Trent and All That
Renaming Catholicism in the Early Modern Era
Ratings1
Average rating4
15
Renaming Catholicism in the Early Modern Era
Ratings1
Average rating4
Counter Reformation, Catholic Reformation, the Baroque Age, the Tridentine Age, the Confessional Age: why does Catholicism in the early modern era go by so many names? And what political situations, what religious and cultural prejudices in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries gave rise to this confusion? Taking up these questions, John W. O’Malley works out a remarkable guide to the intellectual and historical developments behind the concepts of Catholic reform, the Counter Reformation, and, in his felicitous term, Early Modern Catholicism. The result is the single best overview of scholarship on Catholicism in early modern Europe, delivered in a pithy, lucid, and entertaining style. Although its subject is fundamental to virtually all other issues relating to sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe, there is no other book like this in any language. More than a historiographical review, Trent and All That makes a compelling case for subsuming the present confusion of terminology under the concept of Early Modern Catholicism. The term indicates clearly what this book so eloquently demonstrates: that Early Modern Catholicism was an aspect of early modern history, which it strongly influenced and by which it was itself in large measure determined. As a reviewer commented, O’Malley’s discussion of terminology ‘opens up a different way of conceiving of the whole history of Catholicism between the Reformation and the French Revolution.”
Reviews with the most likes.
Please give my Amazon review a helpful vote - https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R1473A7OS2LYEV?ref=pf_ov_at_pdctrvw_srp
This book is “meta.” It is a book of history on the subject of historians plying their historical craft.
In this case, the subject is the term that historians use for the Catholic historical experience during the Protestant Reformation. The author, John W. O'Malley, SJ, is a Jesuit historian specializing in Catholic conciliar history. He has books on the councils of Trent, Vatican I, and Vatican II. The term used for the Catholic experience between 1500 and 1650 matters a great deal to him.
For example, the term “the Counter-Reformation” implies that all of Catholic history during that period was reducible to a response to Protestantism. Can this be true of Catholic art and music during this time? Unlikely. There was something intrinsically and enduringly Catholic about such things. Similarly, the term “Catholic Reformation” implies that everything in the period was tied up with “reform,” which was not the case.
O'Malley traces the positions of the historians on what to call this part of the “Age of Reformation” which was not Protestant. The arguments are technical and require a great deal of attention to the players and their followers and opponents. These passages are really quite tedious for the lay reader. Ultimately, O'Malley suggests that the period should be called “Early Modern Catholicism.” To me, it seems that this term is quite appropriate. Also, it fits in with similar descriptions such as Late Antiquity or the Early Medieval period.
Like one of the other reviewers, I was looking for a book that spent more time on Trent, its doctrines, and its legacy. Obviously, the author is not responsible for not writing the book I expected, and it would be uncharitable for me to rate his book on that basis. Nonetheless, forewarned is forearmed, so be aware of the book you are actually getting. If you are looking for the “inside game” of history, then this is your book. If not, then give it a miss.
