This chapter explores theologian and pastor Johann Joachim Spalding’s immensely popular Bestimmung des Menschen (eleven editions between 1748 and 1804), its reverberations throughout the German Enlightenment, and the ways in which it intersected with both philosophical and religious questions about humankind’s place in the world. The chapter discusses the ways in which religious thinkers attempted to provide new “apologies” for Christianity against deism and atheism, how they did so in a modern, literary German that solidified their positions in the public sphere, and how these interventions also shaped philosophical discourse in the eighteenth century.

The Epilogue argues why it matters that we understand how the first formulation of a Reformation modernization theory emerged in Enlightenment public debate in order to understand the ways in which nineteenth-century thinkers actively confronted or recast an Enlightenment intellectual construct. The Epilogue shows how, by the end of the nineteenth century, the emphasis on the epochal turning point to modernity had slowly shifted from the Reformation to the Enlightenment. The Epilogue looks at four perspectives of German thinking about the Reformation and Protestantism: history, religion, philosophy, and culture (including the Kulturkampf and Kulturprotestantismus) and points to the ways forward for German thinking about both the Reformation and the Enlightenment after the Second World War.

This chapter takes the philosopher Karl Leonhard Reinhold as a starting point to look at the ways in which critical philosophers sought to cast Kantianism as the heir to Protestantism. In his highly influential Letters on the Kantian Philosophy, Reinhold argues that the “first” Reformation of the sixteenth century was only a “preparation” for the current attempts to purify morality through philosophy. Situated in the context of Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi’s accusation that contemporary philosophy led to atheism (the so-called pantheism controversy or Spinozastreit) it traces Reinhold’s evolution from a proponent of the Catholic Enlightenment to an energetic advocate for Kantian philosophy at the University of Jena. Concluding briefly with Johann Gottlieb Fichte, the chapter shows how the new language of Protestantism discussed in the previous chapters proved fruitful for advocates of the new philosophy.

This chapter examines two so-called transitional theologians who straddled the worlds of orthodox belief and learning and forward-looking scholarship and literary engagement. Johann Lorenz von Mosheim (1693–1755) and Johann Georg Walch (1693–1775) pointed the way to a new view of the Reformation, even if the results of their interventions went much farther then they intended. Mosheim’s History of Michael Servetus sought a type of transhistorical reconciliation between the eponymous Spanish heretic and John Calvin, who had him burned at the stake in Geneva. Mosheim tried to acknowledge the occasional brutality of Reformation-era Protestants while contextualizing the historical attitudes of an earlier era. Walch’s twenty-four-volume Luther edition was notable not only for rendering Luther’s language into a readable vernacular, but also for a long historical essay on Luther’s “accomplishments.” Walch sought to both acknowledge the genuine contributions of the first Reformer while also stripping away some of the mythical status that had accrued to Luther through generations of pious veneration.

This chapter shows how Enlightenment theology moved beyond its academic and ecclesiastical contexts to become part of a larger campaign for reform. Advocates of a new system of educating and training clergymen turned to the public sphere and cast their project as a continuation of the Reformation. Intended as a rhetorical strategy to solidify support among a Protestant public that was open to a less stringent and dogmatic Christianity than that of Lutheran Orthodoxy or Pietism, Enlightenment theologians paved the way for a fruitful reinterpretation of the Protestant past. The chapter provides an overview of the theological innovations of Halle theologian Johann Salomo Semler (1725–1791), which formed the backbone of much of Enlightenment theology (or “Neology” as it is frequently labeled). The chapter shows how public controversies about binding doctrines led to a series of public assertions that had the rhetorical effect of recasting the historical understanding of the Reformation.

This chapter looks at the impact of the French Revolution on this German discussion of the meaning of Protestantism, as well as at the internationalization of its themes through Charles Villers’ Essay on the Spirit and Influence of Luther’s Reformation (1804). A French exile in Germany, Villers synthesized a German historical discourse about the Reformation and progress and repackaged and publicized it to a European audience in response to a prize essay competition by the Institut de France. Accompanied by a brief discussion of Johann Gottfried Herder’s historical theories, the chapter also shows how Villers’ intervention (and its reception) signaled a return of the themes of nation and religion as forces of historical discourse.

This chapter looks at the rivalry between religion and philosophy in German culture after 1800, starting with the Reformation anniversary of 1817 and concluding with Schleiermacher’s and Hegel’s competing tercentennial celebrations of the Augsburg Confession in 1830. It starts with a discussion of the Wartburg Festival in 1817, in which students and veterans of the Battle of Leipzig (1813) met at Wartburg Castle, where Luther translated the gospels while in hiding after being declared an outlaw and heretic at the Diet of Worms (1521). It then looks at the ways in which new philosophical and historical ideas about the legacy and impact of the Reformation were reflected in popular and accessible writings, specifically Friedrich Keyser’s Reformations-Almanach (1817, 1819). Finally, through an analysis of late-career works by the most famous theologian and the most famous philosopher of the day – the Berlin University rivals Hegel and Schleiermacher – the chapter’s last section shows how the Reformation was constituted in public discourse as a legitimation strategy for intellectuals courting public opinion and official favor.

This chapter provides an overview of the book’s argument. It first shows how the association of Protestantism with modern freedom and German philosophy was an artifact of political and social debates in the eighteenth century, a German version of Butterfield’s famous concept of the “Whig” idea of history. It next explores the evolution of the term “Protestant” from the early days of the Reformation to the eighteenth century, concluding with the diversity of German Protestantism on the eve of the 1717 Reformation anniversary. Third, the Introduction discusses the intellectual contexts in which Protestantism and the Reformation were redefined, providing working definitions for such terms as "religion," "philosophy," "theology," and the "Protestant public sphere." Particular attention is paid to disputes over the boundaries of philosophy and religion in the context of Pietism, Wolffian philosophy, and eclecticism. Finally, the Introduction situates the book in the scholarly contexts of Enlightenment historiography, early modern European history and Church history, and the history of modern philosophy.