Did Shylock really want a pound of flesh?

Did Shylock really want a pound of flesh?

by Donald Harvey Marks 

Physician scientist and 3rd generation veteran 

There is much is to be learned from Shakespear's play: Merchant of Venice. 

In Shakespeare's time, no Jews had actually been legally present in England for several hundred years (since the Edict of Expulsion in 1290). However, stereotypes of Jews as money lenders remained from the Middle Ages. Historically, money lending had been a fairly common occupation among Jews, in part because Christians were not permitted to practise usury, then considered to mean charging interest of any kind on loans, and Jews were excluded from other fields of work. At the same time, most Christian kings forbade Jews to own land for farming or to serve in the government, and craft guilds usually refused to admit Jews as artisans. Thus money lending was one of the few occupations still open to Jews.

In the Shakespeare play Merchant of Venice, Shylock is a Jew who lends money to his Christian rival Antonio, setting the loan's security at a pound of Antonio's flesh. When a bankrupt Antonio defaults on the loan, Shylock demands the pound of flesh. This decision is fuelled by his sense of revenge, for Antonio had previously insulted, physically assaulted and spat on Shylock in the stock exchange of Venice dozens of times, defiled the "sacred" Jewish religion and had also inflicted massive financial losses on him.

This, the roles of money lending, money lenders, financial, romantic and religious rivalry, and Jews all interplay here.

SALARINO, a Venetian gentleman, and friend to Antonio and others, 

asks of Shylock,

"Why, I am sure, if he forfeit, thou wilt not take his flesh: what's that good for?

To which SHYLOCK replies:

“To bait fish withal: if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a million; laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies; and what's his reason? I am a Jew. 

Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? 

fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? 

If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? 

If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge. The villany you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.”

Additional References found on my personal blog page http://dhmarks.blogspot.com/ and on my Substack 

Elitists, Neocons, Neolibs—Oh My. What Are They, Who Are They, and Why Should I Care? — Donald H. Marks

How Woke Can We Be? The Meaning of Woke, by Donald H. Marks

You’re Just Another Damn Progressive, Aren’t You? — Donald H. Marks

The Long History of Antisemitism at UCLA — Donald H. Marks

Did Shylock really want a pound of flesh? by Donald H. Marks