What Is The Moral Of The Pardoner's Tale

In the Pardoner’s prologue and tale, by presenting the Pardoner as a professional hypocrite in a situation in which he attempts to justify himself by revealing the full truth, Chaucer identifies that the truth in which the Pardoner deals is what makes him such a disturbing and threatening figure. For instance, this is most evident in the lines that are often most confusing to readers, when the Pardoner states, “ –And lo, sires, thus I preche./ And Jhesu Crist, that is oure soules leche,/ So gruante yow his pardoun to receyve, For that is best; I wol yow nat decyve” (L 628-32). The reader is left disturbed in the contradiction between his saying “I wol yow nat deceyve” and his earlier mention of his “yvel entencioun”(122) to “wynne gold and
Though this is likely an exaggeration, when considering the Pardoner’s rhetorical finesse, it is not difficult to conclude that he likely changed some people’s views of morality for the better and saved some from the sin of avarice. The Pardoner does, then, probably produce fruit, or good works, through the shaping power of his rhetoric. Though the Pardoner does not himself believe in this fruit, revealing he has no faith in its effectiveness as he goes about his profession for "nothyng but for coveitise” , the Pardoner is doing some moral work. The Pardoner stays in his role of an actor and a mirror as he can play anything or anything, even a good person, and can reflect good morals on others. The importance of the Pardoner’s description as neither a , "geldyng or a mare" (GP L 691) lies in the reading that he is neither this nor that, as a result the Pardoner can take on the form of many different things. Because he is sterile and unable to be physically defined, the Pardoner relies on the skills of language (his seed) to produce the converted souls of others (the fruit). Without his rhetorical prowess he could not achieve his "yvel entencioun” of greed. The Pardoner uses this seed of rhetoric to inseminate others with moral conversion. As the Pardoner charges the people for his work, the people convert the language,or seed, into money which then fills the Pardoner with a fertility he physically lacks.
For instance, Terry Richardson, one of the most successful fashion photographers in the world, having worked for Vogue, Rolling Stone, GQ and photographed the likes of Barack Obama to Miley Cyrus, has recently been in the spotlight for a very different reason: lawsuits and various reports identifying him as a sexual predator. None of the reports have resulted in legal action, and Terry still has much high profile work today. The difference is that now famous stars that are photographed by him are attacked through various forms of social media for “supporting a [rumored] sexual predator”. Examples, such as that of Terry Richardson, have raised the question of whether people should judge others based on the intent or the outcome. Can we appreciate the work of an artist who is immoral, racist, or sexist? Going even further, is morality itself a matter of intent or outcome? These questions are parallels of the questions that Chaucer raises in The Canterbury Tales through “The Pardoner’s Tale” .In this way, we see that Allen’s examination of the similarities of the questions between 15th century and modern readers of the Pardoner’s tale transcends the context of the Canterbury Tales itself. Her text identified common questions of morality that seem to be