george wishart
born: 1513
died: 1546
father:
james wishart [1]
mother: elizabeth learmount
[1]
spouse:
briefly, wishart's show trial for heresy and subsequent ritualistic
murder by the catholic church was the event that set the scottish
reformation in motion.
- taught greek at a school created by john erskine of dun.
specifically, new testament greek. this was a revolutionary act at the
time. as surreal as it sounds, the bible could only be read in latin.
this is not the language it was written in; anybody wanting to get at
the oldest manuscripts would need to read the greek or aramaic. yet, the
church was hardly interested in this. rather, it enforced the law
specifically to prevent the laity from reading the bible on it's own and
coming to it's own conclusions; only the clergy was permitted to read
and understand the book. as literacy spread with the renaissance, the
blatantly absurd nature of this reality became apparent: the western
world was run by a nearly omnipotent church that based it's power in a
book that nobody was allowed to read. this was one of the major causes
of the reformation. so, it seems silly now, but distributing biblical
material in greek was, at the time, a deeply revolutionary act.
- once the authorities found out what he was doing, he had to flee
to england where he studied "reformed doctrines" at cambridge.
- friend of hugh latimer, bishop of worcester. upon latimer's
suggestion, wishart went to bristol to preach. he was quickly arrested,
charged with blasphemy and sent to thomas cromwell, chief minister to
henry VIII, who had his own reasons to engineer an overthrow of papal
supremacy. however, a law was then quickly passed through parliament
that restored catholic ascendancy and wishart was forced to recant.
- when the church successfully forced somebody to recant, they had
to wear an embroidery on their sleeve that illustrated a heretic being
burned at the stake. this was meant to remind everybody of what happens
when you challenge the authority of the church. as punishment, wishart
was forced to wear the badge as he continued to preach.
- the nature of his initial heresy is unclear, which strikes me as
suspicious. was there a heresy at all, or was the church merely
attacking the language issue? some people have suggested that wishart
carried on the views of latimer: denial of purgatory, rejection of the
saints, rejection of the virgin birth and some other typical reformist
views. others have suggested socinianism. all that is clear is that he
recanted and continued preaching with the burning heretic sewn into his
sleeve.
- he left for germany and switzerland soon after, no doubt
realizing his own luck in escaping death. he seems to have studied
calvinism while there. eventually, he went back to england, and then
returned to scotland under the apparent protection of his maternal
uncle, john learmount, who was in the inner circle of the scottish
monarchy.
- he seems to have started preaching again at the age of 32 or 33,
which is clearly consistent with all of the other evidence that strongly
suggests 'jesus freak'. he also stopped running from persecution,
plausibly under the hope that he would die horribly. see, this is the
creepy side to jesus freaks: an obsession with being the object of
sacrifice. i know from experience...
- as it was, a law was passed in 1543 that allowed for people to
read the bible in greek. so, wishart was safe from direct persecution on
that level. however, the evil cardinal was still out to get him for
challenging his authority. wishart was sent a cease and desist order; he
reacted with a speech full of fancy, delusional language that was
saturated by an egotistical grandeur that saw his persecution as having
some kind of divine purpose. see, this is why you can't persecute these
nutcases. it's like arguing with a conspiracy theorist. the more
tyrannical you are, the more virtuous their suffering is. strategically
working towards the final abolition of religion requires a different set
of tactics that digs deeper into it's root causes.
- wishart seems to have collapsed into irrational behaviour at this
point, fully expecting his own ritual murder. or, perhaps, the stories
enter the realm of exaggerated legend rather than historical fact. he
began preaching in public spaces, getting involved in private quarrels,
preaching to the sick - that sort of thing. he also started spending an
unhealthy amount of time by himself in the garden in the middle of the
night, which began to concern people. of the more obvious jesus freak
fabrications, which appear to be attributable to knox, there's a story
about him catching a priest that was sent to kill him and then pleading
with the angry crowd not to harm the fucker. there's also a story where
he predicts his own death.
- wishart eventually ended up in edinburgh, where he was allowed to
preach under the personal protection of some powerful local landowners
(alexander chrichton of brunstone, hugh douglas of longniddry, john
cockburn of ormiston). some of these landowners appear to have been
involved in a plot against the existing cardinal that also included the
maternal uncle and brother of george wishart. that is to say that there
were political reasons for this protection. here, he became a sort of
mentor to knox. however, his ministry was not well attended. the plan to
"make it big" in the city was a failure, and wishart began to lose
funding from his investors. so, wishart became morose and suicidal,
stating he was 'weary of the world' and other such things. it's not
stated whether or not he turned to drugs, but he'd be a shitty failed
corporate rock star if he didn't. while wishart went home to be burned
alive, knox stayed in edinburgh to spearhead the scottish reformation.
- wishart was arrested while under the care of john cockburn in a
less treacherous spin on the judas myth. knox seems to have recreated
the story of the last supper in his retelling of events, with minor
modifications. then, like jesus, wishart went quietly with his
capturers, stating that what happens is god's will. he was then tortured
by the earl of bothwell, who plays the part of judas. a trial then
follows, in which wishart is convicted of heresy. there's much jesus
freak wordiness in his last words, which knox somehow obtained a perfect
recollection of.
- one of the accusations against wishart is that he denied the
sacrament of confession, claiming instead that confessing to the priest
"has no warrant" and that confession ought to be done with god directly.
this is particularly interesting to me, as confession is one of the
most blatant examples of religion being used as a means of statist
control.
- overall, knox' narrative of wishart seems to be directly adapted
from the life of jesus - to the point that it is questionable if it has
any historical value whatsoever. the catholic church is even substituted
into the role of the pharisees, cartoonish villainy and all. but, what
strikes me most about the story is how wishart is a scottish
substitution of jesus, and how that may have played into a nationalist
discourse. i'm going to leave this page here because he has no
descendants and it is of little consequence how historical the account
of his life actually is. historically, he's an important person. yet, if
i were to make a rationalist guess based on the nature of the stories
surrounding george wishart, it would be that he did not exist at all as
we know him - that he was almost entirely a fabrication of knox and
perhaps even purposefully designed as his socrates.
[1]:
memoir of george wishart
http://dghjdfsghkrdghdgja.appspot.com/categories/gen/lines/wishart/georgemartyr.html
