Hello there.

Welcome to today's lesson.

So great that you are joining me today.

My name is Mr. Barnsley and today we're gonna be diving a little bit deeper into the context behind the writing of Novella, "The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde." Today's lesson is called The Importance of Science and Religion.

Let's get started.

Right, so let's have a look at today's outcome.

So by the end of today's lesson, you are gonna be able to explain what Stevenson's views were on both science and religion and how these materialise, how they appear in the novella.

So as ever, we're gonna start with five key words.

They are on the screen now.

They are the enlightenment, the verb to transgress, the adjective, evangelical, the adjective, progressive, and the noun piety.

In a second the definitions of each of these five words are gonna appear on the screen.

It's really important that you read through each of them carefully so that you recognise these words when they appear in the lesson.

If you need to, do take a moment and pause the video if you want to make a note of these and jot them down somewhere.

Okay, definitions appearing now.

Okay, let's have a look at the lesson outline today.

So there're gonna be two sections of today's lesson, two different learning cycles.

In the first learning cycle, we're gonna look at the era of enlightenment.

Remember that is our key word.

And we're also gonna be looking at Steven's Calvinist upbringing.

Okay, let's dive into our first learning cycle then, the era of enlightenment.

Now if you have ever studied any gothic text before, you might have looked at their historical and social context.

You might have looked at this word or this era, the Enlightenment era before.

So I want us take a moment see if we can remember any of these things, if we've studied gothic text.

And we're gonna take a moment to discuss.

Do you know anything about the era of enlightenment? Do you know when it occurred? Do you know how views were changing at the time? Okay, pause the video.

If you've got someone to discuss with, you can discuss with them.

But otherwise you can just think through this to yourself.

Pause the video, give this a go and press play when you are ready to continue.

Great job there.

I heard some really interesting discussions and it's fantastic to see how much you might have been able to remember from previous units that you've studied.

Okay, let's have a think then.

What was the era of enlightenment? Well, it was a time when there were feelings of excitement about scientific advancements that were happening at the time.

And this was happening in Europe in particular, was entering its period of enlightenment in the late 17th, early 18th century.

Okay, so it was happening, happened a long time ago and certainly before the Victorian era, before our novella was set.

And Alex reminds us the verb to enlighten means to provide someone with information and understanding.

Well, well what does this mean? It means that during this time there was a real shift in thinking.

It meant that reason and rationale was celebrated.

There was really an emphasis on learning the truth about things.

People really wanted knowledge, they wanted to know more.

And people began to feel that reason and rationale would actually bring them that knowledge and that knowledge would bring freedom and happiness.

Okay, so that tells us a little bit more about the era of enlightenment.

We also know that the Victorian era, and this is really important 'cause this is when our text was written and when our text was set, it was marked by a resurgence of enlightened thought.

Okay, so the Victorian ara was a kind of further time of people really wanting to know more, learn more, a time of knowledge.

And there was a renewed interest in using science to improve society.

So lots of people saw science as a way of us gaining more knowledge and that knowledge would lead to freedom and happiness.

So let's take a pause, think about everything that we've just heard then.

And I want you to think about how this idea might be relevant to the novella, "The strange case of Dr.

Jekyll and Mr. Hyde." Okay, so this whole idea of enlightenment, of knowledge and knowledge equaling freedom and happiness.

And knowing that the Victorian era when this novella was written and when it was set, there was a resurgence of enlightened thought.

Okay, what does this mean for the text? How is it relevant to the novella that we are reading? Pause the video, discuss with a partner if you have one, or think through these questions to yourselves and press play when you are ready to continue.

Well done.

I heard some wonderful discussions there and some great work for all those of you who were listening just as well as you were contributing to the discussions.

Obviously science is a theme that we see running throughout our text.

We know that Hyde is the result of scientific experimentation.

You may have said that, you may have said some other things.

So Lucas said that, well, two of our central characters are scientists, Dr.

Jekyll and Dr.

Lanyon.

And we know that Lanyon's death is a result of him craving knowledge and wisdom.

If you remember back to chapter nine, Dr.

Lanyon's narrative, we know he has this curiosity.

Hyde gives him the opportunity to kind of walk away and not know the truth.

But Lanyon chooses to stay and watches Hyde's transformation back into Jekyll.

And it's this curiosity, this desire for knowledge and wisdom that actually leads to him dying of shock.

So Lucas, great point from Lucas there pointing that out.

Alex says, Jekyll definitely isn't improving society through his experimentations though.

And I think that's really interesting 'cause we know the age of enlightenment, the era of enlightenment was all about using, or enlightened thought was the idea that scientific development could kind of give us more knowledge, give us more freedom, give us more happiness.

Alex is saying this is definitely not what happens in the novella here.

Another great point by Alex and well done to anyone who said something similar.

We also know, and again, you might have thought about this in science, you might have discussed this if you've looked at gothic text before, but in 1859, Charles Darwin published "On The Origin of Species." And in this text of his, it explained that the theory of evolution through natural selection, and this was all about the gradual adaptation of animals to suit the environment over time.

Okay, this is an idea that we evolved, we changed over time to suit our environment.

Let's have a think then.

Why might this theory, this idea that kind of animals, creatures change over time, adapting to their environment, why do you think that theory might make Hyde a more terrifying character, particularly to readers at the time when this text would've been a, the theory of evolution would've been a really kind of new and novel idea.

Why might that make Hyde a more terrifying character? Pause the video, think about this question and press play when you are ready to continue.

Wow, some really interesting thoughts there.

And people were really wrestling back and forward about whether this would be a terrifying idea.

Is this not an exciting idea in the age of enlightenment? Do people not want this knowledge? Does this not bring happiness and freedom? Well, yes, for some it might have done, but for others it would definitely have kind of brought a fear, particularly around the character of Hyde.

So let's shine a spotlight in some of those things you might have said.

Well, Lucas says that perhaps, and he's being tentative here, so he's not saying for certain, but perhaps readers may have feared that Hyde was an adaptation and maybe that humans were becoming more evil.

So as humans adapt to their environment, maybe we are evolving and becoming, and might end up becoming creatures like Hyde.

That might be really terrifying for people.

Alex actually flips that idea on his head and he is saying, well, if humans are just getting used to this idea that everything evolves, then maybe things could devolve, things could go backwards, things could degenerate, and maybe Hyde is that.

He's a reflection of something that has evolved backwards from humanity.

And that might be a very real fear that things can move backwards.

So both Alex and Lucas taking different approaches, but seeing why Charles Darwin's theory could bring potential fear or Charles Darwin's theory coupled up with the character of Mr. Hyde could bring fear to the readers of this novella.

Great ideas from both of our Oak pupils there and of course from you.

So Lucas and Alex are making some really valid points here.

Stevenson's novella could definitely be considered as being critical of scientific development.

It does make science seem very dangerous.

But I want you to think, is that what, what is Stevenson trying to say about science? What message might he be saying, trying to convey about transgressive science? And remember that is one of our keywords today, so going against moral or social codes.

But why else then do you think he might have chosen to use science as a backdrop to his gothic novella? So what do you think his message is and what's his purpose? What's he trying to do through including science in his novella? Pause the video, discuss with your partner if you have one.

Otherwise you can think through these questions to yourself and maybe make a couple of notes.

Just make sure you press play when you are ready to continue.

Well done.

I heard some fantastic discussions there, people wrestling back and forth with what Stevens' purpose might be.

And the good thing is we don't know for sure so we can, as long as we're using this tentative language, like perhaps, maybe, might, could, then it's absolutely okay for us to have slightly different interpretations.

Let's have a look at some of the things that you may have said.

So you may have made this point that maybe Stevenson isn't being critical of science in general, you know, the enlightenment era, people were craving knowledge and rationale and reason, but maybe he is being critical of those who transgress, that keyword there, for their own gains.

So seeing there is a difference between science, which brings us new knowledge, which can unlock new ideas for us.

And people use science for their own personal, selfish, greedy gains.

Maybe there is a difference between, you know, he's criticising one but not the other.

You might have also said he's criticising those who made discoveries that could not be kept under control.

So this, you know, Jekyll's creation of Hyde, he fails to keep under control.

If you read other gothic texts or know of other gothic stories, like Frankenstein for example, you can see in Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein creates a creature, a monster that he fails to control.

So maybe there is a criticism here of science when people use it, but don't use it in a way that they cannot control.

Now well done if anyone says that, actually perhaps Stevenson is being a little bit cheeky here.

He is trying to be a little bit controversial.

And he knows that at the time there were certain people in society that had a fear of science.

They were worried about where scientific development was going.

And what he's doing here is saying, well I want to create a gothic text.

My purpose is to scare my audiences, my readers.

So one way I can do that is play on their very real fears of science and how science can go wrong, okay? So yes, he might be criticising it in some way, but in other ways he might be using it to create a really terrifying tale for his readers.

Okay, time for a check for understanding now.

Which of the following is not a logical inference about Stevenson's views on scientific development? Is not a logical inference.

Is it A, that Stevenson was critical of transgressive scientists who wanted to use science for their own personal gain? Is it B, that Stevenson used fears of scientific development to court controversy and add an air of realism to his gothic novella? Or is it C, Stevenson believed in transgressive science, he liked the idea of breaking social and moral codes.

Pause video, select your answer.

There's only one and we're looking for the one which is not a logical inference.

Once you think you've got the answer, you can press play and find out if you are right.

Well done if you said C.

Of course, if could be Stevenson is being critical of transgressive science, it could be that he's just using this fear of scientific development to court controversy and add an air of realism.

I think both of those are logical inferences you could make.

I don't think it's logical to say that actually, yes, Stevenson loves the idea of science being completely uncontrolled.

He loves people kind of using science to break social and moral codes.

I'm not a hundred percent sure that that is a really logical inference.

So well done if you said C.

Okay, over to you now for our first practise activity.

We're gonna just write three sentences summarising what we've learned in this first learning cycle.

So as you can see, the first fragment of each sentence is the same.

It is Stevenson court's controversy.

He encourages controversy by playing on the fears surrounding contemporary scientific development.

So he's saying, look, he deliberately uses these fears that were happening at the time, contemporary, these fears around scientific development.

But you have got three different conjunctions, because, but, and so.

each of those conjunctions are gonna force us to think very carefully about what we, the fragment that we use to finish that sentence, okay? So think carefully what the job of because, but and so are going to do and how they're gonna change the sentence that you create.

Okay, pause the video.

Over to you now to show me what you have understood from our first learning cycle.

Good luck and press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, welcome back.

I could see you working really hard on that and well done to everyone who kind of checked their work as they were finishing just to check there were no spelling, punctuation, or grammar errors in there.

That's fantastic practise to be doing.

Okay, let's look at some model examples here.

Of course, these are not the only things that you could have said, but let's look at some of the things that you might have said.

So for the first one, because it adds a sense of reality or realism to his gothic novella.

Okay, so he plays on these fears to add a sense of reality.

Stevenson courts controversy by playing on the fears surrounding contemporary scientific development but he's also critical of transgressive scientists out for their own personal gain.

So this is acknowledging that actually there might be two reasons why Stevenson uses or kind of uses science as a backdrop to his novella.

And finally, Stevenson courts controversy by playing on the fears surrounding contemporary scientific development so it can be argued that readers were supposed to find Jekyll's experiments deplorable.

We're supposed to really disagree with his experiments because we know there was a fear at the time that science could go too far.

Well done if you've got anything similar to that.

Okay, let's look at our second learning cycle, and now we're gonna be diving into the second part of that title, religion and how religion appears in the novella.

So this learning cycle is called Stephen's Calvinist upbringing, and we'll have a look at what that word Calvinist means in a little bit more detail shortly.

So first of all that we know that Stevenson was able to play on this contemporary fear of science because of religion, because religion played a really prominent important role in both social and political life.

Okay, so let's think about that in a little bit more detail.

Why do you think a religious society might have had concerns about scientific development? Okay, so I'm saying that Stevenson can use these fears of science because it was a religious society.

Why might a religious society have concerns about science? Pause the video, discuss, and press play when you are ready to continue.

Great job there.

And I could see people pulling discussions and ideas that they might have learned from other subjects, like science or religious education.

So that is fantastic.

Well done if you did that.

So Lucas said something along the lines of, well, he can see that many devout Christians, people who kind of really follow their faith, they might have rejected Darwin's ideas because for them it contradicts the idea and the story of creation that God created the world and he created all in it.

And Darwin's theory seems to contrast against that.

Alex says, yes, actually.

And if you start to question God's existence, well that's the backbone of Victorian sense of morality.

When we say that religion played a really important, both social and political life, a lot of the moral code that underpins Victorian society is underpinned through Christian faith and the teachings of the Bible.

So if science and Darwin's work begins to question God's existence, then we could start to say, well, is this moral code of Victorian society, is that even real if it's based on something that isn't true? It is worth pointing out though that not everyone believes that these two ideas are in complete contrast with each other.

And there'll be many Christians who actually see Darwin's theory as further argument that God must exist because Darwin's or the theory of evolution and adaptation is such a complex, wonderful process.

Some Christians would argue that for something to be that complex and that detailed, it must have been created by God, okay? So it is not to say, it's a very sweeping statement to say that scientists believe this and Christians believe this.

And those two things are in complete disagreement with each other because there will be some people who believe that science exists because of God, okay.

Okay, let's check your understanding now.

Let's check how we are getting on.

True or false.

In Victorian Britain, scientific developments could have been seen to conflict with Christian beliefs.

Is that true or false? Pause video, have a think and press play when you're ready to continue.

Yes, well done if you said true.

And that word could, that tentative word could is really important there.

As we said, it doesn't mean that everyone thinks that scientific development conflicts with Christian belief, but we can see that it is possible for people to feel like there is a conflict there.

Okay, let's justify our answers.

Is it A, it was seen as going against God to undertake scientific experiments or is it B, Darwin's theory of evolution could be seen to contradict the story of creation, undermining Christian beliefs at the time? Pause video, have a think, press play when you're ready to continue.

Yes, well done if you said B.

So the idea of evolution could contradict the idea of the story of creation and therefore that may have undermined some Christian beliefs at the time.

Okay, we're gonna look into a very specific branch of Christianity now and that is Calvinism, okay? And it's gonna really important that we understand Calvinism as a branch of Christianity and what that means for Stevenson and how that might have, as Calvinism played an important part in his upbringing and how that might basically impacted the message, what he was trying to say in his novella.

So let's go through and learn a little bit more about Calvinism.

So in Victorian Britain, we know Victorian Britain was a country that was changing quickly.

We have had the industrial revolution as well, and Christianity is attempting to keep up and catch up with it.

At the time there was a mass industrialization in the cities of the north.

It meant that places which were not heavily populated were becoming more and more populated.

People were migrating towards these cities 'cause there were more jobs there in industry.

And as a result, these new cities needed new churches.

The Church of England, which was obviously the Church of the State.

It quickly built many new churches, but we found that theology, the ideas, the interpretations of the Christian faith that appealed in these new cities wasn't always the same.

So you were starting to see slight divergence or differences between kind of the branches of Christianity as population spread across the country.

So some Christian faiths approach scientific development, including Darwinism, from a really progressive perspective.

They believed if evolution occurred as stated, this was even greater proof of God's existence, okay? So that's just a reminder.

We can't say that all Christians believe this because there were some Christians that said, no, science is brilliant, it's great, we want rationale, we want knowledge.

And isn't all of this wonderful thing just further existence that a God exists.

However, for evangelicals, and remembering that key word, whose faith was based on the literal truth of the Bible, they believed that the Bible was literally true, they actually found the developments within science quite shocking and quite difficult and in contrast with their faith, okay? So we can see within the Christian faith, we have different views towards science, some more progressive, some more evangelical.

In Scotland, Calvinism was a branch of Christianity and it was a pretty prevalent, important theology.

So idea and branch of Christianity.

And this was a branch of the Puritans.

And Puritans, nowadays they are synonymous, they're associated with very strict rules and censorship.

So Calvinist, kind of a branch of the Puritans, was definitely more evangelical than it was progressive.

So much more likely to fear scientific development than it is to kind of think scientific development is this exciting, brilliant thing that is clearly an indication that is being created by God.

So one of the key beliefs of Calvinism is that, rather than the grace of God being free and accessible to all, God's grace and salvation was only extended to those who were chosen.

So basically what they were saying is you would know before you died whether you would be going to heaven or not, okay.

Your salvation, God's grace was only given to those who were chosen.

So it was very, very strict really in how you should act.

Because if you want to get into heaven, you need to act in certain ways.

And you will know before you die whether you're gonna get into heaven or not.

So when we think of Calvinism, when we think of this branch of Christianity, we need to be thinking of it as a very evangelical branch of Christianity.

Now, Stevenson was born and lived in Edinburgh, which is in Scotland.

And his parents were both Scottish Calvinists.

They were very firm believers of strict Christian faith.

And he was often threatened to a life of damnation by his parents and his nanny who raised him if he did not live a good Christian life.

So as we said, you know, he was told, if you don't live a good Christian life, you will not get into heaven.

And this was a threat that kind of sat over him throughout his childhood.

However, this probably had the opposite effect on Stevenson.

It caused him to struggle with his faith.

And ultimately he ended up disappointing his parents by telling them that he no longer followed Christianity.

Now some people argue this was his time, a result of his time at university, where Stevenson admitted, and this is a great quote that you might wish to use, this is something that Stevenson said.

He said, "ethics are my veiled mistress.

I love them, but I know not what they are." So he said he understood what ethics were, oh, sorry, he loved the idea of ethics that we should behave in a certain way, but he actually didn't know them and he didn't follow them himself.

So this is an acknowledgement that when Stevenson was at university, he allegedly lived a very dual life.

He was this respectable son from a respectable Christian family, but he very much enjoyed Edinburgh nightlife.

You know, he enjoyed drinking, allegedly he enjoyed visiting houses of ill repute.

So he lived very dual life, did Stevenson.

And some people argue that this, kind of this experience of wanting to live his life in a certain way, which went against the strict Christian upbringing he had saw him kind of move away and lose his faith.

So with bearing all that context in mind, how do you think that might have affected or how we interpret Stevenson's plot and character? So think about everything we know about his upbringing and his experience within Calvinism.

Does it start to kind of make other cogs worrying and going, ah, I can see this, this links to the text, this links to this character, this links to this plot point.

Like what is it unlocking for us? So let's pause the video, have a discussion and press play when you are ready to continue.

Okay, welcome back.

Some fantastic discussion there.

Really tricky but great that people were making links between the context and the novella.

Really, really good stuff.

Okay, let's have a look at some of the things you might have said, shine a spotlight on some of those great ideas.

So well done to anyone who said that Stevenson presents pious and upright men as being boring and dull.

So Utterson is obviously the central narrator, but he's not presented as a particularly interesting character.

And his initial description describes him as long and dreary.

We also see this idea of piety, this closeness to God.

Respectability is synonymous associated with boredom and monotony, okay? Being a respectable Victorian gentleman is not presented as being a particularly fun and exciting idea.

And we see this particularly when Jekyll talks about how in chapter 10 that he tried to reject Hyde, he tried to live his life just as Jekyll, but he very quickly became bored, which meant he eventually started drinking the potion and becoming Hyde again.

And one quote that says that is that the hard law of life, which lies at the root of religion and is one of the most plentiful springs of distress.

So he associates religion with this hard law of life and this law that kind of brings him distress and boredom.

So you can see that Stevenson's own kind of rejection of Christianity and embracing of this dual life is very much reflected in his novella.

You may also have said that any allusions to God or faith actually can be seen as quite blasphemous exclamations.

We see Utterson, you know, I swear to God, oh God.

Utterson, what a lesson I've had.

God forgive us.

We see both Lanyon and Jekyll kind of using these blasphemous exclamations.

And we also see in chapter eight when they break into the laboratory that Utterson finds a copy of Jekyll's pious work, so religious texts.

And Jekyll has actually annotated, he's written all over them with blasphemies.

Arguably we could say that Stevenson uses Jekyll as a vehicle for expressing his own rejection of faith.

So Stevenson Jekyll is a method for Steven to show how he has kind of fallen out of love with religion.

He's rejected it and he's moved away from it.

Okay, let's do a check to see how we are getting on.

Decide which of the two people, so given the most interesting and accurate inference.

So Lucas A says, Stevenson novella is a criticism of all Christian faiths and their inability to be progressive, rejecting scientific development.

We see this through his presentation of pious characters as being dull.

Alex B says, perhaps Stevenson uses his novella as a vehicle of expressing his own dissatisfaction with Calvinism and evangelical faith, which he feels contributed to an unhappy childhood.

Pause the video, have a think and press play when you are ready to continue.

Well done if you selected Alex's response as being the most interesting and most importantly accurate.

Lucas has made that mistake of saying, all Christian faith believe this when we know that is not the case.

Whereas Alex's is much more specific talking about Calvinism and tentative.

You know, he used that word perhaps to show that this might, this is just one interpretation of what Stevenson might be aiming to do.

Okay, over to our final practise task of the lesson.

Lucas has made the following statement.

He says, arguably Stevenson uses the character of Henry Jekyll as a vehicle to be more critical of religion than he is of science.

I want you to decide whether you agree or disagree with Lucas and then use the appropriate side of the table below to support you write a response.

So I want you to decide, do you agree with Lucas that Stevenson has been more critical of religion than he is of science? Or do you disagree and you want to say that actually he's more critical of science than he is of religion? Okay, there are some sentence starters on the screen depending on whether you're agreeing or disagreeing with Lucas.

Pause the video, give this a go and press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, fantastic work there and really interesting that some of you were actually a little bit on the fence there.

You were saying I can see both sides.

So well done if you managed to pick a side and write a really strong response there.

We're now gonna take a moment to compare our response against the checklist below and check that we have done all of these things and if we haven't, maybe using a different colour pen, we can make a few changes.

So have you clearly explained whether you agree or disagree with Lucas? Have you given a clear reason for your position? Have you used reference in the text to justify your position? And have you used contextual knowledge? Pause the video, give this a go and press play when you're ready to continue.

Okay, fantastic work today everybody.

It's been really, really impressive seeing you wrestle with some quite tricky ideas there.

On the screen you can see a summary of all the key learning that we have covered today.

Do take a moment pausing the video if necessary to read through all these things and making sure you feel confident.

If you're not feeling confident on any of these things, just scan back in the video, rewatch and just make sure you are feeling super, super sure about these things before you move on to the next lesson.

Thank you so much for joining me today.

I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day.

Goodbye.