Lichtgedanken 02

S C HW E R P U N K T 13 02 | LICHT GEDANKEN Martin Luther’s gravestone in the Church of St. Michael’s. Commissioned by Johann Friedrich I. after Luther’s death, the bronze epitaph was intended for Luther’s grave in Wittenberg’s Schlosskirche, but it never arrived. Since 1571, the stone has been in the ownership of the university. It was above all the consequences of the Reformation that were dramatic for the town and its development to this day. After Luther’s death in 1546, Em- peror Charles V waged war against the »Schmalkaldic League«, an alliance of local Protestant rulers, in order to push back against the Reformation and Pro- testantism in the country. Besides the Hessian Landgrave Philipp, Johann Friedrich I. from Saxony, was also at the head of the Schmalkaldic League. In 1547, the alliance had to acknowledge defeat against the imperial troops, while Johann Friedrich I. – today affectiona- tely known as Hanfried by the people of Jena – was taken prisoner and lost large parts of his lands. He also had to relinquish Wittenberg and his univer- sity. In 1548, the staunch supporter of the Lutheran Reformation therefore set up the »Hohe Schule« in his remaining dominions, or in the former Dominican monastery in Jena, to be more precise. Ten years later, it was raised to the status of a university. »The foundation of the university is probably the most visible consequence of the Reformation for Jena to this day,« Prof. Dr Christopher Spehr emphasizes. The Professor of Church History is the authorized representative of the FSU’s Executive Committee for the anniversary of the Reformation (in- terview p. 20). »The University of Jena was intended to be the ’better Witten- berg’ from the outset.« The royal house of the Ernestines to which Johann Friedrich I. belonged, supported the ideas of the Reforma- tion and flew the flag for the Lutheran faith. The Ernestines had their archive of manuscripts and prints transported from Wittenberg to Weimar; the royal library – the Bibliotheca Electoralis – came to Jena and today it forms part of the Thuringian State and University Library (ThULB). They include Luther’s personal copies of the Old and New Testaments with hand-written annota- tions. Further collections of Protestant manuscripts and cultural assets were added in the course of the centuries; to preserve Luther’s legacy, the Ernestine Dukes – in competition with the Witten- bergs – had a Jena edition of all Luther’s writings published. A printing works was established in 1554 on the premises of Jena’s Carmelite monastery on what is today Engelplatz. The first edition of the »Jena Luther Edition« was pub- lished there from 1555 to 1558. Scientific networks established — contemporary witnesses made public All this today forms the basis for nu- merous research projects which in the course of the past Luther decade have produced insights under the leadership of the FSU, contributed to the scientific debate on the Reformation with sym- posia, publications and ideas as well as establishing an active network between research facilities, archives and libraries. Above all, however, research into the Reformation in Jena has paved the way for making the unique documents from Luther’s time available to a wider pu- blic and preserving them for scientific research for posterity: They are available for viewing by anybody in the »Digital Reformation Archive« (p. 16), and scien- tists at the FSU were also instrumental in designing the exhibition »Luther and the Germans« (p. 14) which can be seen in Wartburg Castle until November. These, and further research projects and their results are presented on the follo- wing pages. F E AT U R E