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On Reforming the Reformed: A Study of the Religious Changes and the Premonstratensians in Saxony
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 August 2022
Extract
The phenomenon of reform has appeared in many diverse modes throughout the history of the Christian church. At different times Christians have attempted to improve conditions which were perceived to reveal unwelcome deviations from some ideal models. During the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, the call for reform of the church in western Europe was especially loud, and many ameliorating changes did happen at that time. The forces at work strengthened a variety of trends which were as dissimilar as the growing respect for new theological insights, the increasing power of local leaders, and the expanding importance of the common people. Not only did church prelates guide parishioners into reforms; lay folk also influenced their religious superiors into ameliorations. The reforms in the Christian church of western Europe from about 1450 to 1525 were complex upheavals in which Christians attempted to solve the religious problems of that time.
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- Copyright © American Society of Church History 1985
References
1. Extremely valuable along these lines is the series entitled “Studies in Medieval and Reformation Thought,” edited by Heiko Obermann et al.
2. Walter Froese, “The Early Norbertines on the Religious Frontiers of Northeastern Germany” (Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 1978).
3. A good overview of some late medieval reform efforts among the Premonstratensians is provided by Norbert Backmund, “Spatmittelalterliche Reformbestrebungen im Pramonstratenserorden,“ Analecta Praemonstratensia 56 (1980): 194-204.
4. “Gesta Archiepiscoporum Magdeburgensium,” Monumenta Germaniae hisLorica, Scriplores, ed. Georg Pertz et al., 32 vols. (Hannover, 1826-1934), 14:466-475.
5. Albert Bormann and Gustav Hertel, Geschichte des Klosters U. L. Frauen zu Magdeburg (Magdeburg, 1885), pp. 93-96.
6. Iohannes Busch, Chronicon Windeshemense und Liber de reformatione monasteriorum, ed. Karl Grube (Halle, 1886), pp. 507, 510-513.
7. Karel Dolista, ed., Ada capitulorum Inennahurn el annahum circanae Saxoniae ordinis Praemonstratensis inde ab anno 1466 usque ad annum 1516 (Averbode, 1975-1978), pp. 113-117. Donald Sullivan, “Nicholas of Cusa as Reformer: the Papal Legation to the Germanies, 1451-1452,” Medieval Studies 36 (1974): 382-428.
8. Dolista, Acta, pp. 10-18, 115; Busch, Chronicon. pp. 513, 514, 516.
9. “Schöppenchronik,” Die Chroniken der niedersächsischen Städte: Magdeburg (Leipzig, 1869), pp, 391-392.
10. Ludger Meier, “Wilsnack als Spiegel deutsher Vorreformation,” Zeitschrift für Religions-und Geistesgeshichte 3 (1951): 59.
11. A letter by William to Capistrano is published in Joseph Klapper, Der Erfurter Kartäuser Johannes Hagen, ein Reformthelogue de 15. Jahrhunderts, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1960-1961), 2:119.
12. Karel Dolista, “Die Triennal- und Annualkapitel der sächsischen Zirkarie des Prämonstratenserordens,“ Analecta Praemonstratensia 50 (1974): 92, 96.
13. Dolista, Ada, pp. 58-86.
14. Ibid., p. 90.
15. Ibid., p. 92.
16. Gustav Hertel, ed., Urkundenbuch des Klosters Unser Lieben Frauen zu Magdeburg (Halle, 1878), pp. 342-344.
17. Adolph F. Riedel, ed., Codex diplomaticus Brandenburgensis, 41 vols. (Berlin, 1838-1869), pt. 1, vol. 3, p. 262.
18. Ludwig Goetze, “Beiträge zur ältesten Geschichte der Buchdruckerkunst in Magdeburg,” Bibliographiae Reconditae, vol. 1 (Amsterdam, 1966), pp. 344-345, 317-318; Riedel, Codex, p. 263.
19. Dolista. Act, pp. 47, 87, 89.
20. Astrik L. Gabriel, Les Preémontrés dans les Universities medievales dans l'Allemagne due Nord-Est, (Averbode, 1960), pp. 5-8; James J. John, “The Canons of Prémontré and the Medieval Universities of Northeast Germany” (D.M.S. diss., University of Notre Dame, 1959).
21. John, “Canons of Premontre,” pp. 373, 343, 344, 377.