Unit 3.3 (Empires - Belief Systems) The Protestant Reformation

Pre-1517

  • Christian = catholic

  • Roman catholic church wields much power

    • Spiritually throughout Europe

    • Physically in the extensive Papal States

  • Problem: The church is very corrupt

    • what vows do priests take?

    • popes: more political than spiritual?

      • Lived like kings

      • Greed and nepotism were everywhere

      • Julius II - the “warrior Pope”


Martin Luther

  • German monk and theology professor

  • Read and studied the Bible extensively

    • Still struggled with feeling worthy of God’s love

  • Became infuriated with the practice of Indulgences

Indulgences

  • if you spend money, you will be released from all or part of your punishment for sin

    • “as soon as the gold in the casket rings. The Rescued Soul to Heaven Springs”

    • Reduce your time in Purgatory

  • Sold by the Chruch to get money to build new churches and religious structures

  • Why did Luther find this custom so offensive?

Luther begins to doubt

  • No matter how “good” he tried to be, he still sinned

  • began to believe in Justification by Faith alone.

    • “The righteous shall live by faith” (Romans 1:17)

    • Humans can only be saved through the faith in God

    • Not doing good deeds or buying indulgences

  • Luther claimed that the Bible - NOT the Church - is the basis of the Christian faith

    (HERESHY!) ← Luther knows this could be a death sentence

The Ninety-Five These (1517)

  • wrote and nailed his 95 Theses on the door of a church in Wittenburg, Germany


Luther’s Teachings

  • Salvation is only by God’s gift of forgiveness

  • All Church teachings should be clearly based on the Bible

  • Get rid of Sacraments not from the Bible

    • Keep Communion, but denies transubstantiation

    • All people with faith are EQUAL.

Aided by new technology

  • 1439: Johannes Guttenberg “invents” the printing press

  • People can read the Bible themselves!

    • No longer reliant on religious leaders to interpret the Bible, they can do it themselves

  • 95 Theses are published for all to read and become popular

Location: The Holy Roman Empire

  • Really a Germanic Empire

  • Charles V

    • First ruled Spain and Habsburg lands in Germany as Charles I

    • Elected Holy Roman Emperor by Germanic archbishops and princes (1520)

    • Crowned by Pope Leo X

The Counter-Reformation

  • Church’s response to the reformation

  • Tried to ignore Luther but his teachings began to spread

  • Luther is excommunicated by Pope Leo X

  • Diet of Worms (1521)

    • Council held by Charles V

    • Ask Luther to recant his statements

    • Luther refuses and is outlawed by the Holy Roman Empire

  • Luther is now alienated from the Church and the Empire.

Ideas Spread

  • Luther flees to safety but continues to write and translate the Bible into German

    • One of the first attempts to translate the Bible from Latin

  • Some local German churches began to embrace his teachings

  • Reformers became known as Protestants


The protestant reformation

Lutheranism

Calvinism

Church of England (Anglicanism)


The Council of Trent (1545 -1563)

  • Catholic Council reaffirmed beliefs challenged by Luther

  • Abolish the use of indulgences

  • Catholic Church is the ultimate interpreter of Scripture.