Medieval Europe Society Francis Brothers

The Franciscan order was founded in Europe in thirteen century. Its emergence has profound historical background. The development of the long distance trade led to the city begin to rise. And more and more agricultural and handicraft industry products entered cities because of the development of the agricultural technology. These accelerated the development of commodity economy and the market became the center of urban economy. The residents lived in the city gradually became the new citizen class. The development of urban economy made the power of the townspeople become stronger and awaked new social consciousness in them. They opposed feudal system and demanded city autonomy. Autonomous city became a free place. So the townspeople and the free city prepared environmental basis and mass basis for the emergence of the Franciscan. The performance of anti-feudalism in ideology is against the Christian church. Heresy movements against orthodox Christian church appeared in cities. It threatened the pope’s authority. The Franciscan loyal to the pope obtained the support of the orthodox right and became the tool against heresy. The order and the church formed a reciprocal relationship.The rise and the development of the Franciscan are related to the effort of Francis who is the founder of the order. Francis pursued the apostle’s life enthusiastically. So he had apostle’s noble moral characters. Francis’s noble mo ral characters attracted many people around him and organized an order. The F ranciscan can pure the church and recovered the citizen’s confidence in the ch urch because of these moral characters. So the order was admitted by the pope and can sermon legally. The Franciscan organizational form is different from t he traditional monastery. They didn’t have a permanent residence and moved a round every corner of cities. Friars insisted poverty, humility, obedience and ot her moral characters set by Francis. The ways of their sermon is easy to unde rstand and often used kind of vocabularies about market. These reflected the c haracters of city. So the Franciscan was popular among citizens.The Franciscan played an important role in promoting the theological stud- y of the medieval university. Alexander of Hales, Bonaventura, Roger Bacon, John Duns Scotus, William of Occam and other elites in the order are the important scholars of scholastic philosophy research. They occupied the medieval university’s platforms. Their achievements reflected the higher academic achievements of the medieval university.