is deeply committed to his denial, making it the center of his existence.

He establishes a Church without Christ, exposes Asa Hawks, a false prophet who feigns blinding himself in repentance, and engages in fornication with Hawks's promiscuous daughter, Sabbath Lily. When these actions fail to adequately sever his connection to his destiny, Hazell blinds himself, a feat Hawks lacked the courage to perform, and walks with stones in his shoes to mortify his flesh. Under his shirt, three strands of barbed wire encircle his chest.

When his unperceptive landlady comments that he is "not normal" and questions his actions, he responds, "I'm not clean." Ultimately, Hazell sacrifices everything in his effort to avoid becoming a preacher. Through his journey, O'Connor portrays a society filled with individuals unable to accept Christ, often leading to their destruction as they struggle to reject their spiritual nature.

Enoch Emery
Enoch Emery encounters Hazel Motes on Motes's second evening in town. He quickly becomes Motes's most devoted follower, embracing Motes's call for a "new jesus." At twelve years old, a welfare woman who believed in the "old" Jesus took Emery away from his father's care. She then sent him to a Bible academy, threatening him with prison if he did not comply with her demands. After eventually escaping from her, Emery wants nothing to do with "the Jesus kind."

Returning to his father's home, Emery is thrown out at eighteen. With a pimply face that resembles a fox's, he struggles to make friends. To occupy his time, he follows a daily routine of work and visiting the park after his shift. It is at the park that he first climbs into bushes to spy on women at the pool. He then heads to a refreshment stand, orders a milkshake, and makes inappropriate comments to the waitress. Next, he views caged animals, feeling both hatred and affection for them. Lastly, he visits a museum in the park that houses a shriveled mummy, which holds significant, yet unclear, meaning for him.

Emery feels an urge to show the mummy to someone, though he does not know who that person might be. One morning, he wakes up with a feeling in his blood, "wise blood like his daddy," that he will soon meet the person meant to see the mummy. When Hazel Motes drives by the park that day, Emery realizes his blood was telling the truth. After showing Motes the mummy, Emery feels once again that his blood is signaling something—that he is on the brink of being part of something significant.

Mrs. Flood
Mrs. Flood owns the boarding house where Motes resides. After Motes blinds himself, she plans to marry and institutionalize him to obtain his government pension. She feels the government owes her for the taxes she has paid over the years that supported undeserving people. Despite raising Motes's room and board to get a larger share of his money, she still feels shortchanged. She suspects Motes has a secret plan and is not sharing it with her.

Despite her initial reluctance, Mrs. Flood starts to enjoy her time with Motes. She tries to comprehend why he has blinded himself and why he seems content doing nothing but sitting on her porch. She wonders why he wears shoes filled with rocks and glass and wraps barbed wire around his chest. When Motes falls ill with the flu, Mrs. Flood decides to marry him and keep him. However, he dies before she can carry out her plan. She attempts to look into his lifeless eyes to understand how and by whom she was deceived, but she sees nothing. When she closes her own eyes, she perceives a distant point of light that eventually becomes Motes. She feels she has "finally got to the beginning of something she couldn't begin."

Asa Hawks
Scar-faced Asa Hawks pretends to be a preacher who has blinded himself for Jesus. Dressed in black with dark glasses and pale enough to resemble a corpse, Hawks uses a white cane and carries a tin cup. He urges people to repent, but if they refuse, he asks them to donate coins to his cup. His daughter, Sabbath Lily, follows him, distributing pamphlets that say "Jesus calls you."

Although Hawks once had genuine spiritual intentions and a congregation that believed in him, he has lost his sense of purpose. This loss of direction stemmed from a failure in his own faith when he lacked the courage to blind himself to justify his belief in Jesus. He recognizes the true Jesus in Motes, while he has become nothing more than a beggar, competing with street "hawkers" for people's money.

Sabbath Lily Hawks
Sabbath Lily Hawks mimics her father's false piety by handing out pamphlets proclaiming Jesus's desire for people to follow him. Fifteen-year-old Sabbath Lily's large red lips stand out against her skin, which is almost as pale as her father's, contrasting with the innocence her plain appearance might suggest.

Sabbath Lily tells her father, "I never seen a boy that I liked the looks of any better," and wants her father to help her win Motes. She makes desperate attempts to seduce Motes, even telling him that she has written to the lovelorn column in the newspaper asking if she should go all the way or not. None of her efforts sway Motes until she appears in his bed one night. She tells him she knows he is "pure filthy right down to the guts" like her and that she can teach him to enjoy being that way.

Although Sabbath Lily manages to seduce Motes, it doesn't lead to the lasting relationship she hoped would liberate her from her father. Her father abandons her, and Motes disregards her. Despite her claim that "she hadn't counted on no honest-to-Jesus blind man," she becomes such a bothersome presence at Motes's home that the landlady eventually contacts social services, resulting in her being placed in a detention center.

Haze
See Hazel Motes

Mrs. Hitchcock
At the novel's outset, Motes finds himself seated on a train across from a plump woman with pear-shaped legs that don't reach the floor. She introduces herself as Mrs. Hitchcock and mentions she is traveling to Florida to visit her daughter. Dressed in pink with a flat, reddish face, Mrs. Hitchcock tries to engage Motes in conversation about himself. Although she is intrigued by Motes's eyes, she also fears something in them and instead focuses on the price tag still attached to his coat. She is the first of several characters who annoy Motes by attempting to link him to preaching.

Onnie Jay Holy
See Hoover Shoats

Solace Layfield
Shoats hires Solace Layfield to impersonate the True Prophet because he drives a rat-colored car and wears a blue suit similar to Motes's. Afflicted with tuberculosis, Layfield constantly coughs from the depths of his hollow-chested, emaciated body. Layfield preaches for Shoats solely to earn money to support his wife and six children. Motes despises him for being "a man that ain't true and one that mocks what is." One night, Motes follows Layfield, forces him to remove his suit, and then runs him over with his car. Layfield's final words are "Jesus hep me."

Hazel Motes
O'Connor depicts Hazel Motes, the protagonist, as a man who takes everything literally and seeks to reject God's existence. Others perceive Motes as a preacher, a label he vehemently denies. Even a taxi driver tells Motes that his hat and "a look in your face somewheres" make him resemble a preacher.

Motes judges everyone based on their appearances, yet he can't help but search their faces for some sign of their value. He longs for evidence that people have no divine connection. Though he resists his own spiritual ties, Motes feels an undeniable pull towards Christ, described as "the wild ragged figure motioning him to turn around and come off into the dark."

Motes's name and appearance suggest a man who gazes into the unknown. Fittingly, the name "Hazel" derives from the Hebrew for "he who sees God." Motes's distinctive forehead, hooked nose, lined mouth, and flat hair lead the landlady to observe that his "face had a peculiar pushing look as if it were going forward after something it could just distinguish in the distance." Additionally, Motes's deep-set, pecan-colored eyes compel people to submit to a stronger will. For instance, when Mrs. Hitchcock encounters Motes on the train, she feels drawn to his eyes, as if they were "passages leading somewhere," but she also senses danger in them.

In his quest to deny God's existence, Motes tries to establish the "Church Without Christ." He purchases a car and uses it as his pulpit, preaching from its hood. The car becomes a symbol of Motes's rejection of Christ. He asserts that "Nobody with a good car needs to be justified." Motes preaches that since God does not exist, neither do sin or redemption. He offers people a "new jesus" that they can see, one who can save them in a way their Jesus has not. Ironically, it is the loss of his car that leads to Motes's salvation.

Prophet
See Hazel Motes

Hoover Shoats
Hoover Shoats is a chubby, curly-haired man with sideburns and a black suit with silver stripes. Shoats sees a money-making opportunity when he hears Motes preaching his Church Without Christ message and losing his audience. He steps in, trying to sell himself as a devoted follower of Motes and his church. With a smile and an honest look, Shoats can persuade people of almost anything.

Motes, however, is not pleased with Shoats's attempt to take over. He particularly dislikes Shoats's renaming of the church from the Church Without Christ to the Church of Christ Without Christ. Despite Shoats's efforts to convince Motes of the financial potential in promoting the "new jesus," Motes rejects him. In response, Shoats hires Solace Layfield to impersonate the "True Prophet" and preach the message of the Church of Christ Without Christ.

True Prophet
See Solace Layfield

Mrs. Watts
Mrs. Watts runs a house of ill repute in Taulkinham. When Motes arrives in town, he instructs the taxi driver to take him there. He aims to prove to the driver and to himself that he is not a preacher and has no ties to Christ. Motes engages in illicit sex with Mrs. Watts to solidify this denial of religion in his life. To Motes, being with Mrs. Watts signifies that he believes in nothing.