If you look at the Reformation it's understandable, but at the same time a mystery, that it happened when it did. The Renaissance encouraged new ideas, or new ways of looking at old ones, while new translations of the Bible from the original languages showed up mistakes in Jerome's 'Vulgate' and led to new ways of looking at religion. The Renaissance, however, was all about hominocentrism; man as the ultimate of God's creations and imbued with the capacity to reason and investigate God's universe. That's where the mystery comes in. The Reformation produced a view of humanity as fallen and unworthy of God's favour; the very antithesis of what the Renaissance was about.
Part of this new view of man's relationship with God was that nothing that man did could constitute merit in the eyes of God. Since man could not win salvation by merit he relied totally on God choosing to save him. In some respects this was a liberating concept; Justification by Faith meant there was no need for penance or to constantly struggle with guilt. All one needed was faith in Christ and all sins would be forgiven. On the other hand, however, was the rather frightening realisation that salvation was out of your own hands. You were totally reliant upon God choosing you to be saved and, not only that, but since God was perfect and could not change his mind, his choice was made right at the very beginning of time. This was why Erasmus, probably the most prominent figure of the Renaissance, refused to be inspired by Luther's ideas; he saw the whole notion of predestination as incompatible with human free will.
There was, in fact, not one Reformation, but many, as people, as they do, disagreed with notions put forward by Luther. The ideas of confession to clergy, transubstantiation of the Eucharist and the worship of Mary, all of which Luther's church still held to, were too much to stomach for others. There was no such thing as a 'Reformed' or 'Protestant' Church as an entity but, instead, Calvinists, Anabaptists etc. etc. All of these churches, however, held to the same ideas about soteriology. Justification by Faith and the predestined salvation of the Elect were core tenets.
Predestination was embedded in Calvinist Presbyterianism from the very start and John Calvin was extremely pessimistic about the number that were actually going to be saved; he put the figure at 144,000, a number he got from the Book of Revelation. It didn't exactly bode well for the majority of us, did it? No Calvinist church proclaims that number nowadays (most didn't at the time, either!) since, if it were true, there wouldn't be a lot of point to anything, would there? The idea of the predestined 'Elect', however, still held sway and, particularly in Scotland, Calvinists saw themselves as God's Chosen People, just like the Jews in the Old Testament. (I guess that's where the cry 'We are the People' came from.)
There is something about this doctrine that I've never been able to understand. If God decided, right at the beginning of time, who was to be saved and who was to be condemned, then what was the point of Christ? I asked this over on my other blog and WillieWontHe tried to give me an answer, but I suspect that he isn't a member of a mainstream Protestant church as his answer held out the promise of salvation to all; a distinctly non-Protestant concept. Either that or the doctrine of the Church of Scotland, and other churches, has changed dramatically. That might well be, since most CofS members I've spoken to have never even heard of predestination!
Anyway, I invited WWH to tell us his ideas about salvation and I await them with interest. Everybody else is, of course, welcome to chip in!
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