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Characterization of Chaucer in Canterbury tales
Corruption of the church
The General Prologue of The Canterbury Tales introduces readers to a variety of characters, each of whom represents a different aspect of Medieval lif...
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Chaucer and Corruption Within the Catholic Church
The Catholic Church has long been a fixture in society. Throughout the ages, it has withstood wars and gone through many changes. It moved through a period of extreme popularity to a time when people regarded the Church with distrust and suspicion. The corrupt people within the church ruined the ideals Catholicism once stood for and the church lost much of its power. In the Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer primarily satirizes the corruptness of the clergy members to show how the Catholic Church was beginning its decline during the Middle Ages.
Chaucer aptly creates a picture that exposes how materialistic the clergy is. They all should be concerned with spiritual matters, yet they focus their attention on acquiring more mundane goods. The Monk makes no pretense of being poor and without luxuries. "I saw his sleeves were garnished at the hand with fine gray fur, the finest in the land, and on his hood, to fasten it at his chin he had a wrought-gold, cunningly fashioned pin. . ." (197-200, 110). Not only is this monk fat, and thus quite well fed, he has the money to afford details such as fur on his cloak. He is looking for attention by having such fine things. His station as a monk, however, requires him not only to work with the poor, but to be poor himself. Obviously, he is not following this requirement, much like the Prioress. Madam Eglantyne, appears at first glance to be proper for her station in life. However, a closer examination reveals "she wore a coral trinket on her arm, a set of beads, the gaudies tricked in green, whence hung a golden brooch of brightest sheen" (162-64, 109). A golden brooch serves no other purpose than being decorative. The Prioress has no...
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...id too better than lepers, beggars and that crew" (244-46, 111). The Friar cares only about pleasing himself and does not work to make other people's lives better. He neglects the people he is supposed to help and instead spends his time with the rich. These members of the clergy are not devout Catholics and have no right to be masquerading as one. By pretending to be something they are not, they bring corruption into the church.
Clearly then, Chaucer shows us how people from within corrupted the Catholic Church and caused many to lose their faith in it. This same idea permeates the rest of society, even today. The immoral people are the ones who stand out and are remembered. It is because of this that they have the ability to make such an impact in people's minds. Chaucer tells us that just a few corrupt people can ruin an entire society's beliefs in something.
Friar, to satirize the idea of charity and show that they are using charity for
The religious people were the most gluttonous people of those times. They would take the money that they said they did not have, and spend it for their personal gain. The Catholic church in the Middle Ages is not the one the congregation would have preferred. Geoffrey Chaucer did a great job in pointing out just how corrupt the leaders of the church could
While reading, one has no choice but to come to the simple realization that nothing has really changed from Chaucer's time to ours. In "The Canterbury Tales" Chaucer depicted people from all walks of life. Society then had three basic classes of virtue that most people fell under: the Revered, the Commonfolk, and the Despicable. In the days of Chaucer, these people could be found in any village or town, just as they can be found today in our towns. Times were different then, but the people haven't changed a bit.
Throughout the main "Prologue" as well as "The Friar's Prologue", the characteristics and appearance of the friar, Hubert, is presented in such a way that portrays his character as sly and sinful. With such lines that say, "easy man to give penance when knowing he should gain a good pittance", I am compelled to view Hubert as a sly thief, considering he pockets silver gifted to him by confessors who hope for a better penance. This silver helps Hubert live a comfortable life when he should be living in poverty sufficing on the charitable donations of others through begging. Also, instead of the dirty, tattered clothes which friars typically wear, Hubert dresses like that of a lord, described as "Of double worsted was his semi-cope, that rounded like a bell".
In this time, one of the most sacred elements to the people, was the church; in his poem, Chaucer uses satire to critique the hypocrisy of the church. To the dismay of many, Chaucer did not, by any means, disagree with the church, only the hypocrisy. A tremendous representation of hypocrisy in the church, is the Pardoner. For the people, the pardoner is one of the uttermost sacred and pure installments of the church. In line ten of the pardoner's prologue, the pardoner states, “ I stand,and when the yokels have sat down, I preach, as you have heard me say before, and tell a hundred lying mockeries more.” Precedent his speech, the
During the medieval times corruption in the Catholic Church were prevalent. As corruption became more prevalent during Chaucer’s time, the Pardoner’s practice of selling indulgences was becoming one of deception and greed, similar to the upper class focusing on becoming the richest and most powerful. In Geoffrey Chaucer’s, The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer would use satire to criticize different social classes. For example, Chaucer satirizes religious hypocrisy by representing it as the Pardoner while he unveils the corruption of the Pardoner’s job through a middle class man. The people who work for their possessions. Through his description of the Pardoner being a man who is disitful, greedy, and hypocritical, Chaucer uses satire to comment on
Chaucer knows that the church is corrupt and one way he makes it apparent in this text is by describing the Friar. Chaucer describes the Friar in this text as being corrupt and more interested in his personal earnings than the church. The Friar goes against church laws and principles to gain money and power. He even began charging for indulgences. Chaucer states, “He was an easy man in penance-giving where he could hope to make a decent living.” The Friar would charge to forgive other people’s sins. Chaucer’s intentions in mentioning this was to point out to other people in the real world that the Friar was in fact corrupt. This is an example of Juvenalian satire. Robert Albertsen states, “ Juvenalian satire thus is more contemptuous and abrasive, and uses strong irony and sarcasm.” Chaucer was very contemptuous when using satire to describe the Friar. The Friar would have most likely taken much offense to the corruption pointed out by Chaucer in this text. Clearly, Chaucer used Juvenalian satire to describe the
Many bishops and abbots (especially in countries where they were also territorial princes) bore themselves as secular rulers rather than as servants of the Church. Many members of cathedral chapters and other beneficed ecclesiastics were chiefly concerned with their income and how to increase it, especially by uniting several prebends (even episcopal sees) in the hands of one person, who thus enjoyed a larger income and greater power. Luxury prevailed widely among the higher clergy, while the lower clergy were often oppressed. The scientific and ascetic training of the clergy left much to be desired, the moral standard of many being very low, and the practice of celibacy not everywhere observed. Not less serious was the condition of many monasteries of men, and even of women (which were often homes for the unmarried daughte...
From the Middle ages, the church faced many problems such as the Babylonian Captivity and the Great Schism that hurt the prestige of the church. Most of the clergy lived in great luxury while most people were poor and they set an immoral example. The clergy had low education and many of them didn’t attend their offices. Martin Luther had witnessed this himself, “In 1510 he visited Rome and was shocked to find corruption on high ecclesiastical places”
Chaucer once again realizes something about old England that is not humanly right. He makes the observation that the richest beings are often the poorest in soul. “Poverty is, though wanting in estate, A kind of wealth that none calumniate. Poverty often, when the heart is slowly, brings one to God and teaches what is holy, gives knowledge to oneself.” The poorest people often have the biggest hearts and are ultimately better people. Chaucer attacks the social classes by using satire and showing that they are useless because they do not make out the person you truly are. Is the stories Chaucer tells them how they are just continuously being used and that most of the priests are not in it for the good of the people, but rather for the good of themselves. He does not like how the lower classes are used and his purpose is to inform them that not everyone is what they seem to be and to be more careful with their
This tale centers on a frugal merchant who refuses to give his money to his own wife because of her habits of reckless spending. In order to get the money, she turns to a friend, a monk named Sir John, to get the one hundred francs that she needs from her husband. Sir John is able to get the money from the merchant and in turn gives the money to the wife with the agreement that she spends the night in his arms (Chaucer 156). This act demonstrates the destruction of community. In the community, monks ranked higher than merchants and Sir John abuses his status as a monk because he knows that the merchant will give him the money as a sign of respect. He takes advantage of his social ranking in return for personal pleasure. In addition, the story shows how the bond between the merchant and is wife is now weaker due to her obsession with accumulating wealth. Obviously, it is not healthy for a married woman to seek sexual activities with another man, regardless of her own personal incentives. Thus, the wife’s acts prove to weaken their relationship. Although the merchant is unaware of the affair, he does become angered with his wife when she fails to tell him that Sir John “returned” the money to her. If this angers the merchant, he would certainly be angered to find that the monk lied to him in order to obtain the money for the
The monk receives some scathing sarcasm in Chaucer’s judgment of his new world ways and the garments he wears “With fur of grey, the finest in the land; Also, to fasten hood beneath his chin, He had of good wrought gold a curious pin: A love-knot in the larger end there was.” (194-197, Chaucer). The Friar is described as being full of gossip and willing to accept money to absolve sins, quite the opposite of what a servant of God should be like. Chaucer further describes the friar as being a frequenter of bars and intimate in his knowledge of bar maids and nobles alike. The friar seems to be the character that Chaucer dislikes the most, he describes him as everything he should not be based on his profession. The Pardoner as well seems to draw special attention from Chaucer who describes him as a man selling falsities in the hopes of turning a profit “But with these relics, when he came upon Some simple parson, then this paragon In that one day more money stood to gain Than the poor dupe in two months could attain.” (703-706, Chaucer). Chaucer’s description of the pardoner paints the image of a somewhat “sleazy” individual “This pardoner had hair as yellow as wax, But lank it hung as does a strike of flax; In wisps hung down such locks as he 'd on head, And with them he his shoulders overspread; But thin they dropped, and stringy, one by one.” (677-681,
The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories told in one. The time period this takes place is between 1387 and 1400. It is the story of a group of thirty people who travel as pilgrims to Canterbury which is in England. The pilgrims, who come from different places of society, tell stories to each other to kill time while they travel to Canterbury. Geoffrey Chaucer considers the church as corrupt and wasteful. In The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer shows his disrespect for the church through the prologue and The Friars Tale, The Summoners Tale, and The Pardoners Tale; with these tales, Chaucer shows how the church is corrupt.
Religion does not seem to be people’s number one priority anymore. Some prefer to dedicate their lives towards religion, basing their decisions on it and committing to follow the rules the religion may dictate; while others have decide to follow science and logic rather than following what they believe is imaginary and superstitious. During the middle ages, people treated this matter differently. As it is universally known, religion was definitely a main concern during the middle ages, while the written word was mostly authored by monks. The early author Geoffrey Chaucer began writing “The Canterbury Tales”, although he did get far into it, it was unfinished. Chaucer retracted from “The Canterbury Tales”, in his concluding paragraph, in which
"Never disdainful, never proud or fine, but discreet in teaching and benign. " Prologue, 525-526. was the model of what a figure in the church should be like. The church figures of medieval times may have been doing wrong and been selfish. I am not a shaman.