David A. Plaisted
© 2006
Estimates of the Number Killed by the Papacy in the Middle
Ages and later
Chapter 1. Examples of figures concerning the number
killed
Chapter 2. The plausibility of massive persecution
CHAPTER
3. The 50 Million Figure
Chapter 4. The Spanish Inquisition
Chapter 6. An estimate based on population growth
Chapter 7. Indirect evidence of persecution
Chapter 8. Cloistered convents
For two or three centuries, many Protestants have given figures concerning the total number of people killed directly or indirectly by the Papacy during the Middle Ages. The numbers given include 50 million, 68 million, 100 million, 120 million, and 150 million. Roman Catholics typically give much smaller numbers. Frequently the figures are stated without any information about where they came from or how they were computed. The purpose of this note is to describe where some of these figures come from and to comment on their reliability. Surely nearly all Roman Catholics as well as Protestants disapprove of past religious persecutions, so this discussion should not reflect negatively on current members of the Roman Catholic Church. However, events in Nazi Germany show how easily persecution can revive, so it is necessary to be on guard against it and maintain an awareness of its history. Of course, many other groups besides the Papacy have persecuted. And all of us, without Christ, have the roots of sin in ourselves. The reason the Papacy stands out is that it has ruled for such a long period of time over such a large area, exercised so much power, and claimed divine prerogatives for its persecutions. The magnitude of the persecutions is important for the following reason: One can excuse a few thousand cases as exceptional, but millions and millions of victims can only be the result of a systematic policy, thereby showing the harmful results of church-state unions.
In this study I have attempted, with some success, to penetrate the veil of obscurity that surrounds the Middle Ages in order to determine the true history of this period.
In order to consider this subject, it is necessary to recall many unpleasant events. The dreadful totals, computations, and examples that follow, one after another, are not for the faint hearted. These atrocities should convince us not so much of the evils of a particular religious system as of the depravity of the sinful human heart, and lead us to turn to Christ for repentance and salvation that we might have new hearts and be cleansed from sin.
Here are some of the places where figures about religious persecutions are given. Dowling in his History of Romanism says
"From the birth of Popery in 606 to the present time, it is estimated by careful and credible historians, that more than fifty millions of the human family, have been slaughtered for the crime of heresy by popish persecutors, an average of more than forty thousand religious murders for every year of the existence of popery."
-- "History of Romanism," pp. 541,
542.
Commenting on this quote, a fundamental Baptist web site says the following:
For
example, it has been estimated by careful and reputed historians of the
Catholic Inquisition that 50
million people were slaughtered for the crime of "heresy" by Roman persecutors between the A.D.
606 and the middle of the 19th century.
This
is the number cited by John Dowling, who published the classic "History of
Romanism" in 1847 (book VIII,
chapter 1, footnote 1). Only seven years after its first printing, it could be
said of Dowling’s book, "it has already obtained a circulation much more
extensive than any other large volume ever published in
Concerning the figure of two million killed,
Bourne writes
Bertrand, the Papal Legate, wrote a letter to Pope Honorius, desiring to be recalled from the croisade against the primitive witnesses and contenders for the faith. In that authentic document, he stated, that within fifteen years, 300,000 of those crossed soldiers had become victims to their own fanatical and blind fury. Their unrelenting and insatiable thirst for Christian and human blood spared none within the reach of their impetuous despotism and unrestricted usurpations. On the river Garonne, a conflict occurred between the croisaders, with their ecclesiastical leaders, the Prelates of Thoulouse and Comminges; who solemnly promised to all their vassals the full pardon of sin, and the possession of heaven immediately, if they were slain in the battle. The Spanish monarch and his confederates acknowledged that they must have lost 400,000 men, in that tremendous conflict, and immediately after it-but the Papists boasted, that including the women and children, they had massacred more than two millions of the human family, in that solitary croisade against the southwest part of France.
-- Bourne,
George, The American Textbook of Popery, Griffith & Simon,
In only one crusade, two million Albigenses were killed. How many must there have been altogether, and how many millions more must have been killed during the entire Middle Ages! Another source writes
The Catholic crusade against the Albigenses in
-- Cushing B. Hassell,
History of the
W. E. H. Lecky says:
"That the Church of Rome has shed more innocent blood than any other
institution that has ever existed among mankind, will be questioned by no
Protestant who has a competent knowledge of history. The memorials, indeed, of
many of her persecutions are now so scanty, that it is impossible to
form a complete conception of the multitude of her victims, and it is quite
certain that no power of imagination can adequately realize their
sufferings." -- "History of the Rise and Influence of the Spirit of
Rationalism in
The following quotation is from The Glorious Reformation by S. S. SCHMUCKER,
Need
I speak to you of the thirty years’ war in
Estimates range up to 7 to 12 million for the number who died in the thirty years’ war, and higher:
This was the century of the last religious
wars in “Christendom,” the Thirty Years’ War in
-- Cushing B. Hassell,
History of the
Concerning the Irish rebellion, John Temple's True Impartial History of the Irish Rebellion of 1641, written in 1644, puts the number of victims at 300,000, but other estimates are much smaller. Some estimates are larger:
In addition to the Jesuit or Catholic atrocities of this century already enumerated with some particulars, they massacred 400 Protestants at Grossoto, in Lombardy, July 19th, 1620; are said to have destroyed 400,000 Protestants in Ireland, in 1641, by outright murder, and cold, and hunger, and drowning; …
-- Cushing B. Hassell,
History of the
In
fact, the population of
The figure of 68 million appeared in Schmucker’s talk in 1838, in Brownlee’s book of 1836, and also in a book “Plea for the West” by Lyman Beecher (Cincinnati, Truman and Smith, 1835), pp. 130-131:
And let me ask again, whether the Catholic religion, in its union with the state, has proved itself so unambitious, meek, and unaspiring so feeble, and easy to be entreated, as to justify-a proud, contempt of its avowed purpose and systematic movements to secure an ascendancy in this nation? It is accidental that in alliance with despotic governments, it has swayed a sceptre of iron, for ten centuries over nearly one-third of; the population of, the globe, and by a death of violence is estimated to have swept from 'the' earth about sixty-eight millions of its inhabitants, and holds now in darkness and bondage nearly half the civilized world?
The exact quote of Brownlee referenced above is as follows:
In one word, the church of Rome has spent immense treasures and shed, in murder, the blood of sixty eight millions and five hundred thousand of the human race, to establish before the astonished and disgusted world, her fixed determination to annihilate every claim set up by the human family to liberty, and the right of unbounded freedom of conscience.
-- Popery an enemy to civil liberty, 1836, pp. 104-105.
Also, in another work Brownlee states
Papal
-- The Roman Catholic Religion viewed in the
light of Prophecy and History,
And later in the same work,
The best writers enumerate fifty millions of
Christians destroyed by fire, and the sword, and the inquisition; and
fifteen millions of natives of the American continent and islands; and three
millions of Moors in
-- page 97.
These quotations make it clear that the
figure of 50 million refers only to Christians in
Brownlee further comments on the number killed by the Papacy in another work as follows:
When Laguedoc was invaded by these monsters, one hundred thousand Albigensees fell in one day! See Bruys vol. iii. 139.
-- page 346
There perished under pope Julian 200,000 Christians: and by the French massacre, on a moderate calculation, in 3
months, 100,000. Of the Waldenses there perished 150,000; of the Albigenses,
150,000. There perished by the Jesuits in 30 years only 900,000. The Duke of Alva destroyed by the common hangman alone, 36,000
persons; the amount murdered by him is set down by Grotius at 100,000!
There perished by the fire, and tortures of the Inquisition in
To sum up the whole, the Roman Catholic
church has caused the ruin, and destruction of a million and a half of Moors in Spain;
nearly two millions of Jews
Thus the church of Rome stands before the world, “the woman in scarlet, on the scarlet colored Beast.” A church claiming to be Christian, drenched in the blood of sixty-eight millions, and five hundred thousand human beings!
-- W. C. Brownlee, Letters in the Roman Catholic controversy, 1834, pp. 347-348.
Brownlee apparently revised the 69 million figure downwards to 68 million. So the figure of 68 million has several sources in the early 1800’s. The source for some of Brownlee’s figures appears in the following quotation:
These forced baptisms, and the consequent claims which the pope set up over “his slaves,” caused the death of one million five hundred thousand Moors, and on the most moderate calculation, that of two millions of Jews! See Dr. M. Geddes’s Tracts on Popery, vol. i.
-- W. C. Brownlee,
Popery the Enemy of Civil and Religious Liberty, J.
The
work of Michael Geddes referred to may have been Miscellaneous Tracts
…, 3rd ed.,
It has been calculated that, from the time of the conquest of
-- Williams, Henry Smith, The Historian’s History of the World, vol. 8, p. 259.
In 1492, persecution was begun against the
Jews, of
whom 500,000 were expelled from
-- Cushing B. Hassell,
History of the
In fact, the population of
It is estimated that the total population in the middle of the tenth century was about
thirty millions: a phenomenal increase of population, betokening of itself a
very high degree of civilization. A population normally, with fair sanitation
and hygienic conditions, doubles in a quarter of a century. It will tell you in
a word what the Moors had done, and what the Spaniards afterwards undid, if you reflect that this
Spanish population, which was thirty millions in the
tenth century, is now only twenty- two millions. The figure of thirty millions
in the tenth century is an extraordinary tribute to the science and wisdom of the
Moors.
-- Joseph McCabe, The Story of Religious Controversy, Chapter XXV.
This suggests that the Christian reconquest
of
The figure of 68 million appears again in a later work:
Alexander Campbell, well known religions leader of the nineteenth century, stated in debate with John B. Purcell, Bishop of Cincinnati, in 1837 that the records of historians and martyrologists show that it may be reasonable to estimate that from fifty to sixty-eight millions of human beings died, suffered torture, lost their possessions, or were otherwise devoured by the Roman Catholic Church during the awful years of the Inquisition. Bishop Purcell made little effort to refute these figures. (Citing A Debate on the Roman Catholic Religion, Christian Publishing Co., 1837, p. 327.)
Walter M. Montano, a former Catholic priest, asserts in his book, Behind the Purple Curtain that it has been estimated that fifty million people died for their faith during the twelve hundred years of the Dark Ages. (Citing Walter M. Montano, Behind the Purple Curtain, Cowman Publications, 1950, page 91.)
-- The Shadow of
Such figures sometimes appear in recent
books, such as Wilder’s, but
in general, all the figures about the number killed by the Papacy go back many
years and have reputable sources. It is
interesting that Campbell implies that the figure of 68 million includes
many who were not killed, but just persecuted, while the three earlier
references, including Brownlee,
state that this number were killed.
For professing faith contrary to the teachings of the Church of Rome, history records the martyrdom of more then one hundred million people. A million Waldenses and Albigenses [Swiss and French Protestants] perished during a crusade proclaimed by Pope Innocent III in 1208. Beginning from the establishment of the Jesuits in 1540 to 1580, nine hundred thousand were destroyed. One hundred and fifty thousand perished by the Inquisition in thirty years. Within the space of thirty-eight years after the edict of Charles V against the Protestants, fifty thousand persons were hanged, beheaded, or burned alive for heresy. Eighteen thousand more perished during the administration of the Duke of Alva in five and a half years.
--
Brief Bible
This great antichristian power robbed the church of its gospel light and plunged the world into the Dark Ages. It put to death and thus took away the lives of from fifty to one hundred millions of the saints of the Most High.
--
Bunch,
One thousand years covers the crest of the persecutions when from 50,000,000 to 150,000,000 martyrs died of the sword, at the stake, in dungeons, and of starvation because of the confiscation of their earthly possessions.
--
Bunch,
In
like manner the blood of a hundred million martyrs cries for justice to the One
who says, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay saith the Lord.” Rom
--
Bunch,
Let us keep a sense of proportion. The record
of Christianity from the days when it first obtained the power to persecute is
one of the most ghastly in history. The total number of Manichaeans,
Arians,
Priscillianists,
Paulicians,
Bogomiles,
Cathari,
Waldensians,
Albigensians,
witches,
Lollards,
Hussites,
Jews and Protestants killed because of their rebellion against Rome
clearly runs to many millions; and beyond these actual executions or massacres
is the enormously larger number of those who were tortured,
imprisoned, or beggared. I am concerned rather with the positive historical
aspect of this. In almost every century a large part of the race has endeavored
to reject the Christian religion, and, if in those centuries there had been the
same freedom as we enjoy, Roman Catholicism would, in spite of the universal
ignorance, have shrunk long ago into a sect. The religious history of
-- The Story Of Religious Controversy Chapter
XXIII by Joseph McCabe (an atheist) who lived from
1867 to 1955.
'The church,' says [Martin] Luther, has never burned a heretic.' . . I reply that this argument proves not the opinion, but the ignorance or impudence of Luther. Since almost infinite" numbers were either burned or otherwise killed,' Luther either did not know it, and was therefore ignorant, or if he was not ignorant, he is convicted of impudence and falsehood, —for that heretics were often burned by the [Catholic] Church may be proved from many examples.
-- Robert Bellarmine, Disputationes de Controversiis, Tom. ii, Lib. III, cap. XXII, “Objections Answered,” 1682 edition. (Bellarmine was a Roman Catholic.)
Some have computed, that, from the year 1518
to1548, fifteen million of Protestants have perished by war and the Inquisition.
This may be overcharged, but certainly the number of them in these thirty
years, as well as since is almost incredible. To these we may add innumerable
martyrs, in ancient, middle, and late ages, in
(from the commentary on the book of Revelation in Wesley’s “Explanatory Notes on the New Testament,” fifth edition, 1788), in which the comments on the book of Revelation are translated from the work of the German scholar John Bengel, and Wesley stated that he did not necessarily defend all of Bengel’s statements.)
Writing about the Jesuits, Lord states
They are accused of securing the revocation of the Edict of Nantes,-- one of the greatest crimes in the history of modern times, which led to the expulsion of four hundred thousand Protestants from France, and the execution of four hundred thousand more.
-- John Lord, Beacon Lights of History, volume VI, p. 325.
Some estimate that a million or even two
million Huguenots fled
Some two millions of lives had perished since the breaking out of the civil wars.
-- James A. Wylie, The History of Protestantism, Vol. 2, Book 17, Chapter 19.
One
estimate (Mariejol) is
as high as four million. In 1660 there
were about 1,200,000 Huguenots (Protestants) in
A final figure: Mede has calculated from good authorities “that in
the war with the Albigenses and Waldenses there perished of these people, in
-- Christ and Antichrist, by Samuel J. Cassels, 1846, page 257.
And many similar figures could be given.
The following quotation shows the attitude of the Papacy towards heretics, which lends ample credibility to a large figure for the number persecuted and killed in the Middle Ages:
Treason.
The following paragraph from the “Review of the principles and history
of Popery” contains an accurate summary of Romanism, as it involves the
interest and safety of Protestant governments and nations. “Refractory princes who have not been
disposed to glut
--
Bourne,
George, The American Textbook of Popery, Griffith & Simon,
The
following statement concerning
By this it was enacted that any one whom an ecclesiastical court should have declared to be guilty, or strongly suspected, of heresy, should, on being made over to the sheriff with a certificate to that effect, be publicly burnt.
[footnote, page 298] It is remarked that
-- James C. Robertson, History of the Christian Church, The Young Churchman Co., 1904, p. 297.
These persecutions were not necessarily directed by the hierarchy of the church, but for the most part probably originated at a much lower level, from the “ecclesiastical feudalism” of the Middle Ages, as described by Williams:
Abbes and bishops in consequence became suzerains, temporal lords, having numerous vassals ready to take up arms for their cause, counts of justice – in fact all the prerogatives exercised by the great landlords. … This ecclesiastical feudalism was so extensive, so powerful, that in France and England it possessed during the Middle Ages more than a fifth of all the land; in Germany nearly a third.
-- Williams, Henry Smith, The Historian’s History of the World, vol. 8, p. 487.
Probably
the greatest number of those who perished by the Papacy in Europe did so at the hands of these local authorities,
on the grounds of suspected heresy or opposition to the church, and not
necessarily at the direction of the Pope, preceded by a trial, nor mentioned in
records. Who would there have been to
interfere with the actions of the local abbes and bishops? The constant elimination of a few heretics
here and there, in many locations, continued for many years, could easily have
added up to a total of millions without making much of an impression on recorded
history. Throughout the Middle Ages as the possessions of the church increased, so
would the number and power of these officials have increased, together with the
number of their victims. During the
Crusades,
their attention may have been externally directed, but with these ending in
about 1272, the number of martyrs within
The persecutions were not at all limited to the Inquisition, but took many forms. Many of the victims were killed secretly and never brought to trial or sentenced. These deaths would never have appeared in the official records of the Inquisition. Such persecutions even continued until very recent times, as illustrated by the following quotation from W. C. Brownlee, Popery the Enemy of Civil and Religious Liberty, J. S. Taylor, New York, 1836, page 124:
I beg to direct you to the history of
Note that it was common knowledge in Brownlee's day that such executions of dissenters from Catholicism took place. Another quotation from Brownlee, p. 115 gives further support to this fact:
Listen, I beseech you, to your fellow-citizens,
who have returned from their travels in
This
description of persecution derives from the testimony of many travelers to
Catholic countries at that time. If such
persecution took place in the early nineteenth century, how much more must it
have occurred in the Middle Ages when the Papacy was at the height of its
power! For example, M’Crie relates (The Reformation in Spain, pp.
181-188) how a Spaniard in the year 1546 converted to Protestantism
and was in consequence killed by his brother, who never was punished for his
deed. There must have been many such
assassinations in the Middle Ages by loyal Catholics who were jealous for the
reputation of the Virgin Mary. In fact, threats and persecution even took
place in the
Who have their dungeon cells under their cathedrals, in which they claim,
as inquisitors of their own diocese, to imprison free men in our republic? Foreign popish bishops! And the facts respecting a man being so
confined and scourged, in the cells at
Persecution also took the form of murders by
corrupt authorities, as described in the following passage from Peter’s Tomb
Recently Discovered in
At length a Sclavonian waterman came to the
palace with a startling story. He said that on the night when the prince
disappeared, while he was watching some timber on the river, he saw two men
approach the bank, and look cautiously around to see if they were observed.
Seeing no one, they made a signal to two others, one of whom was on horseback,
and who carried a dead body swung carelessly across his horse. He advanced to
the river, flung the corpse far into the water, and then rode away. Upon being
asked why he had not mentioned this before, the waterman replied that it was a
common occurrence, and that he had seen more than a hundred bodies thrown into
the
Even as recently as the mid twentieth century, dissenters from Catholicism were in danger, according to the following quotations:
But to even bring things closer home; an acquaintance told me of a recent conversation between a Protestant relative of hers and a Roman Catholic. The Catholic said, "I would like to see the blood of Protestants flow down the streets of this city." The Protestant was rightly surprised and said, "How can you say that, we are friends and you know that I am a Protestant?" The Catholic responded, "Yes, I know, but the greater the sacrifice, the greater the reward." Since they teach Catholics from childhood on, that to kill a Protestant is to do God a service, we had better be careful how we put Catholics in public office [but note that such teaching does not appear to be continued today, and also other quotations show that many Catholics oppose such persecution].
While I was in
-- Peterson, 1960, pp. 50-51.
While travelling on a train in
-- "The Rise and Fall of the Roman Catholic Church" by F. Paul Peterson, published privately, 1959, page 21.
A pastor in
-- Peterson, 1959, pp. 44-45.
A British Consul in
-- Peterson, 1959, p 50.
Just recently I was in various cities in
-- Peterson, 1959, p. 111.
During its rise to power, the Papacy also essentially exterminated the Heruli shortly after 493 A.D., the Vandals soon after 533 A.D., and the Ostrogoths in 554 A.D, all of whom were asserted to hold to the Arian belief. However, Limborch (The History of the Inquisition, p. 95) doubts that Arius held the views attributed to him. Concerning the Vandals, Bunch writes
“It is reckoned that during the reign of Justinian, Africa lost five millions of inhabitants; thus Arianism was extinguished in that region, not by any enforcement of conformity, but by the extermination of the race which had introduced and professed it.” – History of the Christian Church, J.C. Robertson, Vol. 1, p. 521.
-- Bunch,
Of course, the Heruli and the Ostrogoths also undoubtedly numbered in the millions, and were exterminated. Everywhere one looks there is evidence of millions and millions of people who were killed by the Papacy in various stages of its history. The Hussites were also nearly exterminated:
[footnote, speaking of Innocent VIII] Yet on the papal throne he played the zealot against the Germans, whom he accused of magic, in his bull Summis desiderantes affectibus, etc., and also against the Hussites, whom he well nigh exterminated.
-- Williams, Henry Smith, The Historian’s History of the World, vol. 8, p. 643.
Furthermore,
in a footnote speaking of the thirty years’ war which started in
The intensity of that conflict surpassed that
of other types of armed confrontations. In
-- Krus, D.J.,
& Webb, J.M. (1993) Quantification of Santayana's cultural schism theory. Psychological Reports, 72, 319-325.
In
fact, many sects had been exterminated throughout the history of
The inquisitor Reinerius, who died in 1259, has left it on record: "Concerning the sects of ancient heretics, observe, that there have been more than seventy: all of which, except the sects of the Manichaeans and the Arians and the Runcarians and the Leonists which have infected Germany, have through the favour of God, been destroyed.
-- Broadbent, E.H., The Pilgrim Church, Gospel Folio Press, 2002, p. 90 (originally published in 1931).
One of these sects lost a hundred thousand to persecution:
An edict was issued under the regency of Theodora, which decreed that the Paulicians should be exterminated by fire and sword, or brought back to the Greek church. … It is affirmed by civil and ecclesiastical historians, that, in a short reign, one hundred thousand Paulicians were put to death.
-- Andrew Miller, Short Papers on
Church,
It is often claimed by historic Protestant
writers that 50 million or more people have been killed by the Papacy. For example, Buck [Buck,
Charles, A Theological Dictionary, containing Definitions of All Religious
Terms; ..., Philadelphia, Thomas Cowperthwait & Co., 1838, article
“Persecution”, p.
335] writes, “It has been computed that fifty
millions of Protestants have
at different times been the victims of the persecutions of the Papists, and put
to death for their religious opinions.”
However, most people today have no idea how this figure of 50 million
was originally computed. Some persons today
are claiming that this figure of 50 million has no basis in fact and is an
exaggeration based on anti-Catholic sentiment.
Therefore it is of interest to find out how this figure was originally
computed in order to evaluate its reliability.
This study reveals some aspects of history that are being neglected
today and also gives us an insight into the extent to which the true history of
religion is being lost. This study also
shows how some of the other figures were computed.
There were many attempts to calculate the
number killed by the Papacy. Albert
Barnes, in his commentary on Revelation
Some have computed, that, from the year 1518
to1548, fifteen million of Protestants have perished by war and the Inquisition.
This may be overcharged, but certainly the number of them in these thirty
years, as well as since is almost incredible. To these we may add innumerable
martyrs, in ancient, middle, and late ages, in
(from
the commentary on the book of Revelation in Wesley’s
“Explanatory Notes on the New Testament,” fifth edition, 1788) Also, Bennet [Bennet, Benjamin,
Several discourses against popery,
And some that have pretended to make a
calculation, affirm, that in the space of 40 years
Also,
Halley’s
Bible Handbook, 1965 edition, page 726, referencing many older works on church
history states “Historians estimate that, in the Middle Ages and Early Reformation Era, more than 50,000,000 Martyrs perished.”
Furthermore, speaking of Innocent III,
Halley writes [p. 776], “More Blood was Shed under
his direction, and that of his immediate successors, than at any other period
of Church History, except in the Papacy’s effort to Crush the Reformation in the 16th and 17th
centuries.” In his introduction to [Berg,
Lectures on Romanism, D. Weidner,
depuis environ quatorze cents ans, la
théologie a procuré le massacre de plus de
cinquante millions d'hommes.
This
shows that one of these computations of 50 million killed was accepted by
Voltaire and approximately covered the period from 350
A.D. to 1750 A.D. In commenting on this
figure, a web page maintained by Professor James MacLean of the Department of
French and Spanish at Memorial University of Newfoundland says
allusion
aux Guerres de Religion, aux Croisades, etc.
Thus
Prof. MacLean speculates that the 50 million figure is based on wars of religion,
crusades, and other events.
These quotations give us important clues
about the origin of the figure of 50 million killed by the Papacy in
The time period for the figure of 45 million
has now been reasonably established, but not the place. For this,
The inquisition, which was established in the
twelfth century against the Waldenses ... was now more effectually set to
work. Terrible persecutions were carried on in various parts of
This
suggests that the principal areas of persecution included
Thus
the time and place of the major persecutions contributing to the 50 million
figure have been determined with reasonable confidence. It remains to estimate numbers killed in each
of these persecutions and show that they add up to 50 million. Although it is not yet possible to give a
full accounting, one can assign reasonable totals to these persecutions that do
add up to 50 million.
A large portion of the figure of 45 million
is covered by the thirty years’ war, the conflict in
The Thirty Years War had started as a Religious War; it ended as a
Political War; it resulted in the deaths of 10,000,000 to 20,000,000. Jesuit educated Ferdinand II started it with the purpose of crushing
Protestantism.
Halley, Henry
H., Pocket Bible Handbook,
Estimates
for the number killed in the Huguenot wars in
Henri
IV n'était pas plus riche. Son royaume était dévasté: en quarante ans de
guerres civiles étrangères, la France avait sans doute perdu plusiers millions
d'hommes et de femmes (4 millions, selon Mariéjol).
In
support of this figure, Albert Barnes in his commentary on Revelation 11:14 writes,
In
If
four million persons were killed in
“Thus did popish malice pursue the reformed in most parts of France, and persecute them under various names, but the denomination about this time, viz. the sixteenth century, most obnoxious to the Roman Catholics were hugonots, protestants, Lutherans, and Calvinists; and as these words were then synonymous in their meaning, and implied renouncing the errors of the church of Rome, so all who were apprehended under the imputation of belonging to either, were equally martyred. Yet the reformed flourished under persecution….” [p. 93]
“the king [of
“Those who were not put to death suffered
imprisonment, had their houses pulled down, their lands laid waste, their
property stolen, and their wives and daughters, after being ravished, sent into
convents…. If any fled from these cruelties, they were pursued through the
woods, hunted and shot like wild beasts....At the head of the dragoons, in all
the provinces of
Adding 15 million for the period 1518 to 1548
and 18 million for the thirty years’ war and 3 million for
Also, Wesley in his diary of January 16, 1760 quotes Sir
John Davis in his “Historical Relations Concerning
Ireland” as
stating that “from 1600 to 1641, the
general massacre, with the ensuing war, again thinned their numbers; not so few
as a million of men, women, and children, being destroyed in four years'
time.” The rebellion in 1641 killed more
than 150,000 Protestants in
Now, to obtain 50 million, one has to include
those killed before the Protestant Reformation. For this, estimates for the Hundred Years’
War from 1337-1453 range up to 10 million killed,
and this war could have been furthered by the Papacy, as nearly all other
European wars were. (See Philip Pregill, Landscapes in History, 2d Ed.
estimating the population loss in France at 6.3 million and Frederic J. Baumgartner, France in the Sixteenth Century
estimating the population loss in France at 10 million, taken from a web page
by Matthew White. Both sources deny that the Black Death caused most of these deaths.) In fact, the reconquest of
The stupid quarrels that have originated from
disputes relative to ceremonies the most puerile have deluged
One
can also list the Catholic crusade against the Albigenses in
“In the year 1460, the king of Bohemia published a very severe edict against all protestants; commanding the Bohemian nobility and magistrates, not only to seize them wherever they could find them on their estates, and within their districts, but to pursue them to their retreats, to hunt them in their recesses, and to do every thing they possibly could toward their extirpation.” [p. 184]
“In the year 1510, an edict was prepared for
ordering an immediate and general massacre of all the protestants that could be
found in
Concerning
the Cathari, who
were similar to the Waldenses, near the end of the twelfth century “The
Dominican Rainerius gave 4,000,000 as a safe estimate of their
number and declared this was according to a census made by the Cathari
themselves” [Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, 8
volumes (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdman’s, 1910; reprint, 1978), Volume V, Chapter
X]. Of course nearly all of the Cathari
were killed. They were said to be very
zealous for their faith, and few would have recanted. In addition, if the Cathari conducted a
census, they must have been a cohesive group.
There must have been many other “heretics” that had similar beliefs but
were not part of the Cathari; it would be reasonable to estimate at least 8
million when these were included. This
would imply that the number of those killed by the Papacy before the
Reformation was 8 million or more, especially when one
considers the hundreds of years that elapsed since the Papacy was established.
For evidence that there were many sects
during this time and that they were very numerous and willing to die for their
faith rather than to recant, Neander [General History of the Christian Religion and
Church: Translated from the German of Dr. Augustus Neander by Joseph Torrey, Volume VI,
This sect [Thondracians, a
sect of Paulicians],
though it met with no mercy from the bishops, at whose instigation it was
fiercely persecuted, continually revived, and spread [p. 343] widely in Armenia. At one time, in particular, about the year
1002 it made the most alarming progress …. [p. 342]
The corruption of the clergy furnished the
heretics a most important vantage-ground from which to attack the dominant
church and its sacraments. The ignorance
of the people on religious subjects exposed them to be continually deceived by
those who were seeking, on whatever side, to work upon the minds of the
multitude. The fickle populace were
excited sometimes by the fiery appeals of the heretics … to abhorrence of their
corrupt clergy …; and sometimes, by the influence of the clergy, to fanatical
fury against the heretics, who were represented as utterly irreligious and godless
men. [p. 348]
Except in the case of one ecclesiastic and
one nun, all the pains which were taken to reclaim them from their errors, in
other words, to induce them to recant, were to no purpose. The others, thirteen in number, were
condemned to the stake, and died there.
[p. 354, speaking of members of a sect at
The sufferings to which they [a sect of
Gerhard]
were exposed on account of their doctrines, they encountered cheerfully,
considering them as means of expiating sins committed before and in the present
life ….Those therefore who were deprived of the privilege of dying as martyrs,
died cheerfully under self-inflicted tortures. [p. 361]
… the fury with which the Catharists were persecuted in the thirteenth century may
have contributed to promote among them this fanatical seeking after death; and
we meet with examples which show that they inflicted death on themselves in
these ways, to avoid falling victims to the inquisitions. [Volume VIII, p. 319]
The Catharists were zealous in disseminating their principles
everywhere; they were careful to improve every favorable circumstance for this
purpose, and seized upon every occurrence which could serve as a means to it.
…the heretics, who at the peril of their lives traveled about from village to
village and from house to house. As
merchants they frequented fairs and markets …. [p. 320]
The intrepidity and calmness with which the
Catharists faced an excruciating death might well create
an impression in their favour on those who were not altogether hardened by
fanaticism. … The persecutions furthered
the spread of the Catharists, who
often held their meetings in obscure retreats, catacombs, and subterranean
caves. … in 1231, many priests even were
affected with the heresy, and the sharpest measures had to be employed in order
to stay it. [p. 330]
Such was their boldness that, in open
defiance of the church, they [the Catharists]
proceeded to elect a pope for themselves, to act as supreme head over their
scattered communities. Such a pope
appears in
… not only people of rank left their
possessions and joined them, but also clergymen, priests, monks, and
nuns were among their adherents. And it
is mentioned as a characteristic fact, that the rudest and most unlettered
peasant who joined their sect, would in less than eight days gain so much
knowledge of the Scriptures, that he could not be foiled in argument by any
man. [p. 337, speaking of another sect]
… after he had laboured for ten years in
those regions [Toulouse and Alby],
Bernard of Clairvaux, in
writing to a nobleman, could say, “The churches are without flocks, the flocks
without priests, the priests are nowhere treated with due reverence, the
churches are leveled down to synagogues, the sacraments are not esteemed holy,
the festivals are no longer celebrated.” … he [Bernard] means the priests had
gone over to the Henricians …. [p. 349]
The corruption of the clergy had, even in
places where the church-system of doctrine was still held fast, excited great
dissatisfaction and violent complaints, as appears evident from the songs of
the Troubadours, who
came from these districts, where this tone of feeling is not to be mistaken.
[p. 351]
Since then … the church had now to engage in
a violent contest with tendencies of spirit struggling in opposition to her,
continually multiplying and continually spreading,--a contest such as had never
occurred before,--she must be driven … to employ every means at her command for
the purpose of suppressing an insurrection which could not be put down by
spiritual might alone. [p. 399]
… the
bishops … were no longer regarded in the communities with the requisite
respect. This was especially the case in
Innocent the Third … well understood that extraordinary measures
were needed to suppress the heretical tendencies so rapidly advancing, which
threatened wholly to sever the connection betwixt these districts and the
church of Rome. … he chose for his instruments the monks … the germ of the future inquisitions. [p.
401]
After the land had been laid waste for thirty
years, the blood of thousands had been spilt, and a general submission had
thus, in the year 1229, been finally brought about by force, the maintenance of
the faith was still by no means secured for the future. The sects destroyed by fire and sword sprang
up afresh out of the same needs of the spirit from which they had sprung up at
the beginning. [p. 404]
Many
of these sects were essentially Protestants, so
that many of their martyrs can be included in the figure of 50 million
Protestants killed by the Papacy. Perrin, who
was a leading Waldensian minister, writes [History of the Waldenses,
Book I, Chapter III, 1618] that the Waldenses were called by many names
including Albigenses,
Josephists,
Lollards,
Henricians, and
Arnoldists and that many false accusations were made
against them in order to induce the secular powers to persecute them. They were also called Cathari,
Arians, and
Manichees. In Chapter VI and VIII Perrin shows that the
beliefs of the Waldenses were very similar to those of the later
Protestants. In Chapter VIII Perrin
shows how the teachings of the Waldenses spread to
Where does the figure of 15 million killed in
the period 1518 and 1548 in war and the Inquisition come from?
It is possible to conjecture about this as well, considering the large
numbers of people even in Catholic countries that were accepting
Protestantism. Jortin writes, “…at the time of the Reformation,
when multitudes of Heretics and Schismatics, as they called them, arose in all
places …” [Jortin,
John, 1698-1770. Sermons on different subjects, by the late Reverend John
Jortin, ...
Wherever Protestantism appeared, it was viciously persecuted, both in the period from 1518 to 1548 and later. Concerning the period from 1518 to 1548, R.B. writes [R.B., The scarlet whore, or, the wicked abominations, horrid cruelties and persecutions of the Pope and Church of Rome …, Macnair, Glasgow, 1779]
About the year 1523 Martin Luther begain to shine as a great light in Germany, and
his doctrine soon overspread Bohemia, and
all the parts adjoining; which so enraged the pope and his clergy that they
continually raised very violent persecutions against them, wherein multitudes
of good Christians lost their lives by means of Ferdinand I. and
Charles V.
emperors of
Also,
in 1521 Luther was pronounced a heretic and punishments
against him and his followers were decreed.
In 1522 Hadrian the Sixth incited the princes of
In
“The emperor Charles V, in
the year 1547, ordered that all the decrees of the council of
[Speaking of
With so many persons accepting Protestantism,
the total number killed would have been large.
Kurtz [History of the Church , p. 162] says, “In
Hungary the number of Protestants was reduced one-half, by various intrigues and
enticements.” Freeman [p. 281] writes, “Meanwhile, at the other end
of Ferdinand’s
dominions, the Protestants of Hungary revolted, and for a while turned him out
of that kingdom also.” Also, [p. 303]
“The Emperor Leopold meanwhile, besides the wars with
The following is from the Jesuit Confession of Faith imposed on papists in
One
source [Wylie The History of Protestantism, Volume Third -
Book Twentieth, Chapter 3] says that
The Romanists had all the means of aggression
in their own hands. The Protestants could hope, at best, for nothing better than a
gradual extinction. The Jesuits were at work here, as everywhere, and their
diabolical principles were soon to work the ruin of their defenseless
adversaries.
Speaking
of Siebenbuergen,
Newman [p. 305] writes,
In 1523 and 1525 rigorous imperial laws were
promulgated against the spread of the new doctrine. “All Lutherans are to be extirpated from the kingdom, and
wherever they may be found are to be freely seized and burned, not only by
ecclesiastical but also by secular persons” (Diet of Pesth, 1525).
Siebenbuergen is known in English as
Like
Speaking
of
The correspondence of the time, the careful
records of public and private conferences, and the exceedingly full and
well-preserved archival materials, give us an inside view of the process by
which the Counter-Reformation was inaugurated and carried out to its bitter
end…. [Speaking of Charles] He
was led to believe that the salvation of his soul and the permanent holding of
his hereditary possessions depended upon his remorseless persecution of
heretics. At a conference of Catholic
princes at Munich (October, 1579) Charles was urged to enter with vigor upon the work,
and the princes bound themselves mutually to give each other all needful
assistance in suppressing rebellion among their subjects…. The Jesuits were already present in force, and they were
ready to be the chief instruments in the destruction of Protestantism….
The Protestants struggled heroically, as long as successful resistance
seemed possible. Nowhere do we find a
nobler type of Lutheranism than in this region. No country in
Freeman [General Sketch of European History, MacMillan
and Company,
Thus, for instance, in
Speaking
of
Within a few years Protestantism had been
almost completely exterminated throughout the Hapsburg domains, multitudes having been slaughtered,
and the rest banished or forcibly converted. The Jesuits were the instigators and the chief agents in
this horrible work.
Concerning
In
Lest anyone think that these people were
fleeing to other countries, it is important to recall that the objective of the
Jesuits was to eliminate Protestants and not to push them from one country to
another. Thus the Jesuits would have
attempted by every means to prevent their escape. In support of this, Halley [pp. 780-781] writes, “In Spain,
In
In
In
In
Also,
[Halley,
page 792] “… under the brilliant and brutal leadership of the Jesuits [
Of
the common people not fewer than 36,000 families emigrated. There was hardly a
kingdom in
Furthermore,
Joseph McCabe, The Story of Religious
Controversy, Chapter XXIX The Jesuits: Religious Rogues, 1929.
Kurtz [p.
162] writes, “It [the Protestant church] was wholly exterminated in
Ferdinand Extirpates Protestantism. It need scarcely be said that Ferdinand followed up his victories in the Austro-Hungarian Empire by vigorous measures for the
extirpation of Protestantism. The
Jesuits were on hand in full force to aid in the
terrible work. This is not the place to
describe the process by which Protestants, who
in
In some places they shut up the people in the
church, and forced them to receive in one kind, and if they would not kneel
before the host, they used to beat their legs with clubs till they fell down;
others they gagged, and when they had propped their mouths wide open, they
thrust the host down their throats.
Others were detained in prisons and bonds so long till they died, and
particularly one was kept in a loathsome dungeon so long till his feet rotted
off. If any, to avoid this tyrrany, fled
to the woods or other private places for shelter, edicts were published
forbidding all to entertain them, upon pain of forfeiting great sums of money
for every night’s entertainment. The
country people were fetched out of their houses; nay, out of their very beds,
by troops of soldiers, who drove them before them like beasts in the sharpest
of cold and bitter weather. And with
these poor creatures they filled the common prisons, towers, cellars, stables;
nay, and hog-sties too, where they were killed with hunger, cold, and
thirst. Marriage, burial and baptism
were forbidden to the Protestants, and if they did it privately, they were
imprisoned, or else put to great fines. … In some places the heretics were shut
up in privies, to the end that they might be poisoned with the stench. And these were the charitable ways, by which
the Bohemian Catholics endeavored to reclaim such as were revolted from the
tyrrany of the
As
an illustration of the attitude of the Catholic Church towards the Protestants in
Know that the interests of the Holy See, and
those of your crown, make it a duty to exterminate the Hussites. Remember that these impious persons dare
proclaim principles of equality; they maintain that all Christians are brethren
and that God has not given to privileged men the right of ruling the nations;
they hold that Christ came on Earth to abolish slavery; they call the people to
liberty, that is to the annihilation of kings and priests. While there is still time, then, turn your
forces against
Also, speaking of
After
describing the persecutions in
[Speaking of
[Speaking of the Polish nobility with their papist army in 1655] “In what manner they would have used the refugee citizens who fled [from Lesna], but more especially the pastors, they showed by their heroic conduct to those remaining; and in other places, by the most savage slaughtering of divers ministers of the church, and other faithful members of Christ of both sexes; for of all that they laid hold on, they gave no quarter, but cruelly put every one to death with most exquisite tortures….” [Southwell, op. cit., p. 236]
Concerning Lithuania, “In Lithuania all who were not Roman Catholics were slaughtered without distinction of age or sex” and “their countries and churches [were] laid waste, so that nothing was to be seen but murders and massacres; the blood of the poor suffering Protestants ran in streams through the streets of towns and cities ….” [op. cit., p. 43]. Southwell [op. cit., p. 224] writes,
“The persecutions in
“The barbarities exercised were these: [here
the passage becomes very explicit, so those who are sensitive should NOT read
the rest of it] Skinning alive, Cutting
off hands, Taking out the bowels, Cutting the flesh open, Putting out the eyes,
Beheading, Scalping, Cutting off feet, Boring the thin bones, Pouring melted
lead into the flesh, Hanging, Stabbing, and Sending to perpetual banishment.”
In Protestant countries as well, many would
have been persecuted during the transition to Protestantism. For example, concerning the Thirty Years’ War, Newman [pp.
410-411] writes,
The extent of the destruction of life through
the Thirty Years’ War cannot be estimated. If we take into account the multitudes who
died of starvation and exposure, the hundreds of thousands of women and
children who were slain in the sacking and destroying of the towns and cities,
the fearful waste of life that must have been involved in camp-following, the
deaths caused by the war would amount to many millions. In
[Speaking of the persecutions in
Du
Prin[Du
Pin, Louis Ellies, A new ecclesiastical history of the seventeenth century:
containing an account of the controversies in religion, Translated by Digby
Cotes, T. Combes, London, and A. Peisley,
The
whole
Persecution
typically only increases the zeal and growth of the Christian Church. These Protestant communities could only have
been eliminated by killing on a massive scale.
The vast reduction of the Protestant communities in
Because
the population of
The extent of the Inquisition can also be surmised from the following
quotation, which estimates five million souls killed during the Reformation in
But the country in which the Inquisition has reached its most flourishing estate is
Rev. J.A. Wylie, LL.D, Genius and Influence of the Papacy, Book III - Chapter III.
This could partially explain the figure of 15 million for war and the Inquisition because most of the victims may have suffered after 1481. Those in prison can be counted as killed because they undoubtedly died much sooner than otherwise, and lived the remainder of their lives in miserable conditions. In fact, the Inquisition continued for many years:
When the papal government was temporarily
suspended in 1849 by the
Wylie, op. cit.
Also, Berg [Lectures on Romanism, p. 258] writes,
When the inquisition was thrown open in 1820, by order of the Cortes of Madrid, of the twenty one prisoners who were found in it, not one of whom knew the name of the city in which he was, some had been confined three years, some a longer period, and not one knew perfectly the nature of the crime of which he was accused.
One of these prisoners had been condemned, and was to have suffered the following day. His punishment was to be death by the pendulum.
If 5
million were killed in
Wherever the poor Albigenses and Waldenses fled, the Inquisition followed them; and in a few years it was set
up not only in
Wylie, op. cit.
Another source that indicates millions killed in the Inquisition is Halley:
The Horrors of the Inquisition, ordered and maintained by the Popes, over a period of 500 years, in which unnumbered millions were Tortured and Burned, constitute the MOST BRUTAL, BEASTLY, and DEVILISH PICTURE in all history. [p. 732]
Newman writes
It is also certain that the inquisitorial records preserved represent a very small part of the actual inquisitorial proceedings.
Newman,
Albert Henry, A Manual of Church History Volume 1, The American Baptist
Publication Society,
In fact, many were killed by the secular authorities and would not even be recorded in the official records of the Inquisition:
The Jesuit Sanders himself confesses, that an innumerable
multitude of Lollards and Sacramentarians were burnt throughout all
Towers,
Joseph, Illustrations of Prophecy …, William Duane,
The Papacy would still be responsible for these deaths because it insisted that the secular authorities should persecute heretics. Jones writes
Authors of undoubted credit affirm, and without the least exaggeration, that millions of persons have been ruined by this horrible court.
Jones, William, A History of the Christian Church, volume ii, page 98, 1812.
Also, Robert Bellarmine, a Roman Catholic scholar, write sometime in the period 1586-1593 that “almost infinite numbers were either burned or otherwise killed” by the Catholic Church [Disputationes de Controversiis Christianae Fidei Adversus Hujus Temporis Haereticos (Disputations about the Controversies of the Christian faith Against the Heretics of this Time), Tom. ii, Lib. III, cap. XXII]. This was written well before the beginning of the Thirty Years’ War, and supports the idea that many millions were killed by the Church before the massacres in the Holy Roman Empire began. Wesley’s testimony consists of two parts: First, that “some have computed” that fifteen million persons perished from war and the Inquisition during a certain time period, and second, that Wesley’s knowledge of history confirms that an enormous number of people perished in this manner during this time, even if the figure of fifteen million may be somewhat too large. Thus a number of sources including Wesley give evidence that war and the Inquisition were responsible for millions of deaths during this thirty year period.
After such a survey of the persecutions, it
is possible to revisit the question of how the total of 50 million was
computed.
Even apart from the specific figures, the
general context is important. The
Jesuits “were soon the favorite confessors in the
imperial court and in many of the royal courts of
Another method of computation also yields large figures. Annie Besant [The Freethinker's Text-Book. Part II. Christianity: Its Evidences. Its Origin. Its Morality. Its History, section I] writes,
in the course of the Middle Ages hundreds of thousands perished; in France and Germany "many districts and large towns burned two, three, and four hundred witches every year, in some the annual executions destroyed nearly one per cent of the whole population....”
This
refers only to witches, but
it illustrates the attitude of the church to heretics in general. Because the church had a uniform policy in
all places, one can expect similar numbers of heretics to have been killed
everywhere in
The Waldenses and Albigenses, so renowned for their numbers, their virtues, and the purity of their faith, taught, in the 12th and 13th centuries, that the pope was Antichrist, and the church of Rome the Babylon of the Apocalypse.
Footnote: Such, says Vitringa, was the language of pious men in general, during the whole of the four centuries which preceded the Reformation. In Apoc. p. 749.
The
population of
These figures do not even consider those
killed in the
... truly they went a great way to make this remark literally true with regard to the new world, when first found out: for, according to the account of one of their own bishops, in the space of forty years they destroyed fifty millions of people.
Adding
in these deaths might explain the commonly quoted figure of 100 million killed
by the Papacy. Adding in non-Christians
killed in
There is another computation that yields 100
million killed by the Papacy. In
“Romanism in the light of prophecy and history: its final downfall, and the
triumph of the church of Christ” [New York, American and Foreign Christian
Union, 1854, p. 58], Brownlee quotes a figure of 68,500,000 killed by the
Papacy, composed of 50 million Christians in Europe, 15
million Indians in the New World, 1.5 million Jews in Spain and elsewhere, and 2 million Moors in
And, O merciful Father in heaven, this does
not include the millions of their own people, and her enemies, which fell in
her crusades, and wars, and massacres!
Here thirty millions and a half would be a moderate calculation! Thus,
Other estimates of the number of Indians killed range from 30 to 40 million; using these, one obtains a total of about 120 million instead.
It is notable that discussions of the
Reformation and Inquisition in modern historical works omit the religious
wars from consideration and omit all consideration of the large number of
people who accepted Protestantism in the early years of the Reformation,
thereby hiding the truth about the magnitude of past persecutions. However, even though much of the truth about
history is being forgotten, there is still enough evidence remaining to show
that the figure of 50 million killed for their faith by the Papacy in
There
is some additional information about the number killed in
In
general, whenever the Papacy extended its territory, it appears that a
significant fraction or even a majority of the population was killed, as occurred in
It is
also possible to perform this computation in another way. There were 3 million or more persons with
views similar to the Waldenses in northern
Another
point is that the persecution of the Waldenses lasted four centuries, from 1160 to 1560,
rather than three, according to Armitage. Therefore it is reasonable to multiply the
above estimates by four thirds, obtaining 24 million or possibly 48 million
Waldenses and their converts killed.
Furthermore, the actual estimate was 3.2 million instead of 3 million
persons with evangelical views in northern
In addition, a Bible believing church that is on fire for the Lord will generally grow by at least 5 percent a year, and persecution generally only increases the rate of growth. Because the Waldenses were highly motivated and active in missionary work, one can expect a similar rate of growth for them. With an average population of 1.5 million, this would result in a growth rate of at least 7.5 million per century, or, 30 million in four centuries. Adding the original 3 million gives 33 million, and increasing the result by about 7 percent would put the total at about 35 million, without considering Waldenses in other countries. Including these, a lower bound for the total lost to persecution would appear to be about 40 million. Assuming twice as many persons with evangelical beliefs gives a total of 70 or 80 million. If one assumes that the population of Waldenses held steady during these four centuries instead of decreasing, the totals nearly double again, to nearly 70 million and nearly 135 million, without even considering Waldenses in other countries.
It is
possible to give a partial explanation of where the figure of 3.2 million comes
from, as well. Jones, in
his Church History, Chapter 6, section 1, states “In the year 1530, George
Morel, one
of the pastors of a church of the Waldenses,
published Memoirs of the History of their Churches, in which he states,
that at the time he wrote, there were above eight hundred thousand persons
professing the religion of the Waldenses [Morland’s Evangelical Churches,
p. 224]; nor will this appear an exaggerated statement, if we consider the view
that was given, in the last section, of their dispersions throughout almost
every country of Europe--the
immense numbers that suffered martyrdom; and
what was formerly mentioned, that in the year 1315, namely two centuries before
this time, there were eighty thousand of them in the small kingdom of Bohemia.” Furthermore, there were at least from one to
two million Albigenses in the south of
The most reasonable assumption overall seems to be that there were at one time at least twice as many Waldenses as there were in 1530, and that this number gradually decreased to 800,000 over the course of four centuries. Also, one can assume that the total number of persons with similar beliefs was at least four times as large, and thus decreased from about 6 million to about 3 million. This leads to an average population of 4.5 million during this time, and to a total of 90 million killed. Increasing the number by seven percent gives about 96 million, and adding in the 3 million lost along the way gives 99 million. This may explain where the sometimes quoted total of 100 million comes from.
Now let us consider in particular the Spanish inquisition. Quoting Schmucker,
According to Llorente, this fearful tribunal [the inquisition] cost Spain alone 2,000,000 of lives, and the amount of torments suffered by these, and the other victims of papal persecution, was probably greater than that of all the generations that ever lived and died in God’s appointed way, by natural death.
Llorente had access to the records of the Spanish Inquisition. Overall, Llorente in his “A Critical History
of the Inquisition of Spain,” 1823, gave a much smaller figure. He calculated that more than 300,000 suffered
persecution in
In the course of the first year in which it was erected, the inquisition of Seville, which then extended over Castile, committed two thousand persons alive to the flames, burnt as many in effigy, and condemned seventeen thousand to different penances. According to a moderate computation, from the same date until 1517, the year in which Luther made his appearance, thirteen thousand persons were burnt alive, eight thousand seven hundred were burnt in effigy, and one hundred and sixty nine thousand seven hundred and twenty three were condemned to penances, making all in all one hundred and ninety one thousand four hundred and twenty three persons condemned by the several tribunals of Spain in the course of thirty six years. There is reason for thinking that this estimate falls much below the truth.
According
to Puigblanch,
“Inquisition Unmasked,” the number of reconciled and
banished in
Cecil Roth in “History of the Marranos,” page 143, cites Amadeo de los Rios as giving the figures of 28,540 burned alive, 16,520 burned in effigy, and 308,847 punished in other ways. These figures are exclusively for Jews up to 1525, in less than half a century of existence, implying that the true figures are larger even than Llorente quoted. Speaking of Llorente’s figures, Roth says
… these huge figures are open to suspicion. However, they are exceeded by the indications given by the intensely Catholic Amadeo de los Rios, usually most moderate in his views.
Wilder (page 86) presents the figures in a way that can explain some of the misunderstanding about the number killed. Quoting Llorente, page 5,
The
horrid conduct of this holy office weakened the power and diminished the
population of
Brownlee states
The
number of victims of the Inquisition will never be known until the day of final
retribution. Various have been the
numbers set down. “Authors of undoubted
credit,” says Jones,
“have affirmed, and without any exaggeration, that millions of persons have
been ruined by this horrible court. Many
were banished from
Then after citing Llorente’s figures, he writes,
This number fixed on by this unusually accurate historian, is far below the truth. It is generally admitted that under the first Inquisitor of Spain alone, namely, Torquemada, no less than 100,000 human beings suffered: under the above three classes, that is, they were burned; or they perished on the rack, or by it; or in exile; and perpetual confinement!
-- Brownlee, 1834, pp. 339-340.
In
fact, quite a number perished in prison during the Inquisition, and
these are omitted from the usual statistics, as mentioned in a web article:
It
was with reason that the Serbian Orthodox Bishop, Dr. Nikolaj Velimirovic, so well known
to the Anglo-Saxon world, compared what happened in
This figure of 114,401 is apparently in error and according to Llorente should include all that were punished by any means by Torquemada during this eighteen year period, including life imprisonment. There is also indirect evidence of the magnitude of the victims of the inquisition:
No secrets could be withheld from the
inquisitors; hundreds of persons were often apprehended in one day, and in
consequence of information resulting from their examinations under torture,
thousands more were apprehended. Prisons, convents, even private houses, were crowded with
victims; the cells of
the inquisition were filled and emptied again and again; its
torture chamber was a hell.
-- Romanism and the Reformation by H.
Grattan Guinness, lectures,
To make the subject personal, here is the testimony of one of the victims:
Before we let fall the curtain upon this
awful subject, let us listen for a moment to some of the words of William Lithgow,
a Scotsman, who suffered the tortures of
the Inquisition in
the time of James I. After telling of the diabolical treatment he received,
which was very similar to that I have just described, he says, “Now mine eyes did begin to
startle, my mouth to foam and froth, and my teeth to chatter like the dobbling
of drumsticks. Oh, strange, inhuman, monster man-manglers!. . And
notwithstanding of my shivering lips in this fiery passion, my vehement
groaning, and blood springing from my arms, my broken sinews, yea, and my
depending weight on flesh-cutting cords, yet they struck me on the face with
cudgels to abate and cease the thundering noise of my wrestling voice. At last,
being released from these pinnacles of pain, I
was handfast set on the floor with this their ceaseless imploration: ‘Confess,
confess, confess in time, or thine inevitable torments ensue.’ Where, finding
nothing from me but still innocent, — Oh! I am innocent. O Jesus, the Lamb of
God, have mercy on me, and strengthen me with patience to undergo this barbarous
murder — ’”
Enough! Here let the curtain drop. I
should sicken you were I to pursue the subject further; it is too horrible, too
damnable.
-- Romanism and the Reformation by H.
Grattan Guinness, lectures,
Lower estimates for the number of victims of the Inquisition also exist, as cited by a Roman Catholic on a discussion board:
The best estimate of the total number of executions under the Spanish Inquisition comes from the Encyclopedia Judaica (not a Catholic source) which estimates the number at around 7,000. It should be remembered that the Inquisition was a court charged with hearing cases for all crimes committed on Church property or against the Church, clerics, or professed religious. There were several capital crimes under the Inquisition's jurisdiction besides heresy. These included murder, rape, kidnapping, assault on a bishop, and others. Might I recommend that you get Henry Kamen's recent book The Spanish Inquisition : A Historical Revision (N.B.- Kamen's estimate is that there were only 3,000 executions.)
So there is considerable disagreement in the figures concerning the Spanish inquisition. And such disagreements occur in the larger context, as well. The figures are rapidly decreasing with time, and our memory of past persecutions is being lost. Because records and memories are lost with the passage of time, in general the earliest records and those closest to the source are to be preferred.
Another quotation helps to explain some of the discrepancies.
And Walter M. Montano, writing in Christian Heritage, says:
‘
-- INTOLERANCE—BIGOTRY— PERSECUTION by Loraine Boettner D.D. (taken from his book “Roman Catholicism” first published 1962), Chapter 18.
This
quotation explains where Schmucker’s
figure of two million comes from, though it is still unclear what it
means. The figure of 15,659 (which
perhaps should be 17,659) represents those who were killed before being burnt. Many were also expelled from
The number of the exiles has been estimated variously between 300,000 and 3,000,000. It probably lies much nearer to the first of these figures.
He
also refers to the exiles as “her children,” possibly explaining Schmucker’s
statement and Montano’s
statement about
The
whole number of Jews expelled from
We
need look no further for the principle of action, in this case, than the spirit
of religious bigotry which led to a similar expulsion of the Jews from
[footnote] The Portuguese government caused all children of fourteen years of age, or under, to be taken from their parents and retained in the country, as fit subjects for a Christian education. The distress occasioned by this cruel provision may be well imagined. Many of the unhappy parents murdered their children to defeat the ordinance; and many laid violent hands on themselves.
-- Williams, Henry Smith, Historian’s History of the World, vol. X. pp. 159-160.
Commenting on Llorente’s methods of calculation, Jean Dumont in his book L’Eglise au Risque de l’Histoire (Limoge: Criterion, 1985) states
Professor
Gerard Dufour shows that the impressive numbers of Llorente which are almost universally accepted are
"not at all convincing." They are in no way a reasonable statistic,
but only the naive imposture of purely conjectural numbers established on the
basis of insupportable fragility and exaggeration. How did Llorente arrive at
his figures? The answer is quite simple. Totally ignorant of the number of
victims of the Inquisition, he
fabricated them from conjectural accounts available to him with regard to the
tribunal of
Having
thus taken "entirely erroneous numbers," and these only from
But as he arrived by means of this method of blind multiplication of inflated figures at a total figure that was so enormous as to be absolutely unbelievable, he reduced them on a completely arbitrary basis by 50% in general, and by 90% for the first year after each tribunal was established because they would not have had sufficient time to pronounce sentence on anyone during the first year.
Another
problem with interpreting such figures is that of language. Wilder’s
figure of 68 million apparently includes those who were not killed, but
persecuted and lived. If a writer says
that there were 68 million “victims” of the Papacy then it could be
misunderstood that they were all killed.
Obviously the sources from the early 1800’s interpret the figure of 68
million as those who were killed. The
same problem occurs with Schmucker’s
statement about Llorente;
Schmucker says that Llorente asserted 2 million were
killed in the Spanish inquisition. Other sources claim that Llorente asserted
300,000 were killed (which was probably due to a translation or copying error
as explained by
What is the basis for such a large overall estimate, whether it be 50 million, 68 million or 100 million killed? Dowling does not say where he obtained his figure. Brownlee, at least, breaks the figure into categories, but does not say where the estimate of 50 million comes from. Another source also gives some information about this topic, namely, M. D. Aletheia, The Rationalist's Manual (1897):
Let us look for a
moment at the number of victims sacrificed on the altars of the Christian
Moloch: -- 1,000,000 perished during the early Arian schism; 1,000,000
during the Carthaginian struggle; 7,000,000 during the Saracen slaughters. In
The source for this quote appears to be “Letters
from
From the information given it is possible to explain the origin of some of the common figures. Bengel’s figure of 15 million seems to be general knowledge, passed down from the time of the persecutions themselves, and obtained by some method of computation. The method of computation of the 50 million figure was discussed in a previous chapter. Brownlee shows how the figures of 68 and 69 million derive from the 50 million figure. Middleton’s figure of 56 million does not include the figure of 50 million Protestants, except for an overlap of 3 million. Adding these to Middleton’s figure gives a result of about 100 million. The figures of 120 and 150 million for the number killed by the Papacy in the Middle Ages are still unexplained. Voltaire apparently estimated that 20 million witches were killed; perhaps using this estimate and the casualties for the thirty years’ war explains some of the higher figures.
It is noteworthy that these figures of millions killed by the Papacy do not derive solely from nineteenth century scholarship, as is sometimes claimed, but also go back to sources in the eighteenth and even seventeenth century (Clarke). If Clarke cited two million killed of the Waldenses alone, surely he would have reckoned the total killed by the Papacy at many millions. The question remains whether these figures about the magnitude of religious persecution are trustworthy. Even though the figure of 56 million is broken into categories by Middleton, it is unclear where the individual figures come from and how reliable they are. It is possible, at least, to give a partial answer to this question. Middleton gives a figure of a million killed among the Waldenses, Albigenses, and others; Mede (cited in Cassels) gives a figure at least as large. Clarke doubles the figure. For this figure, at least, Dr. Middleton had some basis, and did not invent it out of thin air. The same is true of the figure of 9 million witches killed:
Gottfried Christian Voigt (1740-1791) extrapolated from his section of
-- Selected Death Tolls for Wars, Massacres and Atrocities Before the
20th Century, by Matthew White.
Therefore the figure of 9 million witches killed also has a source and was not made up. From these two examples it is possible to infer Middleton’s approach: All of the figures he gave were obtained form another source. None of the figures were increased; in fact some of them may even have been reduced. Even the figure of 30,000,000 Mexicans and Peruvians killed, for which we do not have a source, is not too far off from the estimate of 15 million given by Schmucker, cited above.
However, it would be useful to look at one of
these figures in more detail, to see how reliable it is. This can help to give insight into the
reliability of the entire estimate. It
is possible to reconstruct how Voigt arrived at his figure. This is from a German publication, Sepp-Depp,
from July, 2001. Quoting
Voigt,
Ich habe aus dem Zeitraume vom Jahre 1569 bis 1598 also ungefähr in 30
Jahren einige 30 Fälle nachgewiesen. (...) Ich schätze die Anzahl derselben
noch einmal so hoch. (...) Ich will nun annehmen, dass in dem genannten
Zeitraum von 30 Jahren wenigstens 40 Personen durchs Feuer als Hexe
hingerichtet sind; ob ich gleich glaube, dass ich die Zahl auf 60 annehmen
könnte. Nach diesem Verhältnis würden in jedem Jahrhundert in Quedlinburg 133
Personen als Hexen verbrannt worden seyn.
The
publication is highly critical of Voigt’s
estimate, calling it “statisfiction.”
Nonetheless, from the surrounding text (also in German), one can infer
Voigt’s method of computation. In a 30
year period he found records of 30 cases of witches being condemned. He estimates the actual number to be at least
twice as high, but for the sake of an
estimate supposes that 40 witches were burnt during this 30 year period. At this rate, in a century there would be
(100/30) times 40 or 133 witches burnt, and in the period from 1100 to 1600
(five centuries) there would be 665 witches burnt, approximately. He then notes that the population of this part of Germany is about 1/15,000 of the population of Europe (actually slightly more), so multiplying 665
by 15,000 one obtains an estimate of somewhat less than 10,000,000 witches
executed in Europe in 500 years. The
population of
Now, the number of witches executed may have varied from time to time and
from place to place, so the above estimate is not necessarily correct. However, Voigt felt that his area of
Some say that these high death toll figures are tinged by anti-Catholicism. One could just as well say that arguments against these figures are tinged by pro-Catholicism. The figures are so large that even Protestants probably found them hard to believe and preferred smaller rather than larger figures. Wesley or Bengel, at least, did not find the figure of 15,000,000 killed in 30 years to be ridiculous, though he admitted it might be somewhat too large. Many other well-regarded authors also found these figures to be reasonable, as cited earlier. Of course there are also instances of cruelty of Protestants toward Catholics that could be mentioned. And Protestants as well as Catholics have mistreated Indians.
According
to a web site, “Modern research (Dreschner, 1987, Kung, 1991) indicates that the previous
estimates of the number of victims of witch trials are seriously attenuated.
Church archives on concremiret trials remain closed even to academic scholars.
Research by Kung is unique by presenting the insider’s estimate of the number
of victims of witch trials. For this, Kung was expelled from his teaching
position and denied the right to teach at parochial schools in
There is also a plausible source for
Middleton’s
estimate of 30 million killed in the
"I affirm it as very certain and approved that during these forty years (1502-1542) owing to the aforesaid tyrannies and infernal works of the Christians more than twelve million souls, men, women and children, have perished unjustly and tyrannically; and in truth I believe I should not be overstepping the mark in saying fifteen million…two ways have in general been used by those who come to the Indies calling themselves Christians to extirpate and root out these wretched people utterly from the land. One, by unjust, cruel, bloody and tyrannical wars: the other, after they have killed off all those who could long or sigh for liberty, that is to say, all chiefs and warriors, they oppress those that remain, being commonly only children and women, with the most horrible and relentless and pitiless slavery to which ever men or beasts were put."
Las
Casas gave numerous eye-witness accounts of repeated
mass murder and torture. In a version of this work translated in 1699, the
title reads “An account of the first voyages and discoveries made by the
Spaniards in America,
containing the most exact relation hitherto publish'd of their unparallel'd
cruelties on the Indians, in
the destruction of above forty millions of people ; with the propositions
offer'd to the King of Spain to prevent the further ruin of the West-Indies.” Las Casas spent the last forty years of his
life trying to improve the conditions of the native inhabitants in the lands
under Spanish control.
In particular, the population of
Concerning Middleton’s
estimate of 5 million killed in
As for the Crusades themselves, H.Wollschläger (Die
bewaffneten Wallfahrten gen Jerusalem, Zürich 1973) estimates that there
were probably 20 million victims in the
“The last, in the
-- Brownlee, 1834, page 341.
Also, Williams writes
The lives and labors of millions, which were buried in the East, would have been more profitably employed in the improvement of their native country … .
-- Williams, Henry Smith, The Historian’s History of the World, vol. 8, p. 480.
Let us consider the estimate of 9 million
witches killed, in another way. Our main concern is not with the number of
witches killed, but with the total number executed by the Papacy. It is reasonable to assume that the total
number executed by the church was much larger than the number of witches,
probably by a factor of at least 2 or 3 (at least, we read much more about
Bible believing Christians being executed than about witches). If Voigt felt that 40 (or even 60) witches executed per
30 years was a reasonable rate, he probably would have felt that 80 total
executions by the church of witches and others per 30 years was reasonable, as
well. This, extrapolated to
Lyman Beecher stated that the Papacy “has swayed a sceptre
of iron, for ten centuries over nearly one-third of the population of, the globe.” Currently about a third of the world
population professes Christianity. The
world population is estimated to have grown from 200 million in 600 AD to 545
million in 1600 AD. One third of this
population would have grown from about 70 million to about 200 million in this
time, with a reasonable average of about 100 million. Voigt felt that 2 witches executed per year for a population of about
4000 was a reasonable number, even in an area that had been Christian for
hundreds of years. This amounts to 1/20
of one percent executed per year. Assuming
this proportion of executions of all heretics, not just witches, for a thousand
years for an average population of 100 million ruled by
It is also possible to make the estimates of persecutions smaller by reasoning as follows: Suppose that the persecutions took a while to gather strength, then peaked for a short time, then dwindled away. This could have happened because of the natural reluctance of humans to persecute others. Also, after a period of intense persecution, there may not have been many “heretics” left. Furthermore, the Papacy may have seen the reaction against its persecutions and tapered them off. Thus the 15 million or so that Wesley or Bengel accepted may be close to the total.
This reasoning seems to be invalid. In the first place, many respected Protestants and atheists for the last several hundred years accepted the high figures, and at least one Roman Catholic supports a high figure. In addition, any organization as powerful and corrupt as the Papacy was for so many years would continue to gain enemies. This would continue to supply opponents for the church to persecute. What we know of the fierce hostility shown in the past by the Papacy towards Bible believers, Jews, and other religions suggests that the intense persecutions continued in force for many, many years.
In support of the extended nature of the
persecutions,
Deschner notes that in
The Waldenses sent out missionaries on tours of several years, and only about half of them ever came back. This suggests that of the “heretics” existing in the population, at least 10 or 20 percent were executed per year, not necessarily by the Inquisition and not necessarily mentioned in historical records. There must have been a significant number of heretics, or else the Papacy would not have set up the machinery of the Inquisition. Just one percent of heresy would hardly have alarmed them. It must have been a life and death struggle with the Papacy to set up such an elaborate mechanism and maintain it for such a long period of time. So the percentage of heretics must have been at least two percent and probably significantly higher, on the average. If five percent of the heretics were executed each year and two percent of the population were heretics, then 1/10 of one percent of the population would be executed each year. . From 1100 to 1600 the average world population would be about 350 million of which on the average about 100 million would be in Roman Catholic countries. With 1/10 of a percent each year killed there would be 100,000 killed each year, for 500 years, for a total of 50 million killed just during this time period. If the percentage of heretics were four percent and the proportion of heretics killed each year were 10 percent, the total killed during this 500 year period would be 200 million, which appears to be much nearer the truth. Persecutions before 1100 were probably smaller, and persecutions after 1518 were probably considerably more intense.
As evidence of the number of “heretics,” Brownlee states
“These Waldenses,”
says Rainerus, “were in nearly every country.”
“They are multiplied through all lands,” says Sanderus. “They have infested a thousand cities,” says
Caeserius. “They spread their contagion
through almost the whole Latin world,”
says Ciaconius. … Says
-- Brownlee,
1834, page 351, Appendix 1, citing
Thus there would have been many “heretics” to persecute. And as the Waldenses existed throughout the period from 1100 to 1600 and continued to send out missionaries, the population of the Papal countries would have always had an exposure to Bible truth. Along the same line, Brownlee states
I repeat the words of Edgar,
whose testimony I prefer to Malte Brun, or
any modern papist, who has not entered into the estimates of the comparative
nuimbers in ancient times; nor examined the statements of these fathers, and
travelers, now quoted by us: “The
European, the Asian, and African denominations that dissented from popery were four times more numerous than the
partisans of Romanism, when, prior to the Reformation, the papacy shone in all
its glory. Popery, instead of universality, which is its vain boast,
was never embraced by more than a fifth part
of Christendom.” Variations of Popery,
p. 67,
-- Brownlee, 1834, Appendix 1, pp. 352-353.
The Papacy must have had a very efficient method of eliminating heretics, as Bellarmine stated:
Argument 2d. ‘ Experience shows that terror is not effective.’ I reply, EXPERIENCE PROVES THE CONTRARY—FOR THE DONATISTS, MANICHEANS, AND ALBIGENSES WERE ROUTED, AND ANNIHILATED BY ARMS.
-- Robert Bellarmine, Disputationes de Controversiis, Tom. ii, Lib. III, cap. XXII, “Objections Answered,” 1682 edition.
Bellarmine states that these three groups were “annihilated.” This must also have been the fate of almost all the Waldenses, who were “like the sand of the sea; without number” at one time, and were essentially Protestants. How many other groups were annihilated, swelling the total figures to many millions?
Concerning the ferocity of the persecutions, Guinness writes
This part of the prophecy began to
receive its fulfillment at the end of the twelfth century, when, at the third
Lateran Council (A.D.
1179), the
Popedom roused itself collectively to a war of extermination against heretics. Previously
to this, separate members of the system, acting alone and independently, had
opposed the truth by force and cruelty. But in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and
fifteenth centuries, Romanism, then in the plenitude of its power, gathered
itself together for a great, determined, united, and persistent effort to crush
out all that opposed its supremacy, and to clear Christendom of heresy.
-- Romanism and the Reformation, Lecture
8, p. 200.
Instead of eliminating heretics, the
persecutions often only increased their number:
So Sismondi, the historian writes: To maintain unity
of belief the Church had recourse to the expedient of burning all those who
separated themselves from her; but although for two hundred years the
fires were never quenched, still every day saw Romanists abjuring the faith of
their fathers and embracing the religion which often guided them to the stake. In
vain Gregory IX., in A.D. 1231, put to death every
heretic whom he found concealed in
-- Romanism and the Reformation, Lecture
2, p. 45.
Concerning the effectiveness of the
persecutions in
rooting out heresy over a period of many centuries, Guinness writes further
Hear Mosheim’s description of the crisis. “As the
sixteenth century opened, no danger seemed to threaten the Roman pontiffs. The
agitations excited in former centuries by the Waldenses, Albigenses, Beghards, and others, and afterwards by
the Bohemians, had been suppressed and extinguished by
counsel and by the sword. The surviving remnant of Waldenses hardly lived, pent
up in the narrow limits of Piedmontese valleys, and those of the Bohemians, through their weakness and ignorance,
could attempt nothing, and thus were an object of contempt rather than fear.”
Milner, the Church historian, says that at this date, though the name of Christ
was professed everywhere in
-- Romanism and the Reformation, Lecture
8, p. 202.
But of course this was only a temporary
situation, because the Reformation began soon afterwards.
Bible religion has always been attractive in
comparision to the Roman Catholic faith.
It was so in the days of the Waldenses,
when they were greatly multiplied. It
was so in
Adding up the figures that either have
multiple sources of support or seem reasonably well documented, gives 20
million killed in the Holy Land and surrounding areas during the crusades, 1
million Waldenses, 1
million Albigenses, at
least 18 million witches and others killed during steady state
persecutions of heretics in Europe from 1100 to 1600, about 10 million in the 30
years’ war, 20 million Protestants in the Inquisition (not just in Spain)
from 1518 to 1548 and onwards, and 15 million Indians in the New World for a total of 85 million, even ignoring many
small events. This also ignores 9
million from the figures given by Middleton,
plus 7 million for the Saracen slaughters. There is some evidence that millions
of Saracens in
To
these we may add innumerable martyrs, in ancient, middle, and late ages, in
Obviously the figure is open to debate, but at least one can see how such a large figure can be computed.
It is also possible to estimate the magnitude of the persecutions using population figures. The world population from 900 to 1600 is estimated as follows (McEvedy, Colin and Richard Jones, 1978, "Atlas of World Population History," Facts on File, New York, pp. 342-351):
|
Year |
World population |
Percent growth |
European population |
Percent growth |
|
900 |
240 million |
9.1 |
|
|
|
1000 |
265 |
10.4 |
36 |
|
|
1100 |
320 |
20.8 |
44 |
22 |
|
1200 |
360 |
12.5 |
58 |
31 |
|
1300 |
360 |
0 |
79 |
36 |
|
1400 |
350 |
-2.8 |
60 |
-24 |
|
1500 |
425 |
21.4 |
81 |
35 |
|
1600 |
545 |
28.2 |
100 |
23 |
|
1700 |
|
12 |
|
20 |
|
1800 |
|
50 |
|
50 |
|
Year |
Growth deficit, world, percent |
Population deficit, world |
Growth deficit, |
Population deficit, |
|
1100 |
|
|
14 |
5 million |
|
1200 |
|
|
5 |
2.2 |
|
1300 |
19.75 |
71.1 million |
0 |
0 |
|
1400 |
22.55 |
81.2 |
59 |
46.6 |
|
1500 |
-1.65 |
-5.8 |
0 |
0 |
|
1600 |
|
|
12 |
9.7 |
|
Total |
|
146.5 million |
|
63.5 million |
|
Adjusted total |
|
106.5 or 51.5 |
|
53.5 |
The crusades began about 1100, the inquisition in 1231, and the Protestant Reformation in 1517.
In between these dates persecutions were most intense. The population growth from 800 to 900 was 9.1%, from 900
to1000 was 10.4%, from 1000 to 1100 was 20.8%, and from 1100 to 1200 was
12.5%. The population growth from 1500
to 1600 was 28.2%, but without the 30 million killed in the
Beginning the computation of persecutions at 1100 instead of 1200, the average population growth would be 22.2% in the absence of persecution. The deficit in population growth from 1100 to 1200 would be 9.7%, from 1200 to 1300 would be 22.2%, from 1300 to 1400 would be 25%, and from 1400 to 1500 would be 0.8%. This amounts to 203.7 million persons in all. Subtracting 40 million for the Black Death gives over 160 million persons killed by persecutions in the Middle Ages. Of course there were also persecutions before 1100 and after 1500 that are not being considered, such as the 15 million Indians that died in the New World and the estimated 15 million or more killed in war and the inquisition from 1518 to 1548 and onwards. Perhaps 55 million should be subtracted from this quantity, as well.
However, the population growth in
From 1400 to 1500 persecutions in
Concerning the Black Death, Robertson writes
This “Black Death” (as it was called) is said to have carried off at least a fourth of the population in the countries which it visited.
[footnote]
This is Hecker’s
estimate, and he puts the whole loss at 25,000,000 (29). Others say a third, three-fifths, or more. …
The “Eulogium Historiarum” makes the loss in
-- James C. Robertson, History of the Christian Church, Vol. VII, The Young Churchman Co., 1904, pp. 161-162.
The wide divergence in the figures shows a
lack of real data about the magnitude of the loss. However, the figure for
Despite the differences, there are remarkable
similarities in the population growth patterns in
The differences in population growth in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries
may be attributable to the tremendous growth of the Waldenses, who
became like the sand of the sea, without number. By following a Biblical lifestyle, they would
have had low infant mortality and disease rates, long lives, and substantial wealth. The entire world population grew by nearly a
factor of four in the twentieth century, and the Waldenses may have been
increasing at about the same rate in
These population figures may actually underestimate the death
toll by a significant factor. If someone
is killed who is past child bearing age, his death will likely have only a
temporary effect on the population.
Someone who is killed after having half of their children will have half
of the long term effect on the population as someone who is killed before
having any of their children, on the average.
Therefore, the total death toll could easily be double that indicated
above. Furthermore, the possessions of
those who die will be redistributed among those who remain, which will tend to
cause the population to grow somewhat faster than normal. In addition, the base figure for population
growth could easily have been taken as 50 percent or higher instead of the
values given above. This is especially
true because of many millions, perhaps 45 million, killed in
There is also indirect evidence that many were killed by the Papacy:
However the Pope had his own inquisition at
This
information comes from a Christadelphian web site. The lectures were given Sunday February 12 through
The information that you have queried came
from the fourth of a series of Town Hall Lectures given by Robert Roberts of
The Christadelphian Editor, Michael Ashton,
currently has a copy of those lectures given and edited by Robert Roberts himself, in his
A similar account is given in an article at the web site http://www.ianpaisley.org/main.asp:
The discoveries made by the armies of the First
Napoleon on taking Karne and opening the Inquisition are well known, but the abomination was
restored. The revolution at
This led to excavations being made, and further
discoveries of human bones. Digging deeper still the workmen lighted upon a
vault, where a great number of human skeletons were found; some of them so
close together and so amalgamated with lime, that no bone could be moved
without being broken.
In another vault was found a vast quantity of black
rich earth, mixed with pieces of decayed animal matter, and human hair of such
length as to lead to the belief that it belonged to women rather than to men.
From the manner in which the skeletons found in the vaults were placed, it was
evident that they must have been deposited there since the erection of the
edifice, which was within a period of less than twenty-four years.
The bones of such a multitude of human beings,
supplies volumes touching the doings of the so-called Holy Office. The full
history of the dread place, however, will not be known till the day which will
reveal the hidden things of dishonesty.
Another
evidence of massive persecution is a statement made by Colonel
Lehmanowsky who had served in Napoleon’s army sent to
From
this room we proceeded to the right, and obtained access to small cells, extending the entire length of the
edifice; and here such sights were presented as he hoped never to see again.
Those cells were places of solitary confinement, where the wretched objects of
inquisitorial hate were confined year after year, till death released them from
their sufferings, and there their bodies were suffered to remain until they
were entirely decayed, and the rooms had become fit for others to occupy. To
prevent this being offensive to those who occupied the inquisition, there were flues or tubes extending to
the open air, sufficiently capacious to carry off the odor. In these cells we
found the remains of some who had paid the debt of nature; some of them had
been dead apparently but a short time, while of others nothing remained but
their bones, still chained to the floor of their dungeon.
In
other cells, we found living sufferers of both sexes
— and of every age, from three-score years and ten down to fourteen or fifteen
years — all naked as when born into the world! and all in chains! Here were old
men and aged women, who had been shut up for many years! Here too were the
middle aged, and the young man and the maiden of fourteen years old. …
About a hundred, who had been buried for many years, were now restored to life. There were fathers who had found their long-lost daughters, wives were restored to their husbands, sisters to their brothers, and parents to their children; and there was some who could recognize no friend among the multitude. The scene was such as no tongue can describe.
Clearly those who died in this prison would
not have been included in the official records of the Spanish inquisition. Col. Lehmanowsky and his soldiers also discovered many
instruments of torture in this prison.
But Cecil Roth states, “It is a waste of time to point out
the absurdities and incoherences in this egregious account, which was foisted
on the horrified public at the height of a period of mid-Victorian respectability”
(History of the Inquisition, page 251). Because he does not point
out these “absurdities,” it is difficult to evaluate his statement. A historian of Napoleon’s
wars, describing the capture of
When
the French took
"In a recess in a subterraneous vault, contiguous to the private ball for examinations, stood a wooden figure, made by the hands of monks, and representing the Virgin Mary. A gilded glory encompassed her head, and in her right hand she held a banner. It struck us all, at first sight, as suspicious, that, notwithstanding the silken robe, descending on each side in ample folds from her shoulders, she should wear a sort of cuirass. On closer scrutiny, it appeared that the fore part of the body was stuck full of extremely sharp nails and small narrow knife-blades, with the points of both turned towards the spectator. The arms and hands were jointed; and machinery behind the partition set the figure in motion. One of the servants of the Inquisition was compelled, by command of the General, to work the machine, as he termed it. When the figure extended her arms, as though to press some one most lovingly to her heart, the well-filled knapsack of a Polish grenadier was made to supply the place of a living victim. The statue hugged it closer and closer; and when the attendant, agreeably to orders, made the figure unclasp her arms and return to her former position, the knapsack was perforated to the depth of two or three inches, and remained hanging on the points of the nails and knife-blades. To such an infernal purpose, and in a building erected in honour of the true faith, was the Madonna rendered subservient!" [Thiers & Bowen, The Campaigns Of Napoleon, cited by H. Grattan Guinness, The Approaching End Of The Age (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1878), 205-207]
Another
such account is given by Roth, who as explained on a web site,
“records the opening of the Office in
There are also quite a few independent
witnesses of terrible abuses that took place
in the cloistered convents of
the past. Note that cloistered convents are not the same as open convents, where the
nuns can come and go. In a cloistered
convent, the nuns cannot leave, and there is a much greater potential for
abuse:
There were even then sixteen convents, but now there are over four hundred of
these barred and bolted and impenetrable prisons, in which fifteen thousand
Englishwomen are kept prisoners at the mercy of a celibate clergy, who have
power, unless their behests are obeyed, to inflict on these hapless and
helpless victims torture under the name of penance.
-- Romanism and the Reformation by H.
Grattan Guinness, lectures,
-- Guinness, Lecture 2, pp. 41-42.
St. Ligori himself asserts a fact which, as Mr. Smith justly observes, strongly corroborates the Revelations of Maria Monk; namely, that refractory, incorrigible nuns are punished by imprisonment for life. "A nun (says he) who is guilty of a grievous or pernicious crime, and who appears to be notoriously incorrigible is to be confined in perpetual imprisonment." But they are not expelled as some monks are. The reason is obvious. Nuns, if expelled, would reveal the licentious and brutal treatment they have received from the priests, whilst the latter would be careful not to inform on themselves. Smith’s Synopsis of Ligori’s Moral Theology, p. 231, 232. Now let it be remembered, that the writings of Ligori were approved by Pope Pius VII. and by the Sacred Congregation of Rites so late as 1816: and that, as Dr. Varela, the priest of New York asserted three years ago, are in the hands of almost every priest, and therefore also of those at Montreal; and there will be nothing incredible in the following narrative of Maria Monk. …
-- Schmucker, Glorious Reformation, page 17.
The position of the cloistered nuns, those committed to certain convents for life, is quite different from that of the regular nuns. They usually have gone into this seclusion because of some great sorrow or disappointment. Dr. Montano says concerning them:
'There are 100,000 nuns in the world living in strict seclusion in convents. Subsisting in these retreats are nuns who have retired behind closed doors for life. Young women, who accept the vows of the cloistered nuns renounce their homes, their loved ones, their families, never to see them again. They will stay behind bars for the rest of their lives, shut away from the world.
'These unfortunate souls have cloistered themselves, thinking that the fact they are not in touch with the world will save them from temptations. But again and again, throughout my lifetime, some of the most prominent nuns and monks have confessed to me that it is precisely behind the walls of these convents and monasteries that temptation has tortured them more than it ever did when they lived in the world. Here temptation has beset them until they have finally succumbed, because of the unnatural life they lead. Many poor souls have become tools of Satan, victims of the most monstrous sins.
'Severe discipline is inflicted upon these nuns by the Mother Superior, and flagellation and mortification of the body is practised. Self-inflicted suffering is for the purpose of gaining indulgences by works, a striving to achieve salvation by merits. These poor souls are taught that they are putting treasures in the bank of indulgences....
'The psychological disturbances that have resulted from this type of existence are such that not a few of these poor creatures have had to live out their days within the walls of mental institutions. To confirm this, Father More, of the Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., states: “Insanity among priests and nuns (compared with a general population ratio of per 100,000) . . . among sisters who were cloistered rather than active showed a rate of 1,034, nearly twice the general population ratio.” …
Throughout the world there are some 100,000 cloistered nuns. Speaking of one of the more extreme orders, and quoting the regulations under which they live, Dr. Montano says:
'The discalced (barefoot) Carmelite sisters, for example, neither teach, nor nurse, nor care for the old, the orphans, the infirm. They take a vow of silence--complete silence.
'At
'At
'Their main meal may be of fish and
vegetables, and their evening meal is soup and bread. Their day ends at
(from Celibacy, by Loraine Boettner, D.D, taken from his book “Roman Catholicism”, 1962. He was a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary (Th.B., 1928; ThM., 1929), where he studied Systematic Theology under Dr. C. W. Hodge. Dr. Montano’s quotations are from “Christian Heritage,” September, 1959.)
Also,
Cardinal Peter D'Ailly said he dared not describe the immorality of the
nunneries, and that 'taking the veil' was simply another mode of becoming a
public prostitute. (Henry Charles Lea, A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages,
vol. 3, 1888, pp. 629-631.)
Here
is one example of many testimonies about problems in cloistered convents:
I wish to make a statement for those who may think that I am an ignorant protestant who knows nothing about the Catholic Church. I have received numerous e-mails by indignant Catholics who think I don't know anything about what I am writing about and putting on this site.
First of all, I am old enough to be able to say that I attended Mass for years in LATIN! Not English as most today! I am quite familiar with all the Catholic doctrines, traditions and rituals, from the rosary, the stations of the cross, praying to Mary the Mediatrix to not eating meat on Friday.
Moreover, I grew up in
I personally met a dear nun who was enslaved
within a cloistered convent in the
The
nun referred to may have been Edith O’Gorman, who
was still alive in 1947, or Eva Moss, who
spoke to thousands in
I saw scores of
babies born in the convents. Most were abnormal and deformed and seldom was one
normal. With my hands I have delivered many, many of them, therefore I know.
With my eyes I have seen the horror of it all and the world must be told of
what goes on in those chambers of horrors.
Many have said I
exaggerate and that these things are not so, but I have yet to be hauled into
court to refute the charges. They would have to open the cloisters and this
they dare not do. After being snared in this rotten system for twenty-two
years, I know whereof I speak.
Normal young
expectant mothers eagerly anticipate the arrival of their precious baby.
Everything is ready, nursery, crib, clothing, and everyone is happy with her.
By contrast, a little nun in the convent dreads the moment when she gives
birth. The child is the product of a shameful, illicit union with a drunken
priest which was forced on her. She knows from bitter experience that the baby
will only be permitted to live four or five hours at the very most. It will
never be cleaned or wrapped in a warm blanket for Mother Superior will put her
hand over its mouth and pinch its nostrils to snuff out its life.
This is why there
are lime pits in all the convents. Babies' bodies are tossed in these holes to be destroyed.
Pray for the government to force the convents to open their doors to release
the prisoners and let the whole world see what horrors are hidden behind those
doors of cruel religious hypocrisy.
If this happens, I
assure you that even the Catholic people will agree to the closing of the
convents as they did in
The convents in old
Convents were banned in
The sexual-orientation and/or inclination of the priesthood has been scandalous and so very damaging for a very long time. With the rest of the world, we shamefacedly have to look at the "lime-pits" that academic archeology has unearthed close to almost every convent while the "official church" feigns zero tolerance for birth-control or abortion.
In a
sermon “Wisdom versus Faith,” delivered on
I went down there in
It is
hard to believe that all of these statements could result from anti-Catholicism without some basis in fact. In fact, the discovery of the bodies of
babies buried in a great many convents in
In the ninth century, many monasteries were the haunts of homosexuals,
many convents were brothels in which babies were killed and
buried. Since the end of the
-- Peter de Rosa, Vicars of Christ: The Dark Side of the Papacy, pp. 566-567.
Here is a particularly sad example of a nun
who escaped from St. Joe’s Convent in
Menace, Feb., 1927
Little Nellie Fortune, a girl of twenty years, Convent Number 096, saw a chance to escape. Although the night was bitter cold she made her way across fields, through woodlands and over streams, finally reaching a farm house a distance of five miles away, before the coming of daylight forced her to seek shelter She crept into an out-building and was found by a kindly farmer and was taken in and given food and clothing. This man was preparing to move and Nellie was taken to the home of a neighbor, Mr. and Mrs. Charlie Fuller of the Rock Prairie community. Here she was welcomed and given a home by this good Protestant family.
She related the many things which take place
behind the convent walls of
She was happy in her new home, telling her benefactors that "it felt good to be a Protestant." Plans had been made for her to attend church and "be a real Protestant", as she expressed it.
Life was beginning to take on a brighter
aspect for poor little Nellie Fortune. She
had a good home. she had freedom, and what was more, human love and
companionship. But her joy was to be short lived. The unrelenting hounds of
Nellie was dragged back to the convent of
Some more information from the introduction to the 1957
edition of “The Convent Horror: The Story of
Barbara Ubryk” reveals the mistreatment of nuns in some of the
cloistered convents:
The following items
are taken from recent American dailies:--
London, May 23, 1892.--Two huge petitions were wheeled into the House of Commons
this afternoon. They bore the signatures of 13,305 members of the Protestant
Alliance and 101,408 members of the Loyal Protestant League and others, praying
for the appointment of a commission to inquire into the conditions of the
convents and monasteries in the
City of Mexico, Dec. 26, 1891.--It is probably difficult for people in the United States, where church and State are quite distinct in their
spheres of action, to understand the recent forcible closing of convents in Puebla and
Cholula by an armed force, and amid a popular tumult which resulted in the
killing of soldiers and rioters.
But here everybody
understands the difficulty to be the result of the clandestine establishment of
convents, in defiance of the laws governing religious
establishments.
All convents, or other associations of persons under religious vows,
are forbidden by law, and a convent of high church Episcopalian nuns or monks
would be as promptly closed by the authorities as similar associations of
Catholics.
Another account
says: "Sixteen nuns were found within a state bordering on insanity. They
were covered with rags, and their surroundings were of the most filthy
description. Many had forgotten how to speak, and the demeanor of all of them
was more like that of animals than human beings. Those who were induced to talk
expressed themselves perfectly resigned to their fate.
"The cause of
the raid upon the nunnery was the desire of the parents of a young girl who had
entered the convent to recover her. She had been banished to a nunnery on
account of a love affair objectionable to her family. The latter, being unable
to communicate with her, had complained to the police, and an order from the
Minister of Justice for her removal was obtained. She was found to be a mere
skeleton, and her parents became half-crazed at the condition in which she was
discovered. The nunnery has been closed and a strict investigation ordered by
the Governor of Naples.
"Later
intelligence states that ten more nuns have been released from the subterranean
dungeons of the nunnery of 'The Buried Alive' at
An article written in 1886 and found at the http://www.ianpaisley.org/main.asp web site states:
So late as the 25th
of last January, a gentleman writes to a
It is difficult to believe that such things could still happen in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. What is especially disturbing about these accounts is that the Papal hierarchy must have known what was happening, but did not take effective steps to stop it. Not only this, but they demanded that poor Nellie Fortune be returned to the convent! These abuses also demonstrate another danger of church-state unions. At least in countries where the government is not controlled by the church, such abuses can be controlled, but when church and state unite, there is little hope of improvement. Probably the convents are much better today than in the past. But in computing the number of persons killed by the Papacy, if one includes all of the nuns and children who died in the convents, surely the total would increase by many millions.
There were also many killed in wars instigated by the Papacy. Chiniquy, “Fifty Years in the Church of Rome,” chapter 60, quotes President Lincoln as follows:
The common people see and hear the big, noisy
wheels of the Southern Confederacy's
cars; they call they Jeff Davis,
Lee, Toombs, Beauregard, Semmes, ect., and they honestly think that they are
the motive power, the first cause of our troubles. But this is a mistake. The
true motive power is secreted behind the thick walls of the
There is a fact which is too much ignored by
the American people, and with which I am acquainted only since I became
President; it is that the best, the leading families of the South have received
their education in great part, if not in whole, from the Jesuits and the nuns. Hence those degrading principles
of slavery, pride, cruelty, which are as a second nature among so many of those
people. Hence that strange want of fair play, humanity; that implacable hatred
against the ideas of equality and liberty as we find them in the Gospel of
Christ. You do not ignore that the first settlers of
If
indeed the Civil War was partly caused by the Papacy, then the
Papacy was partially responsible for its victims. The Papacy may also be partially responsible
for some of the deaths of World War II; the
following quotation is from a web site: “'Father' Petar Oajic, in the publication organ of the
Archbishop of Sarajevo, Katolicki
Tjednik, No.35, August 31, I941 has these 'Catholic' words to say from the
place of power … :
Until now God spoke
through papal encyclicals, numerous sermons, catechisms, the Christian Press,
through missions, through the heroic examples of the saints, and so on ... And
? They closed their ears. They were deaf. Now God has decided to use other
methods. He will prepare missions. European missions. World missions. They will
be upheld, not by priests, but by army commanders, led by Hitler. The
sermons will be heard with the help of cannons, machine guns, tanks and
bombers. The language of these sermons will be international. No one will be
able to complain that he did not understand it, because all people know
very well what death is, and what wounds, disease, hunger, fear, slavery and
poverty are. (Bold italics added.)
The archbishop was not dismissed, his words condemned as
heresy; it was not secret; it was read; meant to be read. Its
language was soon to be followed in fact by the deeds of its doctrine.”
In fact, these examples are not
exceptional, but typical:
Wars.-Probably at the tribunal where Christian morals and philanthropy preside and arbitrate, to no charge is the system of Popery more exposed, and to no condemnation more equitably doomed, than that of having been the chief cause and the primary instigator of all those pestiferous wars which, during the last thousand years, have filled the European kingdoms and their dependencies with confusion, famine, slaughter, and all diversified wickedness. This attribute of the Roman court has been exemplified in a series of acts, the record of which is too lamentably true to be disputed.
-- Bourne,
George, The American Textbook of Popery, Griffith & Simon,
Considering all wars instigated by the Papacy in the Middle Ages and at other times, the total number of victims would be large indeed. Adding these victims to those killed in persecutions and those who died in convents would result in an enormous total.
However, in addition to the atrocities of the past, the Roman Catholic Church is characterized by many acts of charity and humility. The contradictions in this system are well described by the following quotation.
The career of the papal power has evoked the amazement and admiration of many historians. "It has proved to be the most wonderful fabric of what we call worldly wisdom that our world has seen,--controlling kings, dictating laws to ancient monarchies, and binding the souls of millions with a more perfect despotism than Oriental emperors ever sought or dreamed. And what a marvelous vitality it seems to have....It is too great and venerable for sarcasm, ridicule, or mockery. It is too potent and respectable to be sneered at or lied about. I confess I gaze upon it as a peasant surveys a king, as a boy contemplates a queen of beauty....It is both lofty and degraded; simple, yet worldly wise; humble, yet scornful and proud; washing beggars feet, yet imposing commands on the potentates of earth; benignant, yet severe on all who rebel; here clothed in rags, and there reveling in palaces; supported by charity, yet feasting the princes of the earth; assuming the title of 'servant of the servants of God', yet arrogating the highest seat among worldly dignitaries. Was there ever such a contradiction?-'glory in debasement, and debasement in glory', --type of the misery and greatness of man? Was there ever such a mystery? so occult are its arts, so subtile its policy, so plausible its pretensions, so certain its shafts? How imposing the words of paternal benediction! How grand the liturgy brought down from ages of faith!...And yet what crimes and abominations have been committed in the name of the church?
"If we go back and accept the history of the dark ages, what wars has not this church encouraged, what discords has she not incited, what superstitions has she not endorsed, what pride has she not arrogated, what cruelties has she not inflicted, what countries has she not robbed, what hardships has she not imposed, what deceptions has she not used, what avenues of thought has she not guarded with a flaming sword, what truth has she not perverted, what goodness has she not mocked and persecuted?...Think of gunpowder plots and inquisitions, intrigues and tortures, all vigorously carried on under the cloak of religion—barbarities worse than those of savages, inflicted at the command of the ministers of the gospel of love....Whether exaggerated or not they were more disgraceful than the persecutions of Christians by the Roman emperors....As for the supreme rulers of this contradictory church, so benevolent and yet so cruel, so enlightened and yet so fanatical, so humble and yet so proud,--this institution of blended piety and fraud...the joy and the reproach, the glory and the shame of the earth,--there never were greater geniuses or greater fools, saints or hounds, scholars and dunces, ascetics and gluttons, men who adorned and men who scandalized their lofty position."--"Beacon Lights of History", John Lord, Vol. 3, pp, 96-101.
-- Bunch,
We need to be careful not to show hostility
to Roman Catholics today because of the sins of the past. I am sure that many of us know many wonderful
and loving Roman Catholic priests and church members. But it is important to know the facts of
history, or else we may repeat them. As
church and state grow ever nearer to a union in the
More source material from Peterson
More source material from Brownlee
Many
other references are cited in line and not included in this list.
[Armitage] Armitage, Thomas, 1819-1896. A history of the Baptists : traced by their
vital principles and practices, from the time of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ to the year 1889 /
[Bourne] Bourne, George, The American
Textbook of Popery, Griffith & Simon,
[Brownlee 34] Letters of the Rev. Dr. W. C. Brownlee on
the Roman Catholic Controversy, second
edition, 1834
[Brownlee 36] Brownlee, W.C., Popery the Enemy of Civil
and Religious Liberty, J.
[Bunch] Bunch,
[Chiniquy] Chiniquy, Charles, Fifty
Years in the Church of Rome, Protestant
Literature Depository,
[Edwardson] Edwardson, Christian, Facts of
Faith, Southern Publishing
Association, 1943.
[Lord] Lord, John, Beacon Lights of
History, 1902, volume VI.
[Perrin] Perrin, Jean Paul, History of the Ancient Christians, 1618.
[Peterson 59] Peterson, F. Paul, The Rise and Fall of the
Roman Catholic Church, published privately, 1959.
[Peterson 60] Peterson, F. Paul, Peter’s Tomb Recently Discovered in
[Wills] Wills,
[Wylie] Wylie, J.A., History of the Waldenses, Cassell and Company,
A.D. 1235 24
A.D. 1641 23
Africa 10, 17, 19, 58
Albigenses 4, 7, 9, 11, 20, 24, 27, 38, 40, 43, 50,
54, 57, 58, 64
Albigensians 10
Alby, France 27
Alethia, M.D. 50
Alps 3
America 3, 7,
16, 52, 53, 67, 71
Anabaptists 41, 42
anti-Catholicism 19,
52, 70
Antichrist 40
Arabs 7
Arian 17, 50
Arianism 17
Arians 10, 18, 27
Arius 17
Armenia 25
Armitage 3, 42,
78
Arnoldists 27
Asia 6, 10, 19, 40, 58
assassination 12
auricular confession 68
Australia 63
Austria 14, 31, 32, 33, 35, 36, 39
Babylon 40
Baltimore 15
baptism 7
Baptist 3, 16
Baptists 78
Barbara Ubryk 71
Barnes,
Albert 19,
22
Baumgartner, Frederic J. 24
Bavaria 39
Beecher, Lyman 5, 54, 55
Belgium 31, 32, 39
Bellarmine 10, 56, 57
Bellarmine, Robert 10, 38, 57
Bengel 10, 50, 52, 53, 54, 55, 58
Bengel, John 10
Bennet, Benjamin 19, 21
Berg 20, 24, 37
Bernaldez 47, 48
Bernard 27
Bernard of Clairvaux 27
Berthelot, M.M. 49
Bertrand 3
Besant, Annie 40
Bishop of Chiapa 40
Black Death 24, 59, 60, 61
black legend 53
Boettner, Loraine 47, 67
Bogomiles 10
Bohemia 5, 10, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24,
28, 29, 30, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40, 42, 43, 57, 58
Bourne 3, 4, 13, 75, 78
Brazil 16
Britain 16
Broadbent, E.H 18
Brownlee 5, 6, 7, 9, 14, 45, 49, 50, 54, 56,
60, 78
Brownlee, W. C. 20, 24, 30, 41
Brun, Malte 56
Buck,
Charles 19,
21
Bulgaria 26
Bunch 9, 17, 76, 78
Bunch, Taylor 9, 17, 76, 78
Buried Alive 72
Burton, Robert 21, 33
Callender 3
Cambridge 55
Campbell 8, 9
Carmelite sisters 67
Cassels, Samuel J. 11
Cathari 10, 25, 26, 27
cells 14, 15, 46, 64, 67, 69
Central America 53
Charles (Austria) 22, 31, 39
Charles V 9, 28, 29
Chiniquy 74, 78
Christ 78
Civil War 74
Clark 3, 9
Clarke 50
Clarke, Samuel 9, 22
Clement the Seventh 29
cloistered convents 66, 68, 71, 77
Colombia 16
Colonel Lehmanowsky 64
concremiret
trials 52
Confederacy 74
confessional 68, 74
Congress 68
convent 16, 68, 70, 71, 72
Convento de Santa
Monica 69
convents 46, 63, 66, 67, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73,
74, 75
Council of Aix-la-Chapelle 70
Council of Trent 29
Count Tilly 35
Counter-Reformation 22, 31, 32, 33, 62
Croatia 45
crusades 6, 53, 54, 55, 58, 59
Crusades 13, 41, 50, 53, 58, 60
Cuba 5, 7
Culdees 20
Czech Republic 39
Dark Ages 8, 9
Davis, Jefferson 74
Davis, John 23
de Las Casas, Bartoleme 52
de los Rios, Amadeo 44
de Rosa, Peter 70
Denmark 36
Deschner 55
Dominican order 25
DONATISTS 56
Dowling 3, 50
Dreschner 52
Du Prin 36
Dufour, Gerard 48
Duke of Alva 7, 9
Dumont 48, 49
Dumont, Jean 48
dungeon cells 14, 15
Edgar 56
Edict of Nantes 8, 10, 11
Edwardson 78
Encyclopedia Judaica 46
England 3, 7,
8, 10, 13, 19, 21, 24, 28, 46, 48, 58, 61, 63, 66
Europe 3, 4, 6, 7, 10, 13, 18, 19, 20, 21, 24, 28, 30, 31, 32, 36, 38, 39,
40, 41, 42, 43, 48, 51, 52, 53, 54, 58, 59, 60, 61
extermination 17, 41, 42, 57
Faith 78
Ferdinand and Isabella 47
Ferdinand I 28
Ferdinand II 21, 22, 30, 32, 33, 37, 39
feudalism 13
Flanders 21
Florida 74
Foster, R.F. 5
Fox 3
France 3, 4, 7, 8, 9,
10, 11, 13, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 30, 32, 36, 38, 39, 40, 43, 48,
58, 65, 66, 70
Frederic 33
Frederick 22, 39
Freeman 30, 31
Garrido, Fernando 29
Geddes 7
Geddes, M. 7
General Lasalle 65
Gerhard 26
Germany 2, 4, 5, 10, 13, 18, 19, 21, 22, 24,
28, 29, 31, 32, 34, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40, 51, 52, 54, 55, 58
Granada 7
Great Britain 36
Greece 18
Gregory IX 4, 57
Grosvenor, B. 40
Grotius 7
Guinness 57, 66
Guinness, H. Grattan 46, 65, 66
Gunpowder Plot 76
Hadrian the Sixth 29
Halley, Henry H. 19, 21, 22, 23, 32, 38
Hapsburg 31, 39
Hapsburg, House of 21
Hapsburgs 32, 39
Hassell 4, 5, 8
Hassell, Cushing B. 22
Hecker 61
Henricians 27
Henry
IV 22,
24
Henry V 24
heresy 3, 9, 12, 13, 46, 55, 57, 75
Heruli 17, 41, 42
Hesse 29
history 78
Holland 10, 19, 21, 36, 58
Holy Land 53, 54, 58
Holy Roman Empire 21, 39
homosexuality 68, 69, 70
Honorius III 4
Huguenot 20, 22, 28
Huguenots 10, 11, 23, 30, 50
Hundred Years’ War 24
Hungary 21, 23, 24, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34,
36, 39
Huss, John 28
Hussites 10, 18, 24, 34
India 38
Indians 5, 7, 41, 52, 53, 58, 60
infanticide 70
Innocent III 4, 9, 19, 27
Innocent VIII 18
inquisition 6, 14, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49, 53, 59, 60,
63, 64
Inquisition 3, 7, 8,
9, 10, 13, 17, 19, 20, 28, 30, 32, 36, 37, 38, 39, 41, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49,
53, 55, 58, 60, 61, 63, 64, 65, 68
Ireland 5, 7, 10, 17, 19, 21, 23, 36, 58, 71
Irish Rebellion 5, 23
Italy 7, 14, 21, 28, 32, 38, 39, 41, 42, 43, 63, 72
Jesuit 5, 21, 22, 30, 31, 32, 38
Jesuits 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 21, 30, 31, 32, 33, 36, 40, 74
Jews 6, 7, 8, 10, 37, 41, 44, 45, 47, 48, 55
Joan
of Arc 52
Jones 43, 45, 59
Jones, William 38
Jortin, John 28
Josephists 27
Kamen, Henry 46
Karne 63
Kung 52
Kurtz 28, 30, 33
Laguedoc 6
Languedoc, France 27
Las Casas 53
Lateran Council 57
League (in France) 22
Lebanon 16
Lecky 4, 77
Lehmanowsky 64
Leonists 18
Leopold, Emperor 30
Lesna 34
Liberty 78
Liechtenstein 39
Limborch 17
lime pits 69,
70
Lisbon 7, 65
literature 78
Lithgow, William 46
Lithuania 21, 23, 24, 35, 39
Llorente 9, 44, 45, 47, 48, 49
Lockman 20
Lollards 10, 27, 38
Lombardy 5
London 4, 7, 18, 46, 55, 63, 65, 66, 71, 73, 78
Lord 78
Lord, John 10, 76
Louisiana 74
Luther 10, 29, 44
Lutheran 31
Lutherans 29, 30
Luxembourg 39
Madrid, Spain 37, 64
Manichaeans 10, 18
Manicheans 27, 57
Maria Monk 66
Mariejol 11
Mariéjol 22
Marshall Tito 17
Martin Luther 28
Martin V 34
martyrdom 9, 12, 43
martyrology 9
Martyrology 3, 9
Martyrs 19
Maximilian II 28
McCabe, Joseph 8, 10, 33
McEvedy 59
M'Crie 14, 49
M'Crie, Thomas 44
Mede 11, 51
Mexico 5, 7, 50, 51, 53, 69, 70, 72, 74
Middle
Ages 1,
2, 4, 12, 13, 14, 19, 40, 41, 42, 45, 50, 60, 62, 68, 75, 77
Middleton 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 58
Middleton, Conyers 50
Missouri 74
Mohammedans 24
monasteries 66, 67, 70, 71, 72
Mongol conquests 60
monks 26, 27
Montano 47, 66, 67, 68
Montano, Walter M. 8, 47
Moors 6, 7, 8, 41, 45
Morant, Philip 24
Moravia 36
Morel, George 43
Morescoes 8
Mosheim 57
Moslems 53
Moss, Eva 69
Motley 45
Munich, Germany 31
Naples 14, 72
Napoleon 63, 64, 65
Nazi 2
Neander, Augustus 25
Nellie Fortune 71, 73
Nequinta 26
Netherlands 32, 39
New World 52, 55, 58, 59, 60
New York 78
Newman, Albert Henry 22, 24, 30, 31, 33, 35, 38
O'Gorman, Edith 69
Ohio 15
Orange 21
Orchard 43
Orchard, G.H. 41
Orleans, France 26
Orthodox 45
Ostrogoths 17, 41, 42
Paris 29
Paul 78
Paulicians 10, 18, 25
Perrin 27, 78
Perrin, Jean Paul 64
Persecution 19, 21, 40
persecutions 2, 3, 4, 9, 13, 41, 47, 50, 53, 55, 56, 57,
58, 59, 60, 61, 75, 76, 77
Peru 50, 51
Peter 78
Peterson 16, 17, 78
Peterson, F. Paul 15, 16
Piedmont 21
Piedmont, Italy 38
Plague 8, 53
Ploetz 22
Poland 21, 23, 24, 28, 31, 32, 34, 36, 38, 39, 55
Pope Honorius 3
Pope Julian 7
Pope
Paul IV 3
population 5, 8, 11, 18, 42, 43, 45, 51, 53, 54,
55, 56, 58, 59, 60, 61, 67
Portugal 7, 21, 38, 48, 53
Pregill, Philip 24
Presbyterian Church 16
Priscillianists 10
Protestant Reformation 59
Protestants 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 15, 16, 17, 19,
20, 22, 23, 27, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 39, 40, 50, 52, 55, 57, 58
Prussia 28, 42
Puigblanch 44
Rainerius 25
Reformation, Protestant 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 28, 30, 32,
36, 37, 39, 40, 41
Reinerius 18, 41
Revelation 9, 10, 19, 22, 76
Robbins 34
Roberts, Robert 63
Robertson 61
Robertson, J.C. 17
Robertson, James C. 13, 61
Roman Empire 70
Romania 31
Roth 44, 47, 65
Roth, Cecil 44, 64, 65
Runcarians 18
Sacramentarians 38
San Antonio, Texas 68
Sanders 38
Saracens 24
Saxons 31, 50
Saxony 22, 29, 35
Scandinavians 50
scarlet colored Beast 7
Schaff, Philip 25
Schmucker, S.S. 4, 5, 44, 47, 49, 51, 66
schools 52, 74
Scotland 21
Second Republic 70
Serbia 45
Seville 44, 48
Siebenbuergen 30, 31, 39
Silesia 36
Sismondi 57
Sister Charlotte 69
Slovenia 39
smallpox 53
Smallpox 53
South America 5, 6, 14, 42, 53, 54
South California 74
Southwell, Henry 23, 30, 34, 35, 36
Spain 4, 5, 7, 8, 14, 16, 21, 24, 28, 30, 32, 37, 38, 41, 42, 44, 45,
46, 47, 49, 50, 52, 53, 58, 64, 65, 70
St. Domingo 7
St. Ligori 66
Sweden 22, 36
Switzerland 36, 39
Syria 38
Temple, John 5
Teutonic Knights 42
Texas 74
Theodora 18
Thirty Years War 18, 22
Thirty Years' War 21, 23, 39
thirty years’ war 4, 5, 18, 24, 50
Thirty Years’ War 22, 35, 39
Thondracians 25
Tipton County, Indiana 70, 71
Toledo, Spain 64
Torquemada 45, 47, 49
torture 10, 67
Toulouse, France 26, 27
Towers, Joseph 38, 40
Transylvania 31, 36
treaty of Augsburg 5
Troubadours 27
Turks 30
United States 14, 68, 72
Vandals 17, 41, 42
Vergerius 3
Virgin Mary 14, 65
Vitringa 40
Voigt 51, 52, 54
Voigt, Gottfried Christian 51
Voltaire 20, 50, 54
Waldenses 3, 7, 9,
11, 20, 21, 23, 24, 27, 38, 40, 42, 43, 50, 55, 56, 57, 58, 61, 78
Waldensians 3, 10
Wallenstein 22
Wesley 23, 52, 53, 54, 55
Wesley,
John 10,
19, 20, 23, 39
West-Indies 53
White, Matthew 24
Wilder 9, 44, 49
Wilder, John B. 9
Williams 8, 13, 18, 48, 54
Wills 78
witches 10, 23, 40, 50, 51, 52, 54, 58
Wollschläger 53
Wollschläger, H. 53
World War II 16, 74
Wycliff 20, 28
Wylie 30, 32, 37, 38, 78
Wylie, James A. 11
Yugoslavia 17