Measure for Measure has inspired widely divergent readings, in our century having been seen as either doctrinal (embodying Christian teachings) or “dark” and satiric. The play's prominent biblical and theological allusions do evoke a parallel between the duke and God, as testing master, redeemer, and judge; the parallel, however, is comic, not didactic, showing that the duke is not God but a ruler who makes a quixotic attempt in his government to imitate God (as rulers theoretically were obliged to and as King James had claimed he would), with mixed and humorous results. The duke is fallible, meddling, and laughable but beneficent, inventive, and in large measure successful in helping his subjects.

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