Bede

NOGO,

As I said, the Inquisition did not execute many witches precisely because the evidence was not available. They rarely used torture and when there was no evidence they were not allowed to.

Sojourner,

Your two posts are, as usual, full of stuff picked out from popular history, without any critical analysis, to make your polemical points. I hold no brief for the Inquisition so feel no need to defend them. As your posts are so one sided, any reply to them would look like a defence and so I will not do so. Do you think anything I have said is actually wrong or are you just trying to turn history into rhetoric? I tone down nothing - it is just you want us all to exist in a state of permenant outrage about things that happened centuries ago.

I will reply to Family Man's excellent post a bit later as it raises some interesting issues.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Bede

Dear all,

Family Man’s post poses a couple of important questions:

- What comparisons, if any, can we validly make between the Inquisition and other legal systems?
- Where does the Inquisition fit into the development of legal theory?

The first question is important because according to my 21st century liberal values the Inquisition fairs badly against the ideal of modern English/US justice, not too well even against the imperfect reality of frequent miscarriages of justice, but rather impressively against the treatment of internees by the US military in Cuba.

I would suggest though, that none of these comparisons are valid and that Family Man is implicitly comparing the Inquisition to a modern ideal. The first problem with this is that it is anachronistic, the second that the Inquisition used Roman and not Common law. This makes comparison impossible.

For example, while Roman Law has no presumption of innocence as a legal axiom, the Inquisition could only convict someone with proper proof. In fact, the proofs required under Roman Law are stronger than under common law. English juries can convict on circumstantial evidence but to an inquisitor this would just be the legal form of the leaky bucket fallacy. He needs direct proof.

The Inquisition was active from about 1450 – 1750 but the right to silence and the second? amendment both date from after this time. Surely it is wrong to complain the Inquisition was not even further ahead of its time than it was. Likewise the right to a defence – this developed over time in both Common and Roman law and we have no right to complain given our own record at the same time. We like our jury system but the French think we are mad. They rightly point out that a jury takes a less objective view than a professional magistrate or Inquisitor and that they are swayed by things like the colour of the defendant. English juries were more likely to convict a witch than an Inquisitor like Salazar with experience of this kind of case and an understanding of the scepticism required.

The Inquisition must be seen as part of the development of Roman law that we see today in modern Europe. That is the only valid context and comparisons to today’s justice must be avoided. Even then we see the fearsome reputation of the black legend is hardly deserved- by the standards of its time it was progressive and fair.

The only question now would be is it ever right to prosecute people for religious crimes. The only answer the historian can give, regardless of our personal feelings, is that they thought so. Secure in the 21st century, I disagree. But that is not a matter for the historical record.

Yours

Bede

Bede’s Library – faith and reason

Boro Nut

Happily this is not the stance of the Church of England. The modern interpretation is: Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live next door. This is much easier to adhere to as either of you can move one door away or alternatively you can move in together. This latter option was the one most favoured at the last Synod as it would be more conducive to muti-faith tolerance and understanding in our modern society. Also, if she is a proper pagan witch, you would be more-or-less guaranteed a shag.

Boro Nut

Sojourner553

I think your point is that because the number of witches executed is estimated at 100,000 by recent historians (vs millions by earlier counts) that this makes it a “rare” occurrence.

BTW: Does being burned alive or drowned count as torture by the way?

Bede, I am an analyst by profession.

I primarily listed facts that are easily verified.

I take your tone to mean (as usual) that you cannot respond to these.

Seems to me you already defend with such lines as:

“inquisitors had produced a large body of cautionary literature, and the two early modern institutions that succeeded the medieval inquisition - the Spanish and Roman Inquisitions - demonstrated exceptional concern for proceedual propriety. Indeed the Roman Holy Office has been referred to as a 'pioneer in judicial reform'. Unlike many secular courts, it made provision for legal councel; it furnished the defendent with copy of the charges and evidence against him; and it attached very little weight to the testimony of a suspected witch against her alleged confederates. One of the most noteworthy features of both Spanish and Roman Inquisitiorial proceedure was that torture was very rarely employed."

Some examples would be nice. If you addressed FamilyMan’s points (the details not the rhetoric), I think you would be hard pressed to provide representative examples.

It is as much by what you omit as what you include. Examples:

*”The Spanish Inquisition was formed to ensure that these conversos stayed converted but swiftly moved on to other areas rather than restricting itself to converted Jews.”

One omission here is how many/most conversos only converted to Christianity to escape persecutions. The account gives a blind eye to tortures employed during the period, etc. In all, the Inquisitors sound like “swell” guys.

* “Most witch executions took place in secular jurisdictions in Germany and Switzerland.”

This leaves out that secular- styled executions were generally done with approval by the Church. (Of course there were some exceptions to this – the key word is “generally”.) The tone falsely gives the impression that the Church was somehow unaware all this was going on and therefore possibly against trials of witches and their executions.

There are some outright distortions too. Here is one:

“The Inquisitions did prosecute all forms of magic rather than just witchcraft, but the penalties were mild - penitential rather than retributional.”

Got some citations for this? Was this true 100% of the time?

Bede, If I went by YOUR description of medieval times and the Inquisition, there would be NOTHING for modern folks to be outraged about, yes?

By your description we should instead be “grateful” for the Inquisitors’ contributions to freedom, and regarding those areas we “may not be grateful for “ we should just realize these were “necessary and appropriate” during those times.

Seems to me:

IF it is fair to compare ancient cultures (like the ancient Greeks) with modern society, why are we not "allowed" to compare medieval history in the same manner?

“Those who forget history are condemned to relive it in the future.” -- Santayana

Sojourner

Family Man

Bede --

In the late 19th and early 20th century, the KKK regularly lynched blacks. By your argument, in the context of their times, we couldn't condemn their actions because, by their standards, they were doing the correct thing. After all, they were the product of their times too.

The fact is you also appealed to modern sensibilities by arguing that the Inquisition was relatively mild, the punishments not so harsh, and that they were scrupulous to the accused's rights (which your readers will interpret in modern terms.) I laid out facts that don't reflect so favorably on the Catholic church -- important points that you failed to incorporate into your FAQ but should have. Some even contradicted what you were saying (they had a right to counsel -- pleasing to the modern mind -- but counsel that was ineffective -- not so pleasing to the modern mind.) So the difference between what you did and what I did is nil. The fact is that we always interpret history through our modern lenses. In fact, we have very little choice, since our perceptions always color our thinking. Hence, you don't appear to have much of a point.


You are correct in pointing out that the Inquisition was a product of its time. But there are lots of things in history that we condemn today, for example slavery, which were part of their times but which no one tries to mitigate. If you were to try to claim that slavery was not so bad because of xyz, you'll likely get a good understanding of how Trent Lott felt a month ago.


Just because we need to understand the events in context doesn't mean we lose the right to judge them. The inquisition was an immoral institution that was much abused and used to intimidate the populace into toeing the line. Removing those aspects of Inquisition that reflect poorly to the modern ear simply suggests you either haven't done your homework, as you justifiably pointed out to another poster on this thread is not a good thing, or you're leaving out points that don't support your desired thesis. I suggest you take your own advice and provide a complete picture of what the inquisition was and stop providing the bowdlerized version.

NOGO

There you go again, Bede.

You want us to accept the above statement as a reasonable middle of the road compromise.

NO, Bede. NO GO!

Your statement above implies that there was "evidence" for "some" witches and only when such evidence existed did they torture and burn people.

Bede, come down to reality.

THERE WAS NEVER ANY EVIDENCE FOR WITCHCRAFT. NONE !!!

Perhaps you did not understand my previous post.

Your attempt at whitewashing the issue is shameful.

Bede

Family man,

As you are aware, the comparison to lynching is invalid as it was illegal and condemned at the time. The historian can report this. Again, our own moral considerations are irrelevant to the historical record. You cannot condemn the Inquisition on the basis of a comparison to the twenty first century ideal - but you could by comparing it to its own time and context. You'd need to be careful here though, as most contemporary anti-Inquisition writing was protestant polemic.

While it true we always interprete history through our own lens, it remains a bad thing to do. Just because perfect objectivity is impossible does not mean we should try for it. We can't get to perfectly clean enviroments but that doesn't mean we should perform surgery in a sewer.

I will be amending my FAQ to put in the points you raised, including the specific legal points - especially the differences between Roman and Common law. I made no effort to remove matters that reflect poorly to the modern ear - merely what reflects poorly to those determined to hang on to the black legend at all costs.

All that said, the need to present a case to balance yours and Sojourner's has led my last post to lean to far the other way if taken on its own.

Sojourner,

You quote a work of modern history by Brian Levack as being biased (seemingly thinking it was written by me). I really do get fed up with your accusing widely read professional historians of the bias and whiggishness which in fact you are indulging in. Secondly, my FAQ is about the Inquisition, not about witches. The Inquisition had very little to do with witch trials - this is a fact so just learn to live with it.

My work on witch trials will be coming to a server near you soon.

NOGO,

Pleased to hear you have read all 60,000 odd available witch craft dispositions to establish there was no evidence. Why not write a book.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Family Man

True to a certain extent. But it's not worth pursuing, so I'll concede this point.

Why not? We condemn slavery based on a twenty first century ideal. We condemn the Holocaust on a twenty first century ideal. We condemn human sacrifice on a twenty first century ideal. What's so sacred about the Inquisition? Is it so horrible to say that this is a black eye on the Church just as Thomas Jefferson owning slaves is a black eye on his reputation?

Which, of course, means it was condemned (if not illegal). I never used protestant polemic in my writing, though my conclusions are harsher than yours.

Agreed. For the most part, I'm in agreement with you that many people misunderstand what the Inquisition was. However, your original FAQ left out many points that made me question its objectivity. You should be held to the standards you set out for yourself. If you claim that the accused has right to counsel, but fail to mention that the church undermined that right, then you have failed to reach the standard you have aspired to.

Thank you. But editting out parts that reflect poorly on the church is going to give others the impression that you're trying to whitewash church history, and that was entirely counterproductive. Highlighting the differences between Roman and Common law should highlight how the mechanisms of the Inquisition came about -- and thus a useful endeavor -- but it won't excuse it.

My case stands on its own. I don't dispute many of the points you make, and have completely supported you on some (such as the minor role the Inquisition played in witch hunts.) However, an objective look at the Inquisition does not lead me to conclude that it was a benign institution.

Bede

Family Man,

You said "However, an objective look at the Inquisition does not lead me to conclude that it was a benign institution." and I agree entirely. I regret using the word 'progressive' earlier as this, while perhaps defensible in a early modern context, sounds too much of a value judgement I do not hold. I have not edited out anything, but neither am I wholy objective and to a certain extent probably do err too far the other way.

However, you must admit that to many on these boards the Inquisition is a symbol of unutterable evil, oppression and the worst thing ever (except perhaps the crusades). Hyperbole aside - the question asked of every Christian here is "What about the Inquisition?". With that in mind, it is worth pointing out that it was not the awful monolith that the black legend states. As an example of the blackest pits of absolute evil, it never quite lives up to its reputation. Your correct rejoinder, that it was still not very nice, does nothing to rescue the rhetorical point so dear to the heart to many infidels.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Family Man

Is it the blackest pit of evil? That might be a little too hyperbolic. However, I don't think "it wasn't very nice" exactly captures my attitude either. I would consider a institution that threatened torture if the accused didn't view the evidence the way the authorities did as evil. I would consider a method that stacked the deck against the defendant as the Inquisition did as being corrupt. Yes, witch hunts should be laid at the door of the Christians who pursued that abomination. That hardly clears the Inquisition of its own evil.