Fate Vs Free Will In Macbeth

Words: 1639
Pages: 7

The play Macbeth by William Shakespeare offers great insight regarding the nature of humanity. Arguably one of the biggest themes included in the play is fate verse free will. One of the very first scenes in Macbeth involves three witches who proclaim a prophecy to Macbeth telling him that he will be king. Soon after he hears the prophecy, he becomes obsessed with achieving what it stated. With the influence of his wife, he murders King Duncan to become King. Macbeth soon becomes obsessed with keeping his power and murders anyone who could stand in his way. Ultimately, this leads to his downfall and he is slaughtered while in battle vs Macduff. Macbeth’s death was not a result of fate or predestination, but a result of his own free will. Although the people Macbeth is surrounded influence his decisions, in the end, what happened to him is a result of his own actions and choices, similar to Adams interaction with Satan in the garden of eden. Three witches or weird sister proclaiming a prophecy to Macbeth set the rest of the events in the play into motion. The three main parts to the prophecy were that Macbeth is the thane of Glamis, the thane of Cawdor, and will soon be King. Macbeth was already the thane of Glamis but the other two parts were not yet true. However, soon after he heard the prophecy, he found out that he became the …show more content…
However, the weird sisters never played a role in this happening. Their actions had nothing to do with Macbeth becoming the thane of Cawdor, it is merely a coincidence that causes Macbeth to take the prophecy seriously. If it were Macbeth’s fate, he would not have needed to do anything to become king later on, it would just happen. The weird sisters were not necessary the fates, but prophets. They have no influence on Macbeth, they just see into his future and correctly predict what he will