Adam and Eve in the Protestant Reformation

The story of Adam and Eve, ubiquitous in the art and literature of the period, played a central role in the religious controversies of sixteenth-century Europe. This is the first book to explore stories about Adam and Eve in German Lutheran areas and to analyze their place in Lutheran culture and identity. Kathleen Crowther examines Lutheran versions of the story of Adam and Eve in bibles, commentaries, devotional tracts, sermons, plays, poems, medical and natural history texts, and woodcut images. Her research identifies how Lutheran storytellers differentiated their unique versions of the story from those of their medieval predecessors and their Catholic and Calvinist contemporaries. She also explores the appeal of the story of Adam and Eve to Lutherans as a means to define, defend and disseminate their distinctive views on human nature, original sin, salvation, marriage, family, gender relations and social order.

Introduction; 1. Adam and Eve in the Reformation; 2. In His image and likeness; 3. Framing Eve; 4. Gender and generation; 5. The book of nature; 6. The children of Adam and Eve; Conclusion.

The story of Adam and Eve played a central role in the religious controversies of sixteenth-century Europe. This is the first book to explore the variety and circulation of stories about Adam and Eve in German Lutheran areas and to analyze their place in Lutheran culture and identity.

Kathleen M. Crowther is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of the History of Science at the University of Oklahoma. She received her Ph.D. from The Johns Hopkins University and has held a Mellon post-doctoral fellowship at Swarthmore College and a Kluge fellowship at the Library of Congress. Her articles have appeared in the journals Isis and Renaissance Quarterly and in several edited collections.