Paul Adrian Fried / HAMLET'S BIBLE

Hamlet’s Divinity and Other Essays (Christopher Devlin, 1963) contains two chapters relating to Hamlet as well as a chapter making a case for Shakespeare’s Catholicism. Devlin was a Jesuit priest, and while I was raised Roman Catholic, I find him to be a bit too certain about plucking the heart of the mystery of Shakespeare’s faith. Yet Devlin demonstrates a great knowledge of history and literature, and in a field where for too long Protestants advanced too many of their own assumptions about Shakespeare’s faith, Catholic voices like Devlin’s opposing the status quo played a helpful role. [Image: Author photo. Hamlet's Divinity and Other Essays by Christopher Devlin (d.1961), with an introduction by C.V. Wedgwood. Published 1963. This book is out of print but still available at libraries and in used copies.] In his title chapter, “ Hamlet ’s Divinity” (30-43), Devlin argues that there are various ways he finds divinity to be present in the play. A major element for him is ...

A TALE OF HAMLET & TWO BIBLES: BISHOPS & GENEVA In Shakespeare’s time, the approved Bishops’ bible was used in church; the inexpensive Geneva translation was used at home. Specific words (unlike paraphrase) can point to specific translations: Regarding his accidental killing of Polonius (3.4), Hamlet says, “...heaven hath pleased it so,/ To punish me with this and this with me,/ That I must be their scourge and *minister*.” Hamlet's phrase, “scourge and minister,” uses "minister" in the same sense as the Bishops’ bible Mt 5:25 (in the picture below, right): a minister of justice carries out a judge’s sentence. Because church attendance was required (and absence punishable by fines), Shakespeare would have heard this word, used in this biblical context, every year, all his life. In the Bishops' bible, the word "minister" is used instead of the word "sergeant, which appears in the same place in the Geneva bible. But when Hamlet says...