What was the Inquisition?

[mlchance]

They are all lies to take away power from the Holy Roman Catholic church!

Almost but not quite. They are lies to take glory away from God, and to lead people away from Holy Mother Church and, consequently, possibly to Hell.

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[newbie1234]

Almost but not quite. They are lies to take glory away from God, and to lead people away from Holy Mother Church and, consequently, possibly to Hell.

– Mark L. Chance.

If you would like me to concede the number tortured and killed. I will. Because the actual number doesn’t matter. The truth is the Holy Roman Catholic Church TORTURED AND KILLED PEOPLE FOR OVER SIX HUNDRED YEARS.
The numbers don’t matter.
Take a look at the torture devices.
The fact is Christians who didn’t follow mother church’s teachings were deemed heretics.
Then they were tortured in ways that can’t even be described in decent conversation.
If they didn’t aquiess(sp) they were burned at the stake or killed some other way.
And this went on for over 600 years.
Own up to it.

 

[mlchance]

Own up to it.

Neither me nor anyone in this thread has ever once denied that the various Inquisitions resulted in people’s deaths. That’s the difference between honest historical inquiry and the anti-Catholic propaganda you’ve been regurgitating.

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[Contarini]

You don’t seem to quote any of your sources though.

I’m not making the claims. The best source on the Spanish Inquisition is probably Henry Kamen (The Spanish Inquisition). He’s the source for the 2,000 figure, I believe. For the medieval stuff you have to look at a number of sources. The most recent relevant work I’ve looked at was Jeremy Cohen’s *The Friars and the Jews, *which talks about how the Inquisition persecuted the Jews in the Middle Ages. But I am not offering an estimate of how many people were killed in the medieval Inquisitions. You are. So you need to give a *credible *source.

If you want to hear it from an ex catholic priest go to bereanbeacon.org. He’ll tell you all about it.

Did he live in the 13th century? If not, why does being an ex-Catholic priest qualify him in any way? Having been a Catholic priest probably means that he is bitter and biased and incapable of being fair or accurate. I don’t put a lot of stock in ex-anythings to tell me about their former faith (you can look at my posts on the Mitt Romney thread to see that I apply this across the board!). I’m not saying that a former Catholic can’t have valid things to say, but the fact that they used to be a Catholic makes them less, not more, likely to be fair and accurate.

Halleys Bible commentary is a pretty well accepted book.

Accepted by whom? Accepted as an authority on medieval history?

You can get the Halley’s at any Christian Bookstore

Including Catholic bookstores? Of course I know that what you meant was “Christian Bookstore,” which is a particular kind of Christian bookstore and hardly the best place to get accurate books on history.

You are pressing poor Rev. Halley into service for a purpose he did not intend. He was trying to give basic info on the Bible as he knew it. This is not an authoritative source for medieval history, period. Clearly he was simply repeating an older, 19th-century figure common among polemical anti-Catholic church historians.

Or are you of the school of people that say the Holocaust didn’t happen either.

That’s a piece of insulting irrelevance. Almost all students of the period think the Holocaust happened. No modern scholar as far as I know thinks that the figure of millions is accurate for the Inquisition. All you have been able to cite so far are 19th-century Protestant historians whose work was basically propaganda (most church history at that point was propaganda, though there were some honorable exceptions). If what you were saying had any basis, you could find modern historians who repeated it. Your sources stop with the 19th century (as far as anything remotely approaching serious history goes) because later historians disproved these figures.

Furthermore, we have abundance of direct evidence for the Holocaust. We can visit the sites where these things happened. We can still talk to people who actually experienced these horrible events.

You have no such evidence for your exaggerated claims of medieval atrocities. Nothing but outdated propaganda.

I quoted Plaisted, which you can look up online.

And I did, and I told you what I found–simply a string of 19th-century sources all repeating the same propagandistic line.

I gave you a website of a Catholic Priest.

Currently active as a Catholic priest? If so, I missed that one!

I gave book quotes.

You can’t seriously believe that just because something is written in a book therefore it must be true!

What more do you want?

I want a credible historical source. Preferably a credentialed historian writing in the past 50 years or so and specializing in the period in question. I’d accept an older source that had clearly done a careful study of the primary sources and was not overly biased, and I’d accept a more general source that could be presumed to have used good secondary sources.

 

[Contarini]

If you maintain that there were only 2000 people killed in the 605 years of the Dark Ages, who doesn’t know what he is talking about?

First of all, I maintained no such thing. The 2000 figure is for the Spanish Inquisition over a period of more than 300 years, with most of the deaths coming in the first century. And I’ve admitted that that may be a bit on the low side–from my memory of Kamen I think he said more like 2000-3000.
Add in the Roman Inquisition and the figure will be a bit higher, but probably not a whole lot because the Roman Inquisition was the most restrained of the Inquisitions. Add in all the medieval Inquisitions, though, and the figure will be quite a bit higher, but I have no way of knowing how much. Millions are out of the question–it could be just a few thousand more, or it could be in the tens of thousands.

Plaisted and other sources you’ve cited try to include all the people killed in the Albigensian Crusades. But that was not the Inquisition. Obviously when you have armies running around sacking cities in a holy war you have high casualty figures. That was horrible, but separate from the Inquisition (it still doesn’t get anywhere near your figures).

That averages to 4 to 5 people killed per year.
If that is what you believe, you might as well just say it never happened and it is a figment of the worlds imagination.

Interesting. So you were not telling the truth when you claimed earlier that the numbers don’t matter. You need the inflated figures for your propaganda purposes, apparently. I would hardly say that 4 or 5 people per year is an insignificant number. God cares about the fall of every sparrow. One death is too many. But since I’m not in fact claiming that the numbers were that low, this is irrelevant.

Why do you think it was called THE DARK AGES?

Because people in the Renaissance and later foolishly believed that they were ushering in an age of enlightenment. So they said nasty things about the centuries that had preceded them. No historian today uses the phrase “the Dark Ages” for the Middle Ages as a whole, and very few would use it at all (those who do would use it for the early Middle Ages only, up to the eleventh century at most). I think it’s funny that you date the Dark Ages from the 13th century to the 19th century. It’s nice to find someone who thinks that the 18th century was a dark age–although I’d say that the 20th century was one of the darkest, if we must make such comparisons.

The Middle Ages as a whole were no “darker” than any other period in human history. There was lots of violence and suffering, but what has changed? Do you ever listen to the news? Why is our age somehow full of light in comparison? Medieval society had great darkness and great glory. It was just another period in human history, with its good side and its bad side. Any period that produced Gothic cathedrals, scholastic philosophy, Arthurian romances, Christ-centered mysticism, and the university system (OK, I’m an academic so I had to throw that one in), among many other wonderful things, can hold its own with the best. “Dark Ages” is nothing more than an ignorant slur and you betray your own ignorance in using it.

Edwin

 

[VociMike]

Lies! Lies! Lies!
They are all lies to take away power from the Holy Roman Catholic church!
Lies I tell you!
All Lies!

You need to read onetime Anglican John Henry Newman’s article from the 19th century on why lies are exactly the lifeblood of Protestant attacks against the Church.

newmanreader.org/works/england/index.html

Here’s a bit of it:

“If you would have some direct downright proof that Catholicism is what Protestants make it to be, something which will come up to the mark, you must lie; else you will not get beyond feeble suspicions, which may be right, but may be wrong. Hence Protestants are obliged to cut their ninth commandment out of their Decalogue. “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour” must go, must disappear; their position requires the sacrifice. The substance, the force, the edge of their Tradition is slander. As soon as ever they disabuse their minds of what is false, and grasp only what is true,—I do not say they at once become Catholics; I do not say they lose their dislike to our religion, or their misgivings about its working;—but I say this, either they become tolerant towards us, and cease to hate us personally,—or, at least, supposing they cannot shake off old associations, and are prejudiced and hostile as before, still they find they have not the means of communicating their own feelings to others. To Protestantism False Witness is the principle of propagation. There are indeed able men who can make a striking case out of anything or nothing, as great painters give a meaning and a unity to the commonest bush, and pond, and paling and stile: genius can do without facts, as well as create them; but few possess the gift. Taking things as they are, and judging of them by the long run, one may securely say, that the anti-Catholic Tradition could not be kept alive, would die of exhaustion, without a continual supply of fable.”

 

[E.E.N.S]

Own up to it.

I haven’t seen a Catholic deny the atrocities that took place during the inquisitions yet. I have seen them correct your repeated blatherings of propaganda on multiple occations.

Why don’t you own up to a couple of things: 1) You are an anti-Catholic and you have no quams spreading lies and propaganda as you see fit, 2) the protestants killed Catholics for religious persecution as well.

 

[newbie1234]

Neither me nor anyone in this thread has ever once denied that the various Inquisitions resulted in people’s deaths. That’s the difference between honest historical inquiry and the anti-Catholic propaganda you’ve been regurgitating.

– Mark L. Chance.

So the only thing that I incorrectly stated was the number of people affected?
For that I apologize. But I assure you that I wasn’t lying or making anything up. I just repeated the numbers that I read or heard in various places.
If I understand correctly your contention is that only 2000 or so people were killed in the 600 yrs of the inquisition.
And that would amount to an average of 4to 5 people per year.

 

[VociMike]

If you would like me to concede the number tortured and killed. I will. Because the actual number doesn’t matter. The truth is the Holy Roman Catholic Church TORTURED AND KILLED PEOPLE FOR OVER SIX HUNDRED YEARS.

Are you equally outraged over the past torture and killing of people by other Christian groups? Or is your outrage selective? Your answer will be quite revealing.

 

[Contarini]

I guess he was taught it when he was a catholic priest for 30 years or so.

Well, I *teach *church history at a (Protestant) seminary (as an online adjunct; my full-time job is teaching Bible and religion at a small evangelical college). I have a Ph.D. in church history from Duke University. Yet I’m not claiming I’m an expert on this particular subject. I want to hear from someone who has studied the matter in depth and has credentials as a scholar in medieval history and/or the history of the Inquisition specifically.

Edwin

 

[newbie1234]

Are you equally outraged over the past torture and killing of people by other Christian groups? Or is your outrage selective? Your answer will be quite revealing.

Of course I am outraged at any killing.
But this issue is even more outrageous because the Catholic church asserts that the papacy is a continuation of Christ’s authority given to Peter. They call the pope HOLY FATHER.
They give the pope infallible power.
How can this be true when we look at the actions of popes like innocent III and many others that followed him over the next 6 centuries?
That is the outrage.
There is supposedly no salvation outside the RCC.
So every Christian must be under The Holy Father. And the power of this position has produced corruption time after time after time. That is the outrage.

 

[mlchance]

That is the outrage.

No, the outrage is that someone like you, who obviously knows nothing substantive about Catholic history, doctrine, or practice, has the temerity to come here and lambast Catholics with lies, distortions, and evasions.

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[newbie1234]

Well, I *teach *church history at a (Protestant) seminary (as an online adjunct; my full-time job is teaching Bible and religion at a small evangelical college). I have a Ph.D. in church history from Duke University. Yet I’m not claiming I’m an expert on this particular subject. I want to hear from someone who has studied the matter in depth and has credentials as a scholar in medieval history and/or the history of the Inquisition specifically.

Edwin

Well I don’t know of anyone personally with the credentials of inquisition historian.
I guess you don’t either.
So we are at an impasse about the actual numbers of people tortured or killed.
That is fair enough for me.
I really don’t feel like going to the library and getting a bunch of books to support my case and then being accused of spreading anti Catholic lies from anti Catholic sources.

 

[newbie1234]

No, the outrage is that someone like you, who obviously knows nothing substantive about Catholic history, doctrine, or practice, has the temerity to come here and lambast Catholics with lies, distortions, and evasions.

– Mark L. Chance.

I said it before and I’ll say it again. The numbers I stated were from the sources I stated. I did not make them up.

 

[Redbandito]

I understand the distinction. Moreover, I think we have to be careful in applying the moral standards of today to judge people from a different era.

Nonetheless, I am doing just that in this case because there is no legitimate justification for executing or persecuting people based soley on their religious beliefs. Yes, it’s a moral judgment and one that I am perfectly comfortable standing on. I know that God has given us the freedom to accept him or to reject him (unless you’re a Calvinist I suppose ) and God has made us in his own image. As such, religious persecution is wrong no matter who is doing the persecution-- Catholic, Protestant, Buddist, Secular Humanist or whatever you may call yourself. What is truly fascinating is the number of people in this very thread–mainly but not totally Catholic–who apparently cannot bring themselves to agree on this basic principle of human rights.

I don’t think anyone has argued, on this thread, that people should be put to death strictly for not conforming to certain religious beliefs. Can you point out where anyone has argued this to be good? My argument is, and has been, that there is more to the story than heterodoxy. Furthermore, Catholics guard against the oversimplification and exaggeration of these historical events that have been largely used as polemical devices by way of myth. If you asked anyone on here, outside of the context of this topic, whether they believe we should put heretics to death, I am fairly certain they would say no. However, these events must be put in their historical context. What did Jews do to heretics and blasphemers?

 

[Libertas]

I said it before and I’ll say it again. The numbers I stated were from the sources I stated. I did not make them up.

How about you, personally, go take a look at the demographics of those countries during the time of the Inquisition. No country has 50 million people, let alone heretics, that could be or were condemned to the flames.

 

[newbie1234]

I don’t think anyone has argued, on this thread, that people should be put to death strictly for not conforming to certain religious beliefs. Can you point out where anyone has argued this to be good? My argument is, and has been, that there is more to the story than heterodoxy. Furthermore, Catholics guard against the oversimplification and exaggeration of these historical events that have been largely used as polemical devices by way of myth. If you asked anyone on here, outside of the context of this topic, whether they believe we should put heretics to death, I am fairly certain they would say no.

On the contrary, I would wager there were a few people around here that wouldn’t mind seeing me burned at the stake.

 

[Libertas]

How about you, personally, go take a look at the demographics of those countries during the time of the Inquisition. No country has 50 million people, let alone heretics, that could be or were condemned to the flames.

 

[Redbandito]

I said it before and I’ll say it again. The numbers I stated were from the sources I stated. I did not make them up.

Yeah, and the sources you stated were garbage. Bad books are as poisonous to the mind as cyanide is to the body Seriously Newbie, did you come here to show off? Did you come here to convert some of us Catholics? Or did you come here for rational discussion and dialogue? If it is the latter, please pay attention to the fact that even the Protestants in here state you have no credibility with such silly “facts.”

 

[newbie1234]

How about you, personally, go take a look at the demographics of those countries during the time of the Inquisition. No country has 50 million people, let alone heretics, that could be or were condemned to the flames.

I already stated that I concede the numbers may not be accurate but I did not make them up.I stated my sources.