How much role did the printing press played in the Protestant Revolt?

What role did the printing press play in the Protestant Revolt? There are two contradictory claims about this, one says that Martin Luther liberated the Bible from the censorious Church and translated & mass-published it along with his own writings and to help liberate the minds of the people. The other claim says that printing press published Bibles and other books and spread them far and wide, (which is true) but that this accidentally “enlightened” the minds of the people and freed them for the evil Church. What is the real story of what happened?

This is on my mind right now, because my computer is really messing with my life and plans right now!

 

Hmmm, interesting question. Must've "helped" promulgate his ideas to some extent (pamphlets were "big" then).

 

Well given that literacy even during the revolt was low at best I'm sure it had an impact greatly on the pastors who came forward not having to spend years in formation and learn Latin. They then essentially did what the church had done by preaching to their congregations each week on the day of the Lord with their new interpretation.
It might have helped some of the wealthy as well who were literate and could then read the gospel in their native tongue.

 

The Latin Vulgate was the first bible to come off a printing press. Often referred to as the Gutenberg bible, it was printed in Germany in the mid 15th century, about 30 years before the birth of Martin Luther. Back then the peasantry were illiterate and the aristocracy and professionals learned Latin.

Translations into vernacular languages most likely helped spread Protestantism. Are you sure that Luther's initial support came from the uneducated peasantry? His disdain for honouring saints can't have been a hit with them. Holy days must have been a welcome relief back then when Sundays and holy days were the only rest days.

 

*printer

 

Interesting, that makes a lot more sense.

 

We're learning about this in my son's schooling right now. It seems Luther had a large following from the peasants because they were inspired by his challenge of authority to rise up in revolt against the landowners. And the upper class were inspired to follow him because they thought they could get their hands on Church property--land and wealth--as the Church lost some of its power and status. Sounds to me like the devil was in all the details.

 

It's a good question! I don't know the history exactly of how and when state-paid schools started, but I tell myself that families globally were incited to put their children into schools so that could learn to read & write and give them a better future. So if from the start of the creation of schools, the state had an agenda to get the plebes to read, there must have been a hidden (bad) reason if it was given to the people by the ruling elite. Did the printing press fit into this?

On a related subject, I read a very interesting book a few years ago about the oral tradition of transmission that the people had in Israel for centuries. I found the method complex, but it is apparently still used today in some eastern Churches: they would create a pattern with beads and string that looks like a necklace or part of a fisherman's net on which the beads or knots would correspond to passages of a book in a way that allowed them to memorize entire books. It would look something like this and could be recited either horizontally or vertically:



I

When I read this I thought that the oral tradition of transmission was probably the best to safeguard the Word and Traditions and the printed material put in the hands of all kinds of people would be a risk for keeping its purity.

I guess I'm sharing to look at the big picture of why the push to get everyone to read coupled with the creation of the printing press. But beyond this I know nothing about how the printing press would have benefitted Luther...

 

Read out of context, the Bible seemingly supports Protestantism. Like so many translations call Jesus’ disciples his “brothers”. Only by reading it in context do you realize they’re not physical children of Mary.

You can make anything say its opposite by reading out of context.

We have so many people who claim to know science because they studied it in school, but they treat it like a religion with dogmas because they are scared of being called uneducated to not hold these dogmas that “every educated person knows”.

 

an interesting point is that Luther kept the confession as an instrument of preparation for the Eucharist (called absolution by the Lutheran Church), however several denominations that resulted from the reformation abolished it based on their disastrous interpretation of the Bible