The Real Inqueistion! Raz read, Hans approved.

[Valmy]

Of course it may be that the bar was so low during that time that being "the most humane" isnt really the accomplishment this article might suggest. 

the article suggest exactly that: the standards of the time were pretty low.  And by these standards we should judge the Inquisition as being better than the alternative.

Yeah if you go around judging the whole past by the standards of today, you get a pretty bigoted view of all past people as inferior.  Remember the past is a foreign country and CC does love foreign cultures.

[crazy canuck]

Of course it may be that the bar was so low during that time that being "the most humane" isnt really the accomplishment this article might suggest. 

the article suggest exactly that: the standards of the time were pretty low.  And by these standards we should judge the Inquisition as being better than the alternative.

I was being sarcastic.  It is a trick of smoke and mirrors to suggest that the inquisition didn't bloody its hands but merely turned the heretics and unbelievers over to the secular authorities after they were found so by the inquisition.  The suggestion that the inquisition was more procedurally fair then the secular courts might be true in some places and times but over all the development of secular justice was probably better because, more often than not, the secular authority didn't have a stake in deciding an outcome.  The only important thing was that justice was seen to be done.  So for example medieval juries were comprised of people who had first hand knowledge of the events in dispute.  Juries were essentially witnesses to what had occurred so that the community would consider the judgment to be just.  The inquisition always had an interest in developing the definition of orthodoxy and that definition could be shaped by a number of factors which, as Minsky points out, are now difficult to determine.  Add to that element of self interest the secrecy regarding the inquisitions hearings, the acceptance of secret evidence and the arbitrary nature of the decision of where the boundary between heresy and orthodoxy could be found and the notion that someone appearing before the inquisition was getting a relatively "humane" hearing is difficult to accept.

[Sheilbh]

As to the OP, it may be that Church procedures tended to be less brutal than secular procedures, but that misses the point.  The inquisition as it evolves is part of a Church that becomes more "activist" in defining, policing and enforcing doctrinal orthodoxy; the institutions of the inquisition take on a life of their own.  And one key procedural innovation of the inquisitors was their encouragement of secret accusations, this in contrast to typical medieval law in which questionable accusations could be deterred by nasty legal consequences for false testimony.

Yes. But this is a general development across Europe in that period of faith. This is the dark side of the Renaissance that on both sides of the Reformation the return to the texts and great amounts of new knowledge leads to a more rigorous and rigorously applied orthodoxy. Similarly the great personal piety of the age - which takes a different character than that of the Medieval period - is also matched by Church and State taking more of an interest in policing social norms and personal lives. And I think as CC says there was a defining out of diversity, what may previously have been tolerated became criminal.

The Inquisition and the witch-hunt I think have the same social origins, purposes and effects. After centuries of the black myth of the Spanish Inquisition and anti-Catholic bigotry there does need to be some correction to the view that the Inquisition was even within its time uniquely awful. At least the Inquisition had rules which is why they took a very dim view of alleged witchcraft and there are really very few witches being burned in Italy or Spain, while Scotland, England and Germany are burning tens of thousands - on the other hand the Inquisition have genuine outsiders - heretics, Jews and Muslims - so doesn't need to invent some.

[Razgovory]

So Raz are you saying Obama has fallen victim to Protestant Propaganda by mentioning the Crusades the other day?

Let's not get on our high horse now.

Of course he has.  He is a protestant.

[Valmy]

Well he has got you there Spicey. 

[derspiess]

GOD DAMN AMERICA!!!

[Valmy]

GOD DAMN AMERICA!!!

Well he did, he made us elect the last two Presidents...twice.  How much more torment has the Almighty in store for us Spicey?

[Razgovory]

Of course it may be that the bar was so low during that time that being "the most humane" isnt really the accomplishment this article might suggest. 

the article suggest exactly that: the standards of the time were pretty low.  And by these standards we should judge the Inquisition as being better than the alternative.

I was being sarcastic.  It is a trick of smoke and mirrors to suggest that the inquisition didn't bloody its hands but merely turned the heretics and unbelievers over to the secular authorities after they were found so by the inquisition.  The suggestion that the inquisition was more procedurally fair then the secular courts might be true in some places and times but over all the development of secular justice was probably better because, more often than not, the secular authority didn't have a stake in deciding an outcome.  The only important thing was that justice was seen to be done.  So for example medieval juries were comprised of people who had first hand knowledge of the events in dispute.  Juries were essentially witnesses to what had occurred so that the community would consider the judgment to be just.  The inquisition always had an interest in developing the definition of orthodoxy and that definition could be shaped by a number of factors which, as Minsky points out, are now difficult to determine.  Add to that element of self interest the secrecy regarding the inquisitions hearings, the acceptance of secret evidence and the arbitrary nature of the decision of where the boundary between heresy and orthodoxy could be found and the notion that someone appearing before the inquisition was getting a relatively "humane" hearing is difficult to accept.

The secular states very much had a stake in the outcome.  For one thing, fines were a major source of revenue.  Second, heresy undermined the social order.  A man's contracts and loyalty were based on a oaths before God.  If he wasn't right with God, his oaths meant nothing and he was potential perjurer.  The fact that secular authorities were prosecuting people for heresy prior to the inquisition indicates that they were very interested in orthodoxy.  Our modern idea of an impartial justice system was still hundreds of years away.

[The Minsky Moment]

The fact that secular authorities were prosecuting people for heresy prior to the inquisition indicates that they were very interested in orthodoxy.

Stating this as a fact doesn't make it true. What is the basis for the claim that heresy prosecutions were commonly being carried out by "secular authorities" in the early Middle Ages?  There were no recorded executions for heresy after the fall of the Western Empire until Robert II burned some "heretics" in 1022; that episode is disputed (some historians claim the heresy charge was pretextual) and the inquiry was carried out by a commission of both clergy and devout laypersons, so its status as a "secular authority" can also be questioned.

One thing can be said - the counts of Toulouse certainly seemed to be willing to take a more lenient approach to the "Bonhommes" under their jurisdiction then say Innocent III was prepared to do.  So in that pivotal example, one cannot fairly depict the inquisitors as a benign force protecting suspected heretics from brutal local comital justice.  Very much to the contrary.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah, but as with Lollardy and John of Gaunt these popular heresies were tolerated by certain lords because they were a tool against the crown and Church. Putting them down was an equally secular concern.

[Razgovory]

The first person time people were executed for Heresy was in the Roman empire.   Charlemagne made believing in witchcraft a capital crime.

[alfred russel]

One thing can be said - the counts of Toulouse certainly seemed to be willing to take a more lenient approach to the "Bonhommes" under their jurisdiction then say Innocent III was prepared to do.  So in that pivotal example, one cannot fairly depict the inquisitors as a benign force protecting suspected heretics from brutal local comital justice.  Very much to the contrary.

Of course the counts of Toulouse felt that way. The whole affair was in large part a pretext for giving the king of France a rationale for extending his authority over them.

[Razgovory]

Also I think Justinain executed people for heresy.

[The Minsky Moment]

Yeah, but as with Lollardy and John of Gaunt these popular heresies were tolerated by certain lords because they were a tool against the crown and Church. Putting them down was an equally secular concern.

That's the 14th-15th centuries already . . .
Prior to 1200, there was no widespread heretical movement to speak of that posed some kind of threat to monarchs or local lords.  Even if non-doctrinally orthodox sentiments were held, why would secular rulers care in the early middle ages?  More to the point, since many secular rulers of the time were barely literate or not literate at all, how would they even know?

Heresy becomes an issue once you have a Church that decides it wants to asset control over widely divergent localisms and establish centralized control over doctrine and practice.  And it becomes an issue once you have proto secular states that are establishing rudimentary bureaucracies that are drawing from a narrow pool of ecclesiastically educated clerks that share this fundamental worldview.  It is not coincidence that widespread historical reports of efforts to extirpate heresy, the Inquisition, and the Fourth Lateran Council are all taking place around the same time. 

[The Minsky Moment]

Raz - 1) Witchcraft and heresy are different things.

         2) My comments concern the west - hence the reference to the fall of the "Western Empire.". The continuing persecution of heresy in the Eastern Empire at a time when no such activity is being recorded in the west reinforces the point.  Where you have a centralizing authority that is demanding compliance with a defined doctrinal orthodoxy, heresy becomes an issue; in particular there is a tendency for religious differences to become politicized and political differences to become "heresied". And what's interesting is that the moment when that process begins to take off in Western Europe roughly coincides with the origins of the Inquisition.  My view is that is no coincidence.