Making Heretics is a major new narrative of the famous Massachusetts disputes of the late 1630s misleadingly labeled the "antinomian controversy" by later historians. Drawing on an unprecedented range of sources, Michael Winship fundamentally recasts these interlocked religious and political struggles as a complex ongoing interaction of personalities and personal agendas and as a succession of short-term events with cumulative results. Previously neglected figures like Sir Henry Vane and John Wheelwright assume leading roles in the processes that nearly ended Massachusetts, while more familiar "hot Protestants" like John Cotton and Anne Hutchinson are relocated in larger frameworks. The book features a striking portrayal of the minister Thomas Shepard as an angry heresy-hunting militant, helping to set the volatile terms on which the disputes were conducted and keeping the flames of contention stoked even as he ostensibly attempted to quell them. The first book-length treatment in forty years, Making Heretics locates its story in rich contexts, ranging from ministerial quarrels and negotiations over fine but bitterly contested theological points to the shadowy worlds of orthodox and unorthodox lay piety, and from the transatlantic struggles over the Massachusetts Bay Company's charter to the fraught apocalyptic geopolitics of the Reformation itself. An object study in the ways that puritanism generated, managed, and failed to manage diversity, Making Heretics carries its account on into England in the 1640s and 1650s and helps explain the differing fortunes of puritanism in the Old and New Worlds.

Among America's more interesting new religious movements, the Shakers and the Mormons came to be thought of as separate and distinct from mainstream Protestantism. Using archives and historical materials from the 19th century, Stephen C. Taysom shows how these groups actively maintained boundaries and created their own thriving, but insular communities. Taysom discovers a core of innovation deployed by both the Shakers and the Mormons through which they embraced their status as outsiders. Their marginalization was critical to their initial success. As he skillfully negotiates the differences between Shakers and Mormons, Taysom illuminates the characteristics which set these groups apart and helped them to become true religious dissenters.

By utilizing the contributions of a variety of scholars - theologians, historians, and biblical scholars - this book makes the complex and sometimes disparate Anabaptist movement more easily accessible. It does this by outlining Anabaptism's early history during the Reformation of the sixteenth century, its varied and distinctive theological convictions, and its ongoing challenges to and influence on contemporary Christianity. T&T Clark Handbook of Anabaptism comprises four sections: 1) Origins, 2) Doctrine, 3) Influences on Anabaptism, and 4) Contemporary Anabaptism and Relationship to Others. The volume concludes with a chapter on how contemporary Anabaptists interact with the wider Church in all its variety. While some of the authorities within the volume will disagree even with one another regarding Anabaptist origins, emphases on doctrine, and influence in the contemporary world, such differences represent the diversity that constitutes the history of this movement.

The contributors to this volume examine the complex and dynamic role that Protestant majorities and minorities played in shaping the Reformations of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In doing so, it offers an important perspective on the range of intellectual, social, economic, political, theological and ecclesiological factors that governed intra- and inter-confessional encounter in the early modern period. While the principal focus is on the situation of different Protestant majority and minority groups, many of the contributions also engage the relation of Protestants and Catholics, with a number also considering early modern Christian dialogue with Muslims and Jews.The volume is organised into five sections, which together provide a comprehensive picture of Protestant majorities and minorities. The first section explores intellectual trajectories, especially those which promoted confessional unity or sought to break down confessional boundaries. The second section, taking the neglected Spanish Reformation as an important case-study, examines the clandestine aspect of minority activities and the efforts of majorities to control and suppress them. The third section pursues a similar theme but examines it through the lens of Flemish and Walloon Reformed refugee communities in Germany and the Netherlands, demonstrating the way in which confessional factors could lead to the integration or exclusion of minorities. The fourth section examines marginal or peripheral Reformations, whether geographically or doctrinally understood, focussing on attempts to implement reform in the shadow of the Ottoman Empire. Finally, the fifth section looks at confessional identity and otherness as a principal theme of majority and minority relations, providing both theoretical and practical frameworks for its evaluation.

The dual biography of two remarkable women - Catherine Parr and Anne Askew. One was the last queen of a powerful monarch, the second a countrywoman from Lincolnshire. But they were joined together in their love for the new learning - and their adherence to Protestantism threatened both their lives. Both women wrote about their faith, and their writings are still with us. Powerful men at court sought to bring Catherine down, and used Anne Askew's notoriety as a weapon in that battle. Queen Catherine Parr survived, while Anne Askew, the only woman to be racked, was burned to death. This book explores their lives, and the way of life for women from various social strata in Tudor England.

After the Reformation, the Dutch Republic emerged as the most religiously tolerant country in seventeenth-century Europe. Benjamin Kaplan examines the reasons behind this phenomenon, focusing on the struggle of Calvinist reformers to realize their theocratic aspirations in the Netherlands, and the fierce opposition offered to them by a large, amorphous group of people known as `Libertines'. Nowhere was this struggle more intense than in Utrecht, a city at the heart of the Dutch Reformation. The author illuminates the nature of this conflict through a study of the city and people of Utrecht, examing social relations, popular piety, civic culture, and state formation. This urban case-study shows how Dutch religious developments fitted into the wider European framework. Offering a fascinating microcosm of religious tensions in Europe around 1600, Kaplan shows how the Calvinist-Libertine conflict in the Netherlands was in fact a local manifestation of a broader European phenomenon: the struggle between champions and opponents of `confessionalism'. He thus combines a new interpretation of the Dutch Reformation with a presentation that makes this largely unknown phenomenon accessible to students of other countries. As the first case-study in English of the Dutch Reformation, Calvinists and Libertines fills an important gap in our knowledge of Dutch history and in our understanding of the European Reformation as a whole.

English Reformations takes a refreshing new approach to the study of the Reformation in England. Christopher Haigh's lively and readable study disproves any facile assumption that the triumph of Protestantism was inevitable, and goes beyond the surface of official political policy to explore the religious views and practices of ordinary English people. With the benefit of hindsight, other historians have traced the course of the Reformation as a series of events inescapably culminating in the creation of the English Protestant establishment. Dr Haigh sets out to recreate the sixteenth century as a time of excitement and insecurity, with each new policy or ruler causing the reversal of earlier religious changes. This is a scholarly and stimulating book, which challenges traditional ideas about the Reformation and offers a powerful and convincing alternative analysis.

Martin Luther's posting of the 95 Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg on 31 October 1517 is one of the most famous events of Western history. It inaugurated the Protestant Reformation, and has for centuries been a powerful and enduring symbol of religious freedom of conscience, and of righteous protest against the abuse of power. But did it actually really happen? In this engagingly-written, wide-ranging and insightful work of cultural history, leading Reformation historian Peter Marshall reviews the available evidence, and concludes that, very probably, it did not. The theses-posting is a myth. And yet, Marshall argues, this fact makes the incident all the more historically significant. In tracing how - and why - a 'non-event' ended up becoming a defining episode of the modern historical imagination. Marshall compellingly explores the multiple ways in which the figure of Martin Luther, and the nature of the Reformation itself, have been remembered and used for their own purposes by subsequent generations of Protestants and others - in Germany, Britain, the United States and elsewhere. As people in Europe, and across the world, prepare to remember, and celebrate, the 500th anniversary of Luther's posting of the theses, this book offers a timely contribution and corrective. The intention is not to 'debunk', or to belittle Luther's achievement, but rather to invite renewed reflection on how the past speaks to the present - and on how, all too often, the present creates the past in its own image and likeness.

This book explores the importance of Schleiermacher and his place in the history of the church, religion and Christianity. Was he a reformer of Christianity or merely a catalyst who stimulated a change in how the Church appeared and was perceived? Schleiermacher's importance for philosophy is also discussed. Were his views on preserving religion and the practice of faith in the Christian Church merely apologetic in nature, or did they have a reasonable - in other words - scientific, philosophical basis? These were central questions at a symposium which was organized by the Schleiermacher Research Center of the Berlin Brandenburg Academy of Sciences in May 2009. The papers collected in this volume deal with these questions from the perspective of various disciplines.

Produced during the lifetime of Shakespeare and Donne, the King James Version of the Bible has long been viewed as the most elegantly written and poetic of the many English translations. Now reaching its four hundredth anniversary, it remains one of the most frequently used Bibles in the English-speaking world, especially in America.
Lavishly illustrated with reproductions from early editions of the KJB, Bible: The Story of the King James Version offers a vivid and authoritative history of this renowned translation, ranging from the Bible's inception to the present day. Gordon Campbell, a leading authority on Renaissance literatures, tells the engaging and complex story of how this translation came to be commissioned, who the translators were, and how the translation was accomplished. Campbell does not end with the printing of that first edition, but also traces the textual history from 1611 to the establishment of the modern text by Oxford University Press in 1769, shedding light on the subsequent generations who edited and interacted with the text and bringing to life the controversies surrounding later revisions. In addition, the author examines the reception of the King James Version, showing how its popularity has shifted through time and territory, ranging from adulation to deprecation and attracting the attention of a wide variety of adherents. Since the KJB is more widely read in America today than in any other country, Campbell pays particular attention to the history of the KJB in the United States. Finally, the volume includes appendices that contain short biographies of the translators and a guide to the 74-page preliminaries of the 1611 edition.
A fitting tribute to the enduring popularity of the King James Version, Bible offers an illuminating history of this most esteemed of biblical translations.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE 2017 SHORTLISTED FOR THE ELIZABETH LONGFORD PRIZE 2017 'A magnificent study of one of history's most compelling and divisive figures' Richard J. Evans When Martin Luther nailed a sheet of paper to the church door of a small university town in 1517, he set off a process that changed the Western world for ever. Within a few years Luther's ideas had spread like wildfire. His attempts to reform Christianity by returning it to its biblical roots split the Western Church, divided Europe and polarised people's beliefs, leading to religious persecution, social unrest and war; and in the long run his ideas would help break the grip of religion on every sphere of life. Yet Luther was a deeply flawed human being: a fervent believer tormented by spiritual doubts; a prolific writer whose translation of the Bible would shape the German language yet whose attacks on his opponents were vicious and foul-mouthed; a married ex-monk who liberated human sexuality from the stigma of sin but who insisted that women should know their place; a religious fundamentalist, Jew-hater and political reactionary who called 'for the private and public murder of the peasants' who had risen against their lords in response to his teaching. And perhaps surprisingly, the man who helped create in the modern world was not modern himself: for him the devil was not a figure of speech but a real, physical presence. As an acclaimed historian, Lyndal Roper explains how Luther's impact can only be understood against the background of the times. As a brilliant biographer, she gives us the flesh-and-blood figure. She reveals the often contradictory psychological forces that drove Luther forward and the dynamics they unleashed, which turned a small act of protest into a battle against the power of the Church. A New Statesman, Spectator, History Today, Guardian and Sunday Times Book of the Year

The development of the Federal theology of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries was a significant transformation in Reformed theological thinking. According to the Federal theologians, all of human history could be described using the rubric of a series of covenants, or foedera, beginning with a `covenant of works' in the perfection of Eden and concluding with the new covenant fulfilled by Jesus Christ in the New Testament. The new covenant was in effect the conclusion of the `covenant of grace', and it was this which united the Old and New Testaments into one continuous epic of God's grace and mercy. While John Calvin and many earlier Reformers discussed the importance of the postlapsarian covenant of grace, they never taught the Federal theology with its key identifying feature of a prelapsarian covenant. This book traces the prelapsarian covenant idea in Reformed theology from its first use by Zacharias Ursinus in 1562 to its flowering in 1590. Besides its origins, the implications of the Federal theology for Reformed thinking are made clear, and it is shown that the idea of covenant could have important implications for areas such as church and state, the sacraments, the Puritan doctrine of conversion, the Christian Sabbath, and the doctrine of justification and Christian ethics. The Federal theology is of considerable historical importance in intellectual history and forms the framework for much of the Reformed theology in the English-speaking world for three centuries. The doctoral thesis out of which this book developed won the Frank S. and Elizabeth D. Brewer Prize of the American Society of Church History.

From 1570 to 1640, Protestantism became the leading moral and intellectual force in England. During these seven decades of rapid social change, the English Protestants were challenged to make "morally and spiritually comprehensible" a new pattern of civilization. In numerous sermons and tracts such men as Donne, Hall, Hooker, Laud, and Perkins explored the meaning of man and his society. The nature of the Protestant mind is a crucial question in modern historiography and sociology. Drawing on the writings of these important years, the authors find that the real genius of the Protestant mind was not "Puritanism," but the via media, the reconciliation of religious and social tensions. "'Puritanism,'" the authors show, "is a word, not a thing." Originally published in 1961. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

The complex philosophical theology of Paul Tillich (1886 1965), increasingly studied today, was influenced by thinkers as diverse as the Romantics and Existentialists, Hegel and Heidegger. A Lutheran pastor who served as a military chaplain in World War I, he was dismissed from his university post at Frankfurt when the Nazis came to power in 1933, and emigrated to the United States, where he continued his distinguished career. This authoritative Companion provides accessible accounts of the major themes of Tillich's diverse theological writings and draws upon the very best of contemporary Tillich scholarship. Each chapter introduces and evaluates its topic and includes suggestions for further reading. The authors assess Tillich's place in the history of twentieth-century Christian thought as well as his significance for current constructive theology. Of interest to both students and researchers, this Companion reaffirms Tillich as a major figure in today's theological landscape.

Throughout most of the eighteenth century and particularly during the religious revivals of the Great Awakening, evangelical women in colonial New England participated vigorously in major church decisions, from electing pastors to disciplining backsliding members. After the Revolutionary War, however, women were excluded from political life, not only in their churches but in the new republic as well. Reconstructing the history of this change, Susan Juster shows how a common view of masculinity and femininity shaped both radical religion and revolutionary politics in America. Juster compares contemporary accounts of Baptist women and men who voice their conversion experiences, theological opinions, and proccupation with personal conflicts and pastoral controversies. At times, the ardent revivalist message of spiritual individualism appeared to sanction sexual anarchy. According to one contemporary, revival attempted "to make all things common, wives as well as goods." The place of women at the center of evangelical life in the mid-eighteenth century, Juster finds, reflected the extent to which evangelical religion itself was perceived as "feminine"-emotional, sensional, and ultimately marginal. In the 1760s, the Baptist order began to refashion its mission, and what had once been a community of saints-often indifferent to conventional moral or legal constraints-was transformed into a society of churchgoers with a concern for legitimacy. As the church was reconceptualized as a "household" ruled by "father" figures, "feminine" qualities came to define the very essence of sin. Juster observes that an image of benevolent patriarchy threatened by the specter of female power was a central motif of the wider political culture during the age of democratic revolutions.