Religious reform and consolidation, 1450–1600

Abstract

In 1521, Martin Luther (1483–1546), a professor of theology at the German University of Wittenberg, stood before the Diet of Worms, an assembly of representatives from the nobility, church, and cities in the Holy Roman Empire. Speaking loudly to the group, which included the Emperor Charles V, Luther refused to give in to demands that he take back his ideas. “Unless I am convinced of error by the testimony of Scripture and plain reason,” he said, “I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise.” By the nineteenth century, these words were viewed as the beginning of modern religious individualism and freedom of conscience, joining Renaissance art and the voyages of Columbus as the origins of the modern world. “Here I stand” was the title of what was for decades the most popular biography of Luther, published in 1950 by Roland Bainton, the leading Reformation scholar of his day. These words continue to be highlighted in the twenty-first century; they are on socks for sale in gift shops in Luther’s hometown, and in both television documentaries and movies, one of which describes Luther as “rebel … genius … liberator.”