Review Author(s): J. B. Owens Review by: J. B. Owens Source: The Sixteenth Century Journal, Vol. 15, No. 3 (Autumn, 1984), pp. 381-383 Published by: Sixteenth Century Journal Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2540781 Accessed: 07-06-2016 17:02 UTC Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. Sixteenth Century Journal is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Sixteenth Century Journal This content downloaded from 132.178.94.23 on Tue, 07 Jun 2016 17:02:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms Book Reviews 381 Of particular interest is Kyle's chapter on Knox's political thought and the development of resistance theory. Kyle chronicles both the backgrounds and specific devel- opment of Knox's resistance theory as well as pulling together the various topical aspects of it and the influences that led to Knox's final views. Kyle argues that it was the Old Testament with its numerous stories of the deposition of rulers that was "the prin- ciple source for Knox's theory of resistance." Theologically he based his political thought on Old Testament views of covenant, sin, divine immutability and the contention that the civil power must support true religion. The New Testament he interpreted in light of the Old. Politically, Knox saw the king as charged with establishing "true religion;" if he fails, then the nobles must take the responsibility. The nobles themselves should abolish idolatry (i.e. Catholicism), protect subjects, teach God's word and glorify God even if this means rebellion against the monarch. If the nobles failed in these duties, the people who were generally to obey their magistrates in all things not at variance with God's laws, must take up the task of their callings even if this meant armed rebellion. As Knox said, "God has ... armed subjects against their natural kings, and commanded them to take vengeance upon them according to his law." Parliament and the Church also were charged in Knox's view with political func- tions as well as spiritual ones. While Knox developed "no consistent theory of rebellion," he did teach "the practical duty of insurgence only when no other means is available for carrying out what he believed to be the will of God." While Knox accepted some of Calvin's resistance teachings, he went beyond the Genevan in certain ways as well. There is much more to learn from this splendid study. Specialists may question some of Kyle's specific interpretations. But Knoxian studies now have been greatly enriched by Kyle's labors. Donald K. McKim University of Dubuque Theological Seminary The Emperor and his Chancellor: A Study of the Imperial Chancellery under Gattinara, by John M. Headley. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983. xi + 188 pp. $42.50. Alba: A Biography of Fernando Alvarez de Toledo, Third Duke of Alba, 1507-1582, by William S. Maltby. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London: University of California Press, 1983. xvii + 378 pp. $29.50. The books reviewed here deal with important servants of two major Habsburg rulers of the sixteenth century: Charles V and Philip II. Each author demonstrates the role of personality in the shaping of historical events. Headley has not attempted to write the biography of Mercurino de Gattinara which we still need. Instead he deals with institutional developments within the upper levels of Charles V's administration during the 1520s. His thesis is that this decade witnessed the transition from the medieval chancellery which oversaw all government business to a "cameral" regime of state secretaries in direct contact with the ruler. While Headley's excellent technical and linguistic preparation provided him with a perfect background for research on Charles' administration, his description of institu- tional change is not completely satisfying. Part of the problem is that the book is not well organized to argue clearly his hypothesis. Headley admits that his work began as a study of conflicts between Gattinara and various secretaries for influence with the young emperor, and the discussion of institutions often becomes obscured by elaborate narration of these personal problems. Moreover, basic issues of institutional history are not addressed directly enough. For example, even though some scholars have been skeptical of the presence of any overall imperial chancellery under Gattinara, Headley does not present his case for its existence until chapter four, and neither this chapter nor the appended documents will satisfy doubters. This content downloaded from 132.178.94.23 on Tue, 07 Jun 2016 17:02:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 382 Sixteenth Century Journal The evidence Headley has so skillfully dug out of various archives in five countries suggests a somewhat different interpretation. Rather than a period of transition from one type of bureaucratic institution to another, the 1520s really saw the creation of a new assemblage of diverse and scattered territories under a single ruler but without existing institutional ties. Since he was so young, older men struggled to gain control over Charles as he made decisions about how he would govern such an empire. In this for- mative period. Gattinara sought to dominate affairs by imposing the traditional prerogatives of the Burgundian Grand Chancellor on the entire administration. This strategy ran into two serious obstacles. First, Castile was the physical locus of Charles' government during the crucial central years of the 1 520s, and the chancellery there had no tradition of the type of control Gattinara desired to provide him with an adequate in- stitutional base. His own reorganization of the more established Aragonese-Castilian conciliar system had the paradoxical effect of giving the rival state secretaries a strong bureaucratic position. More serious than institutional obstacles was the fact that Charles wanted to be his own boss. As Gattinara more frequently abused his own position in an attempt to force Charles to adhere to his political line, the more clearly the emperor would see the danger which a chief bureaucrat able to discipline the entire admintration would be to the ruler's independence. The climax was Gattinara's attempt to thwart his master's will in January 1526 when the chancellor refused to affix the seals to the treaty of Madrid. Headley's discussion of Gattinara's role in the crisis of imperial-papal relations in 1526-1527 demonstrates the chancellor's personal rather than bureaucratic role. Gattinara was an important figure in the early development of Charles V's government, and Headley has performed a service by digging out interesting information on his role. But after reading what the author has discovered, it is hard to agree with his assessment that Gattinara was "the first modern bureaucrat" or "an administrative genius of the first order." (p. 141) While Headley's book will attract only a small group of specialists, Maltby's work deserves wide attention, and no review will do it justice. The author writes with a clarity, intelligence and style which can only be appreciated by direct contact with his text. He presents his points in such an attractive manner that I am tempted to lace this review with quotations which would push it well past my assigned word limit. Moreover, Maltby's sound judgments about both the difficult subject of this biography and about matters ranging from domestic issues to military affairs in the sixteenth century display a level of scholarly maturity to which few historians arrive. Alba is a worthy companion in the University of California's series of biographies to Peter Brown's magnificent Augustine of Hippo, and readers of this journal would be foolish to deny themselves the pleasure of reading this book. One can only hope for a paperback edition inexpensive enough to assign the students. As a result of his earlier work on the Black Legend, one of whose components is Alba's terror campaign in the Netherlands, Maltby was attracted by the challenge of understanding a man who successfully sought to become a symbol in the political and religious conflicts of his time. Both because of the complexity of Alba's career as soldier and statesman and because his symbolic status has led to sharply contrasting images of his character among those who see him either as hero or archvillain, a biography of the third duke was no easy task, and it is difficult to imagine that we will get a better one than Maltby's. There are two areas where the book is particularly splendid. Alba was above all a soldier, and even a reader little interested in military history will be drawn to Maltby's discussions of the development of the duke's military insights, especially during the Danube campaign of 1546. Sixteenth century European warfare was lethal but short on the possibility for great conquests, and Alba observed that the wise general preserved This content downloaded from 132.178.94.23 on Tue, 07 Jun 2016 17:02:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms Book Reviews 383 and disciplined his army, harassed opponents to break morale, and risked battle only when his advantage was overwhelming. Secondly, Alba's policy of terror in the Low Countries is the basis of his historical prominence, and Maltby's ability to weave together character and situation to explain the disaster j ustifies by itself a special place for this book among works on the sixteenth century. My complaints are petty. Perhaps conjecture and guesswork in the absence of evidence (pages 10, 244 and 278) exceed what an historian should attempt. While Maltby does a good job of correcting misconceptions about the nature of factional rivalries early in the reign of Philip II, his discounting of ideological isues (p. 76) is undermined when these are introduced later (pp. 122 and 124). There are clear, useful maps to help the reader understand the major military campaigns. However, the one on page 136 is poorly placed, and several towns mentioned in the text are not included on other maps (Cherasco, Orbitello and Port' Ercole on page 91; Nereto on page 102; Estroil on page 294). The system of measurement changes from kilometers to miles between pages 19 and 21. It appears "now" should be "not" in the first line of the quotation on page 154. Finally, there were eighteen, rather than seventeen, Castilian towns with voting rights in the Cortes of 1538 (p. 40). Granada would be offended; in a book this good, one tends to expect perfection. J. B. Owens Idaho State University Gesetz, Evangleium und Busse. Theologiegeschichtliche Studien zum Verhlitnis zwischen dem jungen Agricola (Eisleben) und Martin Luther. Steffen Kjeldgaard-Pedersen. Translated by Monika Wesemann. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1983, 394 pp., 110 guilders This study, originally presented for the doctorate in theology at the University of Copenhagen, reflects the kind of meticulous, concentrated, textual analysis encouraged by the well-known Luther scholar, Leif Grane. The value of Kjeldgaard-Pedersen's work lies in its pioneering effort to deal comprehensively with eight of Johann Agricola's earliest publications, 1524-1527. Its thesis is that fundamental theological differences between Agricola and Luther were present as early as Agricola's first Wit- temberg period, 1516-1525. The two began from different starting points. Agricola's theology must be treated therefore, not as the old historiography would have it, "a clumsy distortion" of Luther, but as a unique variation of early evangelical theology. Its chief characteristics were not developed in conscious opposition to Luther, but in assumed harmony with him against the old Church and the "Schwarmer." Initially, this common front obscured the latent differences. Central to these was Agricola's understanding of the relationship between Law and Gospel. Unlike Luther, he did not see the two in a continuous dialectical relationship. Instead he saw their relationship as sequential in the order of salvation. This led him to a one-sided emphasis on the Christian's life as informed by the Gospel, not by the Law. Kjeldgaard-Pedersen finds this distinguishing feature of Agricola's thought already in his first publication, De capitibus ecclesiasticae (1524). Not intended as a sys- tematic treatment of doctrine, the treatise focused on the Christian life of discipleship defined as a life of repentance (Busse). Given this focus, Agricola shifted attention from the historical work of Christ to his benefits in sacrament and example. Soteriologically, the accent fell on the activity of the Spirit in the believer. Thus Agricola hoped to overcome the distance between the historical Christ and the believer. However, the relationship between the historical Christ, the Word, the Spirit and faith remained theologically ill defined. Similarly, the relationship between justification and sanctification re- This content downloaded from 132.178.94.23 on Tue, 07 Jun 2016 17:02:35 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms