The Spanish Inquisition

I. An overview of the Inquisition in Spain

The earliest form of the Holy Office of the Inquisition was established by Pope Lucius III (Ubaldo Allucingoli of Lucca) during his brief reign (1188-1198). It was expanded by Pope Innocent III (1198-1216), who launched a genocidal Crusade against the Cathars or Albigensians of Provence in 1209. The rise of movements that questioned the authority of the Church of Rome was seen as a resurgence of the Gnostic movements that the established church had spent centuries in extirpating once it had been given the authority to do so by the Byzantine Emperors.

The controversy over the writings of Maimonides in 1232 provided an excuse for meddling in Jewish affairs, and in 1233 Gregory IX appointed permanent judges among the Dominicans and the Franciscans to administer the Inquisition. By 1255 the Inquisition was fully established in central and western Europe, but did not begin functioning in Spain until 1481. There were some anti-Jewish atrocities during this period -- e.g., a mass burning of Jews at the stake in 1288 -- but nothing comparable to the scale and intensity of the persecution of Jews that would take place in Spain.

Judaism was almost always a legal, tolerated religion in Spain, and as Gitlitz (1996, p. 37) says

. . .
the basic concepts and practices of their faith" (Gitlitz, 1996, pp. 19-20). Similarly, the pathological fantasies of Sprenger and Kramer's Malleus Malificarum (The Witches' Hammer) apparently inspired the formation of some actual groups, such as that of the witches of North Berwickshire by the Earl of Bothwell, as detailed by Murray. Just as witches had been defined as heretics by the Papal bull of Innocent VIII in 1488, the Spanish Inquisitors began to define all conversos as Judaizers and therefore as heretics. It no longer mattered whether one's personal faith was strictly orthodox Christianity; any degree of Jewish ancestry could be grounds for arrest, a "confession" extracted by torture, and execution. In this situation, many conversos fled. II. The Expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492. For many reasons, and at the insistence of the Inquisition, the monarchs ordered all Jews in Spain to either leave the country or convert to Christianity by July 31, 1492. Approximately 200,000 of the remaining Jews accepted conversion, 100,000 went into exile in Portugal, and the other 100,000 scattered across Europe and even to the Turkish Balkans (Gitlitz, 1996, p. 27). Those who left suffered financial ruin, avoidance of wh
. . .

Some common words found in the essay are:
Vßez Sevilla, Edicts Grace, Andalucia Gitlitz, Portuguese Gitlitz, Nueva Leon, Balkans Gitlitz, Americas Jewish, Spain Gitlitz, Judaizers Mexico, Dominicans Franciscans, gitlitz 1996, gitlitz 1996 pp, 1996 pp, spanish colonies, crypto-jewish community, jews spain, practice judaism, 1996 pp 54-60, pp 54-60, christians gitlitz 1996, forced conversions, inquisition established, tobias 1990,
Approximate Word count = 1960
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)

More Essays on The Spanish Inquisition