Ghost Soliloquy

It is in the soliloquies of Hamlet and of the Ghost that the themes of infiltration, knowledge and piety are questioned. The Ghost's soliloquy is filled with biblical imagery which perhaps suggests that the Ghost is not only now in the hands of the spiritual world but also attempting to rekindle any faith which he had lost through the betrayal of his brother. This event, what was essentially assassination, remains pertinent in the Ghosts mind, and it is through spiritual and biblical references which the ghost describes it, as just as the audience are, the Ghost is still searching for reason and salvation. This reason and salvation that the ghost attempts to find is articulated through revenge. The linking of the two ideas, revenge and salvation,
He uses analogies, and metaphors from Genesis, to describe assassination and betrayal which could either represent the Ghosts loss of faith through this betrayal or the clinging onto it, in order to give Hamlet good reason to exact revenge. The Ghost refers to Claudius as both a "serpent" and "adulterate beast" and then goes on to describe his actions as "witchcraft of his wits". The serpent represents his loss of faith, akin to postlapsarian belief. The fall of man here not only could be used to reference Gertrude and her giving into temptations, "though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven", but also to describe the Ghost's fall, from a faithful warrior king to a man of no substance and existence. Denmark at the time this is written is in the process of being overrun by second wave reformist, Calvinist and still somewhat under Lutheran influence. King Hamlet has not lost his faith entirely, he has simply changed its direction, believed in something more and something else. Whereas before his faith lay in Denmark and its people, he know, as an ethereal spirit which can look upon a decaying society, has lost faith in it, and thus must direct his path towards Gertrude and Hamlet. Claudius, in one instance, is compared to the "serpent" but in another is said to be using "witchcraft", he shows both aspects of the bible and pagan teaching. King Hamlet thus criticises Claudius as having
In being invaded, subject to attack, he is excluded from Denmark and his palace. In tackling his faith, and ultimately being at the mercy of it, "for the day confined to fast in fires", he is excluded from his previous self and previous belief, and in attempting to pass knowledge on to Hamlet he is excluded from his son. Some could say that with this knowledge Hamlet becomes mad, he has been "drawn into madness", in which case the ghost has elucidated a rupture in Denmark which will go on to influence every character, It is the passing of this knowledge, sworn to remain in the spiritual realm, the real one, that defies the boundaries of knowledge, hence the usage of "distracted globe", which shows that as a whole, knowledge, is now not certain, there is no longer such thing as complete understanding, complete reasoning and complete