| Sumario: | The emergence of religious toleration was one of the most important features of the development of Western society after the Reformation. While previous research has concentrated largely on ideas of toleration, this study of the Lutheran Imperial City of Hamburg is the first major analysis of the way in which those ideas were received and gradually implemented. Like Amsterdam and London, Hamburg was one of the most dynamic mercantile centres of early modern Europe. It attracted substantial numbers of Catholics, Calvinists and Jews. Dr Whaley examines the factors, which influenced the often uneasy relationship with the Lutheran majority. He illuminates the interaction between religion, politics and social change, and he analyses the impact of international movements and German Imperial legislation on local controversies. The first chapter describes the evolution of the city from the Reformation to the nineteenth century. The following chapters discuss the differing fortunes of the Catholic, Calvinist and Jewish communities. Chapter 5 then examines the context and course of the debate which finally led to the promulgation of a formal toleration edict for non-Lutheran Christians (but excluding the Jews) in 1785. Chapter 6 explores the broader reasons why it took so long to grant so little by examining the 'Image of the City': an analysis of the major religious and secular festivities, like the centenaries of the Reformation, illuminates those deep-rooted political and ideological factors which cancelled out the obvious and increasingly pressing economic and humanitarian arguments in favour of open toleration until 1785. This book throws new light on the history of religious toleration. It reveals the relationship between high theoretical principles and practical problems of society and politics in Germany in the three centuries after the Reformation. To understand the problem of toleration, Dr Whaley argues, is to understand the world, which the problem often threatened to destroy.
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