WAS KNOX MISUNDERSTOOD?

In Issue 124 (November 2022) there is an article about John Knox, in which the reformer is portrayed as a bombastic, fire-breathing preacher, utterly uncompromising in his hostility to all but his own narrow point of view. It also casts him as a woman-hater, if not frankly misogynistic. This is basically the traditional picture of Knox, but important evidence has since been found, of which the article’s author Stephen Roberts seems unaware, that indicates that Knox was a much more complicated person.

The new information, hidden for nearly five centuries until found in several obscure archives in England and Wales, consists of letters and other documents related to Christopher Goodman, a Church of England minister and close friend to Knox. Included are letters from Knox, written in his own hand, along with Goodman’s many observations of his colleague. The picture emerging from this extensive archive is far more complex than the earlier, simplistic view expressed by Roberts. Some of the observations are consistent with the traditional view of the Scot as self-righteous, but there is also evidence he was subject to periods of depression and self-doubt. In contrast with the conventional picture, it seems he enjoyed dining and drinking wine with friends, loved to tell stories, and had a well-honed sense of humour.

Knox was far from the misogynist some have painted him. To be sure, his relationship with Mary, Queen of Scots was tempestuous, but the Goodman Papers indicate it was not invariably so, recounting an instance in which the two collaborated in attempting, successfully as it turned out, to heal a marital disruption involving mutual friends. Additionally, the documents provide ample evidence of Knox’s close relationships with many women, whom he liked to call his “godly friends.”

The Goodman Papers and their interpretation form an important part of historian Jane Dawson’s definitive biography of John Knox, published by Yale University Press in 2015.

R. Macbeth Pitkin, FRCOG, La Quinta, California