Daughters of the Inquisition

by Christina Crawford

  The Crown ordered the expulsion of moriscos in 1609, similar to their previous orders of expulsion of Jews in 1492. And just as the Inquisition persecuted conversa women after the initial expulsion, so this current slate of inquisitors now brought the Inquisition to bear on morisca women. The inquisitors were particularly harsh if these women were also identified as alumbrada, visionaries. For, by this time, the alumbradas were primarily women, and these females were set for extermination by the Spanish Inquisition. It has already been recognized that especially for women, the visionary role model had great appeal. Not only did it empower them personally, it also allowed them to speak in public, (which was normally prohibited), and to present themselves as specially chosen by God in a society wherein they held no power. For a morisca woman, forbidden to observe either cultural or religious practices of Islam, “many moriscas followed a Muslim tradition of Taqeyya which is outward conformity to an oppressive religion while maintaining Islam internally and continuing these prohibited practices in secret.”358 These practices were teaching Arabic language and Muslim prayers to children, washing and praying according to Islam, and cooking with vegetable or olive oil rather than with lard made from animal renderings. The Inquisition accused Beatriz of being a devious Muslim as well as being a type of visionary condemned by the Catholic Church.

  Why were these visionary women seen as such a threat to the Church? Because their visions were spoken to beatas, as well as to laymen and women encouraging them to seek their own personal connection with God. Moreover, the visionaries learned to utilize this new power. The churchmen

  especially worried about the charismatic power of such women, who they realized, could infect others with their beliefs and enthusiasms … Inquisitors regarded these women with suspicion because they usually lived free of an convent or religious rule and often spoke of visions and messages they received directly from God, free of any clerical intercession or control … these women undermined clerical authority by answering their own questions and providing their own interpretations of religious experiences. Thus they learned to define what they considered to be reality and to trust their own experience.359

  Visionaries across past centuries from Hildegard of Bigen to Teresa of Avila, Maria of Santo Domingo, Sor Maria de la Visitacion and Madre Catalina de Jesus had led congregations, with hundreds of followers, were esteemed and supported by royals and peasants alike.

  Beatriz was a forty-eight year old woman who was married to an Old Christian man, and had led a rather commonplace life with the sole exception of her visions, when she was brought before the court of the Inquisition. There, she tread a delicate line and managed to be declared a “deluded hysterical women” rather than a heretic. She was sentenced to serve two years in seclusion, and to work in a women’s hospital as a servant in return for room and board. During this period, she was to be assigned to a reliable confessor (Catholic priest) who forbid her to take communion or associate with Beatas (holy women) while he (the priest) “directed her in what was appropriate for the salvation of her soul.”360 Possibly the most vexing reason the Inquisition viewed the holy woman’s visions as dangerous was that “In contrast to conventional literature that portrayed the body as an adversary of the soul, Beatriz’s visions seemed to fuse her body and soul in a single self adored by God … it challenged a widespread denial of the spirituality of sexuality.”361 Today, the visions of Beatriz seem quite modern, connected to the quest for mind/body wholeness many women embark upon. And it is also apparent that by bringing forward the Old Religion concept of sexual spirituality, Beatriz renewed the ideas and beliefs of the ancient Goddess worship rites of sacred union. For all those reasons, Beatriz is fortunate indeed not to have met the fate of the burning stake.

  Beatriz’ biographer also suggests similarities between alumbrados and Sufis. She says,

  Both Sufi’s and alumbrados underwent individual trances and group experiences that sometimes became extravagant expressions of emotion with dancing, weeping, ecstatic shouts, incomprehensible speech, and prophecies … not surprisingly, both sects appealed to women. Mysticism and visionary experience for both … promoted a feminization of religion which undercut the authority of a male clergy and displaced formal theological learning with individual feeling.… the Sufi teacher, al-Ghazzali urged his followers to “hold to the religion of the old women.”362

  It is of particular interest to remember that the center from which the Sufi are believed to originate, is a small city in Turkey (Anatolia), not very far from the ancient Goddess establishment of Catal Huyuk, and that “holding to the religion of the old women” would have been congruent with their place of origin.

  After the official expulsion of Muslims, some aspects of Islam and Christianity intermingled in Spanish culture, especially among women who were the remaining moriscas and conversas. Muslims venerated Mary, the mother of Jesus, and compared her to a wife of Mohammed and to Aminah, the mother of the Prophet. Aminah did not give birth as a “virgin” but she received many celestial signs and the recognition of holy women in phrases such as “There is none like you, O Aminah, from whom emanates the perfect friend, the resplendent light, and the supplicant for people in the Day of Judgement.”363 This is also reminiscent of the language of the ancient text surviving in the Nag Hammadi Library titled “Thunder Perfect Mind.”

  Persecution of Old Christians and Other Out-Groups

  Having either expelled or condemned conversos and moriscos, the Inquisition with the help of the newly formed Jesuit order (in the sixteenth century) turned their collective attention toward the Old Christians, primarily country people. This phase of the Spanish Inquisition became an issue of class, targeting the rural and socio-economically disadvantaged. The Jesuits, “black robes” as they were often called, set themselves apart as the zealous missionaries of the Inquisition, traveling across Spain to instruct the remaining indigenous population in proper observance of Catholicism. Many rural regions had developed what other parts of Europe and Britain experienced, which was a mixture of Old Religion and folk healing overlain with rudimentary Christianity, but a very long way from orthodox Catholicism. Jesuits and inquisitors saw these populations as ripe pastures. The punishing body of the Inquisition now teamed up with the missionary zeal of the Jesuits to bring to trial those illiterate souls who by word rather than by deed had unknowingly offended. From the 1560’s the prosecutions multiplied. “The overwhelming bulk of prosecution was for purely verbal offenses … statements about clergy and church, about aspects of belief and about sexuality … persistent blasphemy and simple fornication.”364

  Previously, heresy had been about holding a belief system which was in contradiction to Catholic orthodoxy. Now the Inquisition moved into the realm of bringing people to trial for offenses such as swearing, spreading gossip, statements made in the heat of anger or when intoxicated. To comprehend why words could be held to such serious account and why the Church regarded them as a potential threat, it is necessary to realize the true power of the spoken word in that time and place. As an illustration, “In a largely pre-literate age, all important social affirmations such as personal pledges or court testimony, were made orally … verbal statements directed against one’s neighbors and against God or religion were treated with severity by both state and church authorities for they disturbed the peace of the community.”365 Nevertheless, in this as in so many other instances, the church obstinately refused to be flexible, even knowing as they did, the lack of education found in these rural people. Instead of educating or perhaps lightening the sentences for condemned Old Christians “the Inquisition increased its punishments in order to achieve greater disciplinary effect.”366 From this vantage point looking back, it would seem that the Church of Rome and the Spanish Inquisition were acting out of desperation, believing that they were actually losing control over the populations where they had dominated, in light of the Reformation movement and the rise of the Protestant sects spreading across Europe.

  Th
e Jesuits were highly influential in the Counter Reformation by the Catholic Church, which was dedicated to uplifting morals. This moral crusade was aimed at both clergy and the local people. And, it did not take long for a primary focus of attention to be turned upon the issue of sexual behavior. Because the theaters were places where the Church believed prostitutes worked, the Jesuits were in favor of closing all theaters in Spain. Strangely enough, however, no plays were censored until 1801. Sermons were pre-censored in order to reign in the more flamboyant clergy. Marriage licenses were issued only after formal instruction by a priest to both the bride and groom. Bishops decreed against the common peasant practice of teenage couples co-habiting after betrothal.

  “Simple fornication” (i.e. voluntary intercourse between an adult man and woman, both unmarried) was preached against, so was concubinage and prostitution, none of which either rural people or local clergy held in objection. As a result of this preoccupation, one might even say obsession, by the churchmen with people’s sexual behavior; twenty percent of all prosecutions of the Toledo Inquisition from 1566 to 1570 were for “simple fornication.”367 This strict observation of Catholic dogma by the urban prelates was being superimposed upon the more traditional and long-standing customs of the rural populations in the countryside who celebrated ancient rites acquired from the Old Religion which was practiced long before Christianity was forced on them. Bigamy was also frequent in a society which prohibited divorce according to the Church of Rome. Five years sentenced to serve in the galleys of the Spanish ships to the New World was the Church penalty given to men for this offence. Women also were found guilty, but neither men nor women seemed to feel internalized guilt for this behavior.

  The male clergy of the Catholic Church was constantly in trouble for sexual offenses which ranged from keeping concubines to soliciting sex during confessions, to accosting single women. In one year alone, 1561–2, the vicar general of Barcelona issued 57 warnings to clergy over keeping concubines (permanent female partners with whom the man had sex) after being told not to continue such practices. In 1613, the Catalonian Inquisition punished 77 familiars and comisarios for offenses involving women.

  And then there was sodomy, which was a practice all religious rulers since Sumeria and the Hebrew patriarchs have struggled to curb. Homosexuality, while knowingly and openly practiced in monasteries, was nevertheless treated as the ultimate moral crime by the Church when persecuting ordinary people. The usual punishment by the Inquisition was to be burned alive, and in Spain castration was added before the accused was stoned to death in public. Then, curiously (since the Papal Inquisition already had developed penalties for sodomy), a split developed in Spain of this issue. The Suprema said that jurisdiction over sodomy would only be punished when heresy was also present. But the kingdom of Aragon continued to prosecute whether or not heresy was also present. Where homosexuality or sodomy was punished, death by burning was restricted to those over 25 years old. Minors, a high proportion of those accused, were whipped and shipped off to the New World on the ship’s galleys. The clergy, always a high proportion of offenders and accused, were treated mildly by their own church courts of the Inquisition. In effect, the brotherhood were chastised but protected.

  Bestiality, usually found in rural peasant areas and among the very poor, was punished ruthlessly. Bestiality is the result of men being segregated away from women, whether for reasons of work or religion. All patriarchal systems which separate women from men have been challenged by this issue. The early desert cultures wrote laws specifically against bestiality, some of which are included in Part Two of this book. But governments under the Goddess cultures show no signs of similar challenges. Kamen says that “Punishment of sodomy may be seen as a preoccupation of both secular and ecclesiastical courts.”368 Between 1571 and 1579, over one hundred men were tried on charges of either homosexuality or bestiality and thirty-six were executed. From 1570 to 1630, the Inquisition of Spain tried 543 cases, but only executed 102 men.369

  The Spanish Inquisition irradiated the intellectuals of the country, decimated the professionals and trades so vital to a healthy internal economy, and sent generations to cope with residual shame and disenfranchisement. Furthermore, it could well be viewed as the prototype for the German Holocaust because all of its principal features were duplicated by Adolph Hitler who spent childhood as a German Catholic. The adage about history teaching us or, conversely, suffering from denial of it is woefully accurate.

  The Peasant Wife

  To show how different remote regions of Spain and Europe were unequally affected by the Inquisitions, there is a rare glimpse into the life of a peasant woman named Bertrande de Rols who lived in the Basque country, the mountainous region between Spain and the south of France. As yet in this region, neither the European nor Spanish Inquisitions have taken hold, though there are Protestant sympathizers among the village Catholics. Her story is that of a woman without real power who tries to maintain a balance between her own desires and her need to follow the traditional customs expected of her among her peers and superiors.

  Two works on the circumstances of her life are written by women. Natalie Zemon Davis wrote the non-fiction The Life of Martin Guerre which has become well known because of dramatic presentations based on it, and Janet Lewis has done a historic novel The Wife of Martin Guerre. In the opening sequence of the novel, a wedding scene is featured. “One night in January, 1539, a wedding was celebrated in the village of Artigues. That night the two children who had been espoused to one another lay in bed in the house of the groom’s father. They were Bertrande de Rols, aged eleven years, and Martin Guerre, who was no older, both offspring of rich peasant families as ancient, as feudal and as proud as any of the great seigniorial houses of Gascony.”370

  Her first encounter with her new husband on the day of their marriage was unpleasant. While no one else was around, Martin accosted her in a hallway, hitting her until one of Bertrande’s female relatives heard her cries and rescued the child. Later as they lay side by side in the marriage bed, he was verbally harsh and unkind to her. But, the next morning, she was able to return to the house of her mother to live until she was fourteen. Upon the death of her mother, Bertrande was required to be handed over to the family of the groom. Nevertheless, she retained her maiden name, that of her mother’s family, throughout her life.

  The people of this mountain region were wealthy from market sales of their many products and protected in their valleys from war, plague and the Inquisition. Their customs, traditions and language were slow to change because necessity did not demand it. They spoke langue d’oc from Occitania. Their primary influences were Basque and Spanish, but the de Rols family was considered Langedoc, while the Guerre family was Basque. Both families bought and sold property, raised sheep, grew millet, apples and grapes, and utilized notaries to write contracts between buyer and seller because they neither read nor wrote in any language.

  Bertrande’s dowry was probably a cash payment and a vineyard along with her household goods and clothes which were sent along with every peasant bride. These would have included a feather bed, sheets of linen and wool, a bedcover, a coffer with lock and key, and two or three dresses.371

  On the second wedding, night approximately five years later, the couple was now teenage, and as was customary a group of revelers led by a female relative of the local curate brought in a drink called “reveil” made of wine heavily seasoned with herbs and spices. (There is some speculation that psychedelic properties of herbs were included.) This wine drink ensured the newlyweds’ ardent mating and a fertile marriage. Unfortunately, Martin Guerre suffered from impotence, and Bertrande did not conceive for the first eight years of their marriage.

  The entire village knew of Martin’s predicament. Some said that the couple had a spell cast over them. Bertrande’s family wanted their beautiful daughter to separate from Martin while she was still young enough to remarry and produce offspring. According to local tradition an unconsummated uni
on could be dissolved after three years and by Church canon, Bertrande could remarry.372 But another custom was used to humiliate impotent men. Charivari, as it was called, was enacted by a group of young men who darkened their faces, dressed in women’s clothes and gathered in front of the family home creating a racket by jeering and beating on wine vats, ringing bells and rattling swords.373 In her later testimony at court, Bertrande said that the couple was “tied” by the charms of a sorceress making sexual relations impossible. Jealousy of another woman was used as the possible reason for the bewitchment.

  Here is the interface between the ancient traditions and the influence of the Church, eventually even the secular courts as a result of the sexual problems with the marriage. But initially it is to the old religion that the couple turns for a cure. Davis says that “Given the tradition of popular curing … the couple must have consulted a local wise woman more than once. Finally, after some eight years, an old woman ‘appeared suddenly as if from heaven’ and told them how to lift the spell, (then) they had four masses said by priests and were given sacred hosts and special cakes to eat.”374 The hosts came from the priest. The cakes were probably part of the old religion where women make cakes with ingredients supposed to contain magical herbs and were formed into shapes with magical properties. The process was successful. Bertrande conceived a son who was given the Basque name of Sanxi. Motherhood had finally given Bertrande an adult place in her community.

  From little girl to grown woman, Bertrande sought to live within the parameters set by village standards. She was beautiful, proud, cunning and strong-willed, learning the ways of women first from her own mother, then from her sisters-in-law with whom she lived in a very self-assured Basque family. “The women of Laboud, often heirs and mistresses of households in their own right, were known for their “effrontery” and would later be notorious as witches.”375 Here is the correlation between being strong minded, clever women and the assertion by the Church that they participated in criminal activities.