Burned Alive: Bruno, Galileo and the Inquisition

by Alberto A. Martinez

  vain hope of wisdom and huge desire for knowledge compel

  them to do? Some forbade themselves from having any

  pleasures at all; others sank all their wealth into the sea;

  others approached the most remote regions with incredible

  labour and danger. There were some others who killed themselves in order to attend to philosophy more easily and freed of their bodies. Thus with much labour Pythagoras went

  to the soothsayers of Memphis [lower Egypt]. Thus with

  laborious troubles Plato travelled to Egypt and to the coast

  of Italy, which was called greater Greece, and with letters

  he almost chased the whole world, was captured by pirates

  and sold, and even obeyed a very cruel tyrant. Thus too, as

  noted by St Jerome in his letter to Paul, quoting Philostratus,

  Apollonius entered Persia, crossed the Caucasus, Albania,

  the Scythians, Massagetas, entered the most opulent kingdoms of India, and to the Brahmans, Parthians, Syrians, Phoenicians, Arabs, Palestinians; returning to Alexandria,

  he travelled to Ethiopia, and to the Gymnosophists and saw

  in the sand the most famous table of the Sun.

  Look finally at the fervour and diligence propagated by

  heretics in their madness and dreams. Daily they write heavy

  books, they labour assiduously to preach, always vigilant to

  capture souls by flattery, promises, lies, frauds, false miracles,

  corrupt books, and even weapons to try to persuade them

  of their terrible errors; they also often tormented and tortured themselves, and even burned themselves alive, but not as bravely as widely reported. For the punishment suffered

  by heretics (as St Cyprian wisely says) is not a crown of

  faith, but the penalty for treachery, and from that temporary

  burning they pass to the eternal fire.225

  Not to be mentioned, Bruno of Nola was one of those heretics who

  had burned for treachery. In this sermon Bellarmine paraphrased

  lines from a letter from around 394 ce from St Jerome to Paulinus,

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  Bishop of Nola. 226 In it, Jerome urged Paulinus to study scriptures diligently. Jerome referred to the great labours of learning carried

  out by wise pagan philosophers and also by the apostle Paul.

  According to Jerome, Apollonius could be described as ‘whether

  a sorcerer, as the vulgar say, or as a philosopher, as the Pythagoreans

  say’, citing his biography by Philostratus, as Bellarmine did later. The

  allusion to ‘the most famous Sun table in the sand’ requires some

  explanation. Philostratus wrote that Apollonius had seen an altar

  dedicated ‘to the indian sun and the delphian apollo’, but

  also that he met an Indian king who made libations to the Sun and

  had an immense round table resembling an altar.227

  Prior to Bellarmine’s sermon, Jerome’s words about Pythagoras,

  Plato and Apollonius had been paraphrased by – of all people –

  Giordano Bruno! In 1588, in a farewell address to the Senate of the

  Academy of Wittenberg, Bruno thanked the people of Germany for

  having received him with kindness:

  Go now, whether Pythagoras, to the soothsayers of Memphis,

  or Archytas [the Pythagorean], to the shores of Italy, or Plato,

  in Sicily. Go now, or [Apollonius] Tynean, among the Persians,

  pass the Caucasus, the Scythians, the Messageti, enter the most

  opulent kingdoms of India and, across the great river Fiso, go

  to the Brahmans, travel among the Elamites, the Babylonians,

  the Chaldeans, the Medes, the Assyrians, the Parthians,

  the Syrians, the Phoenicians, the Arabs, the Palestinians,

  Alexandria, and go into Ethiopia to see the Gymnosophists

  and the most famous table of the Sun on the sand.

  Bruno said he had found similar wonders in Germany and had been

  well received, even though being ‘a stranger to the nation, exile,

  fugitive, laughing stock of fortune, small of body, poor of goods,

  without favour, viewed with hatred by the mob, then contemptible

  fools and those most ignoble who do not recognize nobility except

  where it shines of gold’.228

  In their versions of this passage, Jerome and Bruno portrayed

  Pythagoras, Plato and Apollonius as role models, examples of

  earn est learning. In contradistinction, Cardinal Bellarmine used

  this same passage to ridicule the vanity of philosophers and the

  delusions of heretics as corrupted by lies, terrible errors and false

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  miracles. Contrary to Jerome and Bruno, who praised travel as a

  way to gain knowledge, Bellarmine dismissed it as misguided wandering. Bruno himself had been a wanderer; born and educated in Nola, he had travelled to many cities and countries to seek knowledge: Naples, Venice, Padua, Rome, Genoa, Noli, Bergamo, Savona, Turin, Geneva, Lyon, Toulouse, Paris, Oxford, Wittenberg, Prague,

  Helmstedt, Frankfurt, Zurich and, finally, back to Venice and Padua,

  before being captured and imprisoned. Wanting to travel all over

  the world had been one of Mocenigo’s original accusations against

  Bruno. Bellarmine knew this.

  Also, by alluding to philosophers ‘who killed themselves’,

  Bellarmine’s words seem reminiscent of Lactantius’s claim that some

  Pythagoreans had misunderstood the immortality of the soul and

  had committed suicide.229 Next, Bellarmine drew a contrast between Christians and pagan philosophers:

  And we Christians do not blush, who are not a little of the

  Earth, and greedy; not a little of smoke, and ambitious;

  but not of the most uncertain conceptions, as the pagan

  philosophers; not to propagate the errors of dreams, as the

  heretics; nor so much stipend to pay, as soldiers; but the

  eternal kingdom, the kingdom of heaven, blessed life, and

  immortal, the fellowship of saints, and angels equally, we

  want the likeness of God, do not blush, I say such a prize

  proposed, can we do nothing, or suffer for it?230

  Here, the alleged vanities of pagan philosophers are just a step

  away from the errors of heretics. It reminds me of the claims by

  Tertullian, Lactantius and Jerome that ‘philosophers are the patriarchs of her etics.’ Indeed, Bellarmine knew and quoted these words by Tertullian, while discussing ‘extremely serious’ disputes of the

  origin of the soul, saying that philosophers like Plato and Origen

  had erroneous views about it.231

  Origen had said the world has a soul, that the stars are rational

  beings, and that human souls are immortal, eternal because they

  pre­exist bodies, such that ‘there is nothing new under the Sun.’

  St Jerome accused Pythagoras and Origen of teaching that souls

  fall from heaven, and may be clothed in various bodies in various

  worlds.232 Bruno had advocated these heresies.

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  In 1611 and 1615 Bellarmine had criticized Bruno’s views about

  the soul of the world, that the Earth moves and that God infuses

  everything. Bellarmine dedicated his book of 1611 to Pope Paul v,

  one of Bruno’s judges. Bellarmine there asserted Earth’s centrality in

  the universe. Again, this was contrary to Bruno and Galileo.

  Bellarmine had studied an extensive theological literature that

  included writings by early Ch
ristian and numerous pagan authors,

  including Cicero and Porphyry.233 Still, it is during the long proceedings against Bruno that we most clearly see the link between the Catholic denial of Earth’s motion and the heretical beliefs of the

  Pythagoreans: the existence of other worlds, the soul of the world

  and the transmigration of souls.

  Soon after meeting with Bellarmine, Galileo wrote to the

  Tuscan Secretary of State, saying that the Inquisition’s deliberations

  were not directed at himself but against Copernicus. But that was

  false. Accusations and depositions had all been about Galileo, not

  about Copernicus.

  Galileo said his enemies had failed to make the Church declare

  Earth’s motion heretical and contrary to the faith. Instead the

  Church had only decreed ‘that that opinion does not agree with

  Holy Scripture’, and that only Foscarini’s book would be completely

  prohibited. The works of Zúñiga and Copernicus were temporarily suspended. Galileo bragged that he wasn’t mentioned: ‘my own behaviour in this affair has been such that a saint would not have

  handled it either with greater reverence or with greater zeal toward

  the Holy Church.’ He complained that his enemies were malicious

  gossipers, who ‘have not refrained from any machination, calumny,

  and diabolical suggestion’ to destroy his reputation.234

  Galileo said the books by Zúñiga and Copernicus would be

  ‘corrected’, and that such corrections were already known. One

  sentence would be removed from Zúñiga’s book. Ten lines would

  be removed from Copernicus, ‘from the Preface to [Pope] Paul iii

  where he [Copernicus] mentions that he does not think such a doctrine is repugnant to Scripture; as I understand it, they could remove a word here and there, where two or three times he calls the Earth

  a star’.235 Galileo said Cardinal Caetani was appointed to make the corrections.

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  We should note that the question of whether the Earth is a

  star pertains not only to the controversy of whether it moves, but

  to the more controversial question: if Earth is a star, then are stars

  worlds? In a deposition to the Venetian Inquisition in 1592, Bruno

  had said, ‘I have indeed asserted infinite particular worlds similar to

  that of the Earth, which with Pythagoras I regard as a star.’236 This statement was copied by the Roman Inquisitors in their Summary

  of 1598. It was also implied in the heretical statement ‘Worlds are

  innumerable’, in the initial and final accusations against Bruno,

  voiced by Mocenigo and Schoppe. It was also defended by Foscarini.

  But it had been pinpointed as a senseless absurdity by Giulio Cesare

  Lagalla of the Jesuit Collegio.

  Despite Galileo’s wilful impression that Bellarmine’s warning

  was offered merely in kind courtesy, hearsay about it spread. Soon

  Galileo heard critical rumours. He felt the need to protect himself

  from slander. After al , the Inquisition had not accused him, had

  not put him on trial and his books were not censored. Therefore,

  he contacted Cardinal Bellarmine requesting support. In response,

  Bellarmine sent him a certificate, dated May 1616 and signed by

  Bellarmine, stating that Galileo was being slandered as if he had

  been ordered to abjure some opinion or doctrine, which he had not.

  Thus Bellarmine declared in writing that he had merely informed

  Galileo that the Pope and the Congregation of the Index had decreed

  that the doctrine of the Earth’s motion and the Sun’s immobility ‘is

  contrary to Scripture and therefore cannot be defended or held’.237

  It was a generous understatement, because in fact Galileo had been

  the main source of the proceedings that led to the Pope’s ruling.

  Did Galileo hold any Pythagorean beliefs other than the Earth’s

  motion? Yes – quietly, secretly, he did. In April 1615 Galileo confided

  to one of his supporters:

  It seems to me that in nature there is found a most spiritual

  substance, most tenuous and most rapid, which, spreading

  itself throughout the universe, penetrates into all without

  distinction, warming, vivifying and giving fecundity to all

  living creatures; and about this spirit of which the senses

  themselves show that the body of the Sun is its foremost

  reservoir, from which an immense light expands throughout the universe, accompanied by this spirit that heats and 158

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  penetrates into all vegetative bodies, and gives them life and

  fecundity.238

  This universal, vivifying spirit was not just light. Galileo paraphrased

  Genesis 1:2 to characterize the fertilizing spirit as ‘nourishing the

  waters or incubating over the waters’. 239 That passage had been quoted by Giordano Bruno to suggest that the Holy Spirit is the

  soul of the world. Thus Galileo’s words come alarmingly close to

  that heresy.

  Galileo connected these beliefs to the Sun’s centrality. He wrote

  that the Sun is located at the centre of the universe precisely ‘because’

  there it can receive, focus and strengthen the ‘fer tilizing spirit’ to project it outwards. He said that sunspots might well be ‘nourishments’

  or ‘excrements’ of the Sun. Galileo further said, ‘the vital spirit, sustains and vivifies all the limbs,’ as if echoing Virgil. And Galileo noted, ‘I could provide many testimonies from phil osophers and

  serious writers, in favour of the marvellous force and energy of this

  spirit.’ He did not quote them, but among them were Pythagoras

  (allegedly), Varro, Virgil, Apollonius (alleged ly), Novatian,

  Trismegistus, Abelard (allegedly), Ficino, Bruno, Campanella and

  Kepler. Their claims had been denounced by clergy men such as St

  Augustine, Castro, Piccolomini, Petreto, Bruno’s Inquisitors – and

  Bellarmine, in particular.

  Did Galileo know these views were offensive? Yes.

  He wrote to his confidant: ‘I know and confess my excessive

  temerity in opening my mouth, being inexperienced in Sacred

  Scriptures’, so he asked to be excused, saying that actually he did

  ‘submit totally to the judgment of my superiors’. And lastly he

  begged, ‘please do not let this [letter] reach the hands of anyone who,

  instead of with the sensitivity of the mother tongue, operates with

  the roughness and sharpness of a bestial fang, instead of polishing

  this, no, would lacerate and rip it apart entirely. ’240

  In his letter to the Grand Duchess Christina, Galileo mentioned

  the same belief. Galileo mentioned the soul of the world. Discussing

  the Sun, he wrote: ‘I don’t think that it is far from good philosophizing to say that he [the Sun], as maximum minister of Nature, and in a certain way as the soul and heart of the world, infuses the

  other bodies that surround him not only with light, but also with

  motion.’ Galileo quoted Dionysius the Areopagite, stating that the

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  Sun ‘gathers together all that is dispersed’, and it ‘renews, nourishes, protects, perfects, divides, marries, fosters, restores fecundity, increases, mutates, stengthens, delivers, moves and vitalizes all’.241

  In the Renaissance many writers did not know that this

  ‘Dionysius’ was not the saint converted by St P
aul; instead, he

  was a theologian around 500 ce who misattributed his writings.

  He tried to smuggle pagan beliefs into Christianity. He was the

  same ‘Dionysius’ whom Bruno praised as one of ‘the most profound and divine theologians’ who rightly worshipped God with silence: ‘the negative theology of Pythagoras and Dionysius is much

  more renowned, above the demonstrative one of Aristotle and the

  scholastic doctors. ’242

  Despite any imprudence, Galileo managed to dodge the

  Inquisition. As for the young Father Foscarini, any inquisitorial

  punishment became impossible. The Inquisition arrested and jailed

  the printer of Foscarini’s booklet, for printing it without a licence.243

  A few days later, on 10 June 1616, Foscarini suddenly died.

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  THE ENEMIES OF

  GALILEO

  Soon after Galileo published his book on the Moon, the

  Dutch astronomer Nicholas Mulerius said the opinion of

  the Pythagoreans was ‘openly contrary to Scripture’. Now,

  six months after Bellarmine admonished Galileo, Mulerius complained that the Copernican universe was so immense that it requires

  ‘the existence of many suns. And this deserves to be called absurd

  and contrary to Christian piety.’ Mulerius also referred to the new

  Pythagorean astronomers as ‘a sect’.1

  Other people too associated Pythagorean beliefs with heresies.

  The Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci carried out missionary activities in

  China. His manuscripts on the expedition were published five years

  after his death in 1610. Ricci said that some heretical beliefs of the

  Chinese resembled those of the ancient Greeks. He commented

  about one Chinese sect: ‘It forges, with Democritus and others,

  many worlds, but mostly they seem to have borrowed the transmigration of souls from the doctrine of Pythagoras, and have added many other lies to it, to embellish the falsehood. ’2

  The Jesuit Antonio Rubio spent 22 years as a missionary in

  Mexico, teaching philosophy and theology, returning to Spain in

  1599. Before he died in 1615 Rubio was writing a commentary on

  Aristotle’s On the Heavens. Rubio spent four chapters discussing

  the question of ‘Whether the world is one, or many’. He attributed the theory of worlds to a dozen philosophers including Democritus, while he counted Pythagoras among ten philosophers,