Chaucer’s Relativity and Pluralism in His Religious Narratives

Abstract

Chaucer’s encouraging of a reader’s cooperation in filling in the narrative halfway narrated or in making a judgment in the unsettling moments are frequently observed even in the religious tales such as the Pardoner’s Tale and the Man of Law’s Tale. Chaucer avoids an absolute and unilateral stance in carrying a religious message or a moral truth. Hiding his true opinion through the orchestration of multiple voices on a religious message, he usually assumes the stance of relativity and pluralism. For Chaucer, the religious tales like other tales in the Canterbury Tales suggest that a tale is fiction and that a teller is a fiction-maker, not an exegetical writer who indoctrinates his reader in the absolute truth and belief. Chaucer’s attitude of relativity and pluralism derives from his own intellectual interests and the social and political milieu where he lived.