Medieval Related, Mostly, on Quora (part V)

1) Some Fun on Quora, I · 2) Some Fun on Quora, II · 3) Some Linguistics on Quora (III, still fun) · 4) Creationism vs Evolutionism on Quora, IV, still fun · 5) Medieval Related, Mostly, on Quora (part V)

Q

How would medieval people react to a modern pop-song?

A

There are two options.

He could dislike it. He could also try to figure out the rhythm.

Either way, he would probably think there was sth wrong about the text and try to make a song with some meaning to the text.

Marketa B. Linden Windsor

Interesting. I guess they will like it I mean those real songs, not manufactured pop electro tunes. They were noisy in their time and singers with lute were stars of the courts. Also the medieval dancing had band consisting of 4–5 members of the capela.

Deleted Answer

"They simply wouldn’t understand the appeal in the rhythm."

HGL

We are talking about a time in which Richard the Lionhearted was notorious for walking back and forth in Church clapping his hands to the rhythm of the monks chanting.

Whether they liked the rhythm or not, they would easily have picked it up.

Deleted Answer

"Pop songs as we know them are a distant child of Jazz music."

HGL

With some heavy dilution from 18th C popular music, such as Gilbert and Sullivan.

Deleted Answer

"Music as we know it in general only take roots in the twentieth century and its revolutionary cultural shifts."

HGL

Er, no. Vivaldi and Mozart very certainly DO belong to "music as we know it in general" and so does by now modern performance of Medieval music.

Deleted Answer

"Medieval people would even have a hard time understanding 18th century music, although it might understandably be easier to their ears,"

HGL

Rather harder. Less rhythm and more difficult chords. Elvis would have come much easier than Wagner, especially in Parzifal or Tristan und Isolde.

Deleted Answer

"so it’s safe to say they would frown at ours even more because it belongs to a post-modern society which culture is completely unknown to them."

HGL

You are basically presuming musical styles are progressing in a straight line, and more centuries between equal more alien musical style. That is not the case.

Cole Nielson

I'll assume you mean midieval Europeans. During the midieval times, nearly everyone was a Christian. And almost nobody could read, so it was up to the Church leaders to tell the people what the Bible said. As such, it became corrupted, and the people believed every word that their church leaders spoke. With that in mind, those times were not tolerant times. Being gay was enough to get you killed. Let's say these time traveling midieval people heard the song "Only" by Nicki Minaj. Well, they wouldn't understand it. Our slang in pop is so very different from their speech that they'd be completely lost. If we could finally explain that she is talking about how she has big boobs a big butt, and that she likes to have her ass eaten, they'd react with complete disgust. They'd call for the pop singer to be killed. Then they'd realize that a sizable portion of musicians today are African Americans. That would outrage them, and they'd want to kill them.

HGL

Where do you get this disinformation about Medieval times?

There is ONE close to fact statement.

Cole Nielson

Being gay was enough to get you killed.

HGL

Not really, but committing sodomy was. However, some tend to use the word gay as meaning “someone who has committed sodomy”.

Slang is not news, it is not as if a “visitor” from Middle Ages would have easily picked up standard English and then be totally confused by the slang.

Cole Nielson

During the midieval times, nearly everyone was a Christian.

HGL

There were fairly large Jewish and here and there smaller Muslim minorities. Btw, they were not greater fans of sodomy than Christians were. I suppose btw, that you are not talking about everywhere in Medieval times, but about Latin Christendom.

Cole Nielson

And almost nobody could read, so it was up to the Church leaders to tell the people what the Bible said.

HGL

Almost nobody could read would perhaps describe the peasants (who were a majority). It being up to Church leaders to tell what the Bible says is pretty much still the case, even among modern Protestants where everyone has learned to read (though you haven’t learned to spell Medieval, also spelled Mediaeval, Mediæval) and everyone has a Bible, it is a thick collection of works and most people don’t have the time to doublecheck every passage which might be relevant for a question and so trust their Church leaders - except those who basically make up their own religion.

Cole Nielson

As such, it became corrupted,

HGL

Why? When, where and how?

Cole Nielson

and the people believed every word that their church leaders spoke.

HGL

If the Church leaders do have Apostolic succession, and are not straying from orthodoxy, basically we should. Luke 10:16.

Cole Nielson

With that in mind, those times were not tolerant times.

HGL

If your only standard for “tolerance” is how the gay community has it, well, they weren’t. Apart from that, tolerance varied on various issues and was often greater than in our times. For instance in spelling vernacular languages, among those who did learn to read and write.

Cole Nielson

Let's say these time traveling midieval people heard the song "Only" by Nicki Minaj. Well, they wouldn't understand it. Our slang in pop is so very different from their speech that they'd be completely lost.

HGL

I don’t know about “Only” by Nicki Minaj. I do know about Elvis Presley. And I am supposing the guys had had some time for linguistic adaptation, otherwise it’s like playing an English pop song to a monoglot French speaker. Well, they would consider Elvis obviously bawdy (“I have only one girl, one in every town I go”) and would either enjoy it or be shocked according to personal outlook, precisely as now.

Cole Nielson

If we could finally explain that she is talking about how she has big boobs a big butt, and that she likes to have her ass eaten, they'd react with complete disgust.

HGL

Committing sodomy was punishable with death. Always and everywhere at least in theory. But sado-masochism in heterosexual relationships was not so. I think some would be disgusted, as I am, at openly inviting her boyfriend (?) to be violent, but no one would have been shocked enough to burn her as a witch or forbid her every opportunity of singing everywhere. Some towns would have banned her, others wouldn’t.

Cole Nielson

They'd call for the pop singer to be killed.

HGL

No. They might at worst call for her to be banned from town and go look for another town with worse taste.

Cole Nielson

Then they'd realize that a sizable portion of musicians today are African Americans. That would outrage them, and they'd want to kill them.

HGL

Medievals had a certain concept of courtesy in common with Dixie culture. But NOT the racism. It would not have outraged them a bit.

Indeed, if they found out a large portion of the Afro-Americans were Christians, it would have made them go “Alleluia, the Crusades were successful!”

Mike Tero

Medieval wouldn’t like it, but Bach or Handel would appreciate it, I think, as most of the modern western music (including the classic Rock-n-Roll) is largely based on their immortal work.

HGL

“Medieval wouldn’t like it,”

Why?

[No answer, so far]

Basit Ishaq

Probably seize the singer and start a treatment for witchcraft.

HGL

• 1 Why?
• 2 What do you mean by “treatment” for witchcraft?

[No answer, so far]

Christopher Webster

They would probably dance like lunatics, like we do.

HGL

It sounds like a fairly correct guess.

[Nevertheless, Christopher Webster's answer was collapsed as needing improvement - while it is rather perfect.]

Q

How would medieval people react ot 21 century life?

comment

imagene that medival people from 9th or 13th century are transported to 21th century how would they react seeing all the wonders of technoligy and others gadgets in modern world!

A

If the location from which they came were Western Europe, the one from 13th C would be less surprised or impressed than the one from 9th C.

Also, from 13th C he would have less linguistic problems.

I think the real shock for both would rather be how people lead their lives : sodomy, contraception and free love, abortion, and if you survive that, there is Child Welfare and there is Compulsory school and there is Psychiatry threatening just around the corner.

Q

What kind of people kept being nomads during Late Middle Ages in Europe?

Matt Riggsby

Very few kinds of people practiced a nomadic lifestyle in late Medieval Europe. Post-Roman Europe was never particularly friendly to nomads, and the landscape was fast closing to that kind of existence.

Europe’s biggest population of regular movers were probably herders, and those weren’t enormously nomadic. To the extent that they were nomadic, they typically practiced transhumance. Rather than moving great distances over the landscape, often trying out novel destinations, they’d go between a small number of fairly fixed locations, such as regular summer and winter grazing fields. This happened predominantly in relatively hilly regions like the British Isles, the Balkans, and parts of Iberia.

By the late Middle Ages, the Romani had also begun to appear in Europe, entering via the Balkans in the 14th century, they had made it to the British Isles and Spain by the early 16th. They were an odd case precisely because they were wanderers, without clear allegiances which were important in an increasingly settled and orderly Europe. Their treatment varied widely, from expulsion on pain of death to a sort of official toleration of the kind of vagrant lifestyle which would result in punishments for others.

Beyond those, wanderers were largely individuals: homeless vagrants, itinerant peddlers and entertainers, brigands, the occasional religious ascetic, and others difficult to classify.

Martine Dekker

Agreed, many people, like pedlars or ‘players’ (actors), travelled during the warmer months, but most of them had a semi-permanent home they returned to in winter. The only true nomads were those formerly referred to as gypsies.

Q

How were nomadic people treated in the Europe Middle Ages?

A

Do you mean Gipsies?

They were at one time given a Papal Bull consecrating as their right and even duty to live nomadically, since their Copt Ancestor had refused hospitality to the Holy Family when they were on the Flight to Egypt.

Note, though ethnic origin of Gipsies is in India and they left it centuries after Holy Family came to Egypt, they passed through a place called “Little Egypt” in the Balkans, in Greece I think, and its owner was a Copt. He might have adopted them so they took such an obligation (really extant in his family or they misunderstood it) from him.

Due to the Papal Bull, they were less badly treated than before, and also less badly treated than afterwards, when Popes lost their power and the story in the Bull came to be disbelieved.

Bruno Garcia

Gypsies are the main group, but, correct me if I am wrong, there was more, right?

How does one person adopt a whole people?

How does that make them be called for his ethnicity?

HGL

“Gypsies are the main group, but, correct me if I am wrong, there was more, right?”

I have heard there were both Roma and Sinti, both Gypsies and Tatters.

That is possible. It is also possible the Tatters (and Tinkers are more Tatters than Gipsies) are a branch of Gipsies claiming back then to not be such in order to get preferential treatment.

In Sweden the first Tatters arrived under Gustav Wasa, after the Middle Ages.

“How does one person adopt a whole people?”

The one man has LOTS of land. The people has FEW chieftains. He adopts those in return for letting them live on his land, as long as it remains possible.

“How does that make them be called for his ethnicity?”

Adopted chieftains would probably have noted he was Copt and called themselves accordingly.

Anyway, the time when Roma stayed in “Little Egypt” was the time when words like “Gipsies” and “Egyptians” came to be applied to them.

Bruno Garcia

I dont understand why you changed to bold font in the end, I mean no disrespect, I am sorry if I sounded like that.

Thanks for the response, man, I appreciate you taking your time and effort to enlighten me, I aam sorry if I offended you in any manner.

HGL

The bold font was a mistake, did not know how to avoid it. One word was just bold font and then the rest were too. Sorry and you didn’t offend me at all.

Bruno Garcia

Its ok, we all do stuff like that, thanks again for your answer.

HGL

You are welcome. And thanks for understanding.

[The bold font not shown on the blog post.]

Q

Would it be possible for the entire population of Europe to be wiped out by Black Death during the late Middle Ages?

A

If it was the population of as small a thing as a single village, yes.

Btw, “during the late Middle Ages” should be corrected to 1347 - 1350.

After 1350, it is still late Middle Ages, but not a great time for the Black Death epidemic. It had done its worst by 1349, at the very latest 1350.

Pieter Buis

After the fist wave of plague people figured out quite an effective countermeasure against the plague.

Quarantine.

You’ll probably notice that secondary plague occurrences only struck local areas and never managed to spread like the first wave did. On top of that there are very few ‘plagues’ that have a 100% mortality rate, even things like modern day Ebola have a survival rate however small it might seem to us.

HGL

It was by quarantine that last plague in France was eradicated under Louis XV.

Are you sure it had been around so long as just after Black Death?

At least you were hardly shot at with a musket by the royal army for breaking it in plague years after 1350?

[Pieter Buis has not answered yet, I hope he will, since I am genuinely curious.]

Andrew Harrison

No, for two reasons. A plague that kills everyone it infects quickly runs out of carriers for the disease. The second is genetics. Genetic diversity ensures that plagues will fail to kill certain people. This is how immunity to plagues is created amongst the populace, as once they have been infected, they can never be hurt by the disease again.

HGL

Do you think Europeans got a generally better immune system after the plague as those with weaker immune systems were wiped off?

I mean, allergies, which are running amuck these days, are also a consequence of an over the top well functioning immune system.

Andrew Harrison

No, it just means the immune system can fight off that specific virus. Expose descendants of black death survivors and descendants of unaffected groups to a new plague, and the death rate will look very similar. Our modern immune systems are actually weak and small due to an over dependence on modern medicine. The systems are not forced to be strong, so they aren't strong. Allergies may be a symptom of these weak immune system.

HGL

I am talking about two parallel processes.

Btw, Bubonic plague is not a virus, but a bacterium.

• 1) Survivors who had been exposed had developed immunity, personally, against getting Bubonic plague or Yersinia pestis again.
• 2) Survivors would be those who had stronger immune systems, partly by life style and partly by heredity. Dying in plague (and later in pocks etc) would have been those either having weak immune systems by lifestyle or by hereditary factors.

This second process would have given Europeans a better immune system on the average as far as heredity is concerned.

Allergies are not a symptom of weak immune systems, they are an immune system being too eagerly on the watchout. Your reason for modern immune systems being weak was only lifestyle related and does not take hereditary factors into account.

Roman Huczok

No, I actually studied epidemics as part of my degree, and I'll try to explain the maths simply.

In the case of the black death, you have three basic groups of people, susceptibles, that's people who've never had the plague. Infecteds, people who currently have the plague (actually there's a fourth one for people who have it but aren't showing symptoms yet, but for simplicity we'll ignore those), and the recovered/removed, recovered being people who survived and removed being people who are dead, mathematically they're the same. There's also the consideration of births and natural deaths (which we'll consider to have no effect because the plague hit fast, and it makes our calculations unnecessarily complicated, it literally changes the numbers by less than 1%), and finally changes in the contact rate through quarantine, making the plague even less viable.

Now, at first there will be a very small number number of infected, and the rest will be susceptibles. Thus anyone encountered by an infected will be susceptible, and we'll have an epidemic as the disease spreads rapidly (but I think I recall that the number of infected for the black death will never go over 25% of the population). Susceptibles will move to the infected, and encounter more people, but infected will not seek out susceptibles, as the number of infected and removed people increase, it becomes less and less likely for an infected to encounter a susceptible. This was demonstrated wonderfully at my university, ultimately the first three rows became infected and then removed, but almost no-one in the back four rows was infected (the removed were asked to sit down again after infecting people). I think the worst case scenario, with everyone who becomes infected ultimately dying, and a second epidemic which results from the maths if you include more factors, 12% of people are never infected.

Q

What was the life expectancy of someone during the black plague?

A

Lower than before or after.

Q

The deadly plague was in the middle of which of the centuries?

A

The XIV Century, a k a the Thirteen-Hundreds.

Actually, by 1350, it was over, so, just before the Middle.

Pedro von Eyken

The XIV Century

Q

How often did people die in medieval wars?

A

You mean, I suppose, how often when alive when a war started they were dead when it ended and because of it rather than being alive after it or dying during but of unrelated causes.

I got a book about Gustavus Adolphus when I was ending ninth grade. It gave some background about Thirty Years War.

It gave century by century for Europe how many who had died in this or that century precisely because of wars. Starting with 1200’s.

The century with least deaths (somewhere around 12%) was 1200 - 1300.

Then there was a rise up to 1600–1700 with Thirty Years War (at around 38%?). Then there was a fall, 18th and 19th Centuries were more peaceful, in Europe itself. Then came a new peak in 20th C (40% or sth?).

So, basically, less often than in later wars.

Alan Cowperthwaite

They only died once!

[True enough, and questioner could have been understood as if that was the relevant answer too - that is why I gave a disclaimer about how I took it.]

Jaskaran Singh

People died in medieval wars a lot, although it wasn’t usually because of the fighting itself. Diseases and starvation usually killed most people off, and the fighting only exacerbated this. During sieges, people usually ended up starving because supply lines were cut off to the city that was being besieged. Medieval wars also tended to spread diseases, such as the Black Plague. The Black Death was endemic to southeast China until the Mongols brought it from there to Caffa, a booming trade center on the Black Sea. They besieged Caffa, and they threw plague-ridden bodies over the city walls. The people of Caffa were then infected, and people started to flee, especially merchants. A group of Genoese merchants left Caffa, but rats carrying fleas with bubonic plague were also on the ship, and the plague spread to Genoa. From there, it spread throughout Europe on trade routes. It was also spread in France and England because of the Hundred Years’ War. England invaded France, and the plague had reached France. The Pope at Avignon had tried to dispose of the dead bodies from the plague by throwing them into the rivers, but it only spread the plague further. The French and English both equally suffered from the plague, and the English soldiers brought it back to the mainland when they returned home.

HGL

You are talking mostly about only two wars, the one which launched and the one which further spread the Black Death.

Note that most Medieval wars were not those two and that Middle Ages had more years than 1347 with the siege of Caffa and 1348 / 1349 with Hundred Years’ War.

Q

The Catholic Church owned an enormous amount of land in Denmark prior to the Reformation. Was it also the case in Sweden?

A

I don’t know what you mean by “enormous”, but I know the bishops, the Church, the monasteries had received lots of donations.

This meant that a Church carreer was a viable option not necessarily tied to very great piety.

But calling the amount “enormous” sounds as if there was sth wrong with this.

Stefan Hill

Yes

The church owned a lot of land. The reformation ment that the king, Gustav Vasa, took all church land and made it state property. The confiscation was brutal and devestating.

HGL

Actually, no, Gustav Wasa restored lots of land from Church to the nobility whose ancestors had donated. That is how he got the support of the nobles.

Other things were confiscated, like Churches. This means the State could tax Church bells (which triggered one “rebellion” against the “king” Gustav Wasa), tear down Churches, decide who (namely new Protestant clergy) could reside in a Church previously Catholic, protect Protestant clergy when they committed sacrilege after sacrilege and so on.

Also, the taxes to the Church were mostly confiscated to the Crown. Of the “tithe”, namely 10% of harvest and of a few other things, only part had gone to the parish priest previous to Reformation. That was still “the priest’s tithe” (1/3 of 10% most dioceses). However, the other parts, “bishop’s tithe”, “Church tithe” and “poor men’s tithe” (each 2/9 of 10%) were confiscated into state administration and renamed “Crown tithe”.

Q

Why, after Luther translated the bible to German, did the Catholic still listen to the pope? Wouldn't it make more sense to go off the Bible instead?

A

The questioner presumes that the Popes either didn’t know the Bible, despite knowing Latin, and despite knowing the Bible being a requirement for Catholic clergy, OR that Popes, despite knowing the Bible, didn’t care about it.

The questioner at least seems to presume that Protestants go directly by the Bible rather than listening to their clergy.

That is not quite the case.

Also, the questioner seems to presume Luther’s translation into German was the first one. Before his, there were 14 Catholic versions in High German and 4 in Low German (that is the dialects ranging from Dutch in the West to Berliner Platt in the East). They were all approved by the Church and read by Catholics also other than clergy, most of whom saw no reason to become Lutherans due to reading the Bible. And I mean printed versions, since we are talking versions from Gutenberg to Luther.

Daniel Douglas
Catholic and former Evangelical

Catholics believe that Christians should learn both the Bible and the traditions of the church. See 2 Thessalonians 2:15: "So then, brothers and sisters, stand firm and hold fast to the teachings (or "traditions") we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter." Catholics furthermore do not believe that the Bible is inerrant or that it is entirely intelligible for interpretation by a single person. Thus, trusting in one's own understanding of scripture, especially if that is contrary to the traditions of the church, simply doesn't make sense to a Catholic. The Bible is part of the puzzle, but the centuries of teachings of church leaders and theologians since the Apostles are also valuable.

HGL

“Catholics furthermore do not believe that the Bible is inerrant”

Oh yes, we do.

“or that it is entirely intelligible for interpretation by a single person.”

By a private interpretation.

How many is less important than whether interpretation contradicts the consensus of the Fathers or doesn’t.

As to Biblical history, that was not the issue, Luther and Catholics agreed basically on the timeline, the issues were trickier parts like exact conditions for the sacraments or for salvation.

Daniel Douglas

Do you know what the difference is between inerrancy and infallibility? The Catholic position is infallibility, but not inerrancy. The Church holds that the Bible teaches “solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation.” It does not hold that every statement of the Bible unrelated to salvation is true, such as the scribal errors regarding who really killed Goliath or how many times a patriarch lied to foreigners about his wife being his sister.

HGL

Analyse the quote you just gave:

“and without error”

That means inerrancy.

Infallibility is for the Magisterium, but Bible itself is inerrant. And that is the position of the infallible magisterium.

“It does not hold that every statement of the Bible unrelated to salvation is true,”

You cannot presume any part of the Bible is STRICTLY unrelated to the salvation of each and every man, even if not talking about common conditions or causes of salvation.

“such as the scribal errors regarding who really killed Goliath”

Why not scribal errors on whether Judas was a traitor or wrote an NT Epistle, while we are at it? There were two Judas, Ischariot and St Jude, among the Twelve. There was also more than one Goliath among the Philistines.

“or how many times a patriarch lied to foreigners about his wife being his sister.”

Technically Abraham didn’t lie. Sarah was in a way his sister. I think half sister.

ANY statement of the Bible will, if analysed, give grounds for considering it true or at least no grounds for considering it false.

Scribal error is ONLY for cases in which another reading exists.

Luke could theoretically have a scribal error on stades between Jerusalem and Emmaus, since one text has 160 stades rather than 60 stades. However, that is a Syriac text.

Seth being born when Adam was 130 could very well be a scribal mistake for his being born when Adam was 230, since the LXX has it so. And traditional Christmas chronology has its basis in LXX.

You may have thought of VULGATE being infallible, but not inerrant. But that is only one of the versions, even if the most promoted one and specifically defended as infallible. BIBLE - each book in autograph and at least one extant version - is inerrant.

Justin Eiler, Former Christian, former seminary student

A lot of them didn't listen to the Pope any more. Problem is, there's a lot in the Bible that isn't very clear, and a lot that isn't very nice. When Germans stopped listening to the pope, they got into arguments about who was right, and who was wrong—and those arguments led to the European wars of religion.

It was not precisely a pleasant time to live in Europe.

HGL

I agree that Reformation led to a century of War. Which led to societies trying to prevent further wars by removing the religion, by doubting the Bible. We have just had a century or two or more caused by those societies conflicting with the Christians, mostly Catholics or Orthodox.

Sean Patrick Maiorca,
I an an Orthodox Christian

The Catholic Church claims they put the Bible together which the Orthodox does as well- due to the fact the cannon of the NT which everyone uses was put together in a council before the schism. As a result in both of our view to properly understand the Bible one has to read it in the light of Holy Tradition and that to read the Bible with out this understanding is to just sit down and make up the meaning as we go along.

[Again an answer which was great but which some quorans got marked as needing improvement and collapsing.]

Amy Dawson

This is a history question rather than a Bible question, however in my opinion it would be for these reasons:

• 1) Power. People within the Catholic church in high positions didn't want their land and their influence and lifestyle to be taken away from them.
• 2) Tradition. People had done things a certain way, the same way their parents have done it, the same way the ruts have run for all the history they had known. It's similar to why people seem so racist these days. They don't really have anything against a sexy tan, they are just comfortable with the way things are and don't want to discomfort themselves.
• 3) Illiteracy. Not many people read the Bible. Whether it be lack of education, not being able to find the time, being confused about the context, they didn't really have a chance to understand what it really meant. These days, like my blue-font Bible, there's a little introduction of when each section was written, who wrote it, why it was written. They didn't have that. I could imagine it being really hard to work out on your own. The Pope seemed smart and get things. May as well listen to someone who sounds like they know what they're talking about than read a book you don't quite understand.

HGL

Let’s take it one by one.

• 1) “People within the Catholic church in high positions didn't want their land and their influence and lifestyle to be taken away from them.”
  
  It couldn’t be they actually believed Catholicism to be correct Bible interpretation too?
  
  
• 2a) “People had done things a certain way, the same way their parents have done it, the same way the ruts have run for all the history they had known.”
  
  It couldn’t be that they were doing things like Christians had done since Jesus and Apostles or so?
  
  
• 2b) “It's similar to why people seem so racist these days. They don't really have anything against a sexy tan, they are just comfortable with the way things are and don't want to discomfort themselves.”
  
  Actually, Protestants being more secularised were also more prone to Racism.
  
  
• 3a) “Illiteracy. Not many people read the Bible. Whether it be lack of education, not being able to find the time, being confused about the context, they didn't really have a chance to understand what it really meant.”
  
  How many have that on their own even now?
  
  
• 3b) “These days, like my blue-font Bible, there's a little introduction of when each section was written, who wrote it, why it was written. They didn't have that.”
  
  Catholic Bibles provided that, though not exactly of same “modern scholarship” type. And both Catholics and Reformers provided those.
  
  
• 3c) “I could imagine it being really hard to work out on your own.”
  
  But working it out on ones own was precisely what the Reformers said each Christian could do!
  
  
• 3d) “The Pope seemed smart and get things. May as well listen to someone who sounds like they know what they're talking about than read a book you don't quite understand.”
  
  Seems to be a very universal sentiment, including among today’s Protestants. Though these will not always admit it.

Paul Koreen

Translating from Latin and Greek to German doesn’t change the content already taught in the Church. Just because I can read a medical book doesn’t mean I should be performing my own surgery.

The challenge the printing press created (and it is not a bad thing necessarily) is that people lack the context for what they are reading and pull themselves off course. Martin Luther never anticipated this - while he was eager to get scripture in the hands of the layman, he expected people to still accept Catholic interpretation on most things and his where he differed. Keep in mind he was hoping to remove a number of books but failed, so it is still the books deemed by the Catholic Church in your new Testament. Unfortunately, you are missing Old Testament books :( Therefore there is nothing the Pope himself isn’t following as well.

Also consider that anyone introducing new theology is ignoring Scripture of their choosing, for example Martin Luther not heeding Jesus's warning about a divided house has resulted in tens of thousands of denominations and mini sects.

Q

What are some of the things the government asked from the populace during the Middle Ages?

A

• Obedience.
• Keeping peace.
• Being honest in business.
• Taxes.

Q

What were the eating habits of the Middle Ages?

Description

Esp. breakfast, lunch and dinner foods, frequency of meals, size of meals, types of food

A

• 1) Breakfast was either non-extant or water or beer.
• 2) Forks were not used before the very end. In polite society, you held knife in right hand and cut off meat around the part you pinched in left hand, which was then dipped in sauces and put to mouth.
• 3) Sauces were more likely to be vegetable broths of a certain thickness, basically stews, and less likely to be béchamel if that even existed.
• 4) Potatoes and tomatoes didn’t exist, carrots, beetroots, fruit did.
• 5) Food was more likely to be sugared in some way, for instance by adding honey or raisins, even in main dish totally apart from question of dessert.

These are the main differences I come to think of.

Q

Did the Medieval Europeans use the scientific method?

A

They certainly used A scientific method, but whether they used THE scientific method, that depends on how you define it.

If one rule is “saying goddidit explains nothing” that is a rule in another scientific method than the one used by Medieval Europeans.

Robert Harvey

Absolutely.

Read about Roger Bacon, Galilleo, etc.

Even the alchemists formed theories and tested them in experiments.

HGL

Galileo was technically after the Middle Ages, as usually delimited.