This Day in Religious History: On January 23, 1656, one of Christianity’s best known religious satires, The Provincial Letters, was published in Paris, France, with the author remaining anonymous. Quick to condemn the Catholic Church’s leaders, including the Pope, for going too easy on sin, the author was wise to remain anonymous because he surely would have been condemned as a heretic. However, The Letters also rebuked theologians in general for having double standards. Written in a more common version of the French language instead of the high version usually used for published works, The Letters were easily accessible to the average Frenchmen and its popularity soared. With this rise in popularity, the search for the author took great precedence, and eventually it was discovered that famous mathematician Blaise Pascal, the inventor of the syringe and the hydraulic lift wrote the controversial Letters.
Posted on: Thu, 23 Jan 2014 19:22:03 +0000
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