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The Early Rise and Gradual Decline of Lutheranism in England (1520-1600)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2016

Basil Hall*
Affiliation:
St John’s CollegeCambridge
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Extract

Bishop Gardiner, whom the polemical John Bale had described as ‘the great Caiaphas of Winchester’, sharply drew the attention of the lord protector, Seymour, to ‘two seditious books’ not long after the death of Henry VIII in 1547, showing his anxiety to oppose the advance of protestantism which he saw as leading to civil as well as religious rebellion; both books were by Bale, at this time in exile abroad.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1979 

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References

In its first form this paper was presented as a lecture at Luther-Tyndale church in London at a commemoration of the declaration of the ninety-five theses by Martin Luther. After being expanded, it was published by the Concordia Theological Monthly (the theological journal of the Lutheran church-Missouri synod, St Louis, Missouri) in October 1967. The late and much missed professor W. D. J. Cargill Thompson urged two years ago that it should be made available in this country. Some additions and alterations have been made. Permission ro reprint the paper has been given by Dr Hoerber, chairman of the editorial committee, The Concordia Journal, to whom and to his committee grateful thanks are due.

1 Foxe, [J.], Acts [and Monuments], ed Pratt, Josiah (London 1870), 6, pp 30Google Scholar et seq. The two books by Bale were: The true hystorie of the Christen departynge of the reverende man D. Martyne Luther, 1546, and The Lattre Examinacyon of Anne Askewe, 1547. While Bale corresponded with Lutherans and was a friend of Robert Barnes, he did not adopt Lutheranism. In 1544 he published an account of the ‘examination and death of the blessed Martir Sir John Oldcastle’, a lollard, and published the treatise on the Lord’s supper by the Zwinglian John Lambert.

2 Doernberg, Erwin, Henry VIII and Luther (London 1961)Google Scholar ably covers similar ground to that more thoroughly analysed by Tjernagel, with less emphasis on the Lutheran commitment in the English reformation. Gairdner, J., Lollardy and the Reformation, 4 vols (London 1908)Google Scholar. Smith, H. M., Henry VIII and the Reformation (London 1948)Google Scholar.

3 Tjernagel p 253.

4 Meyer, [C. S.], [‘Melanchthon’s influence on English thought in the sixteenth century’], Miscellanea Historiae Ecclesiasticae, 2 (Louvain 1967)Google Scholar.

5 Rupp, E. G.. Patterns of Salvation in the First Age of the Reformation, ARG (1967) Heft 1/2, p 64Google Scholar.

6 Meyer suggests, in his article on Melanchthon’s influence p 183, that Hooker may have derived his concept of natural law in part from Melanchthon and cites the Loci Communes, 1521 without precise reference. Given the period in which Hooker was writing and the wide range of his reading in scholastic writers and contemporary legal theorists this is improbable.

7 Liturgies ana occasional forms of Prayer set forth in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, PS (1847) PP 445. 453.

8 The Works of John Whitgift, PS (1853), 3, pp 549-50.

9 The Works of Richard Hooker, ed Keble, J. (3 ed 1845) 3, p 503Google Scholar.

10 Select Poetry chiefly devotional of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, PS (1845) 2, p 288. An Answere to a Romish Rime lately printed, 1602.

11 Dickens, A. G., The English Reformation (London 1964) pp 328–9Google Scholar.

12 P. Janelle, Obedience in Church and State, gives a reprint of bishop Gardiner’s De Vera Obedientia. Gardiner’s book was printed at Hamburg for presentation to Lutheran princes and divines.

13 The Works of Hugh Latimer, PS (1844) p 212. From a sermon before Edward VI, 1549.

14 Original Letters relative to the English Reformation, PS (1846) 1 series, p 46.

15 The Writings of John Bradford, PS (1848) I, p 525.

16 Exposition and Notes of Sundry Portions of the Holy Scriptures, William Tyndale, PS (1849). See also the prologues to various biblical books in his Doctrinal Treatises, PS (1848). Tyndale’s positive contribution of Lutheran theology to England will be shown later.

17 Clebsch, W. A., England’s Earliest Protestants, 1520-1535 (London 1964) p 68Google Scholar. ‘Between 1531 and 1534 Barnes’ theology exchanged its conception of autocratic magistracy for one of covenanted society, and traded its insistence on justification by faith alone for an acknowledgment of justification before the world by works.’ However, Clebsch’s next sentence is unacceptable which asserts that Butzer and Calvin drifted from ‘the religious theocentrism of the early Luther toward the socially and ecclesiastically concerned covenant theology’—that drift is much more marked in the Zurich theologians, and to describe Calvin as drifting from theocentrism at any time is indeed a remarkable assertion. For Barnes see the modernised reprint of the major part of the Supplication with helpful introduction and notes by Tjernagel, N.S., The Reformation Essays of Dr. Robert Barnes (London 1963)Google Scholar. Clebsch points also to later manipulation of texts in the interests of the later theology, for example, he shows (pp 81-5) how Patrick’s Places by the Scot Patrick Hamilton, an early statement of Lutheran teaching in English in 1529, was modified in the interests of later protestantism by Foxe, John in the Acts and Monuments and by Knox, John in his History of the Reformation in Scotland. See also Greaves, R. L., John Knox and the Covenant Tradition, JEH(1973)Google Scholar.

18 WA, 51, pp 449-50.

19 For example, compare NCModH (1958) 2, p 241.

20 Many of these themes of church reform can be seen in Erasmus’ Enchiridion milites Christiani, and are implied behind the mockery of his Moriae Encomium. In 1522 Erasmus complacently stated to John Glapion that Rex [Henry VIII] adhuc puer nihil diligentius legit quant meas lucubrationes, e quitus fonasse contraxit nonnihil meae phraseos, si quid tamen habet meum. McConica, J. K., English Humanists and Reformation Politics under Henry VIII and Edward VI (London 1965)Google Scholar provides a full statement of this major influence. (This paragraph has been left as it stands since it was written before McConica’s work appeared. The words used are intended to draw attention to curious parallels rather than to demonstrate that this is the major interpretation of the Henrician reformation.) Elton, G. R., Reform and Renewal (London 1973) pp 45, 1617Google Scholar, attacks McConica with justice as showing ‘an excessive addiction to pattern-making … McConica’s pursuit of Erasmus really distorts … to order all that was written—worse, all that was done—under that single device is to obscure the history of events by hiding it behind a misleadingly comprehensive generalisation’. This must be allowed, but Elton himself gives too little place in his writings to this theme which until McConica’s book appeared might well have not existed as far as Elton’s writings are concerned.

21 Ellis, [Henry], [Original letters, illustrative of English History] 1 series (London 1824) 1, pp 239Google Scholar et seq.

22 The Acts and Monuments of Foxe, John, ed Pratt, J. and Stoughton, J. (London nd) 4, p 667Google Scholar. Foxe gives the title of this catalogue Libri Sectae sive Factionis Lutherianae importati ad Civitatem London per fautores ejusdem sectae, quorum Nomina et Auctores sequuntur, and the date as 1529, but this is probably at least two years too early.

23 Butterworth, [C. C], [The English Primers (1529-1545)] (London 1953) p 33CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Once again, however, it should be remembered that Joye was not a wholehearted favourer of Lutheranism, he was Zwinglian in his eucharistie doctrine like Tyndale.

24 Ibid p 36.

25 Ibid p 61.

26 Ibid p 108. (Butterworth cites the colophon of the ‘Treatise against Images’ at p 57).

27 Jacobs, [H. E.], [The Lutheran Movement in England] (London 1891) pp 118–24Google Scholar.

28 Mclanchthon, Opera quae supersunt omnia, CR. 3, col 1490.

29 Jacobs p 109.

30 Remains of Archbishop Cranmer, PS (1846) 2, pp 84,89.

31 Hardwick, [C], [A History of the Articles of Religion] (London 1904)Google Scholar appendix 2.

32 Hardwick p 266. Jacobs p 139 cites the article on the eucharist from the Repetitio from Seckendorf.

33 Melanchthon, CR 3, col 806. Elton, G. R. shows well that Thomas Cromwell supported Lutheranism, at least on political grounds, England under the Tudors (London 1956) pp 152–6Google Scholar. See also the useful article by Meyer, C. S., ‘Melanchthon, theologian of Ecumenism’, JEH (October 1966) pp 185207Google Scholar.

34 Burton, , Craniner’s Catechism (London 1829) 5, 6Google Scholar.

35 Ellis 2, P 643.

36 Older histories of the book of common prayer which reflect the tendency observed are those of F. Procter and W. H. Frere, and of J. H. Blunt.

37 Dowden, [J-], Further Studies in the Prayer Book (London 1908) p 34Google Scholar.

38 Dowden, , The Workmanship of the Prayer Book (2 ed London 1902) pp 152Google Scholar et seq.

39 Dowden, , Further Studies [in the Prayer Book] (London 1908) p 236Google Scholar.

40 Ellis p cxxi.

41 However, The Communion of the Sick, which survived in 1662, shows the influence of Lutheran orders. Dowden, Further Studies pp 248 et seq.

42 Ibid p 271. Also, part of the general confession is derived from the Pia Deliberano, Procter, F. and Frere, L.H., A New History of the Book of Common Prayer (London 1925) p488Google Scholar.

43 Dowden, Further Studies p 79.

44 Ibid pp 283, 284.

45 Dowden, , The Workmanship of the Prayer Book (2 ed London 1902) p 162Google Scholar.

46 Jacobs p 337.

47 Ibid pp 341, 342.

48 See above p 113.

49 Strype, Memorials (1721) I, pp 317, 318. Also the German merchants in London would have easy means of bringing Lutheran books into England.

50 Foxe, Acts 4, p 667.

51 For example, see Watson, P. S., Commentary on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians by Martin Luther (London 1953) pp 3, 4, 473Google Scholar where he shows the deletions and adjustments made in Luther’s text.

52 Mountagu, Richard, Apello Caesarem (London 1625) pp 11, 12Google Scholar.

53 Hume, M. A. S., CSP Spanish, Elizabeth (1892) 1, pp 61, 62Google Scholar.

54 Article, : ‘Johann der Beständige’, RE (3 ed) 9, pp 240–1Google Scholar.

55 Cross, Claire, Church and People 1450-1660 (London 1876) p 136Google Scholar.

56 It was from Geneva that John Knox had attacked ‘the monstrous regiment of women’, the rule of Mary Stuart and Mary Tudor. He led a revolution in arms against his sovereign in Scotland. Elizabeth neither forgave nor forgot this fact. For her view of the political dangers inherent in presbyterianising puritanism see her letter to James VI of Scotland, Letters of Queen Elizabeth and King James VI of Scotland, ed John Bruce, Camden Society (1849) p 63.

57 Hughes, P., The Reformation in England (London 1960) 3, p 46Google Scholar.

58 Strype, , Annals (2 ed 1725) 1, p 281Google Scholar.

59 Ibid pp 282, 283.

60 Heylyn, P., Ecclesia Restaurata, or the History of the Reformation of the Church of England, ed Robinson, G. C. (London 1849) 2, p 387Google Scholar.