By Brother Aurembald
Let us speak plainly, friends: the Kingdom’s marketplaces are filled with wares of every kind — boots, bread, beetroot wine, and occasionally an alarming number of onions. But they are also filled with that murkier exchange: the dance of the haggle.
It is an ancient rite, older than parchment, older than coins, older perhaps than patience itself. And yet it is not without moral shape.
There is a distinction to be made — indeed, several.
The first is what we might call The Haggle Game: a customary exchange of offers and counteroffers, known to both parties as a form of ritual. It occurs most often in open markets, where prices are suggestions and both buyer and seller understand the rules. This is a form of commerce that, when done with good humour and mutual dignity, does no harm to the soul. In fact, it may strengthen it — teaching prudence, humility, and the art of not speaking too soon.
The second is when the merchant, emboldened by weather or a surplus of foot traffic, prices a turnip as if it were a ruby. In such cases, the buyer may — should — gently call attention to the imbalance. To question excess is not sin. Our Lord overturned the tables of the moneychangers, not the baskets of the honest.
But the third — and here lies the edge — is when one attempts to haggle down a price that is already fair. To do so is to say, in effect, “Your labour, your cost, and your bread are worth less to me than I know they are.” This, though not criminal, begins to resemble injustice. And injustice, when made habitual, hardens the heart.
It is not the bargain that damns us. It is the spirit in which we bargain.
So next time you offer a crown and a half for a fine carving or a perfect jar of pickles, pause and ask: Am I playing a game, correcting a wrong, or quietly declaring that another’s craft is beneath me?
If you’re unsure — pay the asking price. Or walk away kindly. There is grace in both.