APEH

Topic 3 – Reformation and Religious Warfare

Document-Based Question Outline

Intro

Prevailing ideas of the Renaissance in full force throughout Europe by the start of the 16th C:

  • Secularism, individualism, humanism/humanist curricula  Result = more personal emphasis on interpretation of faith through applications of reason and education
  • Problem  can lead to dissent

Charles van Doran Europe in the early 16th C = Theocratic State

  • G.R. Elton Religious dissent constitutes treason

Catholic reform efforts up to 16th C by Catholic individuals never fully constituted a major break with Rome; instead never became more than schisms or heresies

Two new aspects of early 16th C not previously present:

  • Educated middle class, non-religious (5% of pop.)
  • Technology  Printing press

Thesis: While the Protestant Reformation of the 16th initially dealt with the desire for religious and institutional reform within the Catholic Church, it quickly became a revolution in religion due to the combination of social, political, and technological factors.

Body

By the start of the 16th C, it became apparent that the Church faced “widespread awareness of the need to reform” (John C. Olin):

  • Simony, pluralism, absenteeism, immorality, ignorant/illiterate priests, “mumble jumble” of the Latin mass (Chambers)  Effects Europeans religiouslysocially (Rel – how to achieve salvation; Soc. – superstition = widespread b/c Church does not lead adequately)
  • Church seen by the people as too opulent/ostentatious Source 1 Luther attacks princely lifestyle of clergy
  • Reform efforts before Luther
  • Wycliff – trans. Bible
  • Hus – “Jan of the Chalice” (everybody participates, not just clergy)
  • Christian Humanists

1517 Things change Source 2 Luther attacks tradition and biblical foundation of Church hierarchy (Soc/Pol as well as Religious b/c Church is a soc/pol institution in Europe)

  • By 1521, Luther excommunicated (rel), but also an outlaw since the Diet of Worms (Source 11)  effects of his statements at the Diet of Worms proved to be far more socially and politically influential
  • Source 3 Church tradition and infallibility (views of marriage), attack upon the authority of the theocracy itself
  • Sources 6 extravagance of the Church through Gerung’s portrayal of the common man being brought into heaven; Church officials, however – as indicated through their dress and papal crowns – are condemned into Hell
  • Source 8 extravagance shown by juxtaposing Christ’s cleansing of the Temple with the Church’s use of the “Temple” to take money from the common man: “mere human talk” that a soul is saved when a “penny jingles in a box”(Source 2)  demonstrates Church officials’ hypocrisy
  • Calvin  absurd fiction “that the power of judging Scripture is in the Church” (Source 13); Church authority based on tradition not Scripture, therefore attacking the soc/pol foundations of the Church
  • Result?  Princes chose sides
  • Schmalkaldic War (civil war in HRE)… meanwhile Habsburg-Valois War (soc/pol/econ)

Protestant appeals to religious reform and individual interpretation of the bible (“sola scriptura”), but technological advance proved the true impetus behind the revolutionary changes

  • Visual sources (Sources 6-10)  things that anyone can understand
  • Broadsides usually published anonymously until now  Lutherans publish widely in order to sway both educated and non-educated individuals
  • Literate can read An Admonition to Peace as it condemns the splendor and opulence of Church authorities
  • Illiterate need only view pictures
  • Catholic Reformation used same tactics  Peter Paul Rubens and other Baroque artists to “awe and inspire” (Chambers) faith in the individual
  • Pictures not simply attacking Religion/Theology Sources 6, 7, & 9 all show Church officials in bestial portrayals (creates enemy), refers to the Pope as the “Pope-Ass” (Source 9)
  • Source 10 papal crown used as a chamber pot for the common man, has nothing to do with religion/theology but soc/pol allegiance and authority
  • Commoners are easily swayed Source 12 demonstrates this by warning Jesuit ministers not to engage in Calvinistic theological debate b/c it could cause commoners to become spiritually lax if told of predestined fate
  • Many commoners misinterpreted the Protestant Reformer’s messages, which further widened the social and political break with the past
  • Luther  “A Christian is the most free lord of all and subject to none” (peasants revolt)
  • Luther’s response (Source 5): he would “not oppose a ruler” who would “smite and punish” peasants for breaking their social/political order, “even though [this ruler] does not tolerate the Gospel” (not just about religion)
  • Result?  75 – 100,000 peasants killed at the hands of princes, not for religion but for social and political revolt

Closing – Summarize and go back to your thesis!

Euan Cameron – Ref = “blending and coalition” of religious reform and laymen’s political ambitions  this is amply demonstrated in the documents provided

The religious ideas inherent in the Protestant Reformation, while powerful, were not enough to cause such a revolutionary break with the theocratic state of the 16th C. Instead, due to the technological advance of the printing press and widespread dissemination of Protestant ideas after 1517, the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Reformation fought a religious war through social and political channels.

Documents used from DBQ = 12 (skipped Source 4)

Outside sources used = 5 (quotes and paraphrases)