Luther and the Protestant Reformation: Crash Course World History #218

Hi, I’m John Green, this is Crash Course World History and today we’re going to 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.

[Theme Music]

So before the Reformation, pretty much all Christians in Europe were Roman Catholic.

Yes, there were other types of Christians in Eastern Europe, 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” in two—then three, then four, -- until finally there were uncountable denominations of Christianity--

not just Lutherans but Apostolic Lutherans and Reformed Lutherans and Free Lutherans and Lutherans 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 and the world, it 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 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: it 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 1/3 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.

Here at 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, Stan! 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 up, lightning struck him to the ground, and in a panic, he cried, “Help me, Saint Anne! I’ll become a monk!”