Gregory IX was elevated to the papacy in the
papal election of 1227. That same year, in one of his earliest acts as pope, he expanded the
Inquisition powers already assigned to
Konrad von Marburg to encompass the investigation of heresy throughout the whole of Germany. Gregory's bull
Parens scientiarum of 1231, after the
University of Paris strike of 1229, resolved differences between the unruly
university scholars of Paris and the local authorities. His solution was in the manner of a true follower of Innocent III: he issued what in retrospect has been viewed as the
magna carta of the university, assuming direct control by extending papal patronage: his bull allowed future suspension of lectures over a flexible range of provocations, from "monstrous injury or offense" to squabbles over "the right to assess the rents of lodgings". In October 1232, after an investigation by legates, Gregory proclaimed a
crusade against the Stedinger to be preached in northern Germany. In June 1233, he granted a plenary indulgence to those who took part. In 1233, Gregory IX established the
Papal Inquisition to regularize the prosecution of
heresy. According to
Thomas Madden, a defender of the Inquisition, the Papal Inquisition was intended to bring order to the haphazard episcopal inquisitions which had been established by
Lucius III in 1184. Gregory's aim allegedly was to bring order and legality to the process of dealing with heresy, since there had been tendencies by mobs of townspeople to burn alleged heretics without much of a trial. In 1231 Pope Gregory IX appointed a number of Papal Inquisitors (
Inquisitores haereticae pravitatis), mostly
Dominicans and
Franciscans, for the various regions of France, Italy and parts of Germany. Contrary to popular belief, says Madden, the aim was to introduce due process and objective investigation into the beliefs of those accused to the often erratic and unjust persecution of heresy on the part of local ecclesiastical and secular jurisdictions. However, to
Walter Ullmann, "there is hardly one item in the whole Inquisitorial procedure that could be squared with the demands of justice; on the contrary, every one of its items is the denial of justice or a hideous caricature of it [...] its principles are the very denial of the demands made by the most primitive concepts of natural justice [...] This kind of proceeding has no longer any semblance to a judicial trial but is rather its systematic and methodical perversion." '', now in the
Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence Gregory was a remarkably skillful and learned lawyer. He caused to be prepared
Nova Compilatio decretalium, which was promulgated in numerous copies in 1234 (first printed at
Mainz in 1473). This
New Compilation of Decretals was the culmination of a long process of systematising the mass of pronouncements that had accumulated since the
Early Middle Ages, a process that had been under way since the first half of the 12th century and had come to fruition in the
Decretum, compiled and edited by the papally commissioned legist
Gratian and published in 1140. The supplement completed the work, which provided the foundation for papal legal theory. In the
1234 Decretals, he invested the doctrine of
perpetua servitus iudaeorum – perpetual servitude of the Jews – with the force of canonical law. According to this, the followers of the
Talmud would have to remain in a condition of political servitude until
Judgment Day. The doctrine then found its way into the doctrine of
servitus camerae imperialis, or servitude immediately subject to the Emperor's authority, promulgated by
Frederick II. The Jews were thus suppressed from having direct influence over the political process and the life of
Christian states into the 19th century and the rise of
liberalism. In 1234, Gregory issued the papal bull
Rachel suum videns calling for a new crusade to the Holy Land, leading to the
Crusade of 1239. In 1239, under the influence of
Nicholas Donin, a Jewish convert to Christianity, Gregory ordered that all copies of the Jewish Talmud be confiscated. Following a
public disputation between Christians and Jewish theologians, this culminated in a mass burning of some 12,000 handwritten Talmudic manuscripts on 12 June 1242, in Paris. Gregory was a supporter of the mendicant orders which he saw as an excellent means for counteracting by voluntary poverty the love of luxury and splendour which was possessing many ecclesiastics. He was a friend of
Saint Dominic as well as
Clare of Assisi. On 17 January 1235, he approved the
Order of Our Lady of Mercy for the redemption of captives. He appointed ten cardinals and
canonized Saints
Elisabeth of Hungary,
Dominic,
Anthony of Padua, and
Francis of Assisi, of whom he had been a personal friend and early patron. He transformed a chapel to Our Lady in the church of
Santa Maria del Popolo in Rome. Gregory IX endorsed the
Northern Crusades and attempts to bring
Orthodox Russians, particularly in the
Pskov Republic and the
Novgorod Republic, under the
Papacy's fold. In 1229, he declared that
Finlandia (Finland) had passed under his protection. In 1232, Gregory IX asked the
Livonian Brothers of the Sword to send troops to protect
Finland, whose semi-
pagan people were fighting against the Novgorod Republic in the
Finnish-Novgorodian wars; however, there is no known information if any ever arrived to assist. Gregory received news in 1237 that the
Tavastians rejected Christianity and he called on all Christians to join him in a crusade.
Struggle with Frederick II in the
Sala Regia, by
Giorgio Vasari. Since few details were provided to the artist, the excommunication scene is given generically. Frederick is shown pointing to a book with the word "Concilium" shown, possibly a reference to the general council that the emperor attempted to call to depose Gregory. At the coronation of Frederick II in Rome, 22 November 1220, the emperor made a vow to embark for the Holy Land in August 1221. Gregory IX began his pontificate by suspending the
Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, for dilatoriness in carrying out the promised
Sixth Crusade. Frederick II appealed to the sovereigns of Europe complaining of his treatment. The suspension was followed by
excommunication and threats of deposition, as deeper rifts appeared. Frederick II went to the
Holy Land and in fact managed to take possession of
Jerusalem. Gregory IX distrusted the emperor, since Rainald, the imperial Governor of Spoleto, had invaded the Pontifical States during the emperor's absence. He argued that the Pope was the "little horn" of Daniel 7:8: A little horn has grown up with eyes and mouth speaking great things, which is reducing three of these kingdoms – i.e. Sicily, Italy, and Germany – to subserviency, is persecuting the people of Christ and the saints of God with intolerable opposition, is confounding things human and divine, and is attempting things unutterable, execrable. The struggle only ended with Gregory IX's death on 22 August 1241. The pope died before events could reach their climax; it was his successor,
Innocent IV, who in 1245 declared a
crusade that would finish the Hohenstaufen threat. ==See also==