As a teacher of university students and seminarians, I know I was not alone in bemoaning the fact that only two of the great German historian Hubert Jedin's four-volume History of the Council of Trent have been translated into English. But after reading the new Cambridge Companion to the Council of Trent, I am much less bothered. Veteran church historian Nelson Minnich and a team of fourteen historians and theologians have gifted us with a fantastic entrée into the exciting world of the Council of Trent (1545–1563). This ecumenical council was convened to answer the gauntlet thrown down by Protestantism, both through the long-delayed disciplinary and moral reform of the Catholic Church and through the restatement (reformulation?) of doctrine in the face of new challenges.

Minnich opens the volume with two essays. The first, an overview, is required reading for anyone interested in Trent and its historical and scholarly reception. Minnich opens, appropriately, not with a discussion of Martin Luther or Protestantism, but with the late medieval chaos of the Great Western Schism. The Council of Constance staunched the bleeding for a time, but in the intervening century between Constance's Haec Sancta and Luther, it was obvious the ecclesial body was still wounded (see pages 1–3). The papacy, a string of councils, and various pieces of legislation (concordats, the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges, the Acceptance of Mainz, etc.) failed to restore unity and good order in the church. This unedifying story forms a necessary background to Trent, and also explains the reasons for the immense delays in convoking it.

In one of many important discussions in this opening survey, Minnich details the history of the publication of the acta (record of minutes and proceedings) of the Council. Pius IV (pope from 1559 to 1565) had actually intended to have the acta published, but he died too soon (21). The Roman Curia maintained a guarded attitude, since too much documentation might provide fodder for contesting the decisions of the Congregation for the Council (see also chapter 16, Agostino Borromeo's fascinating exploration of the papacy and the “application” of Trent). In 1857, the German Oratorian and Vatican archivist Augustin Theiner received Pius IX's blessing to publish the acta. But after Theiner gathered enough documentation to fill seven tomes, “he was suddenly ordered to stop the printing out of fear that the authority of the council's canons would be weakened when the process by which they were formulated was revealed” (21). This is in keeping with a long-standing papal concern for conciliar narratives and especially for the implementation of councils, particularly from Constance to Vatican II (we might call it papal Deutungshoheit, as a nod to the German Theiner, one of many victims of this phenomenon).

Minnich's second chapter, on the Council's organizational structure, is a necessary evil, but full of useful information on the bewildering eighteen years between the Trent's opening and completion. The next fourteen chapters cover themes ranging from specific documents, like Gabriella Zarri on the Decree on Marriage (chapter 12), or themes, like Vincenzo Lavenia on the nexus of thorny questions surrounding bishops (chapter 9), or Celeste McNamara on early modern models of pastoral care (chapter 11). Each includes a very helpful bibliography for further study.

It is impossible to discuss each chapter, so I will highlight just one in this consistently strong volume. Marcia Hall's chapter on Sacred Art (chapter 14, 279–302) is a particularly insightful exploration of the interplay between pastoral and liturgical renewal, moral rigor, and sensuous piety. Michelangelo's Last Judgement became a “lightening rod for criticism” for Protestants and a certain brand of “Tridentine” Catholic. Giovanni Andrea Gilio's Dialogue on the Errors and Abuses of Painters urged artists to portray the horror of crucifixion or martyrdom in order to evoke pity in viewers, rather than lust for naked bodies or admiration of perfect physiques (284). The more serious and somber perspective articulated by Gilio was in the spirit of a papal deputation that met a mere month after Trent's conclusion. Other organs of ecclesial enforcement, such as the Venetian Inquisition, wanted to put merry artists on watch. For example, in 1573, Paolo Veronese was asked by inquisitors why his Last Supper included a German soldier, a dwarf, and other non-scriptural figures (286). Veronese's witty reply was that he had to find some way to fill an 18 × 50-foot canvas! The impact of Trent on sacred art is a great example of the blurry line between the text of the council itself, the interpretation and implementation by Roman authorities, and the actual on-the-ground realities, which could differ widely around the Catholic world due to local conditions and perspectives as well as the feasibility (or not) of enforcement.

This volume is obviously of great value to the historian. But it is also important for the educator in seminary or university contexts. Paired with John O'Malley's inviting and engaging overview (Trent: What Happened at the Council, Harvard: 2013), educators are now armed with easily accessible works in English that will interest and challenge students. This Cambridge Companion thematically distills an enormous amount of research, based on extensive recourse to the primary sources and the vast specialist historiographies in many languages. Students and educators now have a rigorous but accessible library of introductions to Tridentine debates and decrees that have enduring theological and ecumenical importance: regarding scripture and tradition (Wim François, chapter 4), justification (Michael Root, chapter 5), and the Eucharist (Marshall, chapter 8).

The Trent of history, the actual event and actual documents, is far more interesting than the “myth of Trent” that captured the Catholic imagination beginning in the nineteenth-century ultramontane revival. The mythical Trent, armed with uniform theological method and the clarity of multiple anathemas, is still portrayed by some more traditional Catholics as a bastion of lucidity juxtaposed with the “ambiguity” of Vatican II. On the other hand, some liberal Catholics of today tend to blame the “Tridentine Church” for all the restrictiveness and narrowness that Vatican II supposedly freed Catholics from, especially regarding liturgy and scripture. Both narratives, thankfully, are wrong, and this volume gives educators a tool that dispassionately and decisively shows why.

The real Trent, which emerges from these pages, was full of tension and creativity. At times it was deadlocked. It featured multiple theological “schools” – and in this sense was a far more free and pluralistic environment than was Vatican I, or even, in certain respects, Vatican II. Carmelites, Augustinians, Scotists, various shades of Thomists, the new Jesuit Order, all discussed and debated doctrine, practice, and the right path forward for the church (see the excellent overview of the schools in Christian D. Washburn's chapter 3). The historical reality of “Tridentine” Catholicism is dynamic and polyvalent. The Cambridge Companion to the Council of Trent allows us to look upon this most pivotal historical moment with more understanding and empathy – acknowledging Trent's many great achievements alongside its failures and limitations.