Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures, Maps, and Tables
- Acknowledgments
- A Note on Usages
- Map 1 The Empire in 1547
- Map 2 The Peace of Westphalia, 1648
- Part I The Empire, the German Lands, and Their Peoples
- Part II Reform of the Empire and the Church, 1400–1520
- Part III Church, Reformations, and Empire, 1520–1576
- Part IV Confessions, Empire, and War, 1576–1650
- 13 Forming the Protestant Confessions
- 14 Reforming the Catholic Church
- 15 Limits of Public Life – Jews, Heretics, Witches
- 16 Roads to War
- 17 The Thirty Years War
- 18 German Reformations, German Futures
- Appendix
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
13 - Forming the Protestant Confessions
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures, Maps, and Tables
- Acknowledgments
- A Note on Usages
- Map 1 The Empire in 1547
- Map 2 The Peace of Westphalia, 1648
- Part I The Empire, the German Lands, and Their Peoples
- Part II Reform of the Empire and the Church, 1400–1520
- Part III Church, Reformations, and Empire, 1520–1576
- Part IV Confessions, Empire, and War, 1576–1650
- 13 Forming the Protestant Confessions
- 14 Reforming the Catholic Church
- 15 Limits of Public Life – Jews, Heretics, Witches
- 16 Roads to War
- 17 The Thirty Years War
- 18 German Reformations, German Futures
- Appendix
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
And I saw an angel flying through the midst of heaven. He had an eternal gospel to proclaim to those who sit and dwell on earth, to all heathen and races and languages and nations. And he said with a loud voice: Fear God and give him honor, for the time of his judgment has come. Worship the one who has made heaven and earth, the seas and the springs of water. And another angel followed and said: “She has fallen, she has fallen, Babylon, the great city, for she has made drunk all the heathen with the wine of her harlotry.” This angel … was Dr. Martin Luther.
Johannes BugenhagenThe Protestant reformation grew under the sign of the Last Day. “In these last days of this transitory world,” declares the preface to the Book of Concord (1580), “the Almighty God, out of immeasurable love, grace, and mercy for the human race, has allowed the light of his holy gospel and his Word that alone grants salvation to appear and shine forth purely, unalloyed and unadulterated out of the superstitious, papistical darkness for the German nation, our beloved fatherland.” These words define Luther's principal legacy to his heirs: our lives are lived in the struggle between God and the Devil for mastery of man and the world.
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- German Histories in the Age of Reformations, 1400–1650 , pp. 259 - 290Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009