George Washington University

Shakespeare, the Jews, and The Merchant of Venice

Author(s): Herbert Bronstein
Source: Shakespeare Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Winter, 1969), pp. 3-10
Published by: Folger Shakespeare Library in association with George Washington University
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 Shakespeare, the Jews, and
The Merchant of Venice
HERBERT BRONSTEIN

F THE many unforgettable characterswho poured out of the

vast breadth of Shakespeare's imagination, one of the most
fascinating is Shylock, the Jew. Though he appears in only
five out of twenty scenes, Shylock has attracted the major
share of interest in the drama's long history on the stage and
in critical literature. One's first association with The Mer-
chant of Venice is invariably Shylock. "Shylock" has become a term of disap-
proval, a link in the history of anti-Jewish stereotype, just as Shylock's "pound
of flesh" has become a metaphor for cruel and relentless greed.
It is the experience of this stereotype and what its use has done to the Jew
and to modern man which still makes many uncomfortable with The Mer-
chant of Venice, not only Jews, but directors,actors,and critics, as well.
The issue is only exacerbated by the fact that in purely dramatic and ar-
tistic terms The Merchant of Venice is one of Shakespeare'smost perfect plays.
How could the soul of English culture, whose creativity has entranced and
ennobled the generations and who wrote such beautiful and wise lines as
Portia's speech on mercy (justly considered one of the finest passages in Shake-
spearian drama), have consciously contributed to the long history of Jewish
suffering ?
As Walter Kerr, the well-known theater critic, has written:
The most striking tributewe pay [Shakespeare]today is in continuing
to produceThe Merchantof Venice.
Each productionis, really,an act of faith, made in the face of the evi-
dence. Every time anyone decidesto mount the play he is saying, in effect,
that Shakespearecannot possiblyhave meant what he seems to mean, that
the humane and penetratingintelligencewe have come to know so well in
the thirty-sixother plays could never have been capableof the unthinking,
unfeeling anti-Semitismthat poisons the portrait of Shylock. (Horizon,
Januaryi960)

As a result, the trend has developed of reversing what is the apparent

tendency of the drama: Shylock is portrayed not as a hateful character,but as
one who commands our sympathies. Many critics and scholars have devoted
themselves earnestly and voluminously to proving that Shakespeare did not
create a Jewish villain.
So the question arises: Is Shylock a vicious and vengeful villain whose hate
for Antonio arises from the latter's interference with Shylock's greedy usury?
Is Shylock a comic, even a farcical figure, greedy to the point of the ludi-

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4 SHAKESPEAREQUARTERLY

crous, whose every line and mannerismis intended to evoke belly-laughs,

snickers,hoots,and catcalls?
Or is he a tragicfigure,a man of intelligenceand wit, baitedand humili-
ated by the carelessVenetiansports,mockedby bandsof young children,be-
trayedby his daughter,Jessica(who runs off with a Venetiangay blade,steal-
ing her father'smoney and jewels), victimizedin the Venetiancourtthrough
an unjust and trifling trick, and, bereft of all his worldly goods, subjected
finally to the ultimatehumiliationof conversion,the only personin the play
remainingat its conclusionwith a shredof humandignity?
All who love the work of Shakespearewould wish that Shylockwas not a
villain,that Shakespearehad not drawnan anti-Jewishportrait.But if we are
to read the play honestly,we must admit that he did. Any study of the litera-
ture on The Merchant,or of productionsof it, revealhow very difficultit is
"to take the curseoff".To do so is certainlyto distortthe drama.Shakespeare's
meaning becomesclear only if we can face up to Shylock as a villain, as a
"Jew-villain". No criticalcardtricks,no juggling of lines, can obscurethe fact
that Shylockis a greedyusurerwho dreamsof moneybagsand is implacablein
his demandsfor Antonio'spound of flesh, even when offered six times the
amount stipulatedin his bond. Shylockdoes begrudgehis servantfood, does
miss his ducatsmore than, or a least as much as, his daughter,does go to a
partyonly to have the satisfactionof devouringsomeoneelse'sfood, does use
religiouspiety as a blind for cruel impulse.Moreover,he is a cantankerous
old man who hates music and partiesand speaksto his daughteronly to issue
orders.He is alsocomicin his parsimonyandmeanness.
Not only does Shylock have many villainous qualities,but the average
readermust also get the notion that Shylockis a typicalJew, and that this is
what Jewsare like. It has been arguedthat the Viennesein Measurefor Meas-
ure, the monsterRichardIII, or Edmund in King Lear, are far worse speci-
mens than Shylock;yet no one takes them to be typicalof Christians,Vien-
nese, or Englishmen; nor are Viennese or Englishmensensitiveabout these
characteristics.But nowhere are the disgustingcharactertraits so associated
with a nationalidentity as are Shylock'swith his Jewishness.Shylock is re-
ferredto as "theJew"over sixty times,and as a Jew he is repeatedlyassociated
in one form or anotherwith the devil.Furthermore,thereis one speechwhich
is completelyconclusive.Antonio,the hero,says:
I prayyouthinkyouquestionwiththeJew,-
Youmayaswellgo standuponthebeach
Andbidthemainfloodbatehis usualheight,
Youmayaswellusequestion' withthewolf,
Whyhe hathmadetheewebleakforthelamb:. . .
Youmayas welldo anythingmosthard
As seekto softenthat-thanwhichwhat'sharder?-
His Jewishheart!(IV. i)
Nowhere in RichardIll do we hear of Richard's"Englishheart",as if to
is the sourceof his hatefulness.
sayhis "Englishness"
But havingsaid this, we must immediatelyadd that the very fact that there
are so many interpretationsof Shylockindicatesthat some ambiguity,perhaps

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 SHAKESPEARE,THE JEWS, AND THE MERCHANT OF VENICE 5
deliberate, as is my contention, is written into the texture of the drama itself.
To this, we shall return.
At this point, however, the question is: To the extent that Shylock is a
definitely negative type, and to the extent that this represents the so-called
"Jewish heart", how did this come about in a writer whose breadth of spirit has
embraced so many ages and conditions?
To begin with, Shakespeare'sportrait of the Jew could not possibly derive
from first-hand contact with Jews or with Jewish life. There had been almost
no Jews in England for over three hundred years and no Jewish community
life even of the most rudimentary form. Whatever few Jews by descent so-
journed in England, such as Portuguese agents for English merchants, were,
of course, converts and practising Christians. The idea that some may have
been "secret Jews" is not justified by the evidence, although that accusation
could always be raised to threaten them if the need arose. But even if they
lived as Jews secretly in their ways and manners, this secret life was hidden
from the world about them.
As C. J. Sisson writes1:
Jews of note (such as Lopez and Nunez) and quality were Christianby
conversionor at least by observationand acceptedin the commonwealth
for that reason.... They were Jews only by race to all appearance,at any
rate, very differentfrom that Shylockwho was first and last a Jew... . As
with Lopez and Nunez, so it was, outwardlyat least with the London Jews
of lessernote....
Shakespeare's lack of knowledge of the Jews and of Jewish life is revealed
repeatedly in the text of the play: the unlikely names of the Jews, Shylock,
Tubal, Chus, Jessica, all probably derived from early chapters in Genesis; the
various expletives in Shylock's mouth, "By Jacob's staff" (which was, by the
way, a Christian oath), "by the Holy Sabbath", "my deeds upon my head",
phrases that are not characteristicallyJewish; the fact that nothing distinc-
tively Jewish in the home of Shylock is manifest.
Where then did Shakespeare get his picture of the Jew? He found his
image of the Jew where he found the plots of his plays. The two basic plots of
The Merchant of Venice, like those of his other dramas, are interpretationsand
adaptations of older stories and plots well and widely known in his time. The
story of the loan from the Jew on forfeiture of which the debtor was bonded
to lose a pound of flesh; the foiling of the Jewish creditor when the court
tricks him into losing his suit, his interest, his principal, his property, and al-
most his life; the wooing of a maiden through the choice of one of three
possible caskets in which her picture is contained, even the elements of the
speech on mercy are to be found in these old tales.
In some of the flesh-bond stories then in circulation the blood-thirsty credi-
tor is not a Jew. In one, the usurer is a Christian who victimizes a Jew! Never-
theless, in the best known story, it is the cruel Jew who is the villain. Such, for
example, is the ballad of Gernutus, which was known in many versions and
which begins:
1 C. J. Sisson, "A Colony of Jews in Shakespeare'sLondon", in Essays and Studies by Members
of the English Association, XX, 38.

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 6 SHAKESPEAREQUARTERLY

In Venice town not long ago

A cruel Jew did dwell
Which lived all on usury
As Italianwriterstell
His life was like a barrelhog
That liveth many a day
Yet neveronce doth any good
Until men will him slay.

Shakespeare knew no Jews, but he knew well the stereotype of the Jew as a
nefarious, bloodthirsty monster, found in old English ballads like those of
Hugh of Lincoln, in which Jews kidnap an eight-year-old child, nourish him,
try him, torture him, and then crucify him. Shakespeare undoubtedly knew
Chaucer'stale in which the prioresssays:

Our firstfoe, the serpentsatanus

That hath in the Jewishheart,his waspesnest.

Shakespeare knew the Jews of medieval passion plays and Corpus Christi
pageants where the Jew is an incarnationof the devil himself.
According to Lyly's Euphues, by the time of Shakespeare, the word Jew
had become such a curse word that it was thought particularly hateful to call
another man a Jew.
Now, how and why did this happen? We must ask this question not only
to explain how Shakespeare could have perpetuated the stereotype, but also
because it relates directly to the theme and meaning of the play itself.
William the Conqueror, for his own benefit, brought the Jews to England.
The wealth and power of the nobility was based on land, but in a rising
money economy the nobility often needed ready cash. They forced numbers
of Jews to lend to themselves as well as to the peasants so that these latter
could pay their dues to the nobility. Since the nobility did not use the money
for productive gain, ultimately they could not make good on their debts. As
long as the nobility were economically solvent, the Jewish position was excellent.
But when the nobility had gravely overextended themselves, the position of
the Jews began to deteriorate. Fearing the loss of their pawned lands, the no-
bility turned the wrath of the oppressed peasantry from themselves and
against the Jews, often using the instrument and teachings and rulings of the
Church.
A reign of terror was generated against the Jews which led gradually to
their humiliation and impoverishment, expropriation of their wealth, and
their final expulsion in I290 after brutal riots had been let loose against them.
To justify the ferocity with which Jews were attacked, excuses just as ferocious
had to be made. The image of the Satanic Jew flourished in literature, in bal-
lads, in plays, and was used both as a justification of the terrible treatment
of the Jews and as encouragement to the masses to attack the Jews.
Thus arose the stereotype of the Jew which Shakespeare knew. But why
the Jew, as the poet Pope put it, that Shakespeare drew? It has been said that
Shakespeare was concerned with presenting a popular production and needed
this familiar type to absorb the interest of the populace. In fact, his motives

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 SHAKESPEARE,THE JEWS, AND THE MERCHANT OF VENICE 7

went far beyond this. The image of the villain Jew was absolutely necessary to
the central theme of the play: the ideal of unconditional love.
Shakespeare lived in the midst of an economic revolution that was chang-
ing Europe from an agrarian economy to a commercial economy, from a
feudal and aristocratic society to a commercial, democratic, middle-class so-
ciety. Shakespeare sometimes defended the old values against the new, par-
ticularly when he sensed, in the new, tendencies which he felt were destructive
of human values.
Shylock's proverb:
Fast bind, fast find,
A proverbnever stale in thriftymind.
might have found an honored place in Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's
Almanac. But Shakespeare uses it only to make fun of the Jew, and, perhaps,
as some have argued, through him, of Puritans of London Town who, like
Shylock, also hated parties,revels, masks, and music.
There is abundant evidence that Shakespeare feared the motive of material
gain so important in the rapidly expanding development of commercial cap-
italism, lest it subvert the values of loyalty for its own sake, friendship, and
custom-forged and time-honored allegiances, all based on the structure of me-
dieval feudalism.
In the agrarian economy of the middle ages when the lending of money
was not for gain but only out of need, the Church, in biblical tradition, en-
joined, Mutuum datum inde sperantes: Give freely hoping for nothing (in
return). Commercial values enjoined, on the contrary: Never do anything or
give anything unless you can take or get something in return. Antonio rep-
resents the old philosophy; Shylock, the new. Whereas Antonio and Bassanio
give friends favors without even asking for reasons and expect nothing in re-
turn, certainly not more than they gave, Shylock always asks for a return with
gain.
Did Shakespeare foresee that day when the urgent new commercial values
would so suffuse human relationships that nothing would be done for love or
friendship or the sake of giving alone, but only for the sake of gain; when a
person would do something generous without any apparent motive of self-
gain and people would ask: "What's his angle?"; and even the most important
human relationships such as those between husband and wife, parent and
child, would be judged in terms of commercial analogy, that is, not what am
I giving to these relationships,but what am I getting out of them?
In the very first scene in which we meet Shylock, he uses the word "good",
"He is a good man", not to mean virtuous, but "well-off", capable of paying
back a debt. The criterion of virtue becomes not character but wealth. To a
discerning soul, here lay tendencies destructive of all human values and hu-
manity itself. Because they are at a premium in a society whose mainspring
is struggle for profit, the getting and grasping motives are nurtured; whereas
loving, giving, motives remain uncultivated and atrophy. The motive of deeds
for the sake of love alone disappears;only greed, selfishness, hostility, and hate
remain.
This is in fact the movement in the play itself: Shylock says that he hates

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8 SHAKESPEAREQUARTERLY

Antonio because Antonio lends out money gratis, "in low simplicity", bring-
ing down the rate of interest in Venice and in this manner hindering Shy-
lock's gains. His hate for Antonio finally becomes supreme even over his
greed, and ultimately destroys Shylock himself. This is a warning. This is the
fate of man should material gain become his highest value.
All of this negative tendency Shakespeare sums up in the word usury,
that is, the lending of money for gain, giving not for love but for gain. Now,
though there were no Jewish usurers in England in Shakespeare's time, the
Jew symbolized usury, and Shakespeare could most forcefully express the
evils he was attacking in the figure of a Jew. In one character, Shylock, are
expressed all the evils of greed unleashed which Shakespeare identified with
the new commercial trend.
But the point is that Shakespeare did not stop here. For his aim was not
to attack Jews but to attack the greed and materialism of the Christians all
about him. It was the "Jew" who could best be used to ring the contrast with
"Christian" and to ask "which is which?" The word "Jew" was synonymous
with evil. The word "Christian" meant good. The gold casket, on the inside
of which was a skull and crossbones, symbolizes the choice of gold as the
goal of life; this leads only to death. But there is another meaning to the
casket. Just as one cannot judge what is inside a casket by its outer material,
so all that glistens, like the name "Christian",is not gold.
Shakespeare gives many examples. When Jessica is in the very act of steal-
ing her father's money, the so-called Christian, Gratiano, says admiringly that
she is a Gentile and not a Jew. Bassanio's quest for Portia sounds in his own
mouth more like a hunt for fortune than a journey for love. His sentences of
"love" are full of words designating material values, such as "gold", "golden
fleece", "fortune", "value", "worth", and "thrift" (in the sense of material
gain).
Even Lancelot Gobbo, the clown of the play, parodies this Christian con-
cern for gain when he complains that too many Jewish converts to Chris-
tianity would raise the price of pork.
Shakespeare gives us in the suitors of Portia a catalogue of European so-
called noblemen, each with his foibles and weaknesses; in comparison the
alien Negro Moor, disdained because of his complexion, is far more noble.
His blood, as he says, is as good as any Nordic gentleman's.
It was not only that Shakespeare'sinnate humanity would not allow him to
accept a callow and inhumane stereotype. Shakespeare makes the audience
uncomfortable with its 'hypocritical stereotypes which allow it so easily to
project its own guilt for greed onto the Jew. Underlying glittering Venice and
fabulous Belmont is the increasingly universal passion for gain.
Shakespeare goes even further, and this is the source of the deliberate am-
biguity in the character of Shylock which makes a "tragic", sympathetic por-
trayal possible. His theme is unconditional love: love even when the object
of love is not deserving, compassion just because humans are frail. In order to
communicate this message, Shylock must also have sympathetic, "good",
qualities.
For, if European society, with its greed and hypocrisy, cannot be called
"Christian"in the best sense of the word, neither can Shylock be called "Jew"

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 SHAKESPEARE,THE JEWS, AND THE MERCHANT OF VENICE 9
in the worst senseof that word.Shylockhad to be a Jew and a villainin order
to symbolize tendencieswhich Shakespearedeplored.He could be a comic
figurebecausegreedis sometimesludicrous,buthe couldnot be a monster.
And so, though Shakespearewas an Elizabethanand of his time, he
transcendedhis time and avoided the stereotypeof the Jew as a monster.
The two major instancesare well known. Antonio, still mocking Shylockat
the verytime he is askinghim for a loan,receivesthe celebratedanswer:
SigniorAntonio,manya timeandoft
In theRialtoyou haveratedme
Aboutmy moneysandmy usances:
StillhaveI borneit witha patientshrug,
Forsufferanceis thebadgeof allourtribe.
Youcallme misbeliever, cut-throatdog,
AndspetuponmyJewishgabardine,
Andall foruseof thatwhichis mineown....
WhatshouldI sayto you?ShouldI notsay
"Hatha dogmoney?is it possible
A curcanlendthreethousandducats?"Or
ShallI bendlow,andin a bondman's key
Withbatedbreath,andwhisperinghumbleness,
Say this:
"Fairsir,youspeton meon Wednesday last;
Youspurn'dme sucha day;anothertime
Youcall'dme dog;andforthesecourtesies
I'lllendyouthusmuchmoneys"?(I. iii)
To whichthe Christian,Antonio,answers:
I amas liketo calltheeso again
To speton theeagain,to spurntheetoo.
In anotherplace,Shylocksays:
I am a Jew.Hath not a Jeweyes?hathnot a Jew hands,organs,dimen-
sions,senses,affections,passions?fed with the samefood, hurtwith the
same weapons,subjectto the same diseases,healedby the samemeans,
warmedand cooledby the samewinterand summeras a Christianis?-
if you prickus do we not bleed?if you tickleus do we not laugh?if you
poisonus do we not die? and if you wrongus shallwe not revenge?-if
we are like you in the rest,we will resembleyou in that.(III.i)
Shylock is both villain and comic, but he is also sympathetic.For Shake-
spearehas one more point to make.Moralweaknessis found not alone in "the
Jew",but in all men. Since all men have foibles,are weak, commit sins, are
sometimesgreedyand hateful,as they are all sometimesnoble,therecannotbe
any simple rule for justice. Justiceis necessarythat society be orderedand
endure.But a love that doesnot dependon meritis a sine qua non of the moral
man. Without such an unconditionallove, love gratis,life cannotgo on. "Use
everyman afterhis desertand who shouldescapewhipping?... The less they
deserve,the more merit is in your bounty"(Hamlet II.ii).
Justas mercymust be showneven when men do not fully deserveit, so real

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IO SHAKESPEAREQUARTERLY

joy derives from the ability to give freely, not for a "return" ("What's in it for
me?"), not on any condition, not for any ulterior motive.
This message is enforced by the three-caskets motif, seemingly so far re-
moved from the other issues of the drama. For its purpose is to reject the aim
of gain-seeking (more than you deserve, the golden casket), and rigorous
justice (just what you deserve, the silver casket) in behalf of unconditional
giving (the leaden casket for which one must give and hazard all).
As much as I might wish that Shakespeare had not used a Jew as the axle
on which to turn the wheel of his meaning, nevertheless when we reverse his
intention and make Shylock, the Jew, admirable, and Antonio, Bassanio, and
Portia despicable, the entire movement of the drama disintegrates and the play
loses its proper point.
Let the last word, however, be that justly loved speech which is, as it were, a
commentary on the ancient rabbinic dictum: "As God is merciful, so be ye
merciful."
The qualityof mercyis not strain'd,
It droppethas the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the placebeneath:it is twice blest;
It blessethhim that gives, and him that takes:
'Tis mightiestin the mightiest:it becomes
The thronedmonarchbetterthan his crown;
His sceptreshowsthe forceof temporalpower,
The attributeto awe and majesty,
Whereindoth sit the dreadand fear of kings;
But mercyis abovethis sceptredsway;
It is enthronedin the heartsof kings,
It is an attributeto God himself;
And earthlypowerdoth then show likest God's
When mercyseasonsjustice.(IV. i)
Temple B'Rith Kodesh, Rochester

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