A man managed to write his name in the black letters of infamy for generations to come. Meet Tomas de Torquemada (1420-1498) first Inquisitor General of Spain and confessor of crypto-Jews and crypto-Muslims.
Who was this man whose name and visage conjures up visions of a monster in the service of God?
Torquemada was a native Spanish Dominican friar of Jewish descent, his grandmother having been a Jewish convert to Christianity who had married his grandfather Alva Fernandez de Torquemada. The irony of his Jewish ancestry is that during his tenure as Inquisitor General, many Jews would meet untimely deaths in the hands of his Inquisition.
Tomas was born in Valladolid, Spain in 1420. His uncle Cardinal Juan de Torquemada was a respected theologian, a fact which helped Tomas' career. Tomas was an ascetic priest who, during his early years, had been a Dominican monk and cook. He later rose to the position of Prior at the Monastery of Santa Cruz in Segovia; a position he held till at the age of 63 he was appointed Grand Inquisitor of the Spanish Inquisition.
He had close relation with the queen Isabella whose confessor he had been since her childhood. At Isabella's recommendation he was appointed advisor to Ferdinand and Isabella, monarchs of Spain, and later Inquisitor General in 1483.
The Inquisition was established by the Monarchs of Spain in the atmosphere of a period of war with the Moors who were finally defeated at Granada in 1492. The Inquisition had been motivated by fear and distrust of both Jewish and Moorish converts whose loyalty to the state was suspect.
The Inquisition was officially not concerned with non-Christian Jews and Moors but with those who claimed to have converted to Catholicism. The sincerity of these people in their claim of conversion was held in suspicion and there was the general feeling that the larger body of Jewish population harbored potentially subversive elements.
The distrust of the Jews finally led to the Alhambra Decree sponsored by Tomas de Torquemada which resulted in the general expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492. Tomas had apparently chaffed at the limitation of the power of his office as Grand Inquisitor only to the Jewish converso (that is, Jews who claimed to have converted to Christianity). Tomas detested the Spanish Jews who had not converted. He therefore, vigorously, urged Ferdinand and Isabella to issue an edict commanding all Jews to either leave Spain or convert to Catholicism.
The Jews offered Ferdinand a large sum of money. Ferdinand might have accepted the offer but for a dramatic reaction from Tomas in which he stormed the Palace and accused the king of wanting to sell Christ for money like Judas did.
The jurisdiction of the Inquisition, as already mentioned, was limited to Christians over the age of fourteen, especially Jews and Moors who claimed to have converted to Christianity but were believed to be secretly practicing their old religions. Historians believe that about 2000 people were burned by the Inquisition between 1480and 1530.
The abuses of the Inquisition made Tomas so unpopular than an armed guard of 250 footmen and 50 mounted men had to be provided for his security. The abuses included arbitrary detentions, torture, and reliance on anonymous denunciation. Wealthy Moors and Jews were often targeted for judicial murder and their wealth appropriated. Anyone who spoke against the Inquisition could be arrested on contrived charges of heresy.
A Jew merely suspected of being a "marrano," not only had his property taken over by the Inquisition but he would be publicly humiliated by being forced to march through the streets naked from the waist down and flogged. "Marranos" were forced to live in isolated ghettos in which the conditions were very poor.
Tomas made an elaborate show of organizing a fair trial, most likely to soothe his conscience over the killings. In theory, an accused who confessed his sin of apostasy or heresy would be allowed to go free without any further consequences if he recanted, kissed the cross and confessed Christ. But in reality the chances of going free on confession narrowed as the trial went through its stages. At a point in the trial the accused would be gagged to prevent him from confessing.
The accused was assumed to be guilty from the evidence of unnamed accusers who were adjudged responsible citizens. Torture would be administered to force confession. An accused person who refused to confess would finally be handed over to the civil authorities for execution. Execution was done by burning. The accused person who refused to confess throughout the trial would be executed by slow burning using green wood while those who confessed before execution could be allowed mercy by quick burning using dry seasoned wood. The luckiest were garroted.
Tomas had always been an intensely religious man devoted to his faith throughout his life. He had been an ascetic friar who wore clothing of coarse materials beneath his robe to mortify his flesh. The apparent contradiction between his religious piety and involvement in the cruel murder of an estimated 2000 people can only be explained by the pattern of morality typical of the "Abrahamic" religions in which the highest expression of morality is service to God and religion. That was the context of understanding of the duty of man in which a blood drenched career is interpreted as holy service to the Christian deity.
Torquemada's exemplary service to God earned him several admirable titles: "Hammer of Heretics," "Light of Spain," and "Savior of His Country."