SPREADING REFORMATION IN EASTERN SLOVAKIA IN THE 16th CENTURY AND ITS IMPACT ON TRANSCARPATHIA’S SOCIAL AND POLITICAL LIFE

Abstract

The article highlights the issue of dissemination of the religious, social and political movement widely known as the process of European Reformation on the territory of Eastern Slovakia. In particular, the author traces back the process of adopting legal religious principles and the attempts to achieve top-level systematization of spiritual life management.

Actually, Reformation penetrated into the territory of Slovakia in the early  1520s. Along with the changes in social and political life occurring in Slovakian lands, there were changes in cultural and religious life of the country as well.  Throughout the 16th century new religious movements referring directly to the European Reformation spread all over the territory of Slovakia. It is common knowledge that the Reformation processes led to division of the Roman Catholic Church and formation of new religious doctrines. They were manifested to different extents of efficiency practically in all the countries of the Catholic world. Establishment of new religious principles had a significant impact on the position of the church as a big landowner as well as a component of the feudal system, affecting the role of the Catholicism as a major ideological power. Throughout the 16th century Reformation appeared in the form of widespread religious, social and political movements demanding to reform the Catholic Church and radically change its conventional dogmata and practices, which had been ingrained for years.

At the end of the century practically all over the territory of the Eastern Slovakia there were organized Seniorates and appeared the first attempts to systematize spiritual life management at top level. The first attempts to spread new religious movements were supported by the population of most eastern Slovakian cities, which was to a certain extent, an impetus to further development of the Reformation movement. While Slovaks and Germans longed for the Lutheran form of the Reformation, Hungarian residents were inclined to adopt Calvinism and Anabaptism. Thus, crystallization of Reformation was gradually building up and strengthening its position.

The process mentioned above influenced the lands which are nowadays a part of Transcarpathian region of Ukraine. As Transcarpathia is located in the immediate vicinity of Slovakia, it is reasonable to examine the experience and impact of the process of Slovakian Reformation on the Transcarpathian realia of those days.

Borys, I. (2019). Spreading Reformation in Eastern Slovakia in the 16th Century and Its Impact on Transcarpathia’s Social and Political Life. Mìžnarodnì zv’âzki Ukraïni: naukovì pošuki ì znahìdki – The International relations of Ukraine: scientific searches and findings, 28, 27-44 [in Ukrainian].