The Inquisition is[1] a group of institutions within the judicial system of the Roman Catholic Church whose aim is to combat heresy. It started in 12th-century France to combat the spread of religious sectarianism, in particular the Cathars and the Waldensians. This Medieval Inquisition persisted into the 14th century, and from the 1250s was associated with the Dominican Order. In the early 14th century, two other organisations attracted the attention of the Inquisition, the Knights Templar and the Beguines. At the end of the Middle Ages, the concept and scope of the Inquisition was significantly expanded in response to the Protestant Reformation and the Catholic Counter-Reformation. Its geographic scope was expanded to other European countries,[2] resulting in the Spanish Inquisition and Portuguese Inquisition. Those two countries in particular operated the Inquisition throughout their respective empires (Spanish and Portuguese) in the Americas, Asia, and Africa.[3] Persecution of Jewish and Muslim converts to Catholicism was the special concern of the Spanish and Portuguese inquisitions because of the belief that they secretly practiced their old faiths, resulting in cruel methods of torture to extract confessions. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquisition
Posted on: Sat, 21 Jun 2014 02:15:53 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015