medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
You are misled by the IHT/NYTimes editorializing, smart-aleck headline
about "Downsizing the Inquisition" and the distortions found in
Horowitz's statements in the article. If yuou look at the quotation
attributed to Henry Kamen and at the quotations from the various Vatican
officials, gross numbers are only part of the issue. As with the
revisionist literature in general, among the questions addressed are the
purpose, procedures, percentages of various sentences and punishments,
percentage of commuted sentences etc. Above all, the revisionist
scholarship appropriately places the question of coercion in religious
matters in the context of its times rather than assuming an air of
self-righteous modern superiority. (Even in the modern West we still
coerce in matters of religion and philosophy and politics but with less
severe penalties ([professional, taxation etc.]).
I'm sorry, but I do not see how Hiroshima serves very well as an
analogy. Precisely this sort of sweeping presentist statement about the
inquisitions is what I thought we as medievalists had overcome even if
contemporary pundits and journalists are clueless. Surely we can do
better?
Dennis
>>> [log in to unmask] 6/16/2004 2:10:27 PM >>>
medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
culture
Because of all the conclusions such a conference may have arrived at,
this one
is most irrelevant possible! Would it change the significance of
Hiroshima to
find that fewer died than was previously believed?--V. K. Inman
Quoting Dennis Martin <[log in to unmask]>:
> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
culture
>
> Quite frankly I find the tone and content here offensive. The
Vatican
> conference presumably involved scholars working along the same lines
as
> those who have produced a body of revisionist studies on the various
> inquisitions (Peters, Kamen, Tedeschi and others) over the last
three
> decades. The revisionism was long overdue because of the distorted
and
> exaggerated view of the inquisitions that had become conventional in
the
> 18th and 19th centuries and is now endemic in popular culture.
WIthout
> having seen the papers, why mock the conference or its proceedings?
If
> a conference convoked by one of our professional societies or one of
our
> major universities had announced the publication of its proceedings
with
> similar generalizations, would you not at least have reserved
judgment
> until you had seen the volume? And what does contemporary
geopolitics
> (and ecclesial-politics) have to do with any of this? The joke
works
> only if one asumes that everyone on the list shares the same
> geopolitical assumptions.
>
> Dennis Martin
>
>
**********************************************************************
To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME
to: [log in to unmask]
To send a message to the list, address it to:
[log in to unmask]
To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion
to: [log in to unmask]
In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to:
[log in to unmask]
For further information, visit our web site:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html
**********************************************************************
To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME
to: [log in to unmask]
To send a message to the list, address it to:
[log in to unmask]
To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion
to: [log in to unmask]
In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to:
[log in to unmask]
For further information, visit our web site:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html
|