On The Kingship Divinity And Secularity Of Henriad

William Shakespeare is one of the most productive poets and playwrights in the history of English literature,creating 10 historical plays during his lifetime.Among them,Henriad,composed of Richard II,Henry IV(1 and 2)and Henry V,is always recognized as a classic work in English historical plays and has received wide acclaims from critics.Shakespeare’s view of kingship,as the core issue of Henriad,has become the focus of research.However,as far as the current research results are concerned,most scholars in China have paid attention to the bourgeois humanistic consciousness shown by the playwright,but seldom touched the essence of the British polity,while comments in other countries were fixed on the two camps of Providentialism and Machiavellism,and judged the medieval or modern tendency of the author’s political thought in a dualistic way.This study attempts to make a breakthrough from the previous studies,analyzing the progressiveness and complexity of Shakespeare’s potential political thought reflected in the history plays,with reference to the political theories of Ernst H.Kantorowicz,Max Weber,Dante Alighieri and Jean Bodin.In addition to the Introduction and Conclusion,the present thesis is divided into three chapters.The first chapter mainly explores the origin of divinity of the medieval British monarchy,expounding the manifestation of the divinity of the monarchy in Richard II from its biblical tradition and the theory of king’s two bodies.With the fall of Richard’s kingship,his image realized a triple transformation from “the agent of God” to “the impersonator of Jesus” and to “the abandoned Saul”,and the kingship divinity was gradually deconstructed.The second chapter focuses on Henry IV’s attempt to secularize his ruler-ship in Henry IV(1 and 2),introducing the principles of his charisma authority,as well as the transition of British polity,which eventually transformed into a“mysterious body of republic”.However,with the advancement of secularization,the limitations of charisma authority and excessive democratization were gradually exposed,resulting in the collapse of kingship order and legal belief.The third chapter centers on the plot of Henry V,analyzeing how Henry V reestablished the legitimacy of kingship and realized the unity of kingship divinity and secularity by means of warship and virtue.In this process,the divinity of kingship was reconstructed,flowing from the king to the whole nation.Through the research above,this thesis draws the following conclusion that the contradiction of kingship in Henriad is mainly manifested in the dispute between divinity and secularity.With the disenchantment and reenchantment of kingship divinity in the plays,its essence has changed and become the political means and moral support to maintain the secular monarchy.The conferment of monarchy’s legitimacy was no longer simply from religious forces,but also from the rising consciousness of the people.Therefore,the conflict of kingship divinity and secularity was actually a game between monarchy and civil rights.Shakespeare acquired a deep insight into this point and advocated that the king should accept the restriction of divine law and natural law,emphasizing the limited monarchy,in order to achieve the harmonious unity of the country and society.The republican tendency of his thought pointed to the modernization and public orientation of the medieval monarchy,which was of great far-reaching significance to the construction of England’s political system as well as national consciousness.