writings and fieldwork attempt at implementing it. The period, also, saw the emergency of the hard working monasteries as far as hospitality is concerned as we have already observed. Italso saw Jerome, Lactantius and Chrysostom, among others, defining Christ's hospitality as welcoming the "least" without commercialisation of hospitality. This is highly an ambitious undertaking-to recognise the "least" amongst us.Itclearly echoes Christ and serves to implement every detail of Christ's theology that contrasted the theology of the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the teachers of the Law and the Scribes. Ironically, this distinctiveness of the fourth-fifth century was defined as the church was increasing in wealth, power and influence. This was probably because of the fact that the relation of the church and socio political institutions was changing.
For the church and the political authorities were no longer at odds. They had become intertwined and dependent on one another as hospitality reinforced those relationships, as the above discussion has shown. If the world can embrace Christ's hospitality that sees the primary need is to welcome the very "least" amongst us, then the kingdom of God that Jesus told us to pray for (Matthew 6) will have come, as the people of God embrace "love of the neighbour" as their defining characteristic. Probably we would be thanking God that the kingdom has come to every one of us, as it is done in heaven! As a result, we would no more hear or see widening gap between the rich and the poor-rather the world would be looking forward to ways and means of bridging the gap in the local and international politics.
clear departure from the vision of the early writers and the entire philosophy behind Christ's hospitality.
Medieval hospitality was characterised by specialised Institutions with paid staff who cared for patients/recipients, welcome was now, often, fashioned according to the status of the guest. It was also characterised by reinforcements of existing patterns of wealth and power. Great households belonging to "senior citizens" like Bishop (who had by now acquired noble status as opposed to servants status), and lay aristocrats were central to the practice of hospitality in the middle ages. As Isidore of Seville says, in the early seventh century, "a lay man has fulfilled the duty of hospitality by receiving one or two (guests); a bishop, however, unless he shall receive everyone ... is inhuman".5o This shows that, although all Christians were responsible for hospitality, the bishop had a special role.
The Decretum that was compiled by Gratian in the twelfth century and providing the basis for much of Canon Law stated, "Hospitality is so necessary in bishops that if any are found lacking in it the law forbids them to be ordained".51 While the emphasis on Bishops being hospitable is good and Biblical, according to Pauline Theology (as the letters to Timothy and Titus shows);
but the fact that hospitality lost its Christ like originality and was now, generally, dispensed according to one's social status makes the whole concept of hospitality in the Medieval period faulty and lacking in terms of imitating the ideal Christ's hospitality.
As Tierney notes in his works on the medieval poor Laws, there was a close connection between clerical hospitality and the relief of the poor:
The word, 'hospitality', is of some importance because the phrase most commonly used by the Medieval canonists to describe the poor relief responsibilities of the parish clergy was tenere hospitalitatem- they were obliged, that is, to 'keep hospitality'. The primary sense of the word
50 Patrologia Latina 83.786, quoted in Sherman W. Gray, The Least of my brothers: Matthew 25:31-46: A History ofinterpretation (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1989) P.120.
51 Decretum Gratiani. Distinctio 82 ante c. I, Dist.8? ante c. I, Dist.84 ante c. I, Dist.85 ante c. I, quoted in Brian Tiemey, Medieval Poor Law: A sketch of Canonical Theory and its Application in England
referred to the reception of travellers, the welcoming of guests, but the Canonists very often used it in a broader sense to include almsgiving and
1· f' 152
poor re le Ingenera.
The church generally had a lot of property though it varied at the local level. As it is today in some parts of Africa, some clergy had very minimal resources with which they could offer hospitality. Christians were expected to tithe in the hope that some of the funds for hospitality and relief would be found (through their tithing).53 Unlike in the fourth and the fifth centuries, hospitality in the medieval period began to diminish gradually. Complaints about absentee priests, misappropriation of funds, discrimination, and inadequately endowed clergy houses were now rampant. 54 It is no wonder that in the late Middle Ages, hospitality was explicitly and deliberately connected to power, influence, and grand displays of wealth and status among the great ecclesiastical and lay- households. As Henisch says, for one to retain hislher authority and influence, the great householder had "to show himself the source of all good things for his dependents, and to equal, or preferably surpass, the magnificence of his allies and enemies"
(Henisch 1976:11).
Entertaining visiting dignitaries became an essential demonstration of one's status while to lose the capacity to offer hospitality, or to be forced to depend on the hospitality of other great households, was clear evidence of a person's warning power and influence (Henisch 1976:12).
Though money economy, as such did not yet exist, the nobility consumed its excess wealth "on its estate in the form of strategic hospitality" which "reinforced the complex bonds of interdependence between Lord and vassal, church and nobility, which were characteristic of feudal life" (Pohl 1999:50).
In early fifteenth-century England, households of bishops, as well as those of lay aristocrats, were drunk with the desire to display power that was often evidenced through the magnitude of the entertainment. This kind of hospitality involved an "elaborate deference to rank and power"
(Heal 1982:544-563). Grand hospitality was "perceived as a means of securing good
52See Brian Tiemey, Medieval poor Law, p 168
53See Brian Tiemey, medieval poor Law p. 93,97,126. Tiemey further explains that the way of pastoral care was to feed the hungry and to receive guests-for clergy-among other things.
Tiemey,_Medieval poor Law p. 71-72,107.
neighbourliness, of ensuring communal stability and promoting the general well-being of the commonwealth (Heal 1982: 547).
In the course of dispensing hospitality, those of lower status were received at a different table, fed different and coarser food and housed in different places/less privileged places/lodgings (Henisch 1976: 12). In serving dinner, John Russell gives a fascinating insight into the complexities of serving dinner to clergy and nobility of different ranks. According to him, it included explanations/instructions of how ushers and marshals were to seat strangers, clergy, and men and women of high rank but no wealth, and those in reverse circumstances (PohI1999:51).
As the Medieval period (AD500-1500) came to a close, Christ's hospitality among the Christians of the time had died a systematically co-ordinated death. By this time, most provision for the poor was done at the gate and not within the house. This indicates that the poor were now being seen as a nuisance, meaning that, people were no longer able to see Christ in the poor! This was a terrible reversal of the great gains that had been made in the past as our study has shown. In concluding this sub-section, we realise that the potential of hospitality was lost in the loss of the worshipping community and in the differentiation of care among the recipients. Thus, the medieval period did not fuel the fire of hospitality but instead it extinguished it through the strengthening of class society especially in the dispensation of hospitality.