Louisiana State University LSU Digital Commons LSU Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 2014 Flesh, Blood, and Puffed-Up Livers: The Theological, Political, and Social Contexts behind the 1550-1551 Written Eucharistic Debate between Thomas Cranmer and Stephen Gardiner Amanda Wrenn Allen Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_dissertations Part of the History Commons Recommended Citation Allen, Amanda Wrenn, "Flesh, Blood, and Puffed-Up Livers: The Theological, Political, and Social Contexts behind the 1550-1551 Written Eucharistic Debate between Thomas Cranmer and Stephen Gardiner" (2014). LSU Doctoral Dissertations. 401. https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_dissertations/401 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at LSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in LSU Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized graduate school editor of LSU Digital Commons. For more information, please [email protected]. FLESH, BLOOD, AND PUFFED-UP LIVERS: THE THEOLOGICAL, POLITICAL, AND SOCIAL CONTEXTS BEHIND THE 1550-1551 WRITTEN EUCHARISTIC DEBATE BETWEEN THOMAS CRANMER AND STEPHEN GARDINER A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in The Department of History by Amanda Wrenn Allen B.A., Randolph-Macon Woman's College, 2007 M.T.S., Vanderbilt University, 2010 December 2014 Dedicated to Mom, Dad, Christopher here on Earth and Edward, Cranmer, Gardiner in the Great Beyond. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My years at LSU and my dissertation are very much products of a great support system. I never would have accomplished all I have without the encouragement I have experienced through the whole process. My first thank you doubtless goes to my advisor, Dr. Victor Stater. Thank you for encouraging all of my different research interests for papers and conferences, even though they all involve theology. Your help throughout the dissertation-writing process is greatly appreciated. I would also like to thank my other committee members: Drs. Maribel Dietz, Christine Kooi, and Meredith Veldman. Not only have you all helped me develop into the scholar I am today, but you have also shown me the professor I hope to become. My LSU friends truly deserve loads of thanks. Thank you to my Brit girls Caroline Armbruster, Sabrina Cervantez, Erin Halloran, Clara Howell, and Kat Sawyer- Robinson. Not only have you all been great colleagues, but you have been amazing friends. I thank you all for enabling my Anglophilia. I must also thank Adelaide Hair and Emily Meyer who, despite being American historians, are two reasons I survived generals and my years at LSU. To my "neo-pagan environmentalist" mates David Brokaw, Jeffery Crawford, and Garrett McKinnon I am eternally indebted. You greatly enhanced my theological prowess and kept me emotionally balanced as I finished the dissertation. Of all of my friends at LSU my greatest thanks go to my dear friend and wonderful officemate Meghann Landry. Thank you for not only helping me get through the program, but helping me get through life; I will always value your friendship. To my best friends Amanda McWilliams, Kristen Moore, and Jovonne Vrechek thank you for dealing with my crazy schedule and crazy mind these past years. You all iii keep me grounded. Most important, though, I must thank my family. Mom, Dad, and Christopher I cannot express how thankful I am to call you my family. My father has helped me in so many ways, including serving as my academic sounding board for many years now. Thank you for your patience with all of my different research topics throughout graduate school. Without my mom's advice and strength I know I would not be as successful as I am today. Thank you for serving as my therapist and friend. Christopher, I am thankful for your encouragement my entire life despite your often wondering what it is I actually study. I could not ask for a better older brother. Thank you for being my family; I love you all. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iii NOTES ON QUOTATIONS ............................................................................................. vi ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................... vii INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................. 1 CHAPTER 1 THE TWO-EDGED SWORD: THE POLITICS OF THE EUCHARISTIC DEBATE ................................................................................................................ 16 2 FROM THE CONTINENT TO ENGLAND: THE IMPACT OF CONTINENTAL REFORM ON CRANMER AND THE EUCHARISTIC DEBATE ................................................................................................................ 78 3 CHALLENGING THE ARCHBISHOP: THE ROLE OF CRANMER'S EARLIER EUCHARISTIC LEGISLATION IN THE DEBATE ........................ 115 4 "THIS IS MY BODY:" CRANMER AND GARDINER'S SCRIPTURAL INTERPRETATION ............................................................................................ 142 5 ANCIENT AUTHORITIES: USES OF EARLY CHURCH FATHERS IN THE DEBATE ..................................................................................................... 166 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................... 249 BIBLIOGRAPHY ........................................................................................................... 243 VITA ............................................................................................................................... 267 v NOTES ON QUOTATIONS All original spellings and letter usage have been retained in quotations. Shorthand abbreviations used in the original publications have been written out and included in brackets in the text. All dating is on the modern system with the year beginning January 1. Biblical quotes are from the 1541 English Great Bible unless otherwise noted. vi ABSTRACT In 1550 Thomas Cranmer wrote A Defence of the True and Catholike Doctrine of the body and bloud of our saviour Christ. This theological work sparked a written debate between him and leading English traditionalist Stephen Gardiner in 1551. This dissertation outlines the differences between Cranmer’s newly asserted Reformed understanding of a Spiritual Presence in the Eucharist and Gardiner’s traditional doctrine of Real Presence, more commonly termed transubstantiation. The dissertation analyzes the three-book exchange between these bishops and explains how each uses the same Scripture, writings of the early Church Fathers, and contemporary Continental Reformers to establish their very different ideas. In addition to this theological context, the dissertation argues that both Cranmer and Gardiner are also writing with a personal, not solely spiritual, goal. As the Reformation continued throughout Edward VI’s reign, religious practice and doctrine in England were still quite uncertain and unstable. Thomas Cranmer was attempting to institute more reforms, taking England further from its traditional religious roots and relying on his authority as Archbishop to legislate and enforce the religious changes. Gardiner’s consistent challenge to these changes presented Cranmer a potential discrediting of his authority and the Protestant cause in England. In turn, Gardiner was imprisoned during this debate and challenged Cranmer in order to demonstrate that Cranmer was, in fact, the man who was at fault and Gardiner should not be tried and held for his ‘right’ religious views. Thus, both men were trying to prove he was the credible authority, not his opponent. vii This personal animosity, rife with insults, between the two theologians in 1551 was the culmination of over a decade’s worth of opposition that marked this theological debate with a complicated underlying social context. The dissertation will also show that it was because of this debate that Cranmer created a clearly defined Reformed Eucharistic position that would later be adapted in the Protestant Elizabethan settlement. Thus, this debate directly impacted the trajectory of England's Protestant Eucharistic position well beyond 1551. viii INTRODUCTION "This is my body" seems a simple-enough phrase but in sixteenth-century England it was one of the most hotly debated phrases between church reformers and traditionalists. Understanding just what Jesus meant at the Last Supper, the crucial doctrinal point of the debate, would determine the entire trajectory of the English Church established in 1534, not to mention England itself. Would England support traditionalism, matching the theology of Rome, albeit without papal supremacy, or a new Protestant version following the Zwinglian model? By the dawn of the Reformation the Eucharist had become the center of the entire religious structure. As historian Miri Rubin writes "at the centre of the whole religious system of the later Middle Ages lay a ritual which turned bread into flesh- a fragile, small, wheaten disc into God. This was the Eucharist: host, ritual, God among mortals."1 This was certainly true. By 1500 the Eucharist had become the primary area of religious life.