Macbeth's Responsibility for His Own Fait in William Shakespeare's Play

Macbeth's Responsibility for His Own Fait in William Shakespeare's Play

Third time's a charm. The three wise men. Throughout history, the

number three has been connected to the supernatural. It is the number

of the trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost). In Shakespeare's

Macbeth, the number three crops up as a religious reference, but also

as a perversion of the trinity to show how evil the witches, their

prophecies, and Macbeth all are. It also emphasizes the inherent

magic, or supernatural, influences within the play. The number three

is used to emphasize the supernatural influences and evil events that

abound in The Tragedy of Macbeth.

The three witches, know as the Weird Sisters, are one way Shakespeare

uses the number three to emphasize the supernatural. The audience is

introduced to the three witches in the opening scene.

"First Witch: When shall we three meet again?/ In thunder, lightning,

or in rain?" (Act 1 Scene 1 Lines 1-2). Opening with this scene and

the three witches sets the mood for the entire play. Shakespeare used

three witches rather than one or two to emphasize their supernatural

powers and their significance in the play. Their presence causes the

audience to be apprehensive from the very beginning. This scene

creates a very gloomy, downcast setting to the play. The lightning and

thunder also help to set the mood of the whole play. In one of the

following scenes, Macbeth encounters the witches for the first time,

and they tell him what his future holds.

"All hail, Macbeth…Thane of Glamis...Thane of Cawdor...that shalt be

King hereafter!" (Act 1, Scene 3 Line 48-50)

The three witches are sometimes ref...

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...e 3 Lines 204-205).

While the murders of Duncan and Banquo are both cruel, the slaughter

of Macduff's family is the least reasonable murder in the play because

Macbeth has stooped so low as to kill innocent women and children.

This incident shows how Macbeth has changed from the beginning of the

play; he has turned into a total monster. The three murders in the

play emphasize the evil within Macbeth.

Three for Shakespeare proves a mystical and magical number, and

nowhere in his plays is this more evident than Macbeth. There are

three witches, three murders, three apparitions and three murderers.

The number three appears in the speech patterns of the characters, as

well. There was a mystery to the number three, an enchantment and

magical quality that predates Shakespeare but which he used quite

often in his plays.