Characters of the Inquisition

This book was very informative in clearing up misconceptions about the Spanish Inquisition. Walsh goes in great detail as to who where subject to questioning, and the lengthy, balanced approach taken by the inquisitors themselves. The author does well to make distinctions between those who wanted to clear the faith of subversive, baptized pseudo-Catholic Jews, who had converted merely to advance in social status, but continued to willfully Judiaize, and honest Jews who kept the Old Covenant, who were not subjected to inquiry. Unfortunately, there were instances of outright racial hate crimes, sometimes instigated by bigots out for blood, but this was never, ever a Catholic mandate or professed teaching.This book is broken in to roughly 6 sections, beginning with Moses and the harsh Old Testament precursor to the Inguisition, as the prophet tried to maintain order and piety amid the wandering Israelites. He then moves into the Medieval and Early Modern eras concentrating on various Inquisitors; Walsh gives lots of social and political context to help the reader understand the motives and aims of the Office. One of the letdowns of the book is the chapter on Tomas Torquemada, probably the most famous of the Inquisitors; the author spends the majority of the chapter describing the scene in which he lived, and very little about his actual life or work.The biggest drawback about this book is the last chapter. It deals with Llorente, the last Inquisitor General, who betrayed his Church and was swept up with the 18th century liberalisms of the Enlightenment. He spent the final portion of his life writing such scathing material against the Church that France, his exile, actually asked him to leave the country! From this point on Walsh goes into a long 30 page diatribe against 20th century liberalism, socialism, capitalism and communism. Most of his sentiments I generally agree with, but in reference to the rest of the book, they have absolutely no relevance. He doesn't even wrap up his theme to tie it in with the rest of the book. He writes no conclusion to restate his main points or review the general history, but ends with a rant that has no bearing to 90% of the rest of the book. I was generally enjoying the book up until that point, then it left a bad taste in my mouth. Also, the work suffers from a deficiency of footnotes.On the whole, it worth a read to gain necessary insights into what actually happened during the Inquisition, but watch out for the last chapter.

This book is a really interesting print job. The last chapter does a great job in confirming, the role of the Jews in our Christian Societies, which they are using the Freemasons to bring upon Communism in the form as was operated by the Bolshevik Jews. It confirms the other facts I have found. Jews and their Agents bringing up the One World Government to rule us. The author's perspective on Capitalism is awesome.

This book is awesome. The hardcover edition has been long out of print until now. Take advantage of this great book at a great price. The Catholic Church is God's gift to us.

A very informative book about a very complex and controversial period in History: The Inquisition. Clears many of the mistakes and myths that have spread popularly about it

There are good ideas and there are bad ideas. Civilization survives by keeping, as best it can, the good ideas on the table, and the bad ideas off the table. Adolf Hitler was full of good ideas, but also some bad ones, bringing upon Germany and much of the rest of the world a terrible mortality. (He had strong conservative Jewish support at the beginning of his career, precisely because so many of his ideas were so good.) This subject gets tricky, though, because it reaches deeply into the way that people perceive things, so deeply that it becomes a contest or struggle for life itself. A smart person that has a radically different way of seeing things may have in mind just what civilization needs in order to prosper and go forward (most of us think this way of Jesus, for example, and think similarly of historically famous reformers like Martin Luther), or just what it does not need, for it will bring upon it those "four horses of the apocalypse," war, disease, starvation, and death (?) What the Bible says about the "dreamer or dreams" or the "miracle worker" who would have people follow him in a direction contrary to "loving and serving God," is that he needs to die, and that his very parents, or brother, or closest friend, who he makes this intention known to, needs to be first in line to make sure that he dies. (Deuteronomy 13:6) Why? Because the life of society itself is at stake. The author of this book has profound knowledge of and insights to history. He writes, for example, "What is the prevalent craze for self destruction but a manifestation of the old Manichaean despair of life? And what is the fatal race-suicide known euphemistically as "birth control" but the old nastiness of the Manichees, born of cowardice, sensuality, distrust of life itself and the Author of life?" His thought is seconded by the Bible's teaching that the man who would allow his own infant to be murdered should have rocks thrown at him (that is, he should be "stoned") because he has defamed the name of the Author of life Himself. (Leviticus 20:1) The challenge of keeping bad ideas off the table, and allowing good ideas onto it, does not go away. It is a difficult subject that this book does an interesting job of investigating, by daring to discuss that controversial chapter of European history called the Inquisition. One thing that I feel obliged to mention in writing this commentary, is that another reviewer here calls attention to the idea that Jews who converted to the Catholic religion were expected to abandon whatever practices were peculiarly Jewish. One of those things may have been the Jewish dietary law against eating pork. It should not be lost on us that it was a scientific discovery, made right here in America back in the 1930s by our medical authorities, by means of numerous (170 or so?) autopsies done on persons who had died of causes known not to have involved parasitic infection, that the Jewish Scriptures, in saying "Do not even touch it!" may have been correct from a medical standpoint, contrary to the historic, gleeful reprehension of Christendom against this aspect of Judaism. What is more familiar to us is the campaign resulting from that discovery that taught us to cook pork very thoroughly, we if are going to eat it, so that the microscopic parasitic life contained in it will be dead, rather than alive, and we will be spared the life shortening consequences of becoming infected. But we may not be honest, with ourselves even, to continue to uphold the idea that the Bible and the Jewish religion have all along been wrong in this area.

Impressive!

Full of typos. For instance on page 25, Instead of using the word "Lord", five times they use the word "Ford." On page 21, "ound" not "found". It appears to be a book prepared in violation of copyright laws.

This book really open my eyes on that time of our human history, well researched, and supported with bibliography. Very well concluded, just fantastic. I definitely read it again.....if we didn't superseded inquisition our present days could of been much nicer

The book attempts a sympathetic account of the Inquisition and is not altogether unsuccessful. Some of it is turgid, recounting now long forgotten disputes in far too much detail. There are also lengthy bookends giving the authors views on a host of religious topics which have little to do with the central theme but are nevertheless not without interest. Also notable is the author’s firm yet unsubstantiated “of its time” belief in a long standing international Jewish attack on the Catholic Church; which coming as it does from an otherwise seemingly generous mind is also instructive to read if one can do so without rancour. Overall, I enjoyed it as a rare counterbalance to an emotive topic, engaging and varied in style and content. However, if you are reading the book for its historical content only, you should be aware that it is rather old and I am sure there are more modern, if less charmingly idiosyncratic books which also present a balanced view of the subject, but take into account modern research.