Thesis
The Second Leipzig Colloquy 1539: religious compromise and political failure
Washington State University
Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
2012
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/102836
Abstract
Religious beliefs are more complex than the modern religious groupings like "Catholicism" and "Lutheranism" would suggest. In reality, individuals do not always fit cleanly within these terms. This is the same today as it was in the sixteenth century. Yet historians have often explained the Reformation as the dissolution of medieval Christianity into mutually exclusive religious identities. Some historians have even used the development of these religious identities to explain the deterioration of religious moderates, those people who did not fully fit the model of either religion. These historians note the decline in ecumenical religious colloquies after the early 1540s. However, these colloquies were more political events than expressions of religious views at the moment. Through the case study of the Second Leipzig Colloquy of 1539, I argue that the convening and success of a colloquy remained contingent on political necessity. Further, despite the decline in ecumenical religious colloquies in the sixteenth century, religious moderates continued to argue their perspective, and remained in positions where they could wield real power. Therefore, the decline in sixteenth-century ecumenical religious colloquies was not a result of the decline in religious moderation, but the decline in the understood political necessity that religious compromise held.
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Details
- Title
- The Second Leipzig Colloquy 1539
- Creators
- Alexander Michael Gannon
- Contributors
- Jesse Spohnholz (Degree Supervisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- History, Department of
- Theses and Dissertations
- Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University; [Pullman, Washington] :
- Identifiers
- 99900525386801842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Thesis