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Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, Prefect of the Holy
Office
- The Magisterium and Galileo Galilei
- What was it all about?
- Cardinal Bellarmine’s mistakes
- Galileo’s correct theological
judgment
The Magisterium and Galileo
Galilei
The
fourth Sunday of Advent 1614 was a black day in the life of Galileo Galilei,
then greatest scientist of Europe. In the chapel of Christina of Lotheringia,
the Grand-Duchess of Pisa, he was publicy decried as an unbeliever and a
heretic because his scientific research seemed to contradict the Bible....
On
February 24th 1616 Galileo’s scientific views were condemned by a special
commission of theologians at Rome, presided over by Cardinal Bellarmine. He was
forbidden to ‘hold, teach or defend his opinion in any way, either
verbally or in writing’.
On
February the 13th 1633 Galileo was again summoned to an ecclesiastical court.
He was found guilty as ‘suspected of heresy’. He was made to kneel
down and abjure his opinion. Until his death, in 1642, he was kept under house
arrest ....
And
his crime ? ?
Because he had proved that it is not the sun that moves but the earth; that day
and night come about by the earth rotating round its own axle -a truth now
universally admitted by all people!
“The statement that the earth is not the centre of the world; that the
earth is not immovable, but that it moves, and also with the movement of a full
day, is absurd, false philosophically, and, theologically considered, erroneous
in faith’’.
Text of Condemnation by the Holy Office, 13 February 1633
Galileo s conflict became the best-known example of the clash between academic
research and religious authority.
What was it all about?
The traditional view of the flat earth still widely prevailed, in spite of some learned people, since Greek times, suspecting that the earth was a globe. Most people still believed that
the earth was flat and that the sky was like a huge ceiling, a dome which
covered the space above the earth as a roof. This is actually the way the
universe looks to us when we look round us without the knowledge of science It
was popularly believed that the sun, moon and stars were balls of fire that
moved along the sky from one side of the earth to another. The sun was supposed
to rise in the East and travel along the sky during the day, then set in the
West and travel along the horizon during the night so that it could rise again
the next day.
The
earth was presumed to be held firm as it rested on pillars. Underneath the
earth, people thought, was a great abyss, a deep ocean in which there was place
for lower gods or for the dead (hell).
As
this was the popular conception of the world with all humankind, we are not
surprised to find the idea expressed in Sacred Scripture too.
“O Lord God, you are very great!
You have
stretched out the heavens like a tent ......
You have set the earth on its
foundations so that it could never be shaken ......
You have made the moon
to ma rk the seasons.
The sun knows its time for setting .”
Psalm 103
“The sun rises
and the sun goes down
and hastens to the place
where it rises. ”
Kohelet 1,5
“The sun stood still in the midst of heaven and did not hasten to go down
for a full day.”
Sun miracle, Joshua 10,13
The
popular conception of the universe began to crumble when scientists in the 15th
century discovered that the earth is round and that it rotates round its own
axle. Copernicus and Keppler had already discussed this before Galileo. But
Galileo added additional proofs. Through his telescope he could see that
the moon is round and that there are planets circling round Jupiter. He became
the most outspoken defender of the new understanding of the universe.
As
usually happens with new discoveries, many did not accept it. Moreover, they
thought that the position of the earth relative to the sun had been taught as
divine revelation in the sacred writings. This was the origin of the clash of
which Galileo became the victim.
The
religious authorities of his day, the Pope and his chief theologians, stuck to
a literal understanding of the Bible and refused to accept the evidence that
Galileo had collected through his scientific observations. As a result, his
views were condemned and he was treated as an unbeliever.
Cardinal Bellarmine’s
Mistakes
The first mistake was that Bellarmine stuck to a literal interpretation
of the Scripture texts.
“The Council of Trent forbids the interpretation of Scripture
in a way contrary to the common agreement of the Holy Fathers. Now, if you will
read modern commentators on Genesis, the Psalms, Ecclesiastes [=Kohelet] and
Joshua, as well as the Fathers, you will find that all agree in interpreting
them literally as teaching that the sun is in he heavens and revolves round the
earth with immense speed . . . . ”
Letter of Cardinal Bellarmine to Fr.
Foscarini OCD, 12 April 1615
Bellarmine’s second mistake was that, when Galileo erected his
telescope on the roof of the Holy Office and asked him and other members of the
Holy Office to see the satelites of Jupiter for themselves, he refused saying
that the Scriptures were enough.
This was wrong, as Galileo pointed out:
“It is not in the power of any creature, not even of the highest religious
authority, to make statements true or false, otherwise than if of their own
nature and in actual fact they are true or false.’’
“It is
surely harmful to the religious good of people if the authorities make it a
heresy to believe what has been proved to be a fact.’’
Galileo Galilei in The Authority of Scripture
in Philosophical Controversies
Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, representing the papal Magisterium, thus
made a colossal error of judgment.
Galileo's book remained on the Index of Forbidden Books until
1834!
Galileo’s correct theological
judgment
While the Magisterium of his day miserably failed, Galileo himself held
the correct theological understanding of Scripture, as this extract from one of
his letters shows.
§ 1. “With regard to the standing still or the movement
of the sun and earth, the inspired Scriptures must obviously adapt themselves
to the understanding of the people and this is what they achieve through the
chosen expression, as experience shows. Even today the ordinary people, though
they are no longer so uneducated, still have the same idea. To change the
people from this idea would be a waste of time since the people cannot
understand the arguments against it. Even if the immovable sky and the moving
earth had been proved with certainty for the scholars, one would have to
express themselves differently for the crowd. If you were to ask a thousand
people, one would hardly hear from one the reply that he believes the earth
moves and the sun stands still.”
§ 2. “However, we may not see in this uniform agreement
a proof of its correctness. When we ask these people to substantiate their
belief, and when we compare this with the insights and experiences on which a
small group base their opposite opinion, we find that the small number have
weighty evidence whereas the others appeal to appearance and to observations
which prove nothing.”
§ 3. “That is why the Bible clearly has to speak of a
non-moving earth and moving sun. Otherwise the people, with their limited
imagination, would easily be brought into confusion, and would not be ready to
accept those (religious) truths which are far more important as direct object
of faith.”
§ 4. “I will also add this: not only people's limited
understanding, but the general world view of those times is the reason why the
sacred Scriptures, with regard to everything that is not really necessary for
salvation, have more regard for the local ways of expression than the factual
situation.”
§ 5. “Someone might say: ‘A statement in Scripture
which concerns natural things become as certain as statement of doctrine,
through the agreement with which the Fathers have understood it’.”
§ 6. “In my opinion this could at most hold true only
for such thins in which the Fathers have undertaken the most careful study and
research, in which they have weighed the pros and the cons for both opinions,
and in which they then all decided that the one opinion should be followed, the
other rejected. The movement of the earth and the non-movement of the sun does
not belong to this category.”
§ 7. “The ancient Fathers have obviously not undertaken
such special investigations, but they could have initiated them through the
scholars of those times. Only after checking the experiences, observations,
reasons and argumentations which philosophers and astronomers presented for the
one or the other opinion, could the Fathers with adequate certainty have
determined what divine revelation was telling them.”
§ 8. “People who subject themselves to the Church, but
request to be allowed to present evidence instead of seeing their opinion
condemned, are far more concerned about the honour of the holy Churdch than
those people who, in self-denying blindness or with malicious intent, demand
that the Church swing her sword without ado since it has a right to it --
forgetting that it is not always judicious to do everything that lies in one's
power.”
§ 9. “Such people should first take the trouble to
refute the reasons presented by Copernicus and others, and then leave it to the
responsible authorities to condemn the opinion as erroneous or heretical. But,
in their passion and selfishness, they have to give up the hope to receive rash
decisions from the circumspect and wise Fathers and the wisdom of those who
cannot err.”
§ 10. “As long as the truth of a statement is still
considered possible, its condemnation as heresy is impossible. The attempts of
those who want to condemn the doctrine of the moving earth and unmoving sun
will be in vain until they have proeduced the proof for the impossibility and
falsehood of that doctrine.”
Galileo Galilei, in a letter to Duchess Christina
of Lotheringia, 1615; Briefe zur Weltgeschichte, ed. Karl Heinrich
Peter, Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag 1964, pp. 80-82; translated and provided
with paragraph numbers by John Wijngaards.
Follow @JohnWijngaards
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