The Tower by Alessandro Gallenzi

Author:Alessandro Gallenzi
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Alma Books

16

Venice, 2nd June 1592

The trial resumed after the three-hour intermission. The Patriarch and the nuncio did not return for the afternoon session, but asked their deputies to attend in their stead. Barbarigo ordered that the defendant be brought before the judges. Once Bruno was sworn in, Saluzzo continued his cross-examination.

The inquisitor asked him again if he had ever expressed in word or writing anything else which was contrary to the teachings of the Holy Church – in particular about the Incarnation of the second person – and Giordano repeated what he had declared in the morning, admitting that he had had doubts about this point, but saying he had taken comfort from the words of St Augustine, who wrote: “It is with awe that, when we speak of matters divine, we pronounce the word ‘person’, and we use it only out of necessity.”

“And I don’t think I have ever come across this term or figure of speech,” Bruno added, “in the Old or in the New Testament.”

Saluzzo examined his notes and took his time before continuing the interrogation. “Since you had doubts about the Incarnation of the Word,” he finally said, “what were your beliefs about Christ?”

Bruno was taken aback by the bluntness of that question.

“I… well, my understanding…”

“Your understanding?”

“My understanding is that… the divinity of the Word and the humanity of Christ met in one… individual being. I don’t see how the two natures can coexist in the same way as body and soul in a man.”

“Why?”

“Because there can be no relation between the infinite divine substance and the finite human nature. But I’ve only doubted the ineffable character of this union, without denying the authority of the Scriptures.”

“Give a precise answer to my question,” Saluzzo pressed on. “What were and are your beliefs about Christ? Now you’re saying that you’ve had doubts about how the two natures coexist – earlier on, you said you’ve long questioned the possibility of the Word being made flesh.”

“My only doubt about the Incarnation of the Word,” said Bruno, retaining his composure, “was that it didn’t seem to make sense from a theological point of view: the divine nature can only coexist with the human by way of assistentia, a kind of ‘presence’, as I explained before. But from this I didn’t infer anything contrary to the divinity of Christ, or of the suppositum divinum that is called Christ.”

Saluzzo lowered his eyes and paused, reading through his notes. That fiend was slipping away from him again. He kept changing his story and equivocating, resorting to the subtleties of rhetoric and the dazzling terms of Thomism. The inquisitor glanced up, and the look on Bruno’s face was one of haughty determination, of defiance. Gone was his sarcasm, gone were his angry manners and, more worryingly, gone was any trace of fear or dejection. Saluzzo realized that standing in front of him was one of the best minds of his age, fully in control of himself and resolved to fend off any attack.

“Very well,” he said.

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