Posted on 07/05/2020 8:05:23 PM PDT by CheshireTheCat
On this date in 1415, Czech theologian Jan Hus was burned at the stake at Konstanz for heresy. Hus might be the most consequential pre-Lutheran Christian religious reformer, and the Hussite faith he founded still persists to this day.
In his own time, Hus expounded a reformist theology inspired by John Wycliffe, and putting Holy Writ into the vernacular was essential to his program. His religious movement found common cause with a Bohemian political interest in exploiting western Christendom’s clown carful of rival popes to stake out greater national independence.
He eventually met his martyrdom by agreeing to come to the Council of Konstanz (Constance) under a guarantee of safe conduct, where prelates were going to sort out their rival popes and do the periodic Church reform thing...
(Excerpt) Read more at executedtoday.com ...
I’ve read that Hus failed where Luther succeeded was because of the invention of the printing press. Luther’s ideas were able to spread; Hus’s weren’t.
Is Hus still condemned by the Roman church?
That and the Muslim horde. Hus preached that Christians could never fight in a war. Luther at first liked this angle, and included in his 97 thesis several swipes at papal attempts to raise money for the defense of Christendom. He even called Mohammed the chastisement of God, and eagerly awaited the destruction of Christian kingdoms. German princes who didn’t want to spend money defending others LOVED what Luther had to say, but when Islam threatened the German princes who aligned with him, he changed his tune on just how awesome Mohammed was.
Hus was also anything but a fighter for the little guy. In the medieval era, it became common for only the transsubstantiated bread to be offered to the laity. There were no “extraordinary ministers of the eucharist”, and it was quite awkward for a priest to juggle both the cup and the palate at once. The Catholic Church taught that both the bread and wine became “the body and blood, soul and divinity of Christ.” In places like seminaries however, where multiple priests typically said a given mass, it was quite easy to provide both “species” (bread and wine). So when Hus found his message more popular among the urban elites than the countryfolk, he started preaching that only the bread became only the body, and only the wine became only the blood. Those who ate only the body, he taught, were unsaved, doomed to Hell, and not part of the discerning body of Christ. As such, the ruling class, the urban elites, etc., were able to find that only they had the Holy Spirit.
What a despicable heresy! Thus, from the man who argued that no Christian could ever fight in a war, we also find the basis for Luther’s preaching that the poor and rural were worthy of nothing other than to be cannon fodder.
No, he isn't.
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Benedict XVI confronts the ghost of Jan Hus
Sep 27, 2009, by John L. Allen Jr., Prague
Though lengthy volumes have been written about Christian history in the Czech lands, the casual observer really only needs two words to understand the striking ambivalence that Catholicism often evokes here: Jan Hus.
In America, “Good King Wenceslas” is probably the single most famous figure from Czech history, owing largely to the popular Christmas carol. His memory lives on here too, but more commonly it’s the medieval preacher Jan Hus who is lionized as the real father of the Czech nation and the embodiment of its virtues. The fact that Hus was burned at the stake by the Catholic church in 1415 goes a long way toward explaining why, for some locals, being Czech and being hostile to Catholicism are practically the same thing.
Prague’s Cardinal Miloslav Vlk has played a lead role in trying to heal that wound. Beginning in 1993, Vlk chaired a commission that studied Hus’ life and legacy, with an eye towards reevaluation. In 1995, Vlk became the first official representative of the Catholic church ever to attend a memorial of Hus’ death, held at the Bethlehem Chapel where Hus preached from 1402 to 1412. One year later, Vlk expressed regret in the name of all Czech Catholics for Hus’ death.
Those efforts culminated in a three-day symposium dedicated to Hus in Rome in 1999, when Pope John Paul II issued a historic apology for his “cruel death” and praised him for his “moral courage.”
That history formed the backdrop to Pope Benedict XVI’s meeting this afternoon in Prague with leaders of other Christian churches in the Czech Republic, held at the headquarters of the Archdiocese of Prague.
https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/ncr-today/benedict-xvi-confronts-ghost-jan-hus
Luther learned from Hus not to go to their meeting.
Hus or Hussitism?
Hus was quite possibly manipulated into his despicable heresies. His acceptance of Pope Gregory XII’s condemnation of Wycliffe’s doctrine of impanation (that God became bread) suggests a willingness to be faithful to higher authorities, that would be legitimately frustrated by the existence of an antipope, John XXIII (not to be confused with the legitimate Pope John XXIII of Vatican II). On the other hand, it’s almost impossible to imagine him being naive as to the politicization of the University of Prague: he was made rector of the University of Prague when King Wenceslaus destroyed its international character by giving the Bohemian college a majority of votes, resulting in the international students and doctors returning to their homeland and establishing their own colleges. (This probably also doomed Hussitism to remain a local matter.)
This is not to whitewash what scandalized Hus. Whereas Luther was peddling trash and slander by his preaching against the sale of indulgences, what Hus saw was absolutely unholy! King Ladislaus of Naples protected Pope Gregory against antipope Alexander V, so Alexander raised funds for war against Ladislaus by selling indulgences for a crusade. Wenceslaus and the archbishop he had been obedient to sided with Alexander. The evil of that war led Hus to his absolute pacifism (which probably earns him lots of points among the Francischurch types). The fact that it was against his King and his archbishop probably shows its absolute sincerity, even if he learned the wrong lesson. As such, he may well have a much cleaner conscience than Luther, of whom I cannot imagine why nearly all historians, including Catholics, assume such sincerity.
As I understand it, if he truly believed in his heresies, he is a heretic, perhaps even an apostate, but not necessarily guilty of mortal sin.
Oh, and of course, the fact that he drove out of the University of Prague anyone who wasn’t Bohemian certainly made it easier for his ideas to spread in Bohemia, but earned him great animosity throughout the rest of Europe.
There’s a gulf of difference between “he was treated terribly by people speaking in our name” and “he was right” or even “he was reasonable.”
Obviously.
I never said differently.
Thank you.
Just as a reference point, is Martin Luther still condemned?
I have no idea. That is God's call.
If you want an official point of view you can "google" that very question.
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