Part 54: Ophelia, like Jesus, preaching against hypocritical libertines (deconstructed?)
Ophelia’s first biblical allusion made her sound, to Elizabethan ears, like Jesus condemning hypocrisy and corruption of authorities. She targets her brother as a potential hypocrite and “libertine.” Laertes warns her not to get too close to Hamlet, that he is above her station, warning her not to lose her chastity to him. Ophelia responds kindly but strongly: I shall the effect of this good lesson keep As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother, Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven, Whiles, like a puffed and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads And recks not his own rede.[1] In Matt. 7:13-14, Jesus’ cautions: Avoid the “wide gate” (of too much freedom). “Straight and narrow” for Ophelia becomes “steep and thorny.” In Matt. 23:1-4 Jesus says, do all that “teachers of the law” and Pharisees teach, as they sit in the “seat of Moses” as authorities, but not to do as they do, for they are hypocrites.[2] ...