Biblical Vibrations in Shakespeare

 

SISTER ADELPHINE

 

“I too will take from the crest of the Cedar,

From the topmost branches tear off a tender shoot,

And plant it on a high mountain;

It shall put forth branches and bear fruit,

and become a majestic Cedar”

(Ezekiel, Ch. 17, V. 22, 23)

 

It is obvious, any attempt to analyse the cedarlike personality of Shakespeare in one instance is bound to be a failure. The fact that the cedar has put forth innumerable branches and these have borne incalculable fruit and given shade to myriads of birds for centuries is beyond reproach.

 

Therefore I have taken on myself an effort of analysing a tiny branch of that great cedar, with the ultimate ambition of satisfying the humanity in general and amusing the man of literary sensibility in particular. A moral obligation indeed!

 

A man who seeks cure can hardly be called wise, when there is a man who can prevent it, that needs cure. When the vision takes greater astronomical proportions it turns prophetic. A man understands the value and the validity of the prophetic outbursts in proportion to his own wisdom. A morally stronger man is strong enough to be enlightened as to perceive the magnificence of the Supreme Being in segment, while the weaker man is satisfied with simple faith. Shakespeare was a man who had enough wisdom to perceive the Biblical grandeur in its fulness, if not in its entirety; with all the literary skill he could muster, he dedicated himself to play it down to earth.

 

Shakespeare was a man of abundant intellectual energy which another poet might describe as the “dynamic counterpart of the teleological activity of the Universe.” Shakespeare required this energy to do what he did. On the other hand what we need, to stand up to him, to perceive his efforts, to utilise the fruits of his genius, is a literary sensibility; a sensibility possessed by personalities like Keats, Wordsworth, Milton; a sensibility that would enable us to feel the vibrations that make his words characteristically magnetic; after all, poetry is the result of a person’s vibrations. What we need is a deep concentration, that almost always accompanied by moral vigour, to perceive the fruits of wisdom hidden behind the leaves. It is up to the man to

 

“Look the morn, in russet mantle clad,

Walks o’er the dew of yon high eastward hills”,

 

and thus have aptitude enough to wake up to the beauty Shakespeare knew that the world even in his time had grown “ picked”, that it would require him to speak by “card” and not by “equivocation” which otherwise would have undone him.

 

Hence, this analysis of the vibrations of moral tone!

1. Shakespeare refers to the shortness of man’s life in Act V, Sc. 5 of Macbeth:

 

            “Out, out brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player: that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and there is heard no more.”

(Macbeth)

 

            A similarity could be drawn to the above from the following Biblical passage:

 

            Man’s days are like those of grass,

            Like a flower of the field he blooms;

            The wind sweeps over him and he is gone

            And his place knows him no more.

(Psalm 103. V. 15, 16.)

 

2. Shakespeare shows the transitoriness and futility of the vanities of this world which men clamour for; in Henry VIII Act III, Sc. 2:

 

            “This is the state of man: today he puts forth

            The tender leaves of hopes, tomorrow blossoms

            And bears his honours thick upon him;

            The third comes a frost, a killing frost.  

            And when he thinks, good easy man, full surely

            His greatness is a ripening, nips his root

            And then he falls, as I do.”

(Carginal Wolsey)

 

            Wolsey’s words can be matched with an apt pastage from the Bible:

 

            “Man cannot abide in his pomp

            He is like the beasts that perish

            This is the fate of those who have

            foolish confidence.

            the end of those who are pleased with their portion

            Like the sheep, they are appointed for Sheol.”

(Psalm 49. V 12-14)

 

3. Falstaff in King Henry IV of Part I jokingly tells Prince Hal that an old Lord spoke wisely about Prince Hal and he took no notice of it, and it was on the street too. Prince Hal tells him that he did well,

 

            “for wisdom cries out in the street

            And no man regards it”

(Prince Hal in Act I, Sc. 2)

 

The vein of similarity and the very music in the following Biblical lines are striking:

 

            “Wisdom cries aloud in the street,

            In the open squares she raises her voice;

            Down the crowded ways she calls out

            At the city gates she utters her words.

            “How long you simple ones, will you love inanity

            How long will you turn away at my report.?”

(Proverbs. Ch. IX. V. 20.23)

 

4. More resounding are the following lines of the psalm especially when it is set in comparison with the lines from the soliloquy from Hamlet:

 

            “Yet Thou has made him little less than a God,

            And dost crown him with glory and honour

            Thou has given him dominion over

            The works of Thy hands

            Thou has put all things under his feet.”

(Psalm 8. V. 5, 6)

 

            “What a piece of work is man!

            How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty!

            In form and moving how express and admirable

            In action how like an angel!

            In apprehension how like a Good!

            The beauty of the world! The paragon of animals!”

(Hamlet Act II, Sc. 2)

 

The following lines contain human sentiments expressed in human language – both in the Bible and in Shakespeare’s Macbeth:

 

            “I am in this earthly world; where to do harm

            is often laudable, to do good sometimes

            accounted dangerous folly.” (Lady Madcuff, Act IV. Sc. 3)

            “O everyside the wicked prowl, as vileness is

            exalted among the sons of men.”

(Psalm 12. V. 8.)

 

6. In the following lines there is a vivid representation and revelation of human nature – gleaned from the scriptures and Henry VII!:

 

            “O Cromwell, Cromwell, had I but served my God

            with half the zeal I served my king, he would not in mine age

            Have left me naked to mine enemies.”

(Wolsey - Act III. Sc. 2.)

 

            “It is better to take refuge in the Lord

            Than to put confidence in man.

            It is better to take refuge in the Lord

            Than to put confidence in princes.”        (Psalm 117. V. 8, 9)

 

7. The thread of reality, truth and love which is godliness runs through these Biblical and literary passages:

 

            “Sweet are the uses of adversity

            which like the toad ugly and venomous

            wears yet a precious jewel in its head.”

(As You Like It, Act IT, Sc. I. Duke)

 

            “Whom best I love, I cross; to make my

            gift the more delay’d delighted.”

(Cymbeline. Act V. Sc. 4. Jupiter)

 

            “The Lord reproves him whom he loves,

            As a father the son in whom he delights.”

(Proverbs. Ch. 3. V. 12)

 

8. The following is an allusion to the Biblical passage concern­ing the axioms of life, which Shakespeare puts in the mouth of Lord Bardolph in Henry IV, Part II (Act I. Sc. 3)

           

            “When we mean to build we first survey the plot then draw the model; And when we see the figure of the house. Then must we rate the cost of the erection, which if we find outweighs ability, what do we then, but draw a new model–in fewer offices; or at least desist to build at all?

            “For which of you desiring to build a tower does not first, sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise when he has laid a foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin ‘to mock him, saying, “this man began to build and was not able to finish.”

(Luke. Ch, 14. V. 28-30)

 

9. “Thou knowest in the state of innocency Adam fell and what should poor Jack Falstaff do in the days of villainy – Thou seest I have more flesh than another man and therefore more frailty.”

(Henry IV, Part I, Act II, Sc.3. Falstaff)

 

            “The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

(Mathew, Ch. 26, V. 41)

 

10. Shakespeare in the following passage holds up a faithful mirror of manners of men. The same idea is found in the Bible in Mathew, Ch. 5. V. 19

 

            “Do not as some ungracious pastors do

            Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven

            Whilst like a puff’d and reckless iibertine

            Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads

            And reeks not his own reed.”   

(Hamlet, Act I, Sc. 3

Ophelia to Laertus)

 

            “Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these command­ments

            and teaches men so, shall be called least in the

            Kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches

            them

            shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”

(Mt. 5:19)

 

            A few of the innumerable examples are quoted above to show how Shakespeare so wisely made use of his intellect to perceive the Biblical grandeur in its fulness and also ingeniously had striking passages in a very appropriate manner inserted in all his plays in order to bring inspiration to the coming generations. Though much of his life is still shrouded in mystery, we know from his writings that he had a versatility, a power over words and a wide and deep understanding of human nature such as no other English writer has equaled. He had tremendous range of experience. Hence immortality has crowned the work of this remarkable man. “He was not of an age, but for an age, but for all time.” (Culver)

 

Back