I started playing in the SCA in Northshield, and one of the pieces of the standard peerage ceremony there is the Peerage Admonishments/Admonitions – a listing of qualities that a peer should possess. Usually, these are read by members of the populace, popping up among the assemblage to read from a small slip of paper.
When the person who got me into the SCA, Mistress Orlaith, was elevated to the laurel, Master Ingus arranged them into a chant which still brings tears to my eyes.
A Peer must seek excellence in all endeavors, not for their own
Northshield Boke of Ceremonies
good, but for the good of others.
A Peer must always seek justice, truth tempered with mercy.
A Peer must remain loyal to the people and the ideals they
choose to live by.
A Peer must always defend their kingdom, their family and
those who depend upon them.
A Peer must have the courage to sacrifice for the precepts and
people they value.
A Peer must have faith in their beliefs.
A Peer values the contributions of others and does not boast of
their own accomplishments.
A Peer must be generous as far as their resources allow.
A Peer recognizes that true nobility arises from the journey, not
the destination.
There is no official “list” of peer-like qualities that any kingdom or peer can point to that I am aware of. My understanding is that, rooted in the concept of chivalric/medieval Christian virtues, these qualities are, for the most part, basic human decency – qualities that we see in numerous cultures, reflected in religious and and other ideological writings. It is the fact that these qualities transcend culture that I want to shed light on.
There are a number of lists of chivalric virtues, or virtues from the medieval Christian church, which we could hold up to the SCA’s nebulous list of peer-like qualities/virtues to find an analogue, but I want to go beyond the Christian Normative view of these and look at other faiths and teachings within period to find how the SCA virtues align with those philosophies.
I might, in future, write a series of posts looking at various concepts in Judaism (my religion), what commonalities can be found in the teachings of Confucius, and how PLQs are a reflection of both.
Rather than wax philosophical about this any further, I think I’ll just put gather up quotes and citations for us all to ruminate on.
“What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.”
Hillel the Elder (110 BCE – 10 CE), Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 31a.
“Do to others what you want them to do to you. This is the meaning of the law of Moses and the teaching of the prophets.”
Matthew 7:12
“None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.”
An-Nawawi’s Forty Hadith 13
“What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others.”
Confucius (551 BCE–479 BCE), The Analects, Section 15, No. 24
“Those acts that you consider good when done to you, do those to others, none else.”
Taittiriya Upanishad (Shikshavalli, Eleventh Anuvaka)
“And do nothing that you would not like to see him do,
Grover (1970 CE – ), The Monster in the Mirror, 1989
‘Cause that monster in the mirror, he just might be you.”
