Destiel in Season 4 and 5 of Supernatural and Death of God

German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche’s well-known phrase “God is dead,” introducing the idea of the missing God, laid the foundation for one of the most important topics in the 20th century Existentialist Movement. The possibility of God’s non-existence means that everything that is possible happening can happen, and if everything is allowed, how can man choose? How can man know how to live? If everything is allowed, can there be we define right from wrong?

Such questions are asked on Supernatural, with the character Castiel first appearing at the end of the first episode in the fourth season, which marked the series’ introduction of Christian mythology as a central them ever since. Castiel, an Angel of the Lord, initially shows complete devotion to God and identifies as servant of heaven:

CASTIEL:

We have no choice.

DEAN:

Of course you have a choice. I mean, come on, what? You’ve never questioned a crap order, huh? What are you both, just a couple of hammers?

CASTIEL:

Look, even if you can’t understand it, have faith. The plan is just.

SAM:

How can you even say that?

CASTIEL:

Because it comes from heaven, that makes it just.

- 4.07 It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester

This argument on the morality behind the act of “purifying a city” or “taking one thousand two hundred fourteen lives” between Castiel and the Winchesters is not unsimilar with Danish theologian Søren Kierkegaard’s discussion on Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac. When Abraham was told that as a result of God's will that he must sacrifice his son Isaac, he was in a kind of either-or. If the message is genuinely from God, then he must sacrifice Isaac and it is the right thing to do; but if the message is not from God, then he would be committing what would be the very worst possible crime judged on the basis of Abraham's own view of human ethics.

The dichotomy here, between Castiel’s and Dean’s rationales, is that while the former believes there is a God and God and religion (in other words, heaven’s plan for earth) are the most important things, and man must do nothing but obey heaven’s command, the later insists that there is no God and it is for man to take the total burden of responsibility for the world and for himself upon his own shoulders, with no one to give him any sign.

Though the former seems to suggest a lack of agency or necessity for decision making in moral judgement, as the plot unfolds, we see Castiel demonstrates a sense of uncertainty, the very secret he voices in the conversation with Dean in the episode’s epilogue.

CASTIEL:

I’m not a… hammer as you say. I have questions, I have doubts. I don’t know what is right and what is wrong anymore, whether you passed or failed here. But in the coming months you will have more decisions to make. I don’t envy the weight that’s on your shoulders, Dean. I truly don’t.

- 4.07 It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester

This mirrors Kierkegaard’s Abraham in his questions on God’s will. Indeed, how is one to know whether the command is from God or not? If an angel speaks to him, how does Abraham know it's not a hallucination? And if God himself speaks, how is Abraham, or Castiel, to know whether this is really God or whether the command is their own inward evil wishes? Nobody but Abraham, or Castiel, can decide and they cannot tell within his life whether he has done the right thing or not.

Perhaps it is this introspective nature in Castiel that draws him close to Dean, the human in his charge, and by implication humanity. Dean, a firm non-believer and what many, including himself, perceive to be as farthest from being servant of God as possible, detests the idea of God even in face of angels walking the earth.

DEAN:

God?

CASTIEL:

Yes.

DEAN:

God.

CASTIEL:

Yes! He isn't in heaven. He has to be somewhere.

DEAN:

Try New Mexico. I hear he's on a tortilla.

CASTIEL:

No, he's not on any flatbread.

DEAN:

Listen, Chuckles, even if there is a God, he is either dead—and that's the generous theory—

CASTIEL:

He is out there, Dean.

DEAN:

—or he's up and kicking and doesn't give a rat's ass about any of us.

CASTIEL glares.

DEAN:

I mean, look around you, man. The world is in the toilet. We are literally at the end of days here, and he's off somewhere drinking booze out of a coconut. All right?

- 5.02 Good God, Y'all

Dean has no intention of trying to prove that God does not exist, as one cannot prove a negative, but the very specific objection to the traditional concept of God above parallels with the simple objection in many existentialists work that is based upon the injustice of the universe. Albert Camus has given this same type of criticism in his novel, "The Plague", in which the priest, Padalu, confesses that he is not able to understand how there can be any justification so that even eternal paradise could cancel out the sufferings here on earth of one innocent child. Why, Deans asks, if God is all powerful, does man have to suffer? If God is merciful, then how can he sentence man, any man at all to eternal damnation?

There is an optimistic side to this. As the repetitive occurrence of the term “free will” on this show suggests, if God exists, man is nothing; but if God does not exist, then man is free to choose what he wants to make himself. But for Castiel to arrive at this destination, it first takes him to undergo a two-season long crisis.

ANNA:

What do you want from me, Castiel?

CASTIEL:

I'm considering disobedience.

ANNA nods.

ANNA:

Good.

CASTIEL:

No, it isn't. For the first time, I feel...

ANNA:

It gets worse. Choosing your own course of action is confusing, terrifying.

ANNA puts her hand on CASTIEL's shoulder. He looks at it; she drops it.

ANNA:

That's right. You're too good for my help. I'm just trash. A walking blasphemy.

ANNA turns to walk away.

CASTIEL:

Anna.

ANNA stops.

CASTIEL:

I don't know what to do. Please tell me what to do.

ANNA turns back.

ANNA:

Like the old days? No. I'm sorry. It's time to think for yourself.

- 4.16 On the Head of a Pin

If God isn’t out there, then Castiel has nowhere to turn. This dreadful realization may best be articulated through Hazel Barnes’ analogy that as if one would try to judge a Ford car without any Mr. Ford. So long as there is a Mr. Ford or one of his agents, then one has a model, one has a blueprint and one can say that the car which is coming there off the assembly line is a perfect Ford or an imperfect Ford. But without a plan, one cannot judge a car, and without God, there is no plan for Castiel and there is no final point of reference by which he can judge his values, or right or wrong, or declare that he has lived up to his possibilities or not lived up to his possibilities.

Yet despite “choosing your own course of action” being “confusing, terrifying,” Castiel is not in total despair. Dean, the human equivalent of the burden of a self-creative life, provides reference for Castiel on how to live a life as if there were no God. I have concluded thus that in the context of existentialism Castiel seeks Dean and humanity for answers and view them as his destination.

Note: this article is HEAVILY inspired by Hazel Barnes’ Self Encounter 2: The Far Side of Despair.