God's Jury: The Inquisition and the Making of the Modern World

by Cullen Murphy

  In the waning years of the Roman Empire, a lawyer-turned-littérateur named Aurelius Clemens Prudentius composed the epic poem Psychomachia, about a contest between good and evil. It eventually became popular, and in the Middle Ages influenced a number of better-known works, such as the morality play Everyman and the allegorical poem Piers Ploughman. It was Prudentius who developed the list of the “seven heavenly virtues”—which did battle in his epic with the “seven deadly vices.” The first six of the heavenly virtues are charity, temperance, chastity, diligence, patience, and kindness. At the bottom of the list, appropriately enough, is humility. The “greatest of these,” Paul observed of the core Christian virtues, is charity. That is the standard view of all Christian denominations. It is a constant refrain of the Gospels and a central message of most religions. Stripped of divine sanction, it is a cherished secular value.

  But if the first virtue, charity, summons us to our better natures, it is the seventh virtue, humility, that protects us from our baser ones. A few years ago, the political philosopher Michael Sandel published a small book called The Case for Imperfection. Its ostensible focus is on genetic engineering and other scientific methods for ensuring that the human beings who walk the planet are as good as they can be—as close to perfect as we can make them. But the larger purpose is to raise a question: Is perfection even desirable? Yes, of course, it is a worthy goal to diminish disease, incapacity, and other afflictions. But the quest for perfection goes well beyond such efforts, even as we disagree on what “perfection” actually means.

  More to the point, Sandel asks, shouldn’t we pause to consider the contribution that imperfection makes to the betterment of the human condition? Our individual qualities and flaws are distributed unevenly. For now, they are also distributed randomly. We deserve neither full credit for what is good about ourselves nor full blame for what is bad. No one does. This aleatory quality—each of us in some sense represents a throw of nature’s dice—has important consequences. Rightly understood, it puts a premium on what we do have in common: to begin with, our moral equality as beings, regardless of specific attributes. Because all of us come up short in some dimension, it conduces to tolerance. “One of the blessings of seeing ourselves as creatures of nature, God, or fortune is that we are not wholly responsible for the way we are,” Sandel writes. “The more alive we are to the chanced nature of our lot, the more reason we have to share our fate with others.”

  The Inquisition—any inquisition—is the product of a contrary way of seeing things. It takes root and thrives when moral inequality is perceived between one party and everyone else. Inquisitions invite members of one group—national, religious, corporate, political—to sit in judgment on members of another: to think of themselves, in a sense, as God’s jury. Fundamentally, the inquisitorial impulse arises from some vision of the ultimate good, some conviction about ultimate truth, some confidence in the quest for perfectibility, and some certainty about the path to the desired place—and about whom to blame for obstacles in the way.

  These are powerful inducements. Isaiah Berlin warned against them:

  To make mankind just and happy and creative and harmonious forever—what could be too high a price to pay for that? To make such an omelette, there is surely no limit to the number of eggs that should be broken—that was the faith of Lenin, of Trotsky, of Mao, for all I know, of Pol Pot. Since I know the only true path to the ultimate solution of the problems of society, I know which way to drive the human caravan; and since you are ignorant of what I know, you cannot be allowed to have liberty of choice even within the narrowest limits, if the goal is to be reached. You declare that a given policy will make you happier, or freer, or give you room to breathe; but I know that you are mistaken, I know what you need, what all men need; and if there is resistance based on ignorance or malevolence, then it must be broken and hundreds of thousands may have to perish to make millions happy for all time. What choice have we, who have the knowledge, but to be willing to sacrifice them all?

  This way of thinking is not new. We would have encountered one version of it during the Medieval Inquisition, another during the French Revolution. Modernity itself is not the culprit, but it is an accomplice. It transforms an impulse into a process.

  Some ills have cures of a conventional kind. We can change a law, tweak a regulation, implement a program. The inquisitorial impulse is impervious to such interventions. Legal restrictions can always be finessed (and the Inquisition itself, in any case, was always “legal”). The capacities of surveillance are heading in one direction only, regardless of what any law might say. No matter what happens to the nation-state, bureaucracies are permanent and ever more pervasive. They operate with more autonomy every day.

  I think often of that conversation with Francisco Bethencourt, when he explained that what ultimately sent the Inquisition into decline (we were talking specifically about the Spanish and Roman Inquisitions) was something that had no physical existence at all: the slow advance of Enlightenment notions of tolerance, freedom of conscience, and freedom of expression. Enlightenment and Inquisition have faced off against each other in countless ways over centuries, but I came across a small, symbolic example one afternoon at the British Library. I had gone there to look at Bernard Gui’s Liber Sententiarum—his Book of Sentences—but affixed to the front of the manuscript was a sheaf of eighteenth-century correspondence bearing on how the manuscript had come into the library’s hands. The philosopher John Locke had played a central role; he came across the manuscript in the south of France, alerted the historian Philipp van Limborch to its existence, and eventually managed to find a buyer for it. “When you see what it contains,” Locke wrote to Limborch, “I think you will agree with us that it ought to see the light. For it contains authentic records of things done in that rude age which have either been forgotten or purposefully misrepresented.” Locke’s ideas about religious toleration turned on the very idea of uncertainty: human beings can’t know for sure which truths are “true,” and in any case, attempting to compel belief only leads to trouble.

  Tolerance and free expression did not spread everywhere, or at the same pace anywhere. Locke’s contemporary, Jonathan Swift, published much of his most acerbic writing anonymously, fully aware of the potential consequences if his authorship became known. (Even so, he was denied ecclesiastical preferment in England, and shunted off to a sinecure in Dublin.) But the gradually accruing power of an idea that takes hold can have all the force of physical reality.

  The philosopher John Searle has written about this in several of his books—he calls the process “the construction of social reality.” It’s easy enough to see how aspects of the physical world come to be accepted as givens: rock is hard; water flows downhill; death comes to us all. It is less easy to understand how social conventions—for instance, that the slips of paper known as money possess value—come to enjoy the same universal acceptance. But they do. Some of them are more durable than the tangible world itself. Societies change from one political form into another; civilizations crumble into dust; new technologies transform ordinary life from one generation to the next—but certain agreed-upon ways of thinking live on. The notion that one can own pieces of the physical world—private property—has sunk in deeply. So has the very idea of “rights.”

  Inquisitions have a tangible component and a notional component. On the one hand, there are the laws, the bureaucracies, the surveillance, the data-gathering, the ways of meting out punishment and applying force. One can imagine “reforms,” “restrictions,” “guidelines,” and “safeguards” in all these areas, to keep abuses in check. Some already exist, to limited effect. Individuals and organizations all around the world are engaged in efforts to enact legal curbs of one kind or another. I wish them well.

  On the other hand, there is the idea that some single course is right, that we can ascertain what it is, and that we should take all necessary measures to compel everyone in that direction. Samuel Johnson once remarked of
someone he knew that the man “seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one.” The drafters of the U.S. Constitution—fearful of rule by one opinion, whether the tyrant’s or the mob’s—created a governmental structure premised on the idea that human beings are fallible, fickle, and unreliable, and sometimes to be feared. Triumphalist rhetoric about the Constitution ignores the skeptical view of human nature that underlies it. The Church itself, in its more sober teachings on certitude and doubt, has always raised a red flag: Human beings are fallen creatures. Certitude can be a snare. Doubt can be a helping hand. Consider a list of theologians who have found themselves targets of the Holy Office—Teilhard de Chardin, John Courtney Murray, Yves Congar—only to be “surrounded with a bright halo of enthusiasm” at some later point, as Cardinal Avery Dulles once put it. When the Church says it has “no fear of historical truth,” the point it should be trying to convey is this: it has no fear because if historical truth demonstrates anything, it is that we will keep taking the wrong path—and to acknowledge that fact keeps us on the right one. Humility is the Counter-Inquisition’s most effective ally. It can’t be legislated, but it can come to be embraced.

  Passing from the courtyard of the Holy Office and back through the heavy studded doors, I turned around for a look at the façade. Pope Pius V, who built the palazzo, had put a bold inscription there—in effect, the Inquisition’s mission statement. Translated from the Latin, the inscription declared: “Pius V Pontifex Maximus constructed this home for the Holy Inquisition in 1569 as a bulwark of the Catholic faith, in order that adherents of heretical depravity might be utterly restrained.”

  I noticed for the first time that the inscription is in fact no longer there. The marble scroll on which it was placed has been scraped and polished, shorn of any words at all. French troops, I later learned, had removed the inscription during Napoleon’s occupation. The marble today looks shiny but unnatural, like skin that has burned and then healed. Some things can be erased. Some things cannot be. And some things shouldn’t be. In this instance, I was grateful for the attempt, and grateful for the scar.

  Acknowledgments

  God’s Jury has evolved and matured during the course of more than a decade, and owes a debt to many people. Chief among them are the historians who gave generously of their time and their guidance. They include Francisco Bethencourt, Eamon Duffy, Carlo Ginzburg, Peter Godman, Henry Kamen, David Kertzer, Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, William Monter, Edward Peters, and John Tedeschi. Msgr. Alejandro Cifres, who oversees the Inquisition archives at the Vatican, was unfailingly helpful. I am also grateful to many Jesuit friends and Catholic theologians who offered assistance and perspective along the way, and in certain cases provided insights drawn from personal experience of unhappy interactions with the authorities in Rome.

  Over the years I have discussed aspects of this book, sometimes sharing drafts of work in progress, with a wide circle of people who have particular knowledge or particular judgment: Karen Barkey, Mark Bowden, Fredric Cheyette, Lawrence Douglas, Paul Elie, James Fallows, David Friend, Robert D. Kaplan, Corby Kummer, Toby Lester, Gail Kern Paster, Tom Ricks, Philippe Sands, Eric Schlosser, Benjamin Schwarz, Clive Stafford Smith, Scott Stossel, Doug Stumpf, Charles Trueheart, Alan Wolfe, and Robert Wright. In a category by themselves are the three editors I’ve had the privilege of working for as God’s Jury took shape: William Whitworth and the late Michael Kelly at The Atlantic Monthly, and Graydon Carter at Vanity Fair.

  Finally, I would like to thank those involved in making the book itself: Andrea Schulz, my editor at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; the late Peter Davison, who encouraged the idea for this book to begin with; Anton Mueller, who got the idea off the ground; Martha Spaulding, a longtime friend and colleague, who has copyedited virtually every word I’ve written for more than thirty years; Raphael Sagalyn, my friend and agent over that same period of time; the illustrator Edward Sorel, another friend and frequent collaborator; and Cullen Nutt, who has served ably in the role of both researcher and sounding board. Special thanks are due to my assistant, Keenan Mayo, and to the staff of the Boston Athenaeum, where significant portions of this book took form.

  My wife, Anna Marie, always the first and best reader, has subjected God’s Jury to her typical “rigoroso esamine,” and it is to her that the book is dedicated.

  Notes

  1. Standard Operating Procedure

  1. [>] “No one goes in”: Chadwick, Catholicism and History, p. 89. The archivist was Msgr. Francesco Rosi-Bernardini.

  [>] “Theology, sir”: Miller, The Crucible, p. 67.

  2. [>] in the words of the Apostolic Constitution: Apostolic Constitution (Pastor bonus), translated by Francis C. C. Felly, James H. Provost, and Michel Thériault. Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, 1998.

  [>] plenty of rulings of its own: Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Instruction Dignitas Personae on Certain Bioethical Questions,” September 8, 2008; Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons,” June 3, 2003; “Vatican Tells Parishes Not to Open Archives to LDS Church,” Catholic News Agency, May 7, 2008; Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Declaration on the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church—Dominus Jesus,” August 6, 2000.

  3. [>] Holocaust-denying bishop: Peter Walker, “Profile: Richard Williamson,” Guardian, February 25, 2009.

  use of condoms: Richard Owen, “Pope Says Condoms Are Not the Solution to AIDS—They Make It Worse,” The Times (London), March 17, 2009.

  indigenous peoples: Gina Doggett, “Pope Once Again in Damage Control Mode,” Agence France Presse, May 23, 2007.

  once introduced the visiting Ratzinger: Peter Steinfels, “Cardinal Is Seen as Kind, if Firm, Monitor of Faith,” New York Times, February 1, 1988.

  [>] a Ratzinger fan site: http://www.popebenedictxvifanclub.com/faq.html. http://www.popebenedictxvifanclub.com/faq.html.

  4. [>] so that work could be completed: Pastor, History of the Popes, vol. 17, p. 289.

  [>] When I first set foot: My first visit to the Archivio della Congregazione per la Dottrina della Fede took place in 2000. It was followed by visits in 2001, 2004, and 2010. The account here and elsewhere in this book is based on all four visits and on conversations on each occasion with Msgr. Alejandro Cifres Giménez, the director of the archives.

  vast underground bunker: Richard Owen, “The Vatican Offers a Glimpse of Its Most Secret Archives,” The Times (London), January 8, 2010.

  5. [>] the convenience of modern historians: Chadwick, Catholicism and History, p. 9.

  6. [>] “some pleasant surprises”: Bruce Johnston, “Vatican to Open Up Inquisition Archives,” Daily Telegraph, January 12, 1998.

  7. [>] “No one expects”: “The Spanish Inquisition,” Monty Python’s Flying Circus, series 2, episode 15.

  [>] Mel Brooks dance number: History of the World: Part 1 (1981), produced, written, and directed by Mel Brooks.

  [>] “comedy is tragedy plus time”: Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), written and directed by Woody Allen.

  [>] Cokie Roberts was asked: Good Morning America, December 3, 1998.

  [>] media scrutiny of Sarah Palin’s record: “Fox Special Report with Brit Hume,” September 2, 2008.

  [>] captains of finance who were summoned to testify: Stanley Bing, “The Inquisition Convenes in Washington,” Fortune.com., January 12, 2010.

  8. [>] “I had to learn who Torquemada was”: 20/20, ABC News, November 25, 1998.

  [>] singling out Bobby: “The Visible Vidal,” Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide, vol. 17, no. 2, March 2010.

  [>] criticizing the tactics: Taki, “Rats and Heroes,” The Spectator, 15/22 December, 2001.

  [>] writing about the sex-abuse scandal: Maureen Dowd, “Should There Be an Inquisition for the Pope?,” New York Times, March 31, 2010.

  [>]continued . . . for seven hundred years: The brief summary that foll
ows of three main phases of the Inquisition is based on a variety of sources, including Lea, A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages; Kamen, The Spanish Inquisition; Lea, A History of the Inquisition of Spain; Bethencourt, The Inquisition; Black, The Italian Inquisition; and Peters, Inquisition.

  9. [>] the only Belgian song ever to hit No. 1: Rachel Helyer Donaldson, “New Film Tells Tragic Story of the Singing Nun,” The First Post, April 29, 2009.

  [>] shortage of combustible material: Kamen, The Spanish Inquisition, p. 213.

  10. the victim was a Spanish schoolmaster: Lea, A History of the Inquisition of Spain, vol. 4, p. 461.

  11. pressing to have Queen Isabella declared a saint: Isambard Wilkinson, “Spain Seeks Sainthood for Isabella,” Daily Telegraph, April 23, 2003.

  [>] a fertile recruiting ground for bishops and cardinals: Bethencourt, The Inquisition, p. 136.

  12. [>] “No death certificate has ever been issued”: William Monter, “The Inquisition,” in Hsia, ed., Companion to the Reformation World.

  [>] the rise of a metaphorical Inquisition: Peters, Inquisition. The subject occupies much of the book, but see in particular pp. 189–262, 296–315.