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T. S. Eliot’s Pluralistic Use of the Bible in “The Burial of the Dead” of The Waste Land

T. S. Eliot uses many biblical passages throughout his poetry. Although he changed his faith from the Unitarian church to the Anglican Catholic church in 1927, he extensively uses the Bible to extend poetic significance of his poems. Before he converted into an Anglican Catholic, he mainly incorporates biblical text into his poetry to strengthen religious authority. One of the most important poems in which he poeticizes biblical text is “The Burial of the Dead” of The Waste Land. In The Waste Land, Eliot consistently mixes the prophetic messages of Isaiah, Ezekiel, Ecclesiastes, and John to achieve relative interpretation in “The Burial of the Dead.” However, he does not follow traditional, universal, and absolute interpretations of the Bible in the context of his poetic theme. Rather, he takes biblical text as one of many pluralistic religious poetics. In this sense, his biblical interpretation is plural, relative, and flexible. By using a pluralistic interpretation of the Bible, he extends his poetry into more mythic, philosophic, universal, and religious authority.