Changes

After the introduction of [[Protestantism]], the immense fermentation caused by the introduction of socially subversive principles into the life of a people would exhaust its revolutionary beginnings, and result in a new form of social and religious order - the residue of the great Protestant upheaval in Europe was territorial or [[State Religion]], based on the religious supremacy of the temporal ruler, in contradistinction to the old order in which the temporal ruler took an oath of obedience to the Catholic Church. [[Martin Luther]]'s first reformatory attempts were [[radical]]ly democratic. He sought to benefit the people at large by curtailing the powers of both Church and State. The German princes, to him, were "usually the biggest fools or the worst scoundrels on earth". In 1523 he wrote: "The people will not, cannot, shall not endure your [[tyranny]] and oppression any longer. The world is not now what it was formerly, when you could chase and drive the people like game". This manifesto, addressed to the poorer masses, was taken up by [[Franz von Sickingen]], a Knight of the Empire, who entered the field in execution of its threats. His object was twofold: to strengthen the political power of the knights — the inferior nobility — against the princes, and to open the road to the new Gospel by overthrowing the bishops, but his enterprise had the opposite result: the knights were beaten, lost what influence they had possessed, and the princes were proportionately strengthened. The rising of the peasants likewise turned to the advantage of the princes: the fearful slaughter of [[Frankenhausen]] (1525) left the princes without an enemy and the new Gospel without its natural defenders. The victorious princes used their augmented power entirely for their own advantage in opposition to the authority of the emperor and the freedom of the nation.

After the introduction of [[Protestantism]], the immense fermentation caused by the introduction of socially subversive principles into the life of a people would exhaust its revolutionary beginnings, and result in a new form of social and religious order - the residue of the great Protestant upheaval in Europe was territorial or [[State Religion]], based on the religious supremacy of the temporal ruler, in contradistinction to the old order in which the temporal ruler took an oath of obedience to the Catholic Church. [[Martin Luther]]'s first reformatory attempts were [[radical]]ly democratic. He sought to benefit the people at large by curtailing the powers of both Church and State. The German princes, to him, were "usually the biggest fools or the worst scoundrels on earth". In 1523 he wrote: "The people will not, cannot, shall not endure your [[tyranny]] and oppression any longer. The world is not now what it was formerly, when you could chase and drive the people like game". This manifesto, addressed to the poorer masses, was taken up by [[Franz von Sickingen]], a Knight of the Empire, who entered the field in execution of its threats. His object was twofold: to strengthen the political power of the knights — the inferior nobility — against the princes, and to open the road to the new Gospel by overthrowing the bishops, but his enterprise had the opposite result: the knights were beaten, lost what influence they had possessed, and the princes were proportionately strengthened. The rising of the peasants likewise turned to the advantage of the princes: the fearful slaughter of [[Frankenhausen]] (1525) left the princes without an enemy and the new Gospel without its natural defenders. The victorious princes used their augmented power entirely for their own advantage in opposition to the authority of the emperor and the freedom of the nation.

==See also==

==See also==

[[Millennialism]] | [[Theonomy]]| [[Theocracy]]

[[Millennialism]] | [[Theonomy]]|

 

==References==

==References==

# Cross, F.L.; Livingstone, E.A. (1983), Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (2nd ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 218  

# Cross, F.L.; Livingstone, E.A. (1983), Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (2nd ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 218