Rethinking the Beatitudes in Late Medieval Literature: A Study of the Gawain-Poet’s Middle English Texts

Recognised as the author of the Middle English poems Patience, Cleanness, Pearl, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and as some scholars argue- St Erkenwald, the Gawain-poet is one of late medieval Englands most significant vernacular authors. Although modern criticism has paid some attention to the theological precepts embedded within the Gawain-poet’s oeuvre, previous studies have been largely inadequate and frequently misdirected. This book reassesses the poets works through an exploration of the exegetical meaning and context of his five attributed texts in relation to their shared thematic and narrative interests in the Beatitudes, a morally perfecting set of blessings found in Matthew 5:2-10. Jones re-evaluates the moral underpinning of the poems by situating them within a wider context of patristic and medieval commentary on the Beatitudes and shows how these exegetical traditions informed and shaped the poet’s works. Her analysis reveals the Gawain-poet’s fascination with the subtleties, temporal benefits, and spiritual bliss promised by adherence to the Beatitudes. Such was this fascination that their essence can be seen to influence each work and imbues the texts with homiletic purpose. This study underlines the importance of patristic theology to our reading of the Gawain-poets extant corpus, as well as to our understanding of the poet himself.