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The Reformation

The Reformation in Germany

The initial spread of Luther's ideas produced chaos, dissent, and rebellion, which naturally only confirmed in the minds of staunch Catholics their belief that religious dissent brought civil war as well as spritiual peril. Luther himself called for German resistance to the papacy in nationalist terms, and the call was quickly answered.

In 1522, knights in the Rhineland rebelled. They claimed to be loyal to the emperor, to be defending his rights in Germany, but in truth they were trying to defend their own, for the lower orders of knights in Germany had long been suffering both economically and socially. Many of these also had been persuaded to Lutheranism, and so almost from the beginning religious dissent and political rebellion became entangled.

The revolt of the knights was quickly suppressed, but soon after a peasant revolt broke out in southern German (1524). This revolt spread rapidly in breadth and severity. Here, too, many of the rebels cited Luther's ideas or professed Lutheran sympathies. This rebellion was finally crushed in 1525.

By the later 1520s, Lutheranism spread more peacefully, usually when a prince or a city council formally adopted Luther's ideas and formally suppressed the Catholic Church within their jurisdiction. Although this progress was not marked by violence, it still constituted a flagrant disregard and defiance of established authority (the Emperor and the Church). Becoming Lutheran was not a step taken lightly or without cost.