hi I'm John Green this is crash course
world history and today we're gonna talk
about the Protestant Reformation mr.
green mr. green this is irrelevant for
me I'm an atheist yeah I know me from
the past because I'm you although
actually you are now Episcopalian a
Protestant church started because a king
wanted to get a divorce but anyway let
me submit that religious history is
important regardless of your personal
religious beliefs because it helps us to
understand the lenses through which
people have viewed their lives and
communities and given that the
Protestant Reformation is what proper
historians refer to as a big ass deal
which I will remind you is not cursing
if you are referring to donkeys
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so before the Reformation pretty much
all Christians in Europe were Roman
Catholic yes there were other types of
Christians in Eastern Europe and Asia
and Africa but Roman Catholicism was the
dominant form of Christianity and had
been since like the 4th century the
Protestant Reformation broke so called
Western Christendom into two and then
three and then four until finally there
were uncountable denominations of
Christianity not just Lutheran's but
apostolic Lutheran's and Reformed
Lutheran's and three Lutheran's and
Lutheran's for just going back to being
Catholic because this has become so
complicated this was hugely important it
changed people's way of looking at
themselves in the world that led to
wider European literacy and eventually
forced governments to grant religious
freedoms while also at the same time
maybe being more of a political
revolution than a religious one so
during the European Middle Ages the
Catholic Church really dominated
European civilization it's almost
impossible to imagine the scope of the
church's power in the Middle Ages but
but let's try first off the Catholic
Church was the caretaker of the most
important thing that Christians had
their souls which unlike our temporal
bodies were eternal and then there was
the parish priest who played a pivotal
role throughout every person's life
baptizing them marrying them hearing
their confessions providing last rites
the church also provided all of the
social services that distributed alms to
the poor and ran orphanages and provided
what education was available and most
Europeans would in their lives meet
exactly one person who could read the
Bible which was only available in Latin
their parish priest and the church owned
over one-third of all the land in Europe
which helped make it the most powerful
economic and political force on the
continent and the Pope claimed authority
over all the kings of Europe as the
successor to the Roman Emperor so this
was a very powerful institution and it
was undone by one chronically
constipated monk crash-course we don't
like to get too into like great man
history but the Reformation really was
initiated and shaped by one man Martin
Luther no Stan the Martin Luther he was
named for no stand the Martin Luther
that he was named for yes okay let's go
to the thought-bubble
Luther studied law and like most law
students he hated it then one day a
sudden storm blew
lightning struck him to the ground and
in a panic he cried help me Saint Anne
I'll become a monk he survived and the
next two weeks he withdrew from
University entered an Augustinian
monastery took his vows and sent a
message to inform his family who I'm
sure we're delighted to have spent all
that money on education because
monkeying is so lucrative in 1505 Luther
was sent to Rome on a diplomatic mission
and he ignored all the awesome art and
focused instead on Rome's corruption
with prostitutes openly soliciting on
the filthy streets priests who made
light of their duties hurrying through
mass so fast that it seemed to mean
nothing an open leader riding Church
doctrine Luther was obsessed with his
own sinfulness and he kept confessing
incessantly and finally his confessor
and teachers sent him to the University
of Wittenberg because you know they were
a little bit annoyed with him and they
figured he'd be good at teaching
Scripture these days of course incessant
confessors are put on the Real
Housewives of New Jersey but back then
you sent them to the University of
Wittenberg
anyway Luther finally found his answer
in st. paul's epistle specifically in
one line that said the just shall live
by faith
in other words salvation comes through
faith not good works not through prayer
or fasting or vigils or pilgrimages or
relics or giving to the poor or the
sacraments or any action that a person
can take
we can't ever be good enough through our
actions to merit salvation we can only
have faith in Latin Sola feed a only
faith thanks thought-bubble so Martin
Luther's new interpretation of Sola
fidei grew into a full-scale conflict
with the Catholic Church when a friar
named John Tetzel came to Wittenberg
selling indulgences and indulgences was
a donation to the church that came with
a promise from the Pope to reduce a
sinner's time in purgatory like to quote
from an indulgence that friar Tetzel
sold
I replaced the in the state of innocence
and purity in which thou worked at at
the hour of thy baptism Luther felt like
that wasn't the sort of thing that you
know should be for sale the price of
this whole life complete forgiveness of
any horrible sin certificate by the way
was three marks probably about half a
year's wages for a label so Huether
didn't like seeing his parishioners
handing over money that they didn't have
for a scrap of paper that he believed to
be meaningless so in response he wrote
ninety-five theses against indulgences
and then
dramatically nailed them to the church
door for all to see on October 31st 1517
or else he mailed them to the archbishop
or possibly both we don't actually know
this led to a series of debates with
other men of the cloth during which
Luther's positions became increasingly
radical starting from the statement that
Christians were saved only through faith
and the grace of God for instance Luther
then up to the ante saying that the
church's rituals didn't have the power
to save souls and then he argued that
far from being infallible the church and
the Pope made errors all the time that
was a pretty bold thing to say and then
it got even more dramatic when Luther
ultimately denied that the church and
the officers of it had any spiritual
powers he said that the priesthood was a
human invention and that individual
Christians didn't even need priests to
receive the grace of God instead Luther
described a priesthood of all believers
so this had gone from make a call for
reforming indulgences to a revolution so
in 1521 Luther was called to defend his
ideas before the holy roman emperor
charles v at the imperial diet of worms
or in german firms also let me say retro
actively now that everyone has commented
on my poor german pronunciation victim
burger emperor charles famously said a
single friar who goes counter to all
christianity for a thousand years must
be wrong through which luther was like
stop flapping that hideous Habsburg jaw
of yours there was something to what
Charles was saying right because plenty
of radical friars had criticized the
church's abuses and hypocrisy 'he's over
the years
why would Luther prove influential well
one reason was the printing press now
most people in Europe at the time
couldn't read but a lot of people could
including of course a lot of priests and
over 2,000 editions of Luther's writings
appeared between 15 17 and 15 26 and his
ideas also appeared in pamphlets and
posters and cartoons that were seen and
read aloud reaching millions of readers
and listeners in short Luther's ideas
were all over like the tumbler of the
day which was a town crier and
broadsides nailed to doors and it caused
quite a stir especially the stuff about
like the Pope being the Antichrist sent
by the devil like I said it got pretty
radical but maybe the most revolutionary
of Luther's publications was his new
translation of the Bible into German
the first time ever non priests could
read the Bible for themselves because
Luther used the German that people
actually spoke instead of Latin and his
work quickly caught on among common
people hundreds of thousands of copies
of Luther's Bible were printed people
carried it in their pockets and
memorized it now everyone could quote
scripture and discuss its meaning now
Luther's theory was that if everyone
just returned directly to the scriptures
they would see the one single truth and
the church would be restored to its
original simplicity ya know I have a
message to the restorers of history
there is no original simplicity the
thing is once you start making scripture
accessible to everyone and tell them
that their opinions are just as good as
those of the clergy what happens is that
people start you know having different
interpretations of what religious truth
is so Luther's protest started creating
spin-offs the Zwingli ins and the
Calvinists in the Anabaptist and then
the spin-offs had their own spin-offs
it's like how first there was iron man
and then there was the Avengers and then
you know like an Avengers TV show pretty
soon we're gonna have ant-man get his
own movie the Protestant Reformation is
basically just the exact same thing as
the Marvel comic universe but no Thor
because he's pagan anyway many of these
new denominations will be familiar to
you the Anglicans and Puritans the
Quakers the Presbyterians the Methodists
the Baptist's each of these new
Protestant churches thought that it knew
the one true way to worship God and that
you know everyone else was going to hell
and this led to some fighting and also
some disembowelling oh it's time for the
open letter but first let's see what's
in the globe today oh that's nice I
thought it would be disemboweled people
but it's Anabaptist not baptizing their
infants hi there so you don't believe in
infant baptism you believe that like
people should come of age that they can
make their own decision about salvation
other people Catholics many Protestants
believe that it's okay to baptize
infants or even that it's good I don't
feel like this disagreement should lead
to disembowelment and yet it did the
fascinating thing to me Anabaptists is
that you never had a state you never had
like widespread political say in any
community and yet your brand of
evangelical Christianity managed to
become incredibly important in world
history
in short the bad news is that many of
you are going to be executed the good
news is that your message will prove
surprisingly resilient damn who do not
even make that open letter if
the Anabaptists are Amish now they're
not watching this I guess some of them
are Mennonites I made it for you
Mennonites okay so with all these new
denominations there were years of
religious mayhem clergy preach radical
new ideas and then other people
interpreted them in even more radical
ways people especially young people
smashed up churches because the Bible
says no graven images what started as a
doctrinal dispute turned into a social
revolt and in 1525 German peasants took
up Luther's ideas to give voice to
long-standing grievances against
landlords and clergymen in their most
famous revolutionary Proclamation the 12
articles the peasants echoed Luther's
language proclaiming that serfdom was
invented by men with no basis in
Scripture peasants rebelled refused to
pay taxes pillaged church lands and
raised an army estimated at 300 thousand
people and Luther was like yes
free soul sovereign at last no just
kidding he wasn't Luther chose the elite
and said that Christian Liberty was a
spiritual concept not meant to promote
equality or freedom in like the physical
world he then urged the faithful to
smite slay and stabbed rebels and killed
him like Mad Dogs he also gave up his
idea that congregation should elect
their own ministers and argued that
kings and princes were put in place by
God as caretakers of the church and that
turned out to be the winning side for a
few hundred years anyway the German
peasants revolt the biggest
revolutionary uprising in Europe before
the French Revolution was suppressed
with crushing brutality an estimated
100,000 people were killed so Luther
chose the princes in the name of
stability and success but why would
Prince's choose Lutheranism when the
holy roman emperor had forbidden it
let's look at one example the first
actual ruler who broke with the Pope the
heroic frequently divorced founder of
Anglicanism King Henry the eighth of
England what's that Stan apparently it
was not King Henry the eighth it was
Grandmaster Albert of the Teutonic order
of monks Crusaders who'd come to rule
parts of what is now Poland so many
Teutonic Knights individually left the
order from Lutheranism because they
liked the theology Albert started by
reading Lutheran tracts and he became a
fan allowing Lutheran preachers into his
cities and even travelling to meet with
Lutheran persons on Luther's advice
Grand Master Albert dissolved the
Teutonic state and found
instead the dougie of Prussia I guess
that was a country where they all danced
the dougie oh it's the douchy of Prussia
Stan informs me that it is neither the
dougie nor the douchy of Prussia but the
Duchy of Prussia anyway Albert
established a Lutheran Church there the
First Lutheran state church but it's
unlikely that Albert was really
motivated by a desire to purge the
Church of corruption I mean at the time
of his decision the Grand Master had
been in trouble he was losing
territorial battles against the rest of
Poland and he was running out of money
by breaking with the church Albert was
able to seize the church assets within
his territory which bolstered his
military might and then allowed him to
settle his war favorably in another
major plus now that he was a Duke
instead of a Grand Master monk he could
get married and produce heirs which he
did founding the House of Hohenzollern
destined to unify and rule the German
Empire a few centuries later and this
points to a huge incentive for princes
and kings to break with the Pope what if
instead of the church having all of that
money in power I could have it those are
like the two favorite things of monarchs
and Protestantism allowed them to
confiscate church land and other wealth
collect Church taxes and used Church
land for themselves why is the Queen the
largest landowner in England because the
Protestant Reformation that said we
shouldn't minimize the extent to which
the Reformation really was about belief
I mean Catholics truly believed that
Protestants were heretics and
Protestants truly believed that the Pope
and his hierarchy were imposters if it
were only about land and influence how
could we explain the case of Saxon
elector john frederick for instance when
defeated and imprisoned by his catholic
emperor frederick was given the choice
between his lands and his faith he chose
his faith and then there were Catholics
like Sir Thomas More who would not
sanction Henry the eighth's break with
the Pope and chose execution over
sacrilege so in the end the Reformation
was both a religious movement and a
political one now many argue that the
Reformation eventually led to more
religious toleration in Europe because
people just had to learn to live with
each other once they had a bunch of wars
and figured out that they were going to
be both Catholic and Protestants moving
forward there were many other effects of
the Protestant Reformation Max Weber
famously called it the foundation of
European capitalism but for me the most
crucial aspect of the Protestant
Reformation is contained inside the word
protests and reform these have become
two of the central political ideas in
recent centuries and while religion has
justifiably been blamed for much
violence and intolerance we should also
remember that many of the leaders of the
American civil rights movement for
instance were Protestant clergy and they
saw a history of protests that could
fuel real and lasting reform that
included people like Gandhi and Thoreau
but also people like Martin Luther
thanks for watching
I'll see you next week crash course is
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don't forget to be awesome
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you