Customer Reviews

Reformation: Europe's House Divided 1490-1700

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

In many ways, Diarmaid McCullouch's account is a useful, thorough guide to the Reformation, which starts in the aftermath of the Hussite controversy, the end of the Babylonian captivity, the rise of Humanism and the reconquest of Spain, and which ends with the Glorious Revolution, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes and with the beginning of the Enlightenment. MacCulloch is careful to remind the reader to take seriously the religious passions of the period and avoid the enormous condescension of the secular present. For here was a period where both Catholics and Protestants emphasized the absolute need for faith in Jesus as well as the need for moral behavior and increased discipline. In the battle of faith over works, Protestants emphasized the Gospel of John and the Letter to the Romans, while Catholic emphasized the Gospel of Matthew and the Epsitle of James. Whereas Catholics only had the Eucharist once a year, the Scottish Calvinists emphasized a more rational devotion, such that parishioners could now expect to take it twice. Instead of obeying the Pope, Protestants emphasized thier new ecclesiastical hierarchies. For these differences people were slaughtered from Drogheda to Magdeburg.

MacCulloch's main virtue is thoroughness. This is a history of the Reformation that covers almost all of Western Christianity. Not merely do Britian, France, the Netherlands and what is now Germany all play their parts, but we also get special sections on the suprisingly cosmopolitan culture of late 16th century Poland, the Protestant redoubt that was then Transylvania, as well as accounts of the Counter-Reformation in Italy and Spain. We even get the short and unhappy history of an attempt to turn Moldova Protestant, as well as colonial efforts in Virginia, Japan, Latin American and the Philippines. Indeed of all the countries of Western Christianity, only Slovakia, Slovenia and Finland do not make an appearance. Moreover, MacCulloch also makes clear that this was also a period of religious reform on the Catholic side. Just as the pre-1517 period was not one of religious decadence, there were new orders, new forms of discipline, new cultural forms, new teleogies after the Council of Trent. In 1580, Poland, France, Bohemia, Bavaria, Austria, Hungary, and Belgium were all balanced between Protestantism and Catholicism. A century later they were all clearly Catholic. A third point in MacCulloch's favor is an amusing style and a fine eye for detail. Many people would not know that the Spanish Inquistion was one of the more level-headed groups during the witch-hunt panics, a response, MacCulloch suggests, of their long experience with paranoia. After a lucid and amusing description of medieval Aristotelian theories of transubstantiation, MacCulloch notes the irony that thousands of Protestants were burned at the stake for rejecting an idea of a man who had never heard of Jesus. Later, we will see Protestants rejecting early cures for malaria and syphilis because Catholics were the first to come up with them. Many people are aware of Luther's hostility towards Jews, but MacCulloch notes that Erasmus could be equally venemous against them.

Having said that, this history is not definitive. The Gaelic culture of Scotland was easily absorbed into Protestantism, while the Gaelic culture of Ireland was almost completely hostile. By 1650 Catholics were tiny minorities in both England and Scotland. Meanwhile, in the Netherlands a sizeable minority were (and still are) Catholic, while what is now Belgium was mostly Catholic. Why? There is no systematic explanation of why one area was Catholic and another Protestant. We only get partial explanations, such as the argument that since the cult of purgatory had never developed as far in the South, Luther's polemics against it had much less effect. There is little discussion of what the population as a whole thought about the reformation. The Revisionist argument that the British population was underwhelmed by the Reformation for several decades is never really confronted. What did Europeans actually know about their Christian faith? Whether one uses Keith Thomas, Gerald Strauss, Christopher Haigh or Geoffrey Parker the results are not encouraging. MacCulloch emphasizes the Ottoman threat, many discussions of possible turning points and alternate endings, a discussion of the witch-hunts, and two chapters on sex and gender, even though the changes there were relatively modest. By contrast, there is little discussion of the economic causes or effects of the Reformation. In that way, it is very much a monograph of our time. Much of the book consists of sympathetic discussions of Protestant and Catholic theology, while there is no appearance in the index of El Greco, Montaigne, Spenser, Rembrandt or Milton. In his discussion of theology, there is a certain bias for Reformed theologians over their Lutheran and Catholic rivals. Certainly Augustine is treated as if he were holy scripture, while the modern critical consensus that Jesus opposed divorce absolutely goes unmentioned. Instead, there is the patently incorrect claim that Britain has the most restrictive divorce laws in Europe.

Academics don't need a review of this book and might not need to read it. However, if you are a student of history, particularly American History, you should read this. If you understand that we are a political/social experiment to test the ideas of the Reformation, this book will show you where this "City on a hill" came from. It will make many Americans aware of how and why separation of church and state is so central to our system. It will give you some food for thinking about what has happened in the past 300 years.

Do you know what a Protestant is? A Roman Catholic? An Anabaptist? Do you have any idea how important Jewish thought was to the Reformation? How did Reformation era thinking inform our political philosophy? Which version of the 10 Commandments is at issue in some schools and government offices? Did you even know that there are at least two "official" versions? This book shows how a million doubts and questions were addressed by some great and courageous thinkers and how the debates changed the world.

In a very direct way, ordinary Europeans began to trust thinking outside the box (Church) during the Reformation. The imperative to put ideas into action was part of the revolution in thinking and drove many communities to gather themselves to remake their societies. Many of them came here. Did you ever wonder why so many religious communities came to colonize North America and were so careful not to allow us to become a Theocracy?

This book manages to show a huge variety of the different trains of thought, all of which are different, all of which fall under the definition of Reformation.

I've studied the history of thoughts and communities MacCulloch characterizes so well here. I am astonished that he dared to write this book and amazed that he pulled it off. I wish I had written it, or that I could have.

It is dense, about 700 pages that will seem like 7000 to some people, but I couldn't put it down. I keep wondering what Erasmus, Luther, Zwingli and my immigrant ancestors would say about 2004. I an sure they would be unhappy that we no longer engage in their level of debate but that can change.

While I have had a long-term love of history, my understanding of the Protestant Reformation and the Catholic Counter-Reformation of the 16th and 17th centuries has always been sketchy and superficial.

It went something like this: (1) the Catholic Church allowed people to buy their way into heaven (via indulgences); (2) this made Martin Luther mad so he challenged the church by nailing his position on the door of the church (and he also wanted to get married) and so did John Calvin; (3) Henry VIII wanted a divorce but the pope wouldn't let him (which made him mad); (4) therefore, lots of Protestant churches came into being; and (5) the Puritans were part of one of them and they discovered America.

The truth of these statements was murky and the causal relationship between them was harder for me to understand than the theory of relativity.

I have a feeling I'm not alone. I knew it was all important, but trying to put it all together was beyond by ability. Well, now none of us need to do it alone, because Professor MacCulloch has written a history of the Reformation that is encyclopedic in scope and brilliant in its exectution. He fills in the gaps and clears up the many misconceptions.

This is not an easy book to read. But while MacCulloch doesn't make it easy, he avoids the jargon of the professional historian. That said, this is not a casual beach read--it demands a careful and thoughtful reading. And the rewards are great. For the first time, I have a real clue why the reform movement took off is so many ways and in so many places. I have a far better idea of the relationships between and among men like Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Cramner and so many more. I also now understand that the Reformation was not a linear, coordinated event, but was often chaotic and filled with both both greatness and pettiness.

In our secular world, we tend to view the political history of the past in secular terms (or at least in terms where religion is relegated to being merely one factor among many). MacCulloch quite rightly makes it clear that, while many factors contributed, for example, to the 30 Years' War, in the end it was all about religion.

This is a wonderful book that will illuminate and clarify history for anyone diligent enough to really read it. Highly recommended

MacCulloch's primary goal is to produce a readable, comprehensive overview of the Reformation. He is particularly concerned with educating the general reading public and aims at exposing the general public to recent advances in scholarship concerning the Reformation. It is clear also that he wishes this volume to be sufficiently rigorous to be useful to scholars. MacCulloch succeeds completely. This is a very well written, well organized, and truly comprehensive survey of the Reformation.
MacCulloch begins with an excellent analysis of the features and discontents within the late Medieval church, proceeds to the sequence of events that initiated the Reformation, and then explores the major features of the Reformation and its consequences. There is an excellent, broad view of the events of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation. Rather than just concentrating on the major countries of Europe, MacCulloch provides excellent coverage of regions like Scotland, Lithuania, and Transylvania that were important stages for the Reformation. This is important, not only because these sections fulfill MacCulloch's goal of being comprehensive but also because events in these areas, often regarded as peripheral, are typically revealing of important features of the Reformation. MacCulloch does an excellent job of constructing the basic narrative, presenting the careers and often the personalities of the major figures of the Reformation, discussing the often complicated theological issues, and providing concise analyses for why events at given times and locations resulted in specific outcomes. MacCulloch has no ideological axe to grind and provides equivalent discussion of both the Reform movements and the Counter-Reformation response. Virtually all sections of this book are excellent, and many are outstanding. Among the many highlights are insightful discussions of the impact of printing, the origins of distinctive Anglican theology (the English Reformation is MacCulloch's specialty), the role of the very real threat of Ottoman Islam, and the role of millenarianism in the Thirty Years War.
This is a really admirable performance.

It is almost a year since I read The Reformation: Europe's House Divided (to give it its English title) and I have lent it to a work colleague, so I won't attempt a detailed critique. However, I should note that it is a book whose many strengths more than outweigh the occasional shortcomings I mention below.

Unless I am mistaken, it is many years since anyone has attempted a general history of the Reformation. There has been a wealth of scholarly work carried out in the interim - not least some important revisionist accounts of the late Mediaeval Church.

MacCulloch has spent an academic life immersed in this field, so it is not surprising that his book, if it does nothing else, gives the lay readers a very useful summary of recent detailed scholarly work in many aspects of Reformation and Counter-Reformation history. His scope is broad, as other reviewers here have noted, and almost every page brings to light some fascinating but little known aspect of Reformation history. To mention but one example, the strong links between 16th century Italian Trinitarian sceptics and Central European Unitarianism, which survives to this day.

Despite his Protestant background MacCulloch strives throughout to maintain a balanced approach to this still highly-charged subject matter, but he makes no secret of which individuals he admires or otherwise. Usually this only adds to the human interest of the narrative. But in one case at least, that of Cardinal Reginald Pole, I think his liking for the man leads him to overplay Pole's theological liberalism and portray him as virtually a Protestant manqué.

Similarly, I think MacCulloch's personal religious tradition (which he discusses candidly in the introduction) leads him a somewhat misleading account of the nature and history of the doctrine of Purgatory in the opening chapter. Most unfortunate is the final chapter, which attempts to analyse the legacy of the Reformation in the present day. This shows the author at his liberal hand-wringing worst. The chapter is banal and bathetic and is almost like a caricature of a left-leaning Anglican clergyman.

Until the frankly silly last chapter, MacCulloch pays both Catholics and Protestants the compliment of taking seriously their struggle as a battle of ideas; though he perhaps overplays the largely Augustinian nature of these ideas. When I studied early modern European history in the late 1970's, the Reformation was analysed in terms of economics, the class struggle, princely power politics, jurisprudence, climate - virtually anything except what the protagonists actually said they were fighting over. MacCulloch's interest in the seriousness of the theological disputes is refreshing. But he comes close to suggesting (at least by omission) that there were no other factors at play at all. This becomes increasingly obvious as he deals with events after the 16th century. Can we really believe the Thirty Years Wars was exclusively concerned with religion? Even less sustainable is his apparent assumption that the struggles between England and the France of Louis XIV were a continuation of the Protestant - Catholic wars of the previous century. No doubt anti-popery served a purpose in firing up the English population against the French and the Jacobites, but an alliance that included the Habsburg Empire (a fact I think MacCulloch does not mention) was hardly united Protestant Front.

As other reviewers have noted, MacCulloch has a most engaging writing style and manages to find a surprising amount of humour in these often grim events.

Diarmaid MacCulloch is an excellent writer and story teller. I highly recommend this book for it's broad coverage of the reformation.

Throughout the book, the reformation is viewed as a theological power struggle that often involved preoccupations with rules that people wanted, not rules that always made rational sense. It is true, as other reviewers have pointed out, that the book places emphasis on the ideas of the reformers and counter-reformers, which surely was important in causing such popular swings of religious viewpoint. Additionally, the printing revolution is emphasized as a primary reason for the reformation. The economic situation is only lightly touched on as a major factor.

I personally feel that author did an outstanding job of remaining unbiased throughout this book, which is especially hard to find in history involving religious ideas. As a Roman Catholic, I also think that the author did a tremendous job covering Catholic theology. Although it is touched on very lightly throughout this book, which is my only complaint. Catholic theology is something that most non-Catholic journalists nearly always screw up, and for this reason, it was a pleasant surprise to find the Catholic theology outlined accurately.

This book covers the reformation period from the late 15th century to the beginning of the 18th century. Many aspects are touched upon throughout, including the reformer's long beards. MacCulloch brings an expert's insight to a subject that few know much about today. A summary of the historical conclusions made by MacCulloch is found in the final pages of the book. One such conclusion, summarized below, illustrates a common misperception about the reformation, and one that the author is quick to point out.

"We have no right to adopt an attitude of intellectual or emotional superiority, especially in the light of the atrocities that twentieth-century Europe produced because of its faith in newer, secular ideologies."

5 stars for The Reformation by Diarmaid MacCulloch

Other reviewers naturally concentrate upon the largely post-1517 portions of this study, but I wanted to inform potential readers that MacCulloch also does a fine job in conveying how much of the Reformation was rooted in late medieval tensions between papal centralization and conciliarism--which vested more power in the magisterium and the episcopate. Such conflicts, certainly, dominate the history of Catholicism ever since.

MacCulloch asserts that much of his study investigates theological rather than political, cultural, or historical elements per se. He makes us, far removed for the majority of us from such contentions as were fought over five centuries ago, understand how much passion as well as cogitation made figures like Erasmus, Luther, and Zwingli determined to create a better church promoting the people over the institution.

The author avoids easy stereotypes and devotes less attention than I would've expected to matters such as the sale of indulgences or the "peasants'" revolt. Catastrophic wars often earn but a few seconds of his attention compared to justification by faith, for example. And Luther's rather puzzling insistence to recognize earlier in his revolt the presence of the body and blood in bread and wine receives less than clear explication by MacCulloch. You get the impression either Luther was foggy on the notion or that MacCulloch assumes we readers know more than most of us do about the nuances of Luther's position, which eluded me, I confess.

The feel of the later medieval times dominates the beginning of this work, and while my own limited field of expertise gained only a few pages in this massive work, I sought out what MacCulloch had to say about ideas of purgatory and found to my pleasure that--on this spot-check of sorts--that his approach was up-to-date on the scholarship, his sources varied and new to me, and his incorporation of the few pages on this topic were clearly presented.

This book does not move quickly. I found I had to give it close attention to follow often intricate arguments and densely related material. This is not a criticism of MacCulloch. But the blurbs tend to present it as a lively page-turner, which it is not. It largely eschews jargon, but it does demand intellectual and theological familiarity with the period, to say the least. Understandably, it will serve as the one-volume summation on this period, but perhaps it's beyond the grasp or concentration of those non-experts wishing for a more concise introduction.

I own and have studied a library's worth of books related to this period, and MacCulloch's is the single most comprehensive chronicle that I have seen. Despite my extensive familiarity with the topic, I was totally engrossed by the book.

MacCulloch shows flair in presenting a wide perspective, covering not only the main figures of the Reformation but less-known, if highly influential characters. The scope is not restricted to the 'key players' in western Europe and England, but includes the East and Scandinavia. His writing is apt, wry, witty, and shows an exceptional understanding of the doctrinal and political issues involved, giving the background from previous centuries.

In MacCulloch's hands, well-known basic facts are developed in quite an enlightening fashion. For example, the idea that the Reformers were 'rescuing' the Church from corruption within the ranks of clergy is common in standard and revisionists versions, yet MacCulloch shows the reader the internal conflicts and misunderstandings which flesh out the usual picture.

His keen and entertaining style make this work as engaging as a novel (and undoubtedly twice as intriguing.) From the opening paragraphs, the reader is aware that this will be no cut and dried treatment, but one with unusual insight and humour.

This book deservedly joins the classics by Euan Cameron and Owen Chadwick on the Reformation. It looks at it as it really happened - this is based on solid scholarship and years of careful research. Those wanting a more partisan history will not find it here (my own FIVE LEADING REFORMERS should be more to the tastes of those that do) but as an objective work, looking at the Reformation in the wider context of European, and later global,history, this book cannot be bettered. For those of us who loved this author's CRANMER and then his TUDOR CHURCH MILITANT, this is the big book from him for which we have all been waiting. Make sure your library has a copy, and that your professor and/or pastor have read it. Christopher Catherwood, author of FIVE LEADING REFORMERS (CFP, 2000) and of CHRISTIANS MUSLIMS AND ISLAMIC RAGE (Zondervan, 2003)

MacCulloch's book has few flaws. It is lucid, knowledgeable without being ponderous, and to the point.

Like all great books, its final chapter, "Outcomes," is its best, threading the impact of the Reformation down to our time and touching the policies of current religious and political leadership.

Where the book stops short is the economic and social impact of the Reformation. A few years ago I did an exercise for an audience of Japanese executives trying to understand why Japanese businesses were being surpassed by resurgent U.S. companies like Dell and Wal-Mart. I laid out a simple black and white map of the world. I overlaid this with a foil showing all the advanced nations, Japan included, in red. I overlaid this red foil with another showing all the nations impacted by the Reformation in blue.

The audience gasped -- a most unJapanese reaction -- when the bulk of advanced countries came through in purple. There were almost no red countries (impacted by the Reformation but not advanced) and similarly almost no blue countries (advanced but unaffected by the Reformation) except Japan -- and that country was in trouble.

The greatness of MacCulloch's work is that it goes a long way toward explaining why this should be so. To do so as clearly and simply as it does is a wonder, especially for a 700 page work.

Editing: Five Stars though MacCulloch's Luther-like declaration for the semicolon is a little over the top and a good editor might have restrained him a bit on this point of style.

Copy Editing: Five Stars. Some of MacCulloch's naming conventions are odd, however. The Atlantic Isles could be anywhere in the Atlantic, North or South. And "north America"? Hmm. Then there is "ruinated" when ruined would do.