Pardoner's Hypocrisy Research Paper

Pardon His Hypocrisy: The Pardoner and the Nature of Evil The Pardoner is certainly a character who requires extensive interpretation in order to understand his actions and justify his tale. He serves as a complete antithesis to what the holy road of the pilgrimage symbolizes, selling fake religious relics for personal profit while still preaching “Radix malorum est Cupiditas” (Pardoner’s Prologue 334). Blatant hypocrisy combined with despicable character makes the Pardoner seem like the lowest of the low when compared to the circle of Dante’s Inferno in which the ninth circle is reserved for people like the Pardoner. By practicing what he preaches against as a holy figure, the Pardoner establishes himself as an evil character. However, his evil character is challenged by his upfront honesty and the idea of the Pardoner as a tester of faith. By inviting the pilgrims to kiss his relics even after they know the truth about the falsified nature of them, the Pardoner is performing both an evil and holy task, challenging the notion of him being ultimately evil. In terms of how the Pardoner defines evil, he states that “[his] theme is alwey oon, and evere was—/Radix malorum est Cupiditas,” affirming that greed is …show more content…
It seems that without our understanding of the Pardoner as a person, this tale could have been one of the most moral told so far, having an absolute moral following it as well as containing pathetic characters (the old man) and the numerous references to religious characters. By contrasting the Pardoner as a pilgrim and the Pardoner as a storyteller Chaucer seems to be making the point that he is much more complicated than the way he portrays himself in the prologue. His brutal honesty coupled with his ability to do well in his profession (although through underhanded tactics challenge our perception of him, even when he is so unabashedly