Geographic Catalysts for Secularization in Western Europe
by Ironduke
by Ironduke
In the 16th century, right on the heels of the Renaissance, came the Reformation and the creation of the Protestant faiths that was bound to change the world forever. This led to a permanent schism in Western Christendom, and laid the groundwork for many other types of “schisms”, for example, that of the “inner”, private religious sphere, and “outer, public sphere”. In Western Europe, the Protestant Reformation finally and irreversibly served to divide the secular and religious realms within man which enabled the founding of the modern nation-state, capitalism, and the scientific revolution.
From the time of Constantine, Western Europe had been dominated by varying degrees by the Catholic Church. The axioms of the Church regulated almost all aspects of life: moral, economic, and governmental. The practice of religion was mandatory, and all were forced to take part in its communal rituals.
According to Casanova, “The Christian 'church' is only one particular historical type of combination of religious community and political community, which emerged out of the complex encounter of the Christian religious community and the Roman imperial state structure” (Casanova 47). In the early days of the Church, prior to Constantine, Christianity followed the same model which it did prior to its adoption as the Roman state religion. Indeed, it was a very decentralized, personal religion. By adopting the structure of the Roman imperial state, it transformed into something much different than it was when it began. Indeed, as it was ascribed to Jesus, the central figure in the Christian religion, “Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:21).
With the rise of Protestantism in the 16th century under the leadership of individuals such as Luther and Calvin, the door to today's world was finally opened. “As a state church, the Lutheran Church also partook of this sphere, but Lutheranism introduced the principle of a double morality, a secular one for the “outer” sphere of the office and a Christian one for the “inner” sphere of the person, so that the freedom of “inner religion” was assured (Casanova 33). Not entirely accurate, as “Christendom” had already had this separation of “inner” and “outer” spheres for its first three centuries in which there was a “period of clear separation from the Roman political community and confrontation with the Roman imperial structure was adopted by the Roman Empire as its 'community cult' (47).
It was observed by Max Weber “... the higher grades of skilled labour, and even more the higher technically trained personnel of modern enterprises, are overwhelmingly Protestant” (Weber 35). There is little reason to believe that religion in and of itself has anything to do with this. “The emancipation from economic traditionalism appears, no doubt, to be a factor which would greatly strengthen the tendency to doubt the sanctity of religious tradition, as of all traditional authorities” (Weber 36).
The states where Protestantism took the strongest hold were those that were the most geographically distant from the control of the papacy in Rome within Western Christendom. These nations include Germany, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, and England, which had also been linked by trade through the medieval Hanseatic League and shared a common Germanic heritage. One somewhat differing example is that of Switzerland, an area though geographically close to Rome and the Papacy, can be considered “geologically” distant, as it is a mountainous area which favors the defense and would be most difficult to subdue by force of arms. One thing to keep in mind, however, is that ethnic and religious factors are really secondary catalysts and do not denote by any means the superiority of these groups or their systems over any other. Really, it was the inability of the universalist Catholic Church to use force to exact conformity among these peoples.
The foundation for the creation of the modern nation-state, the scientific revolution, and modern capitalism already having been laid, these geographic and geological distances, already providing a large degree of emancipation from Rome and the Italian-centric and controlled papacy, were formalized through the work and teachings of Luther and Calvin during the Reformation. The Catholic-Protestant schism in Western Christendom and the creation of the Calvinist, Lutheran, and Anglican churches helped serve as a catalysts. Indeed, it seems that the geographic distance and introduction of Protestantism served as mutually catalyzing factors. By clearly delineating the “private” inner sphere and “public” outer sphere, the conditions for the Protestant work ethic was created (Weber 41). Indeed, in countries where there was no distinction between these spheres, and mass of the people were directly hostile toward religion (Weber 42).
In conclusion, the dualist structure, the separation of the secular and religious realms as had been outlined in the New Testament and later greatly diminished with the appropriation and adoption of the structure of the Roman imperial state by the Catholic Church, which reemerged in the sixteenth century with the advent of the Protestant Reformation, is what made possible the advent of the Modern Age. One should not view the factors that made this possible in any light other than that they served as catalysts which made the advent of capitalism, the modern nation-state, and the scientific revolution possible, that is, mankind's entry into the Modern Age.
Works Cited
Casanova, Jose. 1994. Public Religions in the Modern World. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Weber, Max. 1992. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. London,: Routledge.
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