Goa Inquisition

The Goa Inquisition (Portuguese: Inquisição de Goa, Portuguese pronunciation: [ĩkizɨˈsɐ̃w dɨ ˈɣoɐ]) was an extension of the Portuguese Inquisition in Portuguese India. Its objective was to enforce Catholic orthodoxy and allegiance to the Apostolic See.

The inquisition primarily focused on the New Christians accused of secretly practising their former religions, and Old Christians accused of involvement in the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century. Also among the targets were those suspected of committing sodomy; they were given the second most harsh punishments. The inquisition was established in 1560, briefly stopped from 1774 to 1778, and was reconvened and continued until it was finally abolished in 1812.

Crypto-Hinduism practiced by the Goan Catholics was viewed as a challenge to the Church's doctrine. Those accused of such practices were often instructed to confess and realign with Catholic teachings. Imprisonment, torture, death penalties, and intimidating people into exile were used by the Inquisition to enforce Catholic religious control. The Inquisitors also seized and burned books written in Sanskrit, Dutch, English, or Konkani, as they were suspected of containing teachings that deviated from Catholic doctrine or promoted Protestant, Hindu or Muslim doctrine. The Inquisitors aimed to ensure Catholic teachings were absolutely enforced.

The aims of the Portuguese Empire in Asia were trading spices, spreading Christianity, and suppressing Islam (due to the Al-Andalus Islamic rule of Iberia which lasted 781 years). The Portuguese were motivated by both missionary fervor and economic incentive. Examples of this include the Madura Mission of Roberto de Nobili, the Jesuit mission to the court of the Mughal emperor Akbar, as well as the subjugation of the Malankara Church to the Latin Church at the Synod of Diamper in 1599.

In 1545, Francis Xavier wrote to King John III of Portugal requesting a Goan Inquisition. Between the Inquisition's beginning in 1561 and its temporary abolition in 1774, around 16,000 persons were brought to trial. Portuguese authorities sought to enforce Catholic doctrine in Goa. When the Inquisition ended in 1812, the majority of its records were destroyed by Portuguese officials, making it difficult to determine the exact figures of those prosecuted and the nature of their cases. However, the few records that remain indicate that approximately 57 individuals across the 249 year long inquisition were sentenced to execution for significant religious transgressions, while an additional 64 were symbolically condemned after they had died in custody. These numbers reflect the rarity of such punishments amid efforts to enforce compulsory Catholicism over many decades, partly because people avoided prosecution by fleeing Goa.

From the 1590s onwards, the Goan Inquisition was the most intense, as practices like offerings to local deities were perceived as witchcraft. This became the central focus of the Inquisition in the East in the 17th century.

In Goa, the Inquisition also prosecuted violators observing Hindu or Muslim rituals or festivals, and persons who interfered with Portuguese attempts to convert local Muslims and Hindus. The laws of the Goa Inquisition sought to strengthen the spread of Catholicism in the region by criminalising practices that conflicted with Catholic teachings. In this context, the Inquisition prohibited conversion to Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism, as well as restricted the use of Konkani and Sanskrit, languages associated with Hindu religious practices. These measures were intended to force Catholicism on the local population. Although the Goa Inquisition ended in 1812, discrimination against Hindus under Portuguese rule continued in other forms such as the Xenddi tax implemented from 1705 to 1840, which was similar to the jizya levy.

Background

The Inquisition in Portugal

Ferdinand and Isabella were married in 1469, thereby uniting the Iberian kingdoms of Aragon and Castile into Spain. In 1492, they expelled the Jewish population of Spain, many of whom then moved to Portugal. Within five years, ideas of anti-Judaism and Inquisition were adopted in Portugal. Instead of another expulsion, the King of Portugal ordered the forced conversion of the Jews in 1497, and these were called New Christians or Crypto-Jews. He stipulated that the validity of their conversions would not be investigated for two decades. In 1506 in Lisbon, there was a massacre of several hundred conversos or marranos, as newly converted Jews or New Christians were called, instigated by the preaching of two Spanish Dominicans. Some persecuted Jews fled Portugal for the New World in the Americas. Others went to Asia as traders, settling in India.

These ideas and the practice of Inquisition on behalf of the Holy Office of Catholic Church was spread by the missionaries and colonial administrators of Portugal to Portuguese colonies such as Estado da India. One of the most notable New Christians was Garcia de Orta, who emigrated to Goa in 1534. He was posthumously convicted of Judaism. The Goa Inquisition enforced by the Portuguese Christians was not unusual, as similar tribunals operated in South American colonies during the same centuries such as the Lima Inquisition and the Brazil Inquisition under the Lisbon tribunal. Like the Goa Inquisition, these tribunals arrested suspects, interrogated and convicted them, and issued punishments for secretly practising religious beliefs different from Christianity.

Portuguese arrival and conquest

Goa was founded and built by ancient Hindu kingdoms and had served as a capital of the Kadamba dynasty. In the late 13th century, a Muslim invasion led to the plunder of Goa by Malik Kafur on behalf of Alauddin Khilji and an Islamic occupation. In the 14th century, Vijayanagara Hindu rulers conquered and occupied it. It became a part of the Bahmani Sultanate in the 15th century, and thereafter was under the rule of Sultan Adil Shah of Bijapur when Vasco da Gama reached Kozhekode (Calicut) in 1498.

After da Gama's return, Portugal sent an armed fleet to conquer and create a colony in India. In 1510, the Portuguese Admiral Afonso de Albuquerque (c. 1453–1515) launched a series of campaigns to take Goa, wherein the Portuguese ultimately prevailed. The Christian Portuguese were assisted by the Hindu Vijayanagara Empire's regional agent Timmayya in their attempt to capture Goa from the Muslim ruler Adil Shah. Goa became the centre of Portuguese colonial possessions in India and activities in other parts of Asia. It also served as the key and lucrative trading centre between the Portuguese and the Hindu Vijayanagara Empire and Muslim Bijapur Sultanate to its east. Wars continued between the Bijapur Sultanate and the Portuguese forces for decades.

Introduction of the Inquisition to India

After da Gama returned to Portugal from his maiden voyage to India, Pope Nicholas V issued the Papal bull Romanus Pontifex. This granted a padroado from the Holy See, giving Portugal the responsibility, monopoly right and patronage for the propagation of the Catholic Christian faith in newly discovered areas, along with exclusive rights to trade in Asia on behalf of the Catholic Empire. From 1515 onwards, Goa served as the centre of missionary efforts under Portugal's royal patronage (Padroado) to expand Catholic Christianity in Asia. Similar padroados were also issued by the Vatican in the favour of Spain and Portugal in South America in the 16th century. The padroado mandated the building of churches and support for Catholic missions and evangelism activities in the new lands, and brought these under the religious jurisdiction of the Vatican. The Jesuits were the most active of the religious orders in Europe that participated under the padroado mandate in the 16th and 17th centuries.

The establishment of the Portuguese on the Western coast of India was of particular interest to the New Christians population of Portugal who were suffering harshly under the Portuguese Inquisition. The crypto-Jewish targets of the Inquisition in Portugal began flocking to Goa, and their community reached considerable proportions. India was attractive for Jews who had been forcibly baptized in Portugal for a variety of reasons. One reason was that India was home to ancient, well-established Jewish communities. Jews who had been forcibly converted could approach these communities, and re-join their former faith if they chose to do so, without having to fear for their lives as these areas were beyond the scope of the Inquisition. Another reason was the opportunity to engage in trade (of spices, diamonds, etc.) from which New Christians in Portugal had been restricted at the onset of the Portuguese Inquisition. In his book, The Marrano Factory, Professor Antonio Saraiva of the University of Lisbon details the strength of the New Christians on the economic front by quoting a 1613 document written by attorney, Martin de Zellorigo. Zellorigo writes regarding "the Men of the Nation" (a term used for Jewish New Christians): "For in all of Portugal there is not a single merchant (hombre de negocios) who is not of this Nation. These people have their correspondents in all lands and domains of the king our lord. Those of Lisbon send kinsmen to the East Indies to establish trading-posts where they receive the exports from Portugal, which they barter for merchandise in demand back home. They have outposts in the Indian port cities of Goa and Cochin and in the interior. In Lisbon and in India nobody can handle the trade in merchandise except persons of this Nation. Without them, His Majesty will no longer be able to make a go of his Indian possessions, and will lose the 600,000 ducats a year in duties which finance the whole enterprise – from equipping the ships to paying the seamen and soldiers". The Portuguese reaction to the New Christians in India came in the form of bitter letters of complaint and polemics that were written, and sent to Portugal by secular and ecclesiastical authorities; these complaints were about trade practices, and the abandonment of Catholicism. In particular, the first archbishop of Goa Dom Gaspar de Leao Pereira, was extremely critical of the New Christian presence, and was highly influential in petitioning for the establishment of the Inquisition in Goa.

Portugal also sent missionaries to Goa, and its colonial government supported the Christian mission with incentives for baptizing Hindus and Muslims into Christians. A diocese was established in Goa in 1534. In 1542, Martim Afonso de Sousa was appointed the new Governor of Portuguese India. He arrived in Goa with the Society of Jesus co-founder Francis Xavier. By 1548, the Portuguese colonists had completed fourteen churches in the colony.

The surviving records of missionaries from 16th to 17th century, states Délio de Mendonça, extensively stereotypes and criticizes the gentiles, a term that broadly referred to Hindus. To European missionaries, the Gentiles of India that were not outright hostile were superstitious, weak and greedy. One missionary claimed that Indians converted to Christianity for material benefits such as jobs or clothing gifts; freedom in the case of slaves kept by the Hindus and Muslims; and marriage to Christian women in the case of unmarried non-Christian men. After baptism, these new converts continued to practice their old religion in secret in the manner similar to crypto-Jews who had been forcibly converted to Christianity in Portugal earlier. Jesuit missionaries considered this a threat to the purity of Catholic Christian belief and pressed for Inquisition in order to punish the crypto-Hindus, crypto-Muslims and crypto-Jews, thereby ending the heresy.

The Goa Inquisition adapted the directives issued between 1545 and 1563 by the Council of Trent to Goa and other Indian colonies of Portugal. This included attacking Hindu customs, active preaching to increase the number of Christian converts, fighting enemies of Catholic Christians, uprooting behaviours that were deemed to be heresies and maintaining the purity of Catholic faith. The Portuguese accepted the caste system thereby attracting the elites of the local society, states Mendonça, because Europeans of the sixteenth century had their estate system and held that social divisions and hereditary royalty were divinely established. It was the festivals, syncretic religious practices and other traditional customs that were identified as heresy, relapses and shortcomings of the natives needing a preventative and punitive Inquisition.

Controversy regarding Saint Francis Xavier's involvement

Saint Francis Xavier led an extensive mission into Asia, mainly the Portuguese Empire in the East, and was influential in evangelisation work, most notably in early modern India. He was extensively involved in the missionary activity in Portuguese India. In 1546, Francis Xavier proposed the establishment of the Goan Inquisition in a letter addressed to the Portuguese King, John III where he wrote

By another route I have written to your highness of the great need there is in India for preachers... The second necessity which obtains in India, if those who live there are to be good Christians, is that your highness should institute the holy Inquisition; for there are many who live according to the law of Moses or the law of Muhammad without any fear of God or shame before men

He furthermore advocated for greater action by the Portuguese governor for the propagation of Christianity in Goa going as far as threatening the official with severe punishment in case of failure:

Let the king warn the governor that] "should he fail to take active steps for the great increase of our faith, you are determined to punish him, and inform him with a solemn oath that, on his return to Portugal, all his property will be forfeited for the benefit of the Santa Misericordia, and beyond this tell him that you will keep him in irons for a number of years ... There is no better way of ensuring that all in India become Christians than that your highness should inflict severe punishment on a governor

The inquisition was declared two decades after he left Goa, and the main laws were implemented in 1567, about 25 years after his departure and 8 years after his death. Around 472 years passed since his death and transfer of relics back to Old Goa.

The letter cited was one written to King John III of Portugal, dated 20 January 1545 (three years after leaving Goa) from Malacca in the Malay archipelago, in response to the scandalous lifestyle of the Portuguese sailors who had made the port city home, where he criticizes John III himself (something very rare at that time) about his officials who only care about collecting taxes and not about maintaining discipline amongst his subjects, and hence asks that a separate official with powers be sent to aid the old bishop to protect the new converts from ill-treatment from the undisciplined Portuguese commandants.

Launch of the Inquisition in India

Even before the Inquisition was launched, the local government in Goa tried persons for religious crimes and punished those convicted, as well as targeted Judaizing. A Portuguese order to destroy Hindu temples along with the seizure of Hindu temple properties and their transfer to the Catholic missionaries is dated 30 June 1541. Prior to authorizing of the Inquisition office in Goa in 1560, King John III of Portugal issued an order, on 8 March 1546, to forbid Hinduism, destroy Hindu temples, prohibit the public celebration of Hindu feasts, expel Hindu priests and severely punish those who created any Hindu images in Portuguese possessions in India.

A special religious tax was imposed before 1550 on Muslim mosques within Portuguese territory. Records suggest that a New Christian was executed by the Portuguese in 1539 for the religious crime of "heretical utterances". A Jewish converso or Christian convert named Jeronimo Dias was garrotted and burnt at the stake in Goa by the Portuguese, for the religious heresy of Judaizing in 1543 before the Goa Inquisition tribunal was formed.

The beginning of the Inquisition

Cardinal Henrique of Portugal sent Aleixo Díaz Falcão as the first inquisitor and established the first tribunal. The Goa Inquisition office was housed in the former palace of Sultan Adil Shah.

Various orders issued by the Goa Inquisition included:

All qadis were ordered out of Portuguese territory in 1567;

Non-Christians were forbidden from occupying any public office, and only a Christian could hold such an office;

Hindus were forbidden from producing any Christian devotional objects or symbols;

Hindu children whose father had died were required to be handed over to the Jesuits for conversion to Christianity;

Hindu women who converted to Christianity could inherit all of the property of their parents;

Hindu clerks in all village councils were replaced with Christians;

Christian ganvkars (freeholders) could make village decisions without any Hindu ganvkars present, however Hindu ganvkars could not make any village decisions unless all Christian ganvkars were present; in Goan villages with Christian majorities, Hindus were forbidden from attending village assemblies.

Christian members were to sign first on any proceedings, Hindus later;

In legal proceedings, Hindus were unacceptable as witnesses, only statements from Christian witnesses were admissible;

Hindu temples were demolished in Portuguese Goa, and Hindus were forbidden from building new temples or repairing old ones. A temple demolition squad of Jesuits was formed which actively demolished pre-16th century temples, with a 1569 royal letter recording that all Hindu temples in Portuguese colonies in India have been demolished and burnt down (desfeitos e queimados);

Hindu priests were forbidden from entering Portuguese Goa to officiate Hindu weddings.

Sephardic Jews living in Goa, many of whom had fled the Iberian Peninsula to escape the excesses of the Spanish Inquisition, were also persecuted in case they, or their ancestors, had fraudulently converted to Christianity. The narrative of Da Fonseca describes the violence and brutality of the inquisition. The records speak of the demand for hundreds of prison cells to accommodate the accused.

According to Benton, between 1561 and 1623, the Goa Inquisition brought 3,800 cases. This was a large number given that the total population of Goa was about 60,000 in the 1580s with an estimated Hindu population then about a third or 20,000.

Seventy-one autos de fé ("act of faith") were recorded, the grand spectacle of public penance often followed by convicted individuals being variously punished up to and including burning at the stake. In the first few years alone, over 4000 people were arrested. According to Machado, in its two-and-a-half centuries of existence in Goa, the Inquisition burnt 57 people to death at the stake and 64 in effigy, of whom 105 were men and 16 were women. The sentence of "burning in effigy" was applied to those convicted in absentia or who had died in prison; in the latter case, their remains were burned in a coffin at the same time as the effigy, which was hung up for public display. Others sentenced to various punishments totalled 4,046, of whom 3,034 were men and 1,012 were women. According to the Chronista de Tissuary (Chronicles of Tiswadi), the last auto de fé was held in Goa on 7 February 1773.

Implementation and consequences

An appeal to start the Inquisition in the Indian colonies of Portugal was sent by Vicar General Miguel Vaz. According to Indo-Portuguese historian Teotonio R. de Souza, the original requests targeted the "Moors" (Muslims), New Christian, Jews and those Hindus involved in propagating 'Gentility' and heresy, and it made Goa a centre of persecution operated by the Portuguese.

The colonial administration under demands of the Jesuits and Church Provincial Council of Goa in 1567 enacted anti-Hindu laws to end what the Catholics considered to be heretical conduct and to encourage conversions to Christianity. Laws were passed banning Christians from keeping Hindus in their employ, and the public worship of Hindus was deemed unlawful. Hindus were forced to assemble periodically in churches to listen to the Christian doctrine or to the criticism of their religion. Hindu books in Sanskrit and Marathi were burnt by the Goan Inquisition. It also forbade Hindu priests from entering Goa to officiate Hindu weddings. Violations resulted in various forms of punishment to non-Catholics such as fines, public flogging, banishment to Mozambique, imprisonment, execution, burning at stakes or burning in effigy under the orders of the Christian Portuguese prosecutors at the auto-da-fé.

The inquisition forced Hindus to flee Goa in large numbers and later the migration of its Christians and Muslims, from Goa to the surrounding regions that were not in the control of the Jesuits and Portuguese India. The Hindus responded to the destruction of their temples by recovering the images from the ruins of their older temples and using them to build new temples just outside the borders of the Portuguese controlled territories. In some cases where the Portuguese built churches on the spot the destroyed temples were, Hindus started annual processions that carry their gods and goddesses linking their newer temples to the site where the churches stand, after Portuguese colonial era ended.

Persecution of Goan Catholics

The Inquisition considered those Hindus who had converted to Catholicism, but continued to observe their former Hindu customs and cultural practices, as heretics. The Catholic missionaries aimed to eradicate indigenous languages such as Konkani and cultural practices such as ceremonies, fasts, growing of the tulsi plant in front of the house, the use of flowers and leaves for ceremony or ornament.

There were other far reaching changes that took place during the Portuguese occupation, these changes included the prohibition of traditional musical instruments and the prohibition of the singing of celebratory verses, which were replaced with Western music.

People were renamed when they converted and they were not permitted to use their original Hindu names. Alcohol was introduced and dietary habits changed dramatically so that foods which were once taboo, such as pork which is shunned by Muslims and beef which is shunned by Hindus, became part of the Goan diet.

Nevertheless, many Goan Catholics continued to observe some of their old cultural practices and Hindu customs. Some of those accused of Crypto-Hinduism were condemned to death. Such circumstances forced many to leave Goa and settle in the neighbouring kingdoms, of which a minority went to the Deccan and the vast majority went to Canara.

The Catholic descendants of Hindus were more likely to be prosecuted, although this could be due to their having been a higher proportion of the population. About 74% of those sentenced were charged with Crypto-Hinduism (practicing Hinduism privately despite being Christian officially), while Crypto-Muslims (practicing Islam privately despite being Christian officially) made up about 1.5% sentenced; 1.5% were tried for obstructing the operations of the Holy Office of the Inquisition. Most records of the nearly 250 years of Inquisition trials were burnt by the Portuguese after the Inquisition had been abolished. Those that have survived, such as those between 1782 and 1800, state that people continued to be tried and punished. A larger proportion of those arrested, tried and sentenced during the Goa Inquisition, according to António José Saraiva, came from the lowest social strata. The trial records suggest that the victims were not exclusively Hindus, but included members of other religions found in India as well as some Europeans.

Historian Severine Silva states that those who fled the Inquisition preferred to observe a mixture of Hindu customs and Catholic practices.

As the persecution increased, missionaries complained that the Bamonns (Brahmins) continued to perform the Hindu religious rites and Hindus defiantly increased their public religious ceremonies. This defiance by the Hindus, alleged the missionaries, motivated the recently converted Goan Catholics to participate in Hindu ceremonies and relapse into Hinduism. In addition, states Délio de Mendonça, there was a hypocritical difference between the preaching and the practices of the Portuguese who were living in Goa. The Portuguese Christians and many clergymen were gambling, spending extravagantly, practicing public concubinage, extorting money from the Indians, and engaging in sodomy and adultery. The "bad examples" of Portuguese Catholics were not universal and there were also "good examples" in which some Portuguese Catholics offered medical care to the Goan Catholics who were sick. However, the "good examples" were not strong enough when they were contrasted with the "bad examples", and the Portuguese betrayed their belief in their cultural superiority and their assumptions that "Hindus, Muslims, barbarians and pagans did not possess virtues and goodness", states Mendonça. Racial epithets such as negros and cachorros (dogs) were commonly used against the natives by the Portuguese.

In the later decades of the 250-year period of the Goa Inquisition, the Portuguese Catholic clergy discriminated against the Indian Catholic clergy because its members were the children of previously converted Catholic parents. The Goan Catholics were referred to as "black priests" and they were also stereotyped as being "ill-natured and ill-behaved by their very nature, lascivious, drunkards, etc. and, based on these stereotypes, they were considered most unworthy to receive the charge of the churches" in Goa. Friars who did not want to lose their careers and promotions alleged that unlike proper Europeans, those who grew up as native Catholics hated "white skinned" people because they were suffering from the "diabolic vice of pride". These racist accusations were used as grounds to keep the parishes and the institution of the clergy in Goa under the monopoly of the Portuguese Catholics rather than allow native Goan Catholics to rise in their ecclesiastical careers based on their merits.