To what extent did The Church restrict publishment of Galileo Galilei’s scientific findings?
During the 1600s, the Church in Europe was tremendously influential in every aspect of society, but most important it was authoritative in the newly-developing scientific world. Specifically it controlled the scientific findings of one of the greatest scientists at the time, Galileo Galilei. With pressure from the clergy to publish work that corresponded to religious texts, he was forced to hold off many of his findings, as explained in his letter to Johannes Kepler. These worries stalled him from publishing his innovative discoveries, and therefore affected the rate at …show more content…
The worries of putting the Church’s authority in peril is shown vividly in the letter, where Bellarmine states that, “[Galileo] wanting to affirm that the Sun, in very truth, is at the centre of the universe and only rotates on its axis without traveling from east to west, and that the Earth is situated in the third sphere and revolves very swiftly around the Sun, is a very dangerous attitude and one calculated not only to arouse all Scholastic philosophers and theologians but also to injure our holy faith by contradicting the Scriptures…” Basically he is stating his belief that Galileo published his heliocentric findings to harm the dominance of the Church in society, which was not true. There came a point when Galileo had to take matters into his own hands to and address the Church …show more content…
In the letter, Bellarmine tells Father Foscarini how much of a “dangerous attitude” Galileo had taken, and how he suspected Galileo had shown these supposed findings with intent of injuring the Church’s authority. Bellarmine states how the authority forbids the contradiction of Scripture, and at the end he speaks of what the Church will do should these findings be proven true. Outside of Galileo’s communications with other intellectuals of the time, people of authority began to take notice. The text from this message is a great addition because it gives the essay a more holistic perspective on Galileo’s world.
"Letter from Galileo to Cardinal Dini [Father Benedetto Castelli] (May, 1615)." Letter from Galileo to Cardinal Dini (May, 1615). Accessed August 28, 2015. http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/galileo/lettercastelli.html
In his letter to Father Benedetto Castelli, Galileo is arguing that literal interpretations of the Bible should not be taken into account in scientific inquiry. Galileo’s discontent with the stubbornness of the Church is shown most clearly here than in any of my other sources. The letter helps readers further understand Galileo’s standpoints in these matters and how the society at the time