Das Wormser Schisma der Augsburger Konfessionsverwandten von 1557

The Worms Colloquy of 1557, in which eminent theologians took part, was the last imperial attempt to achieve religious unity in the 16th century. It quickly focused however on the serious conflict between the Protestant delegates concerning the condemnation of false doctrines. This conflict was the reason for the subsequent termination of the colloquy and also for the public rift among the adherents of the Augsburg Confession. In this book, Björn Slenczka reconstructs this rift for the first time on the basis of representative sources and sheds some light on the reasons for it. In doing so, he shows that the explosiveness of this rift led to a downright schism and determines to what extent leading theologians and politicians were responsible for this.