Description
Book SynopsisThomas Kaufmann, the leading European scholar of the Reformation, argues that the main motivations behind the Reformation rest in religion itself.The Reformation began far from Europe''s traditional political, economic, and cultural power centres, and yet it threw the whole continent into turmoil. There has been intense speculation over the last century focusing onthe political and social causes that lay at the root of this revolution. Thomas Kaufmann, one of the world''s leading experts on the Reformation, sees the most important drivers for what happened in religion itself. The reformers were principally concerned with the question of salvation. It could all have ended with the pope''s condemnation of Luther and his teaching. But Luther believed the pope was condemned to eternal damnation, and this was the root cause of the great split to come. Hatred of the damned drove people to take up arms, while countless numbers left their homes far behind and carried the Reformation message to the furthest corners of the earth in the hope of salvation. In The Saved and the Damned, Thomas Kaufmann presents a dramatic overview of how Europe was transformed by the seismic shock of the Reformation--and of how its aftershocks reverberate right down to the present day.
Trade ReviewThis book - by the greatest living authority on Martin Luther - provides a new history for our times. In gripping prose, Kaufmann explains how the Reformation spread throughout Europe and then globally, and what its legacy is today. Always he keeps an eye on the Ottoman Empire, central to the story. Kaufmann is a sure guide and knows the world of Reformation popular print inside out. This freshly written book brings sixteenth-century religious ideas to life, so that the reader grasps just why salvation and damnation mattered so much, and what the Reformation means in a united Germany now. The book is packed with unforgettable detail and original insight. * Lyndal Roper, Regius Professor of History, University of Oxford *
This is among the finest brief introductions to the Reformation in the current literature... Essential. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty; professionals; general readers. * Choice *
Table of ContentsI. Luther and the Reformation 1: A European Event 2: Ideal and Actual Reformations 3: One Reformation or Many? In the Beginning Was Luther II. European Christendom circa 1500 1: Construction of a Continent 2: Structures 3: Nations and Powers in Europe 4: The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation 5: Shared Spiritual and Clerical Cultures 6: Cultural Awakenings III. The Early Reformation in the Empire, 1517-1530 1: Thirteen Turbulent Years 2: Martin Luther: A Portrait 3: The Drop-out: A Young Augustinian Monk 4: The Exegete of Wittenberg 5: Luther's Break with the Pope 6: The Imperial Diet of Worms, Rebellion, and Upheaval 7: Zwingli and the Urban Reformation in Zurich 8: Intra-Reformation Disputes 9: Political Decisions of Church and State IV. Post-Reformation Europe, 1530-1600 1: Language, Education, Law: Religious Culture Reformed 2: Early Reformation Movements Outside the Empire 3: John Calvin and the Reformed International 4: The Royal Reformations in Scandinavia and England 5: The Pacified, Restive Empire 6: The Transformation of Roman Catholicism 7: Dissenters and Nonconformists 8: Latin Europe after the Reformation V. The Modern Reception of the Reformation 1: Reformation Jubilees: 1617 to 2017 2: Interpretation and Debate VI. The Reformation and the Present: An Appraisal 1: Time Accelerated: A Change or an Apocalypse? 2: Impact on the Modern West 3: Global Protestantism
