Comparison Of Pessimism In 'Know The Ways Of The Lord'?

Religion has played a significant role in the shaping and molding of human civilization. In the Middle Ages, religion was a core pinnacle that served as a source of guidance and meaning for individuals and the state. The medieval play, Everyman, explores the journey of Everyman to Heaven and the phases he must go through in order to stand before God to give an account of his life. Everyman was written during a time when the Catholic Church’s practice of penance was paramount as a means for attaining salvation. The personification of the everyday person and spiritual qualities in this play gives an impressive insight into the trials and victories that are part of the Christian walk on the journey to eternal life. This work embodies the

Christ Blessing, Surrounded by a Donor Family (1573-1582) offers valuable insight into a changing European landscape during the sixteenth century. The Protestant Reformation, which reached its climax during this era, rejected many aspects of Catholicism. Among other things, Protestants believed that each individual should read the Bible and develop a meaningful connection to G-d rather than limiting the Bible to the clergy’s interpretation.1 This Protestant belief and other tenets of the Reformers are evident in the Reformation’s art. Christ Blessing, Surrounded by a Donor Family demonstrates the manner in which the cultural shift from Catholicism to Protestantism in Northern Europe during the Reformation was reflected in that era’s art.

This book is based on Christianity and how the religion was viewed through images. The text has an ere of concepts that ties in the concepts of Christians to the beginning of the start of Christianity. The purpose of this book is to show the readers the difference between how Christian art was represented and how other art was portrayed. I will be giving an overview of what Christianity represents and the art work that it includes.

As indicated by the sarcastic title of her book “Those Terrible Middle Ages!” French historian Régine Pernoud addresses this commonly held misconception. She argues this time in history spanning approximately a thousand years as well as the image of the Church, have been irresponsibly represented. Her examination of this time period reveals that it is not the Church, but modernism that generates a return to the classical ideology of antiquity. These ancient pagan beliefs of the distant past are not as distant as we may think. They have resurfaced and are present in our own age.

The official religion of England had converted from Catholicism to Protestant multiple times during the reign of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Queen Mary I, and Queen Elizabeth I (Buchanan). The Book of Common Prayer was published to establish unity among the people and to provide a consistent religion across the land. Defining what it means to be a Christian is the first crucial step to understanding the leverage that religion has on Othello. The Book of Common Prayer discusses in multiple cases the desire to be without “sin and wickedness” and contains a morning prayer that specifies “O Lord: to keep us this day without sin” (18-19). For the purpose of this paper, a Christian will be defined as a person who strives to live in a manner without sin or wickedness.

Proving to be the paramount of the conflict between faith and reason, the European Enlightenment of the eighteenth century challenged each of the traditional values of that age. Europeans were changing, but Europe’s institutions were not keeping pace with that change.1 Throughout that time period, the most influential and conservative institution of Europe, the Roman Catholic Church, was forced into direct confrontation with these changing ideals. The Church continued to insist that it was the only source of truth and that all who lived beyond its bounds were damned; it was painfully apparent to any reasonably educated person, however, that the majority of the world’s population were not Christians.2 In the wake of witch hunts, imperial

As the rigidity of the Roman Catholic Church’s power, influence, and corruption reached a climax during the Romanesque period, humanity’s desire for a more pleasurable life began to increase. The Middle Ages brought about a transition that began to replace spiritual emphasis in life and highlighted intellectualism and religious skepticism. Though the church’s power was not necessarily undermined, it was certainly revolutionized and dampened. Examples of this humanistic transformation were represented through the union of Gothic and Scholastic ideals. Rather than simply scare the population into being religious and pious, the Gothic era welcomed the population- beginning with France, followed by the rest of Europe through the airy, dream-like, colorful, and uplifting beauty of the Gothic Cathedrals. This radical change would not have come about were it not for Aristotle’s nominalist philosophy during Antiquity, which pioneered the future revival of this somewhat liberal thinking.

Until the time of the crusades, Christians and Muslims had interacted at least on a surface level through trade activities. Christian Europe had been exposed to the wealth and knowledge of the Arabic world; however, with the movement to the crusades the attitude towards the Muslims shifted to one of religious intolerance. Recognizing that Roland deals with issues that are germane to the Europe of the crusades helps to establish the connection between the religious intolerance that had begun to surface in Europe and the events of the poem.

Texts and primary sources written during the Medieval period of Europe stand as the most important source of information historians possess about the time. However, when analyzing these sources, multiple problems arise, as conflicting interest skews our perception of history, and as time and memory obscure and alter details about the past. Vital primary sources of the Medieval period, such as Einhard’s “Life of Charlemagne,” the accounts of Pope Urban II’s speech at the Council of Clermont, and interrogation records taken during the Inquisition serve to illustrate the changing and fluid nature of the interpretation of primary sources and help us to understand them by showing why we cannot.

The works of Bede in the Ecclesiastical History of the English People are shown through very insightful spirituality. Bede is greatly known for his reverence, and his knowledge in history. This reputation of his makes him notable in varieties of writings. Through my own understanding and reading, I was attracted to two characters introduced in Book I and II, Augustine of Canterbury and Pope Gregory the Great. Their dedication to the church was not only inspiring, but very fruitful towards the history of England. Bravery, inspiration, and change drove Pope Gregory the Great and Augustine to be influential people of their time. From this we can unveil history and use these accounts as our own inspiration.

The triptych Melencolia I (1514), St. Jerome in his Study (1514) and Knight, Death and the Devil (1513) by Albrecht Dürer are allegoric copperplate engravings, known as the old master prints, which embody the three spheres of human activity: the “intellectual”, “theological” and “active”1. Whereas the latter focused on the strengths of humanity through the figure of the ‘knight’, who perseveres despite the threat ‘death’ and immorality pose to the mind, the former highlighted man’s hamartia in this conflict: our curiosity, for a level of knowledge akin to the divine, that first caused humanity to fall in the Bible.

Anderson’s notion that charity was a means by which one could accrue spiritual merit is evident in medieval mortuary tracts. The Tractus Bene Moriendi and the Ars Moriendi, which served as handbooks for the dying man, offered practical solutions to concerns about Purgatory by outlining the ‘crafe to lyue well and dye well.’ A considerable portion of both texts is dedicated to projecting the importance of charity as the ‘queen of all virtues, with which no one can perish, without which no one can live, either in this life or the next.’ By employing a culmination of parables and Augustinian rhetoric, these handbooks reinforced the relationship between alms deeds and the emancipation of the soul. The various vernacular translations and wide distribution of these works suggest that lay readers were aware of the spiritual significance of their philanthropy and what it meant for the afterlife. By helping the needy, testators were not loosing their riches, but ‘sending their wealth to heaven via the hands of the

Religion in the Middle Ages takes on a character all of its own as it is lived out differently in the lives of medieval men and women spanning from ordinary laity to vehement devotees. Though it is difficult to identify what the average faith consists of in the Middle Ages, the life told of a radical devotee in The Book of Margery Kempe provides insight to the highly intense version of medieval paths of approaching Christ. Another medieval religious text, The Cloud of Unknowing, provides a record of approaching the same Christ. I will explore the consistencies and inconsistencies of both ways to approach Christ and religious fulfillment during the Middle Ages combined with the motivations to do so on the basis of both texts.

On the other hand, the Middle Ages brings about an individual who was an influence to the Church in the centuries to come. Gerbert was the model for over a century in respect to teaching logic and he was crucial in the art of rhetoric. The art of rhetoric was a key development in the Middle Ages, because it gave the government a particular voice. The government writes the law, which is rational and not based on emotion, and the law is what gives people freedom. When people have a greater amount of freedom, they are able to express individuality. Even though the serfs and freemen were restricted by the law in similar in levels, the freemen were affected in a rational way. The freemen were not bound to serving a person, while the serfs and so, the freemen were allowed to make distinctive choices. Gerbert’s influence in different realms of life proves that

The medieval times in western Europe exposed people to arduous times of religious wars and deadly plagues that nurtured a bleak view of humanity. This hopeless view of humanity encouraged people to search for happiness and justice in other ways- ways that eventually caused drastic changes in political thought. Many people during this time believed that man was not capable of reestablishing justice and happiness in society because human beings themselves were the source of society’s atrocious condition. People also stopped identifying themselves as reasonable beings, and thus concluded that there was only one solution to their chaotic condition: God. Consequently, the medieval period is often characterized by its rejection of secular ideas; in other words, it rejected any idea that did not conform to Christianity. Other political thinkers, however, rejected this hopeless identity of humanity, and believed that humans could in fact regain the virtue of reason in order to guide society back on the path of justice and happiness. These two opposing viewpoints can be captured in the different ideas of two medieval theologians: St. Augustine and St. Aquinas. St. Augustine argued that people are sinful by nature and that their sins disable them from ever acquiring reason. He argued that since man could no longer inherit the virtue of reason, they could never experience true happiness and justice on earth. Conversely, St. Aquinas refused to accept that a good life