Demonic Possession and Exorcism

In Early Modern France

Sarah Ferber

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781134615193
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

This is a highly original study of demon possession and the ritual of exorcism, both of which were rife in early modern times, and which reached epidemic proportions in France.Catholics at the time believed that the Devil was everywhere present, in the rise of the heretics, in the activities of witches, and even in the bodies of pious young women. The rite of exorcism was intended to heal the possessed and show the power of the Church - but it generated as many problems as it resolved. Possessed nuns endured frequently violent exorcisms, exorcists were suspected of conjuring devils, and possession itself came to be seen as a form of holiness, elevating several women to the status of living saints. Sarah Ferber offers a challenging study of one of the most intriguing phenomena of early modern Europe. Looking towards the present day, the book also argues that early modern conflicts over the Devil still carry an unexpected force and significance for Western Christianity.

Part I

Chapter 1
Scepticism and Catholic reform

Introductory remarks

Around 1530, the Spanish Franciscan reformer Pedro Ciruelo wrote: 'In order to create greater confusion, the devil has invented certain exorcisms quite similar to those used by the Holy Catholic Church against demons who are reluctant to abandon human bodies.'¹ This observation encapsulates the problem of exorcism for the early modern Catholic church: the devil was the Ape of God, and could hold sway when untutored observation allowed him the opportunity to imitate holiness. Ciruelo's comment is a disarmingly frank admission of the difficulty of discerning licit from illicit exorcism, a statement indicative of the troubled mood of educated Catholic sentiment in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. The ability to know when the devil was at work was the most pressing of a range of aspects of Catholic sacramental religiosity which preoccupied reformers, and it underpinned many other anxieties. Reformers targeted the problem of reliance on physical appearances as against spiritual realities — the evidence of the flesh taken over that of the spirit — and feared that for many believers the physical effects of sacramental practices were consistently elevated over the spiritual. The risk of over-reliance on the physical realm was seen as inhering in the magical practices of the unlettered — especially practices associated with healing and fertility — and in flamboyant clerical healing rituals, of which exorcism of the possessed, especially in public, was one of the most troubling.

These critiques also convey a sense that there existed a considerable 'hinterland' of exorcism practices (to use Clark's word), which were carried on with relatively little written publicity.² In the absence of a triumphal literature of exorcism, which was to emerge only later in the sixteenth century, these texts give us a clue as to what practising exorcists were actually doing. They suggest that exorcism at the local pastoral level was taking place everywhere. Clerics like Ciruelo feared the devil lurked in such activities, eager to capitalise on the gullibility of laity and uneducated clergy alike. They portrayed the uneducated and those bent on material and physical benefits alone as the permeable points through which the devil's destructive power was able to seep into the body of the Church.

Several other Catholic commentators from this period, with otherwise divergent agendas, wrote hostile accounts of apparently widespread exorcism practices. The Dominican witch-hunters and authors of the Malleus Maleficarum, Heinrich Krämer (Institoris) and Jakob Sprenger, along with the humanist Desiderius Erasmus, and another Spanish cleric, Manuel de Castañega, levelled criticisms that in some ways prefigured — or later, paralleled — emergent evangelical Protestant views; they also reflected a long historical anxiety about sacramentals in the Catholic church. These authors wanted to streamline Catholic practice, without abandoning its central tenets regarding sacramental forms. It is important to realise that scepticism and credulity in this context were not naturally at odds.³ Rather, achieving certainty in sacramental practices always required a degree of scepticism. Scepticism itself was not new, having been present in the Church since late antiquity; indeed it could be said that a measure of scepticism had been essential to the Church's institutional survival. What was new in this early reform era was the relative unanimity with which scepticism was expressed. Where Protestants on the Continent largely denied the need for physical proofs of divine action, the preoccupying theme of Catholic reformist writing in this period was the need for discernment between otherwise indistinguishable divine, human, and diabolical causes of events.

In the face of growing anxiety about the powers of the devil an almost uniformly critical view of the ancient rite of exorcism was emerging, part of an ongoing critique of so-called superstitions. This tendency had been escalating since the late fourteenth century, and coincided with the intellectualist reforms of the Conciliar era and attendant anxiety about flourishing popular practices. Learned critiques imposed an imperative of distinction, or hierarchy, between ritual objects and forms. The hope was to eradicate excess, 'vanity', reliance on external signs and, in the worst case, diabolism among exorcists themselves.⁴ There was an effort to centralise and prescribe ritual, to prevent the proliferation of highly localised forms of practice. Catholic reformers sought to distinguish licit from illicit in order (at least implicitly) to preserve as valid the inner core of an inherently labile set of beliefs. Ciruelo's treatise and other works aimed to educate readers — presumably the theologically uncertain lower clergy — in how to make just such necessary distinctions, teasing out holy from unholy exorcisms.⁵ Yet almost every feature of exorcism practice seemed to expose some kind of thorny theological dilemma.

As Ciruelo indicated, the mixing of holy and unholy in the practice of exorcism put even potentially licit exorcisms in jeopardy. Ciruelo continued his critique, saying: 'In these diabolical exorcisms, gross expressions as well as superstitious formulas are mixed with holy and pious words.'⁶ Manuel de Castañega likewise deplored the mixing of holy and unholy, and forbad the use of otherwise licit amulets in tandem with 'suspicious and superstitious words and figures.'⁷ The authors of the Malleus sought to separate holy from profane usages. They stipulated, for example, that charms should contain no 'written characters beyond the sign of the Cross'.⁸ They also urged practitioners to focus on the meaning of the holy words they uttered, thereby joining together theology and performance, and implicitly challenging the magical element of practices whose very mystique could derive from the incomprehension of healers, or more, especially, their clients. Reinforcing this concern to purge practices which relied on method over meaning, Institoris and Sprenger required that exorcists place 'no faith in the method' of blessing itself, but rather in God's will, as the source of any success they achieved.⁹ It cannot be stressed enough that these anxieties were not new. As early as the fourth century, at the Council of Carthage, church officials had warned exorcists not to devise their own rites: the Council proclaimed that the choice of formulae to be used by an exorcist should not be 'abandoned to the liberty of particular exorcists'; to prevent exorcists from making up the rite as they went along, the Council instructed them to receive the formula of exorcism 'from the hands of the bishop' and to commit it to memory.¹⁰

Exorcists letting possessing 'devils' speak, or even preach, under the authority of the exorcist, presented perhaps the stickiest commingling of holy and unholy. The devil could potentially have access to accurate knowledge through his own heightened powers of learning, and he could even know theological truths. Critically, though, he was also likely make his own blend, unannounced, and in that way steal ground from the Church and lead souls to perdition. Ciruelo therefore rejected the practice of interrogating demons, in which exorcists held 'a prolonged discussion with the devil' and performed 'other actions that resemble a lawsuit or a trial'.¹¹ He argued that the devil 'desires greatly to preach and speak publicly to men, because then, like a dragon, he can inject much poison into the hearts of his listeners, which poison will lead to their damnation'.¹² Yet it is also important to recall that there was a measure of credible historical support for such practices. In the gospels the devil correctly identifies Christ as the son of God.¹³ Similarly, as part of early Christian proselytism, Gregory of Tours showed relics to the 'devils' of the possessed outside a temple, pointing to their reaction as proof to the pagans of the relics' authenticity and power.¹⁴ Thus demonstrations of diabolic presence paradoxically offered proof of God's presence and authority.¹⁵

Other evidence suggested the acceptance of such practices if they served some holy purpose. The abbot Caesarius of Heisterbach, writing in the thirteenth century, told the story of a cleric who conjured the devil at the behest of his bishop, in order to reveal the secret means whereby heretics seemed resistant to injury.¹⁶ Caesarius made no comment on the use of an evil force to bring about good ends, a practice generally condemned by the Church and repeatedly opposed in the early modern era. An example of the persistence of such forbearance may be found, however, in a large c. 1500 tapestry from the Cathedral of Auxerre, now housed in the Cluny Museum, depicting a tale from the medieval Golden Legend of Jacob of Voragine. It illustrates the story of Eudoxia, a possessed woman whose demons prophesied.¹⁷ The panels show that devils, acting on divine instruction, refused to leave Eudoxia's body until God's will had been fulfilled, through the burial of St Laurent and St Denis in Rome. Eudoxia in this legend was both host and hostage to the devil.¹⁸ Most importantly, the image of her demons helping to fulfil their own prophecy by departing was commissioned by a bishop, Jean III Baillet, and on full display — apparently uncontroversially — in a cathedral. How to account for this? Perhaps even in the early stages of an era when theologically oriented works were critical of exorcism, artistic and fabulous representations at the elite level may have remained relatively unaffected. Clearly, any imputation that either Eudoxia or her exorcists were collaborating with the devil was not seen as important, yet such a preoccupation appears to have coloured most of the views articulated in the era 1480-1550.

The exorcist-as-impresario was especially dangerous not only if he were fooled by the devil, but worse, if he were in league with him. Ciruelo and Castañega explicitly accused exorcists of sorcery. Ciruelo referred to any exorcist who conducts dialogues with devils as an 'evil and superstitious sorcerer,'¹⁹ while Castañega said: 'The devil himself will also aid in an exorcism by leaving the premises in order to contract a discipleship with that exorcist or sorcerer, who would be more daring to gain a foothold in similar businesses, seeing that his exorcisms worked so well.'²⁰ Castañega condemned the practice whereby devils left the bodies of the possessed 'with license to return to the same body the next day',²¹ saying that this could only result from 'an express diabolical pact'.²² However, this kind of 'exorcism by postponement' appears to have been a recognised practice. Caesarius tells the story of a woman whose devil, when adjured to leave her, said: 'It is not yet the will of the Most High.'²³ When an abbot adjured the demon to depart, the demon said: '"The Most High does not yet will it; for two years longer I shall dwell in her; after that time she will be delivered from me . . ." which indeed actually came to pass'.²⁴ Caesarius, whose writings were sources of only the mildest religious instruction, made no comment on the validity of such an exorcism, an absence which might seem to underscore the shift suggested by the anxieties of writers in the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century reforming era. It is worth recalling, however, that Christ's own conjurations (Mark 3:22) had led him to be accused of using demons to cast out demons.²⁵ This accusation posed a profound problem, only surmountable by faith in Christ's own defence of his claim to be the son of God. While the gospels portrayed this accusation as unjust, the slur nonetheless articulated a suspicion which formed a major part of the Church's ongoing internal critiques of exorcisms: the perception that exorcists practised magic.

The possibility that exorcists were conjurors is of course one which found echoes in Protestant critiques of the Catholic priesthood, especially in relation to the Mass. It is an accusation which highlights more generally the problems of church magic, a field of operation whose limits historically, and increasingly in this period, were seen as needing to be patrolled. Yet because this was an area of theological and historical ambiguity, the Catholic project of discernment in these matters was almost certain to derail. Inconsistencies between the assertions of the authors of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century, for example, belie the radical and authoritative image they were trying to promote. Let us consider a few examples. The authors of the Malleus at one point sought to distinguish the practice of exorcists rounding up infesting serpents into a pit to destroy them from the ritual expulsion of serpents 'for a useful purpose, such as driving them away from men's houses'.²⁶ While the distinction seems to relate to private over public ritual, the authors do not say this, and in asserting such a distinction, they might fairly be said to have been toiling with their logic. And Ciruelo refutes altogether the use of exorcisms against animals.²⁷

A comparison between Erasmus and Castañega is more revealing. In his 1524 colloquy, 'Exorcism', Erasmus rehearsed the things which amused and irritated him about what he saw as superstitious exorcist bumbling:

A large vessel filled with holy water was brought. In addition, a sacred stole (as it's called), with the opening verses of St John's Gospel hanging from it, was draped over Faunus' shoulders. In his pockets he had a waxen image of the kind blessed annually by the pope and known as an Agnus Dei. Long ago — before a Franciscan cowl became so formidable — people used to protect themselves by this armor against harmful demons.²⁸

Erasmus's mention of St John's gospel refers to one of the most common practices of exorcists and an element of church magic much favoured since at least the eleventh century: the recitation of the words of St John. These words refer to the Incarnation, an especially apt evocation it would seem, in the struggle against habitation of the body by demons. Yet Castañega, scathing of exorcists in so many ways, nonetheless prescribes reading out the gospel of St John (1:1) 'In principio erat verbum with much faith' among the licit means of exorcism. Castañega adds that the exorcist 'should reverently kneel with much devotion at the phrase Verbum caro factum [John 1:14], kissing the earth with much humility in memory of the son of God, who to free us from the devil and his power descended from heaven to earth, taking our nature in the virginal womb of Our Lady the Virgin Mary'.²⁹ He describes as licit other behaviours and rituals which would seem to be ruled out by the anti-materialism of someone like Erasmus, recommending, for example, that the exorcist wear 'some true relics around his neck with the Gospel of In principio'.³⁰ In so doing, Castañega appears to see as acceptable the kind of paraphernalia which Erasmus cites as objectionable.

It seems that what we are seeing he...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Part I
• Part II
• Part III
• Conclusion
• Notes
• Selected bibliography
• Index