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The Protestant Reformation
1517 onward· Event· Politics, society & justice
Well documentedSolid records, texts or physical evidence.
The religious movement, begun by Martin Luther in 1517, that split Western Christianity and created the Protestant churches.
See it on the Philosophy map →The idea
In 1517 Luther, a monk teaching at Wittenberg, circulated 95 theses against selling indulgences, church pardons said to reduce punishment for sins. His core ideas: people are saved by faith alone, as a gift of grace, and scripture alone outranks popes and councils. Printing spread his pamphlets fast. Excommunicated in 1521, he translated the Bible into German. Zwingli and Calvin led other branches. The main philosophical objection came from Erasmus: denying free will, as Luther did, made moral effort pointless.
Why it matters
It ended the Catholic Church's religious monopoly in Western Europe, set off a century of religious wars, and forced Europe to rethink conscience, toleration and the relation of church and state.
Where it comes from
Luther's theses and writings, thousands of surviving printed pamphlets, records of his 1521 hearing at the Diet of Worms, and the Peace of Augsburg (1555).
Still debated
Whether Luther actually nailed the theses to a church door is uncertain; the earliest accounts, by his aides Georg Rörer and Philip Melanchthon, come decades later. Historians also weigh its political and economic drivers.
Connections (2)
▸Renaissance humanism prepared the ground for The Protestant ReformationMostly agreed
The connection
Humanists urged a return to original sources, including the Bible in Greek and Hebrew. Erasmus's printed Greek New Testament (1516) exposed errors in the Latin Vulgate, and Luther used it for his German translation. Humanist mockery of corrupt clergy and empty ritual also prepared readers, though Erasmus himself stayed Catholic and broke with Luther.
When and how
Northern Europe, 1500–1525; Erasmus in Basel, Luther and the humanist Philip Melanchthon in Wittenberg.
How sure are we?
Luther used Erasmus's Greek New Testament (1519 edition) for his 1522 German translation; the saying 'Erasmus laid the egg that Luther hatched' circulated in their lifetimes.
Debates and open questions
Historians debate how much the Reformation owed to humanism versus late-medieval piety and politics; Erasmus retorted that he had laid a hen's egg, but Luther hatched a different bird.
▸The Protestant Reformation fueled the toleration debates of The EnlightenmentMostly agreed
The connection
The Reformation split Western Christianity into rival churches, and more than a century of religious wars followed. Weary of the bloodshed, thinkers such as Pierre Bayle, Locke and Voltaire argued that states should tolerate differing faiths. That case for toleration and private conscience became a core Enlightenment cause.
When and how
From Luther's 1517 theses in Wittenberg through the Thirty Years' War (1618–48) to Louis XIV's 1685 revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which drove out French Protestants.
How sure are we?
Locke's Letter Concerning Toleration (1689) and Bayle's Philosophical Commentary (1686) argue directly from the experience of religious persecution.
Debates and open questions
Historians debate how much credit Protestantism itself deserves, since Reformers persecuted too; the link may run more through war-weariness than through doctrine.