Clerical Corruption in Chaucer and Las Casas In Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales and Bartólome de las Casas’ A Short Account of the Destruction of the West Indies, both authors criticize and offer solutions to clerical corruption. Chaucer critiques the clergy through the exhibition of the characters of the Monk, Friar, and Pardoner, while offering solutions by the inclusion of moral clergy men such as the Parson. Las Casas is critical of the behavior of the clergy men, also known as the friars, in his telling of the exploration of the West Indies and offers solutions with explicit desire to act with equality and morality towards the natives. In the Canterbury Tales, Chaucer gives a critique on the corruption of the clergy men by incorporating greedy and incontinent clerical members on the journey to Canterbury. Chaucer shows the corruption of these men through examples of them breaking their vows to the Church and through their selfish acts. Among the members of Chaucer’s clergy, the Monk and the Friar exhibit characteristics of corruption, while the Pardoner, although not …show more content…
He does not obey his vows in any sense, and is extremely avaricious in his begging. In return for his penance-giving, Chaucer states that the Friar asked for money in return, which breaks his vow of poverty. “He was an easy man in penance-giving, where he could hope to make a decent living...Therefore instead of weeping and prayer, one should give silver for a poor Friar’s care,” (Chaucer 9). As a clergy man, a friar should not be compensated with money for work through the Church as his vows of poverty forbid it. The Friar tends to spend time in the taverns as the narrator states, and he knows each, “innkeeper and barmaid too,” (Chaucer 9). Spending time in taverns conversing and socializing with the workers violates the Friar’s vow of obedience, once again showing the corruption of the clergy in Chaucer’s Canterbury
He unashamedly takes money from even the poorest of the common people while spending the majority of his time away from them. He is knowingly disobeying his role in the church and could likely be one of the members of the church that joined, not for a religious reason, but in hopes to make money. The diversity in the pilgrims shows all different types of people and types of sinning they may be guilty of, even the religious figures . While some may be like the nun, simply self-conscious about her appearance and reputation, others are as awful as the friar, who knowingly takes from the poor in order to get more money than needed to purely survive. While both of these characters have their own flaws, the friars are more than that of vanity and are further disobedient of how he is supposed
The Friar is a deceitful fellow who uses his faith as justification to benefit himself.. “But rich he was in holy thought and work”(line 479). “Therefore, instead of weeping and prayer, Men should give silver to poor friars all bare”(line 231-232). The Parson’s quote goes to explain how everything he does in his work is strictly to spread Christ’s gospel; he is not looking for an ulterior motive in his journey.
The Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer, reveals that religion does not make moral individuals. Chaucer goes on about telling how several of the characters on the pilgrimage had questionable lifestyles yet the characters were taking part in a religious journey. Religion can only influence a moral character but does not make its followers untouchable to the imperfections found on earth. In The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer’s character, The Pardoner, is a church official who altered the peoples mind by cheating the people into believing any nonsense.
Chaucer’s gift, The Canterbury Tales continues to give and the reader can derive different ideas and responses, and details for each creative character within the brilliantly raveled and thought out tale. One of Chaucer’s characters The Pardoner possibly holds the most detail and material in his appearance and actions which the reader can easily extract from and respond too which possibly holds importance as they tell the reader certain things about the character. The author’s illustration of The Pardoner begins with the description of his hair from behind as a yellow wax like color, falling in “driblets” behind his back, “Thinly they fell, like rat-tails, on by one” (21). He rode on his mount with his wallet before him and a pillow case crammed with relics such as, The Virgin’s veil, bones of saints, and pieces of The Holy Cross, all tricks and no truth in their supposed identity. This deceiver made more than a parson would from the poor and innocent who fell prey to the con, and “made monkeys of the priest and congregation” (22).
When Greed Goes Wrong In the Canterbury Tales the Skipper’s Tale contains Feminism criticism, Historical criticism, and Archetypal criticism. All three tie into the theme of the story which is greed. Greed is well written in many older stories and even newer stories in society.
The three characters from the Canterbury tales: the Pardoner, the Wife of Bath, and Walter from the clerk’s tale, all have aspects that are represented in today’s society. The Pardoner’s religious views are still present today. The Wife of Bath’s ethics and the morals of Walter from the Clerk’s Tale are also present. In the Canterbury tales the Pardoner is portrayed as somewhat of a detestable character who has some very unconventional views on sin and religion.
Chaucer wrote the book: The Canterbury Tales, in which a group of men going on a journey all tell a tale. Within each tale is a moral lesson as well as each tale consists of a corrupt action committed within the church and is conveyed by those kind of characters within the story. One of the tales that Chaucer tells in his book is called: The pardoner 's tale. Within this tale the pardoner (who is telling the tale) is a preacher who often gives sermons but admits that he does is solely for money and not to condemn people of their sins. (Greed)
In the Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer utilizes the immoral character of the Pardoner to tell the utmost moral tale through satirical devices, presenting the true greed and hypocrisy that runs throughout the Church, regardless of it attempt to cover it. Chaucer introduces the hypocrisy within the Church through the characterization of the Pardoner, as he is explained to be a man with, “flattery and equal japes./He made the parson and the rest his apes” (“General Prologue” 607-608). “Japes” are tricks, alluding to the Pardoner’s relics, as they are fake; yet, the Pardoner still sells these relics to the Church members as genuine treasures. This creates dramatic irony, because the character of the Church body is unaware of the situation bestowed
Geoffrey Chaucer presents characters representing a cross-section of Medieval society in the Canterbury Tales. The Wife of Bath, The Friar, and The Knight reveal the conditions of the rising middle class, nobility, and the church in England during the late 1300's. Modern renders continue to study Chaucer's work as the same conditions exist in humans today. The three estates of the Medieval society represented in The Canterbury Tales.
In Geoffrey Chaucer’s, The Canterbury Tales, I chose the Friar as the most immoral human being among the group of pilgrims Chaucer describes along his journey to Canterbury, the Friar exhibits several good things proving his detrimental humanity, but, as far as the religious guidelines go, the Friar breaks them all, he is not alone in this struggle however, as the Summoner and Pardoner also break 3 of the 4. But the Friar alone breaks all 4, which doesn’t necessarily discount him as a bad person in general, it just declares him unfit to be apart of the clergy class in ancient society, which was something you couldn’t just merely opt out of, you had to be excommunicated from the church in order to never be apart of the clergy, or apart
The most immoral character in The Canterbury Tales is the Friar. Why he is the most immoral is he breaks all of the four vows. The four vows are obedience, chastity, poverty, and stability. In the vow of obedience it says, “Therefore instead of weeping and of prayer one should give silver for a poor friars care (Chaucer 235).” This states that they should pay him instead of him giving the word and love of god.
The Friar ends by telling the Summoner that he should turn back to Jesus who will be “your champion and your knight”, this military metaphor refers to Jesus’s ability to protect one’s soul from temptation, like a chivalrous knight follows the code and protects the weak. This implies that the easily corrupted Summoner’s need Jesus’s protection and help to stop giving in to the temptation of corruption. Furthermore, the Friar also warns the Summoner what will happen if he continues down the road stating “learn repentance ere the devil get you.” representing Chaucer’s belief that if the church does not change, it will be punished by
In his “The General Prologue” to The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer reveals the true nature of people from every part of medieval society. Through his observations he contrasts those who perform their jobs well with those who do not. Chaucer discovers that no matter what a pilgrim’s social class, it is their professional conduct that defines their moral character. Specifically, he observes the appearance and behaviour of pilgrims for the nobility, clergy and working classes to help him better understand how well they perform their jobs.
In the novel “The Canterbury Tales,” author Geoffrey Chaucer uses a pilgrimage to the grave of a martyr as a frame for his tale. He introduces a multitude of different characters with unique quirks, all from separate walks of life. One of these characters, the Host of the Inn, sets up a storytelling contest in an attempt to keep the entire group entertained. The first two tales that have been examined thus far come from the Pardoner and the Knight. The two tales were vastly separate in terms of morals, motives and entertainment.
Pilgrims are not all great people; some are admirable and hero-like. Pilgrims are thought to be righteous, trust worth characters, yet in Chaucer’s Canterbury Stories, we discover that occasionally the inverse is valid. Chaucer’s poetry is known for including characters who speaks to the greater part of the social classes of his time. He frequently utilized his poetry to remark on issues in society. He composed his stories to incorporate individuals from varying backgrounds.