Ok, a very brief post this time. The other big rock that gets thrown at Catholics in particular is the Inquisition (and yes, I restrain myself, since you should have all expected - this time at least - the Spanish Inquisition.) The mythology that has emerged around this thing is amazing, including the happy neo-pagans and their claims that millions of women were killed during the "Burning Times." Well, the Burning Times never happened, and the Spanish Inquisition didn't kill tens of thousands of innocents. The truth is much more complex, much more human, and far less sinister than the Church's critics would like to believe. Forunately, the Spanish Inquisition was made up of trained legal minds who left reams and reams of archival evidence of their machinations. And it ends up looking less than conpiratorial.
Here are two good articles on the subject. Yes, people died in this time. Yes, that is terrible. But the scale of the thing leaves one feeling that perhaps the source of so much outcry should feel more evil.
Read here and here for a pretty good idea of how current historians view the whole thing. It's too bad that contemporary academic work tends to take so long to filter down to the masses, or we might be able to hope for a break from the pseudo-history.
6 comments:
I'm still confused, was Charles V the protestant heretic or did he defeat them in battle? Otherwise insightful article. I only had a chance to read the first one. I think I saw some of that special on TV a while ago. Interesting stuff!
Charles the Fifth of Spain = Catholic.
Aha! Another glorious victory for the Catholic Church! I enjoyed in the first article the comment made about "the Protestants fought with words because they couldn't win on the battlefield".
Hey johnson i need something cleared up. I feel like an idiot asking this because i think i might have just missed a class of social, but what is going on with israel. it's mentioned in the bible tons but it was only recently created in the 50's. did it just not exist or am i crazy.I mean have the jews never had a home land. Another thing why are you such a heretic
Chubbs, what is israel right now used to be be called entirely palestine. And it was arab controlled. The Jews have not had a homeland for an extremely long time, not since the Romans threw them out of Jeruselam, I believe. And when the UN decided to give the Jews their homeland back, the Arabs got angry because they had been there for nigh on 2000 years. They didn't think it fair to share. And hence we have the conflict of Israel vs. Palestine
Jeremy W.
The Israelites always claimed what is now Israel to be their holy land. They believed, without question, that today's Israel is the Holy Land reffered to in scripture, and had overwhelming evidence to prove it. They viewed it as their land given to them by God as the Chosen People. To them, they didn't steal anything from Palestine, but instead took back what was rightfully theirs. That's why they protect it to no end and that's why they won't lose to Palestine.
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