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The Reformation from a New Perspective*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Ernest G. Schwiebert
Affiliation:
Wittenberg College, Springfield, Ohio

Extract

All too frequently writers have been tempted to over-simplify the German Reformation. The literature in the field is enormous, contradictory, kaleidoscopic, and infinitely complex, requiring decades to master the more important sources and standard works. Such labels as “Reformation,” the “Protestant Revolt,” and the “Protestant Revolution” are, in a large measure, propaganda terms presupposing fundamental assumptions and lines of reasoning not entirely supported in fact. Often the casual reader in this field receives the impression that Reformers like Wyclif, Hus, Savonarola, Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin were merely out of step with the accepted, centuries-old teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. He is not aware of the fact that he is reading history in reverse.

Information

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1948

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