A fully revised and updated version of this authoritative account of the birth of the Protestant traditions in sixteenth-century Europe, providing a clear and comprehensive narrative of these complex and many-stranded events.

Martin Luther (1483–1546) famously began the Reformation, a movement that shook Europe with religious schism and social upheaval. While his Ninety-Five Theses and other theological works have received centuries of scrutiny and recognition, his political writings have traditionally been dismissed as inconsistent or incoherent. God and Government focuses on Luther’s interpretations of theology and the Bible, the historical context of the Reformation, and a wide range of writings that have been misread or misappropriated. Re-contextualizing and clarifying Luther’s political ideas, Jarrett Carty contends that the political writings are best understood through Luther’s “two kingdoms” teaching, in which human beings are at once subjects of a spiritual inner kingdom, and another temporal outer kingdom. Focusing on Luther’s interpretations of theology and the Bible, the historical context of the Reformation, and a wide range of writings that have been misread or ignored, Carty traces how Luther applied political theories to the most difficult challenges of the Reformation, such as the Peasants’ War of 1525 and the Protestant resistance against the Holy Roman Empire, as well as social changes and educational reforms. The book further compares Luther’s political thought to that of Protestant and Catholic political reformers of the sixteenth century. Intersecting scholarship from political theory, religious studies, history, and theology, God and Government offers a comprehensive look at Martin Luther’s political thought across his career and writings.

Fifteenth-Century Carthusian Reform argues that monastic theology offers a medieval Catholic paradigm distinct from the scholastic theology that has been the conventional source for medieval-oriented interpretations of Renaissance and Reformation. It is based on thorough study of the manuscript record. Nicholas Kempf (ca. 1415-1497) taught at the University of Vienna before becoming the head of Carthusian monasteries in rural Austria and Slovenia. Faced with calls for reform in church and society, he placed his confidence in the patristic Christian idea of reform: the reform of the image of God in the human person. This contemplative monastic idea of reform depended on authoritative structures, especially the monastic rule and rational -- yet divinely inspired -- discernment by a spiritual director. What seemed like simpleminded submission to monastic structures was actually a way to avoid relying on human effort for salvation. By returning to one's true self (the image of God), one opened oneself up for genuine social relationships. To activist reformers, whether adherents of medieval scholasticism, Renaissance humanism, or modern Enlightenment, this monastic idea of reform has seemed escapist, backward-looking, and "womanish." Monks accepted these labels but read them as signs of hidden strength. This book attempts to read through monastic lenses.

"This book sheds new light on the unfolding of Reformation in England by examining the ideological development of Catholicism in the formative years between the break with Rome and the consolidation of Elizabethan Protestantism. It argues that the undoubted strength of Catholicism in these years may have come less from its traditionalism, and its resistance to change, than from its ability to embrace reforming principles. The humanist elements within Henry VIII's religious policies encouraged the development of the Erasmian potential already well established in English Catholic thought. A dominant strain of Catholic ideology emerged which attempted not only to defend, but also to reform the Catholic faith, and to promote the study of Scripture, the use of the vernacular, and the refashioning of doctrine. This provided the basis for attempts to launch a Catholic Reformation under Mary I, and remained influential during the early years of Elizabeth, until reconfigured by the experience of exile and the drive for Counter-Reformation uniformity." "Dr. Wooding shows that Catholicism in this period was neither a defunct tradition, nor one merely reacting to Protestantism, but a vigorous intellectual movement responding to the reformist impulse of the age. Its development illustrates the English Reformation in microcosm: scholarly, humanist, practical, and preserving its own peculiarities distinct from European trends. It shows that reform was not a Protestant reserve, but a broad concern in which many participated. Rethinking Catholicism in Reformation England makes an important contribution to the intellectual history of the Reformation."--BOOK JACKET.