| John Milton (1608-1674) is one of the most important writers in the 17th century England as well as one of the most prestigious poets in Europe. In addition, Samson Agonistes is Milton's last published work. However, this work has been overlooked by most readers ever since its publication in 1671.This thesis paper focuses on the spiritual trek of Samson in Samson Agonistes, in which we may find the numinous task of God carried out by the spiritual giant, who from an infant-like titan, grows into a gigantic god.This Samson story may be in analogy with Milton's life, from which we find similar suffering experiences and growing awareness of God's bidding in spite of physical restraint.The theme of spiritual rebirth is prevalent in many mythologies and modern stories. As a devout religious revolutionist whose ideals are still ambivalent for us today, we can never fully illustrate the ever mystic drama Samson Agonistes respecting either the date or the context.By employing different critical theories from critics like psychoanalyst Carl Jung's, culturalist and structuralist Mikhail Bakhtin's, and numerous other anthropologists or ethnologists' in-depth ideas, thisthesis paper intends to explore psychologically and culturally the deep root of human archetype -- the Trickster .The Trickster may adopt varieties of fluid forms, his drive for life and death, his transformation in limbo, his pursuit for higher consciousness despite of earthly bounding walls, and the ever lasting quest for spiritual truth represent a forever conquering power of mankind.In order to fully explicate my point, I divide this thesis into three integral parts. The first part exhibits different forms of Tricksters before Spiritual Journey in connection with Miltonic Samson, in which we may find similar attributes in the beginning stage of a Trickster journey: Samson the Promethean hero and Samson the Trickster monkey. I also analyzed the distinctive Trickster psyche in relation to anthropology and mythology.The second part mainly expounds how Samson the Trickster at Crossroads behavesto prepare for the second stage, the carnival image ofan ass, or fool and jester may give us a glimpse of how the character manages to live through the darkest tunnel with delight and expectation.The third chapter is concerned with how Samson the Trickster king becomes the savior and transforms himself into the spiritual titan, by which he subverted the Restoration audience's expectation of King Charles and destroyed the spectators who intend to make sport of him. From masked Charles's aspiration for power to the massacre afterRestoration, from Samson's lost of sight to the rising phoenix, from the degraded jester to the great eagle's ascending, we come to understand this carnivalized Trickster figure as the lonely hero of the oppressed, god of border on the verge of life and death, and the enlightener awaiting for the triumph of spiritual war.In conclusion, the renaissance age is full of revolutionary spirit, during which time we encounter diverse cultural implications involuted with sacred spiritual freedom and combined efforts of religion and folkloric touch. The secret of factual evidence is sometimes sealed forever under horizon of our expectations; however, we are still the curious and questing humankind in the very earliest stage of mind exploration. We can not ignore the Dark Age, the enlightening period just as we cannot let by of such a wondrous renascent revolutionizing epoch.
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