/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.5580970]

Why is there virtually no Biblical influence in his work?

[Anonymous No.5580976]

He knew the truth: God doesn't exist. He was one of the first advanced Type 2 reptilian humans to be planted on earth to start off the modern world.

[Anonymous No.5580977]

You mean no Biblical references? Because there is Biblical influence in his work.

[Anonymous No.5580983]

>>5580977
Is there anything western WITHOUT biblical influence?

[Anonymous No.5580995]

>>5580977
I don't mean overt references as such, but rather, nods to Christian themes and ideas. It's been a while since I read Shakespeare, but from what I recall there's way more Greek mythology than anything that can be called Christian.

There's Biblical influence by extension because he lived in the 16th Century which was heavily shaped by Christianity - but it doesn't seem conscious.

There are many biblical phrases and ideas people use every day without realising, but with Shakespeare I feel he doesn't do any deliberate exploration.

[Anonymous No.5580997]

>>5580983
Harry potter.

Because jk rowling is a godless heathen.

[Anonymous No.5580998]

>>5580983
pre-bible stuff.

[Anonymous No.5581000]

>>5580997
What about the whole resurrection thing? You know, Harry coming back from the dead?

[Anonymous No.5581001]

>>5580998
There's a West BEFORE the Bible?

Godamn.

[kitty !kitty/EnNg No.5581006]

>>5580997
actually... you are right, there was a violent reaction of the church vs harry potter

[Anonymous No.5581009]

There are quite extensive references to biblical stories and ideas. Shakespeare is rarely explicit though, he doesn't quote chapter and verse. Much of the playwriting before the Elizabethan era had been almost exclusively biblical retellings, Shakespeare and his contemporaries were keen to use much of the non-christian learning and stories, Greek and Roman, that were more available in their time . Also there was probably a desire not to profane biblical stories by putting them on stage in entertainment and likely get you censored if you didn't stick to the book.

[Anonymous No.5581012]

>>5581001
I think it's conventional to consider the Greeks, "the west". But technically the west is not a good term in my opinion, it's always unclear what is meant.

[Anonymous No.5581078]

>>5581009
pretty much this. explicit references to "god", "heaven", etc were taboo in Shakespeare's time so they used substitute words instead, a bit like prudish americans say "darn it to heck" even now.

for example in twelfth night there is a scene where viola is washed up onshore after a shipwreck and she says "my brother is in Elysium"- "Elysium" is a synonym for "heaven" but for Viola to explicitly say it would have been the equivalent of saying something like "lol my bro was rekt" or something

[Anonymous No.5581083]

because he was black

[Anonymous No.5581117]

I don't agree that their is no biblical influence in his work. A winter's tale is a pastoral play, and several of his female characters are quite christian. He's also part of the Renaissance in England. Obviously he's going to focus mostly on the greeks and romans, that's literally what the Renaissance means.

[Anonymous No.5581729]

>>5580970

The Merchant of Venice, The Jew talks about Portia being a New Daniel. Allan Bloom talks about the OT references in the play in his book about Shakespeare.

[Anonymous No.5581737]

>>5581009
Who names their child Hannibal? I bet their family is awesome. The parents name their kids Hannibal and he writes a book on Shakespeare and the Bible.

[Anonymous No.5581740]

>>5581117
>literally

Learn Italian

[Anonymous No.5581776]

>>5581737
He's named after the 7th most useless (according to Time magazine) American vice president, although are there useful ones?

[Anonymous No.5581777]

>>5581740
French*

[Anonymous No.5581909]

because he's a good writer

[Anonymous No.5582169]

>>5580997
>>5581000
>>5581006

Rowling herself, on the other hand, believes that "the religious parallels have always been obvious" (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/fictionreviews/3668658/J-K-Rowling-Christianity-inspired-Harry-Potter.html).).

[Anonymous No.5582283]

>>5581001
>>5581012

The Greeks are considered part of the cultural history of "the West" partly because of their early settlements in the Western Mediterranean (in North Africa, Southern Italy and Sicily, and even as far West as Marseille); partly because of their extensive influence on Roman culture (and Greek was the second language of educated Romans, as well as a lingua franca of the Mediterranean region from the Hellenistic period onwards), which in turn influenced the subsequent history and culture of the regions under Roman control (including the eventual dominance of Christianity); and partly because of the crucial role of Greek, via the Septuagint and the NT, in the development of the Judaeo-Christian influence on "the West". There are also more recent reasons, such as the 18th and 19th century rediscovery of Greek culture by Western and central Europeans, and the new wave of influence this prompted, and the identification with and support of the Greek campaign for indepence (which worked both ways: the Greek desire for independence was fuelled in part by the influence of Western European and other revolutionary and nationalist movements, and Western Europeans saw it as part of a general strategic push against the Ottoman Turks - indeed, the military and political intervention of several of the great European powers in the late 1820s was crucial to the ultimate success of the Greek campaign for independence).

[Anonymous No.5582292]

>>5582283
>the Greek campaign for indepence

independence

[Anonymous No.5582296]

>>5582169
Rowling herself is merely trying to sell to a significant demographic.

[Anonymous No.5582342]

>>5582296

Except that won't work as an explanation, because apart from saying in reply to direct questions that she was Christian and believed in God, she made very little public mention of her religious beliefs until after the final HP book was published (in mid 2007), by which time the fulminations of religionists had not remotely stopped her selling millions of books. Rowling seems to fit in perfectly well with a significant strand of British culture that is Christian in background, and often though not always in belief, but that strongly distrusts overt and preachy religiosity.

[Anonymous No.5582355]

>>5582169
>>5582296
burrrr anything I don't like is for capitalism and anything I do like is the artist making art decisions for arty art reasons

the Christianity shit has always been obvious as hell in Harry Potter (c'mon, his innocent mom sacrificed herself not just so Harry could live but so humanity could survive Voldemort), as big as or bigger than the direct Tolkein influence. if you didn't see it you were too young or you're a bad reader. (which is not to say HP is brilliant, it's not, it's totally passable YA and nothing more.)

[Anonymous No.5582418]

>>5580983
>>5581001
What's the difference between the West and the North?

[Anonymous No.5582432]

>>5582418
Define "North."

[Anonymous No.5582441]

>>5582432
The opposite of South.

[Anonymous No.5582451]

>>5580970
Because he was only a very nominal Christian. Not literally everyone between the fall of the Roman Empire and 1969 was a devout Christian.

[Anonymous No.5582474]

>>5582451
Possible. Or he just didn't care to write on those sorts of themes for whatever reasons.

[Anonymous No.5582530]

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME.

Literally (LITERALLY) every single play has some Christian motif, theme, element, reference, etc. even the plays that are set in pre-Christian eras.

READ MORE, FAGGOT.

[Anonymous No.5582723]

>>5581078
you're making this up. there was a strong tradition of religious plays in elizabethan england, and shakespeare's contemporaries frequently worked with biblical or christian material.
>>5581117
shakespeare was well after the end of the renaissance as usually defined. the elizabethan era was a time of renewed dynamism in and attention to christianity in england.
>>5582530
you're moving the goalposts way too wide--"motif" or "theme" can include essentially any agreeable moral message.

[Anonymous No.5582735]

>>5582723

>"motif" or "theme" can include essentially any agreeable moral message.

No, I'm talking iconography, quotations and allusions from/to various books of the bible (psalms in particular), character arcs--half of Measure for Measure takes place around a NUNNERY, and one of its main characters is an adept.

It's simple nonsense to claim that there is no "biblicism" in Shakespeare. It practically bleeds through the pages.

[Anonymous No.5582817]

>>5582723
>>5581009
I think there are some subtle but pertinent historical facts being glossed over here, with reference to how religion was framed in the theater under the reign of Elizabeth I. Generally, for theater the period was a time of innovation and a break from the traditional, and while Elizabeth was gregarious in trying not to go around like her father and sister declaiming this and that as heretical, killing people in the process, criticism of certain aspects of religion in theater did exist. The first thing that comes to mind is the banning of one of the varieties of Mystery Plays, finding it too much influenced by Catholicism, papal shit, etc., although the mystery plays themselves had an undeniably huge impact on English theater in general, being traced as its origin in some ways. So, it wasn't a matter of "NO ALLUSIONS TO GOD" or some irreligious sentiment that gave preference to Greek classicism (which has always been present in English literature... since... well... England), but more a matter of degree and kind of religious language, imagery, or topic employed, and, past all that, the innovation and freedom of doing more than JEEBUS.

[Anonymous No.5582831]

>>5582735
>It practically bleeds through the pages.
this is nonsense.

[Anonymous No.5582855]

>>5582723

I suspect >>5581078 is more misremembering than making it up: what were taboo were blasphemous oaths; thus the emergence use of forms like "zounds" as a contraction of "God's wounds", "[gad]zooks" as a contraction of "God's hooks" (i. e., the nails used in crucixifion), and similar minced oaths. Ordinary references to God, Heaven, Hell, angels, and religious festivals (such as the feast of St Crispin in Henry V), etc., are of course by no means absent from Shakespeare, and OP's question is just plain wrong: true, Shakespeare wrote no plays on biblical subjects (which might perhaps have something to do with the fractious religious envrionment), but Christian religious ideas and the language of the Bible (which in his day would have been the Geneva Bible, the "Great Bible", or one of various versions using the work of Tyndale and Coverdale, for Protestants; and later the Douay-Rheims for Catholics, as far as translations went) are very much present.

[Anonymous No.5582871]

>>5580970
Because his gist was in expressing the zeitgeist of society a few decades into the most destructive civil war in European history so far, fought between emerging Bourgeois and vaning Aristocracy. Its all very Marxist.

[Anonymous No.5582889]

>>5582283
Well holy shit a 10/10 post, not everyday we see those.

[Anonymous No.5582893]

>>5582871
What do you major in?

[Anonymous No.5582913]

>>5582871
>most destructive civil war in European history so far, fought between emerging Bourgeois and vaning Aristocracy

Except Shakespeare died 30 years before the English Civil War. Go away.

[Anonymous No.5582917]

>>5582441
Cheeky cunt. I like you.

[Anonymous No.5582950]

>>5582913
Few decades leading to, I meant.
>>5582893
Economic History ;)

[Anonymous No.5582965]

>>5580970
>confirmed for never studying Shakespeare
>>5580995
>implying Greco-Roman myths don't coincide with the Old Testament

>>5582530
this anon gets it

Seriously if you even did a tiny bit of research you would find countless books on this. Fuck, most of his christian/Catholic elements can be found while barely scratching the surface. Instead you go on /lit/ and want to be spoonfed, ebin :^)

[Anonymous No.5582975]

>>5582831
In Hamlet, every time the ghost of his father comes back, he is slightly more pure, implying he's in purgatory and being cleansed of sin.

That's just off the top of my head, there are countless others but you are too euphoric and dense to even pick up on that. Unless you've never actually read Shakespeare or just did it in High School, then that makes sense.

[Anonymous No.5582981]

>>5582975
>pure
What do you mean by this?

[Anonymous No.5582984]

>>5581000
>resurrection automatically implies Jesus
>no other mythology has ever existed with the concept of resurrection
>fantasy has never embraced the idea of resurrection as fantastical
This is what Christfags actually believe

[Anonymous No.5582990]

>>5580970
Yes the most tragic part of Othello was that he renounces his Christian name making his death a much more tragic one where he will toil in hell not merely for the murder of his wife, but because he renounced his CHRISTIAN name. Also Merchant of Venice was really all based how people perceived their religion superior while degrading Schlock

[Anonymous No.5583358]

>>5582283

Of course, Greek culture and thought also wasn't entirely unknown in Western Europe during the Middle Ages: Augustine had drawn on the Platonic philosophical tradition; and more importantly, while a few had been used earlier, from the twelfth century onwards, many of Aristotle's works entered the scope of Western European education and thought, by various means, through translations made much earlier by Boethius, through new translations of works and of commentaries by Western scholars who learned Greek (James of Venice, Robert Grosseteste, and William of Moerbeke among them), and through translations from Arabic versions, especially in Spain. By the end of the 13th century, partly through this process of rediscovery, and partly through the work of leading scholars and thinkers of the age like Roger Bacon, St Albertus Magnus, and St Thomas Aquinas, Aristotle was established as a central part of Western European university education and thought.

[Anonymous No.5583380]

>>5582984

Of course other mythologies have employed resurrection; however, when you find resurrection (esp. of a saviour figure) and afterlife themes in two of the best known British fantasy writers (Tolkien with Gandalf, and Rowling), and both of those writers are known to be Christian, it's not a great leap to assume a connection.

[Anonymous No.5583669]

>>5582831

It's okay to admit that you haven't read either the Bible or any of Shakespeare's plays, but please don't think you have any standing in a conversation about both if that is actually the case.

[Anonymous No.5584438]

>>5580997
>there are SEVEN books
>Dumbledore is basically Gandalf
>Voldemort is more or less literally satan
>completely lacking in Biblical influence

yeah okay

[Anonymous No.5584451]

>>5582984
>resurrection automatically implies Jesus
Of course not--it's the specifically Christian notions of it that have pervaded its usage throughout our literature.

[Anonymous No.5584748]

>>5584438
>OMG seven books
>Dumbledore is super wise wizard
>Voldemort is ultimate evil
>all this biblical

Just admit Rowling is a fucking YA author who caters to people who are just learning about life.

[Anonymous No.5584995]

>>5580976

kek

[Omnisexual Tyrannosaurus !!33slhp0V42i No.5585012]

>>5580983
No, the Bible is what created "Western culture".

[Anonymous No.5585096]

>>5585012

>not greece and rome

Semitic loving race traitor

[Anonymous No.5585129]

>>5582283
>>5583358

Greek culture is a gift that just keeps on giving

[« Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ » !mxvabIoSIE No.5585132]

>>5585012
It surely tainted to an almost unrecognizable shell of it's former self, but it did not make it.

[Omnisexual Tyrannosaurus !!33slhp0V42i No.5585256]

>>5585096
Greece and Rome crated Greco-Roman culture, but that's not synonymous with a general European culture. Greeks myths did not unit lands such as Scandinavia culturally with Spain, the Bible did. Greco-Roman culture is common European heritage now, but that's because the Bible united European identity.

[Anonymous No.5585292]

>>5585256

Bible was an expression of the Greco-Roman culture (it is not "semitic", apart from the fact that it incorporated the pre-existing myth and literature of a (Hellenized) Semitic cultural group from which it was, by AD 100, splitting away) that could never exist in its modern form without Plato, Stoics, or Mithraistic beliefs. The Bible is the means by which the Greco-Roman culture united Europe.

[Anonymous No.5586539]

>>5585256
>Greeks myths did not unit lands such as Scandinavia culturally with Spain, the Bible did. Greco-Roman culture is common European heritage now, but that's because the Bible united European identity.

But Greco-Roman culture is a great deal more than just myth.

The Bible - or more accurately the complex of Christian narratives and ideas - is of course crucial to European culture, but it did not achieve that position solely under its own impetus. In the early centuries, it relied fundamentally on the environment created by Greco-Roman culture: quite apart from the influence of that culture on early Christian texts and writers themselves (from the NT, to Augustine and others), those texts and the associated ideas spread in a Roman world that extended from Spain and Britain to the Middle East, from Egypt to the Rhine; and they spread via the common languages of Greco-Roman culture, first Greek, and then from the Roman to the early modern period via the Latin that became the common language of European elites and education.

The gradual adoption of Christianity by the Greco-Roman elite, and then the state itself, was also crucial; and so were such things as the Roman legal tradition that influenced the Canon Law of the Church. Of course we cannot possibly know for certain, but the legitimacy, protection, and later official authorization and support given to Christinaity by its adoption by the Roman (and that includes the later Greek "Byzantine", which considered itself Roman) elite and state was surely crucial to the religion's place in European culture and history.

And Greco-Roman culture also continued to influence Christian thinkers. The Byzantines had access to a great deal of Greek literature, some of which has not subsequently survived, but we know through their writings (the Bibliotheca of Photios, a ninth century patriarch of Constantinople who was to be crucial in the eventual schism between Western and Eastern Christinaity, records his own reading and shows the culture available to a senior churchman of the age). In the West, Latin and some Greek literature was preserved through being copied and kept, especially in monasteries and universities, and some pre-Christian Latin texts, such as Vergil, are known from the number and form of the extant manuscripts to have been highly valued.

Christianity is a crucial influence on European culture, but so is Greco-Roman culture, not least because of its role in the origins, spread, and ultimate dominance of Christianity.

[Anonymous No.5586573]

>>5586539

And of course, as I wrote at >>5583358 above, some pre-Christian Greco-Roman authors were also central to the education of European elites in the Middle Ages. Cicero was crucial to the translation of Greek philosophical ideas into Latin, was highly influential on early Christian figures like St Augustine and St Jerome, and many of his works survived through the Middle Ages, where some were influential on both thought and Latin style. Ovid and other Latin authors were known to, and major influences on Chaucer. And so on.