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13 - Lollards and Religious Writings

from Part II - Literary Texts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 July 2019

By
Fiona Somerset
Edited by
Candace Barrington  and
Sebastian Sobecki
Candace Barrington
Affiliation:
Central Connecticut State University
Sebastian Sobecki
Affiliation:
Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, The Netherlands
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Summary

The Middle English Rosarium (c. 1375–1415) an alphabetic compendium of religious knowledge compiled by sympathisers with John Wyclif (c. 1330–64), begins its discussion of ‘Lex’ in this way:

‘Law’ is spoken of in two ways, that is to say, true and pretended. True law is a truthful directive, or rectifying, of a created thing, in order to have it as it ought to be, as at its beginning. And this law is divided into God’s law and man’s law.

Man-made laws, as much as God’s law, can be true. That truth is evident in their capacity to bring about reform by restoring created things to how they were in the beginning. This understanding of law’s place in the life of a Christian would surprise scholars who expect lollard writers to adopt a scriptura sola position, where only the Bible is a reliable source of moral rectitude. However, Wyclif and his followers (‘lollard’ or ‘Wycliffite’ are used interchangeably to describe these persons and their mostly anonymous writings) resembled reform-minded religious writers more generally not only in their tendency to seek models in the past, but also in their willingness to cite both church and secular law in order to advance their claims. The Rosarium says no more at this point about pretended law; but other lollard writings dismiss man-made laws only when they regard them as manifestly incompatible with scripture and reason. What is more, they commonly insist on leaving room for human doubt: only God is always sure of the truth. Rather than assuming that lollards simply rejected human law while orthodox writers accepted it unquestioningly, this chapter will take a fresh look at how lollard and other religious writings engaged critically with law and its practice, communicating legal knowledge as they sought to explain the best way to live in this world.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Companion to Medieval English Law and Literature , pp. 167 - 177
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

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References

Further Reading

Arnold, John, ‘Lollard Trials and Inquisitorial Discourse’, in Fourteenth Century England, ed. Given-Wilson, Christopher, Woodbridge: Boydell, 2002, II , 81–94.Google Scholar
Councils and Synods with Other Documents relating to the English Church II: 1205–1313, ed. Powicke, F. M. and Cheney, C. R., 2 vols., Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1964.Google Scholar
Craun, Edwin D., ‘Discarding Traditional Pastoral Ethics: Wycliffism and Slander’, in Wycliffite Controversies, ed. Bose, Mishtooni C. A. and Patrick Hornbeck, J. II, Turnhout: Brepols, 2012, 227–42.Google Scholar
Craun, Edwin D.Ethics and Power in Medieval English Reformist Writing, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.Google Scholar
The English Works of Wyclif Hitherto Unprinted, 2nd edn, ed. Matthew, F. D., EETS o.s. 74, London: Trübner, 1880.Google Scholar
Farr, William, John Wyclif as Legal Reformer, Leiden: Brill, 1974.Google Scholar
Forrest, Ian, The Detection of Heresy in Late Medieval England, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.Google Scholar
Forrest, Ian‘William Swinderby and the Wycliffite Attitude to Excommunication’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History 60 (2009), 246–69.Google Scholar
Four Wycliffite Dialogues, ed. Somerset, Fiona EETS o.s. 333, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.Google Scholar
The Fyve Wyttes, ed. Bremmer, Rolf H., Jr, Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1987.Google Scholar
Heresy Trials in the Diocese of Norwich, 1428–31, ed. Tanner, Norman P., S. J. Camden Society, fourth series, vol. 20, London: Royal Historical Society, 1977.Google Scholar
Hornbeck II, J. Patrick, ‘Records of Heresy Trials’, in Wycliffite Spirituality, ed. and trans. Patrick Hornbeck, J. II, Lahey, Stephen E. and Somerset, Fiona, New York: Paulist, 2013.Google Scholar
Hudson, Anne, The Premature Reformation: Wycliffite Texts and Lollard History, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988.Google Scholar
Jurkowski, Maureen, ‘The Arrest of William Thorpe in Shrewsbury and the Anti–Lollard statute of 1406’, Historical Research 75:189 (2002), 273–95.Google Scholar
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Lollards of Coventry 1486–1522, ed. McSheffrey, Shannon and Tanner, Norman, Royal Historical Society, Camden Society, fifth series, vol. 23., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.Google Scholar
McNamara, Lawrence, Reputation and Defamation, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.Google Scholar
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Selections from English Wycliffite Writings, 2nd edn, ed. Hudson, Anne, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997.Google Scholar
Somerset, Fiona, ‘A Mirror to See God in: An Edition of “Þe Wordes of Poule”’, Yearbook of Langland Studies 31 (2017), 257–86.Google Scholar
[Thirty-Seven Conclusions] Remonstrance against Romish Corruptions, ed. Forshall, J., London, 1851.Google Scholar
Thorpe, William, The Testimony of William Thorpe, in Two Wycliffite Texts, ed. Hudson, Anne, EETS o.s. 301, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993, 24–93.Google Scholar
Wyche, Richard, ‘The Letter of Richard Wyche: An Interrogation Narrative’, ed. and trans. Bradley, Christopher G., Publications of the Modern Language Association 127, 2012, 626–42.Google Scholar

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