Morris Bishop, 'The Middle Ages'

The Middle Ages, by Morris Bishop

In the current modern dark age where a fascism like Islam means 'peace', and plant food causes weather, climate or some globaloney; it is always amusing to hear people discuss in an age saturated with information, but deficient in knowledge and wisdom, the terrible 'dark ages' of Western Christendom. The thousands of Western European inventions between 500-1550, have no other equal in history. But of course, all of them were generated by that great and wonderful Moslem culture, so beneficent, so tolerant, so inspiring, so advanced. This is why Islam is such a paradise today.

Bishop's book is real, devoid of cultural Marxist babble and rubble; fairly balanced and informative.

Hospitals – a Christian invention, flourished.

“Hospitals abounded. In the High Middle Ages, there were 400 in England, and by the time of the Reformation, there were 750. Thirteenth-century Paris had twelve hospitals, with special maternity wards, and also a lazar house and an asylum for the blind. Generally they were supervised by Augustinian monks and nuns; the actual nursing was done by humble lay brothers and sisters, who had renounced the world to serve the unfortunate. Most hospitals were vast halls with partitions, such as the famous Hotel Dieu at Beaune in Burgundy. They were brightened with flowers; their rooms were more cheerful than most modern wards are.”

Social welfare hijacked today by Social Justice Marxists, was a Church priority:

“The church also promoted economic welfare, helping to build and maintain roads and bridges. The bishop of Metz in 1233 ordered that the best suit of clothes of every person who died in the diocese be sold to pay for a bridge over the Moselle. This is the Pont des Morts, which still stands. Many monastic farms were models, introducing new crops and techniques, including the scientific breeding of cattle.”

“The church maintained hospitals, leprosaria, almshouses, orphanages, and hospices along Alpine passes. It fought the remnants of slavery, which lingered in Western lands; a London council in 1102 forbade “the ignoble trade whereby men are sold like beasts.” The church ransomed prisoners and repatriated Christian slaves from Muslim lands. The orders of Trinitarians and Ransomers offered their own bodies to free those whose salvation was in danger. The Penitent Sisters of St. Magdalen reclaimed prostitutes. A kind of Travelers Aid Society succored pilgrims. A poor-relief system was decreed for every parish; the poor were entitled to one-fourth of the tithes and one-half of all other donations to the church. Often, however, the yield was disappointing.”

Relics and cults were viewed with suspicion:

“Sober ecclesiastics, including the great Pope Innocent III, took alarm at the cult of relics and tried to bring it within reasonable bounds. At first, they could do little to counter the vested interests of famous shrines and the need of simple folk for symbols of hope and comfort. Eventually, doubt and skepticism increased, even among the devout. When the Reformation came, mountains of ancient bones were gleefully burned on bonfires. Relics were a particular attraction for medieval pilgrims. The impulse to go on pilgrimage lies deep in the human spirit...”

The Church kept the world together:

“The church fulfilled many of the functions of the modern state. Church courts tried civil and criminal cases involving clerics, and their decisions on such matters as marriage, divorce, and bequests were binding and enforceable by local constables. The church alone controlled scholarship and book production; it alone cared for the poor, the sick, and the aged. It had jurisdiction over all students as well as over priests, monks, lay brothers, and a horde of “clerks” in minor orders, who enjoyed “benefit of clergy” with practically no obligations. The proportion of clerics to the population was perhaps ten times as large as it is today. The church was, in sum, more than the patron of medieval culture; it was medieval culture.”

Protestants, Atheists, the poorly named 'Enlightenment' [witch burnings, religious wars, bigotry, Puritanism etc.]; and other revisionist theology should not be accepted without understanding their bias, their bile, their objectives and dogma. A hard age, an era of transformation, action and initiative, was not dark. It was different and it was the foundation for the modern world.