The death of Becket was an unfortunate event where there are three main suspects who may have been the cause of Becket’s death: The Knights, King Henry, or Becket himself. Even though there are different suspects, there is not only one suspect to blame, as all three of them did play a part in Becket’s death, although there was one who was the significant suspect out of the three. King Henry may have been Becket’s best friend but was the prime person to blame for Becket’s death.
The person who was most to blame for the death of Becket was King Henry, ruler of Britain and Becket’s friend. It may seem strange that Becket’s death was mainly caused by his friend, but this could have been avoided if not Henry had appointed Becket’s the Archbishop of Canterbury. Firstly, Henry did not follow the standard procedure to appoint the archbishop – he was mainly biased for the reason that he wanted it to be his friend. Secondly, Henry knew that as Becket as Archbishop, his rules and orders came from the Pope and God, so it was understandable when Becket refused to do what Henry had requested since it was against his doings as an Archbishop. However, there was a major dispute between them, which could have been settled if not for Henry’s quick temper.
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His death may have been avoided at that time, because even though he may not have fully agreed in what Henry thought, Henry was still King and his friend, so he shouldn’t have caused such a disagreement between them. Also, he made it easy for the knights to kill him since he barely did anything to stop them and even went in front of them to face his death. Despite this, it still doesn’t mean that he is as important as Henry in his death, partly as Henry was the main reason of how he became Archbishop in the first place, and how Henry’s raging temper caused the Knights to consider killing
Every death is ultimately caused by fate, so says Friar Lawrence, “A power greater than we can contradict/ Hath thwarted our intents” (V iii 153-154). No one is to blame because everything happens for a reason.
When we look at Henry as a king we have to look in the context of
The main people that can be blamed for the death of Romeo and Juliet are Juliet, Friar Lawrence, and Romeo. Juliet is one of the main people to blame for Romeo’s death. In Act 5, Scene 3, Romeo states, “Thy drugs are quick. This with a kiss I die.” This reveals that he killed himself to be with her, not knowing that she was faking her death to avoid marrying Paris.
The Anglican Church and the English government were closely related to each other; the king not only ruled the country, but was the head of the church as well. Therefore, disobeying the church meant that people also acted against the king[i]. Like governmental organization, the Church of England was based on a hierarchal structure. It favored powerful bishops, ornate services and liturgies, and allowed people to personally observe the religion. During King Charles I’s reign, royal and elite citizens of England largely composed the Church of England[ii]. These close connections between the church and the state allowed for much corruption to take place[iii].
Now, Henry had an heir to the throne, his son Edward. As time would pass, the future king of England was getting more and more weak and sicker. Henry passed on,
...tury religion and politics and since his death has figured prominently in historians explanations for the breakdown of consensus and the coming of civil war.”(Mason, 1095) Archbishop made a lot of enemies and was hated by many during his time of influence. The opinions of Laud can be understood through Mr. Grymstons speech to Parliament upon the impeachment and accusation of the Archbishop of Canterbury. “Mr. Speaker, hee hath beene and is, the common Enemy to all goodnesse and good men, and it is not safe, that such a Viper should be neere his Majesties person, to distill his poison into his Sacred eares, nor is it safe for the Commonwealth, that hee should fit in so eminent a place of Government…this man is the corrupt Fountaine that hath infected all the streames, and till the fountaine be purged, wee cannot expect to have any cleere Channels.”(Grymstons, 5)
One of the key words in his dialogue is 'honour' because in Elizabethan times honour was bound up with ideas of nobility and manliness. Henry has constant reference to the divine, to get permission for his actions, 'God's will.' Additionally there is various uses of semantic fields, associated with religion, God, covet, honour and sin; all taken from the bible. Henry applies a very close relationship term, 'cuz.'
Henry in Henry V The bishops refer to Henry in the first scene as "a sudden scholar" who can "reason in divinity. " Canterbury says, "The king is full of grace, and fair regard. Ely quotes "and a true lover of the holy church. The two bishops, pretty much have the same view on Henry, they think highly of him.
Laud’s attempts to make the Church more conformed coincided with King Charles I’s personal rule without parliament. In fact, Charles embarked on policies which made the English feel under threat. The Venetian ambassador in London wrote Charles had “changed the principles by which his predecessors reigned…if the road he has taken will lead him to absolute royalty, which is definitely the goal he has set for himself” (Young 106). Even though many English...
When the English were facing great defeat in the Battle of Agincourt, Henry tells him mean that it is up to God’s will. This is a great act of faith and trust in God and it emphasizes his noble Christian qualities. Also Henry displays mercy when he gave those who “Hath no stomach to fight” the option to leave. He did not force them to fight in the battle of Agincourt he trusted in God because all his men left him. This is the Kind of wisdom that we often see displayed by kings in the
He was a human that had emotions, he experienced grief with the multiple miscarriages and deaths of his sons and the betrayals of his wife’s, Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard. Also the death of Jane Seymour, the only wife to give him a male heir, brought him into a depression. These events changed Henry’s perspective of his own self, that he was without a legal heir, his health was horrendous and he was being betrayed by those closest to him. Lipscomb describes the transformation of Henry from the popular prince to the tyrant king know today. As shown, “the last decade of his reign, Henry VIII had begun to act as a tyrant. The glittering, brilliant monarch of the accession, toppled into old age by betrayal, aggravated into irascibility and suspicion as a result of ill health and corrupted by absolute power, had become a despot”. Henry is not thought of as the good Christian, but Lipscomb writes throughout this book that Henry was very serious about his religious affiliations. Lipscomb portrays Henry VIII as, “a man of strong feeling but little emotional intelligence, willful and obstinate but also fiery and charismatic, intelligent but blinkered, attempting to rule and preserve his honor against his profound sense of duty and heavy responsibility to fulfil his divinely ordained role”. In other words he was an emotional mess that did not know what to do with his feelings, so he bottled them up and south to seek
When the Archbishop of Canterbury died in 1162, Henry saw the chance to give his close friend even more power by appointing him Archbishop of Canterbury - the most important church position in England. Why would Henry do this ?
However, he didn't listen to the duke of york who desperately wanted a say. This could have been another reason for the outbreak of conflict because the people didn't think he always made the right decision and the duke of York didn't like not being listened to. Another problem was with patronage, as Henry was overgenerous, but only to some people, he would give lots of patronage to Somerset and Suffolk but none to York. This was even worse because he had borrowed from York and instead if paying him back, gave patronage to others. He gave away more and more money and land so that there wasn't much left for important times like war and to make people happy or come onto his side.
I side with Loades on this as despite resentment from the nobles, after the Perkin Warbeck imposture there were no more serious uprisings which strongly support the success of Henry’s policies. Whilst most nobles would see his methods as unjust (especially the wide of use bonds and recognisances) Henry succeeded in increasing the crown’s standing at the expense of the nobility, securing his position whilst weakening the nobles. Through most of his policies Henry was successful in limiting the powers of nobility. Henry sought to restrict the noble’s power and yet at the same time needed them to keep order and represent him at local levels, therefore Henry sought not to destroy the nobles but to weaken them enough that they did not pose a threat, he needed a balance of control over the nobles and strong nobility.
For the simple fact that when Henry VI was younger and not allowed to take an active role in leading England, he did not really care about running the country. Henry was such a spiritually deep man that he lacked the worldly wisdom necessary to allow him to rule effectively (Wikipedia). Henry was more of an indecisive pushover.