Margherita couldn’t have imagined that, 447 years after her death, her letters would be discovered and studied. And she couldn’t have imagined that, about 150 years after that, readers could sympathize with her challenges and draw from her wisdom.

Church history books are beginning to devote more space to women. Treatments of Medieval Christian women, however, is usually limited to a few queens and nuns – those who could express themselves at a time when most women’s voices were dismissed.
Recently, scholars have turned their attention to the correspondence, discovered in 1870 behind a staircase, of an Italian merchant and his wife – a collection comprising over 150,000 letters and 500 account books.
To historians, this is a rich documentation of how both trade and daily lives were conducted in fourteenth-century Italy. The wife’s letters in particular (over 250) afford the unique opportunity to hear the voice of an ordinary Medieval businesswoman and wife. To Christians, they represent an interesting account on how she met her daily challenges with faith.
Becoming a Merchant’s Wife
Margherita was born in 1360 to the noble Bandini family, who had moved from Florence to Avignon, France, following political exile (both Margherita’s father and her mother’s family had been accused of plotting against the republic). By that time, the papacy had also moved to Avignon, bringing further prosperity to the city.
In 1376, at age 16, Margherita was given in marriage to Francesco Datini, a wealthy merchant from Prato, Italy, who was 25 year her senior. Taking advantage of the papal move, Francesco was thriving in the new papal seat by selling luxury goods and art to cardinals and other clerics who lived there.
The age difference between Margherita and Francesco was not uncommon. In reality, Francesco had been so absorbed by his business that he would have gladly avoided marriage altogether. He had lovers, and had even fathered a son in 1374.
But it was his Prato neighbor Niccolozzo Binducchi, a father figure after Francesco’s parents died of the plague, who insisted that he should marry. A marriage, Niccolozzo expected, would produce legitimate children who could take over Francesco’s business and benefit from his work. As happy as Niccolozzo and his wife Piera had been about the birth of Francesco’s son, “having a legitimate son will bring you more honor before God and the world,”[1] Niccolozzo reminded him. Sadly, Margherita proved to be unable to conceive – a source of great sorrow for the couple.
In 1383, Francesco and Margherita moved back to Prato, where he traded in clothes, weapons, iron and salt, extending his business to other Italian and even Spanish cities and dealing in international commerce. In later years, he dabbled in the banking and insurance business. In reality, charging interest was still forbidden by canon law, but Francesco eased his conscience by saying he would leave his money to the poor when he died.
Francesco’s work caused him to travel for long periods of time, but he stayed in touch with his wife to receive news from home and reports about his business. He also sent her seemingly incessant instructions and reminders, to the point of becoming annoying.
From 1384 till his death in 1410, they corresponded about every two or three days. At first, Margherita, who had only learned to read (mostly her prayer books, typically written with the Gothic alphabet) had to dictate her letters. In her late thirties, she surprised Francesco by learning to read and write in the current “commercial” alphabet. This new ability allowed her to write whenever needed (without having to look for a scribe) and to be more honest in her letters.
Daily Challenges
As most women at that time, Margherita suffered from her husband’s repeated absences, which left her alone with her servants. Apparently, after marriage Francesco continued to be as work-driven as he had always been, so much that Niccolozzo had to exhort him, “You are rich enough, thanks be to God. Don’t want it all, don’t want it all, don’t want it all.”[2]
She was also distressed by Francesco’s extramarital affairs, which he carried on as usual. The birth of her husband’s second son with a sixteen-year-old servant troubled Margherita so deeply that she became seriously ill. Francesco found a husband for the girl, but the baby died after a few months.
Francesco was not irreligious. He often worried about his sins, interpreted contrarieties as God’s punishment, and kept promising to become “a new Francesco.” He never mentioned any sin in particular, and adultery and infidelity might have been low in his concerns, since they were not considered as serious in men as they were in women – something most wives had learned to accept.
While accepting the traditional position of submission to her husband, Margherita felt free to advise (and even reprove) him when it came to religion and morals. This was included, at that time, in the wife’s duties toward her husband, and was encouraged by preachers.
And Margherita had many pearls of wisdom to share – most likely, pearls she had gathered as she juggled the many responsibilities Francesco had placed on her shoulders, and as she persevered in spite of her loneliness, infertility, and chronic illness (which caused her debilitating pain with each menstruation).
Read More
Related Posts:

The Valley of Vision – Various authors, edited by Arthur Bennett. This has long been one of my favourites.  This is a collection of prayers from Puritans and Puritan-minded folks.  Prayers are here from Thomas Watson, John Bunyan, Charles Spurgeon and many others.  My only complaint about this volume is that it doesn’t tell you where the prayers are from or who wrote which prayers.  

Over the years, I’ve received many requests from people looking for devotional literature. The one person wants a book of devotions for retired couples. The other wants a book for engaged couples. Still another is looking for something for their teenager. I used to search high and low for things I could recommend for these niche needs. No longer.
Now I recommend that people just start with reading the Bible prayerfully.  Why is it that everyone feels they need someone to make the Bible relevant for them?  It’s almost as if we’ve returned to the stereotype of the medieval church:  everyone talks about the Bible but no one reads it for themselves.  The Bible seems to have become a mysterious book which someone else has to interpret and apply for us.
Not to Replace Scripture but Supplement
That said, there is a place for devotional literature.  There is a place for authors to share their meditations on sacred Scripture.  There is a place for us to learn from our forebears how to pray and think Christianly.  Yet these things ought never to replace our going directly to the source for ourselves.  They should be supplementary.
Moreover, I wish we could lose this idea of niche devotionals — the devotional for the unemployed single mother, the devotional for the engaged couple, etc., etc.  This trend is reflective of the narcissism of our day:  everyone needs something crafted exactly for their personal, individual needs.  Whatever happened to the Catholic Church?  Whatever happened to the communion of saints?  Whatever happened to being able to think and apply general truths to your individual needs?
Types of Devotionals
There are different types of devotionals.  There’s your traditional devotional which has a reading for each day of the year.  Usually each day has a Bible passage to read, often just a verse or two.  Most of the time the author expounds and applies that Bible passage, although there are now some devotionals which might rarely or not at all involve a reading from the Scriptures.
There are also devotional books developed out of sermons.  These books go into depth with one or more Scripture passages.  The purpose is not primarily intellectual, but spiritual and transformative.  The Puritans and other older writers are well-known for this type of literature.
Finally, there are devotional books composed of prayers.  You can read through these in a meditative fashion and then use them as the starting point for your own prayers.  You can also pray them for yourself as they’re written.  A deeper and richer prayer life can be gained by listening in to other saints’ communication with our God.
Cautions with Devotionals
Besides the niche concern, I see three other prevalent issues with devotional books.  The first is one I hinted at above:  devotions disconnected from the Bible.  Beware of devotional books which are just presenting an author’s ideas.  Those ideas may be based on the Bible and consistent with the Bible, but the less explicit that becomes the greater the risk of not being able to discern truth from error.
Read More

People cannot identify false prophets by the way they appear because they come to us disguised to look as one would expect true prophets, or true Christians, to look. You can only judge false prophets by their false prophecies and false teachings because when they appear at your door, online, or on television, they look like Christians.

One of the most used and abused verses of scripture among cults and pseudo-Christian groups, in our opinion, is Matthew 7:16, where Jesus said to His disciples, “You will know them by their fruit.” Every cultic group, by ignoring the context, abuses this verse to prove to outsiders that their group are the true Christians. The common attitude of the cults is, “Look at our GOOD works and judge for yourselves whether or not we are the TRUE CHRISTIANS.” The Jehovah’s Witnesses (JWs) boast, “We don’t participate in war, and we are the only ones going door to door to spread the gospel,” etc. The Mormons brag, “Our founder, Joseph Smith, received the truth from an angel. We are the only group that has a living prophet and apostles, and we also have the strongest and closest-knit families, etc.” Marshall Applewhite of Heaven’s Gate fame might say, “Oh, you think that’s Christian? We have deserted our families to follow the new ‘ Christ’ – Applewhite himself – and we are the only ones who have truly followed Jesus’ advice about cutting off offending body parts. Isn’t it obvious from our ‘fruit’ that WE are ‘the truth’?”
For one thing, quite a few groups go “from door to door” proclaiming falsehood, claim to have received their truth from “angels,” and say they are the only true truth, etc. We don’t really know of another group besides Heaven’s Gate that has literally cut off “offending” body parts, and frankly, we really don’t want to know. The point is, any group can say they are the only true Christians based upon their squeaky-clean appearance or the “good works” their group supposedly exhibits, and most Bible-based cults do make that claim.
But Jesus Christ said that He, not any organization or religion or church, is “the truth” (John 14:6). And these cult groups really should give Matthew 7:15-20 another look because it does not say what they try to make it say. Jesus in the passage was not talking about identifying Christians at all! He was warning his listeners to beware of false prophets (verse 15) and instructing them to judge the false prophets by their fruits!
And what, my dears, are the “fruits” of false prophets that we are to judge? False prophecies! Apple trees bring forth apples, and pear trees bring forth pears, and “false prophet trees” bring forth false prophecies! You can bank on it. These false prophecies can be in the form of false predictions of future events (Deuteronomy 13:1-3), or they can be in the form of false teachings that contradict scripture (Deuteronomy 18:20-22). Cults often meet both criteria. Did Armageddon come in 1914, 1925, or 1975 as the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society (JWs) predicted? Has Jesus – allegedly Michael the archangel – already returned “invisibly,” as they also claim? Can human beings become gods, as the Mormons teach? Did Joseph Smith receive hidden golden plates from the angel Moroni, as Joseph – a tall tale teller if there ever was one – himself claimed?
Read More
Related Posts: