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Considerations of sin affected all aspects of the deeply religious medieval world-view – yet it would be a mistake to think that this made life simple. As the medieval church increased its efforts to prevent sin, more questions and unforeseen complications arose. We might take as an example the idea of purgatory – the ‘medium’ place between heaven and hell, where moderate sinners were required to suffer in atonement for their sins. The idea only became part of church doctrine during the thirteenth century. Once established, the idea of purgatory created many further questions: can a person do good things to reduce their time in purgatory? Can we know for sure whether our actions will have an effect after death? Is it possible to help the souls of other people through prayer? The medieval church – including as it did great scholars, popes and bishops, but also lay people and enthusiastic converts – had to grapple with other problems in connection with sin: what was the nature of original sin and free will – did people have a choice to act well or badly? There were inherent difficulties in pursuing a normal life and staying free from sin, as traditionally conceived – the church’s rules on commercial transactions were strict but did not always reflect the realities of the market.

Important changes in the conception of sin took place over the course of the Middle Ages. This course starts with Augustine’s insightful description of how he fell into sin in his early life, before looking at the ways in which penitence and absolution became an institution in the Early Church. Traditionally scholars have argued that sin was thought about in a legalistic and mechanical way in the Earlier Middle Ages, but that a more interiorised and subjective understanding of evil arose from the twelfth century on – but this argument has come under increasing attack. One view of medieval Christianity says that there were inherent tensions in the Church’s doctrines which were addressed with varying success with different solutions and reforms: we will use comparisons between different periods and between different parts of Christendom in order to evaluate this view. We will further compare a variety of concepts of sin - including those embraced by medieval heresy – in order to shed light on the range of beliefs available in the Middle Ages. Students will be offered the opportunity to home in on a specialised topic in their essay but will be asked to consider longue-durée questions in the exam. This course will therefore allow students to gain an overview of religious culture over the course of the long Middle Ages. No prior knowledge about religion or Christianity is needed for this course: we will study it as a sociological phenomenon, and full explanations of technical terms will be provided.