Pentecost in Hamlet? (Updated 2025)

There is a Pentecost echo in Hamlet...

[Images, clockwise from UPPER LEFT: Pentecost, circa 1310 and circa 1318, from "Seven panels with scenes from the Life of Christ" by Giotto and workshop (1266–1337). National Gallery, London. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. RIGHT: "The Pentecost," Part of Doña María de Aragón Altarpiece, circa 1600, by El Greco (1541–1614). Museo del Prado, National Museum of Spain, Madrid. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. LOWER LEFT: "The Pentecost" by a follower of Bernard van Orley, circa 1530. North Carolina Museum of Art, USA. Public domain, via Wikimedia.org.]

Hamlet contains more biblical allusions than plays by others of the age, and Shakespeare’s other plays.[1]

There is a rhythm in the gospels: Jesus is a mentor and leader who is crucified, rises, and appears to the disciples. 
- He appears to women at the tomb (Lk 24:1-8, Jn 20:11-18), echoed by Claudius: "Where's the body?" [2]; 
- on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:11-35), echoed in the graveyard (5.1) [3]; 
- and in an upper room. 

In John 20:21-22, he breathes on them and tells them, "Receive the Holy Spirit." In each of the gospels, he sends them to spread the story [4].

On Pentecost (as in Acts 2), the Spirit descends. In Acts 2:5-6, a detail is added about nations and languages:

“...the multitude came together and were aston[ish]ed, because that every man heard them speak his own language.”[5]

The gospel message urges repentance from sin; in the Christian tradition, rising from the dead is not merely about corpses, but figurative: Those who are spiritually "dead" must repent of sin and "rise" from the "death" of sin to a new life.

In Hamlet, the prince repents of his “bloody thoughts” of revenge and madness, starting on his Jonah-like sea-voyage [6], continuing in the graveyard, and in his apology to Laertes. After Laertes poisons him, they forgive each other (more Bible echoes [7] [8]).

Then Hamlet commissions Horatio to tell his story, which parallels Jesus commissioning the disciples. This is the only scene in which representatives of Denmark, England, and Norway are gathered, and Horatio will tell them of what has happened in his own flawed way.

This is not like the source tale in Saxo Grammaticus or Belleforest. Why? Maybe Shakespeare views the story, and his job as a dramatist and storyteller, as one shaped at least in part by the rhythms of the gospel, even if it usually goes unrecognized?

Perhaps Shakespeare has given to Pentecost a "local habitation and a name" (MND 5.1.12-18) in the context of the Hamlet story.

My point here (as always) is not to evangelize using Shakespeare, nor is it to assume that was Shakespeare's point, but merely that the bible culture in which he lived had pervasive influences on his work. These need not be read in any supernatural way: there are no tongues of fire appearing over the heads of people in the last scene of Hamlet, nor should there be.... Those are only symbols, not meant to be taken literally...

https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2022/06/pentecost-in-hamlet.html

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POSTSCRIPT:

In A Midsummer Night's Dream, Theseus says,

The poet’s eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to Earth, from Earth to heaven,
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name. (5.1.12-18)
It seems that Shakespeare has given to Pentecost a "local habitation and a name" in the context of the Hamlet story.

But just as many religious topics were hotly debated in Shakespeare's time, people debate
the meanings of the play,
whether Hamlet is a Christ figure,
whether Horatio will tell his story right,
whether Fortinbras will make a good successor to the throne of Denmark.

In Shakespeare's day, they would also debate whether James, a Scottish prince from the North, will make a good successor to Elizabeth I.

Maybe Shakespeare knows and anticipates this, but still views the story as fitting the rhythms of the gospels?

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NOTES:
All references to Hamlet are to the Folger Shakespeare Library online version: https://shakespeare.folger.edu/shakespeares-works/hamlet/entire-play/

[1] See Naseeb Shaheen, Biblical References in Shakespeare’s Plays, 534-563, for many examples not mentioned below.

Some of these are explicit (such as Hamlet's "Let be" to Horatio, often noted as an echo of Mary to the angel Gabriel at the Annunciation, but more exactly, a quote of Jesus to John the Baptist at the River Jordan).

Others are only implied such as Ophelia holding the book Polonius gives her to read while he and Polonius spy on Hamlet (3.1), with Ophelia and book as a visual echo of prayer book illustrations of Mary reading a book of psalms at the Annunciation.

Or the structural plot echoes of Jonah's sea voyage in Hamlet's (5.2).

Or of the Emmaus tale in the graveyard scene (5.1): https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2018/05/emmaus-in-hamlet-in-emmaus-story-1.html

Or echoes of details from the Jephthah story in details we learn about Young Fortinbras in Hamlet 1.1, 1.2, and 5.2.

Various critics have noted the detail of Gertrude offering to wipe the face of her son Hamlet during his duel with Laertes, like a woman of Jerusalem (or "Veronica") wiping the face of Christ on the way to the crucifixion.

[2] See previous post, “Irony & anxiety in Hamlet about the missing body of Polonius: Three Marys at the Tomb” - April 19, 2022: https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2022/04/irony-anxiety-in-hamlet-about-missing.html

[3] See previous post, “EMMAUS in HAMLET (Introduction/Index: Multi-Part Series)” - May 21, 2018: https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2018/05/emmaus-in-hamlet-in-emmaus-story-1.html

[4] Matthew 28:16–20; Mark 16:14–18; Luke 24:44–49; John 20:19–23; Acts 1:4–8. See the following Wikipedia article for more basic information and comparison:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Commission#New_Testament_accounts

[5] People in Shakespeare's time may have related the Pentecost idea of people understanding in their own language to the idea of relatively new translations of the bible into the vernacular.
The Pentecost gift of understanding languages seems to reverse the curse of God in the story of the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11:1-9.

[6] See previous post, “THE GHOST OF JONAH HAUNTS SHAKESPEARE’S HAMLET” - April 23, 2018: https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-ghost-of-jonah-haunts-hamlet.html

[7] Luke 23:34

[8] John 20:23

IMAGES: clockwise from UPPER LEFT: Pentecost, circa 1310 and circa 1318, from "Seven panels with scenes from the Life of Christ" by Giotto and workshop (1266–1337). National Gallery, London. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
RIGHT: "The Pentecost," Part of Doña María de Aragón Altarpiece, circa 1600, by El Greco (1541–1614). Museo del Prado, National Museum of Spain, Madrid. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
LOWER LEFT: "The Pentecost" by a follower of Bernard van Orley, circa 1530. North Carolina Museum of Art, USA. Public domain, via Wikimedia.org.]

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Disclaimer: If and when I quote or paraphrase bible passages or mention religion in many of my blog posts, I do not intend to promote any religion over another, nor am I attempting to promote religious belief in general; only to explore how the Bible and religion influenced Shakespeare, his plays, and his age.
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Thanks for reading!
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My current project is a book tentatively titled Hamlet’s Bible, about biblical allusions and plot echoes in Hamlet.

Below is a link to a list of some of my top posts (“greatest hits”), including a description of my book project (last item on the list):

https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2019/12/top-20-hamlet-bible-posts.html

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