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Mirdath
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Yet the Church could have acted at any time to stop it. Do you not recall how kings abased themselves and did penance at the mere threat of excommunication or interdict?
Were it almost always nonviolent, I somehow doubt we’d have all the incredible technological advances in the field of torture implements that the Inquisition came up with. As I said, there are entire museums full of the stuff – it’s quite something. And it was not there just to look pretty.
Even to the point of becoming as bad as or worse than that which it is defending itself against?
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LJN21
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Yeah people can be pretty sick.
“Historians” have spent lots of time over the years down playing the massacre of Catholics (and other non-Church of England believers) in England while playing up the Inquisitions.
Just because there are Museums full of stuff doesn’t mean they were used during the Inquistion. Just because the sign says they were also doesn’t mean that was the truth in the matter.
The turth is most of your “advances” came form other countries that used torture exesivesly. Hence why people wanted to be tried by the Inquistion!
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rr1213
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When a Bishop knew that a priest under his jurisdiction had engaged in these acts, and did not turn the priest over to the police but instead sent the priest to another parish, the Bishop acted improperly. If I was the local prosecutor and the evidence showed me this, the Bishop would be indicted for being an accessory after the fact. Likewise, if the Church concurs with burning people alive, and hands people over to the State to be incinerated, then there is complicity on the part of the Church.
And, as I’ve noted a million times in this thread, it doesn’t matter if the offending party is the Catholic Church, Anglican Church, Lutheran Church or whatever. The nature of sin does not change based on church membership.
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BelFarfalla
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“Ferdinand II of Aragon pressured pope Sixtus IV to agree to letting him set up an Inquisition controlled by the monarchy by threatening to withdraw military support at a time when the Turks were a threat to Rome. Sixtus VI later accused the Spanish inquisition of being overzealous, accused the monarchs for being greedy and issued a bull to stop it, but he was pressured into withdrawing the bull.”
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Inquisition
I believe that the Pope made demands on the Spanish crown to stop the inquisition and was ignore.
While people believe that the Pope had ultimate power over all the rulers of Europe, this has not true.
Do you have a link to this stuff?
This is often what happens is it not?
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rr1213
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Discussing Church control, as opposed to State control, of the Spanish Inquisition:
“[T]he predominant ecclesiastical nature of the [Spanish] institution can hardly be doubted. The Holy See sanctioned the institution, accorded to the grand inquisitor canonical installation and therewith judicial authority concerning matters of faith, while from the grand inquisitor jurisdiction passed down to the subsidiary tribunals under his control. Joseph de Maistre introduced the thesis that the Spanish Inquisition was mostly a civil tribunal; formerly, however, theologians never questioned its ecclesiastical nature. Only thus, indeed, can one explain how the Popes always admitted appeals from it to the Holy See, called to themselves entire trials and that at any stage of the proceedings, exempted whole classes of believers from its jurisdiction, intervened in the legislation, deposed grand inquisitors, and so on.”
newadvent.org/cathen/08026a.htm
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I have not defended torture. I have defended the right of the state to defend itself from terrorism and instability.
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Shiann
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As proven in papal and ecclesiastical documents the Church supported defending society. Both secular and Church leaders determined the heresies (which were not always just benevolent opinions) were serious threats to peaceful society at that time. The state defined what constituted treason, and gave the Church (who had the knowledge and internal structure) the duty to undertake the trials of those accused.
History also tells us that once a moral fabric of a society fails, the society disintegrates from the inside out.
I agree- I would like to see some citations for some good literature to this assertion.
???
I do not believe it is wrong for my state to follow through with capital punishment for a crime that has defined by the same state after due process in defense of my society.
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CCM08
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It most certainly is not, you’re attempting to judge the actions of medieval people based on modern standards. That’s just silly to the point of being stupid. When compared to what civil authorities were doing, a fair peer to peer comparison, the Church controlled inqusitions did not torture anyone.
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rr1213
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Before you go around saying what I’ve posted is “stupid” and “silly”, why don’t you actually read it? If you had, you would have seen the following which, YES INDEED, does admit to torture being used in the Inquisition by the Church…even extending to the use of torture on WITNESSES. This is a CATHOLIC source people, I am not making this up:
"[Torture] was first authorized by Innocent IV in his Bull “Ad exstirpanda” of 15 May, 1252, which was confirmed by Alexander IV on 30 November, 1259, and by Clement IV on 3 November, 1265. The limit placed upon torture was citra membri diminutionem et mortis periculum – i.e, it was not to cause the loss of life or limb or imperil life. Torture was to applied only once, and not then unless the accused were uncertain in his statements, and seemed already virtually convicted by manifold and weighty proofs. In general, this violent testimony (quaestio) was to be deferred as long as possible, and recourse to it was permitted in only when all other expedients were exhausted. Conscientious and sensible judges quite properly attached no great importance to confessions extracted by torture. After long experience Eymeric declared: Quaestiones sunt fallaces et inefficaces – i.e the torture is deceptive and ineffectual.
Had this papal legislation been adhered to in practice, the historian of the Inquisition would have fewer difficulties to satisfy. In the beginning, torture was held to be so odious that clerics were forbidden to be present under pain of irregularity. Sometimes it had to be interrupted so as to enable the inquisitor to continue his examination, which, of course, was attended by numerous inconveniences. Therefore on 27 April, 1260, Alexander IV authorized inquisitors to absolve one another of this irregularity. Urban IV on 2 August, 1262, renewed the permission, and this was soon interpreted as formal licence to continue the examination in the torture chamber itself. The inquisitors manuals faithfully noted and approved this usage. The general rule ran that torture was to be resorted to only once. But this was sometimes circumvented – first, by assuming that with every new piece of evidence the rack could be utilized afresh, and secondly, by imposing fresh torments on the poor victim (often on different days), not by way of repetition, but as a continuation (non ad modum iterationis sed continuationis), as defended by Eymeric; “quia, iterari non debent [tormenta], nisi novis supervenitibus indiciis, continuari non prohibentur.” But what was to be done when the accused, released from the rack, denied what he had just confessed? Some held with Eymeric that the accused should be set at liberty; others, however, like the author of the “Sacro Arsenale” held that the torture should be continued, because the accused had too seriously incriminated himself by his previous confession. When Clement V formulated his regulations for the employment of torture, he never imagined that eventually even witnesses would be put on the rack, although not their guilt, but that of the accused, was in question. From the pope’s silence it was concluded that a witness might be put upon the rack at the discretion of the inquisitor."
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Mirdath
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Does it have the right to do so by fomenting more of the same?
Online museum gallery of a few torture devices; note the naming of such things as the ‘inquisitional chairs’ and ‘heretic’s fork’.
A rather well-cited encyclopedia of torture devices with many references.
The Museum of Medieval Torture Instruments in Prague, if you care to visit.
As usual, wikipedia has some information under its article on torture; while the section ‘Torture in the past’ lacks several citations, it provides some sources you may find of interest. Unfortunately I don’t have any dead-tree history books handy (not even my copy of Sir Walter Scott’s Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft, which I assure you contains many interesting accounts), so these will have to do.
Even the Catholic Encyclopedia, which takes a rather pro-Church editorial tone often enough, does not shy away from fact:
Had this papal legislation been adhered to in practice, the historian of the Inquisition would have fewer difficulties to satisfy. In the beginning, torture was held to be so odious that clerics were forbidden to be present under pain of irregularity. Sometimes it had to be interrupted so as to enable the inquisitor to continue his examination, which, of course, was attended by numerous inconveniences. Therefore on 27 April, 1260, Alexander IV authorized inquisitors to absolve one another of this irregularity. Urban IV on 2 August, 1262, renewed the permission, and this was soon interpreted as formal licence to continue the examination in the torture chamber itself. The inquisitors manuals faithfully noted and approved this usage. The general rule ran that torture was to be resorted to only once. But this was sometimes circumvented – first, by assuming that with every new piece of evidence the rack could be utilized afresh, and secondly, by imposing fresh torments on the poor victim (often on different days), not by way of repetition, but as a continuation (non ad modum iterationis sed continuationis), as defended by Eymeric; “quia, iterari non debent [tormenta], nisi novis supervenitibus indiciis, continuari non prohibentur.” But what was to be done when the accused, released from the rack, denied what he had just confessed? Some held with Eymeric that the accused should be set at liberty; others, however, like the author of the “Sacro Arsenale” held that the torture should be continued, because the accused had too seriously incriminated himself by his previous confession. When Clement V formulated his regulations for the employment of torture, he never imagined that eventually even witnesses would be put on the rack, although not their guilt, but that of the accused, was in question. From the pope’s silence it was concluded that a witness might be put upon the rack at the discretion of the inquisitor. Moreover, if the accused was convicted through witnesses, or had pleaded guilty, the torture might still he used to compel him to testify against his friends and fellow-culprits. It would be opposed to all Divine and human equity – so one reads in the “Sacro Arsenale, ovvero Pratica dell Officio della Santa Inquisizione” (Bologna, 1665) – to inflict torture unless thejudge were personally persuaded of the guilt of the accused. – newadvent.org/cathen/08026a.htm
Why are you trying to convince people that it ‘just wasn’t that bad’?
(edit: beaten by rr1213!)
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zzz
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Thanks for the link, rr1213!
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BAIRBRE
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I thought that only God judges. Murder is a sin.
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Only God judges conscience, but the state may judge actions and does.
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LJN21
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When it violates the safety of society.
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rr1213
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Great, so now the Church is going to be the thought police also. Thank God I live in America where we can each worship God as our consciences dictate.
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