Tolerance

2 thoughts on “Tolerance”

1. Mayan Codices were works of the Devil

   “Diego de Landa Calderón (12 November 1524–1579) was a Spanish Bishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Yucatán.”

   Scholars have argued that most instances of the Mexican inquisition showed little concern to eradicate magic or convict individuals for heterodox beliefs,[7] and that witchcraft was treated more as a religious problem capable of being resolved through confession and absolution. Diego de Landa, however was “monomaniacal in his fervor”[8] against it. Landa believed a huge underground network of apostasies,[9] led by displaced indigenous priests, were jealous of the power the Church enjoyed and sought to reclaim it for themselves. These apostates, Landa surmised, had launched a counteroffensive against the Church and he believed it was his duty to expose the evil before it could revert the population to their old heathen ways.

   Landa was remarkable in that he was willing to go where no others would. He entered lands only recently conquered where native resentment of Spaniards was still very intense. Armed with nothing but the conviction to learn as much of native culture as he could, so that it would be easier for him to destroy it in the future,[12] Landa formulated an intimate contact with natives. Natives placed him in such an esteemed position they were willing to show him some of their sacred writings that had been transcribed on deerskin books.[13] To Landa and the other Franciscan friars, the very existence of these Mayan codices was proof of diabolical practices. In references to these books, Landa has said:

   We found a large number of books in these characters and, as they contained nothing in which were not to be seen as superstition and lies of the devil, we burned them all, which they (the Maya) regretted to an amazing degree, and which caused them much affliction.[14]

   Landa himself was never in doubt of the necessity of his inquisition. Whether magic and idolatry were being practiced or not, there can be little doubt Landa was “possessed” by fantasies of demonic power in a new land.[15] Landa, like most Franciscans of the time, subscribed to millenarian ideas,[16] which demanded the mass conversion of as many souls as possible before the turn of the century. Eliminating evil and pagan practices, Landa believed, would usher the Second Coming of Christ that much sooner.

   from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diego_de_Landa)

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2. TORQUEMADA

   “Tomás de Torquemada was born in Valladolid, Castile-Leon, Spain. He was the Grand Inquisitor of Spain from 1483 to his death in 1498, leaving to posterity an extraordinary picture of fanaticism and implacability. In the fifteen years of his direction, the Spanish Inquisition grew from the single tribunal at Seville to a network of two dozen 'Holy Office'.[2]
   To stem the spread of heresy and anti-Catholicism, Torquemada promoted the burning of non-Catholic literature, especially the Talmud and, after the final defeat of the Moors at Granada in 1492, Arabic books as well. [3]”

   –from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom%C3%A1s_de_Torquemada)

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