Notes on the Inquisition

In 1998 the Vatican released documents relating to the Inquisition and opened the Secret Archives of the Inquisition.
The question that must be answered is how did an institution within the Catholic Church become an instrument that would torture and kill thousands over the course of six centuries?

There never was one central Inquisition. Instead there were separate institutions in Spain, Portugal, and Italy that all shared a fear of religious heresy.
In 1100 A.D. the Catholic faith was the only legal religion of the Holy Roman Empire in Europe.
Clergy and regular people were concerned with pleasing God and attaining salvation. They all feared God’s harsh judgment.
Those that challenged the Church were labeled sinners and heretics.
Heresy was seen as treason against God and punishable by death since treason itself was punishable by death and the Catholic faith was the only legal religion.
The Waldensians were a Christian reform group that traveled throughout France, preached, and advocated for a simpler view of Christianity. They interpreting the Bible in their own ways. The Church responded by making it a requirement that anyone peaching publicly needed the local bishop’s approval. When the Waldensians did not get the required license they were excommunicated and labeled heretics.
Cathars were another group that believed that only theirs was the true faith. They also posed a threat to the Church. In 1208, a Cathar supporter killed a papal representative in southern France. Pope Innocent III responded by officially declaring a new crusade. The new crusade would be against heretics.
The Pope called on knights and noblemen in northern France to come to his aid in southern France to defeat the Cathars in what became known as the Albigenzian Crusade (after a cathedral in southern France).
Cathar Perfecti (priests) were easily recognizable due to their black robes and were executed on the spot.
The Pope soon realized that killing heretics was only pleasing to the devil. Instead he turned to the existing judicial system of the time.
The judicial system of the 1200s was accusatorial. A person accused another in public of a crime and then he had to prove that person’s guilt. If the accuser failed to prove the person’s guilt, he would be punished in the same way that the accused would have been had he been found guilty. This made people reluctant to step forward as accusers.
Pope Innocent III realized this wouldn’t work in his new crusade and called the noblemen of Europe together to change the legal rules for prosecuting heretics. Thus, the Inquisition was born.
The inquisitorial system allowed an accuser to build an entire case against a person by gathering the opinions of others. No proof was needed. By 1231, Pope Gregory IX called for inquisitors to seek out heretics. Those that refused to recant their heretical religious beliefs and stop preaching them were to be burned at the stake.
The problem was that good inquisitors were hard to find because most of the good ones were fanatical and out of control.
Conrad of Marburg, one of the most ruthless and famous inquisitors, operated by recruiting a lynch mob, arresting the accused heretic, and then offering him choice: recant or be burned alive.

Because of radicals like Conrad and Robert (in northern France) the Pope stopped appointing ad hoc inquisitors and turned to the Dominicans. By the mid-15th century the Dominicans traveled to France, Italy, Germany, and Spain to seek out and prosecute heretics.
They used clerical spies to gather personal information about accused heretics.
The Dominicans traditionally arrived in towns, preached a sermon about the dangers of heresy, then allowed a period of grace for people to come forward and confess their sins to receive a light punishment. A few weeks would pass and the grace period would end. The edict of faith (auto de fe) phase would then begin where people could come forward and accuse one another of heresy. All testimony was given in secrecy, and therefore, everyone was encouraged to come forward and denounce their neighbors.
Fear and terror were used against everyone in society.
The Inquisitor had to have credible testimony from two credible witnesses to go through with an interrogation.
When the accused was brought forward, the case against him was often almost finished. The accused was asked to list any enemies against him when he was first brought forward and that testimony was supposed to be disregarded. He never learned the names of his accusers or what he was accused of doing. It was very difficult to prove one’s innocence. It also required that he provide the names of additional heretics before being set free.
The alternative was to risk imprisonment and loss of property.
Locking people away with no food was one common way to get people to confess.
Bernard Guy- wrote one manual on how to conduct the inquisition.
1376 Nicolas Eymeric of Aragon wrote another manual on how to trick the accused and get them to confess.

Torture was considered a legitimate form of lie detection when there was sufficient other evidence to justify using it.
Before 1252, torture was not permitted, but after the Cathar supporter murdered the papal official, it was permitted.
Confessions by torture were encouraged.
Those who refused to recant and those who appeared to know more than they admitted were subject to torture
Inquisitors hired professional torturers to carry out the actual torturing.
The method used were to describe the torture method to the accused, to show him or her torture devices to be used, and then finally, to begin torturing. At each step the inquisitor continually asked the accused to confess his or her sins.
At every instance the inquisitor’s notary was ready and prepared to record a confession.
Common torture devices included: the strappado and leg and arm screws and vices.
The inquisitors rationalize the whole process as benevolent since if the accused confessed his sins, he could make good with God.
If a confession was obtained during torture, the torture would stop, time would be given for the person to heal, and then he would be asked again to confessin order to determine whether the torture itself caused the confession or whether it was authentic.

The conviction rate of inquisitors was nearly 90%.
Because of the fear involved, inquisitors could have obtained confessions about almost anything. People were also scared into accusing friends and families.
Penances or punishments were to shame people (wearing a yellow cross). Those who recanted their sins and then sinned again were put to death.
Since inquisitors could not physically harm the accused (if blood was ever seen during torture it had to end), they turned them over to the secular authorities for punishment and execution.
The civil authorities would bring the guilty outsidethe city and burn them at the stake.

Sometimes dead people were accused. They bodies are exhumed and burned. Then their property was confiscated from their relatives, leaving their families poor.
Within 150 years, most Cathars and Waldensians were gone. The inquisition in the 15th century then turned on witches.
They believed that in order for a witch or sorcerer to get magical powers they must have made a deal with the devil. For that reason, they were sought out by the inquisition.
Many Knights Templar and Joan of Arc were accused and convicted of sorcery.
In 1486, the Malleus Maleficarum (“Hammer of the Witches”) was written on how to identify, try, and punish witches (the book was entirely anti-female and depicted thetypical version of the female witch- it also accused women of being weaker in mind and spirit and more susceptible to the temptations of evil, their passions, and lust than men)
Over the next 200 years, Malleus Maleficarum became the key document in prosecuting witches in Europe and in North America

Most inquisitorial tribunals ran out of steam and ended as time passed but by the end of the 1300s, Jews had become the subject of the Inquisition.
In 1391 the king of Spain declared that in order for Jews to remain in Spain, they had to convert to Christianity. Within a short amount of time, because of the new occupations that opened up to these conversos as Christians, many rose to high positions in society and were falsely accused of Judaizing- or secretly remaining Jewish after their conversion.
When Ferdinand and Isabella were married,Judaizing was causing issues in Spain. Ferdinand saw it as an opportunity to get more money from the accused. They called upon the Church to order a new Spanish Inquisition to root out judaizers (this inquisition was highly controlled by King Ferdinand- they were his men, although they were approved by the Pope).
In the early 1500s, the first Auto de Fe occurred in Seville, Spain and 100 conversos were accused. 6 were burned at the stake.
Lighting candles, bathing, washing clothes, butchering meat, preparing meat for the table, or eating meat on a day for fish (Friday or Wednesday) could get one accused. People were forced to provide additional names just to escape harsh penalties.
Inquisitor Torquemada was Spain’s first Inquisitor General and founder of the Spanish Inquisition. During his 20-year tenure, 2,000 people were killed and many thousands more were tortured.
All those who fled the inquisition were guilty. All those who came forward and confessed their sins were guilty. All those tried and determined to be heretics were guilty.
There was no trial, just a series of audiences, after which one returned to his jail cell.
In 1492 Jews either accepted baptism or were forced to leave Spain.
In 1499 Muslims either converted or forced to leave Spain (the Mariscos)
In 1609 the Spanish king declared that the Mariscos were beyond conversion and simply decided to expel all Muslims from Spain.

Interestingly, torture was used sparingly, simply to obtain a confession
There were precise rules for torture (only small loin cloth couldcover private parts)
The Spanish Inquisition commonly used the rack and the toca as torture devices
Torture could only be done three times, and only for 15 minutes at a time. Confessions obtained in tortureweren’t official unless repeated 24-hours later without torture
San Benito robes replaced the old yellow crosses and had to be worn at the Auto de Fe (Act of Faith) judgments and thereafter. Around town you would be humiliated and have rocks thrown at you.
Forced slavery on Spanish ships was also a possible punishment for heresy
After the expulsions of 1492 many Jews fled to Portugal. Portugal forced their conversion to Christianity and then the Portuguese Inquisition began with similar results
The Portuguese inquisition was even harsher than the Spanish

After the Spanish Conquest of the Aztecs in 1521 the Inquisition took on a new role in the new world and was called the Provisorato de Indios
The priests in the new world saw it as their duty to convert natives to Christianity but over time came to believe that the Indians were beyond capable of being converted

In 1517 Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on the door of the church at Wittenberg
The reformation took Europe by storm, especially in northern Europe
Organized Protestant groups in Spain opened up the Inquisition once again and a papal bull allowed the execution for first time offenders in Spain (1559-1562)
Foreign sailors and travelers sometimes found themselves before the Inquisition
The printing press and books spread the horror of the Inquisition throughout Europe

The Roman Inquisition under the Pope formed in the 16th century
Prisoners could get an attorney (and even have an attorney appointed for free) and call witnesses on their own behalf
The attack on Protestants was not all the Roman Inquisition did. It also formed a list of banned books
Giordano Bruno (burned at the stake in 1600)
Galileo Galilei (convicted in 1633 but lived his life under house arrest in Venice)
In the 17th and 18th centuries all Inquisitions declined and were seen as an out-dated instruments
By 1773 the auto de fe was outlawed in Portugal
In 1808 when Napoleon marched into Spain he disassembled the Inquisition
In 1820 the Inquisition was finally disbanded
In 1965 Pope Paul reorganized the inquisition but it still exists today solely as an advisory board. It does not interrogate people or torture any longer.