Galileo's Inquisition Trial RevisitedThis book shows that the known accounts of Galileo's trial leave many important facts unexplained or even clash with them. A most careful reading of the relevant documents and treatises backs an interpretation which has Pope Urban VIII sue Galileo for denying God's omnipotence or His omniscience by admitting the «absolute truth» of Copernicanism. The Pope's opinion results from an argument he fully trusts, together with his belief that Galileo failed to fulfill a condition to which the publication of the Dialogue was subjected. That the trial does not end with a conviction for Urban's awful «formal heresy» but merely for «vehement suspicion of heresy», with the «heresy» consisting in the pseudo-heretical belief in a doctrine contrary to the Bible, all this is due to the existence of a Galileo-friendly party inside the Holy Office, led by Cardinal Francesco Barberini and powerful enough to wring a compromise from the Pope. |
Contents
Acknowledgments | 11 |
Part II | 16 |
Chapter 1 | 19 |
The suspicion of heresy | 26 |
Matters of controversy | 36 |
13 | 44 |
The birth of the conflict | 51 |
Regrettable steps | 59 |
The quest for two motives | 218 |
The biased answers of the Consultants | 229 |
Inchofers answer to the chief question | 235 |
Threatening quotations | 244 |
Oreggis deficient answer | 252 |
the extrajudicial interview | 255 |
An objection answered | 268 |
Justified hopes | 283 |
The private action against Galileo | 84 |
Problems with a plan and problems with its execution | 94 |
Questions of terminology | 100 |
The puzzles of papal behavior | 143 |
Getting ever closer to the explanation | 152 |
Outcome and outlook | 159 |
A protector taking action | 167 |
Who unearthed the notarys brief? | 176 |
Indisposition serious disease and possible cure | 185 |
Looking for further charges and their contrary | 193 |
Galileos first interrogation | 203 |
A method for getting a muchneeded admission | 209 |
What may have been the ultimate intention of the document? | 297 |
The ultimate stage of the investigation | 310 |
The sentence proper | 330 |
Galileos abjuration | 343 |
Problematical facts | 360 |
Urbans argument | 375 |
Which status does Copernicanism have in Galileos Dialogue? | 388 |
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Common terms and phrases
25 February abjuration absolute truth April asked assertion believe Beretta Caccini Cardinal Barberini Cardinal Bellarmine Cardinal Francesco Barberini Castelli Chapter Christina of Lorraine Church Cioli Commissary conclusion condemned Congregation Copernican doctrine Copernican opinion Copernican system Copernican theory Copernicus Copernicus's crime decision Decree defend Dialogue document earth earth's motion fact faith false Fantoli Farinacci 1618 Father favor February Final Sentence Finocchiaro 1989 Gali Galileo affair Galileo Galilei Garzend Gebler God's heresy heretical hold Holy Office Holy Scripture hypothesis Inchofer Inchofer's Index injunction Inquisition Inquisitor Jesuit Letter to Castelli Lord Cardinal Maculano Masini means mentioned monitum Morpurgo-Tagliabue Niccolini Oreggi Pasqualigo Pope Pope Urban VIII Pope's possible praeceptum precetto prohibited question quoted quovis modo reason Redondi Riccardi Rome Sacred Palace Santillana 1976 September 1632 speaking Special Commission Report suppositione suspicion of heresy teach tenere things tion torture translation treat Tribunal Urban VIII Urban's argument vehement writes