Heresy

 

For other uses, see Heresy (disambiguation).

"Heretical" redirects here. For the website, see Heretical (website).

Not to be confused with hearsay.

A Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs. In certain historical Christian and Jewish and some modern cultures, espousing ideas deemed heretical can be and were punishable by law.

The term heresy is from Greek αἵρεσις originally meant "choice", but also referred to that process whereby a young person would examine various philosophies to determine how to live one's life. The word "heresy" is usually used within a Christian, Jewish, or Islamic context, and implies something slightly different in each.

Heresy was redefined by the Catholic Church as a belief that conflicted with established Catholic dogma. Eventually it took on the meaning of an accusation levied against members of another group which has beliefs that conflict with those of the accusers. It is usually used to discuss violations of religious or traditional laws or codes, although it is used by some political extremists to refer to their opponents. It carries the connotation of behaviors or beliefs likely to undermine accepted morality and cause tangible evils, damnation, or other punishment. In some religions, it also implies that the heretic is in alliance with the religion's symbol of evil, such as Satan or chaos.

Heresy is distinct from apostasy, which is the formal denunciation of one's religion, principles or cause, and blasphemy, which is irreverence toward religion. The founder or leader of a heretical movement is called a heresiarch, while individuals who espouse heresy or commit heresy, are known as heretics. Heresiology is the study of heresy.

Heresy in the abstract

Non-religious use of the English term heresy began no later than Geoffrey Chaucer (late 1300s). Heresy is an opinion held in opposition to that of authority or orthodoxy. It is primarily used in a religious context, but by extension (and with increasing frequency), to secular subjects. The term assumes the existence of an orthodoxy.

Scientist/author Isaac Asimov considered heresy as an abstraction; mentioning religious, political, socioeconomic and scientific heresies. He divided scientific heretics into endoheretics (those from within the scientific community) and exoheretics (those from without). Characteristics were ascribed to both and examples of both kinds were offered. Asimov concluded that science orthodoxy defends itself well against endoheretics (by control of science education, grants and publication as examples), but is nearly powerless against exoheretics. He acknowledged by examples that heresy has repeatedly become orthodoxy.

In a secular multi-polar world, the term heresy has lost utility outside of a well-defined (usually religious) context. In an argument among the religious, the scientific, the political and the economic, all groups can defend different orthodoxies. Within Christianity, Catholics and Protestants also defend different orthodoxies. While heresy is pejorative in a religious context (and in some political contexts), it may be complimentary in other contexts where innovation is more welcome.

Even in semi-religious context, heresy is not necessarily a pejorative. Religious heresy is a historical fact and Christianity was a major influence in Western History. The studies of the philosophy, politics, sociology, economics and psychology of religion may all consider heresy dispassionately.

Religious heresy

Christianity

Main article: Heresy in Christianity

The use of the word heresy in the context of Christianity was given wide currency by Irenaeus in his tract Contra Haereses (Against Heresies) to describe and discredit his opponents during the early centuries of the Christian Community. He described the community's beliefs and doctrines as orthodox (from ὀρθός, orthos "straight" + δόξα, doxa "belief") and the Gnostics' teachings as heretical. He also pointed out the concept of apostolic succession to support his arguments.

Heretics usually do not perceive their own beliefs as heretical. For instance, the Roman Catholic Church holds Protestantism as espousing numerous heresies, while some Protestants retrospectively considered Roman Catholicism the "Great Apostasy". The Roman Catholic Church derives claims of orthodoxy from a system of ecclesiastical authority while Protestants view the Bible alone as authoritative.

Constantine I, acceptor of Christianity as a religion of the Roman Empire, the first baptized Roman Emperor, set precedent for later policy. The Emperor was, by Roman law, Pontifex Maximus, the chief priest of all recognized religions. Constantine established Christian orthodoxy by councils of bishops and enforced orthodoxy by Imperial authority.

Massacre of the Waldensians of Mérindol in 1545.

The first known usage of the term in a secular legal context was in 380 AD by the "Edict of Thessalonica" of Theodosius I. Prior to the issuance of this edict, the Church had no state-sponsored support for any particular legal mechanism to counter what it perceived as "heresy". By this edict, in some sense, the State's authority and that of the catholic Church became somewhat overlapping. One of the outcomes of this blurring of Church and State was the sharing of State powers of legal enforcement between Church and state authorities. At its most extreme reach, this new secular reinforcement of the Church's authority gave Church leaders the power to, in effect, pronounce the death sentence upon those whom the Church considered heretical.

Within five years of the official "criminalization" of heresy by the emperor, the first Christian heretic to be prosecuted, Priscillian was executed in 385 by Roman officials. For some years after the Reformation, Protestant churches were also known to execute those whom they considered as heretics, including Catholics. The last known heretic executed by sentence of the Roman Catholic Church was Cayetano Ripoll in 1826. The number of people executed as heretics under the authority of the various "ecclesiastical authorities" is not known.

The Roman Catholic Church had always dealt harshly with strands of Christianity that it considered heretical, but before the 11th century these tended to centre around individual preachers or small localised sects, like Arianism, Pelagianism, Donatism, Marcionism, Montanism. The diffusion of the almost Manichean sect of Paulicians westwards gave birth to the famous XI-XII century heresies of Western Europe. The first one was that of Bogomils in modern day Bosnia, a sort of sanctuary between Eastern and Western Christianities. By the 11th century, more organised groups such as the Patarini, the Dulcinians, the Waldensians, the Cathars, the Tisserands, were beginning to appear in the towns and cities of Northern Italy, Southern France and Flanders, which were the most urbanized areas of Europe at the time. They mainly spread among the textile workers, whence come the name of some of these movements. In western Mediterranean France the Cathars grew to represent a popular mass movement and the belief was spreading to other areas. The Cathar Crusade was initiated by the Roman Catholic Church to eliminate the Cathar heresy in Languedoc. Heresy was a major justification for the Inquisition and for religious wars associated with the Reformation. The division in Christianity has had lasting impact on Western History.

Perhaps due to the many modern negative connotations associated with the term heretic, such as the Spanish inquisition, the term is used less often today. There are however, some notable exceptions: see for example Rudolf Bultmann and the "character" of debates over ordination of women and gay priests. The subject of Christian heresy opens up broader questions as to who has a monopoly on spiritual truth, as explored by Jorge Luis Borges in the short story "The Theologians" within the compilation Labyrinths.

A few early modern scientists were accused of heresy by the Catholic Church. Giordano Bruno, who believed that the universe contained numerous suns, planets, and worlds similar to Earth, and that other such worlds could contain sentient beings, was condemned as a heretic by the Church and burned at the stake by secular authorities. Some sources claim that Bruno's scientific views motivated his prosecution, but other sources say that only his theological views motivated it, in particular, "that Christ was not God but merely an unusually skillful magician, that the Holy Ghost is the soul of the world, that the Devil will be saved, etc." Galileo Galilei was also brought before the Inquisition for alleged heresy, but recanted and was condemned a life time house arrest instead of being burnt at the stake.

Also Eastern Christianity fought against heresies, the most famous of which was Iconoclasm.

Orthodox Judaism

Main article: Heresy in Orthodox Judaism

Orthodox Judaism considers views on the part of Jews which depart from the traditional Jewish principles of faith to be heretical. In addition, the more right-wing groups within Orthodox Judaism hold that all Jews who reject the simple meaning of Maimonides's 13 principles of Jewish faith are heretics. As such, most of Orthodox Judaism considers Reform and Reconstructionist Judaism to be heretical movements, and regards most of Conservative Judaism as heretical. The liberal wing of Modern Orthodoxy is more tolerant of Conservative Judaism, particularly its right wing, as there is some theological and practical overlap between these groups.

Islam

Main article: Heresy in Islam

Many in the two main bodies of Islam—Sunnis and the Shi'as—have regarded the other as heretical. Groups like the Ismailis, the Hurufiya, the Alawis, the Bektashi and even the Sufis have also been regarded as heretical by some.

Other religions

Hinduism ignored or absorbed its heretics. The Bhagavad-Gita (Chapter XVI) makes passing reference to heretics (as the Unheavenly). The Shwasamvedyopanishad opposes standard but diverse Hindu beliefs. Buddhism defines wrong views (micchā diṭṭhi). Buddhist literature mentions a wrathful conquest of Buddhist heretics (see Padmasambhava) and a Buddhist theocracy once existed. Neo-Confucian heresy has been described.

The Church of Scientology uses the term "squirreling" to refer to unauthorized alterations of its teachings or methods.

Contemporary heresy

See also: Christian heresy in the 20th century

Although less common than in the medieval period, formal charges of heresy within Christian churches still occur. Key issues in the Protestant churches have included modern biblical criticism, the nature of God, and the acceptability of gay clergy. The Catholic Church, through the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, appears to be particularly concerned with academic theology.

Today, heresy can be without a religious context as the holding of ideas that are in fundamental disagreement with the status quo in any practice and branch of knowledge. Religion is not a necessary component of the term's definition. The revisionist paleontologist Robert T. Bakker, who published his findings as The Dinosaur Heresies, treated the mainstream view of dinosaurs as dogma. He is an example of a recent scientific endo-heretic.

Immanuel Velikovsky is an example of a recent scientific exo-heretic; He did not have appropriate scientific credentials or publish in scientific journals. His books, scientific arguments against his books, rebuttals and extensive commentary are available. While the details of his work are in scientific disrepute, the concept of catastrophic change (extinction event, punctuated equilibrium) has gained acceptance in recent decades.

The term heresy is also used as an ideological pigeonhole for contemporary writers because by definition heresy depends on contrasts with an established orthodoxy. For example, the tongue-in-cheek contemporary usage of heresy, such as to categorize a "Wall Street heresy" a "Democratic heresy" or a "Republican heresy", are metaphors which invariably retain a subtext that links orthodoxies in geology or biology or any other field to religion. These expanded metaphoric senses allude to both the difference between the person's views and the mainstream, and the boldness of such a person in propounding these views.

Selected quotations

• Thomas Aquinas: "...a species of infidelity in men who, having professed the faith of Christ, corrupt its dogmas" (Summa Theologica, c. 1270)
• Thomas Aquinas: "Wherefore if forgers of money and other evil-doers are forthwith condemned to death by the secular authority, much more reason is there for heretics, as soon as they are convicted of heresy, to be not only excommunicated but even put to death." (Summa Theologica, c. 1270)
• Isaac Asimov: "Science is in a far greater danger from the absence of challenge than from the coming of any number of even absurd challenges."
• Augustine of Hippo: "For it is the wrongdoing of the opposing party which compels the wise man to wage just wars" (City of God, Chapter 7, c. 426)
• Gerald Brenan: "Religions are kept alive by heresies, which are really sudden explosions of faith. Dead religions do not produce them." (Thoughts in a Dry Season, 1978)
• Geoffrey Chaucer: "Thu hast translated the Romance of the Rose, That is a heresy against my law, And maketh wise folk from me withdraw;" (The Prologue to the Legend of Good Women, c. 1386)
• G. K. Chesterton: "Truths turn into dogmas the instant that they are disputed. Thus every man who utters a doubt defines a religion." (Heretics, 12th Edition, 1919)
• G. K. Chesterton: "But to have avoided [all heresies] has been one whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling and prostrate, the wild truth reeling but erect." (Orthodoxy, 1908)
• Benjamin Franklin: "Many a long dispute among divines may be thus abridged: It is so. It is not. It is so. It is not." (Poor Richard's Almanack, 1879)
• Helen Keller: "The heresy of one age becomes the orthodoxy of the next." (Optimism, 1903)
• Lao Tzu: "Those who are intelligent are not ideologues. Those who are ideologues are not intelligent." (Tao Te Ching, Verse 81, 6th century BCE)
• James G. March on the relations among madness, heresy, and genius: "... we sometimes find that such heresies have been the foundation for bold and necessary change, but heresy is usually just new ideas that are foolish or dangerous and appropriately rejected or ignored. So while it may be true that great geniuses are usually heretics, heretics are rarely great geniuses."
• Montesquieu: "No kingdom has ever had as many civil wars as the kingdom of Christ." (Persian Letters, 1721)
• Elie Wiesel: "The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference." (unsourced, from WikiQuote)
• Friedrich Nietzsche: "Whoever has overthrown an existing law of custom has hitherto always first been accounted a bad man: but when, as did happen, the law could not afterwards be reinstated and this fact was accepted, the predicate gradually changed; - history treats almost exclusively of these bad men who subsequently became good men!" (Daybreak, § 20)

See also

• Anathema
• Herem (censure), a related concept in Judaism
• Christian theology
• Deviationism
• Heterodoxy
• History of Christianity
• Iconoclasm
• Infallibility of the Church
• Inquisition
• List of people burned as heretics
• Radical Christianity
• Schism

External links

• Some quotes and information in this article came from the Catholic Encyclopedia.
• (French) Cathars of the middle age, Philosophy and History.
• What Is Heresy? by Wilbert R. Gawrisch (Lutheran)
• ED medication appears to not be a clause on the Roman Catholic "Heresy List"