I don’t listen to many podcasts. But when a friend told me that Tom Holland had done five episodes on Martin Luther at The Rest is History I immediately added it to the list. You know, the list. Despite his quirks and Roman Catholic leanings, I think Tom Holland does a remarkable job of telling Luther’s story, one that was both objective and almost as ostentatious as the German Reformer. Holland also avoids hagiography. And I’m sure Luther wouldn’t have been slow to point to his own his clay feet. Simul Iustus et Peccator, after all. However, I do have one point of contention with something Holland states on more than one occasion: the idea that Luther together with the Reformation at large sowed the seeds for relativism and radical subjectivism.

There Is (and Was) a Place for Protest(antism)

As I set out to respond to this claim, it’s worth noting that it’s actually fairly commonplace. Furthermore, the claim is also an old one. In his Christian Worldview, Herman Bavinck writes: “Rome charges the Reformation, day after day, of being the actual origin of subjectivism and individualism, of autonomy and anarchy, which now apply to all domains.” Bavinck wrote that in 1913, meaning the Reformation has been accused of an autonomous and individualistic spirit for centuries. This begs the question: was Luther a radical subjectivist, as Holland suggests? Was his project driven by a desire for autonomy, to overthrow every and any authority? More broadly, was the Reformation motivated by kind of anarchist spirit, laying the ground work for expressive individualism and relativism?

Bavinck goes on to offer a solid and concise answer. “This claim,” he writes, “is directly in conflict with history. Every unbiased judge will recognise that protesting in itself does not at all necessitate coming to a principle of autonomy. The prophets lived in continual protest against their people. Jesus protested in the name of the Law and the Prophets against the traditions of the elders, against human commandments.” Quite simply, Bavinck challenges the idea that protesting—and the eponymous Protestantism—is always animated by the desire for autonomy. In other words, subjectivism and relativism don’t lie behind every challenge laid against authority.

In fact, as Bavinck continues, “Whoever would attribute all protest to autonomy and anarchy would give a carte blanche to lies and injustice and must condemn all reformation as devilish work.” Building on the lengthier quote above, Bavinck shows that protest is often necessary, though not necessarily anti-authoritarian.

Martin Luther Opposed Abusive Authority, Not All Authority

Thus, we needn’t conclude that the Reformation was the work of radical individualists. Martin Luther’s may have railed vehemently against Roman Catholic authority, but not because he deemed all authority problematic or oppressive. 

Coming back to Bavinck, “Everything comes to the question: In whose name and against what does this protest go forth? And there is no doubt,” he answers, “that from the beginning the Reformation was a protest in the name of the word of Christ and his apostles against the deviations that had invaded the Roman church in the domain of life and doctrine.” Amen. Luther embodied this protest, enraged not so much by the personal inconvenience of Roman power but its gross theological error and abusive malpractice. For many of his contemporaries, Luther wasn’t radical enough, something Tom Holland observes well in the podcast. Together with the other Magisterial Reformers, Luther’s wasn’t playing for autonomy but protesting the excesses of authority, embodied by the Roman Catholic Church. I think it was Gerald Bray who remarked that the Reformation wasn’t fundamentally an argument about justification but authority.

This concern for true authority makes the Reformation profoundly relevant to modern discussions. For starters, protest isn’t anti-authoritarian. Well, it doesn’t need to be. Protestantism wasn’t. The Reformers voluntarily bound themselves to other authorities, from the Bible through to their confessions, creeds and councils. They also strove to locate themselves in the larger historic Christian tradition. This was very likely because they knew as individuals they didn’t have all the answers. Like every human person, they understood that subjectivism is unavoidable, making community and accountability crucial. However, they didn’t lapse into relativism. Probably because they knew that it’s profoundly illogical and practically unworkable.

Don’t Confuse Evangelicalism and Individualism with the Reformation

Before concluding with Bavinck, I’d like to take a brief detour with two contemporary theologians: Michael Horton and Robert Letham. Both identify the challenge of autonomy in the 21st century church. However, both see this as an overcorrection within broad Evangelicalism, imbued by individualism—that is to say, it isn’t Reformed. As Horton puts it, in Introducing Covenant Theology, today “the individual self is sovereign,” which completely misses the Reformers’ emphasis on covenant solidarity. Similarly, in his Work of Christ, Letham notes that the Reformers saw Roman Catholicism putting ecclesiology over soteriology, but their solution wasn’t to enshrine the individual and her salvation at the expense of the church and her authority.

But Bavinck does even better, both in bringing his response together and also by anticipating where the West was—and is currently—heading. He writes, “The battle today is no longer about the authority of pope or council, of church and confession; for countless others it is no longer even about the authority of Scripture or the person of Christ. The question on the agenda asks, as principally as possible, whether there is still some authority and some law to which the human being is bound.” I find it remarkable that he penned those words over a century ago, since they’re even truer today. Is there any place for external authority left or is the individual absolutely free? Our zeitgeist says the individual should never be bound to anyone or by anything. The Spirit of God says otherwise.