No Stinking Puddles!

Lee Gatiss considers Homily 1 on Holy Scripture and its condemnation of mere tradition.

The first of the Church of England’s “official sermons” in the Book of Homilies, is called “A Fruitful Exhortation to the Reading and Knowledge of Holy Scripture.” It extols the virtues of knowing the Bible, and all the positive spiritual effects of reading and obeying it. The alternative is “to run to the stinking puddles of men’s traditions”—which doesn’t sound very thirst-quenching to me!

Here’s some of what it says.... Read More

In Tudor England household wastes, including the contents of chamber pots, were emptied in the narrow streets, where they formed stinking puddles around which pedestrians were forced to warily tread their way.