Talk:Friedrich Spee/Archive 1

Archive 1

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This article was automatically assessed because at least one article was rated and this bot brought all the other ratings up to at least that level. BetacommandBot 11:44, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Copying

Note: this entry has been taken in many cases word for word from http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14213b.htm

--131.111.247.135 (talk) 21:50, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

• The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XIV. Published 1912. Is now public domain. Evercat (talk) 23:02, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Belated thanks. Now this is highlighted as the first item in the References section. —Patrug (talk) 12:06, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Name

The German Wikipedia indicates that the family name should not be written with "von" in this case, though admits that it is a widely cited error. Correct is "Friedrich Spee" (or as he himself wrote it, Friedrich Spe). 217.248.35.49 (talk) 16:01, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

The uncorrect name should be changed:

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Spee

Hegeler (talk) 10:35, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Belated thanks. Now this is highlighted in the lead section. —Patrug (talk) 12:06, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Würzburg?

It is thought that he acted for a long time as "witch confessor" in Würzburg, as he seemed to have knowledge of what could be considered the private thoughts of the condemned. This is not sourced and impossible according to Hellyer, who writes (p. xv–xvi):

Because of Leibniz's anecdote it has been claimed that Spee was present in Würzburg and perhaps the nearby city of Bamberg during the persecutions of 1628–30, ... However, the chronology of his career makes this impossible. Also Spee had completed his philosophical education and departed from Würzburg before the round of witch trials that begin there in 1626.

Hellyer mentions the Prince-Bishopric of Paderborn and neighbouring towns in the Duchy of Westphalia as more likely places for Spee to have acted as confessor. Jeroen N (talk) 20:34, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Hellyer's Translation Choices

Heaps of sincere gratitude go to Marcus Hellyer for undertaking all the hard work of translating this amazing book, saving the rest of us from the tormentorum of the forty-fifth declension. That said, a talk page seems a good place to discuss translation choices. I'll separate them out in case others want to comment under any particular sub.17:41, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

denunciationes

Arguably this best translates as "accusations" but I like Hellyer's choice to leave it closer to the root and let readers calibrate it to modern sensibilities. That would reflect my general take: works like these (or Malleus Maleficarum) don't seem like book club material and should probably have scholar-obsessives in mind even if trying to avoid footnotes,etc.

dubium

Along those same lines, I prefer Gerhard Schormann's choice of leaving this in the original i.e. "Dubium 9" because it seems to convey Spee's intention including his differentiation from quaestionum. (To translate it as "Doubt 9" would seem awkward and probably not quite right.)

conventibus as sabbath?

No Latin derivatives of sabbat can be found in Spee's book so it seems questionable to translate it as "sabbath", and it appears a lot (see Hellyer's Index). I prefer "gathering" or "meeting." For more on this topic see: Witches' Sabbath. Some mid-century scholars seem to put a lot of weight on the term "sabbath" despite the word itself being extremely rare in contemporary documents. (Ever get the feelin you've been cheated Ozzy?!) It might be a helpful term if it consistently denoted a particular concept, like say if it denoted a spectral gathering as opposed to a physical meeting or vice-versa. But unfortunately there's no consistency of this sort as we can see in Spee's first line "corporalibus Sagarum conventibus" and others throughout his book. It seems best to try to avoid adding layers of confusion because this issue of physical vs spectral is critical for denoting the difference between 1)older non-toleration from the Church and 2)the newfangled witch-phobia that emerged in the 15th c. and required a major shift in Christian doctrine for the theologians who subscribed to it. The new doctrine always remained CONTESTED. (It was a Neh for many Catholic bishops, the Lutheran J. Brenz and Jean Calvin; but a Yes for many Dominican inquisitors who were also aligned with certain Popes and found places receptive to their influence like Spee's Rhineland.)