Historical Overview Of The Inquisition
- Part 1

After the Roman Church had consolidated its power in the early Middle Ages, heretics came to be regarded as enemies of society. The crime of heresy was defined as a deliberate denial of an article of truth of the Catholic faith, and a public and obst inate persistence in that alleged error. At this time, there was a sense of Christian unity among townspeople and rulers alike, and most of them agreed with the Church that heretics seemed to threaten society itself.

However, the repression of heresy remained unorganized, and with the large scale heresies in the 11th and 12th centuries, Pope Gregory IX instituted the papal inquisition in 1231 for the apprehension and trial of heretics. The name Inquisition is der ived from the Latin verb inquiro (inquire into). The Inquisitiors did not wait for complaints, but sought out persons accused of heresy. Although the Inquisition was created to combat the heretical Cathari and Waldenses, the Inquisition later extended i ts activity to include witches, diviners, blasphemers, and other sacrilegious persons.

Another reason for Pope Gregory IX's creation of the Inquisition was to bring order and legality to the process of dealing with heresy, since there had been tendencies in the mobs of townspeople to burn alleged heretics without much of a trial. Pope Gregory's original intent for the Inquisition was a court of exception to inquire into and glean the beliefs of those differing from Catholic teaching, and to instruct them in the orthodox doctrine. It was hoped that heretics would see the falsity of the ir opinion and would return to the Roman Catholic Church. If they persisted in their heresy, however, Pope Gregory, finding it necessary to protect the Catholic community from infection would have suspects handed over to civil authorities since these her etics had violated not only Church law but civil law as well. The secular authorities would apply their own brands of punishment for civil disobedience which, at the time, included burning at the stake.

The inquisitiors, or judges of this medieval Inquisition were recruited almost exclusively from the Franscian and Dominican orders. In the early period of the institution, the Inquisitiors rode the circut in search of heretics, but this practice was short lived. The Inquisitors soon acquired the right to summon the suspects from their homes to the Inquisition center. The medieval Inquisition functioned only in a limited way in northern Europe. It was employed most in the south of France and in nor thern Italy.

Throughout the Inquisition's history, it was rivaled by local ecclesiastical and secular jurisdictions. No matter how determined, no pope succeeded in establishing complete control of the institution. Medieval kings, princes, bishops, and civil auth orities wavered between acceptance and resistance of the Inquisition. The institution reached its apex in the second half of the 13th century. During this period, the tribunals were almost entirely free from any authority, including that of the pope. T herefore, it was almost impossible to eradicate abuse.

The first implementations of the papacy using the sword against heretics were the Crusades, which involved sending armies out to forcibly convert those who didn't agree with the Pope (specifically the Muslims inhabiting the Holy Lands). The first Crusade went really well, but subsequent efforts to recapture the magic were miserable failures.

After a series of embarrassing setbacks, the Church turned its attention inward, busying itself with the task of rooting out the disloyal and misguided within its own domains, primarily Europe.

That's when the Inquisition was born.

Technically, the Inquisition is an ongoing function of the church (more on this below), but when people talk about "the Inquisition," they're usually referring to one of two historically notable incidents: the Albigensian Inquisition, or the Spanish Inquisition.

The Abigensian Inquisition was the first major operation of the sort put on by the Catholic Church. In southern France, a Christian sect known as the Cathars arose around the 12th century.

The Cathars become popular in the Languedoc region of France by living a chaste and ascetic lifestyle which was considerably more in the teachings of Jesus than the local clergy, who were at the time a motley crew of fornicating, corrupt money-grubbers.

The pope, motivated in large part by a lust for the wealth and lands of Languedoc, ordered a Crusade and subsequently an Inquisition in the region to stamp out the heretics and assume ownership of their property. The Crusade were very transparently about wealth and political power, so it failed to actually root out the alleged enemy, namely the Cathars. Once the mainstream Catholics had taken control of the region, they moved belatedly to squash the actual believers.

In 1233, Pope Gregory IX pronounced the official beginning of "The Inquisition," and send a cadre of Dominican monks to carry it out. When they arrived in town, the Inquisitors laid out a deadline: Everyone had one month to confess all your warped, evil beliefs and come back into the fold, with only a minimal punishment.

When the month expired, all hell broke loose. The monks began staging trials, with the support of the local government. Any accusation of heresy was enough to start a trial going, and the names of the accusers were kept secret. The trials themselves were held in secret. After a brief flirtation with the concept of a "right to an attorney," all due process was dispensed with. The only appeal of a guilty verdict was to the pope.

The monks decided that the only way you could really be sure if someone was a heretic was to torture them extensively and creatively, just like Jesus would have wanted. Although the later Inquisitors would become far more creative in the use of machinery to support their efforts, the Dominicans were only subject to the papally decreed limit of citra membri diminutionem et mortis periculum, which meant "don't kill 'em" and "no amputations."

The medieval inquisition went on for a couple of centuries, during which time a lot of scores were settled in the South of France. Everyone and anyone with a grudge could hand over their friends, families, enemies and business rivals to the Inquisitors, who were anxious to meet their quotas. The punishment for a guilty verdict in an Inquisitorial trial could range from loss of property to prison to burning at the stake. And the verdict was almost always guilty.

In addition to uncounted numbers of completely innocent people, the Inquisition did succeed where the Albigensian Crusade had failed. By the time it was over, there were no more Cathars. There were also no more Knights Templar. The Knights had been a particularly wealthy and powerful secret society based in the region. The Catholics may have had other motives for killing them. Which is a whole other article. Or two or three.

You probably didn't expect that we would now discuss the Spanish Inquisition. But then, nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! In the late 15th century, a new branch of the Inquisition was formed in Spain. The Spanish Inquisition was founded on the somewhat ludicrous notion that Jews and Muslims were pretending to covert to Catholicism in order to undermine the church in Spain.

 

Tomas de Torquemada was appointed to, uh, whip the Inquisition into shape.

Since the determination of what someone secretly believes in their heart is complicated by the lack of external and incontrovertible evidence, the Spanish Inquisition quickly became notorious for a) extremely creative use of torture and b) its tendency to be unleashed on just about anyone at any time, for any reason, or for no reason at all (thus the "nobody expects" element).

Although you might have a picture of a quaint medieval hysteria, the Spanish Inquisition went on for THREE HUNDRED YEARS, lasting well into the 1800s. The first five years of the Spanish Inquisition were basically rampant mayhem with no appreciable diminishment of the "threat" from the fake Catholics. As a result, Tomas de Torquemada was appointed to, uh, whip the Inquisition into shape.

He succeeded beyond the Church's wildest nightmares. Thousands and thousands of "heretics" were burned at the stakes throughout the duration of the Spanish Inquisition (the exact numbers are unknown). There was no such thing as an "alleged" heretic under the Inquisitions reign of terror; there were only "repentant" and "unrepentant" heretics.

"Repentant" heretics were those who confessed their heresy and agreed to shell over big bucks to the Church. Poor people accused of heresy (who were relatively fewer) could only save themselves with full confessions and by naming the names of other heretics.

To assist people in repenting, the Inquisitors used any torture method they could think of, with the theoretical restriction that they couldn't break the skin. The Inquisitors came up with numerous gadgets to work within this restriction.

Methods of execution weren't much better. Since death was the eventual outcome, the skin-breaking point was rendered largely moot. While burning at the stake was the most widely used method, being cost-effective and providing a fun spectacle for the whole family, there were other approaches used in special cases:

The last burning organized by the Inquisition was in 1834, when the Spanish Inquisition was officially abolished. But though Torquemada's legacy has been laid to rest, the Inquisition lives on.

Based in Vatican City, the Holy Office of the Inquisition is still one of the most powerful branches of the Church hierarchy. In 1965, the P.R.-sensitive Pope Paul VI rebranded the Inquisition as the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, but it was still basically the Inquisition.

The modern church lacked the political power to institute wide-ranging reigns of terror and torture around the world, so the Congregation has to settle for sternly admonishing its targets these days.

Instead of being the most feared institution in the entire civilized world, the Congregation had to settle for making obscure theological pronouncements — in Latin, no less. So just in case you actually wanted to care about what they had to say, you wouldn't be able to read it anyway. In 1966, Paul VI even revoked its ability to ban books, leaving the Inquisition toothless and largely irrelevant going into the 21st century.

The Roman Inquisition

A third variety of the Inquisition was the Roman Inquisition. Alarmed by the spread of Protestantism and especially by its penetration into Italy, Pope Paul III in 1542 established in Rome the Congregation of the Inquisition. This institution was al so known as the Roman Inquisition and the Holy Office. Six cardinals including Carafa constituted the original inquisition whose powers extended to the whole Church. The "Holy Office" was really a new institution related to the Medieval Inquisition only by vague precedents. More free from episcopal control than its predecessor, it also conceived of its function differently. Some saw its establishment as an attempt to counter-balance the severe Spanish Inquisition at a time when much of Italy was under Spanish rule. Whereas the medieval Inquisition had focused on popular misconceptions which resulted in the disturbance of public order, the Holy Office was concerned with orthodoxy of a more academic nature, especially as it appeared in the writings of theologians. In its first twelve years, the activities of the Roman Inquisition were relatively modest and were restricted almost exclusively to Italy. Cardinal Carafa became Pope Paul IV in 1555 and immediately urged a vigorous pursuit of "suspects." His snare did not exclude bishops or even cardinals of the Church. Pope Paul IV carged the congregation to draw up a list of books which he felt offended faith or morals. This resulted in the first Index of Forbidden Books (1559). Although succeeding popes tempered the zeal of the Roman Inquisition, many viewed the institution as the cutomary instrument of papal government used in the regulation of Church order. This was the institution that would later put Galileo on trial.

The Spanish Inquisition

A second variety of the Inquisition was the infamous Spanish Inquisition, authorized by Pope Sixtus IV in 1478. Pope Sixtus tried to establish harmony between the inquisitors and the ordinaries, but was unable to maintain control of the desires of Ki ng Ferdinand V and Queen Isablella. Sixtus agreed to recognize the independence of the Spanish Inquisition. This institution survived to the beginning of the 19th century, and was permanently suppressed by a decree on July 15, 1834.

The Spanish Inquisition is known for the terror it caused the inhabitants of the Iberian peninsula. Although the Inquisition originally began to purify the nation from heretics, it came to have more materialistic, racial, and political motives, instead of just purification. The beginning of the Inquisition is generally credited to the reign of Ferdinand V and Isabella. In truth, it began before that time, and carried on long after Ferdinand and Isabella passed away. In order to better understand the Inquisition and the reasons behind it, it is necessary to first examine the events that led up to it.

The Jewish people are often associated with wealth and with being a plague to the society to which they belong. Fourteenth-century Spain was no different. In the city of Seville, there was an archdeacon named Martinez who continually tried to incite the people to purge themselves of the "dirty" Jewish citizens. After several reproaches by the Spanish Cardinal and the Pope, Martinez finally succeeded. On Ash Wednesday (March 15,1391), Martinez incited his congregation to riot. The crowd moved enmasse towards the Juderia (Jewish quarter). Some of the participants were captured by the police and flogged or beaten, but that was not enough to stop the mob. Although they did not succeed that day to destroy the Jews, the feelings that Martinez had evoked lay simmering until June 6th when the mob sacked the Juderia of Seville. It is believed that the victims numbered in the hundreds, if not thousands (C. Roth, The Spanish Inquisition, 1964). After that episode and a few sporadic others, the Jews thought themselves to be free of those problems, but this was not to be the case.

When Ferdinand V and Isabella were married, it united Aragon and Castille, the two most powerful states in Spain. At the time, Spain was on the verge of becoming one of the wealthiest nations of the period. A large part of that was due to the Jewish community. After their ordeal with Archdeacon Martinez, many Jews had professed to believe in Christianity to free themselves from persecution. It is doubtful, however, that many of the conversos, as they were to become known, were truly converted to the Christian faith. However, these conversos came to enrich and perhaps dominate almost every aspect of Spanish society (Roth, 1964). The problem was that the Jews were getting all of the things the non-Jewish, Catholic people wanted. The Jews were able to gain wealth and positions of power and authority in the kingdom as new Christians. The Catholics, however, could not do anything to them because these new Christians were at least in profession Christian.

The hierarchy of the Spanish church became concerned with the reports of heresy of some of its new members. Then in 1478, the time came that the "true Christians" had been waiting for. A young cavalier, who was trying to court a Jewish girl, went to meet the girl and came upon a group of Jews and conversos in some mysterious celebration. That night was the Jewish Passover, and the assembled had come together to celebrate it. The problem was further exacerbated because that week was also the Holy Week for the Catholic church. News spread quickly of the blaspheme that had been done. A few months later, at the urging of the heads of the Spanish church, Pope Sixtus issued a Papal Bull giving authority for an Inquisition. However, the authorization was actually given to the Spanish crown. They were to be the ones who would appoint the bishops to complete the Inquisition. Thus, the Spanish Inquisition was founded to purify the nation from heretics (Roth, 1964). Although purification was the original intent for the Inquisition, it came to have more materialistic, racial, and political motives, which led to the terror for which it is infamous.

The Spanish Inquisition was executed at the request of Isabella. She was a very pious and devout Catholic. One of her advisors, who would later become the first General Inquisitor, was Thomas de Torquemada. A rumor exists that while advising the queen in her youth, Thomas had her take a vow that should she ever reach the throne, she would devote herself to the termination of heresy and the persecution of the Jews (Roth, 1964), which at the time seemed unlikely. Now, however, she was in a position to do what she had vowed to do. Besides, the queen had already said she wanted "one country, one ruler, one faith" (N. Dirksen and M. Johnson, The Spanish Inquisition's Effect on the Church, 1996).

The Catholic sovereigns were determined to have a united country, and they did not believe this ambition could be achieved unless all their subjects accepted one religion. This they were determined to bring about through persuasion, if possible, and if not, by force. Spain under Isabella and Ferdinand was ripe for the Inquisition; that was why the cruel institution was embraced so heartily and continued to survive until the nineteenth century (J. Plaidy, The Spanish Inquisition, 1967, p.86).

It is likely that Isabella truly wanted to end heresy within the Catholic faith. Ferdinand, however, was not as pious as his wife and probably saw the opportunity for wealth. It is highly likely that some of Spain's early triumphs abroad and at home were financed through the Spanish Inquisition. This idea of financing without increasing taxes could be seen as Machiavellian in nature. Machiavelli suggested that in order for a ruler to hold his principality, he must not overburden his people with taxes, yet he must not spend all of his funds either, or he would risk not being able to finance the maintenance of his kingdom (N. Machiavelli, The Prince, 1965). It is not likely, however, that Machiavelli would have been pleased with the attitude that the "Catholic Kings" had produced in their subjects.

The Spanish Inquisition was particularly terrifying because of its inherent characteristics. The accused never knew who their accusers were. Once arrested, the accused heretic's properties were seized. These properties were then administered at first by the Crown, and later by the General Inquisitor. This fostered the means for anyone to accuse for personal reasons, or to get gain. In many areas, ". . . men began to wonder whether a man's worldly wealth, as well as his descent, was now become [sic] an incriminating circumstance" (Roth, 1964, p. 60). The Inquisition certainly did not limit itself to purifying only those of the Jewish faith. This was especially true if the accused was found to have any Jewish blood in his ancestry. Even if the accused was now a devout Christian, he was tried as severely as possible because of his roots. The accused was also not allowed to have a lawyer or counsel for his defense, and the names of all witnesses were kept secret from him (Roth, 1964).

The punishments and tortures used to gain confessions are the most famous parts of the Inquisition. Because the trials were for spiritual matters, the Church handled them. However, the punishments were usually very much physical, so they were handled by the state. There were many means of this physical torture for confession. The two most famous or infamous were the strappado or pulley, and the aselli or water torment. The strappado was a device that used ropes to strap a person in by their arms and legs, and then weights were attached to the ends of these ropes. The person was raised to a certain level and then the ropes were released. This created a situation where the body would be stretched
painfully, sometimes enough to produce death (see Figure 1). The aselli was accomplished as a person was brought to lay down on a trestle with sharp-edged rungs and secured with an iron band. Their feet would be elevated above their heads. The accused then had a small piece of linen forced into the gullet. Using a jar (jarra), water would be poured into the mouth and nose producing a state of semi-suffocation. The process would be done repeatedly. While doing that process, the cords binding the limbs would be tightened until it would seem the very veins would explode (Roth, 1964). The torture would not be stopped, but a break could be taken. The difference is that if the torture were stopped, it could not be started again according to church law. But, if the torture was only suspended, it could be resumed at a later time.

The tortures were used on old and young alike to get confessions and to learn of accomplices. In this way, the Spanish tried to ensure they would be pure. Once a confession was reached, if it was heinous enough, the perpetrator would be sentenced to death.

The sentence of death was carried out as the accused was thrown into a fire as an auto de fe (act of faith). The fire was reserved for those who would not admit their heresy, those who relapsed in their heresies, and to other dissenters. The guilty were burned because the church believed they (the church) should not be a direct party in the shedding of blood. To remain free of blood, the church "relaxed" or handed over the guilty to the secular arm. Once handed over, the church would recommend mercy with the qualifier that if the accused was guilty, they be punished by death. It was understood that the secular authorities would immediately condemn those with "relaxed" status to death (Roth, 1964). If the guilty were fortunate enough to die in the prisons instead, they and their families were still not safe. Their dead bodies, along with effigies of those that had escaped to other lands, would be taken along with the living and thrown into the fire. This allowed the lands of all of those people to be confiscated, if that had not already been done. There truly was no escape from the fanaticism of the Spanish Inquisition.

It has been suggested that this was an ethnic, as well as religious, purification. The difference between the Spanish Inquisition and the Papal Inquisition was that the Spanish Inquisition was turned over to secular authorities. The secular authorities were the ones who were in charge of the maintenance and perpetuation of the Inquisition.

It was therefore a primary instrument of Spanish absolutism. Moreover, its independent status enabled it to amass wealth, heaped up by repeated confiscations, and this in itself rendered it a force to be reckoned with in the affairs of the country (Roth, 1964, p. 73).

From the actions of the Spanish Inquisition, it is apparent it was an ethnic cleansing. The Spanish Inquisition and its actions caused 200,000 loyal, but Jewish, Spaniards to leave the country. Surely, the Spanish Inquisition was about more than just religious purity.

The crown gained in many ways due to the Spanish Inquisition. Ferdinand and later monarchs were able to use the guilty as rowers for their war ships. Also, besides increasing in wealth because of the Inquisition, the Spanish crown gained a certain amount of control over the Catholic church in Spain. Because Pope Sixtus gave the authority to the crown, the Catholic church lost some authority and control of Spain.

In summary, the Inquisition in Spain began in 1478 and officially ended in 1808. During that time, 323,362 people were burned and 17,659 were burned in effigy. It is one of the darkest periods in Spanish history. By far, the greatest number of cases tried were for Judaising (Roth, 1964). These were also the cases that were tried the most severely. There were other minorities, of course, that were persecuted, but the majority were Jews. The Inquisition definitely had racial overtones. Although, it can be said that Queen Isabella officially initiated the Spanish Inquisition for the purity of faith, nation, and people, this is probably not the case. The materialistic desires of the aristocracy certainly factor into the reasons for the perpetuation of the Inquisition.

The inquisition is like most other dark periods of history. It was primarily brought on because of prejudices and greed. When one people excel within a society and they make up the minority, they historically are labeled as scapegoats for the problems of the rest of society. The Renaissance period was obviously the same. It seems strange that in the history of man we still have not found a way to deal with our own petty jealousies.

Source: Jason L. Slade (August 6, 1996)

The Mexican Inquisition

References