>In article supernews.com>,
>PV pobox.com> wrote:

>>Jerry Kraus yahoo.com> writes:

>>>Not exactly. But, any chance that institutions like the the Spanish
>>>Inquisition might actually have had some social utility?

>>From the one word answer dept: "No."

><http://www.faculty.umb.edu/gary_zabel/Courses/Phil%%20281b/Philosophy%%20of%%20M...>
>"Recent Developments in the Study of The Great European Witch Hunt" by
>Jenny Gibbons, has a section on the Inquisition, including

> Moreover most of the killing was done by secular courts. Church
> courts tried many witches but they usually imposed non-lethal
> penalties. A witch might be excommunicated, given penance, or
> imprisoned, but she was rarely killed. The Inquisition almost
> invariably pardoned any witch who confessed and repented. ...

> The vast majority of witches were condemned by secular courts.
> Ironically, the worst courts were local courts. ...

> In fact, in Spain the Inquisition worked diligently to keep witch
> trials to a minimum. Around 1609, a French witch-craze triggered
> a panic in the Basque regions of Spain. Gustav Henningsen (The
> Witches' Advocate) documented the Inquisition's work in brilliant
> detail. Although several inquisitors believed the charges, one
> skeptic convinced La Suprema (the ruling body of the Spanish
> Inquisition) that this was groundless hysteria. La Suprema
> responded by issuing an "Edict of Silence" forbidding all
> discussion of witchcraft. For, as the skeptical inquisitor noted,
> "There were neither witches nor bewitched until they were talked
> and written about."

> The Edict worked, quickly dissipating the panic and accusations.
> And until the end of the Great Hunt, the Spanish Inquisition
> insisted that it alone had the right to condemn witches -- which
> it refused to do. Another craze broke out in Vizcaya, in 1616.
> When the Inquisition re-issued the Edict of Silence, the secular
> authorities went over their head and petitioned the king for the
> right to try witches themselves. The king granted the request,
> and 289 people were quickly sentenced. Fortunately the
> Inquisition managed to re-assert its monopoly on trials and
> dismissed all the charges. The "witches" of Cataluna were not so
> lucky. Secular authorities managed to execute 300 people before
> the Inquisition could stop the trials.

>It's well worth reading the whole article if you're interested in how
>witchcraft was treated in the Middle Ages. It explodes a lot of
>mistaken notions.