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The word that wounds is this:
When a man speaks a word
for the sake of the killing of a man
or the killing of beasts or the killing of trees
and the "Cross of Light,"
the lying word, and that of anger and that of fury,
or a corrupt and viciously obscene word
or a quarrelsome word that one flings at his brother
this is the hurtful word.
Mani, Kephalaia 211:9-14
Zarathushtra is said to have lived 258 years before Alexander.
Since Alexander had taken over the Persian empire by 330 BC when
Darius III died,
and as Zarathushtra was about forty years old
when he converted King Vishtapa
and lived to be 77, the approximate
dates of his life are 628-551 BC.
Other traditions hold that he
was born long before that,
and some scholars believe he lived
between 1400 and 1200 BC.
It is also possible that there could
have been more than one Zarathushtra.
Little is known about the
life of Zarathushtra, who was called Zoroaster by the Greeks,
but his influence on Iranian religion was very great.
The name
Zarathushtra has been translated as "he of the golden Light,"
and legend indicates that as a child he glowed with radiant light.
The Aryans, who settled in Iran and those who invaded India,
shared a common religion originally, as indicated by a Mitannian
treaty with Hittites
from the 14th century BC which acknowledged
the
Vedic gods Mitra, Varuna, Indra, and the two Nasatyas.
The
names Mitra and Varuna were often linked together
in the Hindu Vedas as a dual compound.
The Iranian god Ahura shared
the characteristics of the early Varuna,
and Zarathushtra added
the attribute of wisdom (Mazda)
and declared that the one
true God is Ahura Mazda.
Apparently when the split occurred between
the Hindus and the Iranians,
they eventually demonized some of
each other gods and spirits.
The divinities the Hindus call devas
became evil spirits or devils
to the Iranians and Zarathushtra,
while the Hindus called evil spirits asuras.
According to tradition Zarathushtra was born smiling or laughing
as the third of five sons
in the Spitama family in the pastoral
Median town of Rhages near what is now Tehran;
he was initiated
into the priesthood at age fifteen.
He left home on a spiritual
quest when he was twenty
and at thirty recognized the Wise Lord (Mazda Ahura)
when Good Thought (Vohu Manah) came
to him and asked him who he was.
Zarathushtra declared that he
was a foe to the Liar and a supporter of what is right.
Zarathushtra
criticized aggressive violators of order as followers of the Lie,
and his teachings were opposed by the religious authorities.
Zarathushtra
was tempted to give up his new faith
but continued on with great
determination.
For ten years he wandered around with very few
followers.
Traveling east as he preached, Zarathushtra struggled for two
years
to convert a Chorasmian prince named Vishtapa.
Opposed by
greedy Karpan priests and critical of their corruption, intoxicated
orgies,
and animal sacrifices, Zarathushtra was put in prison
until he was aided by Vishtapa's consort Hutaosa;
then Vishtapa
accepted the new faith and promoted it actively.
The court of
Vishtapa was drawn into the religion, Zarathushtra marrying a
daughter
of one of the nobles whose brother married Zarathushtra's
daughter by his first wife.
The new religion was promulgated so
actively
that two holy wars were fought in its defense,
and in
the second one Zarathushtra was killed
at the age of 77 while
attending a fire ceremony.
The teachings of Zarathushtra were passed down
through the
ancient poetry of the Gathas.
Zarathushtra declared that
there is one God, the Wise Lord he called Ahura Mazda,
transforming
the polytheism of the Aryan religion into monotheism.
This God
he identified as the creator and governor of the universe through
the Holy Spirit.
The most important characteristic of God is Asha,
which means truth or what is right (justice, law).
This God is
profoundly ethical, rewarding the thoughts, words,
and actions
of the good, and bringing recompense to those of the evil.
All
spirits and beings are free to choose between the good and evil.
The twenty names Zarathushtra gave to God are I am, Giver of Herds,
Strong One,
Perfect Holiness, All-Good, Understanding, Having
Understanding, Knowledge,
Having Knowledge, Blessing, Causing
Blessing, Lord, Most Beneficent, Not Harming,
Unconquerable, Truthful,
All-Seeing, Healing, Creator, and Wise (or Omniscient).
Zarathushtra taught that God has seven major attributes.
Spenta
Mainyu is the Holy Spirit through which everything is created.
God communicated to Zarathushtra through the Vohu Manah
or Good Mind.
Asha Vahishta means best order or justice.
The Khshathra Vairya, which obviously has the same etymology
as the Kshatriya
or ruling caste of India, means Absolute
Power, Desirable Dominion,
and the Ultimate Paradise to be established
on Earth in the end time
which came to be called the kingdom or
sovereignty of heaven by Jesus.
Yasna 41:2 states, "May
we be granted thy good
government (khshathra) for ever
and ever, O Wise Lord.
May a good governor, whether it be a man
or a woman,
rule over us in the two worlds."1
The two worlds
refer to the spiritual and material worlds.
Armaiti means
Devotion and Piety and came to be associated
with the sustaining
nurturing of Mother Earth.
Haurvatat is Wholeness, Health,
and Perfection.
The seventh attribute Ameretat is Immortality.
Because God allows free choice, some spirits,
who were originally
created by the one God, chose badly and
became Druj or the spirit
of Deceit that can lead people astray.
All thoughts, words, and
actions have their consequences for good or bad.
The Yazata
or Adorable Ones give rewards to the good.
The Guardian Spirit
of humanity is called Sraosha,
who along with Mithra and Rashnu,
judges the souls after death.
Sraosha also has a sister called
Ashi Vanguhi,
which means Holy Blessing or Good Reward of Deeds.
She also protects married life and guards the chastity of women,
while abhorring the unfaithful wife.
Mithra listens to appeals
and represents contracts.
He and Rashnu represent truth and light,
and the sin of deceiving Mithra can even affect one's family.
For Zarathushtra fire was a symbol of the divine flame and
pure truth
that glows in the heart of every being.
Xerxes, who
found an ever-burning lamp in the temple of Athere Polias
at Delos,
spared the sanctuary out of respect for Zarathushtran
fire worship.
The Holy Spirit is the highest next to God,
but
it is opposed by the Evil Spirit and its offspring, the daevas,
providing a constant challenge for humans to choose wisely.
The
human soul (urvan) and spirit (fravashi) use the
faculties of
knowing energy (khratu), wisdom and consideration (chisti),
intelligence and perception (ushi), mind
(manas), consciousness and memory (bodha),
practical
conscience (ahu), free will (kama), speech (vachas),
and action (shyaothna) as well as the instrument of the
living body (tanu).
Above all these is daena, the
gift of vision or revealed religion.
In addition to the strong mandates to tell the truth and be
just,
Zarathushtra also taught practical things like tilling the
soil, raising grain,
growing fruits, rooting out weeds, reclaiming
wasteland, irrigating barren ground,
and treating animals kindly,
especially cows who serve farmers.
He severely castigated the
Turanian nomads,
who after killing cattle as sacrifices
went out
on violent raids, destroying fields and produce.
After death the soul comes to the Bridge of the Separator,
and all one's actions, words, and thoughts are evaluated in terms
of good and evil.
The good are able to cross the bridge into the
heavenly world,
but the bad fall down below.
However, Gatha
49:11 makes it clear that Zarathushtra originally taught that
such souls come back to Earth by reincarnation,
though this concept
was later dropped from the religion.
But among evil rulers, evil doers, evil speakers,
among evil egos, evil thinkers, and followers of Untruth,
Souls do come back by reason of dim insight;
truly they are dwellers in the Abode of Untruth.2
This makes sense because Zarathushtra taught that eventually
all souls will be purified
and brought out of hell when the world
enters a new cycle free of all evil and misery,
ever young and
rejoicing with all souls, enjoying ineffable bliss and glory.
This is also referred to as the Resurrection (Ristakhez),
another idea that greatly influenced Judeo-Christian religion.
The essence of the teachings of Zarathushtra can ultimately
be
summed up in three words, "BE LIKE GOD."
Through missionaries the religion of Zarathushtra
spread rapidly
throughout the Persian empire.
Darius I showed in his own proclamations
that survived in inscriptions
how much he was influenced by Zarathushtra's
emphasis on truth and justice.
At Behistun, Darius declared that
Ahura Mazda helped him
because he was not disloyal and did not
follow the Lie.
He did not do wrong but walked in justice.
He
wronged neither the weak nor the powerful.
He was warned not to
befriend those who do wrong but punish them.
In the Naqshi-i Rustama
inscription Darius praised Ahura Mazda,
who created the Earth,
sky, humans, human happiness,
and who bestowed wisdom on him.
He declared that the weak should not have wrong
done to them by
the powerful nor the reverse.
He claimed that he controlled his
anger by his thinking power.
Darius also wrote that he rewards
those who cooperate and punishes
those who do harm according to
the damage they have done.
Mani was born in Babylonia on April 14, 216 soon after
Caracalla
overthrew Vologeses V and made his brother
Artaban IV (r. 215-26)
the last Parthian king.
When Mani was twelve, he was told in a
vision to
withdraw from a baptizing sect associated with Elkhasai.
This revelation coincided with Ardashir's overcoming
the Parthians
and reviving the Persian empire.
Near his 24th birthday Mani was
told by his higher self
or angelic teacher to proclaim himself
a prophet.
Two years later Shapur I became the king of Persia.
Mani's mission took him to Ctesiphon and then into western India
for two years.
There he wrote a book diplomatically praising Shapur.
Hindus found his teaching of celibacy too strict;
but in 243 he
had more success in Khurasan, where he converted Governor Feroz,
who told his brother, King Shapur, that Mani had no political
ambitions
but wanted to unify the people of the empire with this
universal religion.
After Mani spent a year in a cave making paintings,
Shapur
invited the prophet to his court in 245, and Mani requested and
received
royal letters to all the Persian governors telling them
not to hinder his mission.
For the next ten years Mani was able
to spread his teachings
throughout the Persian empire, establishing
many churches and sending out disciples.
Adda and Pateg carried
the teachings of Mani to Egypt.
When people made fun of an ugly
saint, Mani pointed out that
the soul is beautiful and is to be
rescued from the material body.
In 255 Zarathustrian magi led by Kartir persuaded Shapur to
break with Mani
and promote their religion in the empire, causing
Mani to go into exile.
In the next eighteen years the prophet
returned to Khurasan and traveled in
central Asia as far as western
China, returning by way of Tibet and Kashmir.
In 272 Shapur died
and was succeeded by his son Hormizd I, governor of Khurasan,
who supported the Manichaeans; but he died after reigning one
year.
His younger brother Bahram I loved pleasure and was cruel.
He was persuaded by the magi to end toleration of heresies and
foreign cults
in order to promote the orthodox Sassanid religion.
Mani tried to meet with the new king
at his winter palace in Ctesiphon
but failed to do so.
Mani was said to have been related to the
Parthian Arsacid dynasty,
and his association with King Baat,
possibly a Parthian Armenian,
as he lectured to his disciples
at Phargalia,
may have led to Mani's arrest at Gondeshapur (Belapat).
Mani was brought before an angry King Bahram and said he had
done no harm
but had helped the royal family by freeing their
servants of demons and by healing them.
The king accused Mani
of supporting the defeated Parthian cause.
Mani replied that God
sent him to bring the perfect commandments of Christ
that he received
from God through an angel
so that many souls might be saved and
escape punishment.
Bahram asked why God did not reveal this to
him, the king.
Mani replied that God commands and decides whom
to teach.
The angry king silenced the prophet and had him chained
in order to please the magi.
Mani said that he had been protected
by Shapur and Hormizd,
but Bahram sentenced him to death and scourging.
Mani was chained heavily in prison for 26 days.
There he consoled
his disciples and appointed Sisin as his successor.
Mani died
in prison on February 26 in 274 or 277,
described as the messenger
of the Light withdrawing his soul from the body.
Public distress
at the news stimulated the king to order Mani's
body fed to birds
and his head placed on a gate.
So began persecution of the Manichaeans
in the Persian empire
that would continue sporadically for centuries.
Four years of persecution occurred before Sisin could organize
the church.
Many died as martyrs, and many fled to Khurasan or
Turkestan.
Some went west, and Pateg is said to have preached
against the Old Testament in Rome by 280.
Bahram II lost
Ctesiphon and Seleucia to the Roman emperor Aurelius Carus in
282,
while Amu traveled in central Asia, and Adda put together
scriptures in Africa.
About five years later African proconsul
Julian warned Diocletian that
this strange religion's ideas on
sex, war, agriculture,
and civic duties endangered Roman society.
By 290 Manichaeism was flourishing in the Fayyum district of Egypt,
and the Syriac Psalms would soon be translated into Coptic.
Terrible persecution broke out in the Persian empire in 291.
Bahram
II killed Sisin himself, and many Manichaeans were slaughtered.
Innai became the leader and is reported to have healed the king
by prayer,
giving peace to the new religion for a while.
In 296 Diocletian extended the Christian persecution to the
Manichaeans,
resulting in numerous martyrs in Egypt and North
Africa.
Although Persian king Narsi (r. 296-303) lost Mesopotamia
and western provinces
to Rome after he was defeated by Galerius,
he left the Manichaeans in peace.
In 303 Hormizd II executed Innai,
and the next four Manichaean leaders were also killed.
In the
fourth century Manichaeism spread throughout the Roman empire.
Two Christians, Archelaus in his Disputation with Manes
and
Alexander of Lycopolis in his "Of the Manichaeans,"
treated Manichaeism
as a Christian heresy instead of a new religion,
because Mani acknowledged Jesus as the Christ.
In 372 Valentinian
I prohibited all meetings, and Augustine adopted the faith
for
a decade until Christians urged Theodosius I to take away their
civil rights in 381;
the next year he decreed Manichaean elders
put to death,
and in 383 Theodosius banished all Manichaeans.
Exile was again decreed by Valentinian II,
and in Rome their property
was confiscated in 389.
Since Mani believed that other religions had deteriorated
because
their original founders did not write down their teachings,
he
wrote several books himself in the Aramaic language of Syriac
and made sure that they were accurately copied.
His first book, Shabuhragan, honored King Shapur I
and assured him that
he had no political ambitions.
The Living Gospel was written
and illustrated in the Turkestan cave
and contains an account
of the mission of Jesus.
Mani began this book and his letters
by referring to himself as the messenger of Jesus.
The Treasure
of Life describes how the soul comes from the pure Light
and
the body from the bad darkness.
Although Manichaeism is similar
and has been compared to Gnosticism,
this book refutes the Marcionite
doctrine of a third intermediary principle,
and it gives cures
for errors.
The Book of Mysteries teaches that souls are
purged and educated
through reincarnation, and it aims to cut
away false beliefs.
The Pragmateia suggests what ought
to be done.
His other main works are The Book of Giants,
Letters, and The Book of Psalms and Prayers.
Although these books were faithfully copied and translated
into many languages
as the religion spread, the many persecutions
eventually destroyed the books.
As Manichaeism faded into Catharist
movements
in the 13th century, the religion disappeared.
In the
20th century Coptic documents were found at al-Fayyum in Egypt,
and texts were also found in Turfan and Dun-huang in China.
The
Chinese catechism noted a book illustrating the two great principles,
which may have been based on Mani's paintings made for those who
cannot read.
The largest work found at al-Fayyum, the Kephalaia,
contains the principal teachings of Mani described by disciples.
These discoveries, though difficult to piece together because
the texts were deteriorating,
provide a more balanced view to
the already known Christian works refuting Mani.
Mani taught there are two sources that are unborn and eternal
-
God (Light) and matter (darkness).
God as good has nothing in
common with evil,
because "a good tree cannot bring forth
evil fruit."
Mani explained the universe as having three
moments involving these two substances.
In the past Spirit and
matter were at first separate.
Then Spirit entered into matter
as souls incarnated into bodies,
which is the present condition.
Mani as a messenger of Light is helping souls become liberated
from their bodies.
The third moment is the future when the world
will end
as Spirit becomes purified again from matter.
Somehow
the king of darkness decided to enter the region of Light.
God
had no evil with which to punish, so Spirit entered into matter
as souls went into bodies with the five faculties of
intuition,
thought, will, consideration, and reason.
As souls mixed with
matter they began to feel material
and thus became trapped in
bodies.
When the Mother of Life, the First Man, and the Living
Spirit
prayed to the Great Father, that one sent a Messenger with
the following twelve virtues: royalty, wisdom, victory, contentment,
purity, truth, faith, patience, sincerity, kindness, justice,
and Light.
According to Mani, Jesus lifted up the first man Adam to taste
the Tree of Life.
Mani also taught the trinity of the Father (God
of truth)
the beloved Son (Christ), and the Holy Spirit (Mother
of Life).
The five dark rulers may express themselves
as the tyranny
of rulers,
arrogance of officials, idolatrous errors, superstitious
rites, and sorcery.
Previous messengers of God include Zarathustra,
Buddha, and Jesus.
True messengers may be known by the following
five characteristics:
gentleness, austerity, beauty, wisdom, and
transformation.
Their mission is to teach and convert living beings
in order to save them from their suffering.
Mani planted good
seeds of truth and strengthened his church,
sending out envoys
to many lands.
He fought greed and lust in order to teach people
wisdom and knowledge.
The Psalms refer to the divine medicine
that heals wounds,
crushes evil
while crowning godliness, purifies
the Light from the darkness, and gives rest to the souls.
The
Great Father is Love who gives oneself for everything.
Souls are
divine; even though they have fallen into the world, they will
return to God.
Although the Manichaean community had a hierarchy of five levels
including Mani's successor and twelve masters (teachers), 72 illuminates
(overseers),
elders (priests), the rest of the elect, and hearers,
the main distinction was between the elect and the hearers.
The
elect have their hearts, hands, and mouths sealed by
celibacy,
non-injury, and abstinence from alcohol and meat.
The elect eat
only a little in the morning and one meal in the evening.
In their
strict poverty their only possession was
one garment that was
replaced once a year.
The elect teach by grace, wisdom, and faith.
The duties of the hearers are to fast, pray, and give charity.
They are to fast and be celibate on Sundays, and hearers pray
four times a day.
Giving charity includes providing food for the
elect,
who do no injurious work such as farming,
giving a relative
to be one of the elect, and building a temple or dwelling place.
The hearers could work in the fields and have one wife,
but they
were forbidden to fight in wars.
The hearers confess to the elect,
and the elect confess to one another.
The soul is from on high but is imprisoned in the body waiting
to be liberated.
Mani taught renouncing the world's possessions
to find the peace of poverty.
He advised wisely and skillfully
strengthening oneself around the body's gates
lest the sin of
the body prevail and extinguish the Light.
His religious methods
include singing and chanting spiritual words,
reading and studying, discriminating with wisdom and accepting pure commands,
always
being clean in actions of body, mouth, and mind, practicing kind
deeds,
being gentle and amiable, bearing humiliation, following
good rules and habits,
resting the mind in the place of liberation,
and leaping for joy in standing firm in the right way.
Mani warned
against, lying, anger, and hurtful words that may come
from speaking
for the sake of killing a man, beasts, or trees.
Kindness and
sincerity are for saints a base for brightness and a wonderful
gate
which lets one see everywhere while walking a straight path.
Like the Mahayana Buddhists, Mani promised such would be born
in a Pure Land,
where they would be free of penalties and could
rejoice in calmness.
The Light-mind of the Christ awakens those
who sleep
and gathers those who are scattered abroad.
God sends
the soul to the judge of the dead that appears as in a mirror.
The Great Judge has no partiality but knows how to forgive those
who have repented.
No one can hide when that one searches out
their actions
and repays them according to their deserts.
The
saints go to the heaven of Light and are at peace.
Unstained by
ignorance, passion, and desire, they are not pressed into rebirth.
Cathars, meaning the pure ones, believed in a dualistic theology
that derived from the Manichaeans by way of the Paulicians and
Bogomils.
From Bulgaria they moved west; by 1143 a well organized
group in Cologne
was reported to Bernard of Clairvaux for rejecting
the mass
because they believed the papacy and priesthood were
so corrupt.
Cathars spread south into Italy and France.
They participated
in a public debate near Albi in 1165.
At a council there Narbonne
archbishop Pons d'Arsac, six bishops, eight abbots,
provosts,
archdeacons, Louis VII's sister Constance of Toulouse,
and Viscount
Trencavel of Albi and Béziers confirmed
the condemnation
of the Cathars as heretics.
In 1167 some Cathars were burned at
Vézelay.
That year Cathars met at Saint Felix south of
Toulouse,
and Nicetas from Constantinople consecrated bishops
for Toulouse and Carcasonne
and perhaps Agen to add to one Cathar
bishop in northern France and another at Albi.
In 1177 Toulouse
count Raymond V wrote to the Cistercians that heresy was spreading.
Perhaps because Cathar believers did not have to renounce their
wealth,
many of the nobility joined the movement.
Cathars did
not preach against usury, and they had less restrictions on marriage
than the Catholic Church, which had increasingly
complicated prohibitions
against consanguinity.
Cathars held that the evil in the world was created by Satan
and not God.
Like some Gnostics, they identified the creator God
of the Old Testament with Satan
while accepting the divine
Christ of the New Testament
as an angel sent from God to
help trapped souls find release.
They recognized the sacrament
of communion and believed
that any good person could consecrate
the host.
Confession could be made to anyone, but Cathars did
not go in for physical penance.
Yet their beliefs made them disciplined
as their initiated perfecti
renounced sexual intercourse,
violence, and all animal food.
In this way souls could be liberated
from the Devil's world,
while other souls would have additional
opportunity through reincarnation.
Cathars rejected the priesthood
because they believed
everyone could contact God directly by prayer.
They criticized the worldly power and corruption of the Church,
though they did have bishops and deacons for leadership.
Like the Waldensians, the perfecti refused to take oaths,
fight, or kill anyone.
The Cathar perfecti also practiced
apostolic poverty and expected
to be persecuted as Jesus had warned
them they would be
hated by the world because they are not of
the world.
After a year or more of training, the laying on of
hands
in the consolamentum initiated the perfecti.
The perfecti wore black or dark blue, and the men let their
hair and beards grow.
Like Manichaeans, the perfecti devoted
their lives to
prayer and preaching and were supported by the
believers.
The perfecti lived and traveled in pairs of
the same sex,
and they were prohibited from participating in wars
or killing any living beings.
Although the Cathar believers (credentes)
were allowed to eat meat,
have sex, and fight in wars, they were
expected to live peacefully and do good
without lying, stealing,
committing violence, or taking oaths;
before they died, believers
hoped to receive the consolamentum and salvation.
The perfecti
often worked as craftsmen or physicians,
which explains the laws
barring heretics from practicing medicine.
At the third Lateran council of 1179 Cathars were damned as
heretics,
and anathema was declared for anyone giving them hospitality.
Vassals no longer had to do homage to nobles supporting Cathars,
and the Church offered two years' indulgence to those taking up
arms against them.
Archbishop Pons sent letters ordering all bishops
to excommunicate heretics and their supporters.
In 1181 Henry
de Marsiac led local knights against Lavaur,
where the Cathar
bishop of Toulouse resided.
Viscountess Adela surrendered the
town, and Bernard Raymond
and Raymond de Baimiac were captured,
taken to Le Puy,
abjured their beliefs, and were made Catholic
canons.
In 1184 the papal bull of Lucius III issued at Verona
condemned all heretics, including Cathars and Waldensians.
After Innocent III became pope in 1198, he sent two legates
to preach against heresy
in Languedoc and Barcelona; in 1200 he
pronounced
loss of property as the penalty for heresy.
Innocent
renewed the excommunication of heretics and
the indulgence for
those using arms against them.
In 1203 the Pope appointed the
Langedoc native Pierre of Castelnau to preach,
and the next year
he was joined by the Cistercian abbot of Clairvaux, Arnald-Amalric.
They were authorized to suspend bishops who failed to excommunicate
heretics.
The bishop of Béziers was suspended in 1203
and
was killed by his own people two years later.
The corrupt Raymond
Rabastens, bishop of Toulouse,
was replaced by Fulk of Marseilles
in 1206.
Narbonne archbishop Raymond-Berenger resisted several
attempts to depose him
and managed to stay in office until 1212.
Yet the Cathar movement continued to flourish, and an assembly
of 600 Cathar perfecti at Mirepoix in 1206 resolved their
internal differences.
As papal legates traveled around preaching with their elaborate
retinues,
the poverty of their rival perfecti offered a
stark contrast.
The legates were ridiculed and abused until Diego
of Osma and
Dominic of Guzman persuaded them to adopt a simpler
approach.
Pierre of Castelnau became so unpopular in Béziers
that he fled for his life.
At Montreal, Cathars accused Diego
and Dominic
of representing the Church of the devil,
and in the
debate at Foix, Catholic missionaries told
Count Raymond-Roger's
sister Esclarmonde, who had become a Cathar,
that she should attend
to her spinning.
Most of the abbots gave up preaching.
Dominic
said that where gentle persuasion failed, a thick stick would
succeed
when they roused the princes and prelates against them;
he predicted that nations assembled would cause many to perish
by the sword.
Dominic did make some conversions, notably the Waldensian
Durand of Huesca,
who founded the orthodox Poor Catholics.
Dominic
founded a convent at Prouille for poor daughters
and continued
his missionary work there during the war.
After the Albigensian
crusade the convent
was enriched by the spoils from wealthy heretics.
Innocent III wrote to French king Philip II in 1204 and 1205
offering indulgence if he would attack the heretics;
but Philip
was too busy fighting the English to launch a crusade in the south.
Toulouse count Raymond VI agreed to persecute heretics and dismiss
his mercenaries;
but the Count was excommunicated by legate Pierre
after refusing to drive out heretics in the name of peace.
In
1208 after an angry meeting Pierre was murdered by one of the
Count's officers.
Innocent reacted by proclaiming a crusade that
became known as
the Albigensian crusade after Albi, a center for
Cathars.
Arnald-Amalric was appointed to lead it, and at the annual
meeting of the Cistercians
he promulgated the Pope's bull offering
a
full indulgence for only forty days military service.
In May
1209 King Philip II summoned a parliament but refused to join
the war.
However, the duke of Burgundy and several counts and
bishops volunteered.
The army organized was reported to be the
largest ever in the Christian world.
Toulouse count Raymond VI sought reconciliation by offering
seven castles,
and he was publicly flogged by papal legate Milo
before taking the cross.
Raymond denied that he had favored heretics,
and he promised to obey the Church,
including not supporting mercenaries,
not allowing Jews to hold public office, and abolishing new tolls.
By joining the crusade, Raymond's lands in Languedoc would not
be attacked.
However, his nephew Raymond-Roger Trencavel was not
reconciled with Milo.
Viscount Trencavel and the Jews left Béziers
for Carcasonne before it was attacked.
Béziers had successfully
resisted pressure to surrender heretics in 1205
and tried to hold
out; but camp followers without orders
quickly broke into the
city and massacred all the inhabitants.
The Cistercian abbot Arnald-Amalric
was reported to have said to kill them all,
because God would
know his own.
The day after he did write to Pope Innocent,
"Nearly
twenty thousand of these people were put to the sword,
without
regard for age or sex."3
His figure is probably exaggerated
since modern scholars
estimate Béziers to have had about
10,000 people.
Simon de Montfort was rewarded for his role
in
the slaughter and was later elected commander.
Narbonne submitted and promised to give up heretics and the
property of Béziers Jews.
As the crusaders marched to Carcasonne,
Arnald-Amalric reported
that more than a hundred fortified villages
surrendered.
In August 1209 the suburbs of Carcasonne were destroyed,
and King Pedro II of Aragon arrived to mediate for his vassal
Raymond-Roger;
but the viscount refused the offer made, and the
king withdrew.
After their water was exhausted and Raymond-Roger
was captured, the city capitulated.
The viscount died in prison
in November, and Pedro II,
suspecting the new leader de Montfort
of his murder,
refused at first to accept his homage but invested
him in 1211
so he could campaign against the Moors.
Southern towns
surrendered, and in the north Albi submitted.
Then most crusaders
returned to northern France,
and Simon had to pay about 500 remaining
soldiers double wages.
Persecution began with the burning of Cathars when the town
of Castres capitulated.
In the next spring new crusaders arrived
from the north.
Crusaders besieged Minerve in June 1210;
after
it surrendered, 140 perfecti were burned.
A year later
after a siege of one month Simon de Montfort ordered the
Lavaur
leaders, a brother and sister, and eighty knights executed;
he
recorded that then more than 400 heretics were burned to the joy
of the crusaders.
Simon deliberately used terror; a garrison at
Bram had
all their eyes but one put out so they could be led to
Cabaret.
At the University of Paris logic teacher Amalric taught
that a new age was coming
that would supersede the Catholic Church;
nine clergy who shared his views were burned for heresy in 1210.
Meanwhile Toulouse refused to surrender heretics and was put
under an interdict.
Arnald-Amalric ordered preaching against usury
in order to get at wealthy supporters
of the Cathars in Toulouse,
where Bishop Fulk organized a "white fraternity;"
but
they lost credibility after joining the persecution at Lavaur.
As they attacked the houses of money-lenders,
a "black fraternity"
sprung up in opposition.
Simon de Montfort continued to capture
castles and burn Cathars.
After sixty heretics were burned at
Casses,
the perfecti stopped seeking refuge in fortresses.
Apparently these initiates still did not turn to violence,
but
they gave up their distinctive dress and hid among the people.
Simon assaulted Toulouse in 1211; but it was too strong,
and he
withdrew after twelve days to devastate the county of Foix.
As
the crusading army dissolved again in September,
Raymond VI gathered
resistance fighters in the south.
Another crusade was preached
in northern France that winter,
and Simon once again had fresh
troops in the spring of 1212.
In December of that year he held
a parliament at Pamiers
and imposed French laws on Languedoc.
Heresy was made a crime that could be judged by the Church.
Property
on which heretics were living could be forfeited.
Daughters were
excluded from inheritance, and women
with rights to fortresses
were forbidden to marry southerners.
Pedro II was commended by the Pope for helping to defeat Muslims
at Tolosa,
but his offer to mediate in Toulouse was declined.
In 1213 the combined armies of Aragon and Toulouse greatly
outnumbered Simon de Montfort's crusaders near Muret;
but Pedro was killed
early in the battle, and Raymond VI fled.
In 1215 King Philip's
son Louis led a southern crusade.
That November at the Fourth
Lateran Council,
Simon was given the conquered lands;
Raymond
VI received only a pension of 400 marks,
though his son Raymond
VII when he came of age
would get the unconquered lands now controlled
by the Church.
Raymond VI went to Aragon for aid.
Honorius succeeded
Innocent as Pope in 1216
and proclaimed another Albigensian crusade.
After more destruction Simon made a truce with Raymond VII,
whose
father returned in 1217 and gained support from nobles dispossessed
by Simon.
Fulk of Marseilles brought crusaders from the north;
but Simon de Montfort was killed in 1218.
His son Amaury could
not pay the soldiers and withdrew to Carcasonne.
Now many Provence
troubadours criticized the crusade
as an invasion of the south
by northerners.
Prince Louis led another crusade and massacred
the surrendered inhabitants of Marmande in 1219.
In the next two
years southerners regained many castles, but Raymond VI died in
1222.
In 1226 Cardinal Romanus excommunicated Raymond VII
and preached
another crusade, imposing a clerical tax of a tenth.
King Louis
VIII led this crusade but died.
Yet that year the Cathar bishop
of Toulouse summoned a council
of a hundred perfecti that
appointed a new bishop for Razés.
Raymond VII made peace
at Meaux with the Pope and the French crown
in 1229 by promising
to enforce heresy laws.
The Count also had to agree to destroy
the walls of Toulouse,
and he was imprisoned in the Louvre for six
months until this was accomplished.
That November at the council
of Toulouse papal legate Romanus
obliged Count Raymond VII to
contribute 4,000 silver marks annually
for the Catholic university
there, and strict rules for pursuing heretics were devised.
In
each parish a priest and two or three lay persons
were to search
every house and hiding place.
Where a heretic was found, the house
was to be burned and the property forfeited.
Negligent bailiffs
were to lose their post and their goods.
Any heretic who returned
to the Catholic Faith
out of fear of death was to be imprisoned.
Every person from the age of puberty up had to abjure heresy
and
swear loyalty to the Catholic Church.
Heads of households were
required to attend Mass on Sundays and holidays
or pay a fine
unless they had a legitimate excuse.
Lay people were not allowed
to possess an Old Testament nor a New Testament.
Two prominent perfecti were arrested by Count Raymond
VII.
The Albigensian bishop was burned as Romanus watched;
but
William de Solier converted to Catholicism and denounced other
Cathars.
Toulouse bishop Fulk became so unpopular for persecuting
heretics
that he could not raise tithes and died in 1231,
succeeded
by the Dominican Raymond de Fauga.
That year a high mountain fortress
at Montségur became a Cathar refuge and an arsenal,
and
the next year Guilhabert de Castres presided over a meeting there.
More Cathars gathered at the Roquefort castle in 1232 to hear
William Vidal preach;
but after that the three Cathar bishops
of
Toulouse, Agen, and Razes resided at Montségur.
During
the persecution of the 1230s many Cathars emigrated to Lombardy.
In 1233 Pope Gregory IX appointed Stephen de Burnin legate
for southern France and northern Spain, giving the Dominican Order
responsibility to launch the Inquisition against heretics.
At
Toulouse Peter Seila and William Arnald were chosen to be the
first official Inquisitors.
They began by capturing, trying, and
executing the leading heretic Vigoros de Baconia.
Peter Seila
stayed in Toulouse while William Arnald toured the province.
The
Inquisitors acted as prosecutors and judges,
and the suspected
heretics were not allowed lawyers.
In fact lawyers could lose
their right to practice law if they helped a heretic.
Trials were
held in secret, and no appeals were allowed.
They offered light
penance to get people to come forward voluntarily;
but only those
whose information led to the arrest of
perfecti and believers
were given indulgence.
Those who converted back to Catholicism
were required to wear
two yellow crosses on their clothes, which
resulted in ostracism;
or they could volunteer to go on a crusade
for a number of years.
Some were only required to take care of
a poor person for years or the rest of their life.
Dominicans
also established tribunals at Albi, Cahors, and Moissac,
where
210 persons were burned to death.
Two Inquisitors were murdered in Cordes during an uprising
as early as 1233,
and the terror of the Inquisition caused riots
to break out at Narbonne in 1234.
At Toulouse three consuls refused
to cooperate in enforcing the dictates of Arnald,
who was compelled
to leave the city;
he went to Carcassonne and excommunicated the
consuls.
The consuls ordered the Dominican monks to leave Toulouse
and had them
thrown out into the street; since no one was allowed
to take them in, they left.
Bishop Raymond de Fauga was also expelled.
Count Raymond VII wrote to the Pope asking that the inquisitorial
powers be curtailed.
In 1236 Pope Gregory wrote to his legate
to curb him, but little changed.
Posthumous trials were held,
and corpses were dug up to be burned
so that their estates could
be confiscated.
Prisoners could be held for years without being
condemned,
and anyone was subject to re-arrest.
Eventually at
least 5,600 people would be interrogated by the Inquisition in
Toulouse alone.
By the time King Philip III granted amnesty to
heretics in 1279
as many as 507 people had been condemned at Toulouse,
most losing their property.
Many more had to wear the yellow crosses.
In 1235 Count Raymond VII sent knights and bailiffs to Montségur,
but they did nothing.
A third attempt resulted in a deacon and
three perfecti
being taken away to Toulouse, where they
were burned.
The Inquisition returned to Toulouse in 1236;
but
Count Raymond's protests got it suspended by the Pope from 1238
to 1241.
The Inquisition had been established at Barcelona in
1233,
and in 1238 it was authorized in Castille, Leon, and Navarre.
In 1239 the count of Champagne, the king of Navarre, and sixteen
bishops
presided over the burning of 183 Cathars at Montwimer.
The next year Raymond Trencavel led a revolt with Catalan and
Aragonese troops
and was joined by Occitan rebels in liberating
Limoux, Alet, Montreal, and the region.
They besieged Carcassonne
for a month, and the people murdered 33 priests there.
A French
army forced Trencavel to lift the siege,
and then he was besieged
at Montreal.
Raymond VII stayed neutral and mediated a truce
by
which his cousin Trancavel returned to Spain.
Towns that had rebelled
were sacked, and Toulouse count Raymond
pledged fealty to young
Louis IX, promising to drive out heretics and capture Montségur.
Lacking a son, Raymond VII tried to arrange a diplomatic marriage
but failed.
He did join a coalition against France with Henry
de Lusignan of Poitou and
Henry III of England while making alliances
with the
kings of Aragon, Navarre, Castile, and even Friedrich
II.
In March 1242 Raymond VII fell seriously ill
but was supported
in the revolt
by the counts of Armagnac, Comminges, Rodez, Foix,
and several viscounts.
Louis IX invaded Saintonge with his French
army.
In May while hosting Dominican inquisitors, Raymond d'Alfro
sent for knights from Montségur led by Pierre-Roger of
Mirepoix.
The seven monks and their four servants at Avignonet
were murdered with axes, and the murderers escaped to Montségur.
The war was on, and Raymond Trencavel gained territory;
but the
revolt soon ended after Hugues de Lusignan
and Henry III were
defeated that summer.
The count of Foix deserted the cause, and
in January 1243
Count Raymond VII once again promised to fulfill
the terms of 1229.
In 1243 the archbishop of Narbonne, the bishop of Albi, and
the royal seneschal
in Carcassonne besieged Montségur with
an army;
but they could not prevent supplies getting in, and the
siege lasted ten months.
In March 1244 surrender followed a short
truce.
The fighting believers were pardoned, even for the murders
at Avignonet.
They were given only light penances if they abjured
their heretical beliefs;
but the nearly two hundred nonresisting perfecti and the six women and eleven knights,
who took
the consolamentum rather than recant, were all burned at
the stake.
Four Cathars did escape to carry the secrets of their
treasures to others.
Languedoc became part of France.
In 1246
Raymond Trencavel submitted to Louis IX,
received a pension, and
went on the crusade.
A council at Béziers in 1246 instructed
inquisitors to imprison heretics for life,
and that year King
Louis ordered special prisons constructed.
In 1248 many prisoners
were released to go on crusade with Louis.
In 1249 the Count of
Toulouse had eighty Cathar believers
burned at Agen before he
died that year.
Louis IX's brother Alphonse of Poitiers became
count of Toulouse
and made his vassals in Languedoc enforce the
laws against heresy.
The first handbook with instructions for
conducting an inquisition was published by 1249.
In 1252 Pope Innocent IV issued the bull Ad Extirpanda
that first authorized the use
of torture to gain information but
not recantation
since forced confession was considered worthless.
The torture was not to shed blood, mutilate, nor cause death.
Toulouse and Carcassonne were relieved of the Inquisition in 1249,
but it was restored with greater powers by Pope Alexander IV in
1255.
One of the last Cathar refuges in Languedoc was captured
that year when Quéribus was taken.
The Cathars continued
to flourish in Italy and Bosnia.
Although Friedrich II detested
heresy, he had not allowed the Inquisition
to operate in his empire;
his policy was continued by most of his successors
until Louis'
brother Charles of Anjou became king of Sicily in 1266.
He enabled
the Church to institute the Inquisition in his Sicilian kingdom
in 1269.
Voices of dissent were squelched by the Albigensian crusade
and the Inquisition;
even the eminent theologian Thomas Aquinas
justified such persecution of heresy.
The della Scalas of Verona
attacked Sirmione in 1276 and imprisoned 174 perfecti,
who were burned with other Cathars in the Verona amphitheater
two years later.
Peter Autier and his brother Guillem were trained
as perfecti in Lombardy
and began a revival in western
Languedoc in 1298;
but the Inquisition regained its powers, and
Peter Autier was executed in 1311.
This horrendous history of the Albigensian crusade shows that the zeal of the
"Christian" crusades was not only directed
against the Muslims in Palestine
but against the peace-loving
Cathars in southern France as well.
Hundreds of the perfecti
were burned to death;
still they did not fight back with violence,
although their supporters did attempt to fight for their independence.
1. The Dawn and Twilight of Zoroastrianism by R. C.
Zaehner, p. 74.
2. The Divine Songs of Zarathushtra tr. Irach J. S. Taraporewala,
Yasna 49:11, p. 727.
3. Massacre at Montségur by Zoé Oldenbourg,
tr. Peter Green, p. 184.
next chapter: Magna Carta, Francis, and Bonaventure
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