home Charms, amulets and talismans Renaissance and Reformation in Western Europe. Renaissance and reformation and their role in the development of Western European civilization

Renaissance and Reformation in Western Europe. Renaissance and reformation and their role in the development of Western European civilization

In the XV-XVI centuries. two phenomena in culture - the Renaissance and the Reformation - made a kind of revolution in the spiritual life of Western Europe. It would seem that there is little in common between them. The Renaissance is the revival of the ancient heritage, the secular beginning. The Reformation was a renewal of the church and was accompanied by a surge of deep religious feelings. Nevertheless, they are united by the fact that they destroyed the old medieval system of values and formed a new view of the human personality.

Renaissance: victories and tragedies of individualism

Renaissance culture originated in Italy in the second half of the 14th century. and continued to develop throughout the 15th and 16th centuries, gradually covering all the countries of Europe one after another. Contemporaries perceived this era as a "bright" age, as an awakening from the "darkness" of the Middle Ages. The very name "Middle Ages" appeared just then. Ancient Greece and Rome have become objects of passionate nostalgia and worship. The return to antiquity, the resuscitation of its ideals manifested itself in a variety of areas: in philosophy, literature, art. The culture of the Renaissance first appeared among intellectuals and was the property of a few, but gradually new ideas, albeit in a simplified form, seeped into the mass consciousness, changing traditional ideas. One of the most important achievements of the Renaissance is the emergence of humanism in philosophy. Early humanists: the poet and philosopher F. Petrarch (1304-1374), the writer G. Boccaccio (1313-1375) - wanted to create a beautiful human personality, free from the prejudices of the Middle Ages, and therefore, first of all, they tried to change the education system: to introduce into it humanities, focusing on the study ancient literature and philosophy. At the same time, the humanists by no means overthrew religion, although the church itself and its ministers were objects of ridicule. Rather, they sought to combine two scales of values. In his "Confession" Petrarch wrote that the ascetic morality of Christianity purifies the soul, but no less important is the awareness of the value of earthly existence, inherited from the Greeks and Romans.

Thus, the medieval opposition of flesh and spirit was eliminated. The rehabilitation of the earthly was manifested in that era, primarily in the exaltation of the beauty of the world and the human body, carnal love. Artists began to see the world differently: flat, as if incorporeal images of medieval art gave way to three-dimensional, relief, convex space. Rafael Santi (1483-1520), Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) sang with their creativity the perfect personality, in which physical and spiritual beauty merge together in accordance with the requirements of ancient aesthetics. A man with his earthly passions and desires also appeared in literature. The previously forbidden topic of carnal love, its naturalistic descriptions have gained the right to exist. However, the carnal did not suppress the spiritual. Like philosophers, writers tried to create a harmony of two principles, or at least to balance them. In Boccaccio's famous Decameron, mischievous frivolous stories about voluptuaries alternate with tragic tales of unrequited or selfless love. In the sonnets of Petrarch, dedicated to the beautiful Laura, earthly features are given to heavenly love, but earthly feelings are elevated to heavenly harmony. Drawing the ideal of the human personality, the figures of the Renaissance emphasized its kindness, strength, heroism, the ability to create and create around them. new world. The Italian humanists Lorenzo Balla (1407-1457) and L. Alberti (1404-1472) considered the accumulated knowledge that helps a person to make a choice between good and evil as an indispensable condition for this. The high idea of a person was inextricably linked with the idea of his free will: a person chooses his own life path and is responsible for his own destiny. The value of a person began to be determined by his personal merits, and not by his position in society.

The era of spontaneous and violent self-affirmation of the human personality was coming, freeing itself from medieval corporatism and morality, subordinating the individual to the whole. It was the time of titanism, which manifested itself both in art and in life. Suffice it to recall the heroic images created by Michelangelo and their creator himself - a poet, artist, sculptor. People like Michelangelo or Leonardo da Vinci were real examples of the limitless possibilities of man. However, titanism also had its downside, leading not only to good, but also to evil. The Renaissance was also famous for sinister, also titanic figures, such as Caesar Borgia or Lorenzo Medici. With Lorenzo Medici, a representative of a noble Florentine family, the flourishing of art in Florence in the 15th century was associated. However, this educated, refined patron of the beautiful, who seemed to embody the ideal of the personality of the era, did not neglect intrigues, and used poison and a dagger in the fight against opponents. The Pope's son, Caesar Borgia, was known for atrocious crimes. Spontaneous unbridled individualism had its costs. It gave rise to the problem of personal choice between good and evil. The burden of individual freedom gradually began to give rise to a tragic attitude to life, which was especially pronounced in the 16th century. - in the late Renaissance. It is no coincidence that in the plays of the great English playwright W. Shakespeare (1564-1616) a person is often depicted both heroically and tragically. Such is Hamlet, in which the titanism of the mind is combined with weakness, with a sense of one's limited capabilities in the face of the surrounding world, full of malice and passions. Another type of individualist appeared in his works - an egoist, striving for power and rising above morality (Macbeth). Otherwise, the question of individual freedom was decided by the Reformation.

The Reformation: The Limits of Individualism

Germany became the birthplace of the Reformation. Its beginning is considered the events of 1517, when the doctor of theology Martin Luther (1483-1546) spoke with his 95 theses against the sale of indulgences. From that moment began his long duel with catholic church. The Reformation quickly spread to Switzerland, the Netherlands, France, England, and Italy. In Germany, the Reformation was accompanied by the Peasants' War, which was on such a scale that no other social movement of the Middle Ages can compare with it. The Reformation found its new theorists in Switzerland, where its second largest center after Germany arose. There, John Calvin (1509-1564), who was nicknamed the "Pope of Geneva", finally formalized the reformation thought. The Reformation destroyed ideas about the unshakable spiritual power of the church, about its role as a mediator between God and people. It is not the sacraments of the church that bring a person to grace, but personal faith. The only authoritative source for a Christian is Scripture, not the decrees of the popes. Demanding to reform the church, M. Luther argued that it was necessary to secularize church property, dissolve monastic orders, and place schools and hospitals in monasteries. The slogan "cheap church" was very popular, but the main achievement of the Reformation was in the special role that was given to the individual in his individual communion with God. Deprived of the mediation of the church, a person now himself had to answer for his actions, that is, a much greater responsibility was assigned to him. The Reformation exalted the importance of worldly life and activity. Calvin taught that the sign of Divine favor towards a person is revealed in his practical activity: success or failure is a criterion that makes it possible to understand whether a curse or grace lies on a person. The work ethic of the Reformation sanctified practicality, entrepreneurship.

Both the Reformation and the Renaissance put the human personality at the center, energetic, striving to transform the world, with a pronounced strong-willed beginning. But the Reformation had a more disciplinary effect: it encouraged individualism, but introduced it into a strict framework of morality based on religious values. The Reformation had a huge impact on the mass consciousness of Europeans. In Europe, quickly embraced by the ideas of the Reformation, new, reformed churches began to form - Anglican, Lutheran, Calvinist, not subordinate to the Roman Catholic. Often, the assertion of new religious ideals entailed bloody civil-religious wars, such as the war between the Protestant princes and the Catholic camp led by the emperor of Germany, the war between the Catholics and the Huguenots (Calvinists) in France.

The culture of the Renaissance originated in the second half of the 14th century. And continued to develop throughout the XV
and the sixteenth centuries, gradually covering all the countries of Europe one after another. The emergence of Renaissance culture
was prepared by a number of pan-European and local historical conditions.
In the XIV - XV centuries. early capitalist, commodity-money relations were born. One of the first
Italy embarked on this path, which was largely facilitated by: a high level of urbanization,
subordination of the village to the city, a wide scope of handicraft production, financial affairs, oriented
not only to the domestic, but also to the foreign market.
The formation of a new culture was also prepared by public consciousness, changes in
sentiments of various social strata of the early bourgeoisie. Asceticism of church morality in the era of active
commercial, industrial and financial entrepreneurship was seriously at odds with real life
the practice of these social strata with their desire for worldly goods, hoarding, craving for wealth. IN
psychology of the merchants, the artisan elite, the features of rationalism, prudence,
courage in business endeavors, awareness of personal abilities and wide opportunities. took shape
morality justifying “honest enrichment”, the joys of worldly life, the crown of success of which was considered
prestige of the family, respect of fellow citizens, glory in the memory of descendants.
The term "Renaissance" (Renaissance) appeared in the 16th century. Considering the Middle Ages as a simple
break in the development of the cult. Giordano Vasari is also a painter and the first historiographer of Italian art,
the author of the famous "Biographies" of the most famous painters, sculptors and architects (1550) wrote about
"revival" of Italian art. This concept arose on the basis of the widespread at that time
historical concept, according to which the Middle Ages was a period of hopeless
barbarism and ignorance that followed the death of the brilliant civilization of classical ura, the historians of that
time it was believed that the art that once flourished in ancient world, first revived in their time to
new life. The term "Renaissance" originally meant not so much the name of the entire era as the most
the moment of the emergence of a new art, which was usually timed to coincide with the beginning of the 16th century. Only later
this concept received a broader meaning and began to denote an era when in Italy, and then in other countries
a culture opposed to feudalism was formed and flourished. Engels described the Renaissance as
"the greatest progressive upheaval ever experienced by mankind up to that time."
1. Culture of the Renaissance
XIII - XVI centuries were a time of great changes in the economy, political and cultural life
European countries. The rapid growth of cities and the development of crafts, and later the emergence of manufacturing
production, the rise of world trade, involving more and more remote areas in its orbit
gradual deployment of the main trade routes from the Mediterranean to the north, completed after the fall
Byzantium and the great geographical discoveries of the late 15th and early 16th centuries, transformed the appearance of the medieval
Europe. 2 Cities are now coming to the fore almost everywhere. Once mightiest forces
medieval world - the empire and the papacy experienced a deep crisis. disintegrated in the 16th century
The Holy Roman Empire of the German nation became the scene of the first two anti-feudal revolutions -
Great Peasants' War in Germany and the Dutch uprising. The transitional nature of the era,
the process of liberation from medieval fetters taking place in all areas of life, and at the same time
the underdevelopment of emerging capitalist relations could not but affect the characteristics
artistic culture and aesthetic thought of that time.
All changes in the life of society were accompanied by a broad renewal of culture with a flourishing
natural and exact sciences, literature in national languages and, in particular, fine arts.
Originating in the cities of Italy, this renewal then captured other European countries. Appearance
book printing has opened up unprecedented opportunities for the dissemination of literary and scientific
works, and more regular and closer communication between countries contributed to widespread
penetration of new artistic trends.
This does not mean that the Middle Ages retreated before new trends: in the mass consciousness
traditional ideas were preserved. The church resisted new ideas, using the medieval
the remedy is the inquisition. The idea of the freedom of the human person continued to exist in society,
divided into estates. The feudal form of dependence of the peasants did not completely disappear, and in some countries
(Germany, in Central Europe) there was a return to serfdom. The feudal system showed
sufficiently high resilience. Each European country lived it out in its own way and in its own
chronological framework. Capitalism for a long time existed as a way of life, covering only part of the production and
in the city and in the countryside. Nevertheless, patriarchal medieval slowness began to recede into the past.
The great geographical discoveries played a huge role in this breakthrough. In 1456 the Portuguese
the ships reached Cape Verde, and in 1486 the expedition of B. Diaz circled the African continent from the south,
passing the Cape of Good Hope. Mastering the coast of Africa, the Portuguese at the same time sent ships to
open ocean, to the west and southwest. As a result, previously unknown Azores appeared on the maps.
and Madeira Islands. In 1492, a great event happened - H. Columbus, an Italian who moved to Spain, in
crossed the Atlantic Ocean in search of a route to India and landed off the Bahamas, opening a new
continent - America. In 1498, the Spanish traveler Vasco da Gama, having circumnavigated Africa, successfully brought his
ships to the shores of India. From the 16th century Europeans penetrate into China and Japan, which they previously had only
the most embarrassing show. From 1510, the conquest of America begins. In the 17th century Australia was discovered. 3
The idea of the shape of the earth has changed: the round-the-world trip of the Portuguese F. Magellan (1519-
1522) confirmed the conjecture that it has the shape of a ball.
An analysis of the cultural monuments of the Renaissance indicates a departure from many of the most important principles
feudal worldview. Medieval asceticism and contempt for everything earthly are now replaced by greedy
interest in real world, to man, to the consciousness of the beauty and grandeur of nature. Indisputable in the Middle Ages
the primacy of theology over science is shaken by faith in the unlimited possibilities of the human mind,
which becomes the highest standard of truth. Emphasizing interest in the human as opposed to
divine, the representatives of the new secular intelligentsia called themselves humanists, producing this word
from the concept of "studia humanitanis" dating back to Cicero, meaning the study of everything connected with nature
man and his spiritual world. With all the complexity and ambiguity of the aesthetics of the revival as its
one of the basic principles can be identified absolutization of the human personality in its integrity. For
aesthetic treatises and works of art of the Renaissance is characterized by an idealized idea of
man as a unity of the rational and sensual, as a free being with boundless creative
opportunities. It is associated with anthropocentrism in the aesthetics of the Renaissance and the understanding of beauty,
sublime, heroic. The principle of a beautiful artistically creative human personality was combined in
Renaissance theorists with an attempt to mathematically calculate all kinds of proportions of symmetry
perspectives. The aesthetic and artistic thinking of this era is based for the first time on human
perception as such and on the sensually real picture of the world. It is also striking here subjectivistically
individualistic thirst for life sensations, regardless of their religious and moral
interpretation, although the latter, in principle, is not denied. Renaissance aesthetics focuses art on
imitation of nature. However, in the first place here is not so much nature as the artist, who in his
creative activity is likened to God. In the creator who is gradually freeing himself from church ideology
works of art are most valued for a sharp artistic look at things, professional
independence, special skills, and his creations acquire a self-sufficient, and not a sacred
character. One of the most important principles for the perception of works of art is enjoyment, which
testifies to a significant democratic trend as opposed to moralizing and scholastic
"scholarship" of previous aesthetic theories. The aesthetic thought of the Renaissance contains not only the idea
absolutization of the human individual as opposed to the supra-world divine personality in the Middle Ages, but also
a certain awareness of the limitations of such an individualism based on absolute
self-assertion of personality. Hence the motives of tragedy, found in the works of W. Shakespeare, M.
Cervantes, Michelangelo and others. This is the inconsistency of a culture that has departed from the antique - medieval
absolutes, but due to historical circumstances have not yet found new reliable foundations.
The connection between art and science is one of the most characteristic features of the culture of the Renaissance.
The truthful image of the world and man had to be based on their knowledge, therefore, cognitive
the beginning played a particularly important role in the art of that time. Naturally, artists sought support in the sciences,
often stimulating their development. The Renaissance is marked by the appearance of a whole galaxy of artists-scientists,
among which the first place belongs to Leonardo da Vinci.
Man's comprehension of the world filled with divine beauty becomes one of the
ideological tasks of the revivalists. The world attracts a person because he is spiritualized by God. But in the era
Renaissance there was another trend - a person's feeling of the tragedy of his existence. 4
The Russian philosopher N. Berdyaev believed that an unprecedented clash took place in the Renaissance
pagan and Christian principles of human nature. This is what caused the deep division.
person. 5
2. Figures of the Renaissance
Early humanists: poet philosopher F. Petrarch (1304-1374), writer J. Boccaccio (1313-1375) - wanted
to create a beautiful human personality, free from the prejudices of the Middle Ages, and therefore, before
most of all they tried to change the education system: to introduce the humanities into it, focusing on the study
ancient literature and philosophy. At the same time, the humanists by no means overthrew religion, although in itself
the church and its ministers were objects of ridicule. Rather, they sought to combine two scales of values.
In his Confession, Petrarch wrote that the ascetic morality of Christianity purifies the soul, but no less
important is the awareness of the value of earthly existence, inherited from the Greeks and Romans. Thus eliminated
medieval opposition of flesh and spirit. The rehabilitation of the earthly was manifested in that era primarily in
an apology for the beauty of the world and the human body, carnal love.
Artists began to see the world differently: planar, as if incorporeal images of the medieval
art gave way to three-dimensional, relief, convex space. Raphael Santi (1483-1520),
Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) sang with their creativity
perfect personality, in which physical and spiritual beauty merge into one in accordance with
requirements of ancient aesthetics. 6
A man with his earthly passions and desires also appeared in literature. Forbidden before the theme of carnal
love, naturalistic descriptions of it got the right to exist. However, the carnal did not suppress
spiritual. Like philosophers, writers tried to create a harmony of two principles, or at least their
balance. In Boccaccio's famous Decameron, mischievous frivolous stories about voluptuaries alternate with
tragic tales of unrequited or selfless love. In Petrarch's sonnets dedicated to
beautiful Laura, heavenly love is given earthly features, but earthly feelings are elevated to heavenly
harmony.
Drawing the ideal of the human personality, the figures of the Renaissance emphasized its kindness, strength, heroism,
the ability to create and create a new world around you. An indispensable condition for this Italian
humanists Lorenzo Valla (1407-1457) and L. Alberti (1404-1472) considered the accumulated knowledge that
help a person make a choice between good and evil. A high idea of a person was inextricably
connected with the idea of freedom of his will: a person chooses his life path and is responsible for his own destiny.
The value of a person began to be determined by his personal merits, and not by his position in society: “Nobility
- like a kind of radiance emanating from virtue and illuminating its owners, no matter what origin they are
were." The era of spontaneous and violent self-affirmation of the human personality, freeing itself from
medieval corporatism and morality, subordinating the individual to the whole. It was the time of titanism,
which manifested itself both in art and in life. Suffice it to recall the heroic images created by
Michelangelo, and their very creator poet, artist, sculptor. People like Michelangelo or
Leonardo da Vinci, were real examples of the limitless possibilities of man.
3. Reformation
Germany became the birthplace of the Reformation. Its beginning is considered the events of 1517, when the doctor of theology
Martin Luther (1483-1546) made his 95 theses against selling indulgences. From now on
began his long duel with the Catholic Church. The Reformation quickly spread to
Switzerland, the Netherlands, France, England, Italy. In Germany, the Reformation was accompanied by the Peasant
a war that was on such a scale that no social movement can compare with it
middle ages. The Reformation found its new theorists in Switzerland, where the second after Germany arose.
its largest centre. There, John Calvin (15091564) finally formalized the reformation thought.
nicknamed the "Pope of Geneva".
Ultimately, the Reformation gave rise to a new direction in Christianity, which became spiritual
basis Western civilization- Protestantism. Part of the population of Europe departed from Catholicism: England,
Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Holland, Finland, Switzerland, part of Germany, Czech Republic, etc. Yes and in
Catholicism itself underwent significant changes. 7
Protestantism freed people from the pressure of religion in practical life. Religion has become personal
man's work. religious consciousness replaced by a secular worldview. Religious ritual
simplified. But the main achievement of the Reformation was in the special role that was given to the personality in its
individual communion with God. Deprived of the mediation of the Church, man himself now had to answer
for their actions, i.e. he had a much greater responsibility. The Reformation raised the importance
worldly life and activity, preaching the possibility of communion with God through
way society.
Calvin taught that the sign of divine favor towards a person is revealed in his practical
activities: success or failure - a criterion that allows you to understand whether a curse or gratitude lies on
man. The work ethic of the Reformation illuminated practicality, entrepreneurship, which was most
appropriate to the Western way of life. “The result of the reformation ... was, first of all, that, in contrast to
the Catholic point of view, the moral significance of worldly professional work and the religious reward for
have grown tremendously.”
Different historians solve the question of the relationship between the Renaissance and the Reformation in different ways. AND
The Reformation and the Renaissance put the human personality at the center, energetic, striving for
transformation of the world, with a pronounced strong-willed beginning. But the Reformation had more
disciplinary influence: she encouraged individualism, but introduced it into a strict framework of morality,
based on religious values.
There are other differences as well. So S. B. Skazkin believes that humanism and the Renaissance express life in
in all its diversity, for the class basis of the humanistic intelligentsia is different. Moreover, humanism
far from always hostile to the church (the famous Erasmus: Socrates, pray for us!). 8 The Reformation in its
based on the bourgeois phenomenon. It is caused by the emergence and development of the bourgeoisie, which opposes
feudalism and its illumination by the church. The bourgeoisie at this stage of its development is still too weak to
independently act or organize the movement of the entire “third estate”. She only fights against
specific form of feudal exploitation, but not against feudal exploitation in general. feudal
the absolute state for it is not yet a passed stage, but, on the contrary, a progressive form
political organization. The passed stage for it is only the feudal form of religion in the form
Catholic Church, and only against Catholic religiosity and the Catholic religious organization does it
is revolutionary.
S. M. Stam asserts the opposition of the two ideological systems from somewhat different positions. He is not
denies the obvious fact that both were opponents of medieval scholasticism and spiritual
dictatorship of the Catholic Church. Luther and Calvin recognized a certain value of earthly life and
practical activity, the usefulness of some secular knowledge. Can't be denied
individualistic tendency: recognition of the right of one's own decision, and therefore - the mind and will of a person
(Calvinist idea of divine election and the obligation of everyone to show maximum energy in
his "calling"). 9
This is where the similarities end and opposites begin: Christianity sought to
to limit human curiosity, while humanism tried in every possible way to develop it. Humanists
were convinced of the omnipotence of the human mind, on the contrary, the reformers were inspired by the idea
omnipotence of faith. “Let no one think,” wrote Luther, “that he can comprehend faith by reason…. What
says Christ, is the truth, whether I or any other person can understand it.”
Humanists hated asceticism, which is the core of religious morality. Human can
achieve perfection, not by virtue of redemption and special divine grace, but by one's own mind and
will, aimed at the maximum disclosure of all their natural abilities.
On the contrary, Luther proceeded from "the fundamental and general depravity of human nature." Earn
God's grace a person can only repentance, self-abasement and self-trampling before God,
suppression of their own desires and aspirations.
Finally, the dominant idea of Renaissance humanism was the idea of a person whose high dignity
was determined not by nobility of origin, not by titles or wealth, but only by personal prowess,
nobility in deeds and thoughts. The new understanding of man objectively opposed the feudal
class discrimination as a program of human equality. Hence, the humanism of the Renaissance is an ideology
early bourgeois, i.e. anti-feudal, folk. On the contrary, the proximity of the Church Reformation ideology to
to the masses, and even more so, its revolutionary nature seems to S. M. Stam to be very relative. Speaking of freedom
As a Christian, Luther has in mind only spiritual, and by no means worldly freedom.
Conclusion
The ideas of humanism are the spiritual basis for the flourishing of Renaissance art. Renaissance Art
imbued with the ideals of humanism, it created the image of a beautiful, harmoniously developed person. Italian
humanists demanded freedom for man. “But freedom is in the understanding of the Italian Renaissance,” he wrote
expert A. K. Dzhivelegov, - meant a separate person. Humanism proved that a person in his feelings,
in his thoughts, in his beliefs, he is not subject to any guardianship, that over him there should not be willpower,
preventing him from feeling and thinking as he pleases. IN modern science there is no unambiguous understanding of the nature,
structure and chronological framework of Renaissance humanism. But of course, humanism should be considered
as the main ideological content of the Renaissance culture, inseparable from the entire course of historical development
Italy in the era of the beginning of the decomposition of feudal and the emergence of capitalist relations. Humanism
was a progressive ideological movement that contributed to the establishment of the means of culture, relying
primarily on the ancient heritage. Italian humanism went through a number of stages: formation in the XIV century, bright
the heyday of the next century, internal restructuring and gradual decline in the 16th century. Evolution
Italian Renaissance was closely connected with the development of philosophy, political ideology, science, and other
forms public consciousness and, in turn, had a powerful impact on artistic culture
Renaissance.
Humanities revived on an ancient basis, including ethics, rhetoric, philology,
history, turned out to be the main area in the formation and development of humanism, the ideological core of which was
the doctrine of man, his place and role in nature and society. This doctrine developed mainly in ethics and
enriched in various areas of the Renaissance culture. Humanistic ethics put forward for the first
plan the problem of the earthly destiny of man, the achievement of happiness by his own efforts. Humanists
approached issues of social ethics in a new way, in the solution of which they relied on ideas about the power
creative abilities and will of a person, about his wide possibilities of building happiness on earth. Important
they considered the harmony of the interests of the individual and society as a prerequisite for success, put forward the ideal of a free
personal development and the inextricably linked improvement of the social organism and political
orders. This gave many ethical ideas and teachings of the Italian humanists a pronounced
character.
Many problems developed in humanistic ethics acquire a new meaning and special
relevance in our era, when moral incentives human activity perform more and more
important social function.
The humanistic worldview has become one of the biggest progressive conquests of the era
Renaissance, which had a strong influence on all subsequent development European culture.
The Reformation played an important role in the formation of world civilization. without proclaiming any
a certain socio-political ideal, without requiring the reorganization of society in one direction or another, not
making no scientific discoveries or achievements in the artistic and aesthetic field, the Reformation
changed the consciousness of a person, opened up new spiritual horizons for him. Man got freedom
to think independently, freed himself from the guardianship of the church, received the highest sanction for him -
religious to ensure that only his own mind and conscience dictate to him how to live.
The Reformation contributed to the emergence of a man of bourgeois society - an independent autonomous
an individual with freedom of moral choice, independent and responsible in his judgments and
deeds.

PROTESTANTISM

The Reformation gave rise to the third, after Orthodoxy and Catholicism, a branch of Christianity - Protestantism. This is a collection of independent and diverse religions, churches, differing from each other in dogmatic and canonical features. Protestants do not recognize Catholic purgatory, they reject Orthodox and Catholic saints, angels, the Virgin; the Christian triune god occupies a completely monopoly position among them. The main difference between Protestantism and Catholicism and Orthodoxy is the doctrine of the direct connection between God and man. According to the Protestants, grace comes to a person from God, bypassing the church, "salvation" is achieved only through the personal faith of a person and the will of God. This doctrine undermined the dominance of spiritual power over the secular and the dominant role of the church and the pope, freed a person from feudal oppression and awakened in him a sense of dignity. In connection with a different attitude of man to God, not only the clergy and the church, but also the religious cult in Protestantism is given a secondary place. There is no worship of relics and icons, the number of sacraments is reduced to two (baptism and communion), worship, as a rule, consists of sermons, joint prayers and singing of psalms. Formally, Protestantism is based on the Bible, but in fact every Protestant religion has its own creeds, authorities, "sacred" books. Modern Protestantism is spread mainly in the Scandinavian countries, Germany, Switzerland, England and the USA, Canada, Australia, etc.

MARTIN LUTHER

The reform movement in the person of Martin Luther (1483 - 1546) had its outstanding representative. This German reformer, the founder of German Protestantism, who was influenced by the mystic and the teachings of Jan Hus, was not a philosopher and thinker. The reformer's parents came from Thuringian tax-paying peasants. In 1537, in one of his "table speeches," Luther spoke of his childhood and adolescence as follows: "My parents kept me in strictness, amounting to intimidation. For a single nut, which I somehow coveted, my mother whipped me to the point of blood. With this harsh treatment, they ultimately pushed me into the monastery. Although they sincerely believed that they were doing me well, I was intimidated by them to the point of timidity. “In my opinion,” writes E.Yu. Solovyov, - Luther's decision to go to a monastery can be considered as the ultimate expression of that disappointment in the possibilities of practical success, which was generally characteristic of the entrepreneurial-burgher class, thrown into a situation of mercantile-feudal robbery, devoid of any religious and moral support. At the same time, this decision also contains an element of unbroken burgher pride: the desire to achieve one's own on the path of ascetic practicality "approved by God." In July 1505, Luther retired to an Augustinian monastery, famous for its strict rites. However, the result of his various ascetic efforts was deplorable. No matter what Luther did, the consciousness of God-forsakenness did not leave him. In 1512, Luther again suffered an attack of melancholy (it should be noted that at the age of 29 Luther became a doctor of theology and a subprior of the Wittenberg Augustinian convention, these were church-approved successes at that time), and he retired to a cell where he began to work on compiling commentaries on the Latin text of the Psalms. Unexpectedly for himself, he discovered a new meaning for long-known texts, which led to a "revolution" in Luther's mind of understanding the problem of justification and salvation. “Luther realized himself directly involved in God through that very judging ability of conscience, which just testified to his God-forsakenness.” After Luther begins to realize that the development of additional "Christian merits" in the monastery is an empty business. And already in 1515-1516, he questions the foundations of monastic - ascetic piety. The beginning of the reform movement was the event that took place in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517, when Luther promulgated his historic 95 Theses against the sale of indulgences. At that time, there was a saying: "All sins are forgiven by the Church, except for one - the lack of money." The main motive of the "Theses" is the motive of internal repentance and contrition, opposed to any kind of external activity, any deeds, exploits and merits.

The central thought of the Theses is as follows: the idea of expiatory donations is profoundly alien to the Gospel of Christ; the god of the gospel does not require anything from a person who has sinned, except sincere repentance for what he has done. The main idea of the "Theses" - only repentance to God - prompted the believer to the idea that all church-feudal property is an illegal and forcibly acquired property. The denunciation of the hidden impiety of the church, led by the pope, before God brought to the side of Luther all those dissatisfied with the rule of corrupt Rome. Luther does not recognize mediators between God and man; he rejects the church hierarchy along with the pope. He rejected the division of society into laity and priests, since there is not a word about this in Scripture. Luther wrote his first theological works in 1515-1516. In his publications "Explanation to the dispute ...", "Conversation about forgiveness and mercy", etc., he explained the meaning of his "Theses". Since 1518, Rome launched an inquisitorial process against Luther, he was excommunicated from the church. Luther rejected most of the sacraments, saints and angels, the cult of the Virgin, the worship of icons and holy relics. All the ways of salvation are only in the personal faith of a person. Asserting the indisputability of the authority of Scripture, Luther insisted on the right of every believer to have his own understanding of faith and morality, on freedom of conscience, he himself translated it into German. Already in 1519, Luther abandoned the medieval notion of the text of Scripture as a mysterious cipher that could not be understood without knowledge of the established church interpretation. The Bible is open to everyone, and no interpretation of it can be recognized as heretical unless it is refuted by obvious reasonable arguments.

In August - November 1520, Luther's publications were published, which constituted a kind of reformist theology: "To the Christian nobility of the German nation ...", "On the Babylonian captivity of the church" and "On the freedom of a Christian." They outlined a program for a radical transformation of the church organization and "found formulas for a complete moral and religious disengagement from the papacy." Luther declares war on ecclesiastical-feudal centralism. 15-16 centuries - the time of the crisis of scholasticism and the growing dissatisfaction with it on the part of humanists and pioneers of natural science. Luther declared his attitude to scholasticism in the summer of 1517 and touches on this topic in his programmatic essay The Heidelberg Disputation (1518). God, in his understanding, is defined as an unknowable thing, absolutely transcendent in relation to the ability to rationally comprehend the world. Any attempt to investigate what God is, or at least prove that he exists, the reformer considers futile and false. God is only known to man insofar as he himself desired to reveal himself to him through the Scriptures. What is understood in Scripture must be understood; what is not clear should be taken on faith, remembering that one hundred God is not deceitful. Faith and understanding are the only ways in which a person can relate to the creator. Luther tore faith from reason, but at the same time rejected the superintelligent, extraordinary abilities that ensure merging with the deity. As mentioned earlier, in Luther, the knowledge of God, as he is in and for himself, has received the meaning of an absolutely impossible task, and the use of reason to solve it is an irrational (seductive) action. The reformer insisted on the categorical irreconcilability of faith to reason, which justifies faith, and on the categorical irreconcilability of reason to faith, which tries to orient reason in its worldly research. The area where the mind is competent - the world and the mundane - that which the existing common religious consciousness meant as this-worldly (as opposed to the other-worldly) and as created, temporal, conditioned as opposed to the creative, eternal, absolute. The mind must deal with what is below us, not above us. For Luther, God is rather the impersonal motionless mover of Aristotle or the ruler of the Jews, but not the crucified Christ. However, the attitude towards Aristotle as a symbol of scholasticism is expressed in the main slogan of the university reform proposed by Luther - "The fight against Aristotelianism." In 1520-1522 it was in fact carried out in Wittenberg with the active participation of Luther. Aristotelian physics, psychology and metaphysics were excluded from the university course. Logic and rhetoric were preserved for those preparing for a master's degree. The reformer hoped that by excommunicating scholasticism from the universities, he would make them the center of the unrestricted study of the liberal arts, the practically useful sciences, and the new theology. However, by the end of the 1920s, it became clear that scholasticism was reborn and continued to grow. Luther's later writings, in particular his extensive "Interpretation of the First Book of Moses" (1534-1545), "are imbued with a bitter consciousness of the "indestructibility" of the scholastic style of thinking." anti-Copernican", because he did not even know the name of Copernicus, nor his teachings. Luther's reform, despite its relatively progressive features, had a class and historical character. In essence, it expressed the interests of the princes and the urban wealthy patriciate, but not the interests of the broad masses. This world is a vale of sin and suffering, salvation from which must be sought in God. The state is an instrument of the earthly world, and therefore it is marked by sin. Worldly injustice cannot be eradicated, it can only be tolerated and acknowledged, obeyed. Christians must submit to authority, not rebel against it. Luther's views supported interests requiring a strong state power. According to Karl Marx, Luther defeated slavery out of piety only by putting slavery out of conviction in its place. Martin Luther is a controversial spokesman for a turning point. The reformer manages to move forward, to the new time, even in his earliest writings. Criticism of all instances of church authority; understanding of freedom of conscience as an inalienable personal right; recognition of the independent significance of state - political relations; defense of the idea of universal education; upholding the moral significance of labor; religious consecration of business enterprise - such are the principles of Luther's teaching, which brought him closer to the early bourgeois ideology and culture. A successful continuation of the Lutheran undertakings was the Swiss Reformation by Ulrich Zwingli and John Calvin.

JEAN CALVIN

After the decline of the first wave of the Reformation (1531), a second wave rises, associated with the personality of the French theologian John Calvin (1509-1564), who spent most of his life in Switzerland. The hero of his early writings (like that of Luther) is a man disproportionate to the creator, but at the same time endowed with a sublime divine consciousness of his disproportion. Nothingness is interpreted as a quality inherent in only one divine perfection. It is absolutely unlawful for some people to look at others from a divine height, only people are equal before God. Calvin, influenced by the ideas of Luther, renounced the Catholic Church and joined the Protestant movement. In Switzerland, he wrote his main treatise "Instructions in the Christian Faith", his dogmas expressed the interests of the most daring part of the then bourgeoisie. Calvin did not put forward fundamentally new ideas, but systematized the ideas of Luther and Zwingli. Calvinism, however, further simplified the Christian cult and worship, giving the church a democratic character (the elective leadership of the church by the laity), separated it from the state, although it left it an independent political system. Calvin is on the same positions as Luther, i.e. earthly life- this is the path to salvation, in this life one must endure, etc. However, he emphasizes the great possibility of the active inclusion of a Christian in earthly affairs. Initiation to secular goods is associated with the possession of property and its multiplication; only moderate use of wealth is necessary in accordance with God's will. For Calvin, democracy is not The best way board, he considered the most successful political system oligarchy, in extreme cases - a moderate democracy. Since 1536, Calvin settled in Geneva, where in 1541 he became the de facto dictator of the city, seeking to submit to the secular power of the church. The basis of Calvinism is the doctrine of divine predestination. Calvin simplified and strengthened this teaching, bringing it to absolute fatalism: some people are predestined by God to salvation and heavenly bliss even before birth, while others are predestined to death and eternal torment, and no actions of a person, nor his faith is able to correct this. A person is saved not because he believes, but because he is predestined for salvation. Divine predestination is hidden from people, and therefore every Christian must live his life as if he were predestined to salvation. Calvin preached limiting one's vital needs, renunciation of earthly pleasures, thrift, constant hard work and the improvement of professional skills. Success in professional activity is a sign of being chosen by God, the profession acts as a vocation, a place of service to God, therefore professional success is a value in itself, and not a means of achieving wealth. Criticism of luxury and idleness turned into a denial of artistic creativity, literature and art, into a ban on all amusements and entertainment. Calvin reduced the freedom of conscience and interpretation of the Bible proclaimed by the Reformation to freedom from Catholicism, not allowing criticism of his teaching.

THOMAS MUNZER

As in the Middle Ages, theological rationalism during the Reformation was influenced by religious mystical teachings. The Reformation is generally connected with medieval mysticism, adopted its elements and adapted it to its own doctrine of an inner, individual relationship to God. With the most radical presentation of mysticism, we meet in the teachings of the leader of the popular revolution in Germany, Thomas Müntzer (1490-1525), a church preacher, the ideologist of the peasant-plebeian camp of the Reformation. He moved away from the petty-bourgeois limited Lutheranism, criticizing it for the fact that it deals only with questions of individual salvation and leaves the earthly order, which is considered inviolable, without attention. Müntzer saw the Reformation not so much in the renewal of the church and its teachings, but in the accomplishment of a socio-economic revolution by the forces of the peasants and the urban poor. Religious - philosophical views Müntzer are based on the idea of the need to establish such a "God's power" on earth that would bring social equality. He, as a supporter of the idea of egalitarian communism, demanded the immediate establishment of the “kingdom of God” on earth, by which he understood nothing more than a social system in which there would no longer be any class differences, no private property, no state power. Power can be considered legitimate only when it is exercised on behalf of the masses and in their interests. According to Müntzer, God is omnipresent in all of his creations. It manifests itself, however, not as a given, but as a process that opens up to those who carry within themselves God's will. Christ is not a historical figure, but is incarnated and revealed in faith. And only in faith, without an official church, can his role as a redeemer be fulfilled. Müntzer's political program is close to utopian communism; it necessarily led to a complete divergence from Luther's petty-bourgeois reformation. Luther and Müntzer expressed different class interests, one of the burghers and princes, the other of the peasant and plebeian masses.

THE MYSTICAL TEACHINGS OF JACOB BOHME

Jacob Boehme (1575-1624) comes from a poor peasant family in Saxony, was a shoemaker. Brought up in Lutheranism, the Holy Scriptures were the source of his philosophizing. Boehme's philosophy differs from the main direction of philosophical and scientific thinking of that time: they belong neither to scholasticism, nor to the humanism and naturalism of modern times. Of his works, the most interesting are Aurora, or Dawn in Ascent, On the Three Principles, and On the Threefold Life of Man. According to Boehme, God is the highest unity, but this unity cannot be known in itself, it is inaccessible not only human knowledge but even God cannot know himself. The idea that the "self-discovery" of God is possible only through his transformation into nature is presented by Boehme in the terminology of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. The thesis about the direct existence of God in things, in nature and in man is the central idea of Boehme's philosophical and theological system. Nature is closed in God as the highest and active first principle. God is not only in nature, but also above it. Man is both a “microcosm” and a “little god”, in which everything worldly and divine takes place in all its complex inconsistency. It acts as a unity of the divine and natural, corporal and spiritual, evil and good. Boehme's mysticism finds its successors in the mystical currents of the 17th and 18th centuries, and his dialectics in German classical philosophy Schelling and Hegel.

COUNTER-REFORMATION

The Protestant Reformation resonated with Catholicism. Since the 40s of the 16th century, Catholics have been fighting to regain lost positions; in Western Europe begins the period of the counter-reformation. The participants in the movement sharply raise the question of strengthening unity in the very organization of the Catholic Church, of strengthening internal discipline and papal centralization, but the main thing was the open struggle of Catholicism against Protestantism. The order - "The Society of Jesus" (Jesuits) - founded by the Spaniard Ignatius of Loyola in 1534 and approved by the pope in 1540, became the advanced combat detachment of Catholics. The Jesuits formed the core of the Inquisition, reorganized to fight the Reformation. The Inquisition arose as a manifestation and consequence of the crisis of church authority and ideology: it was necessary to bring church ideology into line with the new social situation and the new ideological currents of the era. The Council of Trent (1545-1563), however, evaded the decision philosophical problems and disputes between schools, not wanting to break the unity of the church. During this period, there is a new revival of scholastic philosophy in the form of Thomism. First it was in Italy, then in Spain, initially the Dominicans played the main role, then the Jesuits. Highest value for attempts to restore medieval scholasticism in this era had the teachings of the Spanish Jesuit Francis Suarez (1548-1617).

Introduction ................................................ ...

Reformation and Renaissance ..............................................

Protestantism ........................................................

Martin Luther ...............................................

John Calvin ...............................................

Thomas Münzer ..................................................

The mystical teachings of Jacob Boehme ..................................

Counter-Reformation ...............................................

Conclusion.................................................

Literature...............................................

Introduction

Revival (Renaissance) is defined as a historical process of ideological and cultural development on the eve of the early bourgeois revolutions. Its elements begin to appear in the late phase of feudalism and are due to the beginning disintegration of the feudal system. The whole process lasts until the early bourgeois revolutions.

The last chronological period of the Renaissance is the era of the Reformation, completing this greatest progressive upheaval in the development of European culture. Usually, the historical significance of the Renaissance is associated with the ideas and artistic achievements of humanism, which proclaimed, in contrast to medieval Christian asceticism, the greatness and dignity of man. His right to rational activity, to enjoyment and happiness in earthly life. Humanists saw in man the most beautiful and perfect creation of God. They extended to man the creation, creative abilities inherent in God, saw his destiny in the knowledge and transformation of the world, adorned with his labor, in the development of sciences and crafts.

And this deified man of the humanists was opposed by the reformists with the idea of the complete insignificance of man before God, and their optimistic and cheerful worldview with the harsh spirit of voluntary self-restraint and self-discipline. They experience contempt for “thinking” and absolute trust in religion, reaching the point of obscurantism and hatred of science.

The Reformation is a broad religious and socio-political movement that began in the early 16th century in Germany and aimed at transforming Christian religion. Starting in Germany, the Reformation swept a number of European countries and led to the falling away from the Catholic Church of England, Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands, Finland, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and partly Germany.

The term "Reformation" expresses that essential side of the movement, the center of which is criticism and attack on the monopoly position of the Catholic papal church and its teaching in the political, ideological system of the then European society. F. Engels defined the revolutionary

the course of the reform movement as the first decisive battle of European philistinism against feudalism. This characteristic was related to the German Peasants' War, but similar revolutionary features are contained in every anti-feudal oriented reform movement, because it reflects the liberation interests of the advancing philistinism, the emerging bourgeois class.

Reformation and Renaissance

The process of overcoming medieval scholasticism, in principle, was carried out in two ways: on the one hand, through the Renaissance, and on the other, through the European Reformation. Both currents differ from each other in the ways of criticizing medieval scholasticism, however, both of them express the need to destroy medieval philosophy and ideology, act as a manifestation of its crisis, and form the prerequisites for creating the foundations of the philosophy of the new time. The currents have a common historical basis - both gradually "ripen" in the depths of feudalism with its natural production.

The improvement of labor tools and specialization led to the emergence of many settlements and cities, which quickly grew and developed, gradually freed from the oppression of the feudal lords, and became independent. The need for the development of productive forces gives impetus to the experimental knowledge of nature, and the need for the free labor of an independent worker gives rise to new ideas about man, his freedom and dignity.

The humanism of the Renaissance became a universal expression of these needs, but culture, sciences, teachings were accessible to a narrow circle of people and could not contribute to the victory of the new system.

The spiritual life of that time was determined by religion. Then why was the church unable to rebuff the challenge of the times. Why didn't you oppose Protestantism? Because the Protestants gave an easy and accessible answer to the challenge of history: the Catholic Church must be rejected because it is immoral, and therefore godless!

The Catholic Church, having power over Western Europe and untold riches, found itself in a sad situation. Originating as a movement of the downtrodden and enslaved, the poor and persecuted, Christianity became dominant in the Middle Ages. The undivided dominance of the Catholic Church in all spheres of life eventually led to its internal rebirth and decay. Denunciations, intrigues, burning at the stake, etc. were done in the name of the teacher of love and mercy - Christ! By preaching humility and temperance, the church grew obscenely rich. She profited from everything. The highest ranks of the Catholic Church lived in unheard of luxury, indulged in rampant noisy secular life, very far from the Christian ideal.

A number of elements that anticipated the reform of the church were already contained in the speeches of Renaissance thinkers. Therefore, the Reformation and the Renaissance are inseparable from each other.

Protestantism

The Reformation gave rise to the third, after Orthodoxy and Catholicism, a branch of Christianity - Protestantism . This is a collection of independent and diverse religions, churches, differing from each other in dogmatic and canonical features. Protestants do not recognize Catholic purgatory, they reject Orthodox and Catholic saints, angels, the Virgin; the Christian triune god occupies a completely monopoly position among them.

The main difference between Protestantism and Catholicism and Orthodoxy is the doctrine of the direct connection between God and man. According to the Protestants, grace comes to a person from God, bypassing the church, "salvation" is achieved only through the personal faith of a person and the will of God. This doctrine undermined the dominance of spiritual power over the secular and the dominant role of the church and the pope, freed a person from feudal oppression and awakened in him a sense of dignity.

In connection with a different attitude of man to God, not only the clergy and the church, but also the religious cult in Protestantism is given a secondary place. There is no worship of relics and icons, the number of sacraments is reduced to two (baptism and communion), worship, as a rule, consists of sermons, joint prayers and singing of psalms. Formally, Protestantism is based on the Bible, but in fact every Protestant religion has its own creeds, authorities, "sacred" books.

Modern Protestantism is spread mainly in the Scandinavian countries, Germany, Switzerland, England and the USA, Canada, Australia, etc.

Martin Luther

The reformer's parents came from Thuringian tax-paying peasants. In 1537, in one of his "table speeches," Luther spoke of his childhood and adolescence as follows: "My parents kept me in strictness, amounting to intimidation. For a single nut, which I somehow coveted, my mother whipped me to the point of blood. With this harsh treatment, they ultimately pushed me into the monastery. Although they sincerely believed that they were doing me well, I was intimidated by them to the point of timidity.

“In my opinion,” writes E.Yu. Solovyov, - Luther's decision to go to a monastery can be considered as the ultimate expression of that disappointment in the possibilities of practical success, which was generally characteristic of the entrepreneurial-burgher class, thrown into a situation of mercantile-feudal robbery, devoid of any religious and moral support. At the same time, this decision also contains an element of unbroken burgher pride: the desire to achieve one's own on the path of ascetic practicality "approved by God" .

In July 1505, Luther retired to an Augustinian monastery, famous for its strict rites. However, the result of his various ascetic efforts was deplorable. . No matter what Luther did, the consciousness of God-forsakenness did not leave him. In 1512, Luther again suffered an attack of melancholy (it should be noted that at the age of 29 Luther became a doctor of theology and a subprior of the Wittenberg Augustinian convention, these were churchly approved successes at that time), and he retired to a cell, where he began to work on compiling commentaries on Latin text of the Psalms. Unexpectedly for himself, he discovered a new meaning for long-known texts, which led to a "revolution" in Luther's mind of understanding the problem of justification and salvation. “Luther realized himself directly involved in God through that very judging ability of conscience, which just testified to his God-forsakenness.”

After Luther begins to realize that the development of additional "Christian merits" in the monastery is an empty business. And already in 1515-1516, he questions the foundations of monastic - ascetic piety.

The beginning of the reform movement was an event that took place in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517, when Luther made public his historical 95 Abstracts directed against the sale of indulgences. At that time, there was a saying: "All sins are forgiven by the Church, except for one - the lack of money." The main motive of the "Theses" is the motive of internal repentance and contrition, opposed to any kind of external activity, any deeds, exploits and merits. The central thought of the Theses is as follows: the idea of expiatory donations is profoundly alien to the Gospel of Christ; the god of the gospel does not require anything from a person who has sinned, except sincere repentance for what he has done. The main idea of the "Theses" - only repentance for God - prompted the believer to the idea that all church-feudal property is an illegal and forcibly acquired property.

The denunciation of the hidden impiety of the church, led by the pope, before God brought to the side of Luther all those dissatisfied with the rule of corrupt Rome. Luther does not recognize mediators between God and man; he rejects the church hierarchy along with the pope. He rejected the division of society into laity and priests, since there is not a word about this in Scripture.

Luther wrote his first theological works in 1515-1516. In his publications "Explanation to the dispute ...", "Conversation about forgiveness and mercy", etc., he explained the meaning of his "Theses".

Since 1518, Rome launched an inquisitorial process against Luther, he was excommunicated from the church.

Luther rejected most of the sacraments, saints and angels, the cult of the Virgin, the worship of icons and holy relics. All the ways of salvation are only in the personal faith of a person. Asserting the indisputability of the authority of Scripture, Luther insisted on the right of every believer to have his own understanding of faith and morality, on freedom of conscience, he himself translated it into German. Already in 1519, Luther abandoned the medieval notion of the text of Scripture as a mysterious cipher that could not be understood without knowledge of the established church interpretation. The Bible is open to everyone, and no interpretation of it can be recognized as heretical unless it is refuted by obvious reasonable arguments.

15-16 centuries - the time of the crisis of scholasticism and the growing dissatisfaction with it on the part of humanists and pioneers of natural science. Luther declared his attitude to scholasticism in the summer of 1517 and touches on this topic in his programmatic essay The Heidelberg Disputation (1518).

God, in his understanding, is defined as an unknowable thing, absolutely transcendent in relation to the ability to rationally comprehend the world. Any attempt to explore what is god or at least to prove that it exists, the reformer considers vain and false. God is only known to man insofar as he himself desired to reveal himself to him through the Scriptures. What is understood in Scripture must be understood; what is not clear should be taken on faith, remembering that one hundred God is not deceitful. Faith and understanding are the only ways in which a person can relate to the creator.

Luther tore faith from reason, but at the same time rejected the superintelligent, extraordinary abilities that ensure merging with the deity. As mentioned earlier, in Luther, the knowledge of God, as he is in and for himself, has received the meaning of an absolutely impossible task, and the use of reason to solve it is an irrational (seductive) action. The reformer insisted on the categorical irreconcilability of faith to reason, which justifies faith, and on the categorical irreconcilability of reason to faith, which tries to orient reason in its worldly research. The area where the mind is competent - the world and the mundane - that which the existing common religious consciousness meant as this-worldly (as opposed to the other-worldly) and as created, temporal, conditioned as opposed to the creative, eternal, absolute. The mind must deal with what is below us, not above us. For Luther, God is rather the impersonal motionless mover of Aristotle or the ruler of the Jews, but not the crucified Christ.

However, the attitude towards Aristotle as a symbol of scholasticism is expressed in the main slogan of the university reform proposed by Luther - "The fight against Aristotelianism." In 1520-1522 it was in fact carried out in Wittenberg with the active participation of Luther. Aristotelian physics, psychology and metaphysics were excluded from the university course. Logic and rhetoric were preserved for those preparing for a master's degree. The reformer hoped that by excommunicating scholasticism from the universities, he would make them the center of the unrestricted study of the liberal arts, the practically useful sciences, and the new theology. However, by the end of the 1920s, it became clear that scholasticism was reborn and continued to grow. Luther's later writings, in particular his extensive Commentary on the First Book of Moses (1534-1545), "are permeated with a bitter consciousness of the 'indestructibility' of the scholastic style of thought."

Luther resolutely rejected astrology, did not recognize the heliocentric hypothesis, however, there is no reason to consider him an "anti-Copernican", since he did not even know either the name of Copernicus or his teachings.

Luther's reform, despite its relatively progressive features, had a class and historical character. In essence, it expressed the interests of the princes and the wealthy patriciate of the city, but not the interests of the broad masses. This world is a vale of sin and suffering, salvation from which must be sought in God. The state is an instrument of the earthly world, and therefore it is marked by sin. Worldly injustice cannot be eradicated, it can only be tolerated and acknowledged, obeyed. Christians must submit to authority, not rebel against it. Luther's views supported interests requiring a strong state power. According to Karl Marx, Luther defeated slavery out of piety only by putting slavery out of conviction in its place.

Martin Luther is a controversial spokesman for a turning point. The reformer manages to move forward, to the new time, even in his earliest writings.

Criticism of all instances of church authority; understanding of freedom of conscience as an inalienable personal right; recognition of the independent significance of state - political relations; defense of the idea of universal education; upholding the moral significance of labor; religious consecration of business enterprise - such are the principles of Luther's teaching, which brought him closer to the early bourgeois ideology and culture.

A successful continuation of the Lutheran undertakings was the Swiss Reformation by Ulrich Zwingli and John Calvin.

Jean Calvin

The hero of his early writings (like that of Luther) is a man disproportionate to the creator, but at the same time endowed with a sublime divine consciousness of his disproportion. Nothingness is interpreted as a quality inherent in only one divine perfection. It is absolutely unlawful for some people to look at others from a divine height, only people are equal before God.

Calvin, influenced by the ideas of Luther, renounced the Catholic Church and joined the Protestant movement. In Switzerland, he wrote his main treatise "Instructions in the Christian Faith", his dogmas expressed the interests of the most daring part of the then bourgeoisie. Calvin did not put forward fundamentally new ideas, but systematized the ideas of Luther and Zwingli.

Calvinism, however, further simplified the Christian cult and worship, giving the church a democratic character (the elective leadership of the church by the laity), separated it from the state, although it left it an independent political system.

Calvin is on the same positions as Luther, i.e. earthly life is the path to salvation, in this life one must endure, etc. However, he emphasizes the great possibility of a Christian being actively involved in earthly affairs. Initiation to secular goods is associated with the possession of property and its multiplication; only moderate use of wealth is necessary in accordance with God's will.

For Calvin, democracy is not the best way to govern; he considered the oligarchy to be the most successful political system, and at least a moderate democracy. Since 1536, Calvin settled in Geneva, where in 1541 he became the de facto dictator of the city, seeking to submit to the secular power of the church.

The basis of Calvinism is the doctrine of divine predestination. Calvin simplified and strengthened this teaching, bringing it to absolute fatalism: some people are predestined by God to salvation and heavenly bliss even before birth, while others are predestined to death and eternal torment, and no actions of a person, nor his faith is able to correct this. A person is saved not because he believes, but because he is predestined for salvation. Divine predestination is hidden from people, and therefore every Christian must live his life as if he were predestined to salvation.

Calvin preached limiting one's vital needs, renunciation of earthly pleasures, thrift, constant hard work and the improvement of professional skills. Success in professional activity is a sign of being chosen by God, the profession acts as a vocation, a place of service to God, therefore professional success is a value in itself, and not a means of achieving material wealth.

Criticism of luxury and idleness turned into a denial of artistic creativity, literature and art, into a ban on all amusements and entertainment.

Calvin reduced the freedom of conscience and interpretation of the Bible proclaimed by the Reformation to freedom from Catholicism, not allowing criticism of his teaching.

Thomas Müntzer

Just as in the Middle Ages, theological rationalism during the Reformation was influenced by religious mystical teachings. The Reformation is generally connected with medieval mysticism, adopted its elements and adapted it to its own doctrine of an inner, individual relationship to God.

With the most radical presentation of mysticism, we meet in the teachings of the leader of the popular revolution in Germany, Thomas Müntzer (1490-1525), a church preacher, the ideologist of the peasant-plebeian camp of the Reformation. He moved away from the petty-bourgeois limited Lutheranism, criticizing it for the fact that it deals only with questions of individual salvation and leaves the earthly order, which is considered inviolable, without attention.

Müntzer saw the Reformation not so much in the renewal of the church and its teachings, but in the accomplishment of a socio-economic revolution by the forces of the peasants and the urban poor. The religious and philosophical views of Müntzer are based on the idea of the need to establish such a "God's power" on earth that would bring social equality. He, as a supporter of the idea of egalitarian communism, demanded the immediate establishment of the “kingdom of God” on earth, by which he understood nothing more than a social system in which there would no longer be any class differences, no private property, no state power. Power can be considered legitimate only when it is exercised on behalf of the masses and in their interests.

According to Müntzer, God is omnipresent in all of his creations. It manifests itself, however, not as a given, but as a process that is revealed to those who carry God's will in themselves. Christ is not a historical figure, but is incarnated and revealed in faith. And only in faith, without an official church, can his role as a redeemer be fulfilled.

Müntzer's political program is close to utopian communism; it necessarily led to a complete divergence from Luther's petty-bourgeois reformation. Luther and Müntzer expressed different class interests, one of the burghers and princes, the other of the peasant and plebeian masses.

The mystical teachings of Jacob Boehme

Jacob Boehme (1575-1624) comes from a poor peasant family in Saxony, was a shoemaker. Brought up in Lutheranism, the Holy Scriptures were the source of his philosophizing.

Boehme's philosophy differs from the main direction of philosophical and scientific thinking of that time: they belong neither to scholasticism, nor to the humanism and naturalism of modern times. Of his works, the most interesting are Aurora, or Dawn in Ascent, On the Three Principles, and On the Threefold Life of Man.

According to Boehme, God is the highest unity, but this unity cannot be known by itself, it is inaccessible not only to human knowledge, but even God cannot know himself. The idea that the "self-discovery" of God is possible only through his transformation into nature is presented by Boehme in the terminology of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. The thesis about the direct existence of God in things, in nature and in man is the central idea of Boehme's philosophical and theological system. Nature is closed in God as the highest and active first principle. God is not only in nature, but also above it.

Man is both a “microcosm” and a “little god”, in which everything worldly and divine takes place in all its complex inconsistency. It acts as a unity of the divine and natural, corporal and spiritual, evil and good.

Boehme's mysticism finds its successors in the mystical currents of the 17th and 18th centuries, and its dialectics in the German classical philosophy of Schelling and Hegel.

counter-reformation

The Protestant Reformation resonated with Catholicism. Since the 40s of the 16th century, Catholics have been fighting to regain lost positions; in Western Europe begins the period of the counter-reformation. The participants in the movement sharply raise the question of strengthening unity in the very organization of the Catholic Church, of strengthening internal discipline and papal centralization, but the main thing was the open struggle of Catholicism against Protestantism. The order - "The Society of Jesus" (Jesuits) - founded by the Spaniard Ignatius of Loyola in 1534 and approved by the pope in 1540, became the advanced combat detachment of Catholics. The Jesuits formed the core of the Inquisition, reorganized to fight the Reformation. The Inquisition arose as a manifestation and consequence of the crisis of church authority and ideology: it was necessary to bring church ideology into line with the new social situation and the new ideological currents of the era. The Council of Trent (1545-1563), however, shied away from solving philosophical problems and disputes between schools, not wanting to disturb the unity of the church. During this period, there is a new revival of scholastic philosophy in the form of Thomism. First it was in Italy, then in Spain, initially the Dominicans played the main role, then the Jesuits. The teachings of the Spanish Jesuit Francis Suarez (1548-1617) had the greatest significance for the attempts to restore medieval scholasticism in this era.

Conclusion

The Reformation simplified, cheapened and democratized the church, placed the inner personal faith above the outer manifestations of religiosity, and gave the norms of bourgeois morality a divine sanction.

The reform movement culminated in the 16th century. In a number of European countries, although in different ways, a transition was made to a new, Protestant church. In some places, the bourgeoisie was satisfied with the reformation of the Catholic Church. The 17th century no longer knows the Reformation. In subsequent development, the conditions for the era of bourgeois revolutions are gradually formed.

Therefore, the exceptional role of the Reformation in the development of world civilization and culture is obvious. Not proclaiming any social - political ideal; without requiring the alteration of society in one direction or another; without making any scientific discoveries and achievements in artistic creativity, the Reformation changed the consciousness of man, opened up new spiritual horizons for him. A person received the freedom to think independently, freed himself from the authoritarian guardianship of the papacy and the church, received the highest sanction for him - religious - that only his own mind and conscience can tell him how to live.

The Reformation contributed to the emergence of a man of bourgeois society - an independent individual with freedom of moral choice, independent and responsible in his judgments and actions. The bearers of Protestant ideas expressed a new type of personality with a new culture and attitude to the world.

The emerging capitalism received a spiritual justification in Protestantism.

Literature

1. Philosophical Dictionary. - M., 1986

2. World history: ( tutorial). - M: Thought, V.2. 1985

3. History of philosophy in summary. / Per. From Czech, ed. I.I. Boguta - M: Thought. 1995

4. Training course in cultural studies. - Rostov-on-Don: Phoenix. 1996

5. Luther. Selected writings. - SP-B. 1994

6. Solovyov. The Past Talks Us: (Essays on the History of Philosophy and Culture). - M: Politizdat. 1991

The Renaissance dates back to the 14th-17th centuries. according to others - to the XV - XVIII centuries. The term Renaissance (Renaissance) was introduced in order to show that in this era the best values and ideals of antiquity were revived - architecture, sculpture, painting, philosophy, literature. But this term was interpreted very conditionally, since it is impossible to restore the entire past. This is not a revival of the past in its pure form - it is the creation of a new one using many of the spiritual and material values of antiquity.

The last period of the Renaissance is the era of the Reformation, completing this greatest progressive upheaval in the development of European culture.

Starting in Germany, the Reformation swept a number of European countries and led to the falling away from the Catholic Church of England, Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands, Finland, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and partly Germany. This is a broad religious and socio-political movement that began at the beginning of the 16th century in Germany and aimed at transforming the Christian religion.

The spiritual life of that time was determined by religion. But the church was unable to resist the challenge of the times. The Catholic Church had power over Western Europe and untold riches, but found itself in a sad situation. Originating as a movement of the downtrodden and enslaved, the poor and persecuted, Christianity became dominant in the Middle Ages. The undivided dominance of the Catholic Church in all spheres of life eventually led to its internal rebirth and decay. Denunciations, intrigues, burning at the stake, etc. were done in the name of the teacher of love and mercy - Christ! By preaching humility and temperance, the church grew obscenely rich. She profited from everything. The highest ranks of the Catholic Church lived in unheard of luxury, indulged in rampant noisy secular life, very far from the Christian ideal.

Germany became the birthplace of the Reformation. Its beginning is considered the events of 1517, when the doctor of theology Martin Luther (1483 - 1546) spoke with his 95 theses against the sale of indulgences. From that moment began his long duel with the Catholic Church. The Reformation quickly spread to Switzerland, the Netherlands, France, England, and Italy. In Germany, the Reformation was accompanied by the Peasants' War, which was on such a scale that no other social movement of the Middle Ages can compare with it. The Reformation found its new theorists in Switzerland, where its second largest center after Germany arose. There, John Calvin (1509 - 1564), who was nicknamed the "Pope of Geneva," finally formalized the reformation thought. Ultimately, the Reformation gave rise to a new direction in Christianity, which became the spiritual basis of Western civilization - Protestantism. Protestantism freed people from the pressure of religion in practical life. Religion became Religious consciousness was replaced by a secular worldview. Religious rituals became simpler. But the main achievement of the Reformation was in the special role that was given to the individual in his individual communion with God. Deprived of the mediation of the church, a person now had to be responsible for his actions, i.e. "he was assigned a much greater responsibility. Different historians solve the issue of the relationship between the Renaissance and the Reformation in different ways. Both the Reformation and the Renaissance put the human personality at the center, energetic, striving to transform the world, with a pronounced strong-willed beginning. But the Reformation at the same time had a more disciplined impact: it encouraged individualism, but introduced it into a strict framework of morality based on religious values.

The Renaissance contributed to the emergence of an independent person with freedom of moral choice, independent and responsible in his judgments and actions. The bearers of Protestant ideas expressed a new type of personality with a new culture and attitude to the world.

The church gradually lost its position as a “state within a state”, its influence on domestic and foreign policy significantly decreased, and later completely disappeared.

The teachings of Jan Hus influenced Martin Luther, who in the general sense was not a philosopher and thinker. But he became a German reformer, moreover, the founder of German Protestantism.