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CLASS SET: DO NOT WRITE ON OR REMOVE FROM CLASSROOM Who Wants to be a Heretic? ACTIVITY INSTRUCTIONS: BEFORE READING THE ARTICLE BELOW RESPOND TO THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS: 1. How do you think the Catholic Church reacted to people who started to question it? 2. What do you think would happen to people if they disagreed with the church’s teachings? THE HERETIC Obedience to the Church Religion affected almost every aspect of the way people lived in the Middle Ages. The Church taught that there was only one true religion, Christianity, and the only way to follow it was through the Catholic Church. One 14th century Pope said, “Obedience is the greatest good.” Christians were expected to obey the Church absolutely in all matters of faith. People who began to question what the Church said were called “Heretics.” It is a word that comes from the Greek language and means “someone who disagrees with accepted beliefs.” When the Church used the word, it meant someone who preferred to choose what to believe rather than accept Church teaching. The punishment for heresy was often burning at the stake. Medicine in the Middle Ages Medicine and the treatment of the sick during the Middle Ages was filled with superstition. The Church dominated what direction the medical world took. Any views that were different from the established Roman Catholic Church view could veer towards heresy with the punishments that entailed. Therefore, when the Roman Catholic Church stated that illnesses were punishments from God and that those who were ill were so because they were sinners, few argued otherwise. At the time, no one really knew what caused diseases. Sickness was believed to be a punishment from God for sinful behavior. It was believed that the only way to cure someone was to pray for their forgiveness. Doctors in the Middle Ages were usually priests or other religious scholars. Hospitals often sprang up in monasteries (a community of monks – people who have taken a vow to devote their life to religious service and prayer) or other religious establishments. The patients were given food and comforted by religious nursing staff but little else was done to cure their illness. Education in the Middle Ages In medieval times, the clergy (the people, such as priests, who perform the sacred functions of a church), were the people most likely to be educated. Most of the students in church schools were the sons of nobles who were studying for careers in the clergy. They spent much of their time memorizing prayers and passages from the Bible in Latin. Starting in the 1200s, small schools based in churches and cathedrals, developed into universities. Students in universities studied Latin grammar, persuasive speaking and writing, logic, geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, and music. Books at that time were hand copied and rare, so teachers often read to their students. Ancient texts were greatly respected in the universities, but the Church was sometimes uneasy about them. The Church taught people to be guided by faith. Ancient writers like the Greek philosopher Aristotle taught that reason or logical thinking was the path to knowledge. Church leaders feared that studying such writers might lead people to question the Church’s teachings. CLASS SET: DO NOT WRITE ON OR REMOVE FROM CLASSROOM AFTER READING THE ARTICLE RESPOND TO THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. According to the Catholic Church what is the only way to follow the religion of Christianity? What were all Christians expected to do? Use a quote from the reading to support this. What is a heretic? What might have happened to someone who committed heresy? How did the Church influence medicine during the Middle Ages? How did the Church influence education during the Middle Ages? INFERENCE: How might the fear of heresy impact the pursuit of knowledge or advancements? INFERENCE: How do you think the concept of “heresy” served to keep the people “in line” during the Middle Ages? 9. THINKING QUESTION: How are medicine and the pursuit of knowledge in Medieval Europe different than in the Islamic Empire?