Christianity's relationship with witchcraft: Part 2
Witchcraft was now classified a heretical cult. Not only that, but it was considered heretical to not
believe in the power of the Devil. The punishments against witchcraft
were carefully laid out, as well as the methods for detecting and trying
witches. The hitherto sporadic cases of witchcraft were now to be
viewed as a cohesive group that had been marshaled together by Satan to
attack and destroy Christianity.
In view of this calamitous assault on Christ, the pope commissioned Henrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger,
educated Dominicans who occupied high positions at the University of
Cologne, to systematically bring witches to trial and punishment. They
carried out their assignment with a vengeance. ref
Pope
Innocent’s immediate successors followed his lead and anyone who
opposed the repressive measures could be considered in league with the
witches. In the case of Venice, the entire state was threatened by Leo X
if it did not obey the Inquisition in apprehending witches. Venice
bowed to the Pope's threat, and within a year Venice had sentenced 70
witches to the flames.
The Witches Hammer, the Malleus maleficarum, is the most important and nefarious legacy the world has on witchcraft. Published in 1486, it was written by Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger.
Their book is divided into three parts: the first proves the existence
of witchcraft; the second sets forth the forms in which it manifested
itself; the third describes the rules for its detection and prosecution.
It states that the world in the last quarter of the 15th century was
more given over to the devil than in any preceding age. It appeals to
the Scriptures, the teachings of the Church and especially to Augustine
and Thomas Aquinas for support. Witches and sorcerers are described as
meeting at weekly sabbats and do the devil homage by kissing his ass.
Satan appears among them as a tom-cat, goat, dog, bull or black man
while demons of both sexes swarm at the meetings. During these sabbats,
baptism and the Eucharist are ridiculed and the cross trampled upon.
After an abundant feast the lights are extinguished and at the devil’s
command of "Mix, mix," the participants celebrate with a lewd orgy. The
devil, however, is a strict disciplinarian and applies the whip to
errant members. Further, the book states that witches are supposedly
transported through the air, they kill unbaptized children, and later
they eat them. There is a very frequent mention of sexual intercourse.
To quote: "…it is common to all of them to practice carnal copulation with devils.” Interestingly, there are two full chapters devoted to this topic alone.
For
evidence of the reality of their charges, the authors cite their own
extensive experience and declare that, in 48 cases of witches brought
before them and burnt, all the victims confessed to having practiced
abominable whoredoms for between 10 to 30 years.
Among the
precautions which the book prescribed against being bewitched, are the
Lord’s Prayer, the cross, holy water and salt, and the Church formulas
of exorcism. It also adds that inner grace is a preservative.
The
directions for the prosecution of witches, given in the third part of
the treatise, are set forth in great detail. Public rumor was a
sufficient cause for an indictment. The accused were to be subjected to
the indignity of having the hair shaved off from their bodies,
especially the more secret parts, lest perchance some imp or charm might
be hidden there. Careful rules were given to the inquisitors for
preserving themselves against being bewitched. If someone too zealously
defended the witch, then that was taken as evidence that he was himself
under the same influence. One of the devices for exposing guilt was a
sheet of paper the length of Christ’s body inscribed with the seven
words of the cross. This was to be bound on the witch’s body at the time
of the mass, and then the ordeal of torture was applied. This measure
almost invariably brought forth a confession of guilt. The ordeal of the red-hot iron
was also recommended, but it was to be used with caution, as it was the
trick of demons to cover the hands of witches with a salve made from a
vegetable essence which kept them from being burnt. Such a case
supposedly happened in Constance, the woman being able to carry the
glowing iron six paces and thus going free.
The Witches Hammer was printed in many editions. It was issued 13 times before 1520 and 16 more times from 1574–1669.
That
concludes part one of a three part series on Christianity’s fascination
with witchcraft. You’ve been listening to the Ex-Christian Monologues, a
podcast from ExChristian.Net.
Ref: Shaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge | History of the Christian Church | The Malleus Maleficarum
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Christianity's relationship with witchcraft: Part 1
Hello, you’re listening to the Ex-Christian Monologues, a podcast from
ExChristian.Net. I’m Dave, and today’s date is April 24, 2006.
Today
I want to talk a little bit about Christianity’s historic relationship
with witchcraft. This is part one of a three-part podcast. Part One
draws heavily on the History of the Christian Church by Philip Schaff and the New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge. Schaff’s classic work is in the public domain and freely available on the Internet.
Most
primitive cultures attributed witches with the power to supernaturally
injure crops, animals, health, and possessions. Many ancient cultures
created laws to punish the offense. As in other cultures, the ancient
Hebrews condemned witchcraft, as expressed in the Mosaic Law ( Deut 18:10 & Exodus 22:18). Following in Judaism's footsteps, the early Christian Church believed in and condemned witchcraft Acts 19:19, Acts 8:9. (Click here for Moree examples).
Belief in witchcraft never disappeared, but it wasn’t always severely persecuted. The Synod of Reisbach in 799,
for example, formally mandated penance as a punishment for women
convicted of witchcraft, but prohibited any capital punishment. For a
time the official rhetoric of the Church even tried to tone down belief
in magic or witchcraft, labeling it as either false superstition or
delusion.
For centuries Christianity had taught that God was in
HIS heaven, far removed from human society. The Church encouraged
people to be content with their miserable, medieval lot in life. Poverty
and sickness were considered gifts of God that helped people remain
holy by focusing their minds away from this world and on to the next.
Physical pleasures should be shunned — this life was to be endured, but
not necessarily enjoyed. Common people weren't easily convinced to
meekly adopt this philosophy — many hung on tenaciously to a belief in
magic. They thought magic could empower them to deal with the some harsh
realities of their lives. Belief in magic, instead of subsiding,
actually grew.
Some so-called heretical groups, and some well
meaning churchmen, doubted that witchcraft was anything more than
illusions of the Devil. Most were convinced that witchcraft was a real
power, fueled by the denizens of hell.
Witches were reportedly
transporting people through the air and holding meetings, or sabbats,
where they indulged in lust-filled orgies with demons. Mention is given
to these activities in the The Bishop’s Canon, which appeared first in the 10th century and was later incorporated by Franciscus Gratianus, a lawyer from Bologna, in his collection of canon law in 1150. Women confessed to flying through the air, but Gratianus considered the women delusional. English author, diplomat and bishop of Chartres John of Salisbury, felt the stories illusions propagated by the Devil. But, his contemporaries, such as Englishman Walter Map, reported that the wild orgies were real, with the Devil appearing on the scene in the form of a tom-cat.
According
to Philip Schaff, the daughter of a count was carried through the air
every night, one night even escaping the arms a Franciscan monk who
tried to hold her back. In 1275, a woman of Toulouse, under torture,
confessed she had indulged in sexual intercourse with a demon for many
years and had given birth to a part wolf, part serpent, monster. She
added that she sustained the creature by feeding murdered children to
it.
Pope after pope called upon the Inquisition to root out and
punish witches alongside the heretics they were already persecuting.
Pope Gregory IX issued a bull in 1231 invoking the use of civil
punishment against witchcraft. Dominican theologians spread the belief
that incubi and succubi were mating with people—a belief that was rooted
in Augustine’s “City of God,” xv23., as well as in the Genesis account of angels mating with humans.
In 1233, Pope Gregory IX
asserted that the Devil was making appearances in the forms of a toad, a
pallid ghost and a black cat. His papal bull, the “Vox Rama,”
shockingly and graphically detailed what was taking place during witch's
satanic, sexual orgies, and with the stroke of his pen launched an
official, large-scale persecution of witches.
In 1274, Thomas Aquinas
supported the claims that humans were cohabitation with demons, and
even declared that old women could inject an evil essence into young
people with just a glance. I suppose that's where the evil eye myth was
born.
Jean Gerson, the leading theologian of his age, said it was heresy and impious to doubt the practice of witchcraft, and Pope Eugenius IV spoke in detail about those who made pacts with demons and sacrificed to them.
Among all the papal and other documents on witchcraft, perhaps the place of pre-eminence is held by the papal bull, Summis desiderantes
issued by Innocent VIII in 1484. The pontiff wrote, “…by their
incantations, charms, and conjurings… they cause to perish the offspring
of women, the foal of animals, the products of the earth, the grapes of
vines, and the fruits of trees, as well as men and women, cattle and
flocks and herds and animals of every kind, vineyards also and orchards,
meadows, pastures, harvests, grains and other fruits of the earth… and
hinder men from begetting and women from conceiving, and prevent all
consummation of marriage; that, moreover, they deny with sacrilegious
lips the faith… at the risk of their own souls, to the insult of the
divine majesty and to the pernicious example and scandal of multitudes.”
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