Indulgences in Medieval Europe
Pope Urban II's Plenary Crusade Indulgence Expanded by Other Popes
Dec 4, 2008
Starting in the 11th Century, the medieval church began to actively incorporate indulgences with penance. The indulgence provided grace and allowed for partial penance with the payment of a fee. In 1095, Pope Urban II offered a plenary or full indulgence to anyone participating in the first Crusade. Church sales of indulgences took many forms in later centuries and were applied to various sacramentals and pilgrimages. By 1517 the practice had become so distorted that it was one catalyst for the coming of the Reformation.
Evolution of Indulgences
Popes dispensed indulgences from a reservoir of grace tied to martyrs of the church, those men and women who, by virtue of their suffering, assisted in the intercession for all Christians. In the 12th Century, Pope Innocent III, perhaps the most powerful medieval pope, expanded the Crusade indulgence to include anyone assisting with such endeavors. In AD 1300, Pope Boniface VIII introduced the Jubilee Indulgence, offered only once every hundred years to pilgrims visiting Rome during the Jubilee year.
Rosalind and Christopher Brooke write that, following the first Crusades, the plenary indulgence, “led to other forms…of methods to escape the pains of purgatory altogether for Christians who sought such escape in the state of grace.” [1] They indicate further that lesser indulgences became far more common, often associated with pilgrimage sites* or specific relics. According to Jonathan Sumption, by the end of the 14th Century plenary indulgences were being offered by many churches. [2]
In the mid 1400s, Pope Paul II revised the Jubilee Indulgence: pilgrimage to Rome was no longer necessary and Christians could obtain the indulgence by giving money to local bishops. Indulgences for the dead began in 1476 when Pope Sixtus IV extended indulgences to all souls already in purgatory. Sumption argues that this practice can be traced in rudimentary form to the 9th Century and cites Thomas Aquinas’ argument that, “a man could gain an indulgence in two ways, by fulfilling the conditions himself or…by fulfilling them vicariously.” [3]
Pope Alexander VI introduced a rosary indulgence in 1495. By 1517 Martin Luther questioned the abuse of indulgences after Pope Leo X’s newly promulgated indulgence was perceived to offer remission from sins not yet committed. Reforming indulgences was one of the few changes addressed by the 1545 Council of Trent and Pope Pius V eliminated all indulgences involving exchanges of money in 1456.
Summary
Indulgences were directly linked to an expanding view of Purgatory in the early medieval church and rapidly became a source of immense revenue. An integral part of the popular religious culture, indulgences brought Christians to sacred pilgrimage sites, churches and monasteries exhibiting relics, and to Rome itself where faithful pilgrims could conceivable erase thousands of years off their sojourn in purgatory.
* The Basilica of St. Paul outside the Walls, below, is one of four Roman Basilicas that open Jubilee doors. Pilgrims entering through these doors during a Jubilee year received special indulgences.
[1] Rosalind and Christopher Brooke, Popular Religion in the Middle Ages: Western Europe 1000-1300 (London: Thames and Hudson, 1984) 153-154
[2] and [3] Jonathan Sumption, Pilgrimage: An Image of Medieval Religion (Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1975) 293-296
See also:
Charles Panati, Sacred Origins of Profound Things: The Stories Behind The Rites And Rituals Of The World’s Religions (New York: Penguin Group, 1996)
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