Reformation & Religious Tolerance?

Upon reading the New York Times review of Benjamin Kaplan’s book, Divided by Faith, I gravitate towards the description that “Kaplan maintains that religious toleration declined from around 1550 to 1750.” (Steinfels). This argument for the decrease in religious tolerance during the period appears supported by events of the period, like, for example, the pockets of witch-hunting. Clearly, the Reformation did not necessarily promote open acceptance of all different reform movements that sprung from the period, if it did offer a Protestant alternative to the Catholic Church. One example of decreased religious toleration manifests in the experiences of the Anabaptists of the period, who were “arrested, burned at the stake, and sometimes symbolically punished by drowning” (Zophy 207).

Here, I utilize a woodcut to illustrate the persecution of the Anabaptists. Granted, this particular woodcut comes from “Martyrs Mirror,” a seventeenth-century collection of illustrations by Jan Luyken. Therefore, the art piece is subject to the influence of historical hindsight/revision itself. The specific engraving I chose depicts the drowning of Heinrich Summer and Jakob Mandel in 1582, both of whom were Anabaptists. The illustration naturally draws focus to the anguish of the man who has been subjected to the drowning. The figure above him actually seems to be questioning/displaying anger over the death, hands spread out in a gesture motioning to the plight of the man (Summer or Mandel presumably). Accurately, there are many onlookers- persecution during the Reformation period was intended to be public. The castle in the background and a sort of antiquated feel to the portrait (even for the 1500s) may hint at the feudal system that organized society primarily in the medieval period. In this way, the artist seems to separate his time period from even that of just a century previous. In general, the woodcut demonstrates the ways in which the Reformation was as much a challenge of older structures of religion/society as it was a reinforcement of order/religion/power structures in an intense or instigative manner.

Sources:

Steinfels, Peter. "A Revisionist Historian Looks at Religious Toleration." New York Times, Nov. 24, 2007. Print.

On the artist- http://www.geheugenvannederland.nl/?/en/collecties/jan_en_casper_luyken/jan_luyken

On the Martyrs Mirror- https://kauffman.bethelks.edu/martyrs/creation.html

Image- https://mla.bethelks.edu/holdings/scans/martyrsmirror/