In Shakespeare's Measure for Measure the self-righteous villain Angelo pronounces a death sentence on Claudio, who is guilty of committing fornication. Claudio's sister Isabella comes to Angelo to plead for the life of her brother, but Angelo, who is trying to manipulate Isabella into bed with him, spurns her suit, saying,
Your brother is a forfeit of the law,
And you but waste your words.
Isabella's reply alludes to the great theme of Romans and calls upon the hypocritical judge Angelo to see his life anew in light of God's judgment and grace:
Why, all the souls that were were forfeit once;
And He that might the vantage best have took
Found out the remedy. How would you be
If He, which is the top of judgment, should
But judge you as you are? 0, think on that;
And mercy then will breathe within your lips,
Like man new made.
Isabella resists the oppressor by applying a hermeneutic of suspicion to his pose of righteousness and by appealing to a hermeneutic of trust in the biblical story of God's mercy. Isabella is a profound interpreter of Scripture. We should follow her example.
Richard B. Hays - The Conversion of the Imagination: Paul as Interpreter of Israel's Scriptures; Eerdmans 2005; p.200f
