Catharism: Difference between revisions

'''Catharism''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|k|æ|θ|ər|ɪ|z|əm}} {{respell|KATH|ər|iz|əm}};<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |title=Catharism |encyclopedia=Merriam-Webster |url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/catharism |access-date=9 May 2024}}</ref> from the {{langx|grc|καθαροί|katharoí}}, "the pure ones"{{sfnp|OED|1989|loc = "Cathar"}}) was a Christian quasi-[[Dualistic cosmology|dualist]] and [[Pseudo-Gnosticism|pseudo-Gnostic]] movement which thrived in [[northern Italy]] and [[southern France]] between the 12th and 14th centuries.{{sfn|Huey|2012|loc=Cathars}}

Denounced as a [[heresy|heretical sect]] by the [[Catholic Church]], its followers were attacked first by the [[Albigensian Crusade]] and later by the [[Medieval Inquisition]], which eradicated the sect by 1350. Around one million were slaughtered, hanged, or burnt at the stake.{{sfnp|Martin|2005|pp=105–121}}{{sfnp|Sibly|Sibly|2003|p=128}}<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Tatz |first1=Colin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=N1WaCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA214 |title=The Magnitude of Genocide |last2=Higgins |first2=Winton |year=2016 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-1-4408-3161-4 |page=214 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=John Mackinnon Robertson |url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_bAQ_AAAAIAAJ |title=A Short History of Christianity |date=1902 |publisher=Watts & Company |others=University of California |page=254 |language=English}}</ref>

Followers were known as '''Cathars''' or  '''Albigensians''',{{sfn|Huey|2012|loc=Cathars}} after the French city [[Albi]] where the movement first took hold,{{sfn|Le Roy Ladurie|1990|p=vii}} but referred to themselves as '''Good Christians'''. They famously believed that there were not one, but two Gods{{em dash}}the good God of Heaven and the evil god of this age ({{Bibleverse|2 Corinthians| 4:4}}). According to tradition, Cathars believed that the good [[God]] was the God of the [[New Testament]] faith and creator of the spiritual realm. Many Cathars identified the evil god as [[Satan]], the master of the physical world. The Cathars believed that [[Soul|human souls]] were the sexless spirits of angels trapped in the material realm of the evil god. They thought these souls were destined to be [[Reincarnation|reincarnated]] until they achieved [[Salvation in Christianity|salvation]] through the "[[consolamentum]]", a form of [[baptism]] performed when death is imminent. At that moment, they believed they would return to the good God as "[[Cathar Perfect]]".{{sfnp|Schaus|2006|p=114}} Catharism was initially taught by [[Asceticism|ascetic]] leaders who set few guidelines, leading some Catharist practices and beliefs to vary by region and over time.{{sfnp|Lambert|1998|p=21}}

There is academic controversy about whether Catharism was an organized religion or whether the medieval Church imagined or exaggerated it. The lack of any central organisation among Cathars and regional differences in beliefs and practices has prompted some scholars to question whether the Church exaggerated its threat while others wonder whether it even existed.{{sfn|Roach|2018|pp=396–398}}

In the testimony of suspects who were put to the question by the [[Inquisition]], the term 'Cathar' was not used amongst the group of accused heretics themselves.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Inquisition Records of Jacques Fournier {{!}} People {{!}} San Jose State University |url=https://www.sjsu.edu/people/nancy.stork/jacquesfournier/ |access-date=2024-05-28 |website=www.sjsu.edu}}</ref> The word 'Cathar' (aka. Gazarri etc.) is coined by Catholic theologians and used exclusively by the inquisition or by authors otherwise identified with the Orthodox church—for example in the anonymous pamphlet of 1430, ''Errores Gazariorum'' (Re: ''Errors of the Cathars'').<ref>RE: for example, [[:fr:Errores Gazariorum|Errores Gazariorum]] (c. 1430)</ref> The full title of this treatise in English is, "''The errors of the Gazarri, or of those who travel riding a broom or a stick."''<ref>{{Cite web |last=Hansen |first=Joseph |title=L'aboutissement du concept de sorcellerie |url=https://www.e-periodica.ch/cntmng?pid=zfk-001:1992:86::332 |archive-url=}}</ref>

However, the presence of a variety of beliefs and spiritual practices in the French countryside of the 12th and 13th centuries that came to be seen as [[Heterodoxy|heterodox]] relative to the Church in Rome is not actually in question, as the primary documents of the period exhaustively demonstrate.{{sfn|Wakefield|Evans|1991}}{{page needed|date=May 2024}}<ref name=":2">{{Cite book |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv512txz |title=Materials Toward a History of Witchcraft |volume=1 |date=1939 |publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press |jstor=j.ctv512txz }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Porete |first1=Marguerite |title=The mirror of simple souls |last2=Babinsky |first2=Ellen L. |year=1993 |publisher=Paulist Press |series=The Classics of Western spirituality |location=New York |isbn=978-0-8091-0464-2 }}{{page?|date=May 2025}}</ref>

Several of these groups under other names, such as the [[Waldensians]] or [[Waldensians|Valdeis]], bear a close similarity to the 'creed' or matrix of beliefs and folk-traditions pieced together under the umbrella of the term 'Catharism.'{{sfn|Wakefield|Evans|1991}}{{page needed|date=May 2024}}<ref name=":2" /> The fact that there was clearly a spiritual and communal movement of some sort can scarcely be denied, since legions of people were willing to part with their lives to defend it. Whether they acted in defense of the doctrine or in defense of the human community who held these beliefs, the fact that many gave themselves up willingly to the flames when the option to recant was given to them in many or most cases is significant.<ref name="Taylor 2018 244">{{Cite book |last=Taylor |first=Claire |title=Cathars in Question |date=2018 |publisher=York Medieval Press |isbn=978-1-903153-81-9 |editor-last=Sennis |editor-first=Antonio |series=Heresy and inquisition in the Middle Ages |location=Woodbridge |page=244 |chapter=Looking for the Good Men in the Languedoc}}</ref><ref name="Graham-Leigh">{{Cite web |last=Graham-Leigh |first=Elaine |title=Review of Cathars in Question |date=25 September 2017 |url=http://medievallyspeaking.blogspot.com/2017/09/sennis-ed-cathars-in-question.html}}</ref>

As the scholar Claire Taylor puts it, "[This issue] matters at an ethical level, because by being cleverly iconoclastic and populist in suggesting that those using 'Cathar' have made 2+2=5, Pegg and Moore [re: scholars questioning whether or not the Cathars exist] make 2+2=3 by denying the existence of the persecuted group. The missing element is a dissident religious doctrine, for which historians using a fuller range of sources believe thousands of people were prepared to suffer extreme persecution and an agonising death."<ref name="Taylor 2018 244"/><ref name="Graham-Leigh"/>

 

[[File:Routes des châteaux cathares.svg|thumb|upright=2.5|A map of the routes of the Cathar castles (blue squares and lines) in the south of France around the turn of the 13th century]]

[[File:Paradise Lost 1.jpg|thumb|War in heaven. Illustration by [[Gustave Doré]]]]

All visible matter, including the human body, was created or crafted by this {{lang|la|Rex Mundi}}; matter was therefore tainted with [[sin]]. Under this view, humans were actually [[angels]] seduced by Satan before a [[war in heaven]] against the army of [[Michael (archangel)|Michael]], after which they would have been forced to spend an eternity trapped in the evil God's material realm.{{sfn|Peters|1980|p=108|loc=The Cathars}} The Cathars taught that to regain angelic status one had to renounce the material self completely. Until one was prepared to do so, they would be stuck in a cycle of [[reincarnation]], condemned to suffer endless human lives on the corrupt Earth.{{sfnp|O'Shea|2000|p=11}}

Killing was abhorrent to the Cathars. Consequently, abstention from all animal food, [[Pescetarianism|sometimes exempting fish]], was enjoined of the Perfecti. The Perfecti avoided eating anything considered to be a by-product of sexual reproduction.{{sfn|Johnston|Renkin|2000|p=252}} War and [[capital punishment]] were condemned—an abnormality in Medieval Europe,<ref name="Belloc 1938 91"/> despite the fact that the sect had armed combatants prepared to engage in combat and commit murder on its behalf.<ref name="Belloc 1938 92">{{harvnb|Belloc|1938|p=92}}</ref> For example, the [[Papal Legate]], [[Pierre de Castelnau]], was assassinated in January 1208 in Provence.<ref name="Madaule 1967">{{harvnb|Madaule|1967|p=missing}}</ref>

Despite the implicit [[anti-Semitism]] of their views on the Old Testament God, the Cathars had little hostility to Jews as an [[Ethnic groups in Europe|ethnic group]]: probably, Jews had a higher status in Cathar territories than they had elsewhere in Europe at the time. Cathars appointed Jews as bailiffs and to other roles as public officials, which further increased the Catholic Church's anger at the Cathars.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/albigenses | title=Albigenses }}</ref>

Despite their condemnation of reproduction, the Cathars grew in numbers in southeastern France. By 1207, shortly before the murder of the Papal Legate Castelnau, many towns in that region, i.e., Provence and its vicinity, were almost completely populated by Cathari,<ref name="Belloc 1938 92"/> and the Cathari population had many ties to nearby communities. When [[Folquet de Marselha|Bishop Fulk]] of [[Toulouse]], a key leader of the anti-Cathar persecutions, excoriated the [[Militia of the Faith of Jesus Christ|Languedoc Knights]] for not pursuing the heretics more diligently, he received the reply, "We cannot. We have been reared in their midst. We have relatives among them and we see them living lives of perfection."{{sfnp|O'Shea|2000|p=42}}

Despite women having a role in the growth of the faith, Catharism was not completely equal. For example, the belief that one's last [[incarnation]] had to be experienced as a man to break the cycle.{{sfnp|O'Shea|2000|p=42}} This belief was inspired by later French Cathars, who taught that women must be reborn as men in order to achieve [[salvation]].{{sfnp|Schaus|2006|p=114}} Toward the end of the Cathar movement, Catharism became less equal and started the practice of excluding women Perfects.{{sfnp|Schaus|2006|p=114}} However, this trend remained limited. For example, later on,{{when|date=November 2021}} Italian Perfects still included women.{{sfnp|Schaus|2006|p=114}}

King Philip II of France refused to lead the crusade himself, and could not spare his son, Prince Louis VIII, to do so either—despite his victory against [[John, King of England]], as there were still pressing issues with Flanders and the empire along with the threat of an [[House of Châteaudun|Angevin]] revival. While King Philip II could not lead the crusade nor spare his son, he sanctioned the participation of some of his barons, notably [[Simon de Montfort, 5th Earl of Leicester|Simon de Montfort]]<ref name="Belloc 1938 92"/> and Bouchard de Marly. The twenty years of war against the Cathars and their allies in the Languedoc that followed were called the [[Albigensian Crusade]], derived from [[Albi]], the capital of the Albigensian district, the district corresponding to the present-day [[Tarn (department)|French department of Tarn]].<ref>{{harvnb|Belloc|1938|p=89}}</ref>

On Friday 13 May 1239, in [[Champagne (province)|Champagne]], 183 men and women convicted of Catharism were burned at the stake on the orders of the [[Dominican Order|Dominican]] inquisitor and former Cathar Perfect {{ill|Robert le Bougre|fr}}.<ref>{{harvnb|Haskins|1902|p=missing}}</ref> Mount Guimar, in [[Grand Est|northeastern France]], had already been denounced as a place of heresy in a letter of the Bishop of [[Roman Catholic Diocese of Liège|Liège]] to [[Pope Lucius II]] in 1144.<ref>"Ce lieu est terrible, le Mont-Aimé en Champagne", père Albert Mathieu</ref>{{full citation needed|date=September 2021}}<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://data.bnf.fr/15058149/albert_mathieu/ |title=Albert Mathieu |website=BnF |access-date=16 September 2019}}</ref>

A popular though as yet unsubstantiated belief holds that a small party of Cathar Perfects escaped from the fortress prior to the massacre at {{lang|fr|prat dels cremats}}. It is widely held in the Cathar region to this day that the escapees took with them "the Cathar treasure".<!-- Translated from the French "le trésor cathar" - obvious meaning, no need to use French here --> What this treasure consisted of has been a matter of considerable speculation: claims range from sacred [[Gnostic texts]] to the Cathars' accumulated wealth, which might have included the [[Holy Grail]] (see {{format link|#Historical and current scholarship}} below).

The publication of the early scholarly book ''Crusade Against the Grail,'' by the young German and later [[SS]] officer, [[Otto Rahn]] in the 1930s, rekindled interest in the connection between the Cathars and the [[Holy Grail]], especially in Germany. Rahn was convinced that the 13th-century work ''[[Parzival]]'' by [[Wolfram von Eschenbach]] was a veiled account of the Cathars. The philosopher and Nazi government official [[Alfred Rosenberg]] speaks favourably of the Cathars in ''[[The Myth of the Twentieth Century]].''{{sfn|Rosenberg|1980|p=95}}

The principal legacy of the Cathar movement is in the poems and songs of the Cathar [[troubadours]], though this artistic legacy is only a smaller part of the wider [[Occitan language|Occitan]] linguistic and artistic heritage. The Occitan song ''[[Lo Boièr]]'' is particularly associated with Catharism.<ref name=Blum>{{harvnb|Blum|2007|p=missing}}</ref> Recent artistic projects concentrating on the Cathar element in Provençal and troubadour art include commercial recording projects by Thomas Binkley, electric hurdy-gurdy artist [[Valentin Clastrier]],<ref>{{harvnb|Martí|et al|1975}}</ref> La Nef,<ref>{{harvnb|La Nef|1996}}</ref> and [[Jordi Savall]].<ref>{{harvnb|Savall|2009}}</ref>

In [[popular culture]], Catharism has been linked with the [[Knights Templar]], an active sect of monks founded after the [[First Crusade]] (1095–1099). This link has caused [[fringe theories]] about the Cathars and the possibility of their possession of the [[Holy Grail]], such as in the pseudohistorical ''[[The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail]].''<ref>{{harvnb|Thompson|2008|p=missing}}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Miller|2004}}</ref>

Protestants such as [[John Foxe]], in the 16th century, and [[Jean Duvernoy]], in the 20th century, argued that Cathars followed [[Proto-Protestantism|Proto-Protestant]] theology, though they were criticised by many historians.{{Who|date=January 2023}} Foxe argued that they followed Calvinist soteriology. Such have argued that Cathars did not follow [[dualism in cosmology|dualism]] but instead argued that such accusations were either [[Pseudo-Gnosticism|misinterpretations of Cathar theology]], wrongly attributed to Cathars or merely hostile claims.

* [[Edmund Hamer Broadbent]] – The Pilgrim Church

== General references ==

* {{cite web |first=Peter |last=Biller |title=Review of ''The War on Heresy: Faith and Power in Medieval Europe'' (review no. 1546)|date=2014 |url=http://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/1546 |access-date=9 October 2015 |website=Reviews in History |postscript=, with R.&nbsp;I. Moore's response.}}

* {{Cite web |date=21 December 2020 |first=Jack |last=Crawford |title=The Cathars: Persecuting Heretical Christians In The 13th Century |url=https://www.thecollector.com/cathars-persecution-of-christians-13th-century/ |access-date=2 March 2022 |website=TheCollector |language=en}}

* {{Cite encyclopedia |url=http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Albigensians |title=The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia |contribution=Albigensians |publisher=Columbia University Press |date=2022a|ref={{harvid|CUP2022a}}}}

* {{Citation |title=Columbia Encyclopedia |date=2022b |publisher=[[Columbia University Press]] |contribution=Cathari |url=https://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Cathari |ref={{harvid|CUP2022b}}}}

* {{Cite book| last = Fichtenau| first = Heinrich| title = Heretics and Scholars in the High Middle Ages, 1000–1200| publisher = Pennylvania State University Press| isbn = 978-0-271-04374-6| year = 2010}}

* {{Cite web |title=The Case Against Baptist Successionism |url=https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/stewards-of-the-kingdom |access-date=1 July 2022 |website=Catholic Answers |date=2009 |first1=Dwight |last1=Longenecker |archive-url= |archive-date=}}

* {{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/22/books/the-last-word-the-da-vinci-con.html |last=Miller |first=Laura |date=22 February 2004 |title=The Last Word; The Da Vinci Con |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=16 July 2008}}

* {{cite web |url=http://www.payscathare.com/www/contenu/d_payscathare.asp |title=Pays Cathare |access-date=3 May 2007 |archive-date=10 August 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080810221355/http://www.payscathare.com/www/contenu/d_payscathare.asp |url-status=dead|ref={{harvid|Pays_Cathar2008}}}}

* {{Cite book |last=Pegg |first=Mark Gregory |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NAvHHD8LpkEC&dq=Duvernoy+Protestant&pg=PA149 |title=The Corruption of Angels: The Great Inquisition of 1245–1246 |date=10 January 2009 |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |isbn=978-1-4008-2475-5 |language=en}}

* {{Cite book |last=Stoyanov |first=Yuri |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qdA_AQAAQBAJ&dq=Cathar+Protestant&pg=PA289 |title=The Other God: Dualist Religions from Antiquity to the Cathar Heresy |date=11 August 2000 |publisher=[[Yale University Press]] |isbn=978-0-300-19014-4 |language=en}}

* {{cite book |last=Tyerman |first=Christopher |author-link=Christopher Tyerman |date=2006 |title=God's War: A New History of the Crusades |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ULDUopVCVPoC |location=Cambridge, MA |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=9780674023871}}

* {{Cite journal |last=Walther |first=Daniel |date=1 January 1968 |title=Were the Albigenses and Waldenses Forerunners of the Reformation? |url=https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/auss/vol6/iss2/5 |journal=Andrews University Seminary Studies |volume=6 |issue=2 |issn=0003-2980}}

* {{Cite book |last=Biget|first=Jean-Louis |year=2007 |title=Hérésie et inquisition dans le midi de la France |location=Paris |publisher=Picard |series=Les médiévistes français |language=fr }}

* {{Cite book |last=Biget|first=Jean-Louis |year=2020 |title=Eglise, dissidences et société dans l'Occitanie médiévale |location= Lyon, Avignon |publisher= CIHAM Editions |series=Collection Mondes médiévaux |language=fr }}

* {{Citation |last=Caernaii |first=Petrus Vallis |url=http://www.documentacatholicaomnia.eu/04z/z_1209-1218__Petrus_Vallis_Caernaii__Historia_Albigensium_Et_Sacri_Belli_In_Eos_AD_1209__MLT.pdf.html |title=Historia Albigensium et Sacri Belli in Eos |language=la |series=Migne Patrologia Latina |volume=213 |at=0543–0711 }}. A history of the Albigensian war told by a contemporary.

* {{Citation |last=Chesterton |first=G. K. |author-link=G. K. Chesterton |title = What's Wrong with the World |year=1910 }}

* {{cite book |editor-last=Frassatto |editor-first=Michael |title=Heresy and the Persecuting Society in the Middle Ages: Essays on the Work of R.I. Moore |publisher=Medieval Academy of America |year=1996 |orig-year=1975 |isbn=978-9004150980 }}

* {{Citation |last1=Godlike Productions |url=http://www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message1085242/pg1 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130722221715/http://www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message1085242/pg1 |url-status=dead |archive-date=22 July 2013 |title=Web Forum: Before the Catholics, The Cathars taught of Jesus, Power of Love |publisher=Godlike Productions, Zero Point Ltd. |year=2010 }}

* {{Citation |last1=Henry |first1=William |url=http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_autor_whenry04.htm |title=Secrets of The Cathars: Why the Dark Age Church Was Out to Destroy Them |publisher=Biblioteca Pleyades and Atlantis Rising |year=2002 }}

* {{cite book |last=Le Roy Ladurie |first=Emmanuel |title=Montaillou: The Promised Land of Error, Barbara Bray translator |author-link=Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie |publisher=[[Vintage Books]] |year=1979 |isbn=978-0807615980}}

* {{Citation |last=Magee |first=M. D. |url=http://www.askwhy.co.uk/christianity/0811Inquisition.html |title=Heresy and the Inquisition II Persecution of Heretics |date=12 December 2002 }}

* {{Citation |url=http://gnosistraditions.faithweb.com/ |title=The Trail of Gnosis |first=Judith |last=Mann |publisher=Gnosis Traditions Press |year=2002 }}

* {{Citation |last=Markale |first=Jean |author-link=Jean Markale |title=Montségur and the Mystery of the Cathars |publisher=Inner Traditions |year=2003 |isbn=978-0892810901 |url=http://www.innertraditions.com/titles/momyca.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031204135937/http://www.innertraditions.com/titles/momyca.html |archive-date=4 December 2003 }}

* Mathieu, Albert, "[http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb43633711v Ce lieu est terrible, le Mont-Aimé en Champagne]" Vendredi 13 mai 1239 Réf : Bibliothèque Nationale de France

* {{cite book |last=Moore |first=R.&nbsp;I. |author-link=R. I. Moore |title=The Formation of a Persecuting Society |publisher=Blackwell |location=Oxford |orig-year=1992 |year=2006 |isbn=978-1405129640 }}

* {{Cite book |last=Moreland |first=Miles |title=Miles Away: A Walk Across France |year=1992 |publisher=[[Random House]] |place=New York |isbn=0-679-42527-6 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/milesawaywalkacr00morl }}

* {{cite book |last=Pegg |first=Mark |chapter-url=https://www.academia.edu/11602867 |chapter=Innocent III, les 'pestilentiels Provençaux' et le paradigme épuisé du catharisme/Innocent III, 'Pestilential Provençals' and the Obsolete Paradigm of Catharism |title=Innocent III et le Midi |series=Cahiers de Fanjeaux, 50 |isbn=9782708934542 |publisher=[[Presses Universitaires de Rennes]] |location=Toulouse |chapter-format=Privat (English and French abstracts) |year=2015 |pages=277–207 }}

* {{cite book |last1=Stork |first1=Nancy P. |title=The Inquisition Record of Jacques Fournier, Bishop of Pamiers 1318–1325 |url=http://www.sjsu.edu/people/nancy.stork/courses/c4/s1/jacques_fournier |publisher=[[San Jose State University]] |location=California }}

* {{Citation |last=Théry |first=Julien |year=2010 |chapter=Les Hérésies, du XIIe au début du XIVe&nbsp;s. |trans-chapter=The Heresies, from the 12th to the beginning of the 14th century. |title=Structures et dynamiques de la vie religieuse en Occident (1179–1449) |trans-title=Structures and dynamics of religious life in the West (1179–1449) |editor-last=de Cevins |editor-first=Marie-Madeleine |editor2-last=Matz |editor2-first=Jean-Michel |language=fr |chapter-url=https://www.academia.edu/499340 |publisher=[[Presses Universitaires de Rennes]] |location=[[Rennes]] |pages=373–386 }}

* {{Citation |last1=Weber |first1=Nicholas |contribution-url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01267e.htm |contribution=Albigenses |publisher=[[New Advent]] |title=Catholic Encyclopedia |year=1908a |title-link=Catholic Encyclopedia }}

* {{Citation |last1=Weber |first1=Nicholas |contribution-url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03435a.htm |contribution=Cathari |publisher=[[New Advent]] |title=Catholic Encyclopedia |year=1908b |title-link=Catholic Encyclopedia }}

[[Category:Ascetics]]