Salvation at Stake: Christian Martyrdom in Early Modern Europe

by Brad S. Gregory

Thousands of men and women were executed for incompatible religious views in sixteenth-century Europe. The meaning and significance of those deaths are studied here comparatively for the first time, providing a compelling argument for the importance of martyrdom as both a window onto religious sensibilities and a crucial component in the formation of divergent Christian traditions and identities. Gregory explores Protestant, Catholic, and Anabaptist martyrs in a sustained fashion, addressing the similarities and differences in their self-understanding. He traces the processes and impact of their memorialization by co-believers, and he reconstructs the arguments of the ecclesiastical and civil authorities responsible for their deaths. In addition, he assesses the controversy over the meaning of executions for competing views of Christian truth, and the intractable dispute over the distinction between true and false martyrs. He employs a wide range of sources, including pamphlets, martyrologies, theological and devotional treatises, sermons, songs, woodcuts and engravings, correspondence, and legal records. Reconstructing religious motivation, conviction, and behavior in early modern Europe, Gregory shows us the shifting perspectives of authorities willing to kill, martyrs willing to die, martyrologists eager to memorialize, and controversialists keen to dispute.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Theology, Christianity, European History, Religion, Church History

544 pages, Hardcover

First published December 3, 1999

About the author

Brad S. Gregory is Professor of Early Modern European History at the University of Notre Dame. He received his Ph.D. from Princeton University (1996) and was a Junior Fellow in the Harvard Society of Fellows (1994-96). Before joining the faculty at Notre Dame in 2003, Gregory taught at Stanford University, where he received early tenure in 2001. Gregory has two degrees in philosophy as well, both earned at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium. He has received multiple teaching awards at Stanford and Notre Dame, and in 2005 was named the inaugural winner of the Hiett Prize in the Humanities from the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture as the outstanding mid-career humanities scholar in the United States. Gregory's research focuses on Christianity in the Reformation era, the long-term effects of the Reformation, secularization in early modern and modern Western history, and methodology in the study of religion.

Reviews

[Cali · Rating 4 out of 5]

Exceptionally researched. I agree with his conclusions, and believe that modern and postmodern scholarship is often underpinned by atheist metaphysics masquerading as neutrality, HOWEVER, to conclude on a value judgment about the sixteenth century psyche (even though it serves his point well and I ultimately agree) is the sort of blatant essentialism he himself disavows. How are you going to beat me over the head with your "cross-confessional, anti-reductionist" method while regularly using modern sensibilities to measure early modern ones? Smh - 3.85 stars.

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another book I've only had the chance to read a single chapter out of for my thesis, but which I really enjoyed and hope to read entirely at some point. In the chapter I read, Gregory sets out the logic which Calvinists, Anabaptists, and Roman Catholics used to justify the killing of heretics. Very well researched, very well written. I'm using his ideas and bits and pieces from the chapter in my discussion of the Marian burnings as contextually legitimate 'acts of control' that fit within the larger context of Marian policies, Tudor policies, and contemporary European policies.

[Rachel Zehr · Rating 5 out of 5]

To understand the phenomenon of early modern martyrdom as hinging on anything other than doctrine is to misunderstand badly the ones who died, who executed, who compiled martyrologies, and who sorted false martyrs from true martyrs. In Brad S. Gregory's persistent formulation, doctrine and death was inextricably joined in a sense unaccounted for by modern and postmodern assumptions.

I could argue that Gregory's use of the pun "at stake" and his avid ardour for alliteration came across too strongly at times, but since they provided some comic relief in a topic that could otherwise be gruesome, I won't. In fact, the writing was always solid, and the conclusion particularly so.

[Joshua Pegram · Rating 5 out of 5]

Evenhanded study of martyrdom in the sixteenth century and the impact of that martyrdom on the Western world following the Reformation. Excellent.

"To imply that religious toleration was a sort of missed opportunity in the Reformation era implies that early modern Christian leaders should have made peaceful coexistence a priority over God's truth. This is a blatant anachronism: it is to imagine Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Tyndale, Eck, Fisher, More, Loyola, Sattler, Hubmaier, Huter, Menno, plus dozens of other leaders and the martyrs not as they were, but as one wishes they had been. To suggest that the course and character of early modern Christianity might have been completely different—with the divergences and intensity, but without the disagreements, conflict, and violence—is to imagine early modern Christians who never existed in a world that never was.” (347)

"A critical attitude and close assessment of evidence are necessary prerequisites for doing history; thoroughgoing suspicion and cynicism are inimical to doing it well. Present-day commitments of whatever kind can never substitute for evidence in assessing the motives of past people, including—especially—those whose words and actions might offend us personally. We should not, for example, ascribe to Protestant reformers in general a self-serving duplicity insofar as they quoted scripture to urge the need for control in self, household, town, and state. Is it plausible that men committed to scripture as God's word used it merely to justify social control and to reinforce patriarchal ideology? Can we imagine them believing that the Bible revealed God's truth for humanity, but not thinking it relevant for every domain of human life on which it could be brought to bear? If so, again we meet sixteenth -century Christians who never existed. It is dubious history to locate past people who did things one finds offensive, suspect them of ulterior motives, apply the theory that explains what they were "really up to," and present one's findings is building block in the ongoing quest for post-Enlightenment liberation, understood in secular terms. In the end, such an approach refects a self-indulgent presentism that cannot see past its own political agenda." (351)

[Sharon R Zuiderveld · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read the chapter on the Mennonite movement in the Netherlands. Persecutions and martyrdom pervaded many European countries at this time. Infant baptism was refuted in favor of adult baptism when believers were more aware of their commitment to the Christian life.

[Ally · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5… did go back and finish it after I needed it for class so green flag there, and I love his provocative methodological claims in intro but does he not kinda wrap up the book doin exactly what he said he wouldn’t? Sorry Brad, almost a full slay

[Ardi Pierik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dit boek betoogt dat een religieuze lens noodzakelijk is om de bereidheid van vroegmoderne christenen om voor het geloof te sterven te kunnen begrijpen. Gregory keert zich hiermee tegen exclusief sociaal georiënteerde verklaringsmodellen.
Gregory's eerste twee hoofdstukken (hoofdstuk 2 en 3, de inleiding en conclusie zitten in de nummering) schetsen de gemeenschappelijke basis. Gregory laat zien dat het idee van martelaarschap al voor het begin van de executies in het geloof en denken van vroegmoderne christenen aanwezig was.
Gregory bewijst eerst dat ketters werden geëxecuteerd omdat men dit ideologisch juist achtte. De overheid had immers de taak om de juiste godsdienst te handhaven. Vervolging was in het verleden effectief gebleken. Daarbij was niet doden, maar laten afzweren het uiteindelijke doel. Ook was er een theologische consensus ontstaan die executie een passend middel verklaarde. Wel waren lang niet alle overheden even actief in het vervolgen van ketters. Als vervolging vooral plaatsvond om hun gezag te laten gelden, is dat minder logisch dan bij het doel van afzweren.
Daarna gaat Gregory in op de stervensbereidheid. Sociale verklaringen kunnen niet afdoende verklaren waarom mensen in gelijke omstandigheden niet allemaal bereid waren om hun leven te geven. Men las Bijbelse passages waarin werd aangespoord tot volharding. Gelovigen bemoedigden elkaar ook. Tevens was er de kerkelijke traditie. Bovendien lieten contemporaine voorbeelden zien dat de weg niet onmogelijk was. Men had liever tijdelijk lijden en eeuwige vreugde dan andersom. Er was dus een eigen logica.
In het tweede deel gaat Gregory afzonderlijk in op protestanten, anabaptisten en katholieken. Hij laat in deze hoofdstukken zien dat elke traditie zijn eigen kenmerken had, maar dat in alledrie de tradities de leer een centrale rol speelde in de motivatie om te sterven én in de martyrologieën. Natuurlijk zorgde het voor verwarring dat er martelaren uit alle grote confessionele stromingen kwamen. In het laatste hoofdstuk laat Gregory zien dat er over de scheidslijnen heen een consensus groeide dat niet de volharding, maar de zaak waarvoor men stierf liet zien wie echte martelaren waren. Gregory concludeert dat het juist de religieuze overeenkomsten waren die de verschillen zo explosief maakten. Daarmee acht hij bewezen dat de leer bij executies, bereidheid om te sterven en de strijd rond martyrologieën een centrale rol speelden. Er is dus een religieuze lens nodig.
Gregory's betoog is zeer overtuigend. Hij laat duidelijk zien dat het vroegmoderne martelaarschap niet zonder het geloof en de geloofsleer te begrijpen is. Wel geeft hij met zijn pleidooi voor een eigen logica de indruk dat vroegmoderne christenen een soort funderingsdenkers waren. Ook had hij bij het hoofdstuk over protestants martelaarschap meer oog mogen hebben voor de eigen blokvorming onder lutheranen en calvinisten. Die leidde tot zware onderlinge veroordelingen die mogelijk relevant zijn voor de erkenning van elkaars martelaren. Dat zou een onderzoekje waard zijn.
Dat neemt niet weg dat dit wat mij betreft een heel sterk boek is. Zeker een aanrader!

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent (although a bit overzealous) correction to post-modern misperceptions of marytrdom. As irrational as martyrdom might appear to moderns, early modern Christians (Catholics, Protestants, and Anabaptists) saw martyrdom as a witness the Christ, and the consequences only further sharpened confessional lines.

[Eddie Gonzalez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Required reading for anyone looking at Christian martyrdom, and ought to be considered on the reading list for any Reformation or Christian History classes. This is a master work of history, and will definitely help you understand just how pivotal the martyrs, martyrdom, and the martyrologies were in the development of Christian history.