The Unlocking of Knowledge, Through the Art of Printing Printing was a major factor in shaping the reformation and Protestant Practice by making printing material (including the Bible) available to everyone. It started with Johannes Gutenburg s invention of the printing press as the origin of mass communication. It was the western culture s first workable means of disseminating ideas and information to a large and vast audience. Some historians suggest that print was instrumental in bringing about all the major shifts in Science, Religion, Politics; and the major modes of thought that are commonly associated with western culture. The Protestant reformation had its beginnings in the first half of the sixteenth century, when western Europe experienced a wide range of social, artistic and political changes that ultimately resulted in a conflict with the Catholic Church.
Throughout the scribal era there were not many manuscripts and they had been controlled by a powerful elite who had subscribed a limited world view (a religious dogma).
Scribes, monks and priests produced manuscripts, the information they copied in the scriptoria was primarily of a sacred nature, producing beautiful manuscripts of the Bible and prayer books. These texts were in Latin, which was the language of the Church, you had to go to specific people to get it. Knowledge was completely controlled.
The Essay on Similarities And Differences Among The Major Western Religions
The major religions of the Western world share similarities as a result of their shared heritage, but are also very different due to their divergence from that heritage. All three started with the same stories that are found in the Judaic Torah. Adam, Eve, Abraham, and Noah all exist in the culture of all of these religions. However, as time progressed people would come that would impact those ...
Priests decided on the meanings: the world was created in six days, and the Clergy were Gods representatives on earth. These truths were preached from the Ministry and enforced within the community. Any one who dared to question the correct nature of the meanings was declared a Heretic and was punished accordingly. “One of the most useful ways of thinkin about the effects of the printing press is to see it as a recording and knowledge explosion.” For instead of information being copied in the scriptoria under the strict supervision of the clergy, printing presses suddenly sprang up all over Europe. Others began producing books at an unholy rate, and without any consultation with the Church. These books were printed in local languages, which the Lay people could understand.
And almost over night the Church lost control of information, and began to lose power to the professional classes and the state. It could no longer regulate the access to information, because people could find out things for themselves without the mediation of the Church. Its authority, power and prestige began to decline. The Catholic Church somehow had to counteract with this new evolution, which basically consummated in a poster war with the Protestants. The Church took advantage of the power of print, printing indulgences, theological texts and by it they tried to spread the Church s influence. Despite this the Church had great difficulty controlling the active dissenters like Martin Luther whose theses were widely and rapidly disseminated.
Bibles were already being printed in vernacular (rather than Latin), prompting debates and opposition to the Churches role as the sole guardian of spiritual truth. The Bible was a locked book during the “dark ages”, under authority of the Catholic Church, but now with its accessibility it had become unlocked, enabling people to interpret the scripture for themselves. Printing gave knowledge and religious freedom back to the people. “In the sixteenth century, a religious revolt resulted in the formation of Protestant churches.” But this revolt actually had its beginnings in 1384, when Wycliffe produced a hand written manuscript copy of the complete Bible in English. Then in 1455 when Gutenburg invented the printing press, printing the first Bible in Latin.
The Essay on Religious Freedom Bible Printed People
... Bible. The Gutenberg Bible was initially printed in Latin for the Catholic Church. Various scholars began making new translations and even dared to translate scripture ... who translated, printed, or possessed illegal scriptures. To English speaking people, the most ... Bible had already been spread widely among the people. When the American colonies became populated, the king forbade them from printing ...
In 1517 Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses of contention to the Wittenberg door, “and in 1521/2 he translated and published the New Testament into German. William Tyndale s New Testament was the first ever printed in the English language in 1525/6. William Tyndale said “These things, I say, to know, is to have all the scripture unlocked and opened before the; so that if thou wilt go in, and read, thou canst not but understand.” Printing the Bible from Latin into the common language of that day unlocked the scriptures, making it accessible to everyone, thus making it a major factor in shaping the Reformation and Protestant religious practice, enlightening and freeing the common people from bondage s of the political and religious systems. The lay-people now had access to the Bible and began to understand it for themselves, challenging the Church s authority when the practices of the Church were different from the view of the scripture.
One such practice, challenged by Martin Luther, was the selling of indulgences (the forgiveness of sins), or bartering the release of loved ones from “purgatory.”In 1516, Pope Leo X Began selling pardons, by which he gained a large amount of money from people who were eager to save the souls of their loved ones.” The Clergy realised that having God s word available to the people in the language of common English, would mean disaster to the Church, and would “open the eyes of the blind” and ” the truth would set them free.”So the availability of the scriptures In English was the greatest threat imaginable to the Roman Church. The Church in Rome would never give up without a fight.” The Protestant religious practice was shaped by printing, and also by men with conviction who gave their lives to preach the pure scriptures. “With the aid of the published Bible and with other printed material, men such as Martin Luther, Ulric Zwingle, Thomas Bile ny, John Tewkesbury, John Firth, William Tyndale and many others preached and debated the scriptures. They all were called Heretics and many of them were cruelly persecuted and were executed under the hands of the Roman Church. Many reforms were introduced into the Church, during that time which shaped the Protestant practice.
The Essay on Ian Van Eyck Church Symbolism Religious
Jan van Eyck was a master in style and symbolism, establishing a firm superiority in glaze technique and delicately and elaborately applying subtle, yet powerful religious references to what at first glance may seem simple portraits. Van Eyck's drawing, Saint Barbara, completed in 1437, is an example of the artist's use of fictional exotic or Romanesque style structures, suggestive of those from ...
Martin Luther s reforms included changing the practice of indulgences, a national (rather than Roman) control of Church finances, permission for the clergy to marry, a series of Sacramental reforms, a reformed Mass and the Holy blessing. Other factors shaped the Reformation such as earlier Renaissance discoveries in science, literature and the visual arts. Different experiences and experiments in Architecture surfaced in the sixteenth and sixteenth centuries. In spite of religious controversies the Reformation was also a period of economic revolution when capitalism gained strength. In conclusion, we see that printing has helped to develop an emphasis on individual rights and freedom, freeing the people and society from the rigorous and one tracked way of living.
Print technology facilitated a communications revolution that reached deep into the human thought and social interaction. Print, along with the spoken language, written and electronic media is thought of as one of the markers of key historical shifts in communication that has attended social and intellectual transformation. With the beginning of printing, “knowledge grew in science and in languages, opening a window of light for the world and clearing the way for the reformation of the Church.” In the year 1563 John Foxe wrote; “God gave man the art of printing, which restored knowledge to the Church.” Print facilitated a focus on truth, and on the human ability and rite to chose one s own intellectual and religious path. We today, because of the power of print, are standing on the shoulders of all those who have shaped the Reformation and Protestant religious practice.
