Bridget Heal
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780198737575
- eISBN:
- 9780191800993
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198737575.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History, Cultural History
Chapter 2 analyses the role that images played in the theological controversies of the later sixteenth century. It opens with an investigation of Lutheran church furnishings during the mid-sixteenth ...
More
Chapter 2 analyses the role that images played in the theological controversies of the later sixteenth century. It opens with an investigation of Lutheran church furnishings during the mid-sixteenth century, which shows that there was no clear consensus at that time with regard to images, either at the level of theology or at the level of devotional practice. The chapter then investigates images’ fate during a time of crisis for the Lutheran Church, in the aftermath of the reformer’s death (1546) and Emperor Charles V’s victory over the Schmalkaldic League (1547). As Luther’s heirs contested his legacy, the treatment of images served as a means of indicating allegiance to either Wittenberg or the Gnesio-Lutheran cause. The chapter then considers the role that images played in confessional delineation as Calvinism became established in parts of the Holy Roman Empire from the 1560s onwards.Less
Chapter 2 analyses the role that images played in the theological controversies of the later sixteenth century. It opens with an investigation of Lutheran church furnishings during the mid-sixteenth century, which shows that there was no clear consensus at that time with regard to images, either at the level of theology or at the level of devotional practice. The chapter then investigates images’ fate during a time of crisis for the Lutheran Church, in the aftermath of the reformer’s death (1546) and Emperor Charles V’s victory over the Schmalkaldic League (1547). As Luther’s heirs contested his legacy, the treatment of images served as a means of indicating allegiance to either Wittenberg or the Gnesio-Lutheran cause. The chapter then considers the role that images played in confessional delineation as Calvinism became established in parts of the Holy Roman Empire from the 1560s onwards.
