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Dissertations and Theses

Spring 5-15-2015

Temptation, Sin, and the Human Condition in Shakespeare's Temptation, Sin, and the Human Condition in Shakespeare's

Macbeth Macbeth

Maria Cusimano

https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/1969

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Temptation, Sin, and the Human Condition in Shakespeare’s Macbeth

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the

University of New Orleans

in partial fulfillment of the

ii

Table of Contents

Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iii

Introduction ..........................................................................................................................1

Chapter 1: Presence of Morality in Macbeth .......................................................................3

Witches as Agents of Satan............................................................................................5

Imagery and Motifs Illuminate Macbeth’s Moralistic Themes .....................................6

Shakespeare’s Changes from Holinshed’s Historical Account ...................................13

Chapter 3: Definitions of Sin .............................................................................................31

Sin is Compliance with the Devil ................................................................................31

Sin is a Perversion of Virtue and Goodness.................................................................43

Sin is Unnatural; It Acts Contrarily to the Natural Order of the World ......................45

Sin Disrupts and Ruins Relationships, Ultimately Leading to Solitude ......................50

Sin Begets Sin ..............................................................................................................54

Sin Distorts the Ability to Reason or See the World Objectively................................56

Sin Creates Hell on Earth .............................................................................................64

Sin Cannot Bring Life, Only Death .............................................................................67

Conclusion .........................................................................................................................70

Abstract

basis, Shakespeare’s Macbeth alludes to stories from Scripture as well as Renaissance religious

practices and beliefs, particularly regarding witchcraft, prophecy, and the dangers of sin.

Through this myriad of sources, Shakespeare offers a vivid and grotesque depiction of a man

demise due to his involvement with sin, offering a profound caution to his audience of the

dangers of temptation and sin.

Macbeth, William Shakespeare, Sin, Renaissance Literature, Witchcraft, Prophecy

1

Introduction

through the several instances of heaven and hell imagery and the damned nature of Macbeth as

he delves further into his sin. Although Shakespeare’s play clearly connects to the Gunpowder

Plot, which threatened King James I’s safety, Shakespeare’s use of soliloquies to reveal

Macbeth’s thoughts and sorrows throughout his pathway to damnation prevents the audience

from simply loathing him as a villain. Macbeth’s suffering due to his sin of regicide would

certainly flatter the king; his suffering due to his temptation and sin is a universal experience and

reminds the audience of the dangers of spiritual evil. Through his play, Shakespeare provides an

unified primitive world, but a dynamic and infinitely various society, where social and

intellectual change had long been at work and where currents were moving in many different

directions” (Thomas 5). Shakespeare’s England was a world of confusion and questioning.

Regardless of his personal beliefs, Shakespeare’s works often reflect the changing tides of his

society, both politically and morally. In Macbeth Shakespeare has colored the stage with the

against the monarch because of his direct ordinance from God. A sin against the king is a sin

2

question of the relevance of good and evil in people’s lives, a question just as relevant today as it

agents of the devil. I will also discuss some of the areas where Shakespeare diverges from the

historical account of Macbeth in Holinshed’s Chronicles of Scotland in an attempt to argue that

his changes support the presence of morality in his play. Then I will explore the various beliefs

about predestination and free will in Renaissance England and the ways in which Shakespeare

reflects this question in Macbeth’s entrapment in self-fulfilling prophecy. Through this I will

with so much emphasis on consequence, Macbeth depicts the dangers of entertaining temptation

and conceding to sin. While this is not be an exhaustive study of every spiritual reference and

implication of the play, I do suggest that this is a play steeped in religious overtones that warns

its audience of the dangers of temptation and sin.

3

draws upon a rich variety of intellectual traditions, Christian as well as classical, even in its

moments of most ardent critique” (Gray and Cox 13). There can be no doubt that an extensive

amount of research could provide source material from a myriad of genres and institutions. Here

I will explore some of the specifically religious sources for Shakespeare’s Macbeth in an attempt

to establish the foundation for what he is asserting about the dangers of temptation and sin.

A study of “An Homily Against Disobedience and Willful Rebellion” illuminates the

supreme disdain for rebellion against England’s monarch. The sermon draws directly from

(Rom. 13:5). The marginal commentary on this passage clarifies that “no priuate man can

contemne that gouernemet wc God hathe appointed without ye breache of his coscience.” The

admonition emphasizes the sinful nature of rebelling against the king. Earthly punishments are

certainly something of which to be afraid, but they pale in comparison to the spiritual

consequences that ensue after committing such an act of disobedience.

4

The epistle concludes this warning with stress on the importance of remaining in

imagery, present throughout Scripture, colors the passages of Macbeth as well, a clear indication

of the conflict between good and evil that wages war in Macbeth’s soul. One of the key

components in exploring the play as a conflict between good and evil is acknowledgement of

guilt that Macbeth and Lady Macbeth experience as a result of their actions

. In “Shakespeare

and the Geneva Bible: The Story of King Saul as a Source for Macbeth,” John Parker notes the

desperate and suicidal end. Even as his melancholic despair and ever-present,

deep-seated awareness of inevitable destruction that began with and even

preceded the moment he first plunged the dagger into Duncan, and awareness that

emerges during his angry and frantic interview in Acheron. The play…is not the

story of a villain, but of a good man who terrifyingly collapses—morally,

5

acknowledges his own evil. Several instances throughout the play reveal a presence of forces of

only of regicide and tyranny but of a damned soul, of a man who, having destroyed his own

conscience, is capable of acting in defiance of the restraints both of human nature and religion”

(Jack 183). Macbeth’s crime supersedes that of earthly rebellion. His fall into damnation

illustrates the spiritual dangers of sin.

Shakespeare leaves the role of the witches as somewhat ambiguous

. However, there is

enough evidence in Macbeth, along with a consideration of Renaissance beliefs in witches as evil

or having the capability to inflict harm, to suggest that the witches of Macbeth are agents of the

The dichotomy of good and evil is strongly present in the apparent strengthening of evil at night.

light and darkness as a signal to the audience of the ever-present powers of evils both on the

stage and in real life.

Considering the prevalence of the Heaven and Hell imagery throughout Macbeth, the

audience can interpret Lady Macbeth’s “Hell is murky” statement to be a literal observation of

her condition rather than a metaphorical or hyperbolic statement (5.1.34). The devilish

motif of Hell. Therefore, since it is such an integral part of the play’s language, Lady Macbeth’s

statement illustrates her real and literal experience of Hell. Lady Macbeth’s statement, albeit

only a brief three words, speaks quite poignantly to the crux of the crisis in which the Macbeths

find themselves. Through forging a relationship with the Devil by their murder of Duncan, they

thrust themselves onto a path of damnation. They desire the effects of their actions that they can

action to ensure that their promised earthly success happens promptly. However, they ultimately

foresee and did not anticipate but that she asked for.

is obvious. However, certain changes that Shakespeare made from the historical account add to

the moralistic themes of his play. According to Jack, the changes depict the play as “less a story

of regicide and tyranny than of the war between the forces of evil and supernatural good” (Jack

180). Shakespeare downplays the historical elements that would potentially justify Macbeth’s

actions against Duncan. Instead, Shakespeare has Macbeth hover in indecision over the

representatives of the Devil

And you all know, security

Is mortals' chiefest enemy. (3.5.30-33)

By the conclusion of the play, when Macbeth learns of the witches' trickery he exclaims,

I pull in resolution; and begin

To doubt th'equivocation of the fiend,

that he is secure, a hubris that leads to his unraveling. Shielding himself with this supposed

invincibility, Macbeth lets down his guard, allowing himself to be vulnerable to defeat. The

serpent in the biblical Fall convinces Eve that she does not need to obey God but can achieve her

own superiority and independence through eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Encouraged by the promptings of Lady Macbeth, Macbeth places his trust in the witches'

reflects the promise of full-knowledge and equality with God in the biblical account of man's

Duncan and become king. Ken Colston in his essay “Macbeth and the Tragedy of Sin” explains

the parallels between Genesis and the story of the Macbeths:

In Genesis 3, the serpent and Eve suborn Adam to disobey; the woman has the

more culpable ambition; a childless couple becomes one in sin and loses paradise;

compromised sexuality lurks in the shadows; fertility is cursed… The witches

In scripture, the allure of the tree of knowledge enthralls Eve. She partakes of the fruit

herself and then proffers it to Adam. Similarly, Lady Macbeth is enthralled by the prospect of

Macbeth and herself procuring the crown, decides on the plan for their success, and convinces

Macbeth to act upon the plan of killing Duncan even after he decides otherwise. While this does

not excuse Macbeth's role in his own sin, Shakespeare does capture the intricacies of human

The biblical reflections in Macbeth continue beyond the initial Fall of man to include the

illustrates the arrival of Hell into not only Macbeth's soul but the whole of Scotland. The Porter,

speaking of Macbeth's castle as Hell itself, establishes the depths of the effects of Macbeth's

crime. No longer is Macbeth's sin confined to internal "black and deep desires" (1.4.51). By

outwardly acting upon his lust for greatness by murdering Duncan, Macbeth allows evil a real

presence on the stage and in Scotland.

murdered Duncan depicts a similar imagery to that of the crucified Christ: “His silver skin [was]

laced with his golden blood / And his gashed stabs looked like a breach in nature / For ruin’s

wasteful entrance” (2.3.112-114). Baker acknowledges the similarities in the external effects of

both the death of Duncan and the death of Christ comparing the storm that Lennox describes the

night of Duncan’s death to the earthquake that occurs the day of Christ’s death. He also notes the

resonances” (Baker 243). Jack adds that the commentary regarding the occurrences in nature the

Shakespeare’s language to that of Revelation in its description of the darkness: “And the fourthe

Angel blew the trumpet, and the third parte of the sunne was smitten, & the third parte of the

moone, and the third parte of the starres, so that the third parte of them was darkened” (Rev.

8:12). The connections between Macbeth and Revelation emphasize the eternal damnation that

accompanies Macbeth’s decision to engage in sin without repentance

.

subtlety of this kind of imagery” (Jack 191). Jack compares Macbeth’s statement of the

impossibility of washing Duncan’s blood from his hands

to the passage in Revelation, which

states: “And the secod Angel powred out his vial vpon the sea, and it became as the blood of a

dead man” (Rev. 16:3). As Jack concludes, “Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are haunted by blood”

(Jack 191). Although they do literally wash the blood from their hands, Shakespeare’s use of

green one red” (2.2.59-62).

Pilate washing his hands of Jesus’ death. As Pilate says, “I am innocent of the blood of this iust

After killing Duncan, a knocking at the gate awakens Macbeth from his reverie. This

name of Belzebub?'" (Muir xxvi). With this insight, the audience can rightly predict Macduff's

ultimate defeat of Macbeth as he becomes a type of Christ figure. Ultimately, Macbeth faces his

death at the hands of Macduff who expresses,

Despair thy charm;

And let the Angel, whom thou still hast serv’d,

unnatural way. Macbeth, not foreseeing that this could be possible, has at this point given in to

the allure of entrusting himself to the witches’ words and illusions. In Scripture, the Devil’s

power is defeated by the presence of Christ in the world

. Jesus becomes man by being born of

woman, but without an earthly father, another unnatural birth. Here, Macduff again acts as a

figure of Jesus as he is the one who conquers Macbeth, a source of evil to Scotland.

man: loke you to it,” the people respond with “His blood be on vs, and on our children” (Matt.

27:24-25). Macbeth’s and Lady Macbeth’s bloodied hands incriminate them as not only sinning

The knocking at the gate also reflects Scripture’s analogy of God’s invitation for a

force his way into a person’s life. Macbeth’s invitation, however, is not for God, but for evil to

work in and through his actions. Through this knocking, Shakespeare accentuates the damage to

Macbeth’s soul through his decision to murder Duncan.

Jack notes the similarities between Macbeth’s assassination of the king and the “Old

Testament histories of kings whose reigns are characterised as good or evil according to their

according to the command in the Lawe of God, dilated by Ieremie” (qtd. in Jack 181). James’

concern with the biblical warning against false prophets is evident. Shakespeare captures this

warning quite poignantly in Macbeth. Jack explains Shakespeare’s allusions to King Saul’s

crime

:

Macbeth’s crime here is the same as Saul’s, and his end is the same. When his

and it shalbe giuen to you: seke, & ye shal finde: knock, & it shalbe opened unto you” (Matt.

7:7).

In I Samuel, Saul, afraid of the imminent attack of the Philistines, seeks out the witch of Endor

he only sees Samuel in appearance, for “it was Satan who to blinde his eyes toke vpon him the

forme of Samuel.” Similarly, Macbeth is not able to decipher the truth behind the messages of

the apparitions

Once Macbeth has committed his crimes and seeks to ensure his safety as king, his

character becomes like Herod in his attempts to eradicate children who threaten his kingly status.

Fleance, which fails and his attempts to kill Malcolm

succeed in killing Macduff’s children. While, tragic, the death of Macduff’s children do not

eliminate any threat to his crown

.

Macbeth also contains other references to Revelation. For example, after Duncan’s death,

Macduff announces to everyone still asleep,

apparitions in a later section.

a couple of places. First, Lennox says “I do think, / That, had [Macbeth] Duncan’s sons under his

key / (As, and’t please Heaven, he shall not), they should find / What ’twere to kill a father”

miraculous gifts of healing and prophecy

. He says that “sundry blessings hang about his throne,

thwart the devil and be saint-like.

reaction to their initial greeting of him by his future titles indicates that Macbeth may have

already considered the possibility of his future kingship, perhaps even the possibility of

procuring his future kingship through his own means. This is evident in the response from

Banquo upon his notice of Macbeth’s reaction to the proclamation of his future titles: “Good Sir,

why do you start, and seem to fear / Things that do sound so fair?” (1.3.51-52). The fact that both

surrounding those who claimed to use magic for helpful purposes. Regardless of whether

Shakespeare is entering that debate by depicting Edward as having supernatural powers, he does

seem to be portraying him as a religious savior, much like biblical figures who performed

miraculous deeds through the power of God.

does not choose to act upon any evil impulses.

than agents of evil; however, any evidence that supports them as agents of fate, which would

mind

However, the cost of giving in to the temptation to take hold of it through killing Duncan is

understatedly “foul.

The Porter’s discussion of equivocation in act 2, although somewhat comically lewd,

poignantly captures the trickery of temptation. The Porter first, in his role-playing as the

gatekeeper of Hell, admits an equivocator “Knock, knock. Who’s there, i’th’other devil’s

name?—Faith, here’s an equivocator, that could swear in both the scales against either scale;

who committed treason enough for God’s sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven: O! come in,

If someone has already been dwelling on selfish desires, he would be more apt to succumb to the

promptings of Satan.

will die, unless the apparitions’ messages are another example of the witches simply encouraging

the inclinations in Macbeth to let down his guard, a desire of his because being able to do so

would indicate that he is safe in his position as king, thus enabling the situations that allow the

being complicit in the Gunpowder Plot against King James (Muir 59).

conversation with Macduff and Lenox about the effects of alcohol serve as a symbolic

with lechery: it makes him, and it mars him; it sets him on, and it takes him off; it

persuades him, and disheartens him; makes him stand to, and not stand to: in

conclusion, equivocates him in a sleep, and giving him the lie, leaves him.

(2.3.28-35)

The Porter’s description of the effects of drinking correlates to the effects of temptation and sin

from acquiring the satisfaction that he believes he can achieve. For example, when Macbeth

murders Duncan, he hears a voice that tells him, “Sleep no more! / Macbeth does murther Sleep”

(2.2.34-35). Macbeth’s inability to sleep after he commits the murder illustrates his inability to

acquire peace and satisfaction. He acquires the throne, but he does not feel content with his new

state in life. He utters is discontent when he says, “To be thus is nothing, but to be safely thus”

Chapter 3: Definitions of Sin

relevance of religion in people’s lives. While he seems purposely to leave many ideas open to

debate, such as whether humans are subject to predestination or free will, he does provide a fairly

concrete description of the consequences of sin. Through an exploration of various literary

tropes, I will attempt to define sin, both in identity and consequence, according to Macbeth. In

Macbeth, Shakespeare provides several definitions of sin: sin is a compliance with the Devil and

a perversion of goodness or virtue. Consequently, sin, disrupts human relationships, distorts the

ability to reason, creates a Hell on earth, and prohibits life, instead resulting in only death.

Sin denotes compliance with the Devil. In his essay, “Tanistry, the ‘Due of Birth’ and

Macbeth’s Sin,” Michael J. C. Echeruo explains the choice that Macbeth is actually making

through his decision to murder Duncan:

[Macbeth’s sin] is the result of his willingness to risk the consequences of eternal

damnation for the glory of a temporal crown…The preference itself is damnation.

Macbeth himself equates it with a selling of his soul to the devil. Yet, he returns

to the witches in Act IV, thereby confirming the sale and ensuring that his

further, an understanding of the identity of the witches is necessary as they are undoubtedly the

entangles Macbeth. The hellish imagery of the play identifies their influence as that of the devil.

Banquo recognizes this soon after his and Macbeth’s encounter with them, cautioning Macbeth

against these “instruments of Darkness” (1.3.124). Dark and stormy weather accompanies them

on stage, creating an atmosphere of foreboding. They revel in mischief and destruction. The

audience sees this immediately with the play’s opening. They discuss their imminent meeting

illustrate the depths of the destruction of which they are capable and in which they revel:

But in a sieve I’ll tither sail,

And like a rat without a tail;

I’ll do, I’ll do, and I’ll do…

I’ll drain him dry as hay:

Though his bark cannot be lost,

in destruction, the witches foreshadow the threat of temptation and confusion that they will soon

pose to Macbeth. In these lines, the witch explains that “Sleep shall neither night nor day / Hang

upon his penthouse lid,” which connects to Macbeth’s eventual inability to sleep (1.3.18-19).

This foreshadowing is strengthened by the entrance of Macbeth directly after the witches’

discourse: “A drum! A drum! / Macbeth doth come” (1.3.30-31). These lines follow the first

drum! / … come” (1.3.28-31). The witches later repeat this sound, although pluralized, with their

announcement of his second meeting with them in Act 4: “By the pricking of my thumbs, /

Something wicked this way comes” (4.1.44-45).

The language of the witches and Macbeth connects them further. The witches conclude

their first scene with the lines “Fair is foul, and foul is fair: / Hover through the fog and filthy

witches. This is evidence of the influence that the witches are already having over Macbeth and

connection is already established between his soul and them. Their spells have already wrought

upon his blood” (Muir 25). Because of his weak moral resolve, Macbeth concedes to the

overwhelming influence of the witches.

Macbeth’s connection with the witches also stems from a possible inclination to procure

the crown for himself prior to the start of the play. He has both ambition and gumption,

Which smok’d with bloody execution,

Like Valour’s minion, carv’d out his passage,

Till he fac’d the slave;

Which ne’er shook hands, not bad farewell to him,

Till he unseam’d him from the nave to th’chops,

proven himself to be loyal to King Duncan, when even others—Macdonwald and the Thane of

All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, Thane of Glamis!

All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor!

All hail, Macbeth! that shalt be King hereafter. (1.3.48-50)

Through responding to Macbeth rather than to Banquo who initially commands them to speak,

they invite Macbeth to ally himself with them. When Banquo questions them upon their initial

Upon her skinny lips. (1.3.43-45).

Muir’s note on the text explains a shared understanding that “the gesture means that the witches

refuse to speak to Banquo; they reply directly to Macbeth” (Muir 15). Through this subtle, but

effective, invitation to forge a relationship of trust with them, Macbeth begins to attain some of

the “illness that should attend” his ambition to be king. Through this the witches allow him to

will tomorrow / (And betimes I will) to the Weïrd Sisters: / More shall they speak” (3.4.131-

This Faustian contract begins with his summoning of the darkness to shield his actions:

One cried, “God bless us!” and, “Amen,” the other,

As they had seen me with these hangman’s hands.

List’ning their fear, I could not say, “Amen,”

When they did say, “God bless us”…

But wherefore could not I pronounce “Amen”?

complete grief. Macbeth is not blind to the fact that he has altered the state of his soul through

his decision to kill Duncan. After Duncan’s death is apparent to the assembly of Inverness the

following morning, Macbeth pronounces to his fellow thanes, “Had I but died an hour before this

chance, / I had liv’d a blessed time” (2.3.89-90). The underlying meaning of these lines reveals

his awareness that his blessedness, or holiness, has been shattered by his evil deed.

Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful Day,

His invocation here reflects similar sentiments to his command “Stars, hide your fires” in Act 1.

He receives the “illness” to accomplish the deed through his continued relationship with evil.

Lady Macbeth also invokes evil to give her the pluck she needs to encourage her husband

in his “illness.”

Come, you Spirits

Come, thick Night,

And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of Hell,

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,

Nor Heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,

To cry, ‘Hold, hold!’ (1.5.40-43, 50-53)

That you are so. (1.3.45-47)

The repeated use of triads suggests an inversion of the Trinity, the core principle of

Christian belief. The motif of threes, especially three prophecies, apparitions, murderers, and

witches, illustrates an inversion of the scriptural number of three, such as the Trinity and the

instance of Jesus rising on the third day. Shakespeare surrounds Macbeth with triadic symbolism,

reflecting the counteracting powers of evil and good. This motif illustrates the Renaissance belief

Banquo, and the three apparitions that the witches show to Macbeth. The witches sometimes

refer to the significance of threes, often using it as a curse upon Macbeth.

Thrice to thine, and thrice to mine,

And thrice again, to make up nine

Peace!--the charm's wound up. (1.3.35-37)

well as female characters, the audience’s perception of their gender is further complicated.

a possible reference to the liturgical communion chalice, becomes poisoned with the ingredients

The first major indication that Macbeth’s sinful desires to murder Duncan are contrary to

Cannot be ill; cannot be good:—

If ill, why hath it given me earnest of success,

Commencing in a truth? I am Thane of Cawdor:

If good, why do I yield to that suggestion

Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair,

earlier in my essay, Genesis asserts that God created humans as inherently good: “And God sawe

Prior to Macbeth’s decision to murder Duncan, Lady Macbeth expresses concern that

more obvious if the whole phrase were printed as one word, not “human kindness” but

“humankind-ness”’—that shrinking from the unnatural which is a marked feature of the practical

man” (qtd. in Muir 27). Thus, Lady Macbeth’s concern is that her husband is too human to

perform a deed that is so contrary to the nature of humanity. Lady Macbeth proceeds to dwell on

this idea, claiming that Macbeth does not have enough “illness” to commit such a sinful act as

After hearing that Duncan will be “under [her] battlements” for the night, Lady Macbeth

relinquishes her own humanness in exchange for the illness she needs to carrying out her own

ambition in order to murder him. She summons the “Spirits / That tend on mortal thoughts,”

asking them to “unsex” her, “stop up the access and passage to remorse,” and “come to [her]

woman’s breasts” (1.5.40-41, 44, 47). Lady Macbeth’s bodily terminology highlights the

How tender ’tis to love the babe that milks me:

In claiming that she would murder her own child during what is often considered to be the most

tender moment between a mother and child, a moment of total dependence and nurturing, Lady

Macbeth flaunts her lack of not only femininity but of humanness. This passage also connects to

the repeated reference to dead babies

. Historically, Lady Macbeth had a child with her first

husband. However, she and Macbeth have no children. Their inability to parent children together

Throughout Macbeth, Shakespeare illustrates the upheaval of human nature once it has

been tainted by sin. In response to Macbeth’s sin, the natural world also reacts in agitation. For

example, Rosse and the Old Man discuss the bizarre events of “A falcon” that “Was by a

mousing owl halk’d at, and kill’d” and “Duncan’s horses” that “Turn’d wild in nature, broke

their stalls, flung out, / Contending ’gainst obedience” and did “eat each other” (2.4.12-14, 16-

Of dire combustion, and confus’d events,

J. C. Curry in his Shakespeare’s Philosophical Patterns comments that “the storm which rages

over Macbeth’s castle… is no ordinary tempest caused by the regular movements of the heavenly

bodies, but rather a manifestation of demonic power over the elements of nature… The firm-set

earth is so sensitized by the all-pervading demonic energy that it is feverous and shakes” (qtd. in

Muir 61-62). The witches’ influence over nature foreshadows the effects on nature that the evil

establishing his moral culpability.

Later while Macduff is in England imploring Malcolm for external aid for Scotland,

Rosse arrives and comments on the state of Scotland:

Alas, poor country!

Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot

earth did quake” (Matt. 27:51).

A modern ecstasy: the dead man’s knell

Rosse’s personification of Scotland conveys a sense of lifelessness. Scotland as a land should be

lush and thriving. Instead it is not a home, but a “grave.” The people of Scotland die even before

“the flowers in their caps” die. Death this widespread is suggestive of something as physically

inimical as a plague. The hellish atmosphere of Macbeth’s castle has become the atmosphere

over the entire nation, carrying with it “sighs, and groans, and shrieks.”

countrymen see him as:

Then yield thee, coward,

And live to be the show and gaze o’th’time:

We’ll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,

Painted upon a pole, and underwrit,

Macbeth has become an equivocating, emotionless, tyrant, devoid of any life-giving relationship

The change in the interactions of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is the strongest depiction of

endearment. Despite the strangeness of their inclination to contemplate murder, they at least

share and rejoice in the prospect of royalty each for the other. In his letter to her, Macbeth writes,

“This have I thought good to deliver thee (my dearest partner of greatness) that thou might’st not

lose the dues of rejoicing, by being ignorant of what greatness is promis’d thee. Lay it to thy

heart” (1.5.10-14). The relationship of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is such that Macbeth’s

Duncan’s blood on her hands as well: “My hands are of your colour; but I shame / To wear a

Macbeth orders the company at court to “Let every man be master of his time / Till seven at

plan Banquo’s and Fleance’s assassinations without her knowledge or compliance. Lady

Macbeth later approaches him saying, “How now, my Lord? why do you keep alone, / Of

sorriest fancies your companions making?” (3.2.8-9). She appeals to her husband with affection,

seeking to reestablish the connection they previously had. Harley Granville-Barker in Prefaces to

Shakespeare suggests that “one of the few strokes of pathos that are let soften the grimness of the

because of the detrimental effect of their sin. As he explains, Macbeth’s mind is “full of

scorpions” (3.2.35).

Macbeth is unmoved when Lady Macbeth dies, drastically changing from his

thoughtfulness for her at the beginning of the play. His numbness toward her death reveals his

inability to experience the depth of closeness they once shared. Upon hearing of her death,

doctor for not keeping her from death. Instead, he briefly pauses to consider the meaninglessness

Macbeth’s relationships with his fellow thanes at the beginning of the play, but the general

camaraderie of them is evident. Macbeth’s particular relationship with Banquo is clearly evident

as well. Macbeth and Banquo share their experience of the initial encounter with the witches and

immediately confer with one another about it. Their intuition regarding the thoughts and motives

of the other also indicates a possible companionship beyond their equal statuses as thanes. For

upon a more intimate knowledge of Macbeth’s ambition, as might a close companion.

Duncan also expresses affection for Macbeth in his praise of him toward the play’s

opening: “O valiant cousin! worthy gentleman!” and later, “O worthiest cousin!” (1.2.24;

1.4.14). Duncan’s affirmations of Macbeth’s victories result from Macbeth’s victories on the

battlefield and Duncan’s pride in his familial relationship to the brave Macbeth, yet he bestows

only that Duncan’s relationship with Macbeth is based upon more than the brief encounters that

Shakespeare showcases.

Macbeth’s ambition, encouraged by the deceit of the witches, leads Macbeth to killing

trust” that Duncan has for Macbeth while he considers the consequences of his planned murder

of him (1.7.12). In the Great Performances production with Patrick Stewart production of the

play, Banquo’s character reveals his suspicion of Macbeth’s motives but proceeds to reveal

information regarding his and Fleance’s whereabouts the afternoon preceding his imminent

assassination. Ultimately, Macbeth manipulates and abuses the trust of Duncan and Banquo. His

Macbeth considers his esteem among them: “I have bought / Golden opinions from all sorts of

people” (1.7.32-33). After he yields to his temptation to murder Duncan and then continues in his

attempts to secure his kingship, Macbeth’s relationship with the thanes evolves from them

considering him with “Golden opinions” to considering him the “fiend of Scotland” and a

“tyrant”

scene 3. When Macbeth asks the doctor about his “patient,” the doctor explains that she is “not

a weed, overtaking her entire being. She alone can “pluck” it out, for it is a battle within her soul

that she alone must fight

. Ultimately, her illness—both her participation in evil deeds and the

physical disease resulting from this participation—overtakes her, and she takes her own life.

Because of his initial sin of assassinating Duncan, Macbeth begins to look at past events

through the lens of evil and bitterness. After his coronation, Macbeth reveals his discontent with

MACBETH. Your children shall be kings.

BANQUO. You shall be King.

MACBETH. And Thane of Cawdor too; went it not so?

BANQUO. To th’selfsame tune, and words. (1.3.86-88)

Regarding these lines, Muir notes, “J. M. Nosworthy points out that in all accounts of the episode

anything to heal her. This reflects the debate in the Renaissance of the Church’s role versus a

When first they put the name of King upon me,

prophecy was done in an effort to spite Macbeth. Rather than feel satisfied with that which was

promised to him, Macbeth begins to feel envious of Banquo’s prophecy and ultimately concludes

that he must murder him to regain his peace.

After Banquo’s death, Macbeth is haunted by another illusory image, that of Banquo’s

murdered, ghostly body. Like the dagger, Shakespeare allows Banquo’s ghost to remain

witches, which adds validity to their objective presence, only Macbeth sees the ghost of

Banquo

. Quite possibly, Banquo’s ghost exists only in Macbeth’s mind. Its presence on both

occasions seems to correspond to Macbeth’s mentioning of him, first as he says “Here had we

now our country’s honour roof’d, / Were the grac’d person of our Banquo present,” and later as

he toasts him saying, “I drink to th’general joy o’th’whole table, / And to our dear friend

banquet, but Macbeth only mentions his absence later to Lady Macbeth

, not to the general

Furthermore, the detail Macbeth exclaims upon seeing the image of Banquo’s ghost can

be an indication that the ghost is a fabrication of Macbeth’s delusional mind. After Macbeth’s

commissioning of Banquo’s murderers, he acknowledges his plagued state of mind in his

conversation with Lady Macbeth:

Better be with the dead,

O! full of scorpions in my mind, dear wife! (3.2.19-22, 36)

Macbeth falsely believes his anxiety to be the result of his fear of Banquo, easily eliminated by

having him murdered. After hearing that Banquo has been murdered but that Fleance has

escaped, Macbeth exclaims, “Then comes my fit again: I had else been perfect; / … But now, I

am cabin’d, cribb’d, confin’d, bound in / To saucy doubts and fears” (3.4.20, 23-24). Except,

reappeared, and disappeared again, the fact that the others do not see his tormentor

apparition is an “armed head” and speaks the message “Beware Macduff” (4.1.71). The second

apparition is “a bloody child” and speaks the message “laugh to scorn / The power of man, for

none of woman born / Shall harm Macbeth” (4.1.79-80). Finally, the third apparition is “a child

crowned, with a tree in his hand” and speaks the message “Macbeth shall never vanquish’d be,

until / Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill / Shall come against him” (4.1.92-94). The

Macbeth’s severed head after his duel with Malcolm. The “bloody child” represents the bloodied

baby Macduff, born of a cesarean section rather than of natural birth. The “child crowned, with a

tree in his hand” represents the rightful king of Malcolm who holds a bough of Birnam wood as

he marches toward Macbeth’s fortification at Dunsinane hill. A truly discerning eye could

recognize the deceit of the witches’ apparition and question the significance of the images

psychology is a physiological psychology. It tends to explain mental conditions in terms of

physical causes and vice versa” (Babb 1). This helps illuminate why Macbeth’s internal, spiritual

Macbeth and Lady Macbeth predict.

Immediately after Duncan’s assassination, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth hear a knocking

on the door. This knock startles them because visitors were not part of their plan. For Macbeth,

speaks of the knocking of the Lord upon one’s soul, awaiting the invitation to be present

clearest embodiment of Hell’s presence on earth. Through the Porter’s scene Shakespeare paints

the castle at Inverness as Hell itself. The Porter, acting as the gatekeeper to Hell, imagines

himself answering the door to a variety of sinners:

Here’s a knocking, indeed! If a man were Porter of Hell gate, he should have old

turning the key. [Knocking.] Knock, knock, knock. Who’s there, i’th’name of

sinister reality of what Macbeth has allowed his castle to become. Muir explains, “It is hell

because Lady Macbeth has invoked the murdering ministers, because Macbeth has called on the

stars to hide their fires, and because hell is a state, not a place, and the might say with Faustus’s

tempter, ‘where we are is hell, / And where hell is, there must we ever be’” (Muir xxvi). The

Porter, of course, has no awareness of the crime that has just happened within the castle, but his

for Hell. I’ll devil-porter it no further” (2.3.16-18)

. He decides that even the castle is too

of her unconscious imagining of trying to wash the blood of Duncan from her hands. The

proximity of these statements to one another reveals the connection between Lady Macbeth’s

inability to forgive herself and find peace and her experience of living in Hell because of this. In

asking, “Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?” Lady

Macbeth further reveals her unpreparedness to experience what she now experiences. Like

death, he is unable to experience any shock.

I have almost forgot the taste of fears.

The time has been, my senses would have cool’d

To hear a night-shriek; and my fell of hair

Would at a dismal treatise rouse, and stir,

him so much so that he no longer experiences shock from any horrific stimuli. He has been

shows that he does not even remember what it is like to be without the horrors that have filled his

mind.

In Genesis two of the consequences of Adam and Eve’s sin are removal from the Garden

of Eden

and difficulty in childbirth

Macbeth as well. First, Shakespeare incorporates an agricultural motif throughout the play to

accentuate the difference between virtue and sin. Much like a garden, virtue cultivates growth

and new life. Sin, or the absence of virtue, deprives the soul of what it needs to flourish resulting

was taken. Thus he cast out man” (Gen. 3:23-24).

And say which grain will grow, and which will not,

duration of the play. After the play’s opening battle, Duncan praises Macbeth by saying, “I have

begun to plant thee, and will labour / To make thee full of growing” (1.4.28-29). Immediately

after his promise of growth to Macbeth, Duncan addresses Banquo, to which Banquo replies by

saying, “There if I grow, / The harvest is your own” (1.4.32-33). Right away, the audience can

see a contrast between the growth promised by the witches and the growth promised by Duncan.

comparison to Banquo’s. After Duncan’s murder, when Macbeth has begun to feel the effects of

his sin on his soul, he reflects on his lack of growth versus Banquo’s ample growth.

Then, prophet-like,

They hail’d him father to a line of kings:

Upon my head they plac’d a fruitless crown,

Here Macbeth begins to realize that his path leads to one of death, not one of prosperity. He

contrast of good and evil, especially the consequences of the choice to pursue evil, suggests that

Macbeth’s fruitlessness and barrenness of his kingship are his own doing. Macbeth delivers the

news of Duncan’s death to Malcolm and Donalbain by saying “The spring, the head, the fountain

of your blood / Is stopp’d; the very source of it is stopp’d” (2.3.96-97). Through his act of killing

Duncan, Macbeth has also stopped his own life source. He has, in a sense, murdered the virtue in

produce life. As Lady Macbeth asks the “Spirits / That tend on mortal thoughts” to “unsex” her

and exchange her “milk for gall,” she spiritually disavows her femininity. The terminology of her

prayer explicitly addresses womanly qualities associated with fertility. Although she does not

request that the spirits prevent her from having any more children

femininity takes with it her fertility.

Vita

both English and Catholic theology at the high school level for several years. She joined the

University of New Orleans to pursue a Master of Arts in English in 2011. Her concentrations are

in British literature and professional writing.