Comparison Of Goliath Of Gath And Isaiah

Two of Wheatley’s more explicitly biblical poems are those of “Goliath of Gath” and “Isaiah lxiii. 1-8,” both of which are “verse paraphrases,” respectively, of the story of David and Goliath in 1 Samuel 17 and the verses which the poem is named after (Scheick, “Subjection and Prophecy” 124). In writing on these verse paraphrases, William J. Sheick speculates that Wheatley might have identified with the biblical David, “as a servant of humble origin and as a lyricist from a distant land” and because of his “ruddy complexion” (“Subjection and Prophecy” 124). Furthermore, Wheatley may have seen David as “appealing as a poet of divine favor whose distinctive skin pigmentation made him, as it were, a minority figure among his people” (Scheick “Subjection

and Prophecy” 124). Potentially more interesting than Wheatley’s choice of this narrative to recount or a possible identification with David, however, are the changes Wheatley makes in rewriting the narratives. Instead of writing that (1 SAMUEL 17:49), Wheatley decides to write:
“And now the youth the forceful pebble flung,
Philistia trembled as it whizz’d along:
In his dread forehead, where the helmet ends,
Just o’er the brows the well-aim’d stone descends,
It pierc’d the skull, and shatter’d all the brain. (“Goliath of Gath” 174-178; Sheick “Subjection and Prophecy” 125)
Furthermore, instead of (1 SAMUEL 17:52), Wheatley instead writes, “Scarce ha he spoke, when the Philistines fled: / But fled in vain; the conqu’ror swift pursu’d: / What scenes of slaughter! and what seas of blood!” (“Goliath of Gath” 190-192; Scheick “Subjection and Prophecy” 125). While the reasoning for Wheatley’s changes can only be speculated, Scheick offers the idea that the poem may be a “meditation on a biblical hero as a surrogate for a slave poet who wishes to emerge likewise from personal servitude and to witness the release of her people from bondage” along with “potentially suggest[ing] that Christian slavers are like the God-defying Philistines” (“Subjection and Prophecy” 126). Thus Wheatley potentially tweaks the understanding of her time of the tale of David and Goliath so that it can include undertones of a commentary on the brutality of slavery, therefore combining her conversation with the Bible with her critique of white Christians’ understanding of the Bible.
Wheatley’s Isaiah paraphrase involves another military conflict, along with Isaiah’s prophecy which “foretells the coming of a David-like figure who will release the Israelites from their captivity” (Scheick, “Subjection and Prophecy” 127).

Wheatley’s paraphrase has Isaiah’s prophecy contain the phrase “man’s release,” which “doubtless appealed to the poet as a slave as well as a Christian” (“Isaiah ixiii 13”; Scheick, “Subjection and Prophecy” 127). While Wheatley’s paraphrase is interesting enough in the context of her using biblical narrative to subvert ideas of race at the time, it is also interesting to note where the rest of the poem goes. As Sheick notes, “What follows in the remaining three stanzas is not based on verses 1-8 or, for that matter, on the subsequent verses in Isaiah 63” (“Subjugation and Prophecy” 127). This in itself is potentially powerful, since Wheatley is somewhat more overtly representing her own perception of the verses discussed, which offers herself some autonomy over the text. This “unexpected combat scene,” Sheick argues, essentially offers Wheatley’s view that “Christians who enslave are not aligned with God's chosen people but with those who defy divine providence” (“Subjugation and Prophecy” 128). Basically, Wheatley is calling out what she perceives to be the hypocrisy of white Christians, particularly in their justification of slavery through the Bible. Interestingly enough, this is not Wheatley’s only allusion to the book of Isaiah throughout her poetry.

Perhaps Wheatley’s most well-known poem, “On being brought from AFRICA to AMERICA” is short but poignant in both its biblical allusion and

subversion:
‘Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land,
Taught my benighted soul to understand
That there’s a God, that there’s a Saviour too:
Once I redemption neither sought nor knew.
Some view our sable race with scornful eye,
“Their colour is a diabolic die.”
Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,
May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train. (1-8)
Sheick writes about this poem elsewhere from the verse paraphrases, stating that the first reference to Isaiah comes from the word “refin’d,” which he speculates comes from Isaiah 48:10: (VERSE) (BIBLE; “Phillis Wheatley’s Appropriation” 136). He states, “This allusion can be read to say that being white (silver) is no sign of privilege (spiritually or culturally) because God's chosen are refined (purified, made spiritually white) through the afflictions that Christians and Negroes have in common” (“Phillis Wheatley’s Appropriation” 136). Essentially, rather than any race being separate, Wheatley offers, via Isaiah, that all those who believe in God are “refined” in the same manner. Through this, Wheatley challenges the racial hierarchy of the time by putting black people on the same spiritual level in the eyes of God as white Christians. Scheick continues by offering the biblical allusion of the word train, in reference to Isaiah 6:1: (VERSE) (BIBLE; “Phillis Wheatley’s Appropriation” 137). This refers to the “Lord’s attendant train,” and, Sheick continues, “Wheatley claims that this angel-like following will be composed of the progeny of Cain that has been refined, made spiritually bright and pure” (“Phillis Wheatley’s Appropriation” (137).