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From: O'Connor (Kerri)
Date: 11/15/99
Time: 2:19:09 PM
Remote Name: 152.163.201.78
Before reading chapter 7 of Tower and Tabernacle by Mary Clemente Davlin, I never really saw a tower as a symbol of the Church. According to Davlin, a tower is an architectual image used in Piers the Plowman as a mean to symbolize heaven. The tower, which is a repeated image throughout the poem, symbolizes local pride, a sacred landscape and the Heavenly Jerusalem. In the poem, the tower stands on an eastern position, a position where "earthbound sinners could glimpse the Heavenly Kingdom." The tower serves as a visual construct and as a narrative image.
The narrative image in reference to the tower is somewhat confusing. This image is present in the narrative when the name of God is said to be therein, meaning Truthe. Thruthe is a biblical name that means stability, faith, reliabe and solid proving. According to the public meaning of a tower, the one in Piers the Plowman contains the Truthe's name and all that it means. According to Davlin, however, Piers never states this, but it does state that Truthe is "thereinne." Even though the poem never states the name of the Truthe, the tower's image suggest that Truthe is within the tower.
In the beginning of the article, it was said that Langland's Piers the Plowman focuses on this world and not the supernatural world. The tower and the second architectual image, however, suggests differently. Several times in the poem, a tabernaculum is described. The three translations of the word according to the Vulgate Bible are, the "house of God," the "tent of meeting," and the "tent of testimony." These two images suggest and strongly imply that Langland wrote this poem with the influence of Biblical terms. It seems strange that one would say the poem centers not on heaven but on earth when according to Davlin, "these two images embody a view of heaven as dwelling with God, being with and in God, in mutual indwelling or communion."
The address to find this article is gopher://gopher.luc.edu/00/Loyola/publications/Medieval/Vol-10/chap-7