There are several meanings of the term canon since it appears in the use of everyday language in various ways. The canon can be understood as a rate or tax that is placed on some activity, good or service. It represents what everyone must pay in use of that good or service. On the other hand, in the field of art, the canon is understood as the example or model to follow, the form that must be respected and then filled in with specific information or data. Finally, it also represents the set of laws that govern the considered justice of the Church, that is why it is called "canon law."
The canon can then be a type of tax. Thus, since ancient times, some activities, goods or services are paid for in terms of a rate or tax that entails some type of benefit or protection for those who carry them out or organize them. For example, the canon was the tax that the peasants had to pay in order to be able to use the land that the feudal lord gave them on loan or rent. The canon could take the form of payment in spices or in capital, although the latter has become the almost exclusive means of payment in more recent times. Today, the canon is applied to some economic activities as well as to the purchase of some goods (especially technological) or services (the use of audiovisual media, etc.).
In the second case, the canon is understood as the example or model that each branch of art must follow in order to achieve perfection. This is very visible in the case of painting, sculpture, music, architecture. All these branches of art have had their classical times in which certain canons considered perfect were established and that must be respected by those who want to exercise them. However, the canon in this sense is also denied by many artists in times of crisis or of questioning of classical values.
Finally, the canon is the element that makes up canon law or the Catholic Church. In this sense, the structure of the Church, as well as its operation, its prerogatives and its purpose, is organized through the norms that make up this right.
