The relationship with God is strengthened through his adherence to rules established by the Church – the partaking of the Eucharist, confession, penance, and participation in last rites, thus redeeming him and preparing him for eternal salvation.

Everyman eventually realizes through this pilgrimage that he is essentially alone, despite all the personified characters that were supposed necessities and friends to him, which ultimately do not lead him closer to Christ.

Everyman learns that when you are brought to death and placed before God, your Good Deeds (which in the play include following Church practices of Eucharist, confession, penance and last rites) draw him into salvation with Christ.

[2][3] By the 1980s, Arthur Cawley went so far as to say that the "evidence for … Elckerlijk is certainly very strong",[4] and now Davidson, Walsh, and Broos hold that "more than a century of scholarly discussion has ... convincingly shown that Everyman is a translation and adaptation from the Dutch Elckerlijc".

The oldest surviving example of the script begins with this paragraph on the frontispiece: After a brief prologue asking the audience to listen, God speaks, lamenting that humans have become too absorbed in material wealth and riches to follow Him, so He commands Death to go to Everyman and summon him to heaven to make his reckoning.

[11] Poel then partnered with British actor Ben Greet to produce the play throughout Britain, with runs on the American Broadway stage from 1902 to 1918,[12] and concurrent tours throughout North America.

Another well-known version of the play is Jedermann by the Austrian playwright Hugo von Hofmannsthal, which has been performed annually at the Salzburg Festival since 1920,[15] and adapted into film several times.

[16] A direct-to-video film of Everyman was made in 2002, directed by John Farrell, which updated the setting to the early 21st century, including Death as a businessman in dark glasses with a briefcase, and Goods being played by a talking personal computer.

A modernized adaptation by Carol Ann Duffy, the Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, with Chiwetel Ejiofor in the title role, was performed at the National Theatre from April to July 2015.

[19] In December 2016, Moravian University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania presented Everyman on Trial, a contemporary adaptation written and directed by Christopher Shorr.