Individual vs. Institution
The central conflict between Joan's private judgment and divine inspiration and the institutional authority of the Catholic Church, the feudal system, and the state, which ultimately condemns her for heresy.
Where it surfaces
Preface to Saint Joan
Shaw frames Joan's conflict with the Church and State as a classic struggle between individual conscience and institutional authority, highlighting how institutions suppress dissent to maintain power.
Joan the Original and Presumptuous
Joan's presumption and defiance of official opinion, judgment, and authority highlight the conflict between the individual and established institutions.
Joan and Socrates
Both Joan and Socrates are individuals who challenge the established order and are destroyed by institutional forces.
Failures of the Voices
Joan's expectation of rescue clashes with the institutional indifference of the Church and the Armagnacs, who were glad to be rid of her.
Joan's Manliness and Militarism
Joan's personal drive to live a masculine life conflicts with societal and ecclesiastical expectations of womanhood, setting her against established norms.
Was Joan Suicidal
Joan's defiance of captivity and her choice of death over submission to institutional authority (the English and their allies) exemplifies the conflict between personal will and institutional power.
Heresy and Sanctity
The paradox that Joan was condemned as a heretic by her contemporaries yet later canonized as a saint, highlighting how revolutionary individuals are often persecuted before being recognized as visionary.
Where it surfaces
Joan the Original and Presumptuous
Joan is portrayed as both a pious Catholic and a proto-Protestant martyr, blurring the line between heresy and sanctity.
Was Joan Innocent or Guilty?
Joan is presented as a saint whose 'superbity' led to her condemnation, while her canonization redefined her as a holy figure.
The Modern Education Which Joan Escaped
Shaw redefines heresy and sanctity by comparing Joan's saintly iconography to modern worship of scientific figures, suggesting modern credulities are a form of heresy.
Joan’s Immaturity and Ignorance
Joan is described as having a horror of heretics while being herself a heresiarch, a precursor to schism, illustrating the paradox of her role as both saint and heretic.
Comparative Fairness of Joan’s Trial
Joan and Edith Cavell are both described as arch heretics, persecuted for crossing societal lines.
Joan Not Tried as a Political Offender
The chapter examines the conflict between Joan's personal revelations and the Church's authority, framing her trial as a clash between heresy and sanctity.
Gender and Power
Joan's refusal to accept traditional female roles, her adoption of male dress and military life, and how her 'unwomanly' presumption was a key factor in her persecution and eventual martyrdom.
Where it surfaces
Joan the Original and Presumptuous
Joan's refusal to accept the woman's lot and her dressing as a man challenge traditional gender roles and power structures.
Joan's Good Looks
Explores how Joan's lack of conventional feminine beauty and her commanding presence made her sexually neutral to men, allowing her to operate outside traditional gender roles and pursue her heroic mission.
Joan's Social Position
Joan's pride in her domestic skills and her ability to command respect despite her gender and illiteracy are highlighted, showing how she navigated social expectations.
Joan's Manliness and Militarism
Joan's insistence on male dress and military leadership challenges traditional gender roles, illustrating how power and authority are gendered in medieval society.
Joan Summed Up
Joan's ability to command respect and obedience from all classes, including kings and lords, challenges traditional gender roles.
The Maid in Literature
The chapter critiques how Joan is often feminized or romanticized in literature—for instance, Mark Twain's 'skirted to the ground' and 'ladylike Victorian' Joan—while also noting Andrew Lang's recognition of her capacity for leadership, contrasting with Anatole France's skepticism about her abilities.
Nationalism and Patriotism
Joan as an early apostle of French nationalism, whose military and political actions helped forge a national identity, contrasting with the medieval ideal of a unified Christendom.
Where it surfaces
Joan the Original and Presumptuous
Joan is described as one of the first apostles of Nationalism, embodying early French national sentiment.
The Maid in Literature
English patriotism is cited as a force that may have compelled Shakespeare to alter his portrayal of Joan from sympathetic to scurrilous, reflecting how nationalistic sentiment can distort historical representation in literature.
Comparative Fairness of Joan’s Trial
Edith Cavell's rejection of patriotism as insufficient is contrasted with nationalistic reactions to her execution.
Saint Joan
Joan's mission to crown Charles VII and expel the English embodies a nascent French nationalism.
Justice and Injustice
The exploration of how 'judicial murders' are committed by normally innocent people in the name of righteousness, and how historical trials are often biased by politics and prejudice.
Where it surfaces
Was Joan Innocent or Guilty?
The chapter explores the fairness of Joan's trial, the reversal of its verdict, and the subsequent unfair trial of her judges by posterity.
Protestant Misunderstandings of the Middle Ages
Examines the perception of Joan's trial and execution as either just or unjust, depending on historical context.
Comparative Fairness of Joan’s Trial
The chapter explores the inherent unfairness of politically partisan trials and the lack of neutral tribunals.
The Church Uncompromised by Its Amends
Reflects on the injustice of Joan's burning despite a legal and conscientious trial, and the Church's ability to remedy wrongs.
Cruelty, Modern and Medieval
Explores the cruelty of medieval and modern punishments, questioning the justice of both systems.
Variability of Toleration
Shaw contrasts the legal rigor of Joan's trial with the lawless persecution of modern political dissidents.
Faith and Reason
The tension between Joan's visionary faith (her voices and visions) and the rational, legalistic framework of her judges, with Shaw arguing her visions were a form of superior sanity and genius.
Where it surfaces
Contrast with Napoleon
Contrasts Socrates' rational argument with Joan's faith-driven action, and the irrational fear they inspire.
Joan's Voices and Visions
Explores the tension between rational interpretation of Joan's visions and the faith-based belief in their divine origin.
The Evolutionary Appetite
The chapter examines the tension between rationalist explanations of Joan's visions and a more mystical, evolutionary interpretation, questioning the boundaries between faith, delusion, and superpersonal forces.
The Mere Iconography Does Not Matter
Explores how religious imagery and hallucination mediate between faith, reason, and personal experience of the divine.
The Modern Education Which Joan Escaped
The chapter explores the conflict between medieval religious faith and modern scientific reason, questioning which offers a healthier foundation for the mind.
Failures of the Voices
The chapter explores the interplay between Joan's faith in her voices and her rational decision-making, culminating in a 'Rationalism carried to its ultimate human tests of suicide.'
Historical Interpretation
The theme that history is constantly rewritten to serve contemporary biases—Protestant, Catholic, nationalist—and that understanding Joan requires shedding modern prejudices to see the medieval world as it was.
Where it surfaces
Preface to Saint Joan
Shaw critiques how history is written by the victors and how Joan's legacy has been reinterpreted over centuries, from heretic to saint, reflecting changing political and religious agendas.
Was Joan Innocent or Guilty?
Shaw critiques how Joan's story has been distorted by Jingo patriotism, Protestant polemics, and modern biases, calling for a historian free from such prejudices.
Joan's Good Looks
Discusses the challenge of interpreting Joan's appearance through historical records and art, questioning the authenticity of a potential sculptural portrait and the romanticization of her looks.
Joan's Social Position
The chapter challenges romanticized historical narratives that portray Joan as a poor shepherd girl, instead presenting a more nuanced view of her social standing based on evidence.
Joan's Voices and Visions
Highlights how historians have variously interpreted Joan's voices as evidence of madness, imposture, sorcery, or sainthood.
The Evolutionary Appetite
The chapter critiques how different centuries (19th vs. 20th) have interpreted Joan's experiences, highlighting the evolving nature of historical understanding.
The Tragedy of Greatness
Joan's superior intelligence, courage, and presumption inevitably provoke fear and hatred in lesser minds, leading to her destruction, a pattern Shaw compares to the fate of Socrates.
Where it surfaces
Joan and Socrates
Their superior abilities lead to isolation and martyrdom, illustrating the tragic cost of greatness.
Contrast with Napoleon
Explores how superior beings like Joan, Socrates, and Christ are destroyed by fear, while conquerors like Napoleon escape martyrdom.
Joan's Voices and Visions
Joan's genius and sound strategies are contrasted with the tragic consequences of her being misunderstood and executed.
Was Joan Suicidal
Joan's extraordinary vigor and intensity of character, combined with her deliberate risk-taking, led to her tragic end at the stake, highlighting the cost of greatness.
Joan Summed Up
Joan's extraordinary capabilities and calculated policy set her apart, leading to both her triumphs and her eventual tragic fate.
Unbroken Success Essential in Theocracy
Joan's unbroken success is essential in a theocracy; her failure to maintain it leads to her tragic downfall and political abandonment.
