Christmas and the sweep of the incarnation narratives in Hamlet

It is often noted that in its first scene, Shakespeare's Hamlet contains one of the only explicit references to Christmas:

Some say that ever ’gainst that season comes
Wherein our Savior’s birth is celebrated,
This bird of dawning singeth all night long;
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad,
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallowed and so gracious is that time.
(1.1.173-179) [1]

But the Christmas narrative is actually much longer than merely the story of Jesus' birth. It includes numerous other stories or episodes, each celebrated in gospel readings assigned to particular days in the church calendar.

If we don't include all of Judaeo-Christian salvation history but merely the conception, birth, and childhood of Jesus, it begins with Mary being told by the Angel Gabriel that she has conceived by the Holy Spirit. This is called the Annunciation.

Shakespeare's Hamlet alludes to the Annunciation when Polonius asks his daughter Ophelia to read a book and to "sugar o'er the devil" with "devotion's visage": Mary was usually portrayed in paintings and illustrated prayer books as reading a book when visited by the angel. Polonius wants Ophelia to seem innocent as the Virgin Mary as she acts as bait for his spying.

The Christmas story includes, in one gospel account, Jesus having been born in a stable because there was "no room at the inn." Those who welcome strangers potentially welcome angels, or God, and those who are inhospitable to strangers are inhospitable to the divine. Hamlet refers to this idea when the prince scolds Polonius for being inhospitable to the players:

"Use every
man after his desert and who shall ’scape
whipping? Use them after your own honor and
dignity. The less they deserve, the more merit is in
your bounty. Take them in.
(2.2.555-559)

The incarnation narrative includes selfish King Herod the Great who jealously guards his power; he hears of the birth of a new king and orders all male infants under a certain age to be killed, an echo of the Egyptian Pharaoh's alleged slaughter of the innocents. Shakespeare's Hamlet is similarly about a murderous ruler, Claudius, who tries to kill his own successor, Prince Hamlet (who has a line about how a certain kind of acting "out-Herods Herod").

[Correction:] [On the First Sunday after Epiphay], the gospel story is about Jesus as a young child who wanders off and is found teaching the elders in the synagogue. Jesus amazes the elders and his mother. Hamlet alludes to this after The Mousetrap, the play within the play, in the following exchange:

ROSENCRANTZ:[...] your behavior hath
struck her [Queen Gertrude] into amazement and admiration.

HAMLET: O wonderful son that can so ’stonish a mother!
(3.2.354-356)

One might find even more allusions and parallels if one looked carefully...

For all of you who celebrate Christmas or other holy seasons of other faiths, may this time be one of warm hospitality and welcome astonishment.

https://pauladrianfried.blogspot.com/2022/12/christmas-and-sweep-of-incarnation.html

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

IMAGE: Author photo, San Diego, California
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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.

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