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Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: CHR-CLI |
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CLERGY, BENEFIT OF , an obsolete but once very important feature in English criminal law. Benefit of clergy began with the claim on the part of the ecclesiastical authorities in the 12th century that every clericus should be exempt from the jurisdiction of the temporal courts and be subject to the spiritual courts alone. The issue of the conflict was that the common law courts abandoned the extreme punishment of death assigned to some offences when the person convicted was a clericus, and tqe church was obliged to accept the compromise and let a secondary punishment be inflicted. The term
was still further extended to include laymen who performed duties in cathedrals, churches, &c., e.g. the choirmen, who were designated " lay clerks." Of these lay clerks or choirmen there was always one whose duty it was to be constantly present at every service, to sing or say the responses as the leader or representative of the laity. His duties were gradually enlarged to include the care of the church and precincts, assisting at baptisms, marriages, &c., and he thus became the precursor of the later parish clerk. In a somewhat similar sense we find bible clerk, singing clerk, &c. The use of the word " clerk " to denote a person ordained to the ministry is now mainly legal or 'formal. The word also developed in a different sense. In medieval times the pursuit of letters and general learning was confined to the clergy, and as they were practically the only persons who could read and write all notarial and secretarial work
special
special
ordinary senses of the word. We find, accordingly, the term
petty
ordinary correspondence, or similar " clerkly " work
house
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