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The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of
Religious Knowledge, Philip Schaff Vol. V:
Abridged
and edited for greater clarity. |
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JAN
HUSS (1373–1415)Bohemian forerunner of Protestantism; the
link between John Wycliffe and Martin
Luther
John Huss, the famous
Reformer of Bohemia, was born at Hussinetz (Husinecz - near Prague) July 6,
1369, as commonly given; but the day is an inference from the fact that his
followers honored his memory on July 6, the day of his death, and the year is
probably too late; he was burned at the stake in Constance, July 6, 1415. John
Huss is his common English designation, but the name is more correctly written,
according to Slavic spelling, Hus. It is an abbreviation from his birthplace
made by himself about 1399; in earlier life he was always known as Johann or
Jan Hussinetz, or, in Latin, Johannes de Hussinetz. Hia parents were Czechs, of
meager financial means. Like Luther, be had to earn his living by singing and
performing humble services in the Church. He felt inclined toward the clerical
profession, not so much by an inner impulse as by the attraction of the
tranquil life of the clergy. He studied at Prague, where he must have been as
early as the middle of the eighties. He was greatly influenced by Stanislaus of
Znaim, who later was long his intimate friend, but finally his bitter enemy. As
a student Huss did not distinguish himself. The learned quotations of which he
boasted in his writings were mostly taken from Wycliffe's works. A hot temper
and arrogance were traits of his character, and he was not free from sophistry.
In 1393 he became bachelor of arts, in 1394 bachelor of theology, and in 1396
master of arts. In 1400 he was ordained priest, in 1401 he became dean of the
philosophical faculty, and in the following year rector. In 1402 he was
appointed also preacher of the Bethlehem Church in Prague, where he preached in
the Czech language.
After the
marriage of King Wenceslaus' sister, Anne, with Richard II. of England in 1382,
the philosophical writings of Wycliffe became known in Bohemia. As a student
Huss had been greatly attracted by them, particularly by his philosophical
realism. His inclination toward ecclesiastical reforms was awakened only by the
acquaintance with Wycliffe's theological writings. The so called Hussism in the
first decades of the fifteenth century was nothing but Wycliffism transplanted
into Bohemian soil. As such it maintained itself until the death of Huss, then
it turned into Utraquism, and with logical sequence there followed Taboritism.
The theological writings of Wycliffe spread widely in Bohemia. They had been
brought over, as is said, in 1401 or 1402 by Jerome of Prague, and Huss was
greatly moved by them. The university arose against the spread of the new
doctrines, and in 1403 prohibited a disputation on forty-five theses taken in
part from Wycliffe. Under Archbishop Sbinko of Hasenburg, Huss enjoyed in the
beginning a great reputation. In 1405 he was active as a synodical preacher,
but due to his severe attacks upon the clergy the bishop was compelled to
depose him.
The development of
conditions at the University of Prague depended to a great extent on the
question of the papal schism. King Wenceslaus, who was on the point of assuming
the reins of government, but whose plans were in no way furthered by Gregory
XII, renounced the latter and ordered his prelates to observe a strict
neutrality toward both popes, and he expected the same of the university. But
the archbishop remained faithful to Gregory, and at the university it was only
the Bohemian nation, with Huss as its spokesman, which avowed neutrality.
Incensed by this attitude, Wenceslaus, at the instigation of Huss and other
Czech leaders, issued a decree according to which there should be conceded to
the Bohemian nation three votes in all affairs of the University, while the
foreign nations, principally the German, should have only one vote. As a
consequence many German doctors, masters, and students left the university in
1409, and the University of Leipsic was founded. Thus Prague lost its
international importance and became a Czech school; but the emigrants spread
the fame of the Bohemian heresies into the most distant countries. The
archbishop was then isolated and Huss at the height of his fame. He became the
first rector of the Czech university, and enjoyed the favor of the court. In
the mean time, the doctrinal views of Wycliffe had spread over the whole
country. As long as Sbinko remained obedient to Gregory XII, all opposition to
the new spirit was in vain; but as soon as he submitted to Alexander V,
conditions changed. The archbishop brought his complaints before the papal see,
accusing the Wycliffites as the instigators of all ecclesiastical disturbances
in Bohemia. Thereupon the pope issued his bull of Dec. 20, 1409, which
empowered the archbishop to proceed against Wycliffism - all books of Wycliffe
were to be given up, his doctrines revoked, and free preaching discontinued.
After the publication of the bull in 1410, Huss appealed to the pope, but in
vain. All books and valuable manuscripts of Wycliffe were burned, and Huss and
his adherents put under the ban. This procedure caused an indescribable
commotion among the people down to the lowest classes; in some places turbulent
scenes occurred. The government took the part of Huss, and the power of his
adherents increased from day to day. He continued to preach in the Bethlehem
chapel, and became bolder and bolder in his accusations of the Church. The
churches of the city were put under the ban, and the interdict was pronounced
against Prague, but without result.
Sbinko died in 1411, and with his
death the religious movement in Bohemia entered a new phase - the disputes
concerning indulgences arose. In 1411 John XXIII issued his Cruciata
against King Ladislaus of Naples, the protector, of Gregory XII. In Prague also
the cross was preached, and preachers of indulgences urged people to crowd the
churches and give their offerings. There developed a traffic in indulgences.
Huss, following the example of Wycliffe, lifted up his voice against it and
wrote his famous Cruciata. But he could not carry with him the men of
the University. In 1412 a disputation took place, on which occasion Huss
delivered his Quæstio magistri Johannis Hus . . . de
indulgentiis. It was taken literally from the last chapter of Wycliffe's
book, De ecclesia, and his treatise, De absolutione a pena et
culpa. No pope or bishop, according to Wycliffe and Huss, has a right to
take up the sword in the name of the Church; he should pray for his enemies and
bless those that curse him. Man obtains forgiveness of sins by real repentance,
not for money. The doctors of the theological faculty replied, but without
success. A few days afterward the people, led by Wok of Waldstein, burnt the
papal bulls. Huss, they said, should be obeyed rather than the fraudulent mob
of adulterers and simonists(those who profit through the buying or selling
ecclesiastical preferments). Under the pressure of the opposing party, the king
was forced to punish every public insult of the pope and all opposition against
his bulls. Three men from the lower classes who openly contradicted the
preachers during their sermons and called indulgences a fraud were beheaded.
They were the first. martyrs of the Hussite Church. The theological faculty
requested Huss to present his speeches and doctrines to the dean for an
examination, but he refused. In the mean time the faculty had condemned the
forty-five articles anew and added several other heretical theses which had
originated with Huss. The king forbade the teaching of these articles, but
neither Huss nor the university approved of this summary condemnation,
requesting that the unscripturalness of the articles should be first proved.
The tumults at Prague had
stirred-up a sensation, unpleasant for the Roman party; papal legates and
Archbishop Albik tried to persuade Huss to give up his opposition against the
bulls, and the king made an unsuccessful attempt to reconcile the two parties.
In the mean time the clergy of Prague, through Michael de Causis, had brought
their complaints before the pope, and he ordered the cardinal of St. Angelo to
proceed against Huss without mercy. The cardinal put him Under the great church
ban. He was to be seized and delivered to the archbishop, and his chapel was to
be destroyed. Stricter measures against Huss and his adherents, the
counter-measures of the Hussites, and the appeal of Huss from the pope to Jesus
Christ as the supreme judge only intensified the excitement among the people
and forced Huss to depart from Prague in compliance with the wish of the king;
but his absence had not the expected effect. The excitement continued. The
king, being grieved by the disrepute of his country on account of the heresy,
made great efforts to harmonize the opposing parties. In 1412 he called
together the heads of his kingdom for a consultation and at their suggestion
ordered a synod to be held at Böhmisch-Brod on Feb. 2, 1412. It did not
take place there, but in the palace of the archbishops at Prague, Huss being
thus excluded from participation. Propositions were made for the restitution of
the peace of the Church, Huss requiring especially that Bohemia should have the
same freedom in regard to ecclesiastical affairs as other countries, and that
sanctions and condemnation should therefore be announced only with the
permission of the state power. This is wholly the doctrine of Wycliffe. These
followed treatises from both parties, but no harmony was obtained. "Even if I
should stand before the stake which has been prepared for me,"Huss wrote in
those days, ''I would never accept the recommendation of the theological
faculty." The synod did not produce any results, but the king did not yet give
up his hope -- he ordered a commission to continue the work of reconciliation.
The doctors of the university required from Huss and his adherents an approval
of their conception of the Church, according to which the pope is the head, the
cardinals the body of the Church, and that all regulations of this Church must
be obeyed. Huss protested vigorously against this conception since it made pope
and cardinals alone the Church. Nevertheless the Hussite party seems to have
approached the standpoint of their opponents as closely as possible. To the
article that the Roman Church must be obeyed, they added " so far as every
pious Christian is bound." Stanislaus of Znaim and Stephen of Palecs protested
against this addition and left the convention. The king exiled them, with two
other spokesmen. Of the writings occasioned by these controversies, that of
Huss on the Church (De ecclesia) had been most frequently quoted and admired or
criticized, and yet it is in the first ten chapters but a meagre epitome of
Wycliffe's work of the same title, and in the following chapters an abstract of
a work by the same author (De potestate pape) on the power of the
pope. Wycliffe had written his book to oppose the common view that the Church
consisted only of the clergy, and Huss now found himself in a similar
condition. He wrote his work at the castle of one of his protectors in Kozi
hradek, near Austie, and sent it to Prague, where it was publicly read in the
Bethlehem chapel. It was answered by Stanislaus of Znaim and Palecs with
treatises of the same title. After the most vehement opponents of Huss had left
Prague, his adherents occupied the whole ground. Huss wrote his treatises and
preached in the neighborhood of Kozi hradek. Bohemian Wycliffism was carried
into Poland, Hungary, Croatia, and Austria; but at the same time the papal
court was not inactive. In Jan., 1413, there assembled at Rome a general
council which condemned the writings of Wycliffe and ordered them to be burned.
To put an end to the
papal schism and to take up the long desired reform of the Church, a general
council was convened for Nov. 1, 1414, at Constance. The Emperor Sigismund,
brother of Wenceslaus, and heir to the Bohemian crown, was anxious to clear the
country from the blemish of heresy. Huss likewise was willing to make an end of
all dissensions, and gladly followed the request of Sigismund to go to
Constance. From the sermons which he took along, it is evident that he purposed
to convert the assembled fathers to his own (i.e, Wycliffe's) principal
doctrines. Sigismund promised him safe conduct. Provided with sufficient
testimonies concerning his orthodoxy, and after having made his will as if he
had divined his death, he started on his journey (Oct. 11, 1414). On Nov. 3 he
arrived at Constance, and on the following day the bulletins on the church
doors announced that Michael of Deutschbrod would be the opponent of Huss, the
heretic. In the beginning Huss was at liberty, making his abode at the house of
a widow, but after a few weeks his opponents succeeded in imprisoning him, on
the strength of a rumor that he intended to flee. He was first brought into the
residence of a canon, and later, on Dec. 8, into the dungeon of the Dominican
monastery. Sigismund was greatly angered at the abuse of his fetter of safe
conduct and threatened the prelates with dismissal, but when it was hinted that
in such a case the council would be dissolved, there was nothing left for him
but to accommodate himself to the circumstances. Thus the fate of Huss was
sealed. On Dec. 4 the pope had entrusted a committee of three bishops with a
preliminary investigation against him. The witnesses for the prosecution were
heard, but Huss was refused an advocate for his defense. His situation became
worse after the catastrophe of John XXIII, who had left Constance to evade the
necessity of abdicating. So far Huss had been the captive of the pope and in
constant communication with his friends, but now he was delivered to the
archbishop of Constance and brought to his castle, Gottlieben on the Rhine.
Here he remained seventy-three days, separated from his friends, chained day
and night, poorly fed, and tortured by disease.
On June 5 he was tried for the
first time, and for that purpose was transferred to the Franciscan monastery,
where he spent the last weeks of his life. He acknowledged the writings on the
Church against Palecz and Stanislaus of Znaim as his own, and declared himself
willing to recant, if errors should be proven to him. Huss conceded his
veneration of Wycliffe, and said that he could only wish his soul might some
time attain unto that place where Wycliffe's was. On the other band, he denied
having defended Wycliffe's doctrine of the Lord's Supper, or the forty-five
articles; he had only opposed their summary condemnation. The king admonished
him to deliver himself up to the mercy of the council, as he did not desire to
protect a heretic. At the last trial, on June 8, there were read to him
thirty-nine sentences, twenty-six of which bad been excerpted from his book on
the Church, seven from his treatise against Palacz, and six from that against
Stanislaus. Almost all of his articles may be traced back to Wycliffe. The
danger of some of these doctrines as regards worldly power was explained to the
emperor to incite him against Huss. The latter declared himself willing to
submit if he could be convinced of errors. He desired only a fairer trial and
more time to explain the reasons for his views. If his reasons and Bible tests
did not suffice, he would be glad to be instructed. This declaration was
considered an unconditional surrender, and be was asked to confess (1) that he
had erred in the theses which he had hitherto maintained; (2) that he renounced
them for the future; (3) that be recanted them; and (4) that he declared the
opposite of these sentences. He asked to be exempted from recanting doctrines
which be had never taught; others, which the assembly considered erroneous, he
was willing to revoke; to set differently would be against his conscience.
These words found no favorable reception. After the trial on June 8, several
other attempts were made to induce him to recant, but he resisted all of them.
The attitude of Sigismund was due to political considerations -- he looked upon
the return of Huss to his country as dangerous, and thought the terror of
execution would not he without effect. Huss no longer hoped for life, indeed
martyrdom responded to an inner desire of his being.
The condemnation
took place on July 6 in the presence of the solemn assembly of the council in
the cathedral. After the performance of high mass and liturgy, Huss was led
into the church. The bishop of Lodi delivered as oration on the duty of
eradicating heresy; then some theses of Huss and Wycliffe and a report of his
trial were read. He protested loudly several times, and when his appeal to
Christ was rejected as a condemnable heresy, he exclaimed, "O God and Lord, now
the Council condemns even thine own act and thine own law as heresy, since thou
thyself didst lay thy cause before thy Father as the just judge, as an example
for us, whenever we are sorely oppressed." An Italian prelate pronounced the
sentence of condemnation upon Huss and his writings. Again he protested loudly,
saying that even at this hour be did not wish anything but to be convinced from
Holy Scripture. He fell upon his knees and asked God with a low voice to
forgive all his enemies. Then followed his degradation - he was dressed in
priestly vestments and again asked to recant; again he refused. With curses his
ornaments were taken from him, his priestly tonsure(the part of a cleric's
head, usually the crown, left bare by shaving the hair) was destroyed, and
the sentence was pronounced that the Church had deprived him of all rights and
delivered him to the secular powers. Then a high paper hat was put upon his
head, with the inscription Hæresiarcha(Heretic). Thus Huss was
led away to the stake under a strong guard of armed men. At the place of
execution he knelt down, spread out his hands, and prayed aloud. Some of the
people asked that a confessor should be given him, but a bigoted priest
exclaimed, a heretic should neither be heard nor given a confessor. The
executioners undressed Huss and tied. his hands behind his back with ropes, and
his neck with a chain to a stake around which wood and straw had been piled up
so that it covered, him to the neck. Still at the last moment, the imperial
marshal, Von Pappenheim, in the presence of the Count Palatine, asked him to
save his life by a recantation, but Huss declined with the words "God is my
witness that I have never taught that of which I have been accused by false
witnesses. In the truth of the Gospel which I have written, taught, and
preached I will die today with gladness." There-upon the fire was kindled. With
uplifted voice Huss sang, " Christ, thou Son of the living God, have mercy upon
me." When he started this for the third time and continued "who art born of
Mary the virgin," ' the wind blew the flame into his face; he still moved lips
and head, and then died of suffocation. His clothes were thrown into the fire,
his ashes gathered and cast into the near-by Rhine.
The
Czech people, who in his lifetime had loved Huss as their prophet and apostle,
now adored him as their saint and martyr. He possessed high virtues, but in his
struggles with the University of Prague and his ecclesiastical opponents he can
not be freed altogether from the reproach of slander and abuse. His learning
was not of a universal range; wherever he goes beyond Wycliffe, he falters and
becomes dull or verbose. He left only a few reformatory writings in the proper
sense of the word, most of his works being polemical treatises against
Stanislaus and Polecz. It is doubtful whether he knew all the works of
Wycliffe. He translated the Trialogus, and was very familiar with his
works on the body of the Lord, on the Church, on the power of the pope, and
especially with his sermons. The book on the Church and on the power of the
pope contains the essence of the doctrine of Huss. According to it, the Church
is not that hierarchy which is generally designated as Church; the Church is
the entire body of those who from eternity have been predestined for salvation.
Christ, not the pope, is its head. It is no article of faith that one must obey
the pope to be saved. Neither external membership in the Church nor churchly
offices and dignities are a surety that the persons in question are members of
the true Church. What he says in his sermons on the corruption of the Church,
clergy, and monks, on the duties of secular powers, etc., he has taken almost
literally from Wycliffe. His three. great sermons, De sufficientia legis
Christi, De fidei sum elucidatione, and De pact, with
which he thought to carry away the whole council at Constance, are exact
reproductions of Wycliffe's sermons. He claims not to have shared Wycliffe's
views regarding the sacraments, but this is not certain. The soil had been well
prepared for this very doctrine in Bohemia. There are reasons to suppose that
Wycliffe's doctrine of the Lords' Supper bad spread to Prague as early as 1399.
It gained an even wider circulation after it had been prohibited in 1403, and
Huss preached and taught it, although it is possible that he simply repeated it
without advocating it. But the doctrine was seized eagerly by the radical
party, the Taborites, who made it the central point of their system.
Source of his InfluenceThe great success of Huss in his
native country was due mainly to his unsurpassed pastoral activity, which far
excelled that of the famous old preachers of Bohemia. But even here Huss was
the docile pupil of the Englishman. Huss himself put the highest value on the
sermon and knew how to awaken the enthusiasm of the masses. His sermons are
often inflammatory as regards their contents; he introduces his quarrels with
his spiritual superiors, criticizes contemporaneous events, or appeals to his
congregation as witness or judge. It was this bearing which multiplied his
adherents, and thus he became the true apostle of his English master without
being himself a theorist in theological questions. In the art of governing and
leading masses he was unexcelled. Huss' warm friend and devoted follower,
Jerome of Prague, shared his fate, although he did not suffer death till nearly
a year later. |
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