Human Fitra restriction caused by celibacy undergone by Jim Casy in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath

ABSTRACT

There are many psychological researches done by people in studying the work of literature, especially novel. Most of these researches use some famous psychological theory such as Sigmund Freud theory which is called psychoanalysis, Abraham Maslow’s theory which is called humanistic theory, and others. To make some variation and to broaden the theory used in psychological research of literature, it seem proper to present the new trend in psychological research of literature, it is by using the theory of Islamic Psychology that is still rarely used by people, whereas, Islamic Psychology is one school of psychology begins from Al­Ghazali era in 11s century, it is older than Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis which begins from 19s century. The theory of Islamic psychology used in this research is the specialization of this research from the other researches which hopefully can realize the idea of State Islamic University Maulana Malik Ibrahim Malang in constructing the science and religion integration in all of the students’ work..

John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath contains the character of Jim Casy as the former preacher who is undergone some psychological problems after forcing him self to obey one law of the church, it is celibacy, the law of the church which forbids the preacher to marry or have any sexual relation. From this case, the researcher formulates the two problems of study, they are (1) What are the human fitra restrictions caused by celibacy practice undergone by Jim Casy in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath? (2) What are the effects of human fitra restriction caused by celibacy practice happened to Jim Casy’s psychology in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath?

This research uses the psychological approach and applies the concept of human fitra as the theory. Because this research focused on the discussion of the character’s psychology, this research included to the kind of textual study, one kind that is often used by many researchers.

From this research, there are two findings can be stated as the answer of the problem of the study. First, the human fitra restriction undergone by Jim Casy in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath are the restriction to Jim Casy’s psychological fitra, includes the seat of emotion (qalb), intellectuality (aql), and natural appetite/ desire (nafsu). Second, there are five effects happened to Jim Casy as the result of human fitra restriction, they are anxiousness, loosing self control, feeling shadowed by guilt, psychosomatic and apostasy.