1184-1834 - The Inquisition
Possibly the Inquisition began in the year 1184, and ended in the year of 1834. The congregation of the Roman Inquisition (Romana Inquisitio)is of very ancient origin, dating from Innocent III (1194-1216), although some authorities attribute its establishment to Lucius III (1181-85). In the beginning of the thirteenth century Innocent III established at Rome an inquisitorial tribunal against the Albigenses and other innovators of the south of France. From its first title of Romana Inquisitio was derived the usage of calling this body Congregation of the Holy Roman Universal Inquisition.
Pope Alexander IV established an Office of the Inquisition in Italy in 1254. The Sacred Congregation of the Universal Inquisition was founded in 1542 by Pope Paul III with the Constitution "Licet ab initio," as its duty was to defend the Church from heresy. It is the oldest of the Curia's nine congregations.
Pope St. Pius X in 1908 changed the name to the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office. The name Inquisition was suppressed in order to shield this congregation from the hatred inspired by that name. The Holy Office was to identify the particular note or censure by which objectionable propositions were to be condemned, since all such propositions do not affect the Faith in the same degree, and therefore are condemned by the Holy Office not in a general, but in a specific way, being termed heretical, erroneous, temerarious, false, injurious, calumnious, scandalous, or qualified by the ancient special phrase piarum aurium offensiv, "offensive to pious ears". It received its current name - the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (Congregatio pro Doctrina Fidei) - in 1965 with Pope Paul VI.
The Inquisition was a tribunal or system of tribunals instituted by the Roman Catholic Church for the discovery, examination, and conviction of heretics and their punishment by the secular arm. Under the successors of Constantine in the Roman Empire the repression of heresy, or rather the enforcement of the decrees of church councils and synods, was a function of the imperial government, which inflicted temporal penalties upon the propagators of religious beliefs that contradicted the creeds approved by the State. When the reigning emperor was a favorer of Arianism or any other of the heterodox creeds, the orthodox bishops and their flocks were persecuted: when he was of the orthodox party the heterodox sects were put under the ban. In executing the decrees of the.councils the imperial officials, called in the laws of Theodosius and Justinian "inquisitors" (inquisitores), were assisted by the bishops; but the tribunals were the ordinary secular courts, and judgment was rendered in the name of the State, not the Church.
In the 12th century, when the supremacy of the ecclesiastical power was universally recognized in western Europe, the initiative in the work of repressing heresy was taken by the Church as of course, and the discovery, trial and conviction of the offenders were functions of the ecclesiastical power solely: the secular power simply executed the judgments of the church tribunals. Boniface VIII.'s definition of the respective powers and the mutual relations of church and state was not proclaimed till the close of the 13th century; but had a similar definition been promulgated in the 12th century it would have expressed the universal sentiment of princes and peoples at the time.
The first step toward the establishment of courts of inquisition would seem to have been taken in 1179 when the third council of the Lateran issued a decree of excommunication against the adherents of the heretical sects of southern France, who are charged not only with holding abominable heretical tenets but also with practising "unheard-of cruelties against the Catholics," demolishing the churches and massacring widows and orphans. The council grants aan indulgence of two years to those who shall make war on them." This decree was re-enforced by the Council of Verona (1184) over which Pope Lucius III presided, and at which the Emperor Frederic I assisted: the Council directs the bishops to bring to trial persons accused of heresy and to inflict fit punishment on the guilty.
The fourth Council of the Lateran (1215), held in the reign of Innocent III, imposed on the bishops the duty of making a visitation of their dioceses twice or at least once a year either personally or by delegates to see that the Church's laws be enforced. Bishops are authorized to bind the inhabitants of a district by oath to search out heretics and bring them to trial.
By the Council of Toulouse (1229) in the pontificate of Gregory IX. the search for heretics (inquisitio tuereticce pravitatis) was systematized. The bishops are to name for each parish two or three respectable laymen who shall take oath zealously to search out heretics and to deliver them up to the baillis. Whosoever knowingly conceals a heretic loses all his goods. If heretics are discovered on the estate of a land-owner, he incurs the penalties: the house of the heretic shall be torn down. Heretics who recant have to seek a new abode, and must wear on their clothing two crosses of different colors until the Pope or his legate permits them to assume the ordinary garb. Whoever abstains from use of the sacraments is held suspect of heresy. A person convicted or suspect of heresy was debarred from the practice of medicine.
Lest the ordinary church authorities should be remiss in carrying out this system Gregory IX named (1232) as "pontifical inquisitors* monks or friars from outside, chiefly Dominicans; shortly after the pontifical inquisitors were chosen from the order of the Dominicans exclusively. Thus the duty of inquisition was taken out of the hands of the bishops and was discharged by officials responsible only to the Pope; from the judgments of the inquisitorial tribunals there was no appeal but only to the Holy See: in 1263 Urban IV. appointed an inquisitor-general for Provence, as a means of lowering the flood of appeals to Rome.
The institution passed from southern France into the other provinces of that kingdom and into Italy, Germany and Poland. The Inquisition in England was directed by the metropolitans and their suffragans without being responsible to any inquisitor-general: but as long as Lollardism disturbed the peace of the Church the search for heretics was prosecuted rigorously: bishops and archdeacons were required twice a year to make inquisition of suspects: any man might be compelled under penalties to inform against persons suspected of heresy; the statute de haerctico comburendo was enacted by the Parliament in 1396.
It is remarkable, that a scheme such as the Inquisition, presenting the most effectual barrier, probably, that was ever opposed to the progress of knowledge, should have been revived at the close of the fifteenth century, when the light of civilization was rapidly advancing over every part of Europe. It is more remarkable, that it should have occurred in Spain, at this time under a government, which had displayed great religious independence on more than one occasion, and which had paid uniform regard to the rights of its subjects, and pursued a generous policy in reference to their intellectual culture.
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