LOVE & FEAR & YODA & HAMLET
“My goal, in short, is to help explain Shakespeare, not to endorse the religion he had or the religion he became. But we cannot fully grasp Shakespeare’s own aims, I argue, until we come to terms with those religions too.”
Jeffrey Knapp, 2002, Shakespeare's Tribe
There is a sort of hinge in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, built on a contrast or sometimes proposed complementarity of love and fear.
There is also a universe of Yoda memes on the internet, many of them dealing with Master Yoda’s thoughts on the dangers of fear and the Dark Side.
What might Yoda and Hamlet have in common regarding the themes of love and fear?
Early in the play, we learn that Hamlet would rather speak of mutual love with his sentinels and his friend Horatio, than hear them profess anything about their duty to serve him. We also learn of Hamlet’s great love expressed in letters to Ophelia. It seems Prince Hamlet would, by far, prefer to dedicate himself to love rather than to revenge.
Laertes, however, upon learning of Ophelia’s time spent with the prince, tells his sister to fear Hamlet's intentions and the social consequences of losing her “chaste treasure” to him. Laertes tells her more than once, “fear it.”
Later, Laertes tells Ophelia not to fear him when she says he may prove to be a hypocrite, perhaps not following his own advice in France, and perhaps not writing him as often as she’d like. Love between Hamlet and Ophelia, opposed by Laertes and soon Polonius, both encouraging Ophelia to fear Hamlet, to keep him at a safe distance (Laertes says), or to reject him, to cut him off from all attention (Polonius commands).
When facing the ghost, Hamlet tells Horatio and Marcellus that he does not set the value of his own life at a pin’s fee (the cost of a sewing pin, a tiny amount), and does not fear facing the ghost, because his own soul is immortal, like the ghost’s. Hamlet at this moment seems fearless, but after speaking with the ghost, this begins to change for a time.
Hamlet, in soliloquy, expresses his fear of what dreams may come after death, especially after perhaps acting wrongly by either obtaining revenge for his father’s death, or by failing to do so.
In Hamlet 3.2, the player queen, expressing her fear of dealing with her husband’s death, says,
Now what my love is, proof hath made you know;
And as my love is siz'd, my fear is so.
Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear;
Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.
Hamlet may have written these lines for the Player Queen motivated by the facts that he is still mourning the death of his father, newly scandalized by the ghost’s revelation that Claudius the king, and still disappointed in his mother for not mourning longer, but instead, getting over it and marrying Claudius.
Soon, later the same evening, Hamlet accidentally kills Polonius, claims to “repent” of it, but says it seems to have pleased God to use Hamlet as scourge and minister, to punish Polonius, and to use the act of killing Polonius to punish Hamlet. In all his assumptions about a vengeful and punishing God, Yoda might observe that Hamlet has clearly gone to the Dark Side.
But later, after Hamlet’s Jonah-like sea voyage, after he feels he is the recipient of gifts of mercy from pirates and Providence, after he is surprised to rediscover happy memories of Yorick in the graveyard, Hamlet in 5.2 accepts a proposed duel with Laertes.
[Altered 2011 Geraint Lewis photo for The Independent, with Joshua McGuire as Hamlet]
Horatio says something basically like what at least one Star Wars character in each of those films usually says:
“I have a bad feeling about this.”
Hamlet, again fearless, but feeling Providence may be on his side, seems filled with a sense of acceptance, alludes to scripture, saying “Let be” (Matt 3:15), and “the readiness is all” (Luke 12:40, “Be ye therefore ready,” Bishop’s Bible).
Horatio tells Hamlet he will lose Claudius’ wager against Laertes. Hamlet replies,
I do not think so: since he went into France, I
have been in continual practise: I shall win at the
odds. But thou wouldst not think how ill all's here
about my heart: but it is no matter.
Something ill around Hamlet’s heart?
Matthew chapter 26 (Geneva trans.) describes Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane:
37 And he took unto him Peter, and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to wax sorrowful, and grievously troubled.
38 Then said Jesus unto them, My soul is very heavy, even unto the death: tarry ye here, and watch with me.
39 So he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.
Luke 22 (also Geneva):
41 And He withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and He knelt down and began to pray,
42 saying, “Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not My will, but Yours be done.”
43 [a]Now an angel from heaven appeared to Him, strengthening Him.
44 And being in agony He was praying very fervently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground.
Even Jesus described by these two gospels was sad and troubled when facing the possibility of his own death, but not afraid.
What other biblical passages on love and fear may have repeatedly been evoked in Elizabethan culture, shaping Shakespeare’s thinking and that of his audiences?
In the Elizabethan Book of Common Prayer, the reading of 1 John, chapter 4, was used in church every year of Shakespeare’s life on Trinity Sunday, and at regular intervals three times every year as the second lesson in Evening Prayer in April, August, and December (dividing the year into thirds).
All English citizens were required to attend Sunday services, and many also attended morning and/or evening prayer’s services of lessons and psalms, so this chapter of 1 John was a familiar one. So if Shakespeare and his family attended not only the required Sunday services but also Evening Prayer services, from age 4 through 39, by the time the first ("bad") quarto of his play Hamlet was first published, he would have heard 1 John 4 read in church 140 times, and may have read it in a home copy of the Geneva Bible as well.
This included 1 John 4:18, about love and fear.
Compare:
1 John 4:18 (1599 Geneva trans.):
There is no fear in love,
but perfect love casteth out fear:
for fear hath painfulness:*
and he that feareth, is not perfect in love.
* [is associated with, or anticipates, punishment]
and Hamlet [III, 2]
Player Queen:
Now what my love is, proof hath made you know;
And as my love is siz'd, my fear is so.
Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear;
Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.
This is quite a contrast: The queen (and Hamlet, perhaps having written these lines for the player queen as a reflection of his own fear-troubled character arc) seems to say that fear and love are inextricably related.
Yet the play seems to show Hamlet’s character arc, moving at first from love to fear and sin, then back to a perfection of love.
There is no direct quote of 1 John 4:18 in the play, but its sentiments seem to haunt the play.
There are also interesting results if one examines all the many ways the word LOVE is used,
And then also all the ways the word FEAR is used in the play. (OpenSourceShakespeare.org has a great source for such searches here.)
Consider also the old parenting assumption and religious idea, that fear is necessary, and that punishments—from parents or God, and fear of punishments, are necessary:
It was often assumed (and in some places, among some people, still is) that children often do the “right” thing and avoid the wrong, not because they love what is right, but because they fear the punishment and censure and shaming of the parent; but later, it is said, as they mature, they begin to do the good because it is good.
This is part of the assumption when Christianity of Shakespeare’s time speaks of the importance of “fear of the Lord.” Like “Spare the rod and spoil the child,” the spiritual assumption is that one begins with “fear of God” (many actually get stuck here), and only later do some come to a greater perfection in love, and perhaps in some cases, a mystical union with God.
As the opening quote from Jeffrey Knapp implies, I do not share these thoughts with a goal of endorsing or promoting Christianity, or Christian mysticism, or religion, or George Lukas's understanding of Joseph Campbell, in opposition to other infinite options, but rather, to strive to understand the ideas and cultural forces at work in Shakespeare's texts, and in this case, in Hamlet.
Jeffrey Knapp, 2002, Shakespeare's Tribe
There is a sort of hinge in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, built on a contrast or sometimes proposed complementarity of love and fear.
There is also a universe of Yoda memes on the internet, many of them dealing with Master Yoda’s thoughts on the dangers of fear and the Dark Side.
What might Yoda and Hamlet have in common regarding the themes of love and fear?
Early in the play, we learn that Hamlet would rather speak of mutual love with his sentinels and his friend Horatio, than hear them profess anything about their duty to serve him. We also learn of Hamlet’s great love expressed in letters to Ophelia. It seems Prince Hamlet would, by far, prefer to dedicate himself to love rather than to revenge.
Laertes, however, upon learning of Ophelia’s time spent with the prince, tells his sister to fear Hamlet's intentions and the social consequences of losing her “chaste treasure” to him. Laertes tells her more than once, “fear it.”
Later, Laertes tells Ophelia not to fear him when she says he may prove to be a hypocrite, perhaps not following his own advice in France, and perhaps not writing him as often as she’d like. Love between Hamlet and Ophelia, opposed by Laertes and soon Polonius, both encouraging Ophelia to fear Hamlet, to keep him at a safe distance (Laertes says), or to reject him, to cut him off from all attention (Polonius commands).
When facing the ghost, Hamlet tells Horatio and Marcellus that he does not set the value of his own life at a pin’s fee (the cost of a sewing pin, a tiny amount), and does not fear facing the ghost, because his own soul is immortal, like the ghost’s. Hamlet at this moment seems fearless, but after speaking with the ghost, this begins to change for a time.
Hamlet, in soliloquy, expresses his fear of what dreams may come after death, especially after perhaps acting wrongly by either obtaining revenge for his father’s death, or by failing to do so.
In Hamlet 3.2, the player queen, expressing her fear of dealing with her husband’s death, says,
Now what my love is, proof hath made you know;
And as my love is siz'd, my fear is so.
Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear;
Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.
Hamlet may have written these lines for the Player Queen motivated by the facts that he is still mourning the death of his father, newly scandalized by the ghost’s revelation that Claudius the king, and still disappointed in his mother for not mourning longer, but instead, getting over it and marrying Claudius.
Soon, later the same evening, Hamlet accidentally kills Polonius, claims to “repent” of it, but says it seems to have pleased God to use Hamlet as scourge and minister, to punish Polonius, and to use the act of killing Polonius to punish Hamlet. In all his assumptions about a vengeful and punishing God, Yoda might observe that Hamlet has clearly gone to the Dark Side.
But later, after Hamlet’s Jonah-like sea voyage, after he feels he is the recipient of gifts of mercy from pirates and Providence, after he is surprised to rediscover happy memories of Yorick in the graveyard, Hamlet in 5.2 accepts a proposed duel with Laertes.
[Altered 2011 Geraint Lewis photo for The Independent, with Joshua McGuire as Hamlet]
Horatio says something basically like what at least one Star Wars character in each of those films usually says:
“I have a bad feeling about this.”
Hamlet, again fearless, but feeling Providence may be on his side, seems filled with a sense of acceptance, alludes to scripture, saying “Let be” (Matt 3:15), and “the readiness is all” (Luke 12:40, “Be ye therefore ready,” Bishop’s Bible).
Horatio tells Hamlet he will lose Claudius’ wager against Laertes. Hamlet replies,
I do not think so: since he went into France, I
have been in continual practise: I shall win at the
odds. But thou wouldst not think how ill all's here
about my heart: but it is no matter.
Something ill around Hamlet’s heart?
Matthew chapter 26 (Geneva trans.) describes Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane:
37 And he took unto him Peter, and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to wax sorrowful, and grievously troubled.
38 Then said Jesus unto them, My soul is very heavy, even unto the death: tarry ye here, and watch with me.
39 So he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.
Luke 22 (also Geneva):
41 And He withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and He knelt down and began to pray,
42 saying, “Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not My will, but Yours be done.”
43 [a]Now an angel from heaven appeared to Him, strengthening Him.
44 And being in agony He was praying very fervently; and His sweat became like drops of blood, falling down upon the ground.
Even Jesus described by these two gospels was sad and troubled when facing the possibility of his own death, but not afraid.
What other biblical passages on love and fear may have repeatedly been evoked in Elizabethan culture, shaping Shakespeare’s thinking and that of his audiences?
In the Elizabethan Book of Common Prayer, the reading of 1 John, chapter 4, was used in church every year of Shakespeare’s life on Trinity Sunday, and at regular intervals three times every year as the second lesson in Evening Prayer in April, August, and December (dividing the year into thirds).
All English citizens were required to attend Sunday services, and many also attended morning and/or evening prayer’s services of lessons and psalms, so this chapter of 1 John was a familiar one. So if Shakespeare and his family attended not only the required Sunday services but also Evening Prayer services, from age 4 through 39, by the time the first ("bad") quarto of his play Hamlet was first published, he would have heard 1 John 4 read in church 140 times, and may have read it in a home copy of the Geneva Bible as well.
This included 1 John 4:18, about love and fear.
Compare:
1 John 4:18 (1599 Geneva trans.):
There is no fear in love,
but perfect love casteth out fear:
for fear hath painfulness:*
and he that feareth, is not perfect in love.
* [is associated with, or anticipates, punishment]
and Hamlet [III, 2]
Player Queen:
Now what my love is, proof hath made you know;
And as my love is siz'd, my fear is so.
Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear;
Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.
This is quite a contrast: The queen (and Hamlet, perhaps having written these lines for the player queen as a reflection of his own fear-troubled character arc) seems to say that fear and love are inextricably related.
Yet the play seems to show Hamlet’s character arc, moving at first from love to fear and sin, then back to a perfection of love.
There is no direct quote of 1 John 4:18 in the play, but its sentiments seem to haunt the play.
There are also interesting results if one examines all the many ways the word LOVE is used,
And then also all the ways the word FEAR is used in the play. (OpenSourceShakespeare.org has a great source for such searches here.)
Consider also the old parenting assumption and religious idea, that fear is necessary, and that punishments—from parents or God, and fear of punishments, are necessary:
It was often assumed (and in some places, among some people, still is) that children often do the “right” thing and avoid the wrong, not because they love what is right, but because they fear the punishment and censure and shaming of the parent; but later, it is said, as they mature, they begin to do the good because it is good.
This is part of the assumption when Christianity of Shakespeare’s time speaks of the importance of “fear of the Lord.” Like “Spare the rod and spoil the child,” the spiritual assumption is that one begins with “fear of God” (many actually get stuck here), and only later do some come to a greater perfection in love, and perhaps in some cases, a mystical union with God.
As the opening quote from Jeffrey Knapp implies, I do not share these thoughts with a goal of endorsing or promoting Christianity, or Christian mysticism, or religion, or George Lukas's understanding of Joseph Campbell, in opposition to other infinite options, but rather, to strive to understand the ideas and cultural forces at work in Shakespeare's texts, and in this case, in Hamlet.
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