The Rise of the Inquisition

The Inquisition typically conjures up images of intolerance, persecution, and violence and rightly so. Many people think of it as a reflection of the spiritual, scholastic, and scientific darkness of the medieval period. Hundreds of thousands of trials were processed during its lengthy reign. Thousands died at its hand. It seems hard to believe that the Inquisition ended as recently as the third decade of the nineteenth century and then only with some reservations.

The institution as it is now known, began in the thirteenth century when it was set up to combat the heretical sect of the Albigenses. The Papacy entrusted the Inquisition to the mendicant orders of Dominicans and Franciscan friars. The mendicant orders were bound by a vow of poverty and an ascetic lifestyle. Local bishops had the authority to investigate heresy, but the mendicant orders provided a more extensive organization. The medieval Inquisition had the power to punish Jews who aided Jewish converts to return to Judaism. The Inquisition also had the authority to order testimony by Jews against lapsed converts. In its early years, however, little attention was paid to Jews other than an occasional action focused on banning or burning certain Jewish books which had been deemed heretical or offensive to Christianity.

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