Discussion Questions

1. Did Protestant preaching pave the way for Protestant success?

2. Do Protestant hymns and songs reveal the success of the Reformation? Why or why not?

3. Does the refusal to keep a pastor’s house in good repair signal the failure of the Reformation? For specifications see slide 31.

Reformation and the Culture of Persuasion

Reformation and the Culture of Persuasion Our purposes in reading the book:

1. to assess the effectiveness of various media to present and gain acceptance of the religious message of the Reformation

2. to supplement our investigation of the debate about the success / failure of the Reformation. Can you find connections between the book and the assigned articles and MacCulloch’s Reformation?

Questions to keep in mind:

1. How do we assess effectiveness?

2. Does effective presentation of the Reformation message necessarily mean acceptance of the message?

The Dynamics of Conversion Questions important for success / failure

debate:  ”Why did people choose the Reformation?

What was it in the evangelical teaching that excited, moved or persuaded them? How, and by what process, did people arrive at the new understandings that prompted a change of allegiance, and embedded them in their new faith?” (p. 1)

The Dynamics of Conversion at the beginning of Reformation movement, decision

for Reformation was a difficult one: “embracing novelty in an era that despised it”

Reformation leaders: “restoration not innovation” (p. 1)response: rejection or integration of old customs

but “change…was a universal and very obvious consequence of the Protestant revolution” (p. 2).

loss of old comforts conversion process necessary: lonely, divisive

The Dynamics of Conversion “What did people choose when they adhered

to the evangelical teaching?” (3). Luther: call to repentance, witness to Christian

faith, acceptance of assurance of salvation conversion narratives

difficulties: overreliance on theology, on an appeal to teaching.

“The process of building a new church required much more than conversion. Education, assimilation, familiarity and the creation of new enemies – a new dialectic of belonging and rejection – all played their part” (6).

The Dynamics of ConversionTiered process

of persuasion

Awareness Knowledge about Protestantism

Identification Identification with Protestantism

Understanding Knowledge about beliefs

Activism Iconoclasm, defence of Protestant culture

Media of Persuasion the book: a Protestant medium? culture of persuasion: public, communal “If the Reformation were to succeed, the culture of

persuasion would have to work with the grain of this society. Reformers recognized a necessary double process of engagement: with the individual Christian, and with a collective religious consciousness that also had to be nurtured and reinforced” (p. 8).

“every medium of discourse and communication familiar to pre-industrial society”: preaching, singing, drama

Preaching Sermon “a fundamental part of church life,” “played

an important role in the wider information culture of pre-modern society” (10)

Reformers understood the value of preaching as a medium; they made their reputation on preaching; preached constantly

problem of sermon as source: survives in written form but oral delivery could be different

Preaching: The Sermon Tradition  preaching an essential part of medieval religion:

continuity with the ReformationLent a time for much preaching local demand for preaching increasing in the fifteenth

century cities endowed preacherships: re: commonwealth

(MacCulloch) hearing sermons an urban experience; preaching by

and large not a liturgical experience. emphasis on penance: calling for the leading of a

better life: threats re: consequences of not heeding advice.

Preaching: The Sermon Tradition what the Reformers owed the medieval tradition:

“a sense of the sermon as performance; a belief that preaching could transform the lives of those who stood before them; and a belief that the spirit of God was embodied in the preacher, and that the preacher’s rhetorical skill worked with divine grace” (17)

NEW: sermon becomes central to worship

Preaching: Reformers in the Pulpit Luther: a reluctant preacher (?)

preached regularly in Wittenberg, preached from a bare outline;

sermons characterized by careful preparation (read Scripture), exposition of biblical passage, “relentless attention to the central message” (p. 19) of the passage = rein Evangelium

derided rhetorical tricks of pre-Reformation church accommodated exposition of biblical passage to the

situation of his audience; goal of simplicitystyle: paired opposites (Law vs. Gospel); did not spare

audience: examples on p. 20;

Preaching: Reformers in the Pulpit Zwingli: preaching as cornerstone of career; style

similar to Luther’s = serial exposition of Bible; Bullinger continues Zwingli’s tradition of preaching;

emphasized training of preachers and patience of congregations

 Calvin: least prepared for preaching office; busy, remarkable, popular preacher: listeners

remembered parts of his sermons on street after worship service; like Luther, Calvin criticized his audience

I saw a connection between the theme of the criticizing preacher and Pastor Neander (Goodale, p. 79). Does that make sense to you?

Preaching: Preachers and People “The Reformation became a movement only because the

initiative of Wittenberg and Zurich was emulated in dozens of pulpits across central Europe” (25).

Bernd Moeller: earliest Protestant preaching emphasized justification by faith, but: printed sermons in Latin;

Susan Karant-Nunn: sermons less coherent; popular demand for pure Gospel; included a plea for ideal Christian society and anti-clerical attacks;

Reformers had to restrain ambitions of most zealous listeners

 

Preaching: Preachers and People town councils vie with congregations to appoint preachers;

Strassburg: Matthias Zell was initiator: preaching so popular that carpenters made him a new pulpit when pulpit in Cathedral denied him. Demands for gospel preaching combined with demands for Protestant Church = abolition of Mass

“Shorn of the sacramental powers that had bolstered even the most inadequate of the pre-Reformation clergy, the new ministerial cadre faced a demanding audience fully conscious of their role in shaping the new church. For the preacher in the pulpit this created an uneasy dynamic that the Reformation never entirely resolved” (30).

Preaching: Taming the Prophet“In the first years of the Reformation, preaching often

provided the decisive impetus for lay activism” (30). e.g. iconoclasm

tension: enthusiasm of early years of Protestantism vs. task of building a new Church

training of preachers: Prophezei in Zurich (1525); Geneva: apprenticeship training for preachers

Scotland: recount biblical text, exegesis, applicationprophecy restrained: rebuking monitored by civil authorities“The sermon provided the ideal vehicle to express the

bibliocentric core of Protestantism: in its turn it swiftly became the core of all Protestant worship” (38).

Burntisland Parish Church and Magistrate’s Pew

Huguenot Church in Lyon

Militant in Song distinctive Protestant worship: prayer, Scripture,

preaching, communal singing. communal singing: “the most distinctive

innovation” (40) “If the reformers invested such hopes in music, it

was partly because singing was such a ubiquitous part of pre-industrial society” (41).

“Almost the only place one would not expect regularly to find music was in the parish church” (42).choirs in large urban churches, aristocratic

chapels

Militant in Song: The Wittenberg Nightingale Luther: retains basic structure

of medieval liturgy; adds vernacular songs by 1524 ca. 40 Wittenberg

hymns: texts from psalms or based on familiar Latin texts

hymnal: Geystliches Gesangk Buchlein (1524)

Johan Walter composed polyphonic choral settings

Militant in Song: The Wittenberg Nightingale

hymns quickly became popular effects: proliferation of congregational hymn

books, singing of lessons at school; church ordinances called for congregational singing; singing part of communal response to worship service

Militant in Song: The Wittenberg Nightingale Lutheran Joachimsthal

(Bohemia) vs. failure of Reformers church life “joint creation” of

laity and clergy (49)hymns written by clergy but

part of lay culture catechism hymns

Militant in Song: The Wittenberg Nightingale Lutheran Joachimsthal

(Bohemia) vs. failure of Reformers conveyed central

message of Protestant teachings (e.g. including justification by faith, service of neighbor) and can present teaching in completeness vs. isolated sermon and do so in a positive light.

Militant in Song: The Wittenberg Nightingale Lutheran Joachimsthal

(Bohemia) vs. failure of Reformers “Here all the aspects of

faith—emotional, psychological and rational—combined with physical activity to encapsulate the core teachings of the new church and its claim, so important to Luther, to create a new Christian people” (49).

Militant in Song: The Power of the Word songs for use outside of worship polemical songs and counterfacta: music taken from

secular traditional or religious songs Hans Sachs in Nürnberg took popular Marian tunes and

sets new words that embody Reformation teachings. subversive nature of these songs: intertextuality “The use of these familiar tunes was of utmost importance

to their success” (52). “The new spiritual songs quickly made their way into the

general entertainment culture of the new Lutheran societies” (52): private houses, workshops, market places, streets, and fields.

“Song is cheap and accessible, and requires no staging or training for enjoyment” (53).

Militant in Song: Psalms from Geneva Zurich: austere: no musical embellishment Calvin at first cautiously allowed

congregational singing; then great promoter of metrical psalms in French; wrote some of these

poet Clément Marot 1562 Theodore Beza completed French

translation of psalms psalm singing = “core congregational

activity” (55) at worship psalms constituted complete Reformed

hymnody (vs. Lutheran spiritual songs not taken from Psalms)

Militant in Song: Psalms from Geneva all melodies were new compositions, no

contrafacta: 128 different melodies in 110 different

metrical patterns psalters printed with musical notation Genevan printing industry produced massive

quantities of psalters all psalms completed by 1543 in Calvin’s

Forme des prieres very popular; 1562 Psalter appeared at time

of visibility of French Reformed communities: 1561 Beza obtained royal privilege for printing psalms;

Militant in Song: Psalms from Geneva Why popular? In France: “Psalm singing

became the defining activity of the Protestant insurgency” (60): singing Psalms on way to execution; “insolent expropriation for public space” (60)

The metrical psalms took a powerful part of the Scripture canon and shaped it to the needs of an evangelical movement” (61)

singing created social bonds “The metrical psalms would be a signature

part of the reformed tradition wherever it became established” (62) Netherlands, Scotland, England

Militant in Song: Godly Ballads

godly ballads part of entertainment culture of Elizabethan England

millions of broadsheets produced; penny ballads themes: sin, immorality of everyday life, uncertainties of

salvation, fear of afterlife; celebrated Protestant heroes; attacked Catholicism;

The ballads “sketch the basis of a coherent layman’s theology. Their enduring popularity demonstrated that English parishioners were perfectly capable of absorbing their messages as part of a diverse entertainment culture” (75).

 

Militant in Song Reformed protest songs against Mass, papacy,

clergy collections of chansons…use melodies from

metrical psalms…a curious development given the avoidance of contrafacta;

polemical songs: destroy Catholicism, create new religious society; psalms in opposition to persecution, e.g. Dutch Revolt

--Wilhelmus: celebrated William of Orange, but taken from contemporary Catholic political song; model for many contrafacta: Beggar, Anabaptist, Catholic songs

 

Pastors, Privation, and the Process of Reformation in Saxony

Does the refusal to keep a pastor’s house in good repair signal the failure of the Reformation?

1. What are some reasons in favour of failure?

2. What evidence does Goodale present to challenge Strauss’s argument for failure? Consider the three case studies and look for patterns that connect them.

3. Could you still use Goodale’s evidence to argue for failure?

4. After reading the articles by Strauss, Kittelson, and Goodale, what do you think of visitation records as sources for the debate about the success or failure of the Reformation?

Pastors, Privation, and the Process of Reformation in Saxony

Some useful information: “The church visitation transcripts reveal that the upkeep of the pastor and his family was the greatest source of conflict within the rural villages of Saxony” (81). [Snide comment: Were there urban villages in Saxony? All villages are rural!]

sexton: the parish official responsible for the maintenance of parish buildings (church, school) and properties. He could also be called upon to teach the catechism to children, as we notice in the first case study.

eingepfarrte villages: villages that belong to a larger parish (Pfarrei), i.e. villages that do not have a parish church of their own and depend on the church of another village