Christianity Versus Judaism In Shakespeares Merchant Of Venice

Author : Andrea Oberheiden
Publisher : GRIN Verlag
ISBN 13 : 3640469062
Total Pages : 29 pages
Book Rating : 4.62/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Christianity Versus Judaism in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice written by Andrea Oberheiden and published by GRIN Verlag. This book was released on 2009-11 with total page 29 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Essay from the year 2008 in the subject English - Literature, Works, grade: 2+, Harvard University (Department of English), course: Shakespeare and Modern Culture, language: English, abstract: In Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice, the Jewish character of Shylock refers to the biblical story of Jacob tricking his uncle Laban (1.3.68-98) by tampering with the procreative process of Laban's flock of sheep (Genesis 30.25-43). In the following, I will try to point out why Shylock tells this story, and in which literary context he ruminates upon it. Besides a critical comparison of how his speech interacts with the original biblical story, I will furthermore discuss this analogy foremost in terms of its religious and dramatic functions within the play. Against this background, it will be made evident that 'usury' as a negative Jewish stereotype, presumed by the judging eyes of medieval Christians, is put in the centre of consideration here. It will be argued that as a general declaration in MoV, a superiority of the New Testament to the Old Testament, of Christianity to Judaism, can be derived, and that this conclusion is strongly linked with the majoritarian mindset in Shakespeare's times and cultural sphere, rather than with Shakespeare's personal attitude towards Jews or Judaism, an often supposed attitude of unprovable nature.

Author : Hannibal Hamlin
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1107172594
Total Pages : 331 pages
Book Rating : 4.93/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Religion written by Hannibal Hamlin and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-03-28 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A wide-ranging yet accessible investigation into the importance of religion in Shakespeare's works, from a team of eminent international scholars.

Author : Janet Adelman
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN 13 : 1459605616
Total Pages : 490 pages
Book Rating : 4.19/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Blood Relations written by Janet Adelman and published by ReadHowYouWant.com. This book was released on 2010-11-12 with total page 490 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Blood Relations' Janet Adelman confronts her resistance to The Merchant of Venice as both a critic and a Jew. With her distinctive psychological acumen' she argues that Shakespeares play frames the uneasy relationship between Christian and Jew specifically in familial terms in order to recapitulate the vexed familial relationship between Christianity and Judaism. Adelman locates the promise - threat - of Jewish conversion as a particular site of tension in the play. Drawing on a variety of cultural materials' she demonstrates that' despite the triumph of its Christians' The Merchant of Venice reflects Christian anxiety and guilt about its simultaneous dependence on and disavowal of Judaism. In this startling psycho - theological analysis' both the insistence that Shylocks daughter Jessica remain racially bound to her father after her conversion and the depiction of Shylock as a bloody - minded monster are understood as antidotes to Christian uneasiness about a Judaism it can neither own nor disown. In taking seriously the religious discourse of The Merchant of Venice' Adelman offers in Blood Relations an indispensable book on the play and on the fascinating question of Jews and Judaism in Renaissance England and beyond.

Author : William Shakespeare
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 328 pages
Book Rating : 4.PH/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Merchant of Venice written by William Shakespeare and published by . This book was released on 1917 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Claudia Oldiges
Publisher : GRIN Verlag
ISBN 13 : 3640522885
Total Pages : 33 pages
Book Rating : 4.80/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Jews and Christians in The Merchant of Venice written by Claudia Oldiges and published by GRIN Verlag. This book was released on 2010-02-03 with total page 33 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seminar paper from the year 2002 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 2, University of Osnabrück, course: The Merchant of Venice, 5 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: Although one is able to find a lot bias towards Jews in the play The Merchant of Venice, William Shakespeare is not to be blamed as an anti-Judaic person. Regarding the historical background and the probability of him not knowing a Jewish person, Shakespeare is to be declared as a typical mind of the Elizabethan age. The mentality of the Elizabethan age is resembled in the plot, therefore it was easy for the audience to understand and laugh about this comedy, particularly about the image of the Jew Shylock. Shylock himself has a dominant aversion towards Christians and it is not mentioned whether this attitude derives from his sufferance or is a streak of him. The reader of the past-holocaust-age has a tendency to criticize the Christian behaviour throughout the plot, to feel pity with Shylock and to defend his actions and conduct. A lot of evidence demonstrate fundamental differences and bias between the Jews and Christians in the play The Merchant of Venice. But one ought always consider the time, when the play was written, and the audience, for whom it was written. Fact is that Jews as Christians both pretend to act pious but evidently do not.

Author : William Shakespeare
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 108 pages
Book Rating : 4.39/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Merchant of Venice written by William Shakespeare and published by . This book was released on 1917 with total page 108 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : James Shapiro
Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 0231541872
Total Pages : 351 pages
Book Rating : 4.79/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Shakespeare and the Jews written by James Shapiro and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2016-03-08 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1996, James Shapiro's pathbreaking analysis of the portrayal of Jews in Elizabethan England challenged readers to recognize the significance of Jewish questions in Shakespeare's day. From accounts of Christians masquerading as Jews to fantasies of settling foreign Jews in Ireland, Shapiro's work delves deeply into the cultural insecurities of Elizabethans while illuminating Shakespeare's portrayal of Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. In a new preface, Shapiro reflects upon what he has learned about intolerance since the first publication of Shakespeare and the Jews.

Author : Martin D. Yaffe
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 228 pages
Book Rating : 4.02/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Shylock and the Jewish Question written by Martin D. Yaffe and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Yaffe provides a wide-ranging and probing reflection on the portrayal of Jews and Judaism in early modern thought. His innovative approach to the problem of Shakespeare's treatment of Shylock can stand for the originality of his book as a whole... Yaffe's interpretations are likely to prove controversial, but they are always thought-provoking." -- Virginia Quarterly Review Much attention has been paid to the place of Shylock in the history of anti-Semitism. Most scholars have agreed with Harold Bloom that Shakespeare's famous villain is drawn with a "murderous anti-Semitism" and that Shakespeare uncritically mirrors the rife anti-Semitism of his times. While others see only gross caricature in The Merchant of Venice, however, Martin Yaffe finds a subtle analysis of the Jew's place in a largely Christian society. In Shylock and the Jewish Question, Yaffe challenges the widespread assumption that Shakespeare is, in the final analysis, unfriendly to Jews. He finds that Shakespeare's consideration of Judaism in The Merchant of Venice provides an important contrast to Marlowe's virulent The Jew of Malta. In many ways, he argues, Shakespeare's play is even more accepting than Francis Bacon's notably inclusive New Atlantis or the Jewish philosopher Benedict Spinoza's argument for tolerance in the Theologico-Political Treatise. "Although Yaffe focuses on the Jewish question, his study is a lead-in to a study of the rise of liberal democracy, the development of religious toleration, the relation of church and state, and the inter-relation between politics, economics and religion -- all of these being vital in history's evolution towards modernity." -- Serge Liberman, Australian JewishNews "In a critique that promises to refuel scholarly controversy over the portrait of Shylock... Yaffe's retro-prospective approach to its political philosophy suggests interesting possibilities for contrasting popular anti-Semitic culture and the more tolerant, enlightened statesmanship of the seventeenth-century." -- Frances Barasch, Shakespeare Bulletin

Author : Christopher Marlowe
Publisher : Broadview Press
ISBN 13 : 1770483039
Total Pages : 291 pages
Book Rating : 4.33/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Jew of Malta written by Christopher Marlowe and published by Broadview Press. This book was released on 2011-12-02 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First performed by Shakespeare’s rivals in the 1590s, Christopher Marlowe’s The Jew of Malta was a trend-setting, innovative play whose black comedy and final tragic irony illuminate the darker regions of the Elizabethan cultural imagination. Although Jews were banished from England in 1291, the Jew in the form of Barabas, the play’s protagonist, returns on the stage to embody and to challenge the dramatic and cultural anti-Semitic stereotypes out of which he is constructed. The result is a theatrically sophisticated but deeply unsettling play whose rich cultural significance extends beyond the early modern period to the present day. The introduction and historical documents in this edition provide a rich context for the world of the play’s composition and production, including materials on Jewishness and anti-Semitism, the political struggles over Malta, and Christopher Marlowe’s personal and political reputation.

Author : Lisa Mevissen
Publisher : Grin Publishing
ISBN 13 : 9783640635009
Total Pages : 40 pages
Book Rating : 4.00/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Money Matters - Christian Ventures and Jewish Usury in Shakespeares 'The Merchant of Venice' written by Lisa Mevissen and published by Grin Publishing. This book was released on 2010 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seminar paper from the year 2009 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 2,0, RWTH Aachen University (Lehrstuhl für Anglistische Literaturwissenschaft), course: William Shakespeare: The Tempest and the Merchant of Venice, language: English, abstract: In Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice" we are confronted with a lot of opposites: friendship versus hatred, male versus female power, mercy versus justice or Judaism versus Christianity; just to name a few examples. By contrasting these opposing themes, Shakespeare evolves a lot of problems, which raise unsolvable questions. If we take for example Shylock, we constantly change our opinion about him: on the one hand we dislike him for he is villainous, greedy and merciless, and on the other hand we pity him because of his losses and his isolation in society. Yet, one cannot make a clear-cut statement about him for he bears opposing characteristics in his attitude. So, one can see, Shakespeare does not only depict opposites, but he also creates opposing opinions about the same topic in our heads. Thus, the oppositions he shows in his play should be looked at more carefully. Therefore, I want to focus on the contrast between Jewish usury and Christian ventures, for the conflict between both groups constantly leads to essential problems in the play. As a preliminary step, I want to look at the historical background, an important impact, which influenced the play's final conception. In the following, I want to compare the attitudes of Christians towards Jews and vice versa. In addition to that, in this paper I want to concentrate on the instance that complicates the tension between Christians and Jews: money. Money binds both opposing groups - Christians and Jews - unwillingly together and causes essential conflicts. Therefore, I want to analyse how Christianity and Judaism is interwoven by money, usury, ventures and the characters' behaviour. Therefore, a depiction and an analysis