the
disease, one would see that the priest was more inclined towards subscribing
to another theodicy, which is God’s plan. When he was about to die, he
refused to be taken to the hospital probably because he saw this as God’s
will. As said in one of his sermons:
“My brothers the love of God is a hard love. It demands total self-surrender,
disdain of or human personality. And yet it alone can reconcile us to suffering

4
 and the deaths of children, it alone can justify them, since we cannot
understand them, and we can only make God’s will ours.5”
Dr. Rieux was not willing to acquiesce to that notion of humility as prescribed
by Father Paneloux. Although Dr. Rieux knew that what he was doing could
be lead to nothingness after he dies, he still refused escape this confrontation
which he could have done through adhering to a religious sensibility, some of
which claim that there is life after death, that he can make sense of what he is
doing by seeing his place in the greater scheme of things.
In way, being an atheist, Dr. Rieux did not see the need for that escape.
What mattered for him was now. To some extent, one can even say that he
played god in some instances. He handled the plague and took it to his own
hands because for him, one grew out of pity when it was useless.
In his conversation with Tarrou, one would see how Dr. Rieux saw his
vocation. When he was asked about his belief in a God, the narrator said: “If
he believed in an all-powerful God he would cease curing the sick and leave
that to him.6”

The problem on suffering and evil

In one of the conversations between Dr. Rieux and Tarrou, that same
conversation on why the doctor does not believe in God, Tarrou asked him
who taught him this belief. At this point, the reason why Dr. Rieux did not
believe in a god was because of this teacher he called suffering. For him,
suffering was a teacher that taught him that refusing to believe in God is
better and the same goes with struggling with all their might against death
without raising their eyes toward the heaven where He sits in silence.
In a way, basing from what the doctor said, he sees evil and suffering as
the absence of action by the religious sensibility. For him, suffering and evil
would not happen if there were a God who, with all his might and power,
prevented the spread of this pestilence. To push it further, there would not be
suffering if there were a God who did not permit the existence of these evil
elements that are causing people like him to doubt his existence in the first
place. Another way of saying it is that there would be no suffering in this world
if there were a God who did not just sit in the heavens silently but instead did

5
something to combat this lack of justice. In sum, the novel sees evil as
something that comes from ignorance. Moreover, the novel believes that men
are more good than bad but as said, ignorance or the lack of understanding
causes much harm as malevolence despite the good intentions of man.
Hence, for Dr. Rieux it is up to him and to the people who have the ability
to help the people suffering to play god and do what that god fails to do in the
absence of justice.

Final insights
Seeing how the novel tackled the problem on evil and suffering, especially
seeing that Camus defended the alternative on not believing in a religious
sensibility quite well, one is deemed to ask whether it still makes sense to
believe in a God or not. The quick answer to this question would be “yes.” In
the face of suffering, it would still make sense to believe in a God because
believing in a God, although some might disagree, is a leap of faith. For some
people, believing in something is confused with knowing something. When
one believes, she takes a leap without knowing whether there is something to
catch her when she falls or at least something she will land on.
This is not to be confused with knowing because when one knows that
there is a God and she knows that everything is planned accordingly, that
would be religious optimism. This is a wrong way to believe because in a
sense, one who subscribes to this is already denying the existence of a
higher god. If one already knew that this is a part of the plan, then there would
be no sense in believing in God because that person already dictated that this
is the plan.
Another way not to believe is expecting that one deserves what she thinks
she deserves and that she has the right to demand them. This is not similar to
believing because there will be no nee for a God if one already knows what
she must have. In this case, there is no room for a God because she is
already all knowing.
To end, yes, one must not “believe” in the manner stated above.
However, we ask anyway because there is supreme dignity in our humbly
asking in full knowledge that this is something we ask of Him

6
References
Camus, A. (1955). The myth of Sisyphus, and other essays. New York:
Knopf.

Camus, A. (1991). The plague. New York: Vintage Books, pp.46-47.

Camus, A. (1991). The plague. New York: Vintage Books, p.72.

Camus, A. (1991). The plague. New York: Vintage Books, p.176.

Camus, A. (1991). The plague. New York: Vintage Books, p.127.