A Sin Against God
Thou shalt not kill. --Deuteronomy
5: 17
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The Elizabethans saw in revenge not only a travesty on the sixth petition of the Lord's Prayer, but also a repetition of the prideful sin of Lucifer. In seeking revenge, human beings were usurping a perogative reserved for God. Biblical sources repeatedly state that vengeance is for God alone, not for mankind.
Deuteronomy 32:35: To me belongeth vengeance, and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste. Proverbs 19: 11: The discretion of a man deferreth his anger; and it is his glory to pass over a transgression. Romans 12:17: Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things
honest in the sight of all men. Hebrews 10:30: For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, and I will compense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people |
Sermons and textual exegesis from the time also repeatedly picked up the theme.
If we gladly and freely forgive them [our neighbors] that trespass against us, it is a most manifest argument and undoubted assurance, that we are forgiven of God; but contrariwise, if we be unmerciful, cruel, and vengeance-thirsty against our neighbour, so that we will not forgive them, but seek to be revenged, and to reward evil for evil, by this means neglecting and nothing regarding the blessed will of God, which hath commanded us to forgive our offenders; then it is a most sure sign, that our sins are not forgiven, but that the hot wrath and fierce vengeance of God abideth still upon us, and that we remain in a most damnable state; seeing that the property of such as be in the favour of God, and have obtained remission for their sins, is to be the very same to their neighbour that they feel in their conscience God is unto them. --Thomas Becon (Chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury), A New Chatechism, (1560), ed. John Alyre for The Parker Society, Cambridge, Eng. 1844, v.3, p.183 |
Revenge was also a subject for religious allegory. Anthonie Copley's allegorical poem "A Fig for Fortune" (1596) maps the spiritual journey of an out-cast of Fortune past the Spirit of Dispair (who advocates revenge) to the Temple of Peace, where he is catechised by the good monk, Catechysius.
As vaine it is to thinke Revenges deed |
Copley's good monk argues that:
1. Revenge is an urging sent by Satan.
2. Revenge compounds the injury it seeks to
redress.
3. Revenge is spiritually unhealthy. It "Canker-like
consumes thine Innocence."
4. Revenge feeds on melancholy and despair.
5. The avenger takes as a human perogative
that which is reserved for God alone.
6. The avenger overrides God's great mercy
and charity.
He sees Christ on the cross as the supreme image of one who overcame the urge
to revenge.
Behold his image yonder on the Crosse, See how he droops and dies and damnes Revenge Yeelding his whole humanity in grosse A pendular reproch on woodden henge: -- Anthonie Copley, A Fig for Fortune, (1596), New York, Burt Franklin Press for The Spenser Society, (reprint 1967), p. 54. |
Shakespeare's characters, themselves, speak of the urge to revenge as coming from Hell itself.
And Caesar's spirit, ranging for revenge, With Ate by his side come hot from hell, Shall in these confines with a monarch's voice Cry "havoc!" and let slip the dogs of war, That this foul deed shall smell above the earth With carrion men, groaning for burial. -- Julius Caesar.III.i.273-278 |
O that the slave had forty thousand lives! One is too poor, too weak for my revenge. Now do I see 'tis true. Look here, Iago. All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven - 'tis gone. Arise, black vengeance, from the hollow hell. Yield up, O love, thy crown and hearted throne To tyrannous hate! -- Othello, III.iii.447-453 |