Paul Adrian Fried / HAMLET'S BIBLE

Did people in Shakespeare’s time sometimes have good reason for appearing to Puritans as if they were violating the first commandment [1], celebrating and retelling tales from classical mythology, tales about gods from ancient religious cults that Christianity had declared to be false?  If one wished to talk and write about mystery and transcendent meaning, what was a person to do if one hoped to avoid being executed as a heretic, when Christianity was contentious and rigid, with certain topics prohibited, dangerous?  It was safer to re-tell tales from classical mythology involving gods and humans interacting, and possibly to use these as analogies for contemporary events.  Many gods and other classical references are in Hamlet:  1.2: Hyperion, Hercules, Niobe; 1.4: The Nemian lion (defeated by Hercules); 2.2: Pyrrhus, Priam, Hecuba; 3.2: Vulcan, Phoebus, Neptune, Hymen, Hecate; 3.4: Hyperion, Jove, Mars, Mercury;  5.1: The Greek mountains, Pelion, Olympus, and ...

Why did Hamlet compare his father to Greek and Roman gods - at a time when Elizabeth was often compared to goddesses? In Shakespeare’s England, churches had the Ten Commandments posted prominently. The first commandment: "THOU SHALT HAVE NO OTHER GODS BUT ME." Literally: Don’t worship deities of other religions. Hamlet worries that heaven forbids suicide (“self-slaughter,” 1.2.136), but (oblivious to other biblical prohibitions?) compares his father to a Greek god, the titan Hyperion (1.2.144), and in 3.4, to more gods: See what a grace was seated on this brow, Hyperion’s curls, the front of Jove himself, An eye like Mars’ to threaten and command, A station like the herald Mercury New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill, A combination and a form indeed Where every god did seem to set his seal To give the world assurance of a man. (3.4.65--72) The ghost says he’s being purged in an afterlife, as in purgatory of Catholic teaching, not Greek or Roman mythology. Is Hamlet confused...

Dives and Pauper [1] was an English text from early 1400s, probably by a Franciscan, and although there are no direct allusions in the play to this Middle English text, it has interesting connections to Shakespeare and Hamlet, as well as representing the general influence of the Ten Commandments [2] on the evolution of English religious culture. The title is an allusion to Luke 16:19-31 in which a rich man (Latin: "Dives") neglects the beggar Lazarus and suffers eternal punishment while Lazarus goes to heaven [3]. Lazarus, whose body had sores that were licked by dogs, was often thought to have been a leper (hence "Lazar houses," hospitals for lepers in England). The ghost in Hamlet 1.5 thinks a “leperous distillment” of poison that his brother poured in his ear made his skin all "lazar-like" [4]. Ophelia's reference to the story of the owl and the baker's daughter is a folktale retelling, where a baker is rich in bread, but his daughter is r...

IN THE PERSON OF HAMLET, DOES SHAKESPEARE ASSOCIATE ELIZABETHAN ICONOCLASM WITH DEMONIC POSSESSION?  In Reformation England, images that recreated scenes from familiar religious and biblical tales were destroyed, removed, or painted over as allegedly idolatrous (as described in the 2nd commandment, which prohibited making any “graven image”).  In their place? Commandment boards.  It is frequently noted that Shakespeare’s father, John, was charged with having to paint over images in their church in Stratford. People who loved religious statues and images in their local churches often had to be content with the Ten Commandments, and words, not images.  By placing on Hamlet’s lips a little speech that seems to make him an iconoclast by analogy – and at the very moment when Hamlet seems tempted to revenge by a possibly demonic ghost – this seems to associate English iconoclasm with the demonic [1].  Consider Hamlet’s little speech after his first encounter with the ...

Because Francisco has the watch and is not yet relieved by Bernardo, many observe that Bernardo is speaking out of turn when he says the opening line of the play, "Who's there?" Francisco rightly refuses to answer, and demands that Bernardo "unfold himself" -- identify himself to Francisco instead. Is it acceptable for one soldier or sentinel to demand reform of another? Bernardo violated the rules of the watch: In a time of war or potential war, following such rules carefully can mean life or death. Hamlet is a play in which many rules (such as the Ten Commandments) are broken, and lives are lost. Bernardo doesn't really answer Francisco's question: Francisco guesses Bernardo's identity, and Bernardo confirms it. Rather than be a stickler for military protocol (rules for their own sake), Francisco backs off. Bernardo's approach didn't represent a sneak attack from an enemy, but merely a mistake by another nervous sentinel. Relieved of his ...