Luther afterwards five centuries: thoughts on Heiko Oberman’s book

Prokopiev, A. Yu., Lurie, Z. A. Lyuter pyat’ vekov spustya. Razmyshleniya nad knigoy Khayko Obermana [Luther afterwards five centuries: Thoughts on Heiko Oberman’s book], in: Proslogion: Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Social History and Culture, 2017. Vol. 3 (1). P. 235257.

Andrey Yur’evich Prokopiev, doctor of History, professor, St. Petersburg State University (199034, Rossiya, Sankt-Petersburg, Universitetskaia nab., 7/9)

Zinaida Andreevna Lurie, doctor of History, assistant lecturer, Saint-Petersburg State University (199034, Russia, Saint-Petersburg, Мendeleevskaya liniya, 5)

Language: Russian

The main attention is focused on the new and the old in formation of Luther as a theologian and interpretation of connection between Lutheran and medieval views by Oberman. Could the Reformation be interpreted as a «German event»? Was it the development of the medieval tradition? What was the role of the Luther’s family in development of his personality? In what way the young monk was affected by the late medieval spiritual practices? How Luther’s worldview changed and is it possible to date precisely the appearance of the Reformation doctrine? What is the role of the devil in his theology and what main discoveries during his biblical studies were made? At last, how the first Reformation events went and how did Luther split from the old Church, what are the external and internal circumstances of his apostasy. Reflections about his own past greatly influenced on Oberman’s interpretation of Luther. His book on the Reformer could be seen as his own confession. His thoughts are from positions of modern Luther studies. The wide scopus of academic works timed to the Reformation jubilee is made. The author marks out the most important idea of the book: Luther signifies the end of the Middle ages and beginning of the Modern era, but his personality was unchanged. He was the gifted man who managed to reopen Gospel for people and led them after him.

Key Words: Luther, Reformation, biography, late middle ages, piety, Wittenberg

URL: http://proslogion.ru/31-prokopiev-luriet/

Creative Commons License

Religion und Gesellschaft in deutschen Landen im 15. und frühen 16. Jahrhundert. Mentalität und Bewusstseinshorizont

Buchholz, W. Religion und Gesellschaft in deutschen Landen im 15. und frühen 16. Jahrhundert. Mentalität und Bewusstseinshorizont, in: Proslogion: Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Social History and Culture. 2017. Vol. 3(2). P. 5174.

Werner Buchholz, д. и. н., профессор, университет Грайфсвальда (17489, Germany, Greifswald, Domstraße 11)

Language: Deutsch

The parish, the pilgrimage and atonement were the three pillars of late medieval religious practice. The parish took care of the faithful in their everyday lives, which were inextricably linked their work on the land. During pilgrimages, the parish made sure that pilgrims fulfilled the necessary conditions. Atonement had two main aims: on the one hand, acts of atonement, amongst which a pilgrimage was considered to carry significant weight, were intended to ensure salvation for a person who suffered a sudden death, unprepared for the hereafter, and on the other hand atonement was intended to provide material security for the murdered person’s family. A murderer who killed a father and breadwinner, for example, had to replace what he had taken from a family. All three phenomena were strongly influenced by the veneration of saints. With the Reformation a fundamental change occurred here. The veneration of saints was abolished and with it the pilgrimage and the practice of atonement also disappeared. The relationship of the pastor with the woman in his household was legalized; she became the pastor’s honored wife. The pastor and his family were given the task of serving as a model and ideal example of Protestant family life.The veneration of saints ceased. With that pilgrimages and atonement also came to an end.

Key Words: parish, pilgrimage, atonement, saints, death, conditions, household, Reformation

URL: http://proslogion.ru/32-buchholz/

Creative Commons License

The beginning of Reformation after the «History of Italy» of Francesco Guicciardini

Youssim, M. A.
Nachalo Reformatsii po «Istorii Italii» F. Gvichchardini [The beginning of Reformation after the «History of Italy» of Francesco Guicciardini], in: Proslogion: Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Social History and Culture. 2017. Vol. 3 (2). P. 109124.

Mark Arkav’evich Youssim, doctor of History, scientific researcher, Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Department of the Western European Middle Ages and Early New Age (119334, Moskva, Rossiya, Leninsky Prospekt, 32a)

Language: Russian

In this article the chapters from the «History of Italy» of Francesco Guicciardini dealing with the initial stage of Reformation are considered. The attitude of the Florentine historian and politician toward the appearance of Luther and toward his followers was ambivalent. Just as N. Machiavelli, Guicciardini regarded the observance of religious cult as one of pillars of society and a condition for maintaining moral health in it, but in the matter of faith revealed skepticism. Notwithstanding to his years-long service for the pope Guicciardini is extremely critical in his judgements on the Roman Curia. The propagation of Lutheran doctrine he explains in purely political reasons: weakening of supreme power and a pause in Italian Wars which distracted peoples from corresponding cares. The author of «History of Italy» blames the Pope’s shortsightedness and awkward policy which did not permit to suppress the distress in the bud. The main fault for the diffusion of the heresy he puts on German princes who took advantage of it. Guicciardini, like other figures of the late Renaissance, for example, cardinal G. Contarini, sympathizes with the ideas of renovation expressed by Luther. However, for Italians the universal Catholic Church was at the same time national, that’s why they refused every reform implying rejecting and diminishing the power of Rome.

Key Words: Guicciardini, «History of Italy», Luther, Reformation, Renaissance, papacy, Savonarola, G. Contarini

URL: http://proslogion.ru/32-youssim/

Creative Commons License

The funeral sermons of the Electors of the Palatinate in the 1540s – 1570s: the first biographies?

Berezhnaya, N. A.
Nadgrobnye propovedi na smert’ pfal’tsskikh kurfyurstov 1540-kh — 1570-kh gg.: Pervye biografii? [The funeral sermons of the Electors of the Palatinate in the 1540s–1570s: the first biographies?], in: Proslogion: Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Social History and Culture. 2017. Vol. 3 (2). P. 75108.

Natal’ya Aleksandrovna Berezhnaya, doctor of History, senior lecturer, Institute of History, St. Petersburg State University (199034, Rossiya, Sankt-Petersburg, Mendeleevskaya liniya, 5)

Language: Russian

The present article examines the funeral sermons on the death of four Palatine electors of the reformation: Louis V (Adam Bartlme (Bartolomäus), 1544), Frederick II (Hieronymus Rauscher, 1556), Otto Henry (Bartholomeus Wolffhart, 1559) and Frederick III (Johannes Schechsius, Daniel Tossanus, 1576). The author analyses the early biographical references and notes on what events in the life of the deceased princes the pastors emphasis, what virtues were considered worthy of nobility. Lutheran and Calvinist theologians, trying to influence the potential audience, described the religious choice of the Palatinate princes depending on the specific religious situation (Augsburg Interim, Peace of Augsburg, assistance to the French Huguenots). Most historians (R. Lenz, K. N. Moore, M. J. Haemig, R. Kolb) believe that biographies of the funeral sermons have individuality only in the middle or the end of the 17th century. The study of noble (M. J. Halvorson) and princely funeral sermons shows that many of individual details were also in the texts in the last quarter of the 16th century. Of great importance was the factor of the private acquaintance of the pastor with the deceased – if they knew each other well, they were coreligionists, the sermon would be more detailed and personal. This belief is well illustrated by the funeral sermon of Daniel Tossanus dedicated to the «father of the Calvinist Reformation» Frederick III: the first time we are dealing not just with religious polemics with occasional references to specific subjects, but with an attempt to create a full portrait of the prince, to tell not only about political events, but also about the youth of Friedrich, his interests, his family.

Key Words: funeral sermon (Leichenpredigt), biography, Reformation, electors of the Palatinate, Louis V, Adam Bartlme (Bartolomäus), Frederick II, Hieronymus Rauscher, Otto Henry, Bartholomeus Wolffhart, Frederick III, Johannes Schechsius, Daniel Tossanus

URL: http://proslogion.ru/32-berejhnaya/

Creative Commons License

Reformation and Society: Martin Bucer and Strasbourg

Ronchi, L. Reformation and Society: Martin Bucer and Strasbourg, in: Proslogion: Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Social History and Culture, 2018. Vol. 4 (1). P. 7083.

Laura De Michelis Ronchi, associated professor, University of Rome «La Sapienza» (00185, Italy, Rome, Piazzale Aldo Moro, 5)

Language: Russian

The City of Strasbourg is the best pattern of the close ties between the reform of the church and the reform of the society. In few years (1523–1548) Strasbourg changed its institutes and its foreign and domestic politics. The city becomes one of the most relevant center of the Reformation and was able to welcome the different expressions of the Reformation. Martin Bucer was the author of that success. He was the man of the dialogue, able to work together with Capitone and Sturm and at the same time with authorities. The outcome was a «joint reformation» which by agreement of theologians, authorities, people made of Strasbourg the city of the refugees: reformed and sectarians (spiritualistes, anabaptistes, antitrinitarians). A peaceful revolution, a spiritual political and social revolution which was able to survive the Interim of Augusta.

Key Words: Johann Sturm, Wolfgang Capitone, magistrates, sectarians, reform, agreement, cooperation, Church discipline, Reformation

URL: http://proslogion.ru/41-ronchi/

Creative Commons License

Personification of the Reformation in the 18th century

Richter, S.
Personifikatsiya Reformatsii v XVIII v. [Personification of the Reformation in the 18th century], in: Proslogion: Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Social History and Culture, 2018. Vol. 4 (1). P. 123138.

Susan Richter, doctor of History, professor, Department of History, Heidelberg University (69117, Germany, Heidelberg, Grabengasse 3–5; aud. 229)

Language: Russian

It is thanks to the Augsburgian copperplate engraver Jeremias Wachsmuth (1711–1771) that an emblematical figure of reformation has been handed down to us in 1758. Wachsmuth, in turn, complies with Cesare Ripa’s (1555–1622) riforma which the latter coined in his Iconologia overo Descrittione Dell’imagini Universali cavate dall’Antichità et da altri luoghi in order to anthropomorphically make goals, means, and actors of reform more graspable and more easily explicable, respectively.
Revealing itself in the form of a young woman, Wachstmuth’s reformation holds a billhook in its right hand. Serving as an horticultural tool especially in wine-growing regions, it is applied to the present day, for instance, in the act of fruit tree pruning. In this context, its functions as the perfect instrument for carefully cutting off back dead or diseased branches. The underlying idea is to control growth and stimulate the expected yield. Ripa correspondingly assigns to his personified Riforma both an example of a diseased and a healthy branch, each resulting from a particular course of action: on the one hand, the flourishing branch as the result of a reforming trim, the diseased one, on the other hand, as the outcome of ignorance and a refusal of acting. The knife, accordingly, symbolizes the principle of renasci (renewal) or, alternatively, the idea of revirescere (regreening and regaining strength). Thus, the billhook, in horticultural life, is supposed to assist a well-informed professional. The fashion how Wachsmuth puts this symbolic tool into use, provides guidance to a particular exegesis. For carrying out a correction of the status quo and striving for a change to the better, it is most certainly necessary to have suitable instruments at one’s disposal.
The ensemble consisting of book and billhook additionally indicates the necessity of able key actors being bestowed with faith, knowledge, courage, legitimacy, and, being of the utmost importance, agency. It is thus hardly surprising that the caption precisely hints at such an actor: The biblical king Josiah (647 BC – 609 BC, Destruit Iosias iustus, Simulacra Deorum, Rex populusque ferunt, pectora pura Deo) who is detectable in two scenes in the background of the picture. On the left side, sitting on his throne and internalizing the Divine Laws and, on the right side, acting correspondingly.

Key Words: Correction, Emblematical figure, Personification, Reformation, Reform

URL: http://proslogion.ru/41-richter/

Creative Commons License

Die Begegnung Russlands mit dem lutherischen Protestantismus im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert

Angermann, N. Die Begegnung Russlands mit dem lutherischen Protestantismus im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert, in: Proslogion: Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Social History and Culture, 2018. Vol. 4 (1). P. 101122.

Norbert Angermann, doctor of History, professor emeritus, Historical seminar of the Hamburg University (20148, Germany, Hamburg, Mittelweg 177)

Language: Russian

This article looks at the presence of the Lutheran Protestantism in Russia from the Middle of the 16th century to 1689, the year of the accession to power of Peter the Great. The main attention is focused on the beginning of the Lutheran-Orthodox contacts. The author stresses the role of trade and the relationships between Russia and Livonia. Already on the eve of the Livonian war (before 1558) in Pskov there was a little parish of Russian Protestants, probably formed as a result of trade between Pskov and Dorpat. In the whole time under observation the Lutherans formed the biggest group of the Western foreigners in Muscovy. The author speaks about the services of the Lutheran military men, doctors, interpreters and other specialists for Russia. Above all owing to the utility of these persons the government gave to them a far-reaching religious freedom. With regard to the allowance of the Lutheran faith Muscovy had behind other European countries.

Key Words: Moscow, Ivan the Terribble, Lutherans, Reformation, heresy, tolerance

URL: http://proslogion.ru/41-angermann/

Creative Commons License