The condemnation of usury in the Middle Ages seems more based every day.
They believed that money shouldn't make money. In the words of Aquinas, usury is unjust because we ought not sell "what does not exist.” He meant that money is a unit of exchange, not a productive asset.
To encourage money to be sold like anything else is to set in motion the financialization of everything and give a society over to insufferable nerds and their acquisitiveness.
Goodbye knights and aristocrats--step aside to make room for guys like this 👇.
The medievals understood that money is a jealous god which eventually strangles its rivals: beauty, honor, valor, country, family, greatness, nobility, etc.
Discouraging usury was a safeguard against the rule of the bugman!
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Joshua 1:9
Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.
2 Timothy 1:7
For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.
Deuteronomy 31:6
Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.
Proverbs 28:1
The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion.
Researchers have assured us for decades that vegetarians are hEaLtHiEr than carnivores...
But in 1926, the British government investigated the differences between the Masai tribe of Kenya and the nearby Akikuyu.
The key variable was dietary.
The carnivorous Masai consumed mostly milk, meat, and blood. Their men were 5 inches taller and 23 pounds heavier than their neighbors, with narrower waists and broader shoulders. Dynamometer tests showed them to be 50% physically stronger.
Meanwhile, Akikuyu men ate a mostly vegetarian diet and were more likely to suffer from bone deformities, dental cavities, anemia, lung disease, ulcers, and blood disorders. They were rejected on medical grounds from service in the British army reserve at rates of 65%.
In the early 13th century, the Italian town of Gubbio was terrorized by a wolf. Not only had it killed livestock, but it started devouring humans as well! Anybody who went out beyond the city walls alone was not likely to make it back alive.
St. Francis felt much pity for the townspeople, and he was known to have a special connection to animals, so he decided to go find the wolf. Against the advice of nearly everyone, Francis made the sign of the cross and went forth from the city.
After the Crusaders conquered Jaffa, Saladin retreated to Jerusalem and contented himself with harassing Richard’s foraging parties.
In one case, a foraging party found itself outnumbered and Richard rode out with a party to aid them.
As they came upon the apparently hopeless scene, Richard’s men urged him not to join the fighting.
They said, “You will not succeed in rescuing them. It is better that they die alone than that you risk death in this attack, and so endanger the whole crusade.”
Richard could appreciate the argument, but he wasn’t made to sit on the sidelines while his men fought and died.
“I sent those men there,” he said. "If they die without me, may I never again be called a king.”
So he charged--and he and some of his men lived to tell about it.
I’d rather not even acknowledge this rumor, but the prevalence of it, even among based people, requires a response.
It has to do with Richard The Lionheart’s supposed orientation.
Thread--
There are a few reasons why this accusation has gained acceptance, and all of them are pretty easily answered.
1) Richard did not have an heir.
His marriage to Berengaria of Navarre appears to have been strained. Some suggest that Berengaria was barren, especially since Richard did acknowledge at least one illegitimate son.
I’ve been thinking about one of Faramir’s lines from The Two Towers.
He tells Frodo, “I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.”
There’s a lot to unpack here. At first blush, this sentiment seems beautiful and utterly reasonable. A real warrior doesn’t love fighting more than he loves what he fights for. It also makes perfect sense coming from Faramir, whose brother loved glory a bit too much.
Something about it, however, doesn’t sit right.
A man must first love the things that he fights for. But Faramir says that he only loves those things.
To deny that there’s something beautiful in the glory of the warrior about whom they tell stories is strangely clinical.