When Remuneration's Lost Its Fun Your F###ing Lazy

The first two days of my internship where taken up by opening mail, sorting mail, copying pamphlets, and making coffee. You know, intern stuff. It wasn't until the third day that I got a real job. So far my job has been, and I think will continue to be, reading. The guy I work for is writting a book, and my job is to read all the books about the subject of his book that he either has not read or dosn't want to read. If only I was being payed this would be the best job ever. Any way he also told me to write reviews of all the book, to be posted on Amazon.com (I know that sounds silly, but he said said it was the best way of getting practice). So here is first review,

Medieval Handbooks of Penance:
By John T. McNeill & Helena M. Gamer

The Penitential is a strange form of literature. Never intended for general readership they where instead given to clerics in order to help them give appropriate penances for all varieties of sin. They sprang up, without any historical precedent, in Ireland only a generation or two after St. Patrick and from there spread to England and the continent, and even reaching Rome by the ninth century.
Although you can read these penitentials as quant and funny reminders of the backwardness of the early middle ages, that is really to miss the point, and see the depth of understanding of the human psyche the authors of the penitentials had. What is amazing about these is they leave no type of sin out, the authors where no prudes and they knew human nature was such that it could reach any depth of perversity. Yet they also believed in the truth of their work, i.e. saving souls. Thus the worst things imaginable are still forgiven. There are constant reminders in the text telling the clerics, who are giving the penances, to be gentle with the penitent person and always remind him/her that the cleric himself is only human and thus also commits sins.
This book is also important as a reference about life and society in the early middle ages. We see that even though superstition was still common (although references start to thin out and disappear around the eight and ninth centuries) the church still commanded considerable power over the faithful. The clerics could never have expected any of these penances to be carried out if the conversions of the people was less then sincere, and since the penitentials where copied again and again they must have been working. Also interesting is the considerable learning that the authors will display. In several individual penitentials the author will define how the Greek Church and the Roman Church will differ in viewing a sin and giving penance. Considering that the author was often thousands of miles away, and that most of these where written three hundred years between any break between these churches it shows amazing insight and learning on the side of the author.
The edition itself is wonderful. The introduction is an easy to read but scholarly explanation about the development of the sacrament of penance in the church. It goes into depth about the controversy theses penitential caused in the greater church. The foot-notes are also helpful if you have any familiarity with Latin. It was originally published in 1938 so I highly doubt the scholarship is still cutting edge, but it is easy to read and helpful for a better understanding of the time and place these little penitentials where written.