Who is Piers Plowman?
In passus six, we are finally introduced to the character Piers Plowman, after whom the book is named. I find this very interesting as usually a book would only be named after its most important character, but from Piers’ introduction in passus six, he is simply a poor plowman who used to work for Truth. However, I’m sure that this has some deeper significance since he seems to be the only character who knows where Truth lives. Even when the crowd asked a well-travelled pilgrim if he knew about Truth, the pilgrim claimed that he has never heard about him. Therefore if we take Truth to represent the truth of Christianity, this seems to imply that Piers is the only person who truly understands and knows the gospel, which makes him the most devoted and faithful follower of God.
However, Piers’ behavior in passuses seven and eight don’t really support this conclusion. In passus seven, when the idlers and wasters rebel against Pier’s instructions to help him with plowing, Piers responds to this and “hopyd after Hounger, that herde hym at the fyrste”(line 157, pg 97) (He calls hunger, who answers him right away). If Piers truly is God’s most faithful follower, why would he be able to Hunger, which is inherently evil? Also, in Passus eight, after the priest sees Truth’s pardon for Piers and says that it isn’t a pardon, why does Piers “for tene, pulled hit asunder” (tore the pardon to pieces out of anger)? If he really knows Truth, shouldn’t he believe his words and understand the real meaning to them, instead of abandoning his plowing. My understanding of this is that after hearing the priest’s interpretation of Truth’s pardon, he doesn’t believe that working for Truth (ie. Plowing and giving to those in need) could lead him to a spiritually fulfilled life anymore and instead chooses to pray to bring him closer to God.
Therefore my question is, who exactly is Piers Plowman. If the other characters, such as Mede, Conscience, Glotoun, Peronel etc are allegorical characters that represent the characteristics of the church and of good and evil, what does Piers represent? What makes him so special that the book, which is about discovering the true Christian life, is named after him?
I think that Piers Plowman becomes disillusioned with the church in a similar way to the narrator in the prologue. Piers essentially offers to sell his knowledge of Truthe in exchange for labor from the crowd of people. He uses Truthe as a justification to serve himself. However, when he discovers that his pardon from Truthe is invalid, he learns that his devotion to Truthe was misplaced and he should instead focus on bettering himself. I thought this was similar to the narrator realizing that the church exploits people for profit and uses religion as an excuse to do so. That would be a pretty important development in true Christian life.
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