What is The Beast?

Beelzebub depicted I'm  Collin de Plancy's dictionnaire in 1825

This same photo is on the cover of The Lord of the Flies

What is The Beast? A rather vague question that can have many different answers. Throughout out the novel The Lord of The Flies by William Golding my personal view has changed drastically. I began thinking that the beast was only the wild imaginations of the littluns (the smaller children on the island) getting the best of them in a foreign place. At this time I felt very little of a threat from The Beast. As the story progressed and the children became more barbaric, I came up with the conclusion that instead of being the wild imaginations, I now believed that the Beast was the self conscious fear of all the children and what they were becoming. This was backed up numerous times, such as Jack shuddering at the image of gore going through his head after his first kill. Even Simon agreed that maybe the beast was real, and it was them. On the topic of Simon, I would like to transition into what my new views of the book are. I now view the book to be an allusion to the biblical stories of heaven and hell with Simon being a figure of holy stature as an angel, or even the great prophet Jesus Christ. Further into the story, the boys begin to form separate tribes. One with the hunters, and the other with the other boys. Simon happened to accidentally witness a pig hunt of the hunter tribe and saw the brutality, and the enjoyment of the other boys. He then witnessed them saw off the head of the pig and hoist it onto a stake. This became the Lord of the Flies. The Lord of the Flies is also the name of one of the seven princes of Hell Beelzebub. Simon witnessed this and it broke him. This part of the book showed that god is no longer with these boys for they have become too menacing and barbaric for even him to protect. This was the point of no return for the boys. Going back to the Lord of the Flies he mentions that he IS The Beast which got me thinking that the Beast was Satan who has taken control of the island and in this case, Hell wins over Heaven as soon as Simon is murdered. I believe that The Beast is Satan because Satan is able to transform to fit the best fear for his victim or victims in this case. He was at first the creepers, then a giant squid, and then a dead paratrooper atop a mountain who was slouching in a strange position. I believe that these kids are not entirely at fault for their actions solely based on the reason that Satan is discreetly trying to corrupt the kids, and he is succeeding.

What is The Beast?
By Luke Romano