“For the name of Jesus and the protection of the church, I am ready to embrace death.”
“But the third knight inflicted a grave wound on the fallen one. With this blow, he shattered the sword on the stone and his crown, which was large, separated from his head, so that the blood turned white from the brain.”
“Yet no less did the brain turn red from the blood. Then another knight placed his foot on the neck of the holy priest and precious martyr and it is horrible to say scattered the brains with the blood across the floor.”
“So Christian, those are the words of Edward Grim who was the witness of perhaps one of the most certainly one of the most scandalous perhaps one of the most brutal murders of medieval Europe.”
“And the victim of that murder was none other than the holiest man in the land, Archbishop Thomas Beckett, who was slain on December 29th, 1170.”
“Very shocking.”
“Bloody hell, man. That’s that’s that’s some modern slasher flick stuff.”
“Yeah, that’s some that’s the most visceral description I’ve heard in a while. And I I’ I’ve worked on your darker channel.”
“Yeah, it’s ext it’s an extremely brutal murder. Um it’s almost comically brutal as well because um obviously the victim is an archbishop. He’s not he’s not a fighting man. And um well, we’ll get on to the murder in in a minute, but basically the people who were sent to do him in should have should have got it done very easily and instead it just turns into this complete bloodbath. I mean, it really is uh yeah, it’s pretty it’s pretty grim.”
“Well, well, it says here there’s there’s what, at least three knights, it says here or four knights.”
“Yeah, surely between the four of them, they could have made a pretty clean kill.”
“Yeah, it should have been very easy peasy. Um, but before we get on to the murder itself, I think we need to clear our throats a bit about why this is so important. So, uh, for those who don’t know, uh, you can’t kill priests basically, uh, especially not in medieval Europe. And you definitely,”
“Well, well, you can, but you shouldn’t.”
“Well, yeah, as you’ve seen. Yeah, you can. Um, but you definitely shouldn’t. Um, and so this uh murder is clearly I think it’s the it’s the highest profile sort of case. It’s like crime of the century. This is this is like the worst scandal in living memory at the time that this archbishop has basically been hacked to pieces inside of his own church. And also that church is the is Canterbury Cathedral which is the holiest site in England as well. So not only is the holiest person died uh he’s also sort of been gutted uh and and pulled apart on the holiest place in England. So absolutely scandalous, complete sacrilege and obviously it’s seen as an attack on the church itself. And the real sort of uh the caper is that none other than King Henry II authorized maybe this murder. So it’s very very scandalous.”
“So, this is essentially like saying that a member of the of the was it the Scots Guard or the Swiss Guard came in and murdered the Pope in the Vatican.”
“Or in St. Paul’s Cathedral.”
“Yeah. It’s the English equivalent basically. Yeah. Four of these guards come in and do the Pope in in full gear in the middle of mass basically.”
“That’s insane. And it was uh ordained by the by the king evidently potentially. So we’ll get on to this later. It’s a bit of a question mark. I do have my own opinion, but historians are forever disagreeing about whether or not the king ordered this or whether it was a kind of miscommunication.”
“Historians are disagreeing with each other. That’s shocking.”
“I know. Would you believe it? I know. It’s incredible. Um but yeah, either way this event uh it kind of it it temporarily and sort of in a sense from then on uh leads to the kind of uh disintegration of the relationship between the wonderful English isles and the satanic popery. It’s the beginning of the end really of Catholicism in Britain.”
“So essentially this is the dude who kind of started the feud between the English monarchy and the Roman church then because because I mean I always when I think about the the the crown versus the church I always think of Henry VII.”
“Yeah. Yeah. So he Henry VII is is a fair while down the line yet. So this happened in 1170. Um it definitely is not the same sort of um schism and and political change that happens under Henry VII who literally is almost almost more or less declaring war on Catholicism in the UK. Um this is a lot more by accident um or or or maybe uh if not by accident than then the the the beef with the church is this kind of collateral but it sets up the precedent and when Henry VII actually comes to wage war on the Catholic Church um he will start dealing with this question of Henry II and Thomas Beckett as well. It will keep coming up throughout the ages.”
“So this is really like the starting point of the tensions then.”
“Yeah. This is where it all begins. Yeah. If if um if the Roman Catholic Church and the the English monarchy had a relationship counselor, uh they would they would point to this as like year zero. This is where the troubles began.”
“All right. Well, tell us about the murder then.”
“So, the murder itself, right, so as we said, it’s extremely brutal. Uh and it takes place in Canterbury Cathedral on the 29th of December, 1170, just after Christmas. Now, Thomas Beckett, the Archbishop, he’s in his early 50s. Um, which is actually incredibly young for an archbishop, and we’ll see how he got there a bit later on. Um, uh, but, you know, he to by our standards, he’s a relatively middle-aged man. He’s standing in Canterbury Cathedral, and he’s holding vespers, which is a kind of evening prayer. And he actually start the starter of this prayer is quite appropriate. He says deos in atorium may inendi which basically means oh lord come to my assistance. Um which is great because he’s going to need it. He’s going to need it. Um while he’s holding these vespers, four armed knights basically turn up and start banging on the door and they’re saying, “Where’s Thomas Beckett? He’s a traitor to the king and the kingdom. Where is he?” And at this point, all the monks in the church basically start hanging around Becket and going, “Look, mate, you better you either need to lock the door up or you need to leave because they’re going to do you.” And Becket refuses. He’s not up for it. So, he refuses to leave and he refuses to barricade the church. And he says to one of the monks, “This church shall not be made a fortress.” Um, which although, you know, it’s incredibly willful and badass, it’s not particularly wise. Um there’s nothing to stop the four knights getting in and get in they do. Now it’s not terribly important but these these four knights they’re called William D Tracy Reginald Fitz Richard Lab Breton and Hugh Demorville and they storm into this church and they basically they they bang in through the doors and everyone just stops and looks at each other. No one knows what’s happening and they’re like where’s Becket? and none of the monks want to um you know reveal who he is. So they’re all just stunn literally says here I am no traitor but a priest of God. So clearly identifies himself says here I am come and get me and they do they do so um because of the sensibilities of the time they shouldn’t really kill him in the church. So they they grab hold of him and they basically start trying to pull this middle-aged man out from the church. But he knows as well, you’ve probably figured this out, he knows if he ends up outside the church ground, he’s done for.”
“So So they’re specifically trying to pull him out of the church because to kill him in the church would be sacriiggious.”
“Yeah. It would be an action or a sin just making a sin even worse. Yeah. Well, it would just be sloppy as well, wouldn’t it? Um, so yeah, they they try and drag him out and on the on the way out, he gets hold of uh one of the pillars in the church and these four guys like they can’t get him off. So they’re they’re trying endlessly u I I can’t imagine what it must have looked like with these four knights armed to the teeth unable to get this guy off of the column. And eventually uh they’ve had enough of this and they just decide they’re going to do the job in the church. It would better if they could do it outside, but since they can’t, they decide they’re just going to do it there and then. Now, we don’t really know why. It could be that they didn’t want it to go on too long in case someone intervened. Um they might not have even thought about how sort of catastrophic it was going to be politically and were just impatient, just wanted to get to him, hated him. Anyway, uh one of the knights swings first and uh he misses more or less. Um he doesn’t land a killing blow on uh Becket, but he does just about skim the top of his scalp and knocks off his miter, which is this sort of religious hat. Um so Becket’s not looking too pleased at this point. Obviously, he’s alive, survivable, but he is missing a little bit of the top of his head. Um, now Edward Grim, the one that we heard from in the beginning who described the brains and blood and so forth, Edward Grim at this point decides to intervene, but there’s so much sort of steel uh and hands being thrown around around that um he accidentally catches one of the blades in his wrist and Neil loses his hand. Again, we’re not sure if um one of the knights purposefully struck him or if it was just such a sort of cluster that no one knew what was happening.”
“Yeah. So, it’s it’s comical.”
“He has he has a very comically fitting name. That’s the worst part.”
“Yeah. It’s proper nominative nom nominative determinis, isn’t it?”
“Exactly. Exactly.”
“Like Edward Grim. Yeah. I mean, to be fair to Edward though, uh you know, he clearly writes quite well. Um, and he obviously has a certain amount of courage because I think if I was there, I I would just be leaving. I wouldn’t be thinking about getting in between the swords and the the old archbishop.”
“He might have written quite well, but I would be quite worried about his handwriting after this event.”
“Yeah, he must hope it was his left hand. Anyway, um, so I mean it’s com it’s comical. You’ve got these four trained soldiers. They’re knights, right? So sort of aristocrats, but they are trained in the soldierly ways. and they just can’t seem to get on with it. So much so that they’re they’re sort of indiscriminately whacking people’s limbs about taking tops of scalps off and they still haven’t dealt with Thomas Beckett. And eventually though, they managed to sort of wrestle him off of the um column and they get one last good swing in and this one uh more or less opens Beckett’s skull and kills him. And this is where we get the quote of blood mixing with the brains as he falls down. Part or all of his sort of uh gray matter ends up on the floor. Uh at this point, one of the other knights, it might be an attendant, it’s it’s debated, um then basically walks up to the dead uh archbishop with his brain sort of pooling outside of his head, and dips his uh sword in the uh brain and sort of scatters it around ceremonially to sort of show that he’s taken part even if he didn’t land a blow on the living archbishop.”
“That is so extra.”
“Yeah. I mean, you saw a lot of this as well. There was a lot of talk that after the assassination of Julius Caesar, people were sort of dipping their knives and hands in his blood just to sort of show the participation even if they didn’t actually do the act themselves cuz a lot of people obviously freeze in that moment as well. So afterwards you kind of want to show that you did mean to do it even if you sort of froze up in the moment.”
“So it’s it’s it’s a solidarity with the other murderers to say that I’m I’m just as much part of this as them.”
“Yeah, basically. or maybe even a little bit of um as we’ll come to see there are conflicting motivations amongst these uh these would be assassins. Well, I guess they were successful assassins but um maybe they’re thinking that they might get some kind of reward or there might be some sort of glory involved in so they want to have proof by having by having the blood on their blade possibly. Well, not necessarily proof um but but certainly you know some of the honors they want to earn their stripes basically.”
“All right. All right. So anyway, that’s Arch that’s Archbishop Thomas Becker. He’s done.”
“she’s very bad. But the fallout, the fallout from this murder is enormous. And later in the episode, we will come on to that. Um but a lot of the reason for the fallout is that the the orchestrator supposedly potentially of this brutal murder murder is uh King Henry II who is on the throne when he supposedly potentially issues this order and that’s really what seals the deal and for Henry it’s a complete catastrophe and it’s made even more shocking by the fact that for most of their lives, especially in as children, young Henry and Thomas Beckett were the best of friends. So, what happened?”
“Wait, so any guesses?”
“I’m just trying to wrap my head around this. So, this dude calls for the the execution of his best friend and and he’s the king.”
“Maybe maybe calls for maybe. Maybe. Okay. Okay. So, so so he maybe calls for the execution of his best friend. his best friend being the Archbishop of Canterbury and him being the current king of England.”
“Yes, that’s so he’s not insane. He’s not just assassinated his sort of political rival in in the shape of an archbishop and thus declared war intentionally not on the church. He’s also done his best mate in so it’s extremely personal and extremely political. So Henry II, as I said earlier, I know more about Henry VII, um, and Henry V. Uh, but Henry that he was the he was the guy like to eat straw, right?”
“Yes. Yes. Henry Henry II likes to eat straw. Um, so we’ve got a we’ve got a letter written by uh John of Salsbury who is talking about the king’s temper and says um, “And the king flying into his usual temper, flung his cap from his head, pulled off his belt, threw off his cloak and clothes, grabbed the silken coverlet off the couch, and sitting as he might be on a dung heap, started chewing pieces of straw.” So this is one of Henry’s um, Henry II’s. He’s famously got this plantaginate anger and this is one of his ways of uh dealing with his uh with his anger issues.”
“I heard about him eating I heard about him eating straw. But this whole quote is is is like absurd. It sounds like something out of a Monty Python skit. He’s sitting on a dung heap gnawing on some straw after going off the rails.”
“Well, he’s he’s sitting on the couch like he would on a dung heap. I’m not exactly sure what that means. like he was on a dung heap.”
“Oh, I thought he was I thought he actually like was so fed up he just found the closest horizontal surface he could.”
“Ah yeah. Well, I mean maybe that’s maybe that is what Richard John Salsbury meant. I’m not sure. But anyway, um Henry I he has a terrible temper which sometimes leads to straw eating. And uh yeah, this temper is going to get him in some trouble later in the story. Um but he’s lucky because even though as a child he always was extremely hot-tempered um he was uh in some senses sort of mellowed by his good pal and childhood friend Thomas Beckett who was much more sort of um reflective, much more gentle, much more uh tranquil. I think there are deep storms inside Henry whereas uh Thomas is is pretty chill. Um now both of them even as children are are very intelligent. Um they’re clearly made of good stuff and they’ve got um some pretty uh bright futures ahead of them. And in fact when they’re children um they’re quite happy to indulge in the sort of pleasures of of royal and noble life. So obviously Henry II’s going to be king as a child. Thomas Becker has got to find his own way and he’s a he he will find it eventually. Um but while they’re sort of in the in the throws of youth um they just basically spend their time messing about and having a good time. So at one point this is Beckett alone not even his uh his friend and future king Henry just just Becket he rec he apparently had uh maintained 700 knights a series of falconers some hunting dogs and endless and endless lavish banquetss. Um, now that’s that’s not necessarily out of the usual for a noble. Um, but it’s really interesting because later in life once he gets involved in the church completely changed. I mean he he basically forsakes all or most of these kind of material lavish outgoings and in fact starts to uh wander around in a rough hair shirt which is really uncomfortable. So he’s gone from complete luxury to complete discipline. It’s quite an interesting change.”
“I I I I was really confused by this description of of the way he kind of lived his life in his younger ages because you’re talking about him being this like well a monk, you know, kind of like uh humble and like kind of down to earth as you say with a rough hair shirt, but the person you’re describing is like like my mate from AA now he’s a now he’s a monk.”
“Yeah, it’s a huge change. Um it’s a huge change, but I think I think it’s genuine. I think Becket actually genuinely does have a change of heart and a change of priorities. And I think most young people are like that, right? I’m not interested now in the things that I was when I was 16 or 18. Um, so anyway, uh, Thomas and uh, Henry, they grow up together. They’re they like to hunt together and play chess, classic nobleman’s activities. And, uh, a deep trust is is forged between the two of them. Henry, in particular, uh, really comes to trust Becket. And um this is a sort of uh almost the trope of of medieval kings really is that they rely so strongly on people that they can trust because there aren’t many people you can trust in a royal court. Um and so that trust is an enormous currency and if he place it in the wrong person, wink wink, foreshadowing, uh you could end up in a pretty uh brutal quagmire. Anyway, so in 1154, Henry actually becomes king of England. Um, and Beckett the year after in 1155 is appointed chancellor. And this is one of the most powerful sort of roles you can have in the land other than king.”
“it’s gone.”
“It’s it’s a good to have friends in high places. I guess it’s great. Yeah. So for Becca, it’s great to have friends in high places, but for Henry, it’s great to have it’s even better to have friends in lower places because you’ve got someone around you that that’s personally loyal to you. They don’t sure if like if you’ve grown up together and and you know everything about each other and you genuinely love each other, then you’re not going to be worried that this guy’s going to try and sideliner you if there’s some political disagreement cuz chances are you’re cut from the same cloth. You’re going to have similar priorities. And this is where Henry gets it wrong because it is leading up to and around this time that Thomas Beckett starts to really involve himself in the church. Now, you you said it’s good to have friends in high places. It certainly is. But let’s not forget that Beckett’s a young man. He’s got to make his name. He’s got to do something. He’s not destined to be king like Henry is. And he sees his future in the church. So whilst Henry is sort of getting ready to be king, uh Thomas is is becoming a really really serious Christian and his other sort of church contemporaries take him really seriously as well. This is a person who’s got some real some real talent for that job and is definitely going places. Um so Henry’s misread it a little bit already. He thinks that this guy is going to be his guy and is going to back him on everything. But Beckett has loyalties elsewhere. He’s not that interested anymore really in just being second fiddle to the crown and doing whatever his best mate tells him to. Becket’s become quite seriously attached to the church and has some opinions of his own and this is going to lead to some real problems later on. Anyway, those first six years um as Becket goes by as chancellor uh are more or less event-free and then in 1161 uh Archbishop Theobald of Bach succumbs after a long bout of illness. And Henry II sees this as a massive opportunity. So the next year in 1162, he promotes Hen he promotes um Thomas Beckett to Archbishop of Canterbury.”
“how’s that even possible? I that seems like a massive like it’s it’s two incredibly powerful positions and it feels like one person can’t possibly hold both of them.”
“No, they can’t. Well, Henry thinks they can. And again, for Henry, it’s all about trust. It’s a bit I think Medieval Kings is almost sort of like the mafia um in that you’re just constantly worrying about who you can trust. That’s what’s the most important thing. who’s loyal, who’s going to stick by you. Um, he thinks Henry, he thinks that Thomas Becket is this guy. So, he gives him two jobs at once. Now, Becket obviously is is thrilled when he gets this archbishop promotion because he loves the church. He’s obsessed with Christianity and theology, and he thinks this is going to be a great thing. So, Becket is like jumping up and down, uh, shaking his hand and going, “Yes, please. I’ll have that job.” Um, and Henry thinks, “Great, I’ve now got um my strongest supporter in the two uh one of the two of the most powerful positions in the land. I’m golden. My reign’s going to be marked by security and ease of governance and all these things.””
“I I cannot see how that would end up end badly, putting one guy in two incredibly powerful positions, one being the church and one being the government. No, I that’s that’s flawless. Truly flawless planning.”
“Yeah. So you you secular thinkers like you and I would already be guessing what’s going to go wrong here. But we’re but you’d be mistaken. Thomas Becket is not that ambitious politically in the sense of wanting to be king or wanting to get anything out of the king. Instead he does the most unexpected thing. Chris, he resigns. He resigns as chancellor and says, “I’ve got to do what I really want.””
“That’s crazy. Like you that’s unheard of in like today’s like world where people cling to power until they’re dead and this is the most powerful position you can get without being born into it.”
“Yeah. Yeah. And and to and to be fair it’s not just our world. I mean, Henry II, um, anyone who’s who’s aware of him will know that this is someone who was desperate to cling to power until he was dead and had to constantly fight his sons over it because they kept basically asking him if he could if they could have their turn on the crown on the throne. Now, he’d made them king and then just refuse to give them any power. So, Hen Henry’s God, this is how Henry sees power. Once you once you get it, you keep it. And so he’s he’s absolutely flabbergasted that Thomas Becket has has basically jumped ship and just decided um to go to the church only. And Thomas Becker has got a fair point. He says he can’t serve the crown and the church equally. So he’s got to do what he will do best and he’s going to go with the church. What Becket doesn’t realize or maybe doesn’t care about is that leaving that chance of the ship uh spot as a sort of vacuum is actually going to massively hurt Henry’s political stance. It’s a massive problem because and I’ll keep saying it over and over again this this episode, trust is everything, especially in an early early medieval court. And whoever comes next may not necessarily be someone Henry can trust. So now he’s got to give someone what are the most important jobs in the land and”
“and they’re not their best friend.”
“Yeah. Who’s he going to give it to? Um so you know Thomas thinks great I’ve got my dream job. See you later. Thanks. Thanks Henry. You know you got me exactly where I wanted to be. It is nice to have friends in high places. And Henry’s sort of thinking well that’s disappointing. You know he’s not furious. I’m sure you know at home he was probably you know a few strong words were used when he was explaining the situation. But he he’s he’s not chastising uh Thomas yet or anything like that. The two the two aren’t angry at each other. It’s just disappointing.”
“But but but I’m sure I’m sure there was a part of Henry that could have seen his perspective of I can’t be holding two perspectives. I can’t be holding two positions. I have to focus on one. And they’re almost contradictory positions at times where the interests of one won’t necessarily serve the interests of the other. So, I can see how he could resign without there actually being a rift between the two of them.”
“So, you’re you’re right that you can’t serve both. And I think Henry probably would have seen that. And and we’re we’re actually just about to see uh those conflicts emerge. Um, but at the same time, I think Henry feels like I’ve given you the best job in the land, and then I’ve given you your favorite job in the land, and instead of sort of sticking them both out as a favor to me, you’ve sort of given me the middle finger and just run off with the church like you always wanted to. Um, I’m just I’m I’m just left out here high and dry trying to figure out who’s going to fill your boots that I can trust in the same way. And also again, uh it’s that violation of trust. It’s that feeling that there’s, you know, the walls are closing in. There’s one less person you can count on. Um I think I think it’s fair to I feel sorry for Henry actually all throughout this episode. I’m quite anti-becket. Uh I think I think although Henry was a terrible person, I do feel for him on the on the Becket question and I think you will too after this uh this next section. So basically”
“all right”
“the the church and the crown come to blows more or less they they have a massive uh falling out and uh this is over the legal system. So basically um at this time in in England and parts of northern France as well because that was Henry’s kingdom too. You had two legal systems, two courts. You had ecclesiastical courts. Now, these were run by the church and um you had royal courts which were run by the king. So, if you were a commoner or a normal person, you did something wrong, chances are you were going to end up in the royal court and you’d be met with a pretty severe punishment, especially considering the standards of the time. If you were a member of the clergy though, then you would go to the ecclesiastical court and there you would receive much more lenient punishments, much more. So uh there was uh in one case there was a priest who was accused of murder and uh we don’t know too much about this case. We don’t even know the priest’s name actually and I think that’s because the church protected his privacy.”
“and this person was accused of murder.”
“Yeah. Yeah. They’ll get you. Um thousand year history of covering scandal. Anyway, um anyway, we’re not flashback politics. So, uh yeah,”
“sorry.”
“Um anyway, uh so this priest is accused of murder. He’s found guilty. And guilty uh being guilty of murder in um in the royal courts would mean you’d probably be executed. Murder is a death penalty offense. Um this priest however, this man of God who should do no evil receives uh the harshest of slap on the rips and uh he gets a sentence of penance which basically means an extended period of praying. Uh so it’s pretty so the church the church are literally letting people get away with murder.”
“Just say sorry.”
“Yeah. Yeah, basically more say sorry to God. You know, spend some time praying, maybe eat some really bland food for a while. Uh you might have to go somewhere unpleasant, do some praying in a sort of boring room, but you know,”
“go think about what you’ve done.”
“Yeah. Basically, um basic because God forgives, right? Um anyway, so to the average person and and especially to those in Henry’s administration, they’re sort of they’re sort of thinking that this isn’t on that it it shows that the justice system isn’t properly working and it actually undermines Henry’s authority to rule because if if you if the realm isn’t working under your crown, um then maybe you shouldn’t be the one wearing it. I mean, it’s the same as politicians today. you know, if you can’t sort your out, people will start asking who else can. So Henry has to crack down on this. So he goes to Beckett and he basically says, “Look, we we’ve got to do something about this.” And Becket says, “Nap, church must remain independent. The king should not interfere interfere with the church authority. Nothing’s going to change here. You can have your royal court. You can do what you want to your commoners, but the clergy, we play by our own rules, basically. And the king can’t stick his nose in. Um, yeah. You you’re thinking something there, Christian?”
“It just looks It just looks really really bad. It’s It’s just It’s really messy that this guy can turn around and say no to the king. It just looks really bad for the king.”
“Yeah. And also, let’s not forget uh who put him there.”
“Yeah. He didn’t just magic his way or work his way necessarily as a commoner, as a stranger up to that position. He was put there as a favor with the sort of unspoken, perhaps even quietly spoken expectation that look, I’ll give you a dream job, but every now and again, you’re going to have to sort of pull the line and help me out. And here Becket is basically digging his his heels into the ground over is essentially a Yeah, it’s not it’s not it wasn’t this particular case, but”
“Oh. Oh, sure. Sure.”
“But murder is in, you know, I think in in general, I’m I’m with Henry.”
“Yeah. Me, too. Fully.”
“Yeah. I think if you if you’re going to break the law, you should you should expect the same uh legal recourse as anyone else would.”
“Yeah. Yeah. Totally. That’s insane.”
“Especially if you’re going to be a priest, you shouldn’t even be really breaking the law. um supposed to be a good egg.”
“It feels like there’s this insane like audacity on the end of Beckett who’s like, “No, we’re we have our own rules and I choose those rules.””
“Yeah. Yeah. It’s in this is Beckett’s problem. He’s incredibly stubborn. Um now I think what Beckett’s thinking, and I’ll I’ll do my best to sort of give Becket’s opinion here, is that he’s thinking that the church is sacred. um that the king can’t really be meddling into the ecclesiastical courts, otherwise there’d be no point of having them. And as much as he’s my mate, as a Christian and as a me as the archbishop and a member of the church, I cannot betray the principles of this religious organization as a favor to my old pal. Obviously, I don’t think either of us buy that argument, but I do think that that’s where Henry’s coming from. Uh that’s where Thomas is coming from. Sorry. I don’t think he’s out to get his old pal. I just I just think he’s a bit of a of a sort of Bible basher, you know?”
“I get his logic, but it’s a stretch to me because at the end of the day, you’re trying to skirt the law. You are still trying to get around punishment, like legal punishment.”
“Um, not necessarily actually because uh the king’s law wasn’t the only law in town. That’s why there were two courts. So, it’s not that Thomas Becket’s saying we clergymen shouldn’t be held accountable. He’s just saying we’re not going to be held accountable by you. But my issue is that the standards of account are so different. And it’s like when when one person says you should be hung, which I’m not I’m not even necessarily saying like yay, death penalty. But when one person says you’re getting hung and another person says go think about what you did for the same crime, I can”
