The Primacy of the Postils: Catholics, Protestants, and the Dissemination of Ideas in Early Modern GermanyJohn M. Frymire Scholarship on the German Reformation has long equated preaching with Protestantism, just as many scholars have employed sermons but usually in supplemental and unsystematic ways. Based on an analysis of over 400 standard sermon collections (postils) produced by Catholics, Lutherans, and Calvinists (1520-1620), this study offers the first comprehensive, systematic presentation of these works from a cross-confessional perspective. It lays to rest the notion that preaching was somehow distinctively Protestant while tracing the creation, production, use, and censorship of postils. These sermon collections were nothing less than the applied distillation of Christianity delivered on a regular basis by the clergy to the laity, and as such the most important vehicle for the dissemination of ideas in early modern Germany. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
Chapter One Catholic Preaching and the German | 9 |
The Catholic Response | 38 |
The Religious | 50 |
Catholic Postil Production | 98 |
Lutheran | 148 |
Lutheran | 157 |
Implications | 216 |
Catholic Postils in an Era of Uncertainty | 328 |
The Use and Abuse of Johann | 346 |
The Dominance of Medieval | 403 |
Conclusion | 437 |
Appendices Tables | 445 |
Catholic and Protestant Postils by Year | 454 |
Catholic and Protestant Postils by Author | 466 |
Notes on Select Postils Listed | 517 |
Calvinist Postils? The Pragmatism | 225 |
Postils Catholic | 253 |
Postils and the Primacy | 288 |
Censorship | 319 |
Complete Sets of Catholic Postils by Year | 524 |
Luthers Postils | 535 |
Catholic Postil Production The Data | 556 |
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