Supernatural Theme in Macbeth

 Introduction – Supernatural:
 The term “Supernatural” has its roots in the medieval times. Its is
derived from two terms in Latin language.
“Super” – Outside or Beyond of
“Natural” – From the word ‘natura’ meaning nature.
Which collectively refers to anything that is beyond the scope of
nature observed by humans or anything whose existence cannot be
explained or proven by science. For example, the popular belief of
ghosts, demons, angels, spirits to name a few. In the same way
there are events like Saint Peter attempting to walk on water as
Jesus asked him to. The concept of supernatural was popular in the
Middle Ages. These ideas started to fade away, with the formation
of Renaissance and were challenged by thinkers like Immanuel Kant
and Copernicus. As the Scientific Revolution came, these ideas
became obsolete, until the pre modern era, when they became part
of the Pop Culture and still now are very widely renowned.
Although there still are people who still believe in these
Supernatural Ideas and have professions around them.

 Supernatural Ideas in the Jacobean Era –

Macbeth was written in the Jacobean Era, which is considered to be
an important time in the history of English Literature. In this time
Supernatural entities like demons and witches we believed to exist.
King James wrote a book ‘Daemonologie’ which is a book about
demons and about the dark arts. Witches were thought to be in
league with the Devil, and were blamed for various misfortunes like
crop failure and outbreaks. These also led to witch hunts and trial .
Once identified as a witch the person would be burned alive.
In this time all creature were put in a hierarchy from inanimate
objects to living creatures, it was also believed that the ruler is
chosen by the God.
Macbeth

Macbeth is a play that was written in the Jacobean Era by William

Shakespeare. As we know, back in those times witchcraft and magic were
considered to be the norm. Moreover the King of England during that
time was King James the First. He was so fascinated by the ideas of
supernatural that he wrote an enite book on it. Aforementiond
‘Daemonlogie’. This play was first performed in his court.

Supernatural ideas in this play are shown in mainly three forms the
witches, apparitions and ghosts and the nature. Now we discuss them in
this order.
The witches are a prime part of the drama. They are the driving force of
Macbeth’s evil arc. They heightened Macbeth’s ambitions and then we
descended on the path of evil. The depiction of witches are taken from
the Christian mythology or the classic folklore. Thy have slender fingers,
chapped lips and beards on their chin. This is to show that they are not
natural rather they are obnoxious abominations of the nature. They can
cast spells, talk to spirits and see the future. They can even disappear in
the thin air. Thus they were described as ‘bubbles of the earth.’
The witches are shown as the classic examples of evil character. They are
evil by nature. In Act 1 Scene 1 we get a glimpse at their twisted
philosophy. ‘Fair is foul and foul is fair.’ This idea is crucial in the play.
What ever is good for a common member of the society is bad for them,
and whatever is bad for the normal human is good for them. This is why
they live in barren lands, in a bad weather. They have spirit attendants
that they talk to. They have in their possession peculiar items like a
pilots’s thumb. They are very vindictive, a woman denied her of nuts so
she terrible punished her husband. They have supernatural powers like
controlling the wind and vanishing into the thin air.
They consist of the opening scene of the play where they talk among
themselves in a rhyme which is a characteristic trait of them. They talk
about Macbeth and his battle, they were never near the battlefield yet
they are aware of these events. Then we find them talking to Macbeth in
scene 3. Here they greet Macbeth as the Thane of Cawdor and the King.
This really confuses Macbeth, but when it came true he believed the
witches and walked on the evil path. Banquo gave Macbeth a really
important advice that is, “The instruments of darkness tell us truths, Win
us with honest trifles, to betray us in the deepest consequence.’’ It
basically means that evil forces lure us with little joys then betrays us with
the worst way possible.
Next we see the witches talking to Hecate, the Goddess of Witchcraft,
herself. The next time Macbeth approaches the witches, wanting to know
about his enemies. In a lot of places Lady Macbeth is also considered a
witch. Although her appearance is of a Queen, but she deals with evil
forces. She askes the spirit to make her cruel and fill her with direst
cruelty. She wanted to forget the softness of a woman and turn into a
fiend. Such other thing she asked from the witched. But later we see that
Lady Macbeth suffer from visions. She see her hand red with blood and
later kill herself out of guilt. Shakespeare wanted to show that, messing
with the evil forces results in a miserable end.
Apparitions in this play had the role of communication and shaping the
play. In the play we see Macbeth is doubt whether to kill the king and
bring glory to himself but will end up committing treachery or not kill the
king, with out any development in his life, but he will remain the king’s
loyal and confidante. At such a moments he saw a vision. The vision of a
bloodied knife hanging in the air and this is the vision that led him to
finally decide that he should kill the king. If we see, this vision had a great
role in shaping the plot of the play. There were other visions too. During
the banquet, Macbeth saw the ghost of Banquo, this serves as a reminder
that, even after we have killed someone, we have committed a sin, and
the punishment will be serve, sooner or later. Here Macbeth’s conscience
is punishing him for his deed. There is another vision Macbeth saw,
though it is a bit different from the ones earlier. Those were to cause an
effect while these will be there to inform Macbeth. The first apparition
was an armed head, which is basically telling that Macbeth’s head will be
cut off by Macduff, The second apparition of a bloody child is Macduff
himself. He was ripped off from his mother’s womb and was not bor by
natural procedure. Finally the image of a crowned child with a tree in
hand. It represents Macduff tree is a representation of Birnam Woods.
The final representation of Supernatural in Macbeth is nature. After killing
Duncan, when Macbeth was talking to Lennox, he replied that a bird was
behaving weirdly and he also said that the world shook. This is a reference
to the Great Chain of Being. It was a belief that all creatures were linked
together and arranged in a hierarchical order. It basically says that
Macbeth’s actions were so evil that it disrupted the order of the entire
world. Later when he approached the witches, they described Macbeth as
something wicked, which implies that he had turned so evil that even the
witches called him evil.
In the end we find that Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, who embraced the
dark powers, have under gone terrible punishment by them. This conveys
the idea that witchcraft is bad among the people through the play. In
those time these practices were very popular among people and King
James believed them to be evil. This play portrayed this exact idea, which
impressed the king and maybe that’s also why we are able to read this
today.
We must keep in mind that this is literature, and we all have our personal
interpretation, which vary widely. We must respect each other’s opinion.
There are a lot of people who still believe in supernatural and they have
the right to believe, there is nothing wrong in it. I just presented my
personal opinion. With this I would like to end this essay.