Merchant of Venice: Dehumanization of Shylock

Shakespeare on Religious Dehumanization: Bringing Awareness, Not Change Discrimination and hatred across religions can be often become a normal part of everyday life, and can be difficult to eradicate and extinguish. In William Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, the idea of the “normality” of everyday prejudices comes across in interactions and the portrayal of Shylock, a Jewish moneylender in Venice. Through Shylock’s character, Shakespeare provides a commentary on how his society has viewed Judaism in a dehumanizing way for many generations, but also expresses how difficult and not in a playwright’s place to change these societal prejudices. Shakespeare utilizes Shylock’s character as an antagonist to Antonio to demonstrate how dehumanization happens to both the perpetrator and the victim. This commentary begins in the first scene of the play, when Antonio asks Shylock to lend money for Bassanio’s journey to impress Portia. Even before he meets Antonio, Shylock remarks “how like a fawning publican he looks!/[Shylock] hates him for he is a Christian” and that he “will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him./ He hates our sacred nation” (1.3.36-43).

Because of the history of resentment between Christians and Jews, Shylock’s comment shows that “feeding the fat” to the “ancient grudge” against Antonio is seemingly “normal”, and that he is unwilling to stop fueling this “ancient grudge” between religions. Antonio contributes this same of idea of sticking to status quo when Shylock mentions how “[Antonio] calls [him] a misbeliever, cut-throat dog” (1.3.106-107). After Shylock lists these atrocities and is bewildered on how Antonio still “needs [his] help”, Antonio makes it clear that he is “as like to call thee so again/To spit on thee again, to spurn thee too” (1.3.107, 125-126). Shakespeare makes an interesting choice to use the word “spurn”. One may think that it is easily replaceable with “hate”. However, Shakespeare uses the word to show that Antonio does not even see Shylock as a human worthy of hatred, but in fact as an animal or object that must be rejected, trampled upon and kicked about. The word “spurn” is purposely used to show the subtle prejudice towards Shylock.

By creating a foil in Antonio and Shylock’s encounter, Shakespeare makes it clear that Antonio and Shylock are not willing to change, and see no harm in continuing everyday prejudices against others. Both Shylock and Antonio hold prejudices against each other, and are averse to acknowledging each other as equals. Another example of Shakespeare exposing numbness to prejudice is how the characters address Shylock. Throughout the play, Shylock is referred to by Antonio as “the devil”, “a villain” and “The Hebrew”; he is rarely addressed by his first name during the entire play (1.3.93, 95, 174). The term “devil” is used to describe the “fallen archangel who […] rebelled and sinned against God” and have been “cast out into the earth […] and his angels cast out with him” (Achtemeier, Rev 12). According to Antonio and his imposed beliefs, Shylock perfectly resembles the devil – Shylock is a money-lender, which is a profession considered to be a sin to Christians (Exodus 22:25), and therefore must be “cast out” from society and degraded in his status as a human being. By attaching religiously negative and generic words to Shylock, Shakespeare reveals how simple and seemingly normal actions can give the affect of complete dehumanization to a character.

To further demonstrate how far the dehumanization affects Shylock, Shakespeare uses family power dynamics and importance of religion over status. For example, Lancelot, Shylock’s Christian inferior family servant, acts much like Antonio in that he exclusively addresses Shylock as “fiend”, and “very devil incarnation” – he rarely even mentions Shylock’s actual name, and in fact, refers to Shylock as “the Jew” approximately 13 times in his introductory scene (2.2. 2, 36, 98). Besides the resistance to call his master by his name, Lancelot is disgusted with his very association with Shylock. During his first appearance in the play outside of Shylock’s home, Lancelot equates his connection to Shylock as a family servant with “a mark” and must “run from this Jew” (2.2.2, 22). Lancelot does not even want to be associated with Shylock, for “[he is] a Jew if [he] serve[s] the Jew any longer” (2.2.105). The repetition of “Jew” instead of Shylock’s own name demonstrates how religion can bear a heavier weight on status. Similar to Lancelot’s situation, Jessica is ashamed of connected to Shylock by blood. When Lancelot talks to her about running away and become a Christian man’s servant, Jessica wishes to “end this strife [and] /Become a Christian” (2.3.19-20).

The word choices of “strife” and “run from” in Jessica and Lancelot’s lines show that Shylock is hated by his own family, even if he technically and financially superior to his daughter and servant in rank. This power reversal shows that in Shakespeare’s society, status of religion is regarded more highly than financial stature and pre-set societal gender roles, and can be the most easily targeted for dehumanization. While The Merchant of Venice points out overlooked moments of dehumanization and problems of religious discrimination, the play also provides a process of re-humanization for Shylock to the audience. After Jessica has run away from Shylock with her Christian suitor Lorenzo, Salarino and Solanio, two of Antonio’s friends, begin to mock and insult Shylock as usual. Unlike Shylock’s previous sarcastic reactions to the insults of others, Shylock attempts to appeal to the ethos and pathos of his tormentors, and ultimately of the audience as well. For the first time, Shylock compares himself to a Christian as an equal. He simply pleads Salarino and Solanio if he is “fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, […] healed with the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian is?” (3.1.54-57).

The parallel structure and repetition of “same” in Shylock’s speech bring the audience’s attention to a moment of singularity – Shylock is the same as a Christian, and is a human-being, just like Antonio and the rest of the characters, and just like the rest of the audience. The only reason Antonio and the audience sees Shylock differently is because, as Shylock says it, “I am a Jew” (3.1.32). This explicit call for re-humanization is extremely clear in the first half of Shylock’s speech, and would shock and greatly impact the audience at the time. Although Shakespeare shows his society’s numbness to prejudices towards Judaism and sheds light on the idea of re-humanization through Shylock’s speech, he also makes a point that he is not the one that should initiate the change of mindset. Right after Shylock emotionally breaks down with his moving speech about re-humanization and the sameness between two cultures, he seemingly becomes more villainous and vengeful. He asks Salarino and Solanio, “If you wrong us, shall we not revenge?

If we are like you in the rest, we resemble you in that. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge!” (3.1.60-83). Shylock uses his similarities argument to prove that he has a right to seek revenge from Antonio. He argues that if he is like a Christian, and experiences life just like a Christian, he is allowed to revenge another as a Christian would. While recognizing the pleasant and kind aspects Christians and Jews share, Shylock makes the point that they also share the more unfortunate traits of mankind. By changing the tone of the passage and making the audience and the other characters uncomfortable with the fact that they may share many more traits than expected with the play’s villain, Shakespeare re-iterates his point from the first encounter with Antonio and Shylock – although these prejudices exist among mankind, it is difficult to remove them because of the nature of mankind.

Shakespeare can create a character like Shylock to help show the audience their own flaws and societal problems, but is up to the audience to think about the characters put forth in front of them in order to change and remove the problems in their society. The Merchant of Venice acts a mirror, as do many of Shakespeare’s plays. Shakespeare creates a commentary about the society he lives in, not a movement to change the society he lives in. Much like many artists during a time of blatant prejudice, Shakespeare acts a messenger of dehumanization, not an activist. He leaves the activism and contemplation to his audience, and effectively makes them re-think what seems “normal” to their everyday lives. Shakespeare’s Shylock is the start of change, but not the change itself.

Works Cited

Achtemeier, Paul J. “Fallen Angels.” Harper’s Bible Dictionary. San Francisco: Harper, 1985. N. pag. Print. Good News Bible. Trans. Susan Lightly. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print. Good News Bible. Moore, Gary. “Is Charging Interest Sinful?” The Christian Science Monitor. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Feb. 2013. <http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2008/0812/p09s01-coop.html>.