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INDULGENCE (Lat. indulgentia, indulge...

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Originally appearing in Volume V14, Page 507 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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INDULGENCE (See also:Lat. indulgentia, indulgere, to See also:grant, concede) , in See also:theology, a See also:term defined by the See also:official See also:catechism of the See also:Roman See also:Catholic See also:Church in See also:England as " the remission of the temporal See also:punishment which often remains due to See also:sin after its See also:guilt has been forgiven." This remission may be either See also:total (plenary) or partial, according to the terms of the Indulgence. Such remission was popularly called a See also:pardon in the See also:middle ages--a term which still survives, e.g. in See also:Brittany. The theory of Indulgences is based by theologians on the following texts: 2 See also:Samuel (See also:Vulgate, 2 See also:Kings) xii. 14; Matt. xvi. 19 and xviii. 17, 18; 1 See also:Cor. v. 4, 5; 2 Cor. H. 6-11; but the practice itself is confessedly of 1'a.ter growth. As See also:Bishop See also:Fisher says in his Confutation of See also:Luther, " in the See also:early church, faith in See also:Purgatory and in Indulgences was less necessary than now. . . . But in our days a See also:great See also:part of the See also:people would rather See also:cast off See also:Christianity than submit to the rigour of the [See also:ancient] canons: wherefore it is a most wholesome See also:dispensation of the See also:Holy See also:Ghost that, after so great a See also:lapse of See also:time, the belief in purgatory and the practice of Indulgences have become generally received among the orthodox " (Confutatio, cap. xviii.; cf.

See also:

Cardinal Caietan, See also:Tract. XV. de Indulg. cap. i.). The nearest See also:equivalent in the ancient Church was the See also:local and temporary See also:African practice of restoring lapsed Christians to communion at the intercession of confessors and prospective martyrs in See also:prison. But such reconciliations differed from later Indulgences in at least one essential particular, since they brought no remission of ecclesiastical See also:penance See also:save in very exceptional. cases. However, as the See also:primitive practice of public penance for sins died out in the Church, there See also:grew up a See also:system of equivalent, or nominally equivalent, private penances. Just as many of the punishments enjoined by the Roman criminal See also:code were gradually commuted by See also:medieval legislators for pecuniary fines, so the years or months of See also:fasting enjoined by the earlier ecclesiastical codes were commuted for proportionate fines, the recitation of a certain number of See also:psalms, and the like. " Historically speaking, it is indisputable that the practice of Indulgences in the medieval Cz C, C,, See also:Condenser in See also:primary See also:circuit. Condenser in secondary circuit. '.,, Inductance in primary circuit. L2, Inductance in secondary circuit. l church arose out of the authoritative remission, in exceptional cases, of a certain proportion of this canonical See also:penalty. At the same time, according to Catholic teaching, such Indulgence was not a See also:mere permission to omit or postpone See also:payment, but was in fact a See also:discharge from the See also:debt of temporal punishment which the sinner owed.

The authority to grant such discharge was conceived to be included in the See also:

power of binding and loosing committed by See also:Christ to His Church; and when in the course of time the vaguer theological conceptions of the first ages of Christianity assumed scientific See also:form and shape at the hands of the Schoolmen, the See also:doctrine came to prevail that this discharge of the sinner's debt was made through an application to the offender of what was called the " Treasure of the Church " (Thurston, p. 315). " What, then, is meant by the ` Treasure of the Church' ? . . . It consists primarily and completely of the merit and See also:satisfaction of Christ our Saviour. It includes also the superfluous merit and satisfaction of the Blessed Virgin and the See also:Saints. What do we mean by the word ` superfluous' ? In one way, as I need not say, a See also:saint has no superfluous merit. Whatever he has, he wants it all for himself, because, the more he merits on See also:earth (by Christ's See also:grace) the greater is his See also:glory in See also:heaven. But, speaking of mere satisfaction for punishment due, there cannot be a doubt that some of the Saints have done more than was needed in See also:justice to expiate the punishment due to their own sins . . . It is this ` superfluous' expiation that accumulates in the Treasure of the Church " (Bp. of See also:Newport, p.

166). It must be noted that this theory of the " Treasure " was not formulated until some time after Indulgences in the See also:

modern sense had become established in practice. The doctrine first appeared with See also:Alexander of See also:Hales (c. 1230) and was at once adopted by the leading schoolmen. See also:Clement VI. formally confirmed it in 1350, and See also:Pius VI. still more definitely in 1794. The first definite instance of a plenary Indulgence is that of See also:Urban II. for the First Crusade (1095). A little earlier had begun the practice of partial Indulgences, which are always expressed in terms of days or years. However definite may have been the ideas originally conveyed by these notes of time, their first meaning has See also:long since been lost. See also:Eusebius See also:Amort, in 1735, admits the gravest See also:differences of See also:opinion; and the Bishop of Newport writes (p. 163) " to receive an Indulgence of a See also:year, for example, is to have remitted to one so much temporal punishment as was represented by a year's canonical penance. If you ask me to define the amount more accurately, I say that it cannot be done. No one knows how severe or how long a Purgatory was, or is, implied in a See also:hundred days of canonical penance." The rapid See also:extension of these time-Indulgences is one of the most remarkable facts in the See also:history of the subject.

See also:

Innocent II., dedicating the great church of See also:Cluny in 1132, granted as a great favour a See also:forty days' Indulgence for the anniversary. A hundred years later, all churches of any importance had similar indulgences; yet Englishmen were glad even then to See also:earn a pardon of forty days by the laborious See also:journey to the nearest See also:cathedral, and by making an offering there on one of a few privileged feast-days. A See also:century later again, Wycliffe complains of Indulgences of two thousand years for a single See also:prayer (ed. See also:Arnold, i. 137). In 1456, the recitation of a few prayers before a church crucifix earned a Pardon of 20,000 years for every such repetition (Glassberger in Analecta Franciscana, ii. 368) : " and at last Indulgences were so freely given that there is now scarcely a devotion or See also:good See also:work of any See also:kind for which they cannot be obtained " (Arnold & Addis, Catholic See also:Dictionary, s.v.). To quote again from See also:Father Thurston (p. 318) : " In See also:imitation of the prodigality of her Divine See also:Master, the Church has deliberately faced the See also:risk of depreciation to which her treasure was exposed . . . . The growing effeminacy and corruption of mankind has found her censures unendurable . .. and the Church, going out into the highways and the hedges, has tried to entice men with the offer of generous indulgence." But it must be noted that, according to the orthodox doctrine, not only can an Indulgence not remit future sins, but even for the past it cannot take full effect unless thesubject be truly contrite and have confessed (or intend shortly to confess) his sins.

This salutary doctrine, however, has undoubtedly been obscured to some extent by the phrase a poena et a culpa, which, from the 13th century to the See also:

Reformation, was applied to Plenary Indulgences. The prima-facie meaning of the phrase is that the Indulgence itself frees the sinner not only from the temporal penalty (poena) but also from the guilt (culpa) of all his sins: and the fact that a phrase so misleading remained so long current shows the truth of Father Thurston's remark: " The laity cared little about the See also:analysis of it, but they knew that the a culpa et poena was the name for the biggest thing in the nature of an Indulgence which it was possible to get " (See also:Dublin See also:Review, See also:Jan. 1900). The phrase, however, was far from being confined to the unlearned. See also:Abbot Gilles li Muisis, for instance, records how, at the See also:Jubilee of r3oo, all the Papal Penitentiaries were in doubt about it, and appealed to the See also:Pope. See also:Boniface VIII. did indeed take the occasion of repeating (in the words of his See also:Bull) that See also:confession and contrition were necessary preliminaries; but he neither repudiated the misleading words nor vouchsafed any clear explanation of them. (Chron. Aegidii ii Muisis ed. de Smet, p. 189.) His predecessor, See also:Celestine V., had actually used them in a Bull. The phrase exercised the minds of learned canonists all through the middle ages, but still held its ground. The most accepted modern theory is that it is merely a catchword surviving from a longer phrase which proclaimed how, during such Indulgences, See also:ordinary confessors might absolve from sins usually " reserved " to the Bishop or the Pope. Nobody, however, has ventured exactly to reconstitute this hypothetical phrase; nor is the theory easy to reconcile with (i.) the uncertainty of canonists at the time when the locution was quite See also:recent, (ii.) the fact that Clement V. and Cardinal See also:Cusanus speak of See also:absolution a poena et a culpa as a See also:separate thing from (a) plenary absolution and (b) absolution from " reserved " sins (Clem. See also:lib. v. tit. ix. c.

2, and Johann See also:

Busch (d. c. 1480) Chron. Windeshemense, cap. xxxvt.). But, however it originated, the phrase undoubtedly contributed to See also:foster popular misconceptions as to the See also:intrinsic value of Indulgences, apart from repentance and confession; though Dr See also:Lea seems to See also:press this point unduly (p. S4 ff.), and should be read in See also:conjunction with Thurston (p. 324 ff.). These misconceptions were certainly widespread from the 13th to the 16th century, and were often fostered by the " pardoners," or professional collectors of contributions for Indulgences. This can best be shown by a few quotations from eminent and orthodox churchmen during those centuries. Berthold of See also:Regensburg (c. 1270) says, " Fie, See also:penny-preacher! . See also:thou dost promise so much remission of sins for a mere See also:halfpenny or penny, that thousands now See also:trust thereto, and fondly See also:dream to have atoned for all their sins with the halfpenny or penny, and thus go to See also:hell' (ed. See also:Pfeiffer, i.

393).1 A century later, the author of Piers Plowman speaks of pardoners who " give pardon for pence poundmeal about " (i.e. whole-See also:

sale; B. ii. 222); and his contemporary, Pope Boniface IX., complained of their absolving even impenitent sinners for ridiculously small sums (See also:pro qualibet parva pecuniarum summula, Raynaldus, See also:Ann. Ecc. 1390). In 1450 See also:Thomas See also:Gascoigne, the great See also:Oxford See also:Chancellor, wrote: " Sinners say nowadays ` I care not how many or how great sins I commit before See also:God, for I shall easily and quickly get plenary remission of any guilt and penalty whatsoever (cujusdam culpae et poenae) by absolution and indulgence granted to me from the Pope, whose See also:writing and grant I have bought for 4d. or 6d. or for a See also:game of See also:tennis' " —or sometimes, he adds, by a still more disgraceful bargain (pro actu meretricio, Lib. Ver. p. 123, cf. 126). In 1523 the princes of See also:Germany protested to the Pope in See also:language almost equally strong (See also:Browne, Fasciculus, i. 354). In 1562 the See also:Council of See also:Trent abolished the See also:office of " pardoner." The greatest of all Plenary Indulgences is of course the Roman 1 Equally strong assertions were made by the provincial council of See also:Mainz in 1261; and Lea (p. 287) quotes the complaints of 36 similar church See also:councils before 1538.

Jubilee. This was instituted in 1300 by Boniface VIII., who pleaded a popular tradition for its celebration every hundredth year, though no written See also:

evidence could be found. Clement VI. shortened the See also:period to 50 years (1350): it was then further reduced to 33, and again in 1475 to 25 years. See also the See also:article on LUTHER. The latest and fullest authority on this subject is Dr H. C. Lea, Hist. of Auricular Confession and Indulgences in the Latin Church (See also:Philadelphia, 1896); his standpoint in frankly non-Catholic, but he gives ample materials for See also:judgment. The greatest orthodox authority is Eusebius Amort, De Origine, &c., indulgentiarum (1735). More popular and more easily accessible are Father Thurston's The Holy Year of Jubilee (190o), and an article by the Bishop of Newport in the Nineteenth Century for See also:January 1901, with a reply by Mr See also:Herbert See also:Paul in the next number. (G. G.

End of Article: INDULGENCE (Lat. indulgentia, indulgere, to grant, concede)

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