Quarantine in Purgatory: Medieval Leprosy and the Dual Legacy of Good & Evil that it Created
“And the leper in whom is the plague...shall cry, Unclean! Unclean! All the days wherein the plague is in him he shall be defiled; he shall dwell alone…” -from Leviticus 13:45-46 KJV It is exactly one thousand one hundred and fifty years since the birth of your Lord Jesus Christ. Day and night you wander barefoot through the countryside, heading south, towards the capital city of Winchester in the county of Hampshire. You are travelling there because rumor has it that there is a place there for people like you, a place called a ‘Lazar’ House, that stands right in the shadows of the great cathedral that has only recently been built in the Anglican capital city to the great glorification of the one true Lord Jesus Christ. It is a hospital, of sorts, where your people are quarantined and instructed in the cloistered and holy monastic life that can earn one’s way to Heaven. Through the cold and the rain you continue on your journey. You ...