Posted on 06/18/2004 9:55:45 AM PDT by xsysmgr
When the sins of the Catholic Church are recited (as they so often are) the Inquisition figures prominently. People with no interest in European history know full well that it was led by brutal and fanatical churchmen who tortured, maimed, and killed those who dared question the authority of the Church. The word "Inquisition" is part of our modern vocabulary, describing both an institution and a period of time. Having one of your hearings referred to as an "Inquisition" is not a compliment for most senators.
But in recent years the Inquisition has been subject to greater investigation. In preparation for the Jubilee in 2000, Pope John Paul II wanted to find out just what happened during the time of the Inquisition's (the institution's) existence. In 1998 the Vatican opened the archives of the Holy Office (the modern successor to the Inquisition) to a team of 30 scholars from around the world. Now at last the scholars have made their report, an 800-page tome that was unveiled at a press conference in Rome on Tuesday. Its most startling conclusion is that the Inquisition was not so bad after all. Torture was rare and only about 1 percent of those brought before the Spanish Inquisition were actually executed. As one headline read "Vatican Downsizes Inquisition."
The amazed gasps and cynical sneers that have greeted this report are just further evidence of the lamentable gulf that exists between professional historians and the general public. The truth is that, although this report makes use of previously unavailable material, it merely echoes what numerous scholars have previously learned from other European archives. Among the best recent books on the subject are Edward Peters's Inquisition (1988) and Henry Kamen's The Spanish Inquisition (1997), but there are others. Simply put, historians have long known that the popular view of the Inquisition is a myth. So what is the truth?
To understand the Inquisition we have to remember that the Middle Ages were, well, medieval. We should not expect people in the past to view the world and their place in it the way we do today. (You try living through the Black Death and see how it changes your attitude.) For people who lived during those times, religion was not something one did just at church. It was science, philosophy, politics, identity, and hope for salvation. It was not a personal preference but an abiding and universal truth. Heresy, then, struck at the heart of that truth. It doomed the heretic, endangered those near him, and tore apart the fabric of community.
The Inquisition was not born out of desire to crush diversity or oppress people; it was rather an attempt to stop unjust executions. Yes, you read that correctly. Heresy was a crime against the state. Roman law in the Code of Justinian made it a capital offense. Rulers, whose authority was believed to come from God, had no patience for heretics. Neither did common people, who saw them as dangerous outsiders who would bring down divine wrath. When someone was accused of heresy in the early Middle Ages, they were brought to the local lord for judgment, just as if they had stolen a pig or damaged shrubbery (really, it was a serious crime in England). Yet in contrast to those crimes, it was not so easy to discern whether the accused was really a heretic. For starters, one needed some basic theological training — something most medieval lords sorely lacked. The result is that uncounted thousands across Europe were executed by secular authorities without fair trials or a competent assessment of the validity of the charge.
The Catholic Church's response to this problem was the Inquisition, first instituted by Pope Lucius III in 1184. It was born out of a need to provide fair trials for accused heretics using laws of evidence and presided over by knowledgeable judges. From the perspective of secular authorities, heretics were traitors to God and the king and therefore deserved death. From the perspective of the Church, however, heretics were lost sheep who had strayed from the flock. As shepherds, the pope and bishops had a duty to bring them back into the fold, just as the Good Shepherd had commanded them. So, while medieval secular leaders were trying to safeguard their kingdoms, the Church was trying to save souls. The Inquisition provided a means for heretics to escape death and return to the community.
As this new report confirms, most people accused of heresy by the Inquisition were either acquitted or their sentences suspended. Those found guilty of grave error were allowed to confess their sin, do penance, and be restored to the Body of Christ. The underlying assumption of the Inquisition was that, like lost sheep, heretics had simply strayed. If, however, an inquisitor determined that a particular sheep had purposely left the flock, there was nothing more that could be done. Unrepentant or obstinate heretics were excommunicated and given over to secular authorities. Despite popular myth, the Inquisition did not burn heretics. It was the secular authorities that held heresy to be a capital offense, not the Church. The simple fact is that the medieval Inquisition saved uncounted thousands of innocent (and even not-so-innocent) people who would otherwise have been roasted by secular lords or mob rule.
During the 13th century the Inquisition became much more formalized in its methods and practices. Highly trained Dominicans answerable to the Pope took over the institution, creating courts that represented the best legal practices in Europe. As royal authority grew during the 14th century and beyond, control over the Inquisition slipped out of papal hands and into those of kings. Instead of one Inquisition there were now many. Despite the prospect of abuse, monarchs like those in Spain and France generally did their best to make certain that their inquisitions remained both efficient and merciful. During the 16th century, when the witch craze swept Europe, it was those areas with the best-developed inquisitions that stopped the hysteria in its tracks. In Spain and Italy, trained inquisitors investigated charges of witches' sabbaths and baby roasting and found them to be baseless. Elsewhere, particularly in Germany, secular or religious courts burned witches by the thousands.
Compared to other medieval secular courts, the Inquisition was positively enlightened. Why then are people in general and the press in particular so surprised to discover that the Inquisition did not barbecue people by the millions? First of all, when most people think of the Inquisition today what they are really thinking of is the Spanish Inquisition. No, not even that is correct. They are thinking of the myth of the Spanish Inquisition. Amazingly, before 1530 the Spanish Inquisition was widely hailed as the best run, most humane court in Europe. There are actually records of convicts in Spain purposely blaspheming so that they could be transferred to the prisons of the Spanish Inquisition. After 1530, however, the Spanish Inquisition began to turn its attention to the new heresy of Lutheranism. It was the Protestant Reformation and the rivalries it spawned that would give birth to the myth.
By the mid 16th century, Spain was the wealthiest and most powerful country in Europe. Europe's Protestant areas, including the Netherlands, northern Germany, and England, may not have been as militarily mighty, but they did have a potent new weapon: the printing press. Although the Spanish defeated Protestants on the battlefield, they would lose the propaganda war. These were the years when the famous "Black Legend" of Spain was forged. Innumerable books and pamphlets poured from northern presses accusing the Spanish Empire of inhuman depravity and horrible atrocities in the New World. Opulent Spain was cast as a place of darkness, ignorance, and evil.
Protestant propaganda that took aim at the Spanish Inquisition drew liberally from the Black Legend. But it had other sources as well. From the beginning of the Reformation, Protestants had difficulty explaining the 15-century gap between Christ's institution of His Church and the founding of the Protestant churches. Catholics naturally pointed out this problem, accusing Protestants of having created a new church separate from that of Christ. Protestants countered that their church was the one created by Christ, but that it had been forced underground by the Catholic Church. Thus, just as the Roman Empire had persecuted Christians, so its successor, the Roman Catholic Church, continued to persecute them throughout the Middle Ages. Inconveniently, there were no Protestants in the Middle Ages, yet Protestant authors found them there anyway in the guise of various medieval heretics. In this light, the medieval Inquisition was nothing more than an attempt to crush the hidden, true church. The Spanish Inquisition, still active and extremely efficient at keeping Protestants out of Spain, was for Protestant writers merely the latest version of this persecution. Mix liberally with the Black Legend and you have everything you need to produce tract after tract about the hideous and cruel Spanish Inquisition. And so they did.
In time, Spain's empire would fade away. Wealth and power shifted to the north, in particular to France and England. By the late 17th century new ideas of religious tolerance were bubbling across the coffeehouses and salons of Europe. Inquisitions, both Catholic and Protestant, withered. The Spanish stubbornly held on to theirs, and for that they were ridiculed. French philosophes like Voltaire saw in Spain a model of the Middle Ages: weak, barbaric, superstitious. The Spanish Inquisition, already established as a bloodthirsty tool of religious persecution, was derided by Enlightenment thinkers as a brutal weapon of intolerance and ignorance. A new, fictional Spanish Inquisition had been constructed, designed by the enemies of Spain and the Catholic Church.
Now a bit more of the real Inquisition has come back into view. The question remains, will anyone take notice?
— Thomas F. Madden is professor and chair of the department of history at Saint Louis University in St. Louis, Missouri. He is the author most recently of Enrico Dandolo and the Rise of Venice and editor of the forthcoming Crusades: The Illustrated History.
All you have to do is hit dictionary.com to find out how wrong you are.
Ex*ter"mi*nate\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Exterminated; p. pr. & vb. n. Exterminating.] [L. exterminatus, p. p. of exterminare to abolish, destroy, drive out or away; ex out + terminus boundary, limit. See Term.] 1. To drive out or away; to expel.
The dictionary disagrees with the almighty and allknowing Havoc. Nice try, though.
The same document from Lateran IV goes on to describe what to do about "exterminated" heretics who repent.
The errors in Wycliffe's translation are straight out of his source: The church-authorized Vulgate.
Monarchs don't "authorize" anything. They have no authority to authorize a translation of the Bible. That belongs to the Church.
Fact: Henry VIII had Tyndale strangled and burned for producing an English translation of the bible.
Fact: Henry VIII had Tyndale's work used to create an English version of the bible three years later.
Fact: Tyndale's work was later used for the famous King James Version.
In light of that, does the Catholic church hold the position that publishers of the King James Version should be burned for error?
Argue all you want, but history is history no matter how ignorant you are of it.
Wycliffe's translation had Wycliffe's interpretative notes in it as well, which were vigorously anti-Catholic.
But, strictly speaking, Henry VIII didn't have Tyndale burned. He was executed for heresy in Belgium, not England. But he was accused of heresy by an English agent in Henry's pay, in part because Tyndale agreed with the Pope that Henry's marriage to Ann Boleyn was illegitimate.
Stop right there. That's not a fact. As I've struggled to try to get you to understand, the language used is not the factor here. It is the unauthorized and erroneous edition of the Bible that was the problem. Not that it was in English. Is any of this getting through?
In light of that, does the Catholic church hold the position that publishers of the King James Version should be burned for error?
Is the KJV an "authorized" version by the Catholic Church? No. It's still as error-prone as it was when it was first written.
As for the remedy for producing an erroneous Bible in this secular nation? That is not the Church's decision, is it? We don't advocate killing people just for professing, say, Islam. But when their beliefs lead to a disruption of society, we may seek to reduce the threat posed.
SD
Another "fact," eh?
SD
That's beside the point. The protestants by the same measure are something basically good. That doesn't make either of you scripturally right when you take it upon yourselves to "throw the first stone". And I truly don't care which group it is. I study Religions as a hobby - mostly after the type of a Walter Martin. I've done so for quite a long time. And I've got little use for handwringing from any group, Lutheran, Mormon, Jehovah's witnesses, Roman Catholics, Orthodox, it matters not a whit to me. If you pick up the name of Christ and start waving it as a banner but aren't following scripture, I'm going to defend scripture. If you stand up and lie openly with Christ's standard out in front of you, I'm gonna call you a liar. Simple as that. Mormons want to walk through the bible and pick out verses here and there - 'look God has hands, he has feet, he has hair... God is a man.' I say, Psalm 57:1 - God has wings - he's a chicken. That is mildly funny; but, it's terribly absurd that one should have to make it that blatent - even if I have to uncerimoniously lift the example from Walt Martin LOL.
Translation: I am Havoc the Great, I alone have all knowledge, I alone am fit to judge the actions of all others.
You don't even see how much you fit the profile of the publican who prays to God "Oh thank you for not making me like them."
SD
I suppose there is no difference in your mind?
Is the KJV an "authorized" version by the Catholic Church? No. It's still as error-prone as it was when it was first written.
LOL. I would love to see a compilation of what the Catholic church finds erroneous in any translation, especially the KJV as the entire civilized world finds the KJV to be a very good translation.
Hello? Those who give credence to the teachings of theheretics are those who believe in heresy. "Credence" means belief, at least in most major dictionaries. You results may vary.
SD
This is one of the best articles I have ever read on the Inquisition.
BTW, the primary target of the Inquisition was the clergy. In Mexico, for example, only one layperson, an Indian who refused to stop acting as what would be similar noawdays to a "santería" priest, was put to death by the Inquisition. The rest were all clergy, and they were punished for things ranging from wilfully teaching false doctrine - to having enslaved or sexually abused Indians.
Another "fact," eh?
And I suppose that since George Bush wasn't in Iraq when Hussein was arrested, he had nothing to do with it?
Between unauthorized and erroneous? Not really. Why would someone act without authority except to spread error? Or at lest to encourage others to follow in disobedience?
I would love to see a compilation of what the Catholic church finds erroneous in any translation, especially the KJV as the entire civilized world finds the KJV to be a very good translation.
The entire Protestant world finds the KJV to be a good translation. Many respect its way with words and bow to its impact upon our language.
But that doesn't mean that it is without flaw. And, for these conversations, it doesn't mean that the first English Bible were not printed in order to spread error and disobedience.
Here's one example:
KJV Luke 2: 14 Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.
NIV:14"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."
AMP:14Glory to God in the highest [heaven], and on earth peace among men with whom He is well pleased [[1] men of goodwill, of His favor].
(interstingly enough, the footnote is that this wording is from the Wycliffe Bible. Didn't make it to the KJV which totally boned up this verse)
NAB: 14 "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests."
Just one example. The KJV confuses God granting favor on those with whom He is pleased" or "with those on whom His favor rests" with a general "good will towards men."
This is not a minor point.
SD
>>Maybe, but that doesn't change the fact that the focus was to force people to believe very specific things. If nothing else, I hope they learned that you can't force someone to believe something. You can only force them to pretend they believe.<<
Hey, it was working until the Protestants figured out to attack whenever Rome was preoccupied withe the Muslims.
>>How many people would OJ Simpson have to kill to be guilty of murder?<<
>>Answer: More than two, obviously.<<
>>How many people must the Inquisition put to death to be an unforgiveable atrocity?<<
>>Answer: The heretics were put to death by merciful religious people, thus saving them from being put to death by those awful secularists. It isn't the quantity of death, so much as the quality the redeems.<<
No, 99% of them WERE saved, according to the article. And you just might find out that you would also consider most of the 1% who were killed guilty of something, too.
you're handwringing again. You said one thing and got burnt on it because it was wrong, now you are changing your story. Why don't you tell everyone what I didn't say.. that they were given a year to recant and if they failed to do so within a year, they would be judged a heretic. Just like the nobles failing to prosecute heresy with the death penalty - anyone who didn't was excommunicated, given a year to recant, then deemed a heretic themselves if they didn't - ie the death penalty.
Give us some more minimalist maneur Dave. God has already judged those men guilty of murdering innocents under the auspices of being "heretics". It isn't about that at this point - not for me. And I've made that clear. The problem I have with you is that it was A) wrong in the first place and you won't fix it B) Done and now you want to lie about it. Many of you say not just that it wasn't that bad; but these threads just today say it was the right thing to do. Now, that tells us you haven't learned either from scripture or from history and that the Pope had no reason to apologize. If he had no reason to apologize and ya'll have to lie about complicity, then all this is - is a pr stunt trying to BS people into the Roman Church. And it's pretty lame and dispicable.
ping
>>what is it that Galileo went through starting in 1611? <<
Given that Gallileo was attempting to prove nihilism, I doubt few Protestant churches would have treated him as gently as the Catholic church... whose horrific treatment was being given free room and board. Had Gallileo stayed in a Protestant area, he'd probably be burned at the stake
To see how the church dealt with the topic of geocentrism, look to Copernicus.
Perhaps you'd like to investigate the backgrounds of the researchers and determine if they were merely propagandistic hacks, or the best experts in their fields. Could it be that it was the British and American text-book publishers who didn't like Catholicism?
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