Waldenses

Specific details of the life of Peter Waldo are largely unknown.

Extant sources relate that he was a wealthy clothier and merchant from Lyons and a man of some learning.

Sometime shortly before the year 1160, he had been inspired by a series of events, firstly, after hearing a sermon on the life of St. Alexius, secondly, when rejection of transubstantiation was made a capital crime, thirdly, the sudden and unexpected death of a friend during an evening meal.

From this point onward, he had begun living a radical Christian life giving his property over to his wife, while the remainder of his belongings he distributed as alms to the poor.

At about this time, Waldo began to preach and teach publicly, based on his ideas of simplicity and poverty, notably that "No man can serve two masters, God and mammon" accompanied by strong condemnations of Papal excesses and Catholic dogmas, including purgatory and transubstantiation, while accusing them of being the harlot from the book of Revelation.

By 1170, he has gathered a large number of followers who are referred to as the Poor of Lyons, the Poor of Lombardy, or the Poor of God, who spread their teaching abroad while disguised as peddlers.

Often referred to as the Waldensians (or Waldenses), they are distinct from the Albigensians or Cathari.

Pope Lucius has disputed with the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I over the disposal of the territories of the late Countess Matilda of Tuscany.

The controversy over the succession to the inheritance of the Countess had been left unsettled by an agreement of 1177, and the Emperor had proposed in 1182 that the Curia should renounce its claim, receiving in exchange two-tenths of the imperial income from Italy, one-tenth for the Pope and the other tenth for the cardinals.

Lucius had consented neither to this proposition nor to another compromise suggested by Frederick I the next year, nor does a personal discussion between the two potentates at Verona in October 1184 lead to any definite result.

In the meantime, other causes of disagreement had appeared when the Pope refused to comply with Frederick I's wishes as to the regulation of German episcopal elections which had taken place during the schism, especially as regards a contested election to the See of Treves in 1183.

During the conflict between Frederick I and the papacy, the problem of heresy requires a political solution.

In November 1184, Pope Lucius III, aiming to abolish completely Christian heresy, decrees in Ad abolendam that all "counts, barons, rectors, [and] consuls of cities and other places" who do not join in the struggle against heresy when called upon to do so will be excommunicated and their territories placed under interdict—and declares that these provisions join the apostolic authority of the church with the sanction of imperial power.

Among the particular sects mentioned in Ad abolendam are the Cathars, Humiliati, Waldensians, Arnoldists, and Josephines.

More important than the direct attack on heresy, however, is the stipulation of equal measures for those who support heretics, overtly or indirectly.

Those accused of heresy, if they cannot prove their innocence or forswear their errors, or if they backslide into error subsequently, are to be handed over to the lay authorities to receive their animadversio debita ("due penalty").

All those who support heresy are to be deprived of their many rights: the right to hold public office, the right to trial, the right to draft a will, and the hereditability of their fiefs and offices.

For the enforcement of the measures demanded by the decretal, Lucius obligates all patriarchs, archbishops, and bishops to re-announce the excommunication on certain feasts and holidays.

Those who do not observe this for three years consecutively are to be deprived of their ecclesiastical offices.

The bishops are furthermore obligated to "seek out" heretics.

They are to make bi- or triannual rounds of their dioceses, visiting locations of suspicion and question the people about the existence of heresy.

The people will be required to swear under oath (compurgation) anything they know about heretical activity.

All oath-breakers are to be treated as heretics.

Though largely ineffective, the document serves as tinder for the eventual flames of the Albigensian Crusade and the Inquisitions.

Contrary to what is often said, Pope Lucius did not institute the Inquisition, which will not be created until the reign of Pope Gregory IX in 1234.

The Waldensian movement has been characterized from the beginning by lay preaching, voluntary poverty and strict adherence to the Bible.

Between 1175-1185, Peter Waldo has either commissioned a cleric from Lyons to translate the New Testament into the vernacular, the Arpitan (Franco-Provençal) language or has himself been involved in this translation work.

Regardless of the source of translation, he is credited with providing to Europe the first translation of the Bible in a 'modern tongue' outside of Latin.

Waldo and one of his disciples had gone in 117 to Rome, where they were welcomed by Pope Alexander III, and the Roman Curia.

They had had to explain their faith before a panel of three clergymen, including issues which were then debated within the Church, as the universal priesthood, the gospel in the vulgar tongue, and the issue of self-imposed poverty.

The results of the meeting were inconclusive, and Waldo's ideas, but not the movement itself, had been condemned at the Third Lateran Council in the same year, though the leaders of the movement had not been yet excommunicated.

Driven away from Lyons, Waldo and his followers have settled in the high valleys of Piedmont, and in France, in the Luberon.

Finally, Waldo had been excommunicated by Pope Lucius III during the synod held at Verona in 1184.

Folquet de Marselha, initially famed as a troubadour, is elected Bishop of Toulouse in 1205, after two Cistercian Papal legates had been sent to the region to reform it.

Pope Innocent III is particularly concerned by the prevalence of both heresy and episcopal corruption in the Languedoc and uses the Cistercians to combat both.

The legates had deposed the previous Bishop, Raimon de Rabastens, and were probably instrumental in arranging Folquet's nomination for the position.

Diego de Acebo, bishop of Osma from 1201, had traveled to Denmark via southern France in 1203 or 1204, accompanied by his canon, Dominic de Guzmán, to secure a bride for crown prince Ferdinand, son of Alfonso VIII of Castile.

When they crossed the Pyrenees into southern France, Dominic and Diego had encountered the Cathars, a Christian religious sect with gnostic and dualistic beliefs, viewed by the Roman Catholic Church as heretical.

The Cathars ordain women as well as men; their clergy are celibate, vowed to poverty, and not subject to the pontiff's rule.

They made a second journey in 1204 or 1205 intending to bring the girl back with them, but found that she had meanwhile died.

They returned by way of Rome, where Diego had unsuccessfully petitioned Pope Innocent III to be entrusted with a mission to the northern pagans.

Instead, continuing their journey via Citeaux, Diego and Dominic have begun the work of conversion of the Cathars.

Folquet, as Bishop of Toulouse (now traditionally referred to by his proper name, Foulques, Fulk, or Folc, instead of the diminutive Folquet) takes a very active role in combatting heresy.

Throughout his episcopal career he will seek to create and encourage outlets for religious enthusiasms that are Catholic in an effort to woo believers away from preachers of heresy (primarily Cathar and Waldensian).

In 1206, he creates what will become the convent of Prouille to offer women a religious community that would rival (and, where necessary, replace) those of the Cathars.

The Poor of Lyon, the Poor of Lombardy, or the Poor of God, are also referred to as the Waldensians (or Waldenses), after their leader, Peter Waldo, who had been excommunicated by Pope Lucius III during the synod held at Verona in 1184.

Distinct from the Albigensians or Cathars, their ideas had been condemned in 1179 at the Third Lateran Council.

Driven away from Lyon, Waldo and his followers have settled in the high valleys of Piedmont, and in France, in the Luberon.

Waldo and his followers have developed a system whereby they go from town to town and meet secretly with small groups of Waldensians, confessing sins and holding service.

A traveling Waldensian preacher is known as a barba, and there is even record of some women holding this office.

The group shelters and house the barba and helps make arrangements to move on to the next town in secret.

Diego de Acebo, who had been instrumental in the foundation of Prouille, had taken part in the early Cathar-Catholic debates at Verfeil, Pamiers and Montréal, but was soon afterwards ordered by the Pope to return to his diocese, where he dies on December 30, 1207.

Bishop Foulques had participated in the initial preaching mission of Dominic de Guzman that was led by Dominic's superior, Bishop Diego of Osma.

He continues to support this new form of preaching after Bishop Diego's death by backing Dominic and his followers, eventually allotting the nascent Dominicans property and a portion of the tithes of Toulouse to ensure their continued success.

Durand of Huesca, one of Peter Waldo's early companions, had converted to Catholicism after debating with Bishop Diego and Dominic.

Durand later went to Rome where he professed the Catholic faith to Innocent III.

Innocent gives him permission to establish the Poor Catholics, a mendicant order, which continues the Waldensian preaching mission against the Cathars.

Recruits are taken from the Pauperes Lugdunenses (the original name of the Waldensians); the distinguishing name is given by Pope Innocent III. (The Franciscans and Dominicans, both of which form in this era, will later supplant the Poor Catholics.)

French ecclesiastic Pierre de Castenau, born in the diocese of Montpellier, was in 1199 archdeacon of Maguelonne, and was appointed by Pope Innocent III as one of the legates for the suppression of the Cathar heresy in Languedoc.

In 1202, when a monk in the Cistercian abbey of Fontfroide, Narbonne, he had been designated to similar work, first in Toulouse, and afterwards at Viviers and Montpellier.

In 1207 he was in the Rhone valley and in Provence, where he had become involved in the strife between the count of Baux and the powerful count Raymond VI of Toulouse.

Raymond had refused to assist and was excommunicated in May 1207.

The Pope has called upon the French king, Philip II, to act against those nobles who permit Catharism, but Pierre has declined to act.

Count Raymond meets with the papal legate on January 13, 1208, and after an angry meeting, Castelnau is murdered the following day near Saint-Gilles, supposedly at Raymond's instigation.