Abstract

Perhaps no episode in medieval literature has proven as puzzling to modern readers as the pardon scene in the B text of Piers Plowman. Critics continue to debate whether the document which Piers receives in Passus VII is a pardon. The document is, after all, sent by Truth, the divine authority whose tower overshadows the fair field. Its message — “Et qui bona egerunt ibunt in vitam eternam; / Qui vero mala in ignem eternum” — is an article of the Athanasian Creed and thus an orthodox tenet of the faith. Moreover, critics who argue that Truth's document is a pardon maintain that its text is consistent with the theme of the Visio