Reformation

For other uses, see Reformation (disambiguation).

Not to be confused with Reform movement.

The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation, the Protestant Revolution, and the European Reformation) was a major movement from Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in part to papal authority. The Reformation was the start of Protestantism and the Western Church, the Latin Church, remained the Catholic Church.

It is considered to be one of the events that signified the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of the early modern period in Europe. The end of the Reformation era is disputed among modern scholars.

Prior to Martin Luther and the other Protestant Reformers, there were earlier reform movements within Western Christianity. Although the Reformation is usually considered to have started with the publication of the Ninety-five Theses by Martin Luther in 1517, he was not excommunicated by Pope Leo X until January 1521. The Diet of Worms of May 1521 condemned Luther and officially banned citizens of the Holy Roman Empire from defending or propagating his ideas. Luther survived after being declared an outlaw due to the protection of Elector Frederick the Wise.

The spread of Gutenberg's printing press provided the means for the rapid dissemination of religious materials in the vernacular. The initial movement in Germany diversified, and other reformers such as Huldrych Zwingli and John Calvin arose.

In general, the Reformers argued that salvation in Christianity was a completed status based on faith in Jesus alone and not a process that requires good works, as in the Catholic view. Protestantism also introduced new ecclesiology.

The Counter-Reformation, also called the Catholic Reformation or the Catholic Revival, was the period of Catholic reforms initiated in response to the Protestant Reformation.

Background

Further information: Christianity in the 14th century and Christianity in the 15th century

Calamities

See also: Little Ice Age, Malleus Maleficarum, and Medieval demography

Detail of the danse macabre by John of Kastav in the Holy Trinity Church, Hrastovlje, Slovenia (completed in 1490)

Europe experienced a period of dreadful calamities at the beginning of the Late Middle Ages. In the first half of the 14th century, exceptionally heavy rains or severe droughts caused crop failures and famine in large regions. In the middle of the century, a devastating pandemic known as the Black Death hit Europe, killing about one third of the population. Regarding the plague as a sign of the wrath of God, the fearful people were praying for intercession to the saints. Thousands of Jews fell victim to anti-semitic pogroms, as irrational rumours accused them of spreading the pandemic by well poisoning. Although the plague abated, it returned from time to time. It was only in the late 15th century that a slow demographic recovery began. Around 1500, the population of Europe was about 60–85 million people—no more than 75 percent of the mid-14th-century demographic maximum.

The constant fear of unexpected death was mirrored by popular artistic motifs, such as the allegory of danse macabre ('dance of death'), and by the common funerary inscription memento mori ('remember that you die'). The fear also contributed to the growing popularity of Masses for the dead. These indicated a widespread belief in an intermediate place between Hell and Heaven known as the Purgatory. Its existence was declared a Catholic dogma at the Council of Florence in 1439. Fear of malevolent magical practice was also growing and witch-hunts intensified from the 1430s.

Due to a shortage of workforce and a decline in revenues, the landlords began to restrict the rights of their tenants which led to rural revolts. The peasantry demanded the cancellation of new duties and the restoration of old customs that allowed them free access to rivers, woods, and other natural resources. Ecclesiastic lordship were especially vulnerable. The revolts often ended with a compromise between the peasantry and the landlords.

Towards the end of the 15th century, a new pandemic started to spread in Europe. This was syphilis, a sexually transmitted infection that destroyed its victims' looks with ulcers and scabs before they died. Along with the French invasion of Italy, the new fatal disease gave the background to the success of the charismatic preacher Girolamo Savonarola (d. 1498) in Florence. His sermons on the Last Days of Humankind became especially popular, and his calls for a moral renewal led to a revolution putting an end to the Medici's rule in the city. Pope Alexander VI (r. 1492–1503) forbade him to preach but he ignored the ban, for which he was excommunicated. As the calamities continued, Savonarola lost popular support. He was arrested and executed, but his meditations were read in many parts of Europe.

Clergy

Seven Sacraments Altarpiece by Rogier van der Weyden (completed between 1445 and 1450)

Western Christianity displayed a remarkable unity by the early 14th century. This was mainly the outcome of the 11th-century Gregorian Reform that established papal supremacy—the undisputed authority of the papacy—over the Catholic Church, and secured the legal separation of the clergy from laity. Clerical celibacy was reinforced through the prohibition of clerical marriage, and the clergy was exempted from the jurisdiction of secular courts. In contrast, ecclesiastical courts had exclusive jurisdiction over laypeople's marriage affairs and disputes over testaments.

The clergy consisted of two major groups, the regular clergy and the secular clergy. Regular clerics lived under a monastic rule within the framework of a religious order; secular clerics were responsible for pastoral care among laypeople. The Church was a hierarchical organisation. The pope was elected by high-ranking clergymen, the cardinals, and assisted by the professional staff of the Roman Curia. Most religious orders, such as the Cistercians, Franciscans, Dominicans, and Teutonic Knights, were centralised international organizations. Secular clerics were organised into territorial units known as dioceses, each ruled by a bishop or archbishop. Each diocese was divided into parishes headed by parish priests who administered most sacraments to the parishioners. These were sacred rites thought to be essential for transferring divine grace to humankind. The Council of Florence fixed their number at seven, declaring baptism, confirmation, marriage, extreme unction, penance, the Eucharist, and priestly ordination as the sacraments of the Catholic Church. Women were not ordained priests but could administer baptism or hear confessions under exceptional circumstances. They could also take the three monastic vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience and live as nuns in convents.

Believers were expected to pay the tithe—one tenth of their income—to the Church. Pluralism—the practice of holding multiple Church offices (or benefices)—was not unusual. This led to non-residence, and non-resident clerics mainly hired other priests to carry out their spiritual duties. The deputies were often poorly educated and underpaid, eager to extract extra fees from their flock. Aristocrats mainly supported their relatives' church career because a bishop, abbot, abbess, or other prelate might possess remarkable wealth. Some of the ecclesiastic leaders were also secular princes, such as the prince-bishops in Germany and the Grand Masters of the Teutonic Knights in their Ordensstaat in the Baltic region. Other prelates who held high offices in state administration might be the power behind the throne. Examples include the Spanish cardinal Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros (d. 1517) and the German archbishop Matthäus Lang (d. 1540).

Papacy

See also: Papal States

Meeting of cardinals, bishops and theologians with Antipope John XXIII at the Council of Constance (from the Chronicle of the Council of Constance by Ulrich of Richenthal)

The papacy was "Europe's first major international power" (Chris Wickham) although its authority was based on a well organised system of communication and bureaucracy rather than armed forces. Regarding themselves as successors of Peter the Apostle (d. c. 66), the popes claimed the power of binding and loosing that Christ had reportedly granted to Peter, and offered indulgence—the reduction of the penance both in this world and in the Purgatory—to sinners. To strengthen the conceptional basis of this practice, scholastic theologians elaborated the concept of the inexhaustible treasury of merit available to the papacy to distribute among the faithful. The popes could also grant dispensations to institutions or individuals, exempting them from certain provisions of canon law (or ecclesiastic law).

The proclamation of the papal bull Unam sanctam in 1302 marked "the zenith of medieval papal ecclesiastical ambitions" (Alister McGrath). In the bull, Pope Boniface VIII (r. 1294–1303) stated that only those who were obedient to the papacy could come to salvation. A year later, French troops arrested the Pope at Anagni, and in 1309, the seat of the papacy was transferred from the chaotic Rome to Avignon. During the period of the Avignon Papacy, the popes assumed control of the appointment of all senior Catholic clergy. This increased papal income as the new prelates paid a fee for their letter of appointment and ceded to the papacy one-third of the income they earned in the first year in their new office.

The idea that Rome was the legitimate center of Catholicism never faded away, and Pope Gregory XI (r. 1370–1378) returned his seat to Rome in 1377. Conflicts between his successor Urban VII (r. 1378–1389) and the College of Cardinals developed into the Western Schism when his opponents declared his election invalid and proclaimed the French Clement VII (r. 1378–1394) pope. Clement returned to Avignon, establishing a rival line of popes. In each country, church leaders had to take sides between the two popes. They mainly accepted the local ruler's decision, which weakened the supranational character of the Catholic Church. To put an end to the schism, cardinals from both sides assembled at Pisa in 1409. They elected a new pope but their decision only exacerbated the problem because his two rivals refused to resign. More prudent preparations paved the way for the Council of Constance under the auspices of the German king Sigismund of Luxemburg (r. 1410–1437). In Constance, one of the three popes resigned, his two rivals were deposed, and the legitimacy of the newly elected pope Martin V (r. 1417–1431) was acknowledged throughout Catholic Europe.

The Council of Constance challenged papal supremacy by declaring that the popes owed obedience to the ecumenical councils. Although this idea known as conciliarism was condemned by Pope Pius II (r. 1458–1467) in a papal bull, ecclesiastic and secular leaders often cited it during their conflicts with the papacy. The French Charles VII (r. 1422–1461) went as far as enacting its fundamental principles in the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges in 1438. In Germany, an antipapal document known as the Grievances of the German Nation was in circulation around 1450, demanding the severance of the links between the local church and the Holy See. Relationships between the papacy and most powerful Catholic rulers were regulated through special agreements known as concordats. These agreements limited papal authority over the national churches in favor of the local rulers.

As princes of the Papal States in Italy, the popes were deeply involved in the power struggles of the peninsula. In this respect, the Renaissance popes were not dissimilar to secular rulers. Pope Alexander VI appointed his relatives, among them his own illegitimate sons to high offices. Pope Julius II (r. 1503–1513) took up arms to recover papal territories lost during his predecessors' reign. The popes were also generous patrons of art and architecture, and Julius II ordered the demolition of the 4th-century St. Peter's Basilica in preparation for the building of a new Renaissance basilica in 1509.

Church life

The Nativity by Filippo Lippi (completed around 1445)

Latin was the language of public worship in most dioceses of Catholic Europe although few laymen could understand it. The Eucharist, the central element of Christian worship, was also celebrated in Latin. Western Christians believed that the sacramental bread and wine of the Eucharist transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ during the liturgy of the Mass. This belief known as the transubstantiation was defined as a Catholic dogma at the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 along with the principle that only validly ordained priests could celebrate the Eucharist. For unknown reasons, laymen only received the sacramental bread during the ceremony from the 13th century. Priests were ordained by bishops in accordance with the principle of apostolic succession—a claim to the uninterrupted transmission of their consecrating power from Christ's Apostles through generations of bishops. Laypeople could express their devotion through activities outsides the churches as well, such as participating in charitable associations known as confraternities, or reciting the popular prayer cycle of the Rosary. In accordance with Christ's parable on the Last Judgement, the Catholic Church taught that only those who performed good works, such as feeding the hungry and visiting the sick, could go to Heaven. The faithful also made pilgrimages to the saints' shrines, but the proliferation in the saints' number and the extensive commercialization of their cults undermined their reputation in the late medieval period. The church buildings were richly decorated with paintings, sculptures, and stained glass windows. While Romanesque and Gothic art made a clear distinction between the supernatural and the human, starting in the 14th century, Renaissance artists depicted God and the saints in a more human way.

The sources of religious authority included the Bible and its authoritative commentaries, apostolic tradition, decisions by ecumenical councils, scholastic theology, and papal authority. Matters of faith that had not been declared a dogma could be freely discussed. Catholics regarded the Vulgata as the Bible's authentic Latin translation. To resolve contradictions within the Bible, commentators applied several methods of interpretations. For instance, they read the Law of Moses in a symbolic or mystical sense because the Jewish ceremonies and laws were irrelevant for Christians. Apostolic tradition verified religious practices that could not be traced back to the Bible, such as infant baptism and the observation of Sunday instead of Saturday. The ecumenical councils' theological decisions were binding to all Catholics. The crucial elements of Christian faith were summarised in the Nicene Creed whose basic text had been adopted at the First Council of Nicaea in 325. The western text of the Creed contained an addition that the Eastern Christians had not agreed to which contributed to the rift between Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy. Scholastic theologians began the systematic study and logical categorization of the unstructured writings of earlier theologians in the 12th century. Among the prominent scholastics, Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274) argued that reason could never be at variance with faith, while William of Ockham (d. 1349) concluded that human logic could not prove the existence of God. Legitimate debates among scholastics were not uncommon. For instance, Aquinas rejected the popular concept of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, whereas Duns Scotus (d. 1308) supported it. Church authorities acknowledged that an individual might receive direct revelations from God under exceptional circumstances but maintained that a genuine revelation could not challenge traditional religious principles. A notable example was the Dominican nun Catherine of Siena (d. 1380) whose revelations convinced Pope Gregory XI to return his seat from Avignon to Rome.

Origins

Dissidents

See also: History of Protestantism, Proto-Protestantism, and Compactata

After Arianism—a Christological doctrine condemned as heresy at 4th-century general councils—disappeared in the late 7th century, no major disputes menaced the theological unity of the Western Church. Conflicts between religious enthusiasts and the representatives of the official Church could lead to the development of nonconformist groups but most of them disbanded after their founder died. The Waldensians were a notable exception. They had set up their own ecclesiastic organisation by the time their founder Peter Waldo (d. c. 1205) died. They rejected the clerics' monopoly of public ministry and allowed all trained members of their community, men and women alike, to preach. They regarded baptism, marriage and the Eucharist as sacraments, and deplored the grant of indulgences. In contrast with the more radical Cathars of Occitania, the Waldensians survived the anti-heretic crusades and the investigations by specially appointed commissioners of inquiry known as inquisitors, but they had to seek refuge in the mountains of Piedmont and other remote places.

Burning of Jan Hus at Constance (from the Chronicle of the Council of Constance by Ulrich of Richenthal)

The scandalous Western Schism reinforced a general desire for the reformatio of the Church. The Oxford theologian John Wycliffe (d. 1384) sharply criticised traditional practices, such as pilgrimages and prayers to the saints. He regarded the Church as an exclusive community of the faithful who were chosen by God to salvation, stating that they owed respect only to priests who showed moral leadership. Wycliffe rejected papal supremacy, and towards the end of his life also attacked the doctrine of transubstantiation. He initiated an English translation of the Bible that was completed by his followers.

Known as Lollards, Wycliffe's followers adopted a more radical position, demanding that the Church should renounce endowments and abandon clerical celibacy. They faced serious persecution after the Parliament of England passed a law against heretics that ordered their execution by burning. Despite this, Lollard communities survived in East Anglia, Kent, the valley of the Thames River and the Midlands.

Wycliffe's theology, particularly his teaching about sinful priests had a marked impact on the Prague academic Jan Hus (d. 1415). A popular preacher at the Bethlehem Chapel, he was preaching against the wealth and temporal power of the clergy. After publishing his treatise On the Church, he was summoned to Constance to defend his views before the ecumenical council. Although Sigismund of Luxemburg had granted him safe conduct, Hus was sentenced to death for heresy and burned at the stake on 6 July 1415. His execution led to a nationwide movement in Bohemia although his followers were divided into a moderate and a radical wing. The moderate Hussites, mainly Czech aristocrats and academics, were known as Utraquists for they offered both the bread and the wine to laymen during the Mass, stating that the Eucharist be administered sub utraque specie ('in both kinds'). The radicals, mainly guildsmen and peasants, established a new town, Tábor, where they held their property in common. Henceforth known as Taborites, the radicals assumed the leadership of the Hussite movement during the crusades that the papacy proclaimed against Bohemia but their millenarian missionary fervour prevented them from consolidating their position.

From 1435, the Utraquist Jan Rokycana (d. 1471) held the Archbishopric of Prague, and from 1458, the Utraquist George of Poděbrady (d. 1471) ruled as king. Although none of them were acknowledged by the papacy, their rule consolidated the Utraquists' dominant position in Bohemia. By this time, almost exclusively the German-speaking communities and some free royal cities remained loyal to the papacy. More radical Hussites set up their own Church known as the Union of Bohemian Brethren under the spiritual guidance of the writer Petr Chelčický (d. c. 1460). They rejected the doctrine of transubstantiation and the idea of a separate priestly class, and condemned all forms of violence and oath taking. As no new archbishop was elected after Rokycana's death, the Utraquist priests were sent to the tolerant Catholic city of Venice to be ordained. The absence of a local Church hierarchy reinforced the control of the aristocracy and urban leaders over the Bohemian clergy.

According to the historian Peter Marshall, the Lollards and the Hussites along with the conciliarist clerics "collectively give the lie to any suggestion that torpor and complacency were the hallmarks of religious life in the century before Martin Luther." Historians customarily refer to Wycliffe and Hus as "Forerunners of the Reformation". The two reformers' emphasis on the study of the Bible as the sole source of theology is often cited as an early example of the idea sola scriptura ('by the Scriptures alone') that became one of the basic principles of the Reformation. In fact, prominent scholastic theologians had been convinced that the Bible summarized all knowledge necessary for salvation, and theologians associated with the Augustinian Order such as Gregory of Rimini (d. 1358) rarely cited other sources of faith.

Humanism

Portrait of Erasmus of Rotterdam by Hans Holbein the Younger (d. 1543)

The Late Middle Ages saw the development of a new intellectual movement known as Humanism. The Humanists' slogan ad fontes! ('back to the sources!') demonstrated their enthusiasm for classical texts and textual criticism. The rise of the Ottoman Empire led to the mass immigration of Byzantine scholars to Western Europe, and many of them brought Greek manuscripts containing ancient works previously unknown to western scholarship. These included philosophical works of the Greek philosopher Plato (d. 347/348 BC) and a collection of treatises on various subjects known as the Corpus Hermeticum. The rediscovery of Plato and his ideas about an ultimate reality lying beyond visible reality posed a serious challenge to medieval scholasticism and its rigorous definitions. Some treatises in the Corpus Hermeticum discussed Gnostic ideas that attempted to synchronize Platonism with Christianity. Textual criticism called into question the reliability of some of the fundamental texts of Catholic doctrine. The Humanist scholars Nicholas of Cusa (d. 1464), Lorenzo Valla (d. 1457), and Reginald Pecock (d. c. 1461) proved that one of the basic documents of papal authority, the allegedly 4th-century Donation of Constantine was actually a medieval forgery; Juan Luis Vives (d. 1540) did not hide his contempt of the popular hagiographic collection known as the Golden Legend, describing it as a book "written by men with mouths of iron and hearts of lead".

Completed by Jerome (d. 420) in the early 5th century, the Vulgata contained the Septaguint version of the Old Testament that included books with no parallel Hebrew texts. As different copies of the Vulgata might contain slightly different phrases, scholars used Hebrew, Greek and Syriac manuscripts to restore the authentic wording. A polyglott version of the complete Bible was published under the auspices of Cardinal Jiménez in Spain in 1517. The systematic study of the Bible revealed that Jerome sometimes misinterpreted his sources of translation. Valla was the first scholar to demonstrate that Jerome's incorrect translations laid the foundation for some ideas developed by renowned theologians such as Aquinas. The erudite Dutch Humanist Erasmus (d. 1536) completed a critical edition of the New Testament, and his new Latin translation challenged the scriptural basis for some Catholic dogmas and practices. He threatened the concept of the treasury of merit by choosing the adjective gratiosa ('gracious') instead of the traditional gratia plena ('full of grace') to address the Virgin Mary in the Latin text of the Hail Mary. Erasmus also attacked the allegorical interpretation of Biblical texts. For example, he rejected that a reference to Jesus's obedience to his parents in the Gospel of Luke could be interpreted that Jesus still owed obedience to his mother, thus indirectly challenging the belief in the intercession by the Virgin.

New religious movements promoted the deeper involvement of laity in religious practices. The Brethren of the Common Life dissuaded their members from receiving priestly ordination and often placed their and their sisters' houses under the protection of urban authorities. They were closely associated with the devotio moderna, a new method of Catholic spirituality with a special emphasis on the education of laypeople. A leader of the movement the Dutch Wessel Gansfort (d. 1489) attacked abuses of indulgences and stated that a professor of Biblical studies could better understand the Scriptures than untrained clerics. With the spread of the manufacturing of paper from rags and the printing machine with movable type in Europe from the 15th century, books could be bought at a reasonable price which improved laypeople's reading skills. Demand for religious literature was especially high. The German inventor Johannes Gutenberg (d. 1468) first published a two-volume version of the Vulgate in the early 1450s; it was republished several times which made the Latin text of the Bible the most frequently published book in the century. The Bible was translated to vernaculars: High and Low German, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, Czech and Catalan translations of the Bible were published between 1466 and 1492; in France, the Bible's abridged French versions gained popularity in the 1470s. By studying their Bibles, some laypeople concluded that the Church was unnecessary for their salvation. Already in 1515, some of them started to challenge their priests' sermons stating that "In my book it is different from what the preacher says".

Failed reforms

Portrait of Leo X by Raphael (d. 1520)

The necessity of a Church reform in capite et membris ('in head and limbs') was frequently discussed at the ecumenical councils from the late 13th century. With the emergence of conciliarism in the early 15th century, this notion transformed into a demand for the replacement of papal authority with a collective control over the Catholic Church. However, most stakeholders—popes, prelates and monarchs—preferred the status quo because they did not want to lose their privileges and revenues. The system of papal dispensations became a principal obstacle to the implementation of reformist measures as the Holy See regularly granted immunities to those who did not want to execute them. Reform movements within regular clergy had some significant successes with the spread of the so-called "congregations of strict observance". These were monastic communities that returned to the strict interpretation of their order's monastic rule. Reformist bishops tried to discipline their clergy through regular canonical visitations in the local parishes and by issuing exhortations to errant clergymen. Their attempts mainly failed as they could hardly overcome the resistance of autonomous institutions such as cathedral chapters. Neither could they exercise real authority over non-resident clerics who had received a benefice from the Holy See. After the failure of conciliarism, most reformist clerics refrained from demanding structural changes; instead, they criticised the clergy's moral failings mainly repeating phrases borrowed from 12th- and 13th-century reformers' works.

On the eve of the Reformation, the Fifth Council of the Lateran was the last occasion when efforts to introduce a far-reaching reform from above could have achieved. It was convoked by Pope Julius II in 1512 in response to attempts by the French king Louis XI (r. 1498–1515) to revive conciliarism with the support of a group of cardinals. The assembled prelates discussed sophisticated treatises on the necessity of reform but the council made no important decisions, and was dissolved in 1517.

Beginnings

Ninety-Five Theses

Portrait of Martin Luther (1529) by Lucas Cranach the Elder

Pope Leo X (r. 1513–1521) decided to complete the construction of the new St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. As the sale of certificates of indulgences had been a well-established method of papal fund raising, he proclaimed the bull Sacrosanctis announcing new indulgences and suspending the promotion of previous ones in 1515. On the advice of the banker Jakob Fugger (d. 1525), he appointed the German pluralist prelate Albert of Brandenburg (d. 1545) to supervise the sale campaign in Germany. The Dominican friar Johann Tetzel (d. 1519), a leading figure in the campaign, applied unusually aggressive marketing methods. One of his slogans famously claimed that "As soon as the coin into the box rings, a soul from purgatory to heaven springs". The campaign's vulgarity shocked most serious-minded believers. Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony (r. 1486–1525), forbade the campaign because Albert was his rival, and the suspension of other indulgences deprived him of a significant part of the revenues that he had spent on his collection of relics in Wittenberg.

Martin Luther (d. 1546), a professor of theology at the newly established University of Wittenberg in Saxony, was among those whom Tetzel's campaign outraged. Born into a middle-class family, Luther entered the Augustinians' monastery in Erfurt after a heavy thunderstorm dreadfully reminded him the risk of sudden death and eternal damnation. Although he followed the strictest interpretation of the Augustinians' rules, his anxiety about his sinfulness did not abate. Throughout his life, he suffered from headaches, earaches, fainting, and digestive problems. Retrospectively, he would state that these symptoms—that he described as "temptations"—proved that the Devil was fighting him. He started his lectures on Biblical texts at the Wittenberg University in 1513. His studies of the works of the Late Roman theologian Augustine of Hippo (d. 430), particularly On the Spirit and the Letter convinced him that those whom God chose as his elect received a gift of faith independently of their sinful acts. He sharply denounced the scholastic idea of justification before God through human efforts in his Disputatio contra scholasticam theologiam, published in September 1517. He declared that "we are not made righteous by doing righteous deeds; but when we have been made righteous we effect righteous deeds".

Luther on the Christian struggles toward God

Christians should be exhorted to seek earnestly to follow Christ, their Head, through penalties, deaths, hells. And let them thus be more confident of entering heaven through many tribulations rather than through a false assurance of peace.

Martin Luther, Ninety-Five Theses

On 31 October 1517, Luther addressed a letter to Albert of Brandenburg, stating that the clerics preaching the St. Peter's indulgences were deceiving the faithful. He had completed a discussion paper, known as Ninety-Five Theses, and also sent it to the archbishop. In this document, he attacked the concept of Purgatory, and questioned the efficacy of indulgences for the dead. On the other hand, he stated "If ... indulgences were preached according to the spirit and intention of the pope, all ... doubts would be readily resolved". His fellow academics received the discussion paper from him privately. Its first printed editions were published likely without his consent in Leipzig, Magdeburg, Nuremberg, and Basle in November. Archbishop Albert ordered the theologians at the University of Mainz to examine Luther's theses, and forwarded the case to the Roman Curia for judgement. Tetzel, and the theologians Konrad Wimpina (d. 1531) and Johann Eck (d. 1543) were the first to criticise Luther in public, associating some of his theses with Hussitism. Deeply involved in Italian politics, Pope Leo X (r. 1513–1521) remained uninterested in Luther's case. He described it as "a quarrel among friars" in reference to the well-known feud between the Augustinians and Dominicans.

New theology

Title page of the papal bull Exsurge Domine published "against the errors of Luther and his followers"

As the historian Lyndal Roper notes, the "Reformation proceeded by a set of debates and arguments". Initially, Luther's views were spreading primarily through debates within the Augustinian Order. He presented his views in public at the assembly of the congregation of observant Augustinians in Heidelberg on 26 April 1518. Here he explained his "theology of the Cross" about a loving God who had become frail and foolish to save fallen humanity, contrasting it with the scholastic "theology of glory" that in his view celebrated erudition and human acts. With his fortright and spirited speech, Luther convinced many of those who attended the assembly which contributed to the favorable reception of his ideas in southwestern Germany. The historian Thomas Kaufmann notes that students were especially effective "mobile agents in the distribution of Reformation ideas."

Pope Leo appointed the jurist Girolamo Ghinucci (d. 1541) and the Dominican theologian Sylvester Mazzolini (d. 1527) to inspect Luther's teaching. Mazzolini published a response to Luther, titled Dialogue Against the Arrogant Theses of Martin Luther Concerning the Power of the Pope. He argued that Luther had questioned papal authority by attacking the indulgences. Mazzolini's accusation first frightened Luther but he soon realised that only a fundamental reform could put an end to the sale of indulgences that he regarded as an abuse. Pope Leo did not excommunicate Luther because he did not want to alienate Luther's patron Frederick the Wise. Instead, he appointed the General of the Dominicans Cardinal Thomas Cajetan (d. 1534) to convince Luther to withdraw some of his theses but Luther resisted with obstinacy during their meeting at Augsburg in October 1518. The historian Berndt Hamm argues that Luther's interrogation by Cajetan was the "historical point at which the opposition between the Reformation and Catholicism first emerged", as Cajetan feared that believers who thought that God destined them to salvation would no more accept clerical guidance.

Luther first expressed his sympathy for Jan Hus at a disputation in Leipzig in June 1519. Here he also stated that ecumenical councils and the papacy could err in matters of faith. His theology quickly developed in the subsequent period. In his Latin treatise On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church, he concluded that only baptism and the Eucharist could be regarded as sacraments because other Catholic sacred rites had no Biblical foundations. He stated that priests could not be viewed as a special cast but only servants of the community hence they became called ministers from the Latin word for servant. His German manifesto To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation associated the papacy with the Antichrist, and described the official Church as "the worst whorehouse of all whorehouses" in reference to the huge amount of fees flowing to the Roman Curia. Luther also denied the Biblical justification of clerical celibacy. This statement was liberating for many clerics who felt compunction for having broken their oath of chastity. Luther's study On the Freedom of a Christian consolidated his thoughts about the inner freedom of believers with their obligation to care for their neighbours although he rejected the traditional teaching about good works. This work is a characteristic example of Luther's enthusiasm for paradoxes.

Luther's case was reopened at the Roman Curia. Cajetan, Eck and other papal officials drafted a papal bull that condemned Luther and his 41 theses. Published on 15 June 1520, the bull Exsurge Domine offered a 60-day-long grace period to Luther to recant before his excommunication came into force. The bull caused widespread outrage in Germany and its copies were vandalised at many places. The papal nuncio Girolamo Aleandro (d. 1542) ordered the burning of Luther's books at Louvain and Liège. In response, Luther and his followers burned a copy of the Exsurge Domine along with works by scholastic theologians, and a copy of the Corpus Juris Canonici—the fundamental document of medieval ecclesiastic law—on the banks of the river Elbe at Wittenberg on 10 December. The students celebrated the burning of the papal bull with a parade where they also burnt a papal tiara. Luther made use of their radicalism but also tried to keep a safe distance from it: a printed leaflet about the events emphasized that no professor had attended the students' parade. The papal bull of Luther's excommunication called Decet Romanum Pontificem was published on 3 January 1521.

The newly elected Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (r. 1519–1556) wanted to outlaw Luther at the Diet of Worms, but he could not make the decision alone. The Holy Roman Empire was a loose confederation of principalities, prince-bishoprics, free imperial cities and other secular and ecclesiastic states. Elected by the seven prince-electors, the Holy Roman Emperor was the nominal ruler of the confederation but real authority rested with the Imperial Diets where the Imperial Estates assembled. Frederick the Wise vetoed the imperial ban against Luther, and Luther was summoned to Worms to defend his case at the Diet in April 1521. Here he was warned to recant but refused stating that only arguments from the Bible could convince him that his works contained errors.

After Luther and his supporters left the Diet, those who remained passed the imperial ban, threatening those who supported Luther with imprisonment and confiscation of their property. To save Luther's life but also to hide his involvement, on 4 May Frederick the Wise arranged Luther's abduction and delivery to his castle of Wartburg. During his 10-month-long staged captivity, Luther completed the translation of the New Testament into High German. The historian Diarmaid MacCulloch describes Luther's translation as an "extraordinary achievement that has shaped the German language ever since", adding that "Luther's gift was for seizing the emotion with sudden, urgent phrases". Luther also composed religious hymns that were first published in collections in 1524.

Spread

Further information: Magisterial Reformation

Woodcuts by Lucas Cranach the Elder from the Passional of Christ and Antichrist depicting Christ wearing the Crown of Thorns and being mocked (on the left), and the pope crowned with a tiara and adored by bishops and abbots (on the right)

Roper argues that "the most important reason why Luther did not meet with Hus's fate was technology: the new medium of print". Luther was publishing his views in a series of short but pungent treatises that gained unexpected popularity: he was responsible for about one-fifth of all works printed in Germany in the first third of the 16th century. In sharp contrast with most European countries, German printing presses were not concentrated in a few urban centers but scattered in many places which prevented their control by central authorities. Statistical analysis indicates a significant positive correlation between the presence of a printing press in a German city and the adoption of Reformation. Cities with a competitive printing market were even more likely to accept new theologies.

Luther worked with the artist Lucas Cranach the Elder (d. 1553) who had a keen sense of visualising Luther's and his followers' message. Cranach produced Luther's idealised portrait that set a template for further popular images printed on the covers of books and put on medals made for sale. Cranach's woodcuts together with itinerant preachers' explanations helped the mainly illiterate people to understand Luther's teaching. A smart peasant called Karsthans ('Hans of the Hoe') was one of the popular fictional characters of early Reformation pamphlets although none of them was written by a peasant. The illustrated pamphlets were carried from place to place typically by travellers such as peddlers and merchants. Printed copies of the Ninety-Fine Theses reached as far as Spain, France and Italy already in 1519.

Laypeople started to discuss and question various aspects of the traditional religion both in private and in public all over Germany. Initially, the self-governing cities were the principal centers of the reform movement. Reformation spread through the activities of enthusiastic preachers such as Johannes Oecolampadius (d. 1531) and Konrad Kürsner (d. 1556) in Basle, Sebastian Hofmeister (d. 1533) in Schaffhausen, and Matthäus Zell (d. 1548) and Martin Bucer (d. 1551) in Strasbourg. Called "Evangelicals" due to their insistence on teaching in accordance with the Gospels (or Evangelion) the reformer preachers quickly convinced a number of laypeople that many of the well-established practices of the traditional Church had no precedent in the Bible. They read excerpts from Luther's translation of the New Testament, offered the Eucharist to the laity in both kinds, and denied the clerics' monopolies, which resonated with popular anti-clericalism. It was not unusual that their supporters attacked priests, monks, and ecclesiastic buildings. In some cities such as Strassbourg and Ulm, the urban magistrates actively supported the reformers, while in the cities of the Hanseatic League the affluent but politically almost powerless middle classes enforced changes in church life. Cities located closer to the most important ideological centers of the Reformation—Wittenberg and Basle—adopted its ideas more likely than other towns. This either indicates the significance of student networks, or shows that proximity to neighbours who had rejected Catholicism increased the likelihood of also abandoning the traditional religion. Regions that were poor but had a great economic potential were more likely to adhere to Luther's theology.

Luther on education

My dear sirs, if we have to spend such large sums every year on guns, roads, bridges, dams, and countless similar items to insure the temporal peace and prosperity of a city, why should not much more be devoted to our poor neglected youth—at least enough to engage one or two competent men to teach school?

Martin Luther, To the Councilmen of all Cities in Germany that they Establish and Maintain Christian Schools (1524)

The sociologist Steven Pfaff underlines that "ecclesiastical and liturgical reform was not simply a religious question ... since the sort of reforms demanded by Evangelicals could not be accommodated within existing institutions, prevailing customs, or established law". The reformers expelled their leading opponents, dissolved the monasteries and convents, secured the urban magistrates' control of the appointment of priests, and established new civic institutions. Luther advised that the faithful "must render love and support to Christ in his needy ones" but condemned beggars. Evangelical town councils usually prohibited begging but established a common chest for poverty relief by expropriating the property of dissolved ecclesiastic institutions. The funds were used for low-interest loans and gifts to the impoverished to start a new business, and also for the daily support of orphans, old people and the sick. In contrast with the late medieval German popular saying "the learned are daft", Luther was convinced that only educated people could effectively serve both God and the community. Under his auspices, public schools and libraries were opened in many towns offering education to more children than the traditional monastic and cathedral schools.

Resistance and oppression

Treasury of Saint Ursula in the Basilica of St. Ursula, Cologne. Her popular cult contributed to the townspeople's resistance to Evangelical proselytism in Cologne.

Resistance to Evangelical preaching was significant in some regions of the Holy Roman Empire, such as Flanders, the Rhineland, Bavaria and Austria. Here the veneration of local saints was strong, and statistical analysis indicates that cities where the indigenous saints' shrines served as centers of vivid communal cults were less likely to adopt Reformation. Likewise, cities with an episcopal see or monasteries more likely resisted Evangelical proselytism.

Most representatives of the older generation of Humanist scholars never accepted the ideas of Reformation. Some of them argued that academic debates on theology could not make better Christians. Others like Konrad Peutinger (d. 1547) feared that ordinary people would not obey religious authorities if they learnt of quarreling theologians. Erasmus considered Luther's ideas and paradoxes as speculations, and stated that Luther's "unrestrained enthusiasm carries him beyond what is right". Jacob van Hoogstraaten (d. 1527) refused Luther's theology of salvation comparing it "as if Christ takes to himself the most foul bride and is unconcerned about her cleanliness".

Luther's works were burned in most European countries after his excommunication. Emperor Charles V was determined to defend the Catholic Church, and initiated the execution of the first Evangelical martyrs. They were two Augustinian monks Jan van Essen and Hendrik Vos who were burned at the stake in Brussels in the Habsburg Netherlands on 1 July 1523. However, Charles's authority was extremly limited outside the Habsburgs' domains, and his attempts to fight the supporters of the Reformation were hindered by the Ottoman expansion towards Central Europe. The Ottomans captured Belgrade in 1521, inflicted a decisive defeat on the Hungarian army in 1526, and laid siege to Vienna for the first time in 1529.

The English king Henry VIII (r. 1509–1547) was the first crowned head to publicly condemn Luther's theology. Inspired by the staunch anti-Lutheran Bishop of Rochester, John Fisher (d. 1535), Henry commissioned a team of theologians to complete a treatise in response to Luther's attacks against Catholic dogmas. Titled The Assertion of the Seven Sacraments, their treatise defended the traditional list of sacraments. It was published under Henry's name, and the grateful pope awarded him with the title Defender of the Faith and offered indulgence to all who read the treatise.

In France, the theologians of the Sorbonne declared Luther as an enemy of Catholicism who "vomited up a doctrine of pestilence". Guillaume Briçonnet (d. 1534), the bishop of Meaux, condemned Luther but employed reform-minded clerics like Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples (d. c. 1536) and William Farel (d. 1565) to renew religious life in his diocese. The French king Francis I (r. 1515–1547) did not persecute the reformist theologians, and his sister Marguerite of Angoulême (d. 1549) supported them. After Francis was captured in the Battle of Pavia in 1525, the Parliament of Paris accused some priests of Briçonnet's diocece of heresy, forcing them into exile.

The Spanish Inquisition effectively prevented the spread of Evangelical literature in the country, and repressed the spiritual movement of the Alumbrados ('Illuminists') who put a special emphasis on personal faith.

The Italian translations of Luther's works were distributed underground, sometimes under Erasmus's name. Known as Spirituali, some Italian men of letters and clerics such as the Venetian nobleman Gasparo Contarini (d. 1542) and the Augustinian canon Peter Martyr Vermigli (d. 1562) expressed ideas resembling Luther's theology of salvation but they did not break with the official Church.

Correspondence between Luther and the representatives of the Bohemian Brethren revealed that their theologies were incompatible although the Brethren's leader Luke of Prague (d. 1528) emphasized the similarity of their views about justification. King Louis of Bohemia and Hungary (r. 1516–1526) ordered the persecution of Evangelical preachers in his realms. In contrast, his wife Mary of Austria (d. 1558) favoured the reformers but she was forbidden to employ the Evangelical priest Paul Speratus (d. 1551) as her court chaplain.

Christian II, who ruled the Kalmar Union of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway (r. 1513–1523), was sympathetic towards the Reformation. He decided to sever the links between the papacy and the churches in his realms, but his despotic methods led to revolts. He was replaced by his uncle Frederick I in Denmark and Norway (r. 1523–1533) and by a local aristocrat Gustav Vasa in Sweden (r. 1523–1560). Relationship between the papacy and the Scandinavian realms remained tense, and both Frederick and Gustav appointed their own candidates to vacant episcopal sees as bishops-elect.

Radicalisation

Main article: Radical Reformation

Saxony

During Luther's absence, his co-workers assumed the leadership in Wittenberg. Philip Melanchthon (d. 1560) consolidated Luther's thoughts into a coherent theological work titled Loci communes ('Common Places') that was first published in 1521. Andreas Karlstadt (d. 1541) was more radical. On Christmas Day 1521, he administered the Eucharist in common garment instead of priestly vestments; the next day he announced his engagement to a fifteen-year-old noble girl Anna von Mochau. Their subsequent marriage set a precedent for other priests who often married with their parishioners' consent. Karlstadt proclaimed that all religious images were examples of "devilish deceit" which led to the mass destruction of pictures and sculptures in the local churches. Religious enthusiasts were swarming to Wittenberg from the nearby regions. Among them, the so-called Zwickau prophets, who had been incited by the radical preacher Thomas Müntzer (d. 1525), claimed that they received revelations from God. They rejected the concept of transubstantiation and stated that infant baptism lacked Biblical foundations. Luther regarded infant baptism as an important sign of membership in the Christian community, insisted on the idea of transubstantiation, and defended religious art as a proof of the beauty of the Creation. To put an end to the anarchy, Frederick the Wise released Luther in March. Luther called the Zwickau prophets fanatics, and achieved their removal from Wittenberg. He married the former nun Katharina von Bora (d. 1552).

Shortly after Luther's return to Wittenberg, Karlstadt renounced his academic position and moved to Orlamünde where he gained the parishioners' support. Although Karlstadt condemned all violent acts, Luther associated him with Müntzer whose supporters had destroyed a chapel in Allstedt. Luther went on a tour visiting the region's many parishes to prevent them from introducing radical reforms, but the radicals received him by abuses or stones in many places. Luther wanted to achieve Karlstadt's dismissal but the parishioners resisted, referring to Luther's words about the congregations' right to freely elect their ministers. Karlstadt called Luther a "perverter of the Scriptures", and described the Eucharist as a symbolic act in his publications. He was expelled from Saxony in September 1524 but he continued to defend his theology in his treatises.

Rhineland

Although Luther condemned the application of violence, some of his followers were ready to take up arms. Franz von Sickingen (d. 1523), an imperial knight from the Rhineland, formed an alliance with his peers against Richard von Greiffenklau zu Vollrads, Archbishop-elector of Trier (r. 1511–1531), declaring that they wanted to lead the archbishop's subjects "to evangelical, light laws and Christian freedom". Sickingen had sponsored pamphlets supporting Luther's ideas and demanding the restitution of monastic property to the grantors' descendants. The pamphlets claimed that the secularisation of church property would improve even the poor peasants' situation. Sickingen and his associates attacked the archbishopric but failed at the siege of Trier. Sickingen was mortally wounded during the siege of his own castle by the troops of Greiffenklau and his allies. Sickingen's anti-monasticism gained popularity among the peasantry but Luther denounced his violent acts. To secure the support of the German princes, Luther summarized his theory of two kingdoms in a treatise called On Secular Authority. He explained that true Christians had to submit to princely authority because public order could not be maintained without coercion and rules.

Old Swiss Confederacy

Huldrych Zwingli's portrait by Hans Asper

Luther was not the only opponent of scholastic theology. The Swiss Humanist priest Huldrych Zwingli (d. 1531) would claim that he "began to preach the Gospel of Christ in 1516 long before anyone in our region had ever heard of Luther". Just like Luther, Zwingli rejected the authority of the papacy and the ecumenical councils, and regarded the Bible as the sole source of theology. He came to prominence due to the "Affair of the Sausages" when he attended a meal of sausages in Zürich during Lent 1522, breaching the rules of fasting. He married secretly and, along with ten other clergymen, approached the bishop of Constance to sanction clerical marriage even though they knew that the bishop had no choice but to reject their petition. The local urban magistrates defended Zwingli against the bishop, and with their support he introduced further radical changes in Zürich's ecclesiastic life. In 1524, all images were removed from the churches, and fasting and clerical celibacy were abolished. Two years later, a German communion service replaced the Latin liturgy of the Mass. The close cooperation between the reformist clergy and the urban magistrates brought about the establishment of two new institutions that would be adopted in other towns. The first was a public theological school called the Prophezei where scholars, priests, and laymen listened to lectures from the Bible; the Marriage and Morals Court was a legal court consisting of two laymen and two clerics with a jurisdiction over marriage affairs but also acted as a moral police.

Zwingli introduced reform measures with the town council's consent because he wanted to preserve public order. This "Magisterial Reformation" outraged the more radical reformers such as Conrad Grebel (d. 1526). The son of a Zürich patrician, he had married a low born girl for which he fell out with his family. He and his followers were convinced that the Church should be freed from the state. They summarized their theology in a letter to Müntzer on 5 September 1524. They identified the Church as an exclusive community of those who lived a righteous life, condemned all religious practices that had no Biblical foundations, specifically they rejected infant baptism and endorsed believers' (or adult) baptism. In the nearby villages, the most radical rural priests demanded the abolition of the tithe stating that divine grace was free. In January 1525, a former Catholic priest George Blaurock (d. 1529) asked Grebel to rebaptize him, and after his request was granted they rebaptized fifteen other people. For this practice, their enemies started to call them Anabaptists ('rebaptizers'). Rebaptism had been a capital offence since Roman times and a featuring element of some heretic movements such as the Donatists and Cathars. The Zürich magistrates ordered the imprisonment of some radicals which led to public demonstrations, and Blaurock called Zwingli the Antichrist.

The urban magistrates did not long tolerate the Anabaptists' radicalism. First the Anabaptist preacher Balthasar Hubmaier (d. 1528) from Waldshut-Tiengen was arrested, tortured and forced to leave Zürich. By the end of 1526, the magistrates enacted a law threatening rebaptizers with capital punishment. The Zürich citizen Felix Manz was the first to be condemned to death in accordance with the new law. He was drowned in the Limmat River on 5 January 1527 thus becoming the earliest victim of persecution by Reformed authorities. The persecution convinced many Anabaptists that they were the true heirs to the early Christians who had suffered martyrdom for their faith. Their movement spread in Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands and Germany. They often took inspiration from the Book of Daniel and the Book of Revelation for apocalyptic prophesies, and some of them shocked the conservatives with radical acts such as burning of the Bible because "the letter kills". Even most radicals considered scandalous that some Anabaptist groups were headed by women. In St. Gallen, many women cut their hair short to avoid arousing sexual passion, while a housemaid from Appenzell Frena Bumenin first proclaimed herself the New Messiah, then announced that she would give birth to the Antichrist.

Peasants' War

Title page of the peasant manifesto known as Twelve Articles

As MacCulloch notes, the Reformation "injected an extra element of instability" into the relationship between the peasants and their lords, as it raised "new excitement and bitterness against established authority". Public demonstrations and agrarian strikes against the St Blasien Abbey and secular lords in the Black Forest area in May 1524 were the first indicators of a general discontent among the southern German peasantry. Although the radical Hubmaier was one of the leaders of the movement, most participants never went beyond traditional anticlericalism. The peasants' movement spread towards Upper Swabia early in 1525. A peasant leader in Baltringen Ulrich Schmid requested the radical preacher Cristopher Schappler and the pamphleteer Sebastian Lotzer to summarize the Swabian peasants' demands. The two completed a manifesto known as Twelve Articles, setting a template for further similar documents. The Twelve Articles declared that the local communities could freely elect and dissmiss their priests and supervise the use of church revenues. The manifesto demanded the abolition of the tithe on meat, stating that it had been "invented by men alone". The last of the articles announced that the peasants were willing to abandon any of their demands that contradicted the Bible but also emphasized their right to present further demands against non-Biblical seigneurial practices. A second document titled Federal Ordinance declared the establishment of a "Christian union and league ... for the praise and honour of the almighty, eternal God, to call upon the holy Gospel and the Word of God". It named fourteen arbitrators who approached Luther, Zwingli, Melanchthon and other leaders of the Reformation for the clarification of the "divine law" to be applied in relations between landlords and tenants but none of them answered.

Luther did not take sides in the conflict, and equally blamed the lords for the oppression of the peasantry and the rebels for their arbitrary acts. Georg Truchsess von Waldburg (d. 1531), the commander of the troops of the Swabian League, achieved the dissolution of the Swabian peasant armies either by force or through negotiations. His treaty with the peasants from the region of the Lake Constance was praised by Luther. Peasant movements in Franconia were more violent and the rebellious peasants terrorised and massacred the local landlords and their representatives. Truchsess forced them into submission by the end of June. In Thüringia, Müntzer was one of the leaders of the rebellious peasantry. He had been expelled first from Zwickau then from Allstedt for his radicalism. He convinced about 300 radicals from Allstedt and Mühlhausen to assemble at Bad Frankenhausen. He promised them that they were invincible, but they were annihilated by Philip the Magnanimous, Landgrave of Hesse (r. 1509–1567) and George, Duke of Saxony (r. 1500–1539) in May. Müntzer had hidden in an attic before the battle but he was discovered and executed. Outraged by the peasants' violent acts, Luther published a treatise Against the Murderous, Thieving Hordes of Peasants and encouraged the German princes to supress the revolt by force. He blamed Müntzer for the violence, describing him as the "archdevil" who "does nothing else than stir up robbery, murder and bloodshed". In 1525, further peasant movements began in the Tyrol, Austria, Styria, Salzburg, the Rhineland, Burgundy and other regions but they were pacified through concessions or suppressed by force. The Tyrolian peasant leader Michael Gaismair (d. 1532) drafted a program of radical political, social and ecclesiastic reforms called the Territorial Constitution. He demanded the abolition of all feudal privileges and immunities along with a ban on the Mass but his program was never implemented.

Consolidation and confessionalization

Princely Reformation

The Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights Albert of Brandenburg-Ansbach (r. 1510–1525) was the first prince to formally abandon the traditional faith. The Knights held Royal Prussia on the southern shores of the Baltic Sea in fief of Albert's cousin Sigismund I the Old, king of Poland and grand duke of Lithuania (r. 1506–1548). After a series of defeats in a war against Poland and Lithuania had demoralised the Teutonic Order, Albert transformed this region into the hereditary Duchy of Prussia with Sigismund's consent in April 1525. The secularisation of Royal Prussia was an open rebellion against the old Church system, and brought about the establishment of the first Evangelical state church. In August 1525, Casimir, Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach (r. 1515–1527) and George, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach (r. 1536–1543) ordered the priests in the two margraviates to preach that faith alone was enough for salvation in accordance with Luther's theology. In Electoral Saxony, Frederick the Wise refused to persecute Luther and his followers but remained Catholic until the end of his life. His successor John the Constant (r. 1525–1532) was less conservative. On Christmas Day 1525, he ordered that the Mass be said in German. The introduction of the Reformation in the powerful Electoral Saxony facilitated the adoption of Evangelical teaching in the nearby principalities. Gebhard of Mansfeld (d. 1558) and Albrecht VII von Mansfeld (d. 1560) followed John's example in 1525, Philip the Magnanimous in 1526.

Sack of Rome in 1527 by Emperor Charles V's troops (1555) on a woodcut by Maarten van Heemskerck

The Catholic and Evangelical imperial princes reached a compromise at the Diet of Speyer in 1526, agreeing that the imperial ban against Luther could not be implemented, and each prince would "live, govern, and act in such a way as everyone trusted to justify before God and the Imperial Majesty". Fully occupied with the War of the League of Cognac against France, Venice, Florence, and the papacy in Italy, Emperor Charles had appointed his brother Ferdinand I, Archduke of Austria (r. 1521–1564) to represent him in Germany. Ferdinand was brought into succession struggles in Bohemia and Hungary after their brother-in-law King Louis died in the Battle of Mohács. In 1527, Charles's mutinous and largely Protestant troops sacked Rome and took Pope Clement VII (r. 1523–1534) under custody in the Castel Sant'Angelo. On learning of the events, Luther stated that "Christ reigns in such a way that the emperor who persecutes Luther for the pope is forced to destroy the pope for Luther".

In practice, the Speyer compromise introduced the principle cuius regio, eius religio ('whose realm, their religion') in the German principalities, acknowledging that each prince had the right to determine his subjects' religious affiliation. The villagers of the autonomous Graubünden region in the Swiss Alps adopted a different approach and allowed each village to choose between the two religions. By this time, Luther had concluded that only the princes were able to prevent the disintegration of the ecclesiastic system, and no more wrote of the congregations' right to elect their pastors. In theory he maintained that a prince's intervention in ecclesiastic affairs was irregular, but acknowledged that a prince could act as an "emergency bishop" if the Church was in lack of competent leadership.

The establishment of an Evangelical ecclesiastic system was mainly carried out through church visitations. In Electoral Saxony, John the Constant appointed theologians and princely officials to visit all parishes. The visitations convinced Luther that the villagers' knowledge of the Christian faith was imperfect, as many of them could not cite even the Ten Commandments, the Apostles' Creed, or the Lord's Prayer. To deal with the situation, he completed two cathecisms—the Large Catechism for the education of Evangelical pastors, and the Small Catechism for children. Between August 1527 and March 1528, princely decrees were issued to enact the most important Evangelical ideals. Church liturgy was simplified through the elimination of practices considered as unevangelical, new clerics replaced priests regarded unqualified by the visitators, church property was placed under governmental control, and the jurisdiction of church courts was abolished. In 1533, the Evangelical version of bishopric was established with the appointment of Johannes Bugenhagen (d. 1558) as the superintendent of the Evangelical Church in northern Germany.

"Protestation" at Speyer and compromise in Switzerland

Evangelical Imperial Estates on their protestation at the Diet of Speyer

"In matters concerning God's honor and our soul's salvation everyone must stand before God and answer by himself, nobody can excuse himself in that place by the actions of decisions of others whether they be a minority or majority."

Five imperial princes and representatives of fourteen imperial cities, Protestation at Speyer (1529)

Taking advantage of Emperor Charles' victories in Italy, Ferdinand I achieved the abolishment of the previous compromise and the reinforcement of the imperial ban against Luther at the Diet of Speyer in 1529. In response, five imperial princes and fourteen imperial cities presented a formal protestatio arguing that the decision could only be implemented through warring. Their opponents mocked them as "Protestants", and this appelation would be applied to all followers of the new theologies.

Zwingli decided to spread his theology in the so-called Mandated Territories—municipalities ruled jointly by all Swiss cantons. Early in 1529, he persuaded Zürich, Bern, Strassbourg and other Protestant Swiss and south German communities to conclude an alliance. In response, the Catholic Swiss cantons formed a separate military union with Ferdinand's support. The Protestants launched a surprise invasion against the Catholic cantons. The bloodless conflict ended with a compromise allowing each community in the Mandated Territories to choose between Protestantism and Catholicism by a majority vote of the male inhabitants. Zwingli began an intense proselytizing campaign in the region which secured the conversion of much of the local communities to Protestantism. He reorganized church administration by establishing territorial assemblies with the participation of clergymen and lay delegates. Zwingli, as MacCulloch notes, "thus created the first evangelical church synods, which in many later, more fully developed Reformed systems formed part of a tiered structure of such decision-making bodies, some alternatively called presbyteries".

As theological disputes between Luther and Zwingli had not abated, Philip the Magnanimous organised a colloquy (or theological debate) at his capital Marburg early in October 1529. He invited Luther, Melanchton, Zwingli and Oecolampadius to participate. They agreed on fourteen slightly ambigious articles of faith but could not accept a common formula on the Eucharist.

Schleitheim Articles

Title page of the Schleitheim Articles passed at the pacifist Anabaptists' assembly in 1527

The historian Carter Lindberg states that the "Peasants' War was a formative experience for many leaders of Anabaptism". Most of them had been in close contact with Münzer during the revolt. Hans Hut (d. 1527) continued Müntzer's apocalyticism, prophesying that the world would end on Pentecost 1528. Others such as Hans Denck (d. 1527) and Melchior Rink rejected all forms of violence. The pacifist Michael Sattler (d. 1527) took the chair at an Anabaptist assembly at Schleitheim in February 1527. Here the participants adopted an anti-militarist program now known as the Schleitheim Articles. In addition to reasserting the principle of believers' baptism and describing the Eucharist as a memorial service, the document ordered the believers' separation from the evil world prohibiting oath-taking, the bearing of arms and the holding of civic offices. Facing Ottoman expansionism, the Austrian authorities considered the Anabaptists' pacifism as a direct threat to their country's defense. Sattler was captured and executed at Rottenburg am Neckar. During his trial, he stated that "If the Turks should come, we ought not to resist them. For it is written: Thou shalt not kill."

The total separatism of the Schleitheim Articles was alien to Balthasar Hübmaier who tried to achieve a peaceful coexistence with non-Anabaptists. Expelled from Zürich, he fled to Moravia and settled in the domains of Count Leonhard von Liechtenstein in Nikolsburg (now Mikulov, Czech Republic) in July 1526. He maintained that only adult baptism had Biblical foundations but agreed to baptize infants on the parents' request for which Hut called him as an evil compromiser. Ferdinand I did not tolerate Anabaptism, and on his orders Hubmaier was sentenced to death and burned at the stake for heresy. His execution inaugurated a period of intensive purge against Anabaptists. Hubmaier's followers relocated to Austerlitz (now Slavkov u Brna, Czech Republic) where Anabaptist refugees from Tyrol joined them. One of them, Jakob Hutter (d. 1536) assumed the leadership of the community, and they began to held their goods in common. The Bohemian Brethren symphatised with the Hutterites which facilitated their survival in Moravia.

Augsburg Confession and Confessio Tetrapolitana

Back in Germany in January 1530, Charles V asked the Protestants to summarize their theology at the following Imperial Diet at Augsburg. As the imperial ban prevented Luther from attending the Diet, Melanchthon was selected to complete the task. When drafting the document, Melanchthon sharply condemned Anabaptist ideas and adopted a reconciliatory tone towards Catholicism but did not fail to emphasize the most featuring elements of Evangelical theology, such as justification by faith alone, and the denial of the necessity of uniform church ceremonies. The twenty-eight articles of the Augsburg Confession were presented at the Diet on 25 June. The Emperor requested Eck and other Catholic theologians to respond it, and they completed a document called Confutatio ('refutation'). After it was also presented at the Diet on 3 August, Charles ordered the Evangelical theologians to admit that their argumentation had been refuted completely. Ignoring this order, Melanchthon wrote a detailed explanation for the Augsburg Confession known as the Apology of the Augsburg Confession. Four south German Protestant cities—Strasbourg, Constance, Lindau, and Memmingen—did not sign the Augsburg Confession because they were influenced by Zwingli's interpretation of the Eucharist. They adopted a separate confessional document called Tetrapolitan Confession although they tried to achieve a compromise by stating that "true body and true blood" were "truly eaten and drunk" in the Eucharist.

Charles wanted to wage a war against the Protestant imperial princes and cities but the Catholic Imperial Estates refused to support him because they feared that his victory could strengthen central authority in the Holy Roman Empire. The Diet passed a law prohibiting further religious innovations and ordering the Protestants to return to Catholicism until 15 April 1531. The Protestant rulers decided to form a defensive league. Luther had previously questioned their right to resist imperial power, but by the end of 1530 he concluded that a defensive war for religious purposes could be regarded as a just war. Known as the Schmalkaldic League, the Protestant Imperial Estates' defensive alliance was signed by five princes and fourteen cities on 27 February 1531. A new Ottoman invasion of Central Europe prevented the Habsburgs from attacking the Protestants, and the parties concluded a peace treaty at Nuremberg which suspended the Protestant signatories' prosecution in the Reichskammergericht ('Imperial Court') in July 1532.

Political situation in Germany about 1560

Religious situation in Germany and Europe about 1560

Scandinavia

Having been expelled from his Scandinavian realms, Christian II settled in Wittenberg where he converted to Evangelism, and initiated the first Danish translation of the New Testament. Its first publication contained a manifesto encouraging the readers to rise up for the deposed king. The lack of funds prevented him to take up arms but he presented a protential threat to his successors due to his close family links to the Habsburgs.

The Danish Parliament prohibited the newly elected bishops to seek confirmation from the Roman Curia, thus establishing a national Church in 1526. The former Hospitaller knight Hans Tausen (d. 1561) who had studied in Wittenberg became the first Evangelical preacher of Viborg in 1525, and he kept his office with Frederick I's support. He introduced Danish liturgy in the Viborg Cathedral in 1529. The same year, twelve of the fifteen churches were demolished in the town which set a precedent for the dissolution of religious insitutions, mainly friaries all over the country. The Catholic clergy tried to achieve the condemnation of heresy at a legislative assembly in 1530, but the assembly decreed that only preachers who could not prove that their sermons were in line with the Bible should be "brought to justice". After Frederick's death the bishops prevented the election of his Evangelical son Christian as his successor with the conservative noblemen's support. The interregnum allowed Christopher, Count of Oldenburg (r. 1526–1566) to take up arms on the deposed Christian II's behalf, but the subsequent civil war known as Count's Feud ended with the victory of Frederick's son. As the bishops had supported his opponents, Christian III (r. 1534–1559) ordered their arrest, and put an end to their office in August 1536. He was crowned king by Bugenhagen who also ordained seven superintendents. Most Catholic clerics accepted the change without resistance, and many Catholic traditions survived. The priests continued to elevate the bread and wine before offering them to the kneeling congregation, and pilgrimages to the most popular shrines continued.

The introduction of the Reformation required vigorous governmental interventions in the Danish dependencies of Norway and Iceland. In Norway, mostly the German townspeople of Bergen had heard Evangelical preaching before 1536. The last Catholic Archbishop of Norway Olav Engelbrektsson (d. 1538) was a staunch opponent of Christian III. Gjeble Pederssøn (d. 1557) was appointed as the first Norwegian Evanglical superintendent but other former episcopal sees remained vacant. In Iceland, Gissur Einarsson (d. 1548) was appointed the first Evangelical bishop in 1540.

Gustav I of Sweden appointed the Evangelical preacher Laurentius Andreae (d. 1552) as his chancellor, and the Evangelical scholar Olaus Petri (d. 1552) as a minister at Stockholm. Andreae supported Gustav's attempts to seize church property by theological arguments, and Petri translated the Gospels into Swedish in 1526. On Petri's advice, Gustav closed a printing house that published anti-Evangelical literature under the auspices of the Catholic Bishop of Linköping, Hans Brask (d. 1538).

Reformation outside Germany

The Reformation also spread widely throughout Europe, starting with Bohemia, in the Czech lands, and, over the next few decades, to other countries.

John Calvin

Main articles: John Calvin and Republic of Geneva

John Calvin was one of the leading figures of the Reformation. His legacy remains in a variety of churches.

Following the excommunication of Luther and condemnation of the Reformation by the Pope, the work and writings of John Calvin were influential in establishing a loose consensus among various churches in Switzerland, Scotland, Hungary, Germany and elsewhere. After the expulsion of its Bishop in 1526, and the unsuccessful attempts of the Berne reformer Guillaume (William) Farel, Calvin was asked to use the organisational skill he had gathered as a student of law to discipline the "fallen city" of Geneva. His "Ordinances" of 1541 involved a collaboration of Church affairs with the City council and consistory to bring morality to all areas of life. After the establishment of the Geneva academy in 1559, Geneva became the unofficial capital of the Protestant movement, providing refuge for Protestant exiles from all over Europe and educating them as Calvinist missionaries. These missionaries dispersed Calvinism widely, and formed the French Huguenots in Calvin's own lifetime and spread to Scotland under the leadership of John Knox in 1560. Anne Locke translated some of Calvin's writings to English around this time. The faith continued to spread after Calvin's death in 1563 and reached as far as Constantinople by the start of the 17th century.

The Reformation foundations engaged with Augustinianism. Both Luther and Calvin thought along lines linked with the theological teachings of Augustine of Hippo. The Augustinianism of the Reformers struggled against Pelagianism, a heresy that they perceived in the Catholic Church of their day. Ultimately, since Calvin and Luther disagreed strongly on certain matters of theology (such as double-predestination and Holy Communion), the relationship between Lutherans and Calvinists was one of conflict.

Nordic countries

See also: Reformation in Denmark-Norway and Holstein, Religion in Iceland § The Reformation, Religion in Norway § From Reformation to 1964, and Religion in Sweden § Lutheran Reformation

The seal of the Diocese of Turku (Finland) during the 16th and 17th centuries featured the finger of St Henry. The post-Reformation diocese included the relic of a pre-Reformation saint in its seal.

All of Scandinavia ultimately adopted Lutheranism over the course of the 16th century, as the monarchs of Denmark (who also ruled Norway and Iceland) and Sweden (who also ruled Finland) converted to that faith.

Sweden

Main article: Reformation in Sweden

In Sweden, the Reformation was spearheaded by Gustav Vasa, elected king in 1523, with major contributions by Olaus Petri, a Swedish clergyman. Friction with the pope over the latter's interference in Swedish ecclesiastical affairs led to the discontinuance of any official connection between Sweden and the papacy since 1523. Four years later, at the Diet of Västerås, the king succeeded in forcing the diet to accept his dominion over the national church. The king was given possession of all church property, church appointments required royal approval, the clergy were subject to the civil law, and the "pure Word of God" was to be preached in the churches and taught in the schools—effectively granting official sanction to Lutheran ideas. The apostolic succession was retained in Sweden during the Reformation. The adoption of Lutheranism was also one of the main reasons for the eruption of the Dacke War, a peasants uprising in Småland.

Denmark

Under the reign of Frederick I (1523–33), Denmark remained officially Catholic. Frederick initially pledged to persecute Lutherans, yet he quickly adopted a policy of protecting Lutheran preachers and reformers, of whom the most famous was Hans Tausen. During his reign, Lutheranism made significant inroads among the Danish population. In 1526, Frederick forbade papal investiture of bishops in Denmark and in 1527 ordered fees from new bishops be paid to the crown, making Frederick the head of the church of Denmark. Frederick's son, Christian, was openly Lutheran, which prevented his election to the throne upon his father's death. In 1536, following his victory in the Count's War, he became king as Christian III and continued the Reformation of the state church with assistance from Johannes Bugenhagen. By the Copenhagen recess of October 1536, the authority of the Catholic bishops was terminated.

Iceland

Main article: Icelandic Reformation

Luther's influence had already reached Iceland before King Christian's decree. The Germans fished near Iceland's coast, and the Hanseatic League engaged in commerce with the Icelanders. These Germans raised a Lutheran church in Hafnarfjörður as early as 1533. Through German trade connections, many young Icelanders studied in Hamburg. In 1538, when the kingly decree of the new Church ordinance reached Iceland, bishop Ögmundur and his clergy denounced it, threatening excommunication for anyone subscribing to the German "heresy". In 1539, the King sent a new governor to Iceland, Klaus von Mervitz, with a mandate to introduce reform and take possession of church property. Von Mervitz seized a monastery in Viðey with the help of his sheriff, Dietrich of Minden, and his soldiers. They drove the monks out and seized all their possessions, for which they were promptly excommunicated by Ögmundur.

United Kingdom

Main articles: English Reformation and List of Protestant martyrs of the English Reformation

England

Church of England

Main articles: Church of England and Anglicanism

Henry VIII broke England's ties with the Roman Catholic Church, becoming the sole head of the English Church.

The separation of the Church of England from Rome under Henry VIII, beginning in 1529 and completed in 1537, brought England alongside this broad Reformation movement. Although Robert Barnes attempted to get Henry VIII to adopt Lutheran theology, he refused to do so in 1538 and burned him at the stake in 1540. Reformers in the Church of England alternated, for decades, between sympathies between Catholic tradition and Reformed principles, gradually developing, within the context of robustly Protestant doctrine, a tradition considered a middle way (via media) between the Catholic and Protestant traditions.

The English Reformation followed a different course from the Reformation in continental Europe. There had long been a strong strain of anti-clericalism. England had already given rise to the Lollard movement of John Wycliffe, which played an important part in inspiring the Hussites in Bohemia. Lollardy was suppressed and became an underground movement, so the extent of its influence in the 1520s is difficult to assess. The different character of the English Reformation came rather from the fact that it was driven initially by the political necessities of Henry VIII.

Henry had once been a sincere Catholic and had even authored a book strongly criticising Luther. His wife, Catherine of Aragon, bore him only a single child who survived infancy, Mary. Henry strongly wanted a male heir, and many of his subjects might have agreed, if only because they wanted to avoid another dynastic conflict like the Wars of the Roses.

Thomas Cranmer proved essential in the development of the English Reformation.

Refused an annulment of his marriage to Catherine, King Henry decided to remove the Church of England from the authority of Rome. In 1534, the Act of Supremacy recognised Henry as "the only Supreme Head on earth of the Church of England". Between 1535 and 1540, under Thomas Cromwell, the policy known as the Dissolution of the Monasteries was put into effect. The veneration of some saints, certain pilgrimages and some pilgrim shrines were also attacked. Huge amounts of church land and property passed into the hands of the Crown and ultimately into those of the nobility and gentry. The vested interest thus created made for a powerful force in support of the dissolution.

There were some notable opponents to the Henrician Reformation, such as Thomas More and Cardinal John Fisher, who were executed for their opposition. There was also a growing party of reformers who were imbued with the Calvinistic, Lutheran and Zwinglian doctrines then current on the Continent. When Henry died he was succeeded by his Protestant son Edward VI, who, through his empowered councilors (with the King being only nine years old at his succession and fifteen at his death) the Duke of Somerset and the Duke of Northumberland, ordered the destruction of images in churches, and the closing of the chantries. Under Edward VI the Church of England moved closer to continental Protestantism.

Yet, at a popular level, religion in England was still in a state of flux. Following a brief Catholic restoration during the reign of Mary (1553–1558), a loose consensus developed during the reign of Elizabeth I, though this point is one of considerable debate among historians. This "Elizabethan Religious Settlement" largely formed Anglicanism into a distinctive church tradition. The compromise was uneasy and was capable of veering between extreme Calvinism on one hand and Catholicism on the other. But compared to the bloody and chaotic state of affairs in contemporary France, it was relatively successful, in part because Queen Elizabeth lived so long, until the Puritan Revolution or English Civil War in the seventeenth century.

English dissenters

Main articles: Puritanism, English Dissenters, Independent (religion), Nonconformism, English Presbyterianism, Ecclesiastical separatism, and 17th-century denominations in England

Oliver Cromwell was a devout Puritan and military leader, who became Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland.

The success of the Counter-Reformation on the Continent and the growth of a Puritan party dedicated to further Protestant reform polarised the Elizabethan Age, although it was not until the 1640s that England underwent religious strife comparable to what its neighbours had suffered some generations before.

The early Puritan movement (late 16th–17th centuries) was Reformed (or Calvinist) and was a movement for reform in the Church of England. Its origins lay in the discontent with the Elizabethan Religious Settlement. The desire was for the Church of England to resemble more closely the Protestant churches of Europe, especially Geneva. The Puritans objected to ornaments and ritual in the churches as idolatrous (vestments, surplices, organs, genuflection), calling the vestments "popish pomp and rags" (see Vestments controversy). They also objected to ecclesiastical courts. Their refusal to endorse completely all of the ritual directions and formulas of the Book of Common Prayer, and the imposition of its liturgical order by legal force and inspection, sharpened Puritanism into a definite opposition movement.

The later Puritan movement, often referred to as dissenters and nonconformists, eventually led to the formation of various Reformed denominations.

America

The most famous emigration to America was the migration of Puritan separatists from the Anglican Church of England. They fled first to Holland, and then later to America to establish the English colony of Massachusetts in New England, which later became one of the original United States. These Puritan separatists were also known as "the Pilgrims". After establishing a colony at Plymouth (which became part of the colony of Massachusetts) in 1620, the Puritan pilgrims received a charter from the King of England that legitimised their colony, allowing them to do trade and commerce with merchants in England, in accordance with the principles of mercantilism. Civil and religious restrictions were most strictly applied by the Puritans of Massachusetts which saw various banishments applied to dissenters to enforce conformity, including the branding iron, the whipping post, the bilboes and the hangman's noose. Notable individuals persecuted by the Puritans include Anne Hutchinson who was banished to Rhode Island during the Antinomian Controversy and Quaker Mary Dyer who was hanged in Boston for repeatedly defying a Puritan law banning Quakers from the colony. Dyer was one of the four executed Quakers known as the Boston martyrs. Executions ceased in 1661 when King Charles II explicitly forbade Massachusetts from executing anyone for professing Quakerism. In 1647, Massachusetts passed a law prohibiting any Jesuit Roman Catholic priests from entering territory under Puritan jurisdiction. Any suspected person who could not clear himself was to be banished from the colony; a second offence carried a death penalty.

The Pilgrims held radical Protestant disapproval of Christmas, and its celebration was outlawed in Boston from 1659 to 1681. The ban was revoked in 1681 by the English-appointed governor Edmund Andros, who also revoked a Puritan ban on festivities on Saturday nights. Nevertheless, it was not until the mid-19th century that celebrating Christmas became fashionable in the Boston region.

Wales

Further information: History of Wales § Early modern period

Bishop Richard Davies and dissident Protestant cleric John Penry introduced Calvinist theology to Wales. In 1588, the Bishop of Llandaff published the entire Bible in the Welsh language. The translation had a significant impact upon the Welsh population and helped to firmly establish Protestantism among the Welsh people. The Welsh Protestants used the model of the Synod of Dort of 1618–1619. Calvinism developed through the Puritan period, following the restoration of the monarchy under Charles II, and within Wales' Calvinistic Methodist movement. However few copies of Calvin's writings were available before the mid-19th century.

Scotland

Main articles: Scottish Reformation, Church of Scotland, and Presbyterianism

John Knox was a leading figure in the Scottish Reformation

The Reformation in Scotland's case culminated ecclesiastically in the establishment of a church along reformed lines, and politically in the triumph of English influence over that of France. John Knox is regarded as the leader of the Scottish reformation.

The Reformation Parliament of 1560 repudiated the pope's authority by the Papal Jurisdiction Act 1560, forbade the celebration of the Mass and approved a Protestant Confession of Faith. It was made possible by a revolution against French hegemony under the regime of the regent Mary of Guise, who had governed Scotland in the name of her absent daughter Mary, Queen of Scots (then also Queen of France).

Although Protestantism triumphed relatively easily in Scotland, the exact form of Protestantism remained to be determined. The 17th century saw a complex struggle between Presbyterianism (particularly the Covenanters) and Episcopalianism. The Presbyterians eventually won control of the Church of Scotland, which went on to have an important influence on Presbyterian churches worldwide, but Scotland retained a relatively large Episcopalian minority.

France

Main articles: Massacre of Mérindol, Huguenot, Reformed Church of France, and French Wars of Religion

Although a Catholic clergyman himself, Cardinal Richelieu allied France with Protestant states.

Besides the Waldensians already present in France, Protestantism also spread in from German lands, where the Protestants were nicknamed Huguenots; this eventually led to decades of civil warfare.

Though not personally interested in religious reform, Francis I (reigned 1515–1547) initially maintained an attitude of tolerance, in accordance with his interest in the humanist movement. This changed in 1534 with the Affair of the Placards. In this act, Protestants denounced the Catholic Mass in placards that appeared across France, even reaching the royal apartments. During this time as the issue of religious faith entered into the arena of politics, Francis came to view the movement as a threat to the kingdom's stability.

Following the Affair of the Placards, culprits were rounded up, at least a dozen heretics were put to death, and the persecution of Protestants increased. One of those who fled France at that time was John Calvin, who emigrated to Basel in 1535 before eventually settling in Geneva in 1536. Beyond the reach of the French kings in Geneva, Calvin continued to take an interest in the religious affairs of his native land including the training of ministers for congregations in France.

As the number of Protestants in France increased, the number of heretics in prisons awaiting trial also grew. As an experimental approach to reduce the caseload in Normandy, a special court just for the trial of heretics was established in 1545 in the Parlement de Rouen. When Henry II took the throne in 1547, the persecution of Protestants grew and special courts for the trial of heretics were also established in the Parlement de Paris. These courts came to known as "La Chambre Ardente" ("the fiery chamber") because of their reputation of meting out death penalties on burning gallows.

Despite heavy persecution by Henry II, the Reformed Church of France, largely Calvinist in direction, made steady progress across large sections of the nation, in the urban bourgeoisie and parts of the aristocracy, appealing to people alienated by the obduracy and the complacency of the Catholic establishment.

Saint Bartholomew's Day massacre, painting by François Dubois

French Protestantism, though its appeal increased under persecution, came to acquire a distinctly political character, made all the more obvious by the conversions of nobles during the 1550s. This established the preconditions for a series of destructive and intermittent conflicts, known as the Wars of Religion. The civil wars gained impetus with the sudden death of Henry II in 1559, which began a prolonged period of weakness for the French crown. Atrocity and outrage became the defining characteristics of the time, illustrated at their most intense in the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre of August 1572, when the Catholic party killed between 30,000 and 100,000 Huguenots across France. The wars only concluded when Henry IV, himself a former Huguenot, issued the Edict of Nantes (1598), promising official toleration of the Protestant minority, but under highly restricted conditions. Catholicism remained the official state religion, and the fortunes of French Protestants gradually declined over the next century, culminating in Louis XIV's Edict of Fontainebleau (1685), which revoked the Edict of Nantes and made Catholicism the sole legal religion of France, leading some Huguenots to live as Nicodemites. In response to the Edict of Fontainebleau, Frederick William I, Elector of Brandenburg declared the Edict of Potsdam (October 1685), giving free passage to Huguenot refugees and tax-free status to them for ten years.

In the late 17th century, 150,000–200,000 Huguenots fled to England, the Netherlands, Prussia, Switzerland, and the English and Dutch overseas colonies. A significant community in France remained in the Cévennes region. A separate Protestant community, of the Lutheran faith, existed in the newly conquered province of Alsace, its status not affected by the Edict of Fontainebleau.

Spain

Main articles: History of Spain § Phillip II and the wars of religion, and Protestantism in Spain

The New Testament translated by Enzinas, published in Antwerp (1543)

The New Testament translated by Joanes Leizarraga into the Basque language (1571) on the orders of Navarre's Calvinist queen, Jeanne III of Navarre

In the early 16th century, Spain had a different political and cultural milieu from its Western and Central European neighbours in several respects, which affected the mentality and the reaction of the nation towards the Reformation. Spain, which had only recently managed to complete the reconquest of the Peninsula from the Moors in 1492, had been preoccupied with converting the Muslim and Jewish populations of the newly conquered regions through the establishment of the Spanish Inquisition in 1478. The rulers of the nation stressed political, cultural, and religious unity, and by the time of the Lutheran Reformation, the Spanish Inquisition was already 40 years old and had the capability of quickly persecuting any new movement that the leaders of the Catholic Church perceived or interpreted to be religious heterodoxy. Charles V did not wish to see Spain or the rest of Habsburg Europe divided, and in light of continual threat from the Ottomans, preferred to see the Roman Catholic Church reform itself from within. This led to a Counter-Reformation in Spain in the 1530s. During the 1520s, the Spanish Inquisition had created an atmosphere of suspicion and sought to root out any religious thought seen as suspicious. As early as 1521, the Pope had written a letter to the Spanish monarchy warning against allowing the unrest in Northern Europe to be replicated in Spain. Between 1520 and 1550, printing presses in Spain were tightly controlled and any books of Protestant teaching were prohibited.

Contemporary illustration of the auto-da-fé of Valladolid, in which fourteen Protestants were burned at the stake for their faith, on 21 May 1559

Between 1530 and 1540, Protestantism in Spain was still able to gain followers clandestinely, and in cities such as Seville and Valladolid adherents would secretly meet at private houses to pray and study the Bible. Protestants in Spain were estimated at between 1000 and 3000, mainly among intellectuals who had seen writings such as those of Erasmus. Notable reformers included Dr. Juan Gil and Juan Pérez de Pineda who subsequently fled and worked alongside others such as Francisco de Enzinas to translate the Greek New Testament into the Spanish language, a task completed by 1556. Protestant teachings were smuggled into Spain by Spaniards such as Julián Hernández, who in 1557 was condemned by the Inquisition and burnt at the stake. Under Philip II, conservatives in the Spanish church tightened their grip, and those who refused to recant such as Rodrigo de Valer were condemned to life imprisonment. In May 1559, sixteen Spanish Lutherans were burnt at the stake: fourteen were strangled before being burnt, while two were burnt alive. In October another thirty were executed. Spanish Protestants who were able to flee the country were to be found in at least a dozen cities in Europe, such as Geneva, where some of them embraced Calvinist teachings. Those who fled to England were given support by the Church of England.

The Kingdom of Navarre, although by the time of the Protestant Reformation a minor principality territoriality restricted to southern France, had French Huguenot monarchs, including Henry IV of France and his mother, Jeanne III of Navarre, a devout Calvinist.

Upon the arrival of the Protestant Reformation, Calvinism reached some Basques through the translation of the Bible into the Basque language by Joanes Leizarraga. As Queen of Navarre, Jeanne III commissioned the translation of the New Testament into Basque and Béarnese for the benefit of her subjects.

Molinism presented a soteriology similar to Protestants within the Roman Catholic Church.

Portugal

Main article: Protestantism in Portugal

During the Reformation era Protestantism was unsuccessful in Portugal, as its spread was frustrated for similar reasons to those in Spain.

Netherlands

Main article: History of religion in the Netherlands

Anabaptist Dirk Willems rescues his pursuer and is subsequently burned at the stake in 1569.

The Reformation in the Netherlands, unlike in many other countries, was not initiated by the rulers of the Seventeen Provinces, but instead by multiple popular movements which in turn were bolstered by the arrival of Protestant refugees from other parts of the continent. While the Anabaptist movement enjoyed popularity in the region in the early decades of the Reformation, Calvinism, in the form of the Dutch Reformed Church, became the dominant Protestant faith in the country from the 1560s onward. In the early 17th century internal theological conflict within the Calvinist church between two tendencies of Calvinism, the Gomarists and the liberal Arminians (or Remonstrants), resulted in Gomarist Calvinism becoming the de facto state religion.

Belgium

The first two Lutheran martyrs were monks from Antwerp, Johann Esch and Heinrich Hoes, who were burned at the stake when they would not recant.

Harsh persecution of Protestants by the Spanish government of Philip II contributed to a desire for independence in the provinces, which led to the Eighty Years' War and, eventually, the separation of the largely Protestant Dutch Republic from the Catholic-dominated Southern Netherlands (present-day Belgium).

In 1566, at the peak of Belgian Reformation, there were an estimated 300,000 Protestants, or 20% of the Belgian population.

Hungary

Main article: Reformation in the Kingdom of Hungary

Stephen Bocskay prevented the Holy Roman Emperor from imposing Catholicism on Hungarians.

Much of the population of the Kingdom of Hungary adopted Protestantism during the 16th century. After the 1526 Battle of Mohács, the Hungarian people were disillusioned by the inability of the government to protect them and turned to the faith they felt would infuse them with the strength necessary to resist the invader. They found this in the teaching of Protestant reformers such as Martin Luther. The spread of Protestantism in the country was assisted by its large ethnic German minority, which could understand and translate the writings of Martin Luther. While Lutheranism gained a foothold among the German- and Slovak-speaking populations, Calvinism became widely accepted among ethnic Hungarians.

In the more independent northwest, the rulers and priests, protected now by the Habsburg monarchy, which had taken the field to fight the Turks, defended the old Catholic faith. They dragged the Protestants to prison and the stake wherever they could. Such strong measures only fanned the flames of protest, however. Leaders of the Protestants included Mátyás Dévai Bíró, Mihály Sztárai, István Szegedi Kis, and Ferenc Dávid.

Protestants likely formed a majority of Hungary's population at the close of the 16th century, but Counter-Reformation efforts in the 17th century reconverted a majority of the kingdom to Catholicism. A significant Protestant minority remained, most of it adhering to the Calvinist faith.

In 1558 the Transylvanian Diet of Turda decreed the free practice of both the Catholic and Lutheran religions, but prohibited Calvinism. Ten years later, in 1568, the Diet extended this freedom, declaring that "It is not allowed to anybody to intimidate anybody with captivity or expulsion for his religion". Four religions were declared to be "accepted" (recepta) religions (the fourth being Unitarianism, which became official in 1583 as the faith of the only Unitarian king, John II Sigismund Zápolya, r. 1540–1571), while Eastern Orthodox Christianity was "tolerated" (though the building of stone Orthodox churches was forbidden). During the Thirty Years' War, Royal (Habsburg) Hungary joined the Catholic side, until Transylvania joined the Protestant side.

Between 1604 and 1711, there was a series of anti-Habsburg uprisings calling for equal rights and freedom for all Christian denominations, with varying success; the uprisings were usually organised from Transylvania. The Habsburg-sanctioned Counter-Reformation efforts in the 17th century reconverted the majority of the kingdom to Catholicism.

The center of Protestant learning in Hungary has for some centuries been the University of Debrecen. Founded in 1538, the university was situated in an area of Eastern Hungary under Ottoman Turkish rule during the 1600s and 1700s, being allowed Islamic toleration and thus avoiding Counter-Reformation persecution.

Ireland

Main article: Reformation in Ireland

A devout Catholic, Mary I of England started the first Plantations of Ireland, which, ironically, soon came to be associated with Protestantism.

The Reformation in Ireland was a movement for the reform of religious life and institutions that was introduced into Ireland by the English administration at the behest of King Henry VIII of England. His desire for an annulment of his marriage was known as the King's Great Matter. Ultimately Pope Clement VII refused the petition; consequently it became necessary for the King to assert his lordship over the church in his realm to give legal effect to his wishes. The English Parliament confirmed the King's supremacy over the Church in the Kingdom of England. This challenge to Papal supremacy resulted in a breach with the Roman Catholic Church. By 1541, the Irish Parliament had agreed to the change in status of the country from that of a Lordship to that of Kingdom of Ireland.

Unlike similar movements for religious reform on the continent of Europe, the various phases of the English Reformation as it developed in Ireland were largely driven by changes in government policy, to which public opinion in England gradually accommodated itself. However, a number of factors complicated the adoption of the religious innovations in Ireland; the majority of the population there adhered to the Catholic Church. However, in the city of Dublin the Reformation took hold under the auspices of George Browne, Archbishop of Dublin.

Italy

Further information: Reformation in Italy and Girolamo Savonarola

Waldensian symbol Lux lucet in tenebris ("Light glows in the darkness")

Word of the Protestant reformers reached Italy in the 1520s but never caught on. Its development was stopped by the Counter-Reformation, the Inquisition and popular disinterest. Not only was the Church highly aggressive in seeking out and suppressing heresy, but there was a shortage of Protestant leadership. No one translated the Bible into Italian; few tracts were written. No core of Protestantism emerged. The few preachers who did take an interest in "Lutheranism", as it was called in Italy, were suppressed, or went into exile to northern countries where their message was well received. As a result, the Reformation exerted almost no lasting influence in Italy, except for strengthening the Catholic Church and pushing for an end to ongoing abuses during the Counter-Reformation.

Some Protestants left Italy and became outstanding activists of the European Reformation, mainly in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (e.g. Giorgio Biandrata, Bernardino Ochino, Giovanni Alciato, Giovanni Battista Cetis, Fausto Sozzini, Francesco Stancaro and Giovanni Valentino Gentile), who propagated Nontrinitarianism there and were chief instigators of the movement of Polish Brethren. Some also fled to England and Switzerland, including Peter Vermigli.

In 1532, the Waldensians, who had been already present centuries before the Reformation, aligned themselves and adopted the Calvinist theology. The Waldensian Church survived in the Western Alps through many persecutions and remains a Protestant church in Italy.

Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth

Main articles: Reformation in Poland and Counter-Reformation in Poland

Jan Łaski sought unity between various Christian Churches in the Commonwealth, and participated in the English Reformation.

In the first half of the 16th century, the enormous Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was a country of many religions and Churches, including: Roman Catholics, Byzantine Orthodox, Armenian Oriental Orthodox, Ashkenazi Jews, Karaites, and Sunni Muslims. The various groups had their own juridical systems. On the eve of the Protestant Reformation, Christianity held the predominant position within the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and Catholicism received preferential treatment at the expense of the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox.

The Reformation first entered Poland through the mostly German-speaking areas in the country's north. In the 1520s Luther's reforms spread among the mostly German-speaking inhabitants of such major cities as Danzig (now Gdańsk), Thorn (now Toruń) and Elbing (now Elbląg). In Königsberg (now Kaliningrad), in 1530, a Polish-language edition of Luther's Small Catechism was published. The Duchy of Prussia, a vassal of the Polish Crown ruled by the Teutonic Knights, emerged as a key center of the movement, with numerous publishing houses issuing not only Bibles, but also catechisms, in German, Polish and Lithuanian. In 1525 the last Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights secularised the territory, became Lutheran, and established Lutheranism as the state church.

Lutheranism found few adherents among the other peoples of the two countries. Calvinism became the most numerous Protestant group because Calvin's teachings on the role of the state within religion appealed to the nobility (known as szlachta), mainly in Lesser Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Several publishing houses were opened in Lesser Poland in the mid-16th century in such locations as Słomniki and Raków. At that time, Mennonites and Czech Brothers came to Poland. The former settled in the Vistula Delta where they used their agricultural abilities to turn parts of the delta into plodders. The latter settled mostly in Greater Poland around Leszno. Later on, Socinus and his followers emigrated to Poland. Originally the Reformed Church in Poland included both the Calvinists and the Anti-trinitarians (also known as the Socinians and the Polish Brethren); however, they eventually split due to an inability to reconcile their divergent views on the Trinity. Both Catholics and Orthodox Christians converts became Calvinists and the Anti-Trinitarians.

The Commonwealth was unique in Europe in the 16th century for its widespread tolerance confirmed by the Warsaw Confederation. This agreement granted religious toleration to all nobles: peasants living on noble estates did not receive the same protections. In 1563, the Brest Bible was published (see also Bible translations into Polish). The period of tolerance came under strain during the reign of King Sigismund III Vasa (Zygmunt Wasa). Sigismund, who was also the King of Sweden until deposed, was educated by Jesuits in Sweden before his election as King of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. During his reign, he selected Catholics for the highest offices in the country. This created resentment amongst the Protestant nobility; however, the country did not experience a religiously motivated civil war. Despite concerted efforts, the nobility rejected efforts to revise or rescind the Confederation of Warsaw, and protected this agreement.

The Deluge, a 20-year period of almost continual warfare, marked the turning point in attitudes. During the war with Sweden, when King John Casimir (Jan Kazimierz) fled to Silesia, the Icon of Mary of Częstochowa became the rallying point for military opposition to the Swedish forces. Upon his return to the country Kihn John Casimir crowned Mary a Queen of Poland. Despite these wars against Protestant, Orthodox, and Muslim neighbours, the Confederation of Warsaw held with one notable exception. In the aftermath of the Swedish withdrawal and truce, attitudes throughout the nobility (Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant) turned against the Polish Brethren. In 1658 the Polish Brethren were forced to leave the country. They were permitted to sell their immovable property and take their movable property; however, it is still unknown whether they received fair-market value for their lands. In 1666, the Sejm banned apostasy from Catholicism to any other religion, under penalty of death. Finally, in 1717, the Silent Sejm banned non-Catholics from becoming deputies of the Parliament.

The strategy the Catholic Church took towards reconverting the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth differed from its strategy elsewhere. The unique government (Poland was a republic where the citizen nobility owned the state) meant the king could not enforce a religious settlement even if he so desired. Instead the Catholic Church undertook a long and steady campaign of persuasion. In the Ruthenian lands (predominately modern day Belarus & Ukraine) the Orthodox Church also undertook a similar strategy. Additionally, the Orthodox also sought to join the Catholic Church (accomplished in the Union of Brześć [Brest]); however, this union failed to achieve a lasting, permanent, and complete union of the Catholics and Orthodox in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. An important component of the Catholic Reformation in Poland was education. Numerous colleges and universities were set up throughout the country: the Jesuits and Piarists were important in this regard but there were contributions of other religious orders such as the Dominicans. While in the middle of the 16th century the nobility mostly sent their sons abroad for education (the new German Protestant universities were important in this regard), by the mid-1600s the nobility mostly stayed home for education. The quality of the new Catholic schools was so great that Protestants willingly sent their children to these schools. Through their education, many nobles became appreciative of Catholicism or out-right converted. Even though the majority of the nobility were Catholic circa 1700, Protestants remained in these lands and pockets of Protestantism could be found outside the German-speaking lands of the former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth into the 20th century.

Among the most important Protestants of the Commonwealth were Mikołaj Rej, Marcin Czechowic, Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski and Symon Budny.

Slovenia

Main article: Religion in Slovenia § Protestantism

Primož Trubar, a Lutheran reformer in Slovenia

Primož Trubar is notable for consolidating the Slovene language and is considered to be the key figure of Slovenian cultural history, in many aspects a major Slovene historical personality. He was the key figure of the Protestant Church of the Slovene Lands, as he was its founder and its first superintendent. The first books in Slovene, Catechismus and Abecedarium, were written by Trubar.

Greece

Main article: Timeline of Orthodoxy in Greece (1453–1821) § cite ref-ZAKYTHINOS108 127-0

The Protestant teachings of the Western Church were also briefly adopted within the Eastern Orthodox Church through the Greek Patriarch Cyril Lucaris in 1629 with the publishing of the Confessio (Calvinistic doctrine) in Geneva. Motivating factors in their decision to adopt aspects of the Reformation included the historical rivalry and mistrust between the Greek Orthodox and the Roman Catholic Churches along with their concerns of Jesuit priests entering Greek lands in their attempts to propagate the teachings of the Counter-Reformation to the Greek populace. He subsequently sponsored Maximos of Gallipoli's translation of the New Testament into the Modern Greek language and it was published in Geneva in 1638. Upon Lucaris's death in 1638, the conservative factions within the Eastern Orthodox Church held two synods: the Synod of Constantinople (1638) and Synod of Iași (1642) criticising the reforms and, in the 1672 convocation led by Dositheos, they officially condemned the Calvinistic doctrines.

In 2019, Christos Yannaras told Norman Russell that although he had participated in the Zoë movement, he had come to regard it as Crypto-Protestant.

Spread

The Reformation spread throughout Europe beginning in 1517, reaching its peak between 1545 and 1620. The greatest geographical extent of Protestantism occurred at some point between 1545 and 1620. In 1620, the Battle of White Mountain defeated Protestants in Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) who sought to have the 1609 Letter of Majesty upheld.

Religious fragmentation in Central Europe at the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War (1618).

The Reformation at its peak, superimposed on modern European borders.

The Thirty Years' War began in 1618 and brought a drastic territorial and demographic decline when the House of Habsburg introduced counter-reformational measures throughout their vast possessions in Central Europe. Although the Thirty Years' War concluded with the Peace of Westphalia, the French Wars of the Counter-Reformation continued, as well as the expulsion of Protestants in Austria.

The Reformation & the Counter-Reformation—both at their end—and superimposed on modern European borders.

According to a 2020 study in the American Sociological Review, the Reformation spread earliest to areas where Luther had pre-existing social relations, such as mail correspondents, and former students, as well as where he had visited. The study argues that these social ties contributed more to the Reformation's early breakthroughs than the printing press.

Conclusion and legacy

There is no universal agreement on the exact or even the approximate date the Reformation ended. Various interpretations emphasise different dates, entire periods, or argue that the Reformation never really ended. However, there are a few popular interpretations. The Peace of Augsburg in 1555 officially ended the religious struggle between the two groups and made the legal division of Christianity permanent within the Holy Roman Empire, allowing rulers to choose either Lutheranism or Roman Catholicism as the official confession of their state. It could be considered to end with the enactment of the confessions of faith. Other suggested ending years relate to the Counter-Reformation or the 1648 Peace of Westphalia. From a Catholic perspective, the Second Vatican Council called for an end to the Counter-Reformation.

• In the history of theology or philosophy, the Reformation era ended with the Age of Orthodoxy. The Orthodox Period, also termed the Scholastic Period, succeeded the Reformation with the 1545–1563 Council of Trent, the 1562 Anglican Thirty-nine Articles, the 1580 Book of Concord, and other confessions of faith. The Orthodox Era ended with the development of both Pietism and the Enlightenment.
• The Peace of Westphalia might be considered to be the event that ended the Reformation.
• Some historians argue that the Reformation never ended as new churches have splintered from the Catholic Church (e.g., Old Catholics, Polish National Catholic Church, etc.), as well as all the various Protestant churches that exist today. No church splintering from the Catholic Church since the 17th century has done so on the basis of the same issues animating the Reformation, however.

Thirty Years' War: 1618–1648

Treaty of Westphalia allowed Calvinism to be freely exercised, reducing the need for Crypto-Calvinism

The Reformation and Counter-Reformation era conflicts are termed the European wars of religion. In particular, the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) devastated much of Germany, killing between 25% and 40% of its entire population. The Catholic House of Habsburg and its allies fought against the Protestant princes of Germany, supported at various times by Denmark, Sweden and France. The Habsburgs, who ruled Spain, Austria, the Crown of Bohemia, Hungary, Slovene Lands, the Spanish Netherlands and much of Germany and Italy, were staunch defenders of the Catholic Church. Some historians believe that the era of the Reformation came to a close when Catholic France allied itself with Protestant states against the Habsburg dynasty.

Two main tenets of the Peace of Westphalia, which ended the Thirty Years' War, were:

• All parties would now recognise the Peace of Augsburg of 1555, by which each prince would have the right to determine the religion of his own state, the options being Catholicism, Lutheranism, and now Calvinism (the principle of cuius regio, eius religio).
• Christians living in principalities where their denomination was not the established church were guaranteed the right to practice their faith in public during allotted hours and in private at their will.

The treaty also effectively ended the Papacy's pan-European political power. Pope Innocent X declared the treaty "null, void, invalid, iniquitous, unjust, damnable, reprobate, inane, empty of meaning and effect for all times" in his apostolic brief Zelo Domus Dei. European sovereigns, Catholic and Protestant alike, ignored his verdict.

Consequences of the Reformation

Six princes of the Holy Roman Empire and rulers of fourteen Imperial Free Cities, who issued a protest (or dissent) against the edict of the Diet of Speyer (1529), were the first individuals to be called Protestants. The edict reversed concessions made to the Lutherans with the approval of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V three years earlier. The term Protestant, though initially purely political in nature, later acquired a broader sense, referring to a member of any Western church which subscribed to the main Protestant principles. Today, Protestantism constitutes the second-largest form of Christianity (after Catholicism), with a total of 800 million to 1 billion adherents worldwide or about 37% of all Christians. Protestants have developed their own culture, with major contributions in education, the humanities and sciences, the political and social order, the economy and the arts and many other fields. The following outcomes of the Reformation regarding human capital formation, the Protestant ethic, economic development, governance, and "dark" outcomes have been identified by scholars:

The absence of Protestants, however, does not necessarily imply a failure of the Reformation. Although Protestants were excommunicated and ended up worshipping in communions separate from Catholics (contrary to the original intention of the Reformers), they were also suppressed, and persecuted in most of Europe at one point. As a result, some of them lived as crypto-Protestants, also called Nicodemites, contrary to the urging of John Calvin, who wanted them to live their faith openly. Some crypto-Protestants have been identified as late as the 19th century after immigrating to Latin America.

Radical Reformation

Main article: Radical Reformation

In parts of Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, a majority sympathised with the Radical Reformation despite intense persecution. Although the surviving proportion of the European population that rebelled against Catholic, Lutheran and Zwinglian churches was small, Radical Reformers wrote profusely and the literature on the Radical Reformation is disproportionately large, partly as a result of the proliferation of the Radical Reformation teachings in the United States.

Despite significant diversity among the early Radical Reformers, some "repeating patterns" emerged among many Anabaptist groups. Many of these patterns were enshrined in the Schleitheim Confession (1527) and include believers' (or adult) baptism, memorial view of the Lord's Supper, belief that Scripture is the final authority on matters of faith and practice, emphasis on the New Testament and the Sermon on the Mount, interpretation of Scripture in community, separation from the world and a two-kingdom theology, pacifism and nonresistance, communal ownership and economic sharing, belief in the freedom of the will, non-swearing of oaths, "yieldedness" (Gelassenheit) to one's community and to God, the ban (i.e., shunning), salvation through divinization (Vergöttung) and ethical living, and discipleship (Nachfolge Christi).

Literacy

Modern High German translation of the Christian Bible by the Protestant reformer Martin Luther (1534). The widespread popularity of the Bible translated into High German by Luther helped establish modern Standard High German.

The Protestant Reformation was a triumph of literacy and the new printing press. Luther's translation of the Bible into High German (the New Testament was published in 1522; the Old Testament was published in parts and completed in 1534) was also decisive for the German language and its evolution from Early New High German to Modern Standard German. Luther's translation of the Bible promoted the development of non-local forms of language and exposed all speakers to forms of German from outside their own area. The publication of Luther's Bible was a decisive moment in the spread of literacy in early modern Germany, and stimulated as well the printing and distribution of religious books and pamphlets. From 1517 onward, religious pamphlets flooded Germany and much of Europe.

By 1530, over 10,000 publications are known, with a total of ten million copies. The Reformation was thus a media revolution. Luther strengthened his attacks on Rome by depicting a "good" against "bad" church. From there, it became clear that print could be used for propaganda in the Reformation for particular agendas, although the term propaganda derives from the Catholic Congregatio de Propaganda Fide (Congregation for Propagating the Faith) from the Counter-Reformation. Reform writers used existing styles, cliches and stereotypes which they adapted as needed. Especially effective were writings in German, including Luther's translation of the Bible, his Smaller Catechism for parents teaching their children, and his Larger Catechism, for pastors.

Using the German vernacular they expressed the Apostles' Creed in simpler, more personal, Trinitarian language. Illustrations in the German Bible and in many tracts popularised Luther's ideas. Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472–1553), the great painter patronised by the electors of Wittenberg, was a close friend of Luther, and he illustrated Luther's theology for a popular audience. He dramatised Luther's views on the relationship between the Old and New Testaments, while remaining mindful of Luther's careful distinctions about proper and improper uses of visual imagery.

Human capital formation

• Higher literacy rates.
• Lower gender gap in school enrollment and literacy rates.
• Higher primary school enrollment.
• Higher public spending on schooling and better educational performance of military conscripts.
• Higher capability in reading, numeracy, essay writing, and history.

Protestant work ethic

• More hours worked.
• Divergent work attitudes of Protestant and Catholics.
• Fewer referendums on leisure, state intervention, and redistribution in Swiss cantons with more Protestants.
• Lower life satisfaction when unemployed.
• Pro-market attitudes.
• Income differences between Protestants and Catholics.

Economic development

Katharina von Bora played a role in shaping social ethics during the Reformation.

• Different levels of income tax revenue per capita, % of labor force in manufacturing and services, and incomes of male elementary school teachers.
• Growth of Protestant cities.
• Greater entrepreneurship among religious minorities in Protestant states.
• Different social ethics.
• Industrialization.

Governance

• The Reformation has been credited as a key factor in the development of the state system.
• The Reformation has been credited as a key factor in the formation of transnational advocacy movements.
• The Reformation impacted the Western legal tradition.
• Establishment of state churches.
• Poor relief and social welfare regimes.
• James Madison noted that Martin Luther's doctrine of the two kingdoms marked the beginning of the modern conception of separation of church and state.
• The Calvinist and Lutheran doctrine of the lesser magistrate contributed to resistance theory in the Early Modern period and was employed in the United States Declaration of Independence.
• Reformers such as Calvin promoted mixed government and the separation of powers, which governments such as the United States subsequently adopted.

Other outcomes

• Witch trials became more common in regions or other jurisdictions where Protestants and Catholics contested the religious market.
• Christopher J. Probst, in his book Demonizing the Jews: Luther and the Protestant Church in Nazi Germany (2012), shows that a large number of German Protestant clergy and theologians during the Nazi Third Reich used Luther's hostile publications towards the Jews and Judaism to justify at least in part the anti-Semitic policies of the National Socialists.
• In its decree on ecumenism, the Second Vatican Council of Catholic bishops declared that by contemporary dialogue that, while still holding views as the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, between the churches "all are led to examine their own faithfulness to Christ's will for the Church and accordingly to undertake with vigor the task of renewal and reform" (Unitatis Redintegratio, 4).

Historiography

Margaret C. Jacob argues that there has been a dramatic shift in the historiography of the Reformation. Until the 1960s, historians focused their attention largely on the great leaders and theologians of the 16th century, especially Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli. Their ideas were studied in depth. However, the rise of the new social history in the 1960s led to looking at history from the bottom up, not from the top down. Historians began to concentrate on the values, beliefs and behavior of the people at large. She finds, "in contemporary scholarship, the Reformation is now seen as a vast cultural upheaval, a social and popular movement, textured and rich because of its diversity."

Music and art

Further information: Protestantism § Arts

Painting and sculpture

• Northern Mannerism
• Lutheran art
• German Renaissance Art
• Swedish art
• English art
• Woodcuts
• Art conflicts
• Beeldenstorm

Building

• Influence on church architecture

Literature

• Elizabethan
• Metaphysical poets
• Propaganda
• Welsh
• Scottish
• Anglo-Irish
• German
• Czech
• Swiss
• Slovak
• Sorbian
• Romanian
• Danish
• Faroese
• Norwegian
• Swedish
• Finnish
• Icelandic
• Dutch Renaissance and Golden Age
• Folklore of the Low Countries
• 16th century Renaissance humanism
• 16th century in poetry
• 16th century in literature
• English Renaissance theatre

Musical forms

• Hymnody of continental Europe
• Music of the British Isles
• Hymn tune
• Lutheran chorale
• Lutheran hymn
• Anglican church music
• Exclusive psalmody
• Anglican chant
• Homophony vs. Polyphony

Liturgies

• Reformed worship
• Calvin's liturgy
• Formula missae
• Deutsche Messe
• Ecclesiastical Latin
• Lutheran and Anglican Mass in music
• Cyclic mass vs. Paraphrase mass
• Roman vs. Sarum Rites
• Sequence (retained by Lutherans, mostly banned by Trent)

Hymnals

• First and Second Lutheran hymnals
• First Wittenberg hymnal
• Swenske songer
• Thomissøn's hymnal
• Ausbund
• Book of Common Prayer
• Metrical psalters
• Souterliedekens
• Book of Common Order
• Genevan Psalter
• Scottish Psalter

Secular music

• English Madrigal School
• Greensleeves
• German madrigals
• Moravian traditional music
• Meistersinger

Partly due to Martin Luther's love for music, music became important in Lutheranism. The study and practice of music was encouraged in Protestant-majority countries. Songs such as the Lutheran hymns or the Calvinist Psalter became tools for the spread of Protestant ideas and beliefs, as well as identity flags. Similar attitudes developed among Catholics, who in turn encouraged the creation and use of music for religious purposes.

See also

• Anti-Catholicism
• Anti-Protestantism
• Catholic Church and ecumenism
• Catholic-Protestant relations
• Criticism of Christianity
• Criticism of Protestantism
• Concordat of Worms
• Confessionalization
• European City of the Reformation
• Free Grace theology
• Historiography of religion
• History of the Catholic Church
• History of Christianity
• List of Protestant Reformers
• Protestantism in Germany
• The Reformation and its influence on church architecture
• Women in the Protestant Reformation

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Further reading

Surveys

• Appold, Kenneth G. The Reformation: A Brief History (2011) online
• Collinson, Patrick. The Reformation: A History (2006)
• Elton, Geoffrey R. and Andrew Pettegree, eds. Reformation Europe: 1517–1559 (1999) excerpt and text search
• Elton, G.R., ed. The New Cambridge Modern History, Vol. 2: The Reformation, 1520–1559 (1st ed. 1958) online free
• Gassmann, Günther, and Mark W. Oldenburg. Historical dictionary of Lutheranism (Scarecrow Press, 2011).
• Hillerbrand, Hans J. The Protestant Reformation (2nd ed. 2009)
• Hsia, R. Po-chia, ed. A Companion to the Reformation World (2006)
• Lindberg, Carter. The European Reformations (2nd ed. 2009)
• Mourret, Fernand. History of the Catholic Church (vol 5 1931) online free; pp. 325–516; by French Catholic scholar
• Naphy, William G. (2007). The Protestant Revolution: From Martin Luther to Martin Luther King Jr. BBC Books. ISBN 978-0-563-53920-9.
• Spalding, Martin (2010). The History of the Protestant Reformation; In Germany and Switzerland, and in England, Ireland, Scotland, the Netherlands, France, and Northern Europe. General Books LLC.
• Reeves, Michael. The Unquenchable Flame: Discovering the Heart of the Reformation (2nd ed. 2016)
• Spitz, Lewis William (2003). The Protestant Reformation: 1517–1559.

Theology

• Bagchi, David, and David C. Steinmetz, eds. The Cambridge Companion to Reformation Theology (2004)
• Bainton, Roland (1952). The Reformation of the Sixteenth Century. Boston: The Beacon Press. ISBN 978-0-8070-1301-4.
• Barrett, Matthew, and Michael Horton. Reformation Theology: A Systematic Summary (2017).
• Braaten, Carl E. and Robert W. Jenson. The Catholicity of the Reformation. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996. ISBN 0-8028-4220-8.
• Cunningham, William. The Reformers and the Theology of the Reformation (2013).
• Payton, James R., Jr. Getting the Reformation Wrong: Correcting Some Misunderstandings (IVP Academic, 2010)
• Pelikan, Jaroslav (1984). Reformation of Church and Dogma (1300–1700). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-65377-8.

Primary sources in translation

• Fosdick, Harry Emerson, ed. Great Voices of the Reformation [and of other putative reformers before and after it]: an Anthology, ed., with an introd. and commentaries, by Harry Emerson Fosdick. (Modern Library, 1952). xxx, 546 pp.
• Janz, Denis, ed. A Reformation Reader: Primary Texts with Introductions (2008) excerpt and text search
• Littlejohn, Bradford, and Jonathan Roberts eds. Reformation Theology: A Reader of Primary Sources with Introductions (2018).
• Luther, Martin Luther's Correspondence and Other Contemporary Letters, 2 vols., tr. and ed. by Preserved Smith, Charles Michael Jacobs, The Lutheran Publication Society, Philadelphia, Pa. 1913, 1918. vol.2 (1521–1530) from Google Books. Reprint of Vol. 1, Wipf & Stock Publishers (March 2006). ISBN 1-59752-601-0.
• Spitz, Lewis W. The Protestant Reformation: Major Documents. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1997. ISBN 0-570-04993-8.

Historiography

• Bates, Lucy (2010). "The Limits of Possibility in England's Long Reformation". Historical Journal. 53 (4): 1049–1070. doi:10.1017/S0018246X10000403. JSTOR 40930369. S2CID 159904890.
• Bradshaw, Brendan (1983). "The Reformation and the Counter-Reformation". History Today. 33 (11): 42–45.
• Brady, Thomas A. Jr. (1991). "People's Religions in Reformation Europe". The Historical Journal. 24 (1): 173–182. doi:10.1017/S0018246X00013984. JSTOR 2639713. S2CID 162991792.
• de Boer, Wietse (2009). "An Uneasy Reunion The Catholic World in Reformation Studies". Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte. 100 (1): 366–387. doi:10.14315/arg-2009-100-1-366. S2CID 170395778.
• Dickens, A.G.; Tonkin, John M., eds. (1985). The Reformation in Historical Thought. Harvard University Press, 443 pp. excerpt
• Dixon, C. Scott (2012). Contesting the Reformation.
• Fritze, Ronald H. (2005). "The English Reformation: Obedience, Destruction and Cultural Adaptation". Journal of Ecclesiastical History. 56 (1): 107–115. doi:10.1017/S0022046904002106. S2CID 162920265.
• Haigh, Christopher (1982). "The recent historiography of the English Reformation". The Historical Journal. 25 (4): 995–1007. doi:10.1017/s0018246x00021385. JSTOR 2638647. S2CID 154848886.
• Haigh, Christopher (1990). "The English Reformation: A Premature Birth, a Difficult Labour and a Sickly Child". The Historical Journal. 33 (2): 449–459. doi:10.1017/s0018246x0001342x. JSTOR 2639467. S2CID 162341988.
• Haigh, Christopher (2002). "Catholicism in Early Modern England: Bossy and Beyond". The Historical Journal. 45 (2): 481–494. doi:10.1017/S0018246X02002479. JSTOR 3133654. S2CID 163117077.
• Heininen, Simo; Czaika, Otfried (2010). "Wittenberg Influences on the Reformation in Scandinavia". European History Online. Mainz: Institute of European History. Retrieved 17 December 2012.
• Howard, Thomas A. and Mark A. Noll, eds. Protestantism after 500 Years (Oxford UP, 2016) pp. 384.
• Hsia, Po-Chia, ed. (2006). A Companion to the Reformation World.
• Hsia, R. Po-chia (2004). "Reformation on the Continent: Approaches Old and New". Journal of Religious History. 28 (2): 162–170. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9809.2004.00212.x.
• Hsia, R. Po-Chia (1987). "The Myth of the Commune: Recent Historiography on City and Reformation in Germany". Central European History. 20 (3): 203–215. doi:10.1017/s0008938900012061. JSTOR 4546103. S2CID 146309764.
• Karant-Nunn, Susan C. (2005). "Changing One's Mind: Transformations in Reformation History from a Germanist's Perspective". Renaissance Quarterly. 58 (2): 1101–1127. doi:10.1353/ren.2008.0933. JSTOR 10.1353/ren.2008.0933. S2CID 170423375.
• Kooi, Christine. "The Reformation in the Netherlands: Some Historiographic Contributions in English." Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 100.1 (2009): 293–307.
• MacCulloch, Diarmaid (1995). "The Impact of the English Reformation". The Historical Journal. 38 (1): 151–153. doi:10.1017/s0018246x00016332. JSTOR 2640168. S2CID 162582384.
• MacCulloch, Diarmaid; Laven, Mary; Duffy, Eamon (2006). "Recent Trends in the Study of Christianity in Sixteenth-Century Europe". Renaissance Quarterly. 59 (3): 697–731. doi:10.1353/ren.2008.0381. JSTOR 10.1353/ren.2008.0381.
• Marnef, Guido (2009). "Belgian and Dutch Post-war Historiography on the Protestant and Catholic Reformation in the Netherlands". Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte. 100 (1): 271–292. doi:10.14315/arg-2009-100-1-271. S2CID 164021053.
• Marshall, Peter (2009b). "(Re)defining the English Reformation" (PDF). Journal of British Studies. 48 (3): 564–586. doi:10.1086/600128. JSTOR 27752571. Archived (PDF) from the original on 9 October 2022.
• Menchi, Silvana Seidel (2009). "The Age of Reformation and Counter-Reformation in Italian Historiography, 1939–2009". Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte. 100 (1): 193–217. doi:10.14315/arg-2009-100-1-193. S2CID 201096496.
• Nieden, Marcel (2012). "The Wittenberg Reformation as a Media Event". European History Online. Mainz: Institute of European History. Retrieved 17 December 2012.
• Scott, Tom (1991). "The Common People in the German Reformation". The Historical Journal. 24 (1): 183–192. doi:10.1017/S0018246X00013996. JSTOR 2639714. S2CID 161111542.
• Scott, Tom (2008). "The Reformation between Deconstruction and Reconstruction: Reflections on Recent Writings on the German Reformation". German History. 26 (3): 406–422. doi:10.1093/gerhis/ghn027.
• Walsham, Alexandra (2008). "The Reformation and 'The Disenchantment of the World' Reassessed". Historical Journal. 51 (2): 497–528. doi:10.1017/S0018246X08006808. JSTOR 20175171.
• Walsham, Alexandra. "Toleration, Pluralism, and Coexistence: The Ambivalent Legacies of the Reformation." Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte-Archive for Reformation History 108.1 (2017): 181–190. Online
• Wiesner-Hanks, Merry (2009). "Gender and the Reformation". Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte. 100 (1): 350–365. doi:10.14315/arg-2009-100-1-350. S2CID 192966856.

External links

• Internet Archive of Related Texts and Documents
• 16th Century Reformation Reading Room: Extensive online resources, Tyndale Seminary
• The Reformation Collection From the Rare Book and Special Collections Division at the Library of Congress
• An ecumenical official valuation by Lutherans and Catholics 500 years later
• The Historyscoper
• Robinson, James Harvey (1911). "Reformation, The" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 23 (11th ed.). pp. 4–22.