Models of Ministry: Re-Reading Chaucer's Friar's Tale

Models of Ministry: Re-reading Chaucer's Friar's Tale

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While critics continue to study Chaucer and The Canterbury Tales, they afford relatively little scholarship to the Friar's Tale .1 In the almost thirty years since the publication of Richard H. Passon's influential semiotic reading, "'Entente' in Chaucer's Friar's Tale," scholars have approached the tale in two primary manners: (1) from an analysis of the friar's story as a comic satire within the frame of his historical feud with the secular summoner-pilgrim; and (2) by utilizing Passon's theoretical apparatus to locate more moments of semiotic ambiguity and tension.2 V.A. Kolve's "'Man in the Middle': Art and Religion in Chaucer's Friar's Tale" altered notably the critical analysis of the friar's narrative by attempting to discuss it as a unified story with its own independent integrity.3 While the Friar's Tale clearly contains numerous instances of semiotic uncertainty, and is easily interpreted as one part of a sardonic dialogue between the Medieval seculars and mendicants, it is also a complete moment within The Canterbury Tales. The friar's brief narration of a corrupt summoner's encounter with a yeoman-fiend offers two distinct models of ministerial service. By presenting the summoner and the fiend as servants, the condensed poem displays the similarities between these two characters, while revealing the devil's superior role as a humble minister.

The Friar's Tale initially introduces the employer of the immoral summoner. Chaucer4 describes this archdeacon as "a man of heigh degree, / That boldely dide execucioun / In punysshynge" (1303-1305). As an administrator of the ecclesiastical court, he maintains control over individual's restitution for religious and socially unacceptable crimes. T.W. Craik indicates that the poet ultimately "approaches the summoner's moral character through that of his employer" (101). The most prominent feature of the portrait of the archdeacon is the use of his power to punish "insufficient" church tithes (1312). The poet concludes that "For smale tithes and for smal offrynge / He made the peple pitously to synge, / For er the bisshop caughte hem with his hook, / They weren in the erchedeknes book" (1315-1318). Thomas Hahn and Richard W. Kaeuper suggest that "Deference to the archdeacon was appropriate, for so awesome was his power" (72). Morton Bloomfield succinctly summarizes the vices of the archdeacon: blackmailing, friendship with the prostitutes of the towns in his jurisdiction, lechery, and the acceptance of bribes (287). By beginning with a sketch of the sinister superior of the corrupt and inane summoner, Chaucer provides a helpful context for the protagonist's role and manners as a minister.

The poem's incipient description of the summoner emphasizes both his immoral character and his perverted conception of ministry. Julian N. Wasserman asserts that "By definition, his function as a summoner is to act as a mediator between the laity and the ecclesiastical court" (78). However, his portrait in the poem quickly disparages both the credibility of this mediation and his status as a minister. The friar immediately notes that "A slyer boye nas noon in Engelond; / For subtilly he hadde his espiaille" (1322-1323). The summoner is at once a Machiavellian individual and an employer of spies. Through his professional role as a deliverer of ecclesiastical summonses and the use of his cadre of informers, "He took hymself a greet profit therby; / His maister knew nat alwey what he wan" (1344-1345). Craik argues that the true ridicule embedded in his portrait is not the performance of his professional employment, but the corruption of his duties (101). The friar concisely defines him as "A theef, and eek a somnour, and a baude" (1354). His illegitimate dispersion of summonses and collection of fines/bribes emphasize his mercenary nature. Wasserman concludes that by inventing or fabricating summonses, the summoner abuses his role as an employee of the ecclesiastical court (78). This initial portrait displays him as a selfish solicitor of money who neglects the interest of his superior while reflecting his rapacious attitude, rather than a dutiful or effective minister.

Chaucer complements his depiction of the avaricious summoner by accentuating his improper conception of ministry. Although the archdeacon governs the activity of the ecclesiastic court which the summoner serves, the immoral servant has established his own system of uncovering lewd secrets and rumors of supposed church