The Spanish Inquisition

Paper Summary:

This paper presents a critical history of the development of the Spanish Inquisition. The paper focuses on the anti-Semitic roots that led to the Inquisition and examines the Church-sanctioned atrocities committed through the course of the Spanish Inquisition in 15th century Europe. The paper contends that the Inquisition's fanaticism grew in Spain out of the enmity between Christians and Jews. However, over the years of its operation, it gradually became a completely independent body functioning not to oppress the Jews, but to finish the holy quest of saving the world from heretics of all sorts.

From the Paper:

"From the period in which Christianity became dominant, people of the Jewish faith have endured centuries of contempt, suffering and oppression. The Middle Ages, specifically, saw infinite wrongs committed against the Jews. In most cases the Church was partially if not wholly responsible for such acts of intolerance and persecution. "Under the canon law the Jew was a being who had scarce the right to existence and could only enjoy it under conditions of virtual slavery" (Lea, Henry Charles. History of the Spanish Inquisition Volume I p. 36). The general attitude of the Church was summed up in 1581, "Gregory XIII declared that the guilt of the race in rejecting and crucifying Christ only grows deeper with successive generations, entailing on its members perpetual servitude" (Vol. I p. 36)."

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