This is one of the darkest periods in the history of Christianity. When people point out the dark sides of the Catholic Church, the Inquisition is the first thing that comes to mind. This is a difficult period in history, and it is not surprising that many myths and misconceptions have grown around it.
1. The Inquisition was an isolated event
When we talk about the Inquisition, in no small part, thanks to Monty Python and Mel Brooks, we usually mean the Spanish Inquisition. But she was by no means the only one, although the most famous.
The idea of the Inquisition originated much earlier. Already in the first century, Roman law made allowances for what is called "inquisitorial procedures." There were other methods, for example, the right of the investigation to torture the interrogated.
When Christianity began to spread throughout Europe in the 4th century, laws governed both religious and secular matters. From the very beginning of Christian history, bishops were quite active in the work of the Inquisition.
In 1184, the rules of the Inquisition were changed by Pope Lucius III. the side of more aggressive means of searching and exterminating heresy. During the Middle Ages, religious orders formed groups of people who were supposed to act as inquisitors. Their goal was to change people's behavior, not punish them for it. However, everything changed a few hundred years later with the emergence of the Spanish Inquisition.
Promotional video:
2. Gentiles and Jews
Usually, when thinking about the goals of the Inquisition, we think about those people who worshiped pagan gods, and about the Jews. While they were of course the primary target of the Inquisition, they were not the first targets.
One of the first groups of people targeted by the Inquisition was the Christian Cathar group. The Cathars opposed the Roman Catholic Church, especially its wealth and power. Serious persecution of the Cathars began under Pope Innocent III century. Toulouse. The soldiers were ordered to kill the Cathars, but they could not distinguish them from other Christians. Then the Pope's legate told them: "Kill everyone in a row, God will then choose his own!"
Around the same time, the pope also announced his condemnation of another Christian group, the Waldensians. This group was recognized as heretical by the Roman Catholic Church, including for its disbelief in the existence of purgatory and the idea that someone can consecrate wine and bread. The Waldensians have been active for several hundred years, but ultimately fell victim to accusations of witchcraft.
3. It was longer than you thought
In fact, the purpose of the Inquisition is not torture and death; she was going to eradicate heretical thoughts and actions. Moreover, the inquisitors watched not only what people do, but also what they read. The result was the Banned Books Index. The first official version of the list was published in 1559 by Pope Paul IV and caused much controversy. The idea for the list originated several decades before, and over the next four centuries, the Index was constantly updated and refined.
As many unauthorized religious texts circulated, countless strange entries were added to the Index. Among them are works by Alexandre Dumas, Victor Hugo, Daniel Defoe and Jonathan Swift. Most of the philosophers: Descartes, Mill, Kant, Sartre, and others were also included in this list. It was only in 1966 that the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith stopped publishing and updating the Index of Forbidden Books, although it still claims that highly moral believers should continue to use the list as a guide for which books to read.
In our time, the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith acts as the Inquisition. This is its modern name. The purpose of the Congregation, of which the Sacred Congregation of the General Inquisition was created in 1542, is to protect the church from heresies, according to the Vatican.
4. Prohibition of torture
This is probably the main thing that the Inquisition became famous for. But torture was not always the most common method in the church's arsenal. Some of the earliest writings on freedom of religion, such as the writings of Lactantius, 4th century, argue that whoever defends their religion through torture will not enter the kingdom of heaven. At the beginning of its activity, the Inquisition did not use torture and punishment.
In the 13th century, torture was banned by inquisitors. But they could be present at the tortures carried out by secular executioners. Torture was used to extract confessions, but the upper strata of society were exempted from it. This was the case until 1252, when Pope Innocent IV authorized the members of the Inquisition to use torture as a way to achieve the truth.
Later, torture was used on the condition that the blood of the interrogated was not spilled or there was no incurable damage to the limbs, and the death of the tortured was also not encouraged. This, of course, required the presence of secular executioners at the torture - specialists in such methods of interrogation.
5. Number of executed
How many people died during the Inquisition - no one knows. Some historians claim that millions were killed, while others say tens of thousands. According to an official statement released by the Vatican in 2004, there were far fewer casualties.
According to documents prepared by the Vatican, 125,000 people were brought before the Spanish Inquisition, and only about one percent of them were executed. The results were published following a process that began in 1998. The same study showed that about 25,000 people were executed in Germany for witchcraft, but most of them were not by the hands of the Inquisition itself. The small country of Liechtenstein presented its sad statistics: only 300 people were executed by the Inquisition, but at the time it was about 10 percent of the total population of the country.
The Vatican even issued a statement in which Pope John Paul II apologized for the church's actions in the past.
6. Inquisition in the New World
The Spanish Inquisition was very far away. However, the Inquisition existed not only in Europe - all the Spanish colonies in the New World felt its heavy hand on them. While the monarchs of Europe fought for their share in the New World, Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain were among the most determined supporters of a united nation in the shadow of the Catholic Church. It was under their rule that the Spanish Inquisition gained power. And the Grand Inquisitor Torquemada, with his sinister fame, was the Queen's personal confessor.
When Spain and Portugal were busy colonizing a new continent, people subject to the Inquisition's judgment found many ways to hide in the New World; many persecuted by the Inquisition settled in Lima. By 1520, missionaries and monasteries were allowed to perform all the duties that the Inquisition deemed necessary.
One of the largest museums in Peru is the Museum of the Congress and Inquisition. It opened in 1968 and is still in the building that once housed the Spanish Inquisition. The rooms where testimony was beaten out by torture and the cells in which people served their sentences still serve as a terrible reminder of Lima's Spanish heritage.
7. Everyone was waiting for the inquisitors
The idea of the Spanish inquisitors appearing unannounced on the doorstep and sending ordinary people to the cells for interrogation is still terrifying.
When the inquisitors opened their offices in the region, the first thing they did was announce what they were going to do. Until 1500 they read the Decree of Grace, and after 1500 it was the Decree of Faith. The meaning of the decrees was approximately the same, but they clearly stated the purpose of their activities.
The decrees gave members of the community from two weeks to several months before the court of the Inquisition began work. Any heretic was asked to appear in court and plead guilty. When the deadline came, they started asking questions, and people testified against each other. It was enough for you to get into serious problems if someone testified against you during confession.
It is believed that a huge number of accusations were the result of slander from neighbors or denunciations of those people who thus sought to get rid of competitors or take possession of someone else's property. Denunciations were collected and evaluated, after which the Inquisition knocked on the door. But this was never a surprise.
8. Conflict of the "black legend"
It is not so easy to get completely reliable information about what actually happened. Much of what we know about the Spanish Inquisition (or think we know) is in fact part of a massive smear campaign led by people who simply hate Spain very much, writes Spanish journalist Julian Huderias.
This rather new idea appeared in 1912. Much of the criticism and horror stories about the Spanish Inquisition came from the second half of the 16th century, according to Huderias. The journalist believes that what we know about the Spanish Inquisition is only part of the truth, and that its history was written by representatives of other countries of Protestant Europe, who wanted to present Spanish Catholics in a rather unsightly light.
Converted Catholic reformers, by and large, did not stray far from the Inquisition itself, and this fact is cited as support for the so-called "black legend." After the Protestant movement, focused on heretical Catholics, began to gain strength, everything was not only turned upside down, but also used to pervert the ideas of the Inquisition.
9. Willingness and unwillingness to change
If a person was considered a heretic, this did not mean that he was necessarily tortured or that he was sentenced to death.
In 1391, riots broke out in southern Spain, and eventually about 20,000 people officially converted to Catholicism. The law was a two-edged sword.
As for the Jews, the Catholic Church did not really have jurisdiction and had no real power over them. Those who changed their faith to Catholicism were accepted under the wing of the church and had to be true Catholics. If this did not happen, the Inquisition came to them.
The converts, along with their children and grandchildren, were called converso. Conversion to Catholicism opened some doors for them. There were jobs that were only available to Catholics, and many trade opportunities that were closed to those who were not adherents of the "true religion."
By 1391, the converso formed a new middle class in Spain, and this became a problem for the Inquisition. It consisted in the fact that the converso were moving too quickly up the hierarchical ladder for people whom no one truly believed. As a result, the church was forced to monitor them to make sure that they regularly attend confession, receive communion and are baptized, as promised.
10. Survivors
There were people who fought against the Inquisition and won, such as Maria de Casaglia. The trial against her began in 1526, and in 1530 she was arrested. Maria, a member of the upper class and sister of the bishop, was a converso, that is, with a label that was supposed to work against her. In 1534, she was found guilty on several charges, including adherence to the Protestant idea, opposing the saints with the religious authority of a mortal woman, and arguing that sex is a more religious experience than prayer.
Over the next several years, she experienced torture, imprisonment and countless interrogations. Maria did not accuse anyone of heresy and did not confess to anything. It was justified in a discussion within the framework of church doctrines. In the end, the court was unable to find any concrete evidence against her, and after nearly 10 years of investigation, she paid a small fine and was exempted from prosecution by the Inquisition. What happened to her later is unknown.
