“Reformationsgeschichtliche Studien und Texte.” Vergangenheit und Zukunft einer wissenschaftlichen Reihe (review)

This slim volume constitutes an expanded version of the keynote address given by Peter Walter at the centenary celebration of the founding of the series Reformationsgeschichtliche Studien und Texte. The series was the brainchild of Joseph Greving (1868–1919), a scholar of early Catholic controversial literature. Walter begins by noting how strongly Ludwig Pastor, at the time the pre-eminent Catholic scholar of the sixteenth century, opposed the use of the term Reformation in the series title, preferring Glaubensspaltung. Words have meaning; Pastor’s disagreement was that the term Reformation was itself an attack on Catholicism. His concern was hardly irrational in the aftermath of the Kulturkampf in Bismarck’s Germany. Greving viewed matters differently. His goal was to establish a series devoted to the study of Catholic thought in the sixteenth century, but one that would be free from all confessional polemic. In the one hundred years since its founding, the series has continued to provide a venue for scholars interested in the Catholic perspective on the Reformation era through the publication of monographs, essay collections, and other documents.

In addition to the 152 volumes of the RST, the society has published three subseries. Walter describes the Corpus Catholicorum as the “flag ship . . . so to say, the raison d’être” (p. 31) of the society. This series of editions of the correspondence and writings of Catholic theologians, politicians, and religious was initiated in 1919 as a response to the Corpus Reformatorum. The “little series,” Katholisches Leben und Kämpfe im Zeitalter der Glaubensspaltung begun in 1927, includes short monographs, few longer than 100 pages. In 1967, in a reflection of the new mood after the Second Vatican Council, “Kämpfe” was replaced with “Kirchenreform,” the title the series carries to this day. The society also published Vorreformationsgeschichtliche Forschungen, a series begun in 1900 and taken over in the 1960s.

Walter chronicles the changes in editorial policy in the main series, with occasional side glances at the history of the various subseries. In the 1950s and 1960s, under the leadership of Hubert Jedin and August Franzen, the RST turned more toward the Counter-Reformation. Under subsequent editors, most notably Erwin Iserloh and Klaus Ganzer, the original focus on the early-sixteenth century was revived. Walter ends by considering the future direction of the series. He notes that it is no longer necessary to found a series to publish a book—there are a number of publication series devoted to Reformation history; the older confessional obstacles that once hindered Catholic scholars have disappeared. Moreover, the older focus of the series— Luther’s earliest Catholic opponents—seems to have run its course. What more, Walter asks, remains to be said about Eck or Cochlaeus? Hence the new direction of the series, focusing on areas of concern in more recent scholarship. Walter identifies three areas of research as the future of the series: continuities and discontinuities between the late Middle Ages and the early-modern era; reception theory; and Catholic Confessionalization. All three subjects are represented in the publications of the main and subseries over the past decade, and will likely to be fruitful areas of research for some time.

This is a useful little volume for students of early-modern Catholicism. The appendices contain a complete bibliography of the four series, and the essay details the strengths and weaknesses of the series. It would be particularly useful for graduate students embarking on a major research project: the monographs and essay collections in the series have consistently been first-rate, while the document collections provide access to a wide range of materials pertaining to both religious and secular history not found elsewhere. Walter has also done a service to remind us of the contribution of Greving, a pioneer of modern Catholic historiography.