open access

https://hdl.handle.net/2115/39032

What a Dramatic Impropriety! : Barabas the Martyr and The Book of Maccabees

日本語

2009-07-31

Research Faculty of Media and Communication, Hokkaido University

Media and Communication Studies

56

101-122

Biblical allusion in The Jew of Malta has been examined by a number of critics and their analysis has established not only Marlowe's familiarity with Scripture, but also his use of it as parody in the play. Given the amount of critical attention to Biblical reference, it is all the more striking that The Book of Maccabees to which Barabas alluded in the play has been critically neglected. For example, one reference to the Apocrypha book had a couple of functional elements in the play: it was meant to be recognized by the educated in the audience as a book about the plight of the Jew; it was also designed to associate Barabas with Jude Maccabee, the Jewish champion who liberated the Jew from the yoke of the Gentiles. The name, 'Maccabees' sounded familiar to even those who were ignorant of the Apocrypha book: they readily misheard the name, 'Maccabees' as 'Machiavelli' who had appeared in the Prologue of the play to claim Barabas as his own. The ironic juxtaposition of the godly champion with the notorious atheist and devil-figure suggests that Marlowe attempted something more daring than simply catering to the popular Anti-Semitism of the audience. Taking advantage of the legacy of the symbolical reading of the Bible, Marlowe depicted Barabas in such a way that through an official Machiavellian villain an ideal and educated audience would discover a suppressed half: in other words, a hidden Barabas, that is a Jewish hero who ended up dying as a martyr. By invoking the name of Maccabees, Marlowe succeeded in writing a secret Maccabees' story between the lines of his official Machiavellian one. The death of Barabas, which was to be seen as religious retribution, could be identified with the martyrs' deaths of the seven Maccabee brothers who were also boiled to death in the cauldron just as Barabas was. The manner of his death was cruel enough to invite the audience, especially those who had been aware of The Book of Maccabees to sanctify Barabas as a martyr.

紀要論文

Version of Record

1882-5303