The Index

Title page of the Index (1564)

The concern of the Catholic Church over books, which are considered dangerous to the faith or morals of the Church dates back a long time. But in 1559 the first catalog of banned books was actually published. The Index or at full length Index Librorum Prohibitorum (Latin for “Index of Forbidden Books”) was drawn up by order of Pope Paul IV and published by the Sacred Congregation of the Roman Inquisition. The list specified books as unholy, heretic or dangerous to the Catholic religion and included writings of Calvin, Luther, Zwingli, Erasmus, Machiavielli, the Koran etc. Some works were prohibited because of the words the author used or for the life of the author himself; sometimes for both. The Index was an implementation of the Roman Catholic Church to prevent the contamination of the faith or the corruption of morals through the reading of theologically flawed books.

With the invention of the printing press in Europe in the middle of the 15th Century, the problem of control increased. As more books were written, copied and increasingly widely disseminated, subversive and heretical ideas were spread beyond control. Therefore, the purpose of the Index was on the one hand to guide censors of what publications to authorize because printers were not free to publish books without official permission. On the other hand it condemned published books that were judged to be harmful regarding the Catholic believes. It is important to understand, that the Index was never a complete catalog of forbidden reading but those that ecclesiastical authority was asked to act upon. It is still unclear in which way the Index limited the spread of Protestant doctrines since they were already known and shared in Europe. Zophy claims that it at least “had a chilling effect on the freewheeling exchange of ideas that had been such a stimulating part of the Renaissance” (Zophy 264).

Fact is the last and 20th edition of the Index appeared in 1948. The complete publication of the list was suppressed not until 1966 under Pope Paul VI. Today the Index has the status of a historic document.

Sources:

Zophy 264

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/285220/Index-Librorum-Prohibitorum

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/indexlibrorum.asp