CHAPTER 9.
An impressive preliminary fact about Shakespeare's Bible references is their range of distribution.
According to Naseeb Shaheen's trilogy on the subject (1987, 1989, 1993), Shakespeare cites at least once
from almost every book of the Bible
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, including relatively obscure books such as Malachi, I & II Esdras,
Judith, Tobit, I & II Maccabees, Susanna, Bel and the Dragon, Titus, and Jude. This distribution in itself
supplies very strong ground, confirmed by other reasons cited below, of the author's intimate familiarity
with the Bible, a familiarity induced at least in part through regular study of the scriptures. "That
Shakespeare was quite literate in Christian theology, and easily conversant in its categories, seems to me
indisputably apparent” (10), states Roland Mushat Frye, a leading critic of Christian interpretations of the
plays and poems, in his Shakespeare and Christian Doctrine (1963). The evidence for this familiarity,
furthermore, seems to consist almost exclusively of his direct knowledge of the Bible and not any of the
myriad works of theology produced by the age. After reading the complete works of every major 16th
century theologian as well as the greatest of the medieval thinkers, Frye's verdict on the evidence for
Shakespeare's knowledge of any of these writers is decisively negative:
I have found no demonstrable instances of Shakespeare's indebtedness, even to Augustine or
Aquinas…(11)…I must report my inability to establish Shakespeare's theological affinities or to discover
even a single unquestionable instance of indebtedness of the kind which can so frequently be found in the
history plays, or of the kind which unequivocally demonstrates Shakespeare's extensive use of the Geneva
Bible…
(12: emphasis added)
It is therefore on the basis of this reading of the Geneva Bible that Frye's Shakespeare emerges as an
“intelligent and maturely informed layman, whose citation of theological doctrines for purely dramatic
purposes shows an easy and intimate familiarity with Christian theology” (13).
The annotations in the de Vere Bible are striking for their inclusion of relatively obscure Biblical
books, for their attention to theological and editorial detail, and for their systematic approach to key
points of doctrine such as sin, economics, and redemption. De Vere apparently read his Bible frequently
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The only exceptions are, I believe, Obdaiah and Haggai in the late prophets of the Old Testament.
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