Editing Reformation (section)

=== Historiography ===
Margaret C. Jacob argues that there has been a dramatic shift in the historiography of the Reformation. Until the 1960s, historians focused their attention largely on the great leaders and theologians of the 16th century, especially Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli. Their ideas were studied in depth. However, the rise of the [[social history|new social history]] in the 1960s led to looking at history from the bottom up, not from the top down. Historians began to concentrate on the values, beliefs and behavior of the people at large. She finds, "in contemporary scholarship, the Reformation is now seen as a vast cultural upheaval, a social and popular movement, textured and rich because of its diversity."{{sfn|Jacob|1991|p= 215}}

For example, historian John Bossy characterized the Reformation as a period where Christianity was re-cast not as "a community sustained by ritual acts, but as a teaching enforced by institutional structures," for Catholics as well as Protestants;<ref group= note>"But in the Renaissance era, and even more so in the Reformation period which followed, reliance on symbol and image gave way to the privileging of the printed or spoken word. Peace remained a fundamental Christian aspiration, but ritual and sacrament gave way to persuasion and instruction as the means to achieve it."{{harvnb|Duffy|2016}}.</ref><ref group= note>"Until the seventeenth century, …Christianity meant a body of people, but since then it refers only to a body of beliefs." {{cite journal |last1= Lewis |first1= Eleanor V. |title= (Review) Christianity in the West, 1400–1700. By John Bossy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1985 |journal= Church History |date= June 1986 |volume= 55 |issue=2 |pages= 225–26 |doi= 10.2307/3167429 |jstor= 3167429 |s2cid=162279854}}</ref> and sin was re-cast from the [[seven deadly sins]] —wrong because antisocial— to transgressions of the [[Ten Commandments]] —wrong as affronts to God.