The Protestant Reformation
Marshall High School Western Civilization II Mr. Cline Unit Two LA * The Reformation
• The Protestant Reformation
• Most people know the term 'the Reformation' deals with unrest between Catholics and Protestants, but do you know why and where it all began?
• This was a time when new ideas regarding the Christian religion developed, and people began to choose between Catholicism and Protestantism.
• Catholics believed salvation could be found by completing certain actions like recognizing the sacraments (such as baptism and communion) and confession to a priest.
• This leaves authority in the hands of the Church.
• Protestants believed the Church should not have authority over a person's relationship with God. Instead, each person was responsible for reading the Bible for guidance.
• The Reformation occurred in the 16th century, and was one of the most important events in history. * The Reformation
• The Protestant Reformation
• Many say this event was responsible for leading history into the modern age.
• As Christians became divided between Catholicism and Protestantism, the religious unity that once held a society together fell apart.
• This led to the beginning of individual thought and individual opinions regarding religion.
• Inevitably, this led to free thinking in other areas, like politics, economics and social structure.
• Luther Ignites a Revolt
• Martin Luther is often credited with starting the Reformation.
• Luther was unhappy with corruption in the Catholic Church. * The Reformation
• Luther Ignites a Revolt
• He thought the Church was selling pardons for sins (called indulgences) without concern of whether the person was legitimately repentant.
• Luther believed the Pope should not have ultimate authority.
• He believed the Bible should hold authority and that each person had as much authority over their own religion as the church officials.
• Luther nailed 95 theses against indulgences (pardoning of a sin) to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg to display his distaste with the Church.
• He also said nuns and monks shouldn't be held to their vows as he felt this gave the church more authority. * The Reformation
• The Reformation spread throughout Europe.
• Scholars encouraged many to learn to read Hebrew and Greek so they could study the Bible in its original language.
• Many people saw this as an opportunity to gain more control over their lives and a break from authority, leading to mass popularity of freethinking ideas.
• The Peasant Wars
• The life of a peasant at this time was not easy.
• Because of high taxes and the ownership of all land belonging to royalty, peasants were basically slaves who worked the land without receiving any benefit from it.
• Peasants faced the heaviest taxes.
• The clergy and the nobles were exempt from taxes.
• In addition, costs for basic necessities rose consistently. * The Reformation
• The 95 Theses: Martin Luther Challenges the Church
• The dominance of the Roman Catholic Church remained unchallenged for nearly 500 years.
• Then, in 1517, a German priest shook the Catholic Church to its very foundations. His name was Martin Luther. Luther was not a rebel. He wasn't trying to destroy the Catholic Church or even start his own religion. All Luther was trying to do was to stop the Church from engaging in some practices that he considered unchristian.
• Luther's problem was with the Church's practice of selling indulgences.
• An indulgence is a remission of punishment for sins.
• You can think of an indulgence as a 'get out of hell free' card.
• The church had been in the practice of granting indulgences in exchange for good works and acts of piety for centuries, ever since Pope Urban II offered indulgences to Crusaders in 1095. * The Reformation
• The 95 Theses: Martin Luther Challenges the Church
• Luther questioned whether the church had the authority to grant such indulgences.
• He believed that the only true path to salvation lay through faithfulness to Christ and his teachings, not through adherence to the ideologies and dogmas of the Catholic Church.
• Yet Luther probably would not have made a fuss if it weren't for the fact that these 'get out of hell free' cards weren't actually free.
• Earlier that year, in 1517, Pope Leo X had made an unconventional move.
• Leo wanted to rebuild St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, but he didn't want to spend his own considerable wealth to do so.
• This is not surprising, as Leo was a member of the wealthy Medici banking family, which dominated Florence. The man was more of a banker than a priest. * The Reformation
• The 95 Theses: Martin Luther Challenges the Church
• Leo's solution was to begin offering indulgences in exchange for donations to the Basilica's renovation.
• While these donations technically counted as pious works, Luther saw them as simple payment.
• To Luther's eyes, the Church was essentially selling salvation.
• He witnessed poor peasants giving up their life savings to buy an indulgence for a dead relative, in the hope of saving their loved ones from the tortures of purgatory.
• All the while the Church grew ever richer.
• This was too much for Luther.
• Luther had read the Bible, something most people of his age could not do, since the only available translations of the Bible were in Latin and Greek. * The Reformation
• The 95 Theses: Martin Luther Challenges the Church
• Luther saw nothing in the Bible that gave the Church the right to charge people for their salvation.
• The church was supposed to be a spiritual sanctuary, not a marketplace.
• So, Luther set about writing 95 complaints with the Church's greedy behavior.
• These complaints are now called the 95 Theses.
• On October 3, 1517, Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Church of Wittenberg and sent copies to the higher authorities of the Catholic Church.
• The posting of the 95 Theses is considered by many the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.
• However, it is important to remember that Luther was not trying to undermine the Church. * The Reformation
• The 95 Theses: Martin Luther Challenges the Church
• He was just trying to get them to stop making money off the business of salvation.
• Luther's 95 Theses spread across Europe like wildfire.
• Within two months, they were being read in cities across the continent.
• The next year, they were translated into German and printed on a massive scale, further fueling the controversy.
• Luther suddenly found himself at the center of the greatest conflict of his age.
• The Diet of Worms: The Church Strikes Back
• The Pope was not happy at having his scam with the indulgences exposed.
• He had Luther accused of heresy. * The Reformation
• The Diet of Worms: The Church Strikes Back
• A couple of years later, in 1520, the Pope wrote a letter to Luther in which he banned any further distribution of Luther's 95 Theses and demanded that Luther recant his heresy or face excommunication, or being cut off from the Church and its sacraments.
• This threat of excommunication was a big deal, since pretty much everyone believed that the only way to get to heaven was to receive the sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church.
• Since Luther did not think he needed the papacy to achieve salvation, he did not care if he was excommunicated.
• Luther publicly burned the Pope's letter and thereby broke all ties with the Roman Catholic Church.
• Yet the Church was not done with Luther.
• The Church decided to hand Luther over to the greatest secular authority in Germany, the Holy Roman Empire. * The Reformation
• The Diet of Worms: The Church Strikes Back
• In 1521, Martin Luther was summoned to the Diet of Worms, a conference of both religious and secular leaders held in Worms, Germany.
• Once again, Luther was commanded to recant his heresy.
• He refused.
• The Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, published the Edict of Worms, calling for Luther's immediate arrest.
• Yet Luther's supporters would not let him be imprisoned. Instead, they spirited him away and hid him in Wartburg Castle.
• The Protestant Reformation Gains Momentum
• Not content to hide on the sidelines, Luther made good use of his exile.
• He spent his year at Wartburg writing various letters and treatises attacking the Catholic Church. * The Reformation
• The Protestant Reformation Gains Momentum
• His greatest achievement of the time was his translation of the Bible into German.
• Luther held the Bible as the highest authority, higher even than the papacy.
• He realized that so long as people could not read the Bible, they would continue to fall for the lies and deceptions of Catholic ideology.
• Luther's supporters smuggled his translation out, and soon printing presses across Germany were cranking out copies of Luther's Bible.
• The publication had the desired effect.
• All across Germany, people started reading the Bible and began challenging the authority of the Church.
• In fact, things started getting a little out of hand. * The Reformation
• The Protestant Reformation Gains Momentum
• When Luther returned to Wittenberg in 1522, he found the populace in nearly full-scale revolt.
• The mob was being whipped up by a set of radical zealots known as the Zwickau Prophets.
• Luther drove the Zwickau out of Wittenberg and settled down to reestablish law and order.
• He founded his own Lutheran Church in Wittenberg in 1526.
• Meanwhile, the Zwickau spread across Germany, burning churches, monasteries, bishop's palaces, and libraries, often in Luther's name.
• The Zwickau were determined to use Luther's treatment by the Church and state as a rallying point for their revolution, regardless of Luther's feelings on the matter. * The Reformation
• The Protestant Reformation Gains Momentum
• This uprising, which became known as the Peasants' Revolt, was but the beginning of about five centuries of nearly unending bloodshed.
• The Protestant Reformation swept across Europe, spreading first to the Netherlands, then to France and England.
• Soon all of Northern Europe was in the throes of religious warfare as Protestants fought Catholics for the soul of Europe.
• The Spread of the Reformation
• The Reformation was a huge movement leading to the popularization of Protestant Christianity. It spread to Christians across Europe, but how did it spread so far?
• The Protestant Reformation was a rebellion against Catholic beliefs by Christians in the 16th century. * The Reformation
• The Spread of the Reformation
• At the time, the Catholic Church held a heavy authority over its laypeople. Authority rested in the Pope and the Church officials.
• Luther believed the Church should hold no authority over its laypeople, and each person was capable and responsible for determining his or her religious strength.
• He also believed nuns and monks shouldn't be held to their vows, nor should the clergy be celibate.
• Luther's beliefs became known as Lutheranism.
• This revolution sparked a growing interest in individual thought and reasoning.
• This type of thinking became very popular in Germany and soon began to spread to other areas.