21 June 1632 AD. Galileo, Church Censures, & Italian Inquisitors

21 June 1632 AD.  Galileo threatened with torture, yields to Vatican, and agrees that earth is motionless with the sun moving around it.

Dr. Rusten tells the story. 

Rusten, E. Michael and Rusten, Sharon. The One Year Christian History. Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2003. Available at: http://www.amazon.com/The-Year-Christian-History-Books/dp/0842355073/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1393302630&sr=8-1&keywords=rusten+church+history

Galileo was born 18 Feb 1564 in Pisa, Italy, the same year that Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon.  As an astronomer, he was granted lifelong tenure as a Professor at the University of Padua.  

In 1610, he was working with his telescope with a magnification—1000 times. He noted 4 moons going around Jupiter.  The theorized that planets moved around the sun.

He left for Florence, but in 1615, protests were lodged against him.  He was cited to appear before the famous Inquisition officers ( = IOs) of that famed tribunal set up to oppose heresy.

Galileo went to Rome hoping to convinced leaders of his views, but the IOs ordered silence.

The IOs stated, “The view that the sun stands motionless at the center of the universe is foolish, philosophically false and utterly heretical.”  We would add that the IOs (renamed these days as the Congregatio Doctrina and once headed by Mr. Joseph Ratzinger, AKA, Benedict XVI), still hubristically claim an ecclesiastical equivalent, to wit, “We, Rome, are the center of the ecclesiastical universe.”

Galileo submitted to the IOs.  He stayed out of the limelight until 1632.

In 1632, he published a major book on astronomy.  It got wide press in the academic world.

The IOs pulled him back in and accused him of violating his 1616 submission.  He was threatened with the usual IO tools—torture.

On 21 June 1632, Galileo submitted.  The next day, he was adjudged “guilty of heresy” and was remanded to jail “for an indefinite time.”  He was penalized with imprisonment, but also the penance of reciting 7 penitential Psalms 4 times daily for 3 years.

3 days later, on 25 June 1632, the Pope allowed Galileo to be a prisoner at his own villa.  As scholars do, Galileo continued his leisurely scholarly inquiries.  Galileo’s daughter, a nun, recited the penitential Psalms for her father.

Sources

Acworth, R. J. P. “Galileo.” EC. 4: 294-5.

Clouse, Robert. “Galileo Galilei.” NIDCC. 399-400.

Durant, Will and Ariel. The Age of Reason Begins. Vol. 7 of The Story of Civilization.  New York: Simon and Schuster, 1961. 600-612.