The Renaissance and Reformation – two of Europe’s major movements – dealt with many of the same issues. Both time periods are strikingly similar in some ways and completely different in others. They both share a similarity on the importance of the individual person and traditional languages. There were many causes during the Renaissance such as the fall of Constantinople, the invention of printing machine, and the Crusades. As for the causes of the Reformation were the rise of Nationalism, the abandonment of Rome by the Popes, Corruption in the Church, and the Black Death.
The main cause of the Renaissance was the fall of Constantinople (Rana). The fall of the Byzantine Empire gave rise to the Renaissance. Many Greek scholars and artists, who lived in Constantinople prior to its fall, left the city and relocated to cities in Italy where they began teaching aristocracy, history, geography, astronomy, mathematics, and the arts. This gave birth to the Renaissance.
Also, Crusaders brought in new thoughts and beliefs, which replaced the old thoughts and beliefs of other well-known groups. They also brought in new ideas and materials from other people in the Middle East such as scientific books of Aristotle, the Arabic numerals, and paper. The invention of the printing press was also responsible of the cause of the Renaissance. The printing press was invented by Johannes Gutenberg in the 1440s. The printing press had a huge impact on the spread of ideas throughout Europe. This made books become more widespread and cheaper and people learned to read. This also helped Renaissance ideas spread more rapidly across Europe.
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Humanism was the most important intellectual movement of the Renaissance. Humanism is an outlook or system of thought attaching prime importance to human rather than divine or supernatural matters. The humanists thought that every person has respect and worth and therefore should command the respect of every other person. The movement began during the early Italian Renaissance.
According to the article by David Lattier:
On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther purportedly nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church, thus marking the beginning of the Protestant Reformation—a movement that was to permanently divide Western Christendom.
Luther was a priest in the Catholic faith in 1517 when he posted the Theses. He posted the Theses in response to the sale of indulgences in nearby towns.
Another cause of the Reformation was that the Church was having some problems at the time, such as the Great Schism. The Great Schism greatly reduced the Church’s popularity when there was so much confusion over who was Pope. In 1305, Pope Clement V was elected (Lattier). Clement moved the papal court from Rome to the city of Avignon, France in 1309. After the papacy returned to Rome in 1377, it had produced several rival claimants to the papacy. The Reformation was also impacted by the printing press.
This was one of the similarities that the Renaissance and the Reformation shared. It allowed for the Reformation ideas to spread more rapidly and a have a bigger impact. A major cause of the Reformation was also the Black Death. Many people at the time believed that God had sent the plague as a punishment for people’s sins. It destroyed somewhere around 30-60% of Europe’s population (Lattier). According to the article by Lattier, Belloc believes that this incident “had most to do with the deplorable splitting up of Christendom into separate independent nations,” and was perhaps most responsible for laying the groundwork for the Protestant Reformation:
In the first place, as always happens when men are severely tried, the less fortunate men became violently hostile towards the more fortunate. There were risings and revolutionary movements. Prices were disturbed, there was a snapping of continuity in a host of institutions. The names of the old institutions were kept, but the spirit changed. For instance, the great monasteries of Europe kept their old riches but fell to half their numbers.
There were a lot of short term and long term causes to the Reformation. There were also similar causes that the Renaissance and the Reformation had shared. I believed that this time period happened when it did because it helps set the stage for today. Because of the time period that it happened it helped influences us in countless ways. They both helped paved the way for further advancements. There were a lot of things that were discovered during those times such as the linear perspective, art, science, communication (printing press), etc.
In conclusion, there were many causes to the Renaissance and the Reformation. They both made significant changes in history that helped shaped our world today. After carefully examining both the time period there were many differences and similarities as well. One of the main differences was that the reformation was all about the way to reform the church, and the renaissance had a much more secular view. The similarities they both shared was that they were both about accepting new ideas and both had leaders that were corrupt. The black death also played a huge role in both time periods. Overall, many of these reasons played a huge role in each time period and help set the stage for todays world.
Works Cited
- Rana, Vikram. “Renaissance in Europe: Meaning, Causes and Results of Renaissance.” History Discussion – Discuss Anything About History, 8 Aug. 2015, www.historydiscussion.net/history/history-of-europe/renaissance-in-europe-meaning-causes-and-results-of-renaissance/1941.
- Lattier, Daniel. “5 Causes of the Protestant Reformation (Besides Indulgences).” Intellectual Takeout, 31 Oct. 2017, www.intellectualtakeout.org/article/5-causes-protestant-reformation-besides-indulgences.
