Wednesday, June 30, 2004 AD
Whatever happened to the English Lutherans? (2)
So, why did English Lutheranism fail to blossom? How did we go from the situation in the 1520s and 1530s - when to be an English Protestant was almost synonymous with being Lutheran - to the 1550s, when Lutheran teachings were explicitly repudiated by the Church of England?
AG Dickens puts most of the blame on the Lutherans, starting with the Schmalkaldic League's insistence that Henry VIII's England adopt the Augsburg Confession. During the 1540s, Cranmer made a number of important links with European Reformers (most notably, Martin Bucer), but failed to make much headway with the Lutherans in Germany:
In 1546, the Schmalkald War broke out, resulting in defeat for the (Lutheran) Schmalkadic League in 1547. This was followed by Charles V's attempt to impose a religious settlement (the Augsburg Interim) on the Holy Roman Empire, and the attempt by Melanchthon and others to reach a compromise in the Leipzig Interim. Only in 1555 was the position of Lutheranism assured within the Empire, with the Peace of Augsburg. But the theological disputes (occasioned, in part, by Melanchthon's compromises) continued for a further 20 years, until they were finally resolved in 1577 with the publication of the Formula of Concord.
In short, during the crucial years of Edward VI's reign (1547-1553), and the early years under Mary, the Lutheran theologians, far from sitting back on their gains and letting the Calvinists run amok in England and elsewhere, were still engaged in a fight to preserve the Gospel from external aggression and internal error and dissension. For an English Lutheran, it is certainly frustrating to think of "what might have been" had Lutheranism's early influence in England survived. But that's not to say that the Lutheran Church "dropped the ball" as Dickens seems to suggest.
However, I'll be grateful for any further input from anyone who knows more about this issue, particularly from the Lutheran side (and I'd also appreciate recommendations for English-language histories of the Reformation from a Lutheran perspective, or which go into the relationship between the English and Lutheran Reformations in more detail).
AG Dickens puts most of the blame on the Lutherans, starting with the Schmalkaldic League's insistence that Henry VIII's England adopt the Augsburg Confession. During the 1540s, Cranmer made a number of important links with European Reformers (most notably, Martin Bucer), but failed to make much headway with the Lutherans in Germany:
"The men [Cranmer] befriended display in their life-stories almost the whole range of European religious politics, yet amongst them one grievous omission remained. Cranmer failed to persuade Melanchthon or any other representative leader of the Lutherans to visit England. Though henceforth foreign influences upon the English Reformation increased, they came not from Wittenberg but from Strassburg, Zurich and Geneva. The Saxon Reformers, having gained their local objectives, left the leadership of international Protestantism to others, and their renunciation has an especial importance in the history of English religion" (p319)Lutheran isolation from the English church increased during the reign of Mary, when many English Protestants escaped to the Continent:
During their years of exile eight English congregations were established in the continent ... Despite the pleas of Melanchthon the Lutheran states proved most inhospitable, partly because they believed English Protestants held the wrong sacramental beliefs, partly because they feared political complications. Whatever the justification for this attitude it should be numbered among the many opportunities lost by the ultra-cautious Lutherans, and it killed any remaining possibility that the English Church might gravitate into a Lutheran orbit. (pp.389f.)Though Dickens does speculate later on what might have happened had Henry VIII taken a more conciliatory approach in the 1530s:
If Henry had foreseen the ultimate political dangers of Calvinist Protestantism, he might have been prompted to thrust aside his scruples and adopt as his State-religion a fully-fledged Lutheranism, with its veneration for the godly prince. Yet whether this would have exorcised more radical creeds or merely paved the way for their advent, we can only conjecture.(p.447)However, I do wonder if Dickens is being a little harsh on the Lutherans. Unfortunately I do not know as much as I'd like about the history of the Lutheran Reformation after Luther's death (the point at which most English-speaking histories of the Reformation lose interest in Wittenberg and turn their attention instead to Geneva). But the years following Luther's death were not easy ones for the Lutheran Church (despite Dickens' rather lofty assertion that the Lutherans "having gained their local objectives, left the leadership of international Protestantism to others").
In 1546, the Schmalkald War broke out, resulting in defeat for the (Lutheran) Schmalkadic League in 1547. This was followed by Charles V's attempt to impose a religious settlement (the Augsburg Interim) on the Holy Roman Empire, and the attempt by Melanchthon and others to reach a compromise in the Leipzig Interim. Only in 1555 was the position of Lutheranism assured within the Empire, with the Peace of Augsburg. But the theological disputes (occasioned, in part, by Melanchthon's compromises) continued for a further 20 years, until they were finally resolved in 1577 with the publication of the Formula of Concord.
In short, during the crucial years of Edward VI's reign (1547-1553), and the early years under Mary, the Lutheran theologians, far from sitting back on their gains and letting the Calvinists run amok in England and elsewhere, were still engaged in a fight to preserve the Gospel from external aggression and internal error and dissension. For an English Lutheran, it is certainly frustrating to think of "what might have been" had Lutheranism's early influence in England survived. But that's not to say that the Lutheran Church "dropped the ball" as Dickens seems to suggest.
However, I'll be grateful for any further input from anyone who knows more about this issue, particularly from the Lutheran side (and I'd also appreciate recommendations for English-language histories of the Reformation from a Lutheran perspective, or which go into the relationship between the English and Lutheran Reformations in more detail).
