Mit Liebe und Sanftmut eines Besseren belehren: Die lange Reformation als anhaltende Krise der Autorität

Abstract

This article examines the conflict between Antoine Lescaille and the two pastors Léonard Constant and Jacques Couet of the French church of Basel. In 1590, Lescaille criticized the pastors’ teachings on the doctrine of justification. He expected to be properly instructed on his alleged errors and mistakes subsequently, however, the pastors insisted that as a layman he could not truly understand the complexity of the subject to begin with. Rather than exhaustively explain the theological doctrine of the Justification, the pastors approached Lescaille with «love and humility,» hoping this would help restore his trust in the French church and the pastors’ teachings. By examining this conflict and the French church’s strategies to handle Lescaille, this article illuminates how the long Reformation was driven by a clerical institutionalization of the Protestant church by the end of the 16th century, and how the long Reformation must be understood as an ongoing crisis of authority.