Three Words About The Inquisition(s)

The Gay President, B. Hussein Obama, has dared to smear the Inquisition – and the Crusades, see the other post – by comparing it to the atrocities of the ISIS. I have dealt with the ISIS in the other post. Today, let’s talk about the Inquisition.

The Inquisition is born of the perfectly orthodox desire to avoid the Truth being polluted by internal enemies. If you aren’t Christian, the Inquisition won’t touch you. But if you try to sabotage Christianity from the inside, you will be in their sight.

Is fighting heresy important? How should heresy be punished? If God is the highest Good, the attempt to pollute God’s Truth is certainly one of the highest crimes. Of course it should be punished with the ultimate punishment. To think differently means to state that God’s Truth is less worthy of protection than human life, which is patently absurd and obviously secular.

I know, we don’t “do” Christian Orthodoxy anymore. This is because we do not care for Truth anymore as our ancestors did. We worship “tolerance”, “diversity” and, most of all, human life instead. To our ancestors, God’s Truth was the highest good. To us, it is not even worth being “unkind”.

To our ancestors, as I was saying, God’s Truth was the highest good. As those were Christian times, a natural Christian duty fell on their rulers to care for the protection of orthodoxy. At the same time, the Church had a right of at least supervision and steering, to avoid the abuse of civil authority in religious matters. Therefore, a system of Inquisitions developed.

Some territorial organisation, like for example Florence, delegated the power of heresy trials to the Latin Inquisition, run by Rome. When Galileo was first investigated (Galileo was under investigation twice), he traveled to Rome to be interrogated, but in the presence of a Florentine civil servant who reported to Florence and made sure no abuses were committed.

Other territorial organisations, like France and Spain, had their own Inquisition. These tribunals worked in a way regulated by agreements between them and Rome. The agreements were generally such that whilst the tribunals were under the authority of the State, they had to be run by religious. The Spanish Inquisition was, so to speak, a Ministry of the Spanish Government. But a Ministry that had to be run in a certain way, in which Rome had a say.

All Inquisitions shared one character: they were the most advanced example of criminal procedure ever appeared since the Romans. The defendant had the right of a true defence. There was a degree of fairness that, whilst not optimal when seen with today’s eyes, was more advanced than anything else the world knew at that time. In those time, every interrogation for murder or theft could go on with a brutality unknown to the Inquisition. Not saying the Inquisitors were retiring wallflowers. But far more advanced than everyone else, Christian or not, they certainly were.

Take Galileo again. He is summoned (second time). He hires a lawyer of his own choice. The lawyer discusses the facts with him, and they agree a defence line. The Court listens to both sides, and the matter gets very technical. The Court then appoints a panel of experts to be enlightened about the technicalities. The panel produces its own report. The Court reaches a verdict. This, my friends, is something that should make us proud of the Inquisition, not ashamed.

The best compliment – and evidence – in favour of the Inquisition is that the Italian criminal trial in force until 1989 was called inquisitorio, exactly because its fundamentals were taken from the inquisition. In 1989, the trial procedure changed to a system called accusatorio, the Anglo-Saxon trial system you see in the movies. This was made not, mind, because the new system is inherently more just – though an argument might be made for that – but primarily because it is faster, more flexible, and cheaper.

The Inquisitorial system was not only right in principle, but it constituted a notable advancement compared to the praxis used up to then. If it was at times brutal, it is because the times were more brutal. But that it was less brutal than whatever else you would find at the time inside and outside Christianity there can be no doubt.

There were differences, of course. The mildest Inquisition was the Latin one (Rome). Those who were steered by foreign Government partially followed the interrogation techniques and trial customs prescribed by those Government. This is, then, not even the Church’s responsibility. One lives in one’s own time.

Unfortunately, we live in times where people think they can be the measure of centuries of Western History whilst showing an appalling ignorance of it. Obama, a product of Affirmative Action if ever there was one, is one of the worst examples (his wife is clearly another).

It is high time to rediscover these two great example of Church-steered bravery and progress, the Crusades and the Inquisition(s).

But to do so, we must rediscover the beauty of our Civilisation and the robustness of our cultural and civilisation roots, instead of committing impure acts with the Baddy White Christian Man who is so mean to peaceful Muslims or Maya/Incas/Aztec kingdoms or nature-bound Redskins.

We, the Christian West, are the crème de la crème of every Civilisation ever appeared, and we must stop whipping ourselves without pause. When we start recovering a proper perspective all pieces will fall into places again.

M