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 p100  Chapter XII
The Religious Revolt in Lithuania

(The numbers link directly to the sections.)

Hardly had seventeen years elapsed after the outbreak of the Protestant Revolt in Western Europe, when the doctrines of the Reformers were already publicly preached in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. This was but a natural consequence of the trend of that period. The secularization of the Teutonic Knights in 1525 had established a Protestant vassal state on the borders of the Grand Duchy. In 1524, Riga, Dorpat and Reval of northern Livonia had shown sympathies toward Lutheranism. As early as 1520 Sigismund had forbidden the importation of Lutheran books and the propagation of Lutheran writings in Poland. Through the influence of Sigismund's Italian wife, Bona Sforza, humanists resided in Poland's capital, Cracow, as well as in Lithuania's Vilnius. German merchants in Lithuanian cities and towns were definitely inclined toward the new Lutheran teachings, while the sons of the magnates and the lesser gentry studied at German universities, and inevitably came into actual contact with the doctrines of the Reformers.

Nevertheless the Protestant Reformation in Lithuania uncovered not the pathetic condition of the Catholic Church, but rather the vast power wielded by the gentry in the organization of the Church and the degree of Polonization that the Lithuanian magnates and boyars had reached at that time. The Reform movement appealed  p101 to the Lithuanian gentry not because it proposed to correct existing defects, for in reality the gentry itself had been responsible for many of the prevalent vices. It attracted the magnates and boyars because it offered a splendid opportunity to increase their already wide privileges. This movement also initiated a series of clashes on religious issues which resulted in violence even as late as the middle of the seventeenth century. It likewise was the cause of the publication of some of the earliest books in the Lithuanian language and the establishment of a university in the Grand Duchy's capital, Vilnius. Since it never received full governmental support it failed to entrench itself as deeply in the Grand Duchy as it had succeeded in doing elsewhere.

1. The First Reformers

Just exactly when and where the religious revolt began in Lithuania is not known. John Tartila, a Catholic priest, is usually considered to have been the first reformer, having begun his activities at the Church of Silelis in Samogitia with a public explanation of Luther's theses (1535‑6). That same year Grand Duke Sigismund issued a decree forbidding the propagation of Lutheran and Anabaptist teachings under pain of confiscation of personal property. Tartila was compelled to flee into Prussia. The copious correspondence carried on between Albert of Prussia and the Lithuanian magnates about that same time revealed the wavering position of the prominent families of Bilevicius, Katkevicius, Radvila and Kesgaila. And in 1540, the Franciscan monks at Vilnius began to preach Protestant doctrines in the Church of St. Ann, where from the beginning of the sixteenth century religious devotions had already been held in the German language for the accommodation of the German merchants. In the previous year (1539), Abraham Kulva, who had studied at Cracow, Leipzig, Sienna, at Louvain under Erasmus, and at Wittenberg under Melanchton, had established at Vilnius a school favoring Protestant tendencies which was attended by a few dozen sons of the magnates and boyars. But through the efforts of Paul Alseniskis, Bishop of Vilnius  p102 (1537‑1555), acting with the approval of Sigismund, Kulva was compelled to exile himself to Koenigsberg in 1542, and his school was suppressed. At the Prussian capital he obtained a professor­ship, where another Lithuanian, a Franciscan, Stanislas Rapalavicius (Rapagelanus), who had studied at Wittenberg through Albert's support, also taught. Their efforts, however, were short-lived, since both died in 1545.

2. Sigismund and His Son

While Sigismund the Elder reigned, the Protestant Revolt failed to make any appreciable progress. He had remained the movement's constant opponent. By the decree of 1541, he attempted to prevent the sons of the Lithuanian magnates from matriculating in Western Europe, especially at Wittenberg. In 1543, because of the gentry's opposition, he was compelled to modify his previous edict, and only forbade the propagation of the reform doctrines in Lithuania and the participation of individuals in public discussions on religious issues. But the presence of such Lithuanian students, as the sons of Katkevicius, Jundzila, Sapiega, Valavicius, Giedraitis, Tiskevicius, Zavisa at the Protestant universities of Koenigsberg, Leipzig, Wittenberg, Heidelberg, Tübingen necessarily precipitated the infiltration of the teachings of the Reformers into the Grand Duchy, particularly among the members of the upper classes, the aristocracy.

Sigismund Augustus, quite contrary to his father's way of acting, had assumed an attitude of religious indifference and uncertainty. His education, under the direction of his mother, Bona Sforza, had been committed to the guidance of Italian humanists, as the Franciscan Lismanini, who later even amassed a library in the Grand Ducal palace at Vilnius, which included the works of Erasmus, Luther, Calvin and Melanchton. He had previously instructed Sigismund in Calvin's Institutio religionis christianae. Among other reformers closely associated with Sigismund, either as spiritual advisers or secretaries, were Prasnicki, Liutomirski, John Cosmini and Andrew Frycz Modrzewski. In 1554, Calvin himself  p103 dedicated to Sigismund Augustus his commentary on the Epistle of Paul to the Hebrews. That same and following year, he wrote two letters to Sigismund urging him to inaugurate the reforms in his domains, eliciting from Sigismund but a polite evasive reply. This attitude, as a result, assisted the rapid spread of Protestant doctrines. In the Grand Duchy the Lithuanian magnates became ardent public supporters of the Calvinists. In Poland, the Calvinists, the Bohemian Brethren, Lutherans, Anabaptists, anti-Trinitarians vied with one another for supremacy. Sigismund for a time (1552‑56) even supported the efforts of the Polish National Church, but continued to oppose the proposed Polish national synod for the Calvinists, who had already overrun the Polish Diet. Finally, in 1564, Sigismund accepted the decrees of the Council of Trent from the papal legate Giovanni Commendone. And although he separated from his wife, Catherine of Habsburg, in 1570, he did not divorce her as the Reformers advised him to do. He died in 1572, having never formally accepted Protestantism. Although he had pursued a rather uncertain course, thereby indirectly aiding the Reformers, nevertheless he had not given them the governmental support in Lithuania or Poland, which they had received in other countries.

3. Calvinism

The chief supporters of the Reformation in the Grand Duchy were the Lithuanian magnates, at whose head was the Radvila family. At first, Radvila the Black, Palatine of Vilnius and Chancellor of Lithuania, and Radvila the Brown, Palatine of Trakai and Hetman of Lithuania, merely imitated the indifferent attitude of Sigismund Augustus, simply assisting and sheltering the Reformers, while they themselves remained Catholics. However, after corresponding with Calvin at Geneva in 1555, the Radvilas apostasized. And in 1557 at Lukiskiai in Vilnius,⁠a Radvila the Black established an independent Calvinist Church. Sympathetic local clergy supplanted the Catholic priests, who refused to accede to the new doctrines, at Brasta, Nesvyzius, Kleck, Birzai, Kedainiai, Mordava and in other areas which either fell under the jurisdiction  p104 of the Radvilas, or where they exercised the right of patronage for particular churches. Ministers of the new religion were likewise invited from Poland as Krzyszkowski, Falkonius, Czechowicz, Wedryzhowski. The last two mentioned were even sent by Radvila the Black to Switzerland for advanced study of the Calvinist doctrines.

In 1557, through the efforts of the same Radvila the Black the first synod of the Reformers was convoked in Vilnius. On this occasion a Protestant Society, which perdured even into the twentieth century, known as "The Lithuanian Unit," was founded. This organization, in conjunction with the synods, evolved its own canon law and constituted a strong Calvinist force in Lithuania. In 1558, Radvila established a printing house at Brasta (Brest), which published Protestant books in the Polish and Latin languages. In 1564, he also sponsored the publication of a new version of the Bible in the Polish language known as the Biblja Brzeska (The Bible of Brest), dedicated to Sigismund Augustus. In 1562, one of his assistants, Matthew Kviecinskis, undertook the administration of another printing house at Nesvyzius, and there produced Luther's catechism in the White Ruthenian tongue. His secretary Mancinski was delegated to issue a Polish-Latin dictionary. At Vilnius, Birzai, and elsewhere, Calvinist parochial schools were established. Radvila also lent his financial support to reform activities in Poland.

Many of the families of the magnates followed in the footsteps of Radvila the Black and became Calvinists. And since they constituted the Grand Ducal Council or the Lithuanian Senate, the ruling body of the Grand Duchy had thereby definitely become Calvinistic. Thus, when the Protestants received their magna charta in Lithuania in 1563, guaranteeing members of all confessions equal rights and equal privileges, which in reality merely sanctioned an existing fact, ten of the twenty-one signatories were Calvinists, three were Catholic bishops and the other eight were Catholic or Ruthenian Orthodox magnates.

The lesser gentry imitated the magnates. In the Ukmerge district in 1563, for example, not one boyar professed the Catholic faith. The peasants, subject as they were in all matters to the gentry,  p105 were influenced by the Reform doctrines only insofar as the upper classes attempted to enforce the maxim, cuius regio, ejus religio, by preventing their subjects from attending Catholic services, and depriving them of Catholic churches and priests.

Radvila remained a staunch supporter of Calvinism until his death in 1565. Although an ardent opponent of the Polish-Lithuanian Union, he nevertheless illustrated a typical Polonized Lithuanian gentleman, who himself corresponding and speaking in Polish, advanced the progress of Polish culture through his active participation in the Protestant Reformation in Lithuania.

4. Lutheranism

Lutheranism, another form of Protestantism, predominant in Poland's vassal state of Prussia, competed with Calvinism in Lithuania. It was sponsored mainly by Albert of Prussia, but never received the active support of the Lithuanian magnates. Albert harbored the first Lithuanian reformers, John Tartila, Stanislas Rapalavicius and Abraham Kulva. He corresponded with the aristocratic families of Bilevicius, Kmita, Kesgaila, Katkevicius and Radvila. He sponsored the education of Vilentas, George Zablockis, Augustine Jomantas, Alexander Radvinenis, all Lithuanian boyars, in Protestant universities, and even journeyed to Vilnius, in 1546, to urge a greater registration of Lithuanian students at Koenigsberg.

In appealing to the Lithuanian element in Prussia and neighboring Lithuania, Albert pursued a course different from that of the Radvilas. He approved and favored the use of the Lithuanian language spoken by the ordinary people. Consequently, Martin Mazvydas published a translation of Martin Luther's catechism in the Lithuanian language in 1547. To Lithuanian parishes he invited Lithuanian-speaking priests, such as Bretkunas and Vilentas. But the field open to Lutheran activity in Lithuania itself was restricted merely to the townspeople, who associated with the German merchants; for the peasants and villagers were subject to the Polonized Lithuanian gentry who favored  p106 Calvinism. Even in the areas of eastern Prussia bordering on the Grand Duchy and populated chiefly by Lithuanians, Lutheranism made slow progress. Martin Mazvydas, pastor at Ragnit, in 1551, in his letter to Albert stated that after twenty years of intensive efforts to convert his parishioners to Lutheranism, very many still crossed the border into Lithuania to attend Catholic services at Batakiai, Sveksna, Siluva, Tautage, Veliuona and there contracted marriages before Catholic priests.

5. Anti-Trinitarianism

Another sect created by the Protestant Revolt of the sixteenth century which had attained some temporary success in Lithuania was the modified Arianism propagated by Lelio Sozzini, Blandrata and other Italian and French reformers, supported by Queen Bona Sforza. Among its chief sponsors in Lithuania was John Kiska, the Castellan of Vilnius. Its active existence in the Grand Duchy began in the year 1560. Radvila the Black, although a Calvinist, and although urged by Calvin himself to abandon the anti-Trinitarians as dangerous rivals, continued to associate with them, harbor and retain a protective attitude toward them. In July, 1564, he even wrote to Calvin at Geneva, seeking an explanation for the existence of the various Protestant sects and their different dogmas. But Calvin died; and before the letter of the theologians of Geneva, urging Radvila to give up the anti-Trinitarians, arrived, Radvila also was dead.

6. Counter-Reformation

What degree of influence the Protestant Reformation had attained in Lithuania is uncertain. It cannot be considered as having been very extensive. The bishops of Vilnius and Samogitia had not joined the ranks of the Reformers, who had obtained the sympathies of a large number of the magnates and boyars, but failed to convert the Grand Duke, Sigismund Augustus. The latter exercised the right of patronage over many churches, which therefore remained Catholic possessions, rendering annexation of Catholic  p107 institutions on a vast scale an impossibility. Only those churches which were newly established by the Reformers or which came under the special care of non-Catholic magnates and boyars by reason of the jus patronatus, formed the Protestant centers of worship in Lithuania. Although Sigismund Augustus' attitude seemed to be uncertain, he never actually supported the Protestant Revolt. Thus, in 1562, he permitted the Palatine Zbaraska to establish a Calvinist Church at Vitebsk, but at the same time forbade him to interfere in any way with the Catholics or Orthodox and their religious practices.

The granting of equal privileges and rights to Catholics and Calvinists in 1563 and 1568 by Sigismund Augustus did not serve to guarantee the spread of the Reformation, but rather laid the basis for its downfall. The Protestants had divided into various sects, numbered by historians as totalling thirty-four in Lithuania and Poland, each possessing and teaching varying dogmas and interpretations of the Scriptures. The efforts of the magnates to support one or another of these sects were only individual attempts without sanction of the state, which advocated freedom of worship. Further, the gentry had obtained no extraordinary privileges through the Reformers, except perhaps a greater liberty in the direction of ecclesiastical affairs. The doctrinal differences, however, had induced Radvila the Black to send inquiries to Geneva before his death, which finally robbed the Calvinists of his strong financial support and influence. That same year Sigismund Augustus had accepted the decrees of the Council of Trent, which were promulgated in every diocese of the two countries during Bathory's reign. (Sigismund merely banished the more fanatical heretics.) In 1567, the son of Radvila the Black, Nicholas Christopher, scandalized by the fact that the Calvinist leaders in Switzerland proceeded to consult the English Queen before issuing a decision, returned to the Catholic Church together with his three younger brothers, George, Stanley, and Albert. The next year, at Vilnius, he publicly burned the copies of The Bible of Brest, which even the Calvinists had branded as anti-Trinitarian. In 1570, John Katkevicius, who had been the administrator of Lithuania's Protestant vassal state, Livonia, likewise abandoned Calvinism.

 p108  In 1569‑70, Bishop Protasevicius of Vilnius, at the urging of Hosius, Bishop of Varmia, who had been born in Vilnius, established the Society of Jesus in the capital of the Grand Duchy. This proved to be the turning point of the struggle of the Catholics against the Reformers, and led to a stronger and sounder reestablishment of the Catholic Church in Lithuania.

Assigned to the Church of St. John in Vilnius, the Jesuits soon organized their own college, which was raised to the status of a university in 1579, with philosophical and theological faculties, in spite of the opposition of Chancellor Radvila the Brown and Vice-Chancellor Eustache Valavicius. They preached in Lithuanian and Polish, as well as in Italian, German and Latin. They taught at the first seminary in Lithuania, opened at Vilnius by Bishop George Radvila in 1582. They engaged the Protestant scholars in public disputes and formed schools in various towns as Kraziai, Kaunas and Gardinas. The results of their efforts were manifested in 1586, by the return to the Catholic Church of approximately three hundred magnates and boyars, among them Leon Sapiega, the editor of the Third Lithuanian Statute (1589).

Unfortunately, a somewhat intensive struggle between Protestants and Catholics continued until the middle of the seventeenth century, for many members of the gentry remained ardent adherents of Calvinist and Lutheran doctrines.

7. Causes

The ecclesiastical organization of the Catholic Church in Lithuania in the sixteenth century was rather thoroughly dominated by the wishes of the Grand Duke and the members of the gentry, thereby merely imitating the mode of procedure existing in Poland. It was the Grand Duke who proposed candidates for bishoprics, especially since these same bishops automatically became members of the Grand Ducal Council. Members of Chapters were also selected by the Grand Duke and very often they were neither priests nor Lithuanians. Thus, in 1570, of nine members forming the Vilnius Chapter, only one was a Lithuanian and an an ordained  p109 priest. Pastors were usually appointed either by the Grand Duke, or magnates or ordinary boyars, if they had acquired the right of patronage by granting an endowment to some particular church. Consequently, the bishop could exercise little jurisdiction over one who could be appointed and discharged by the free will of an aristocrat. Meanwhile, the selection of bishops by the Grand Duke, or pastors by the gentry, could offer no guarantee that these men would concern themselves mainly with their religious duties. Furthermore, only members of the gentry alone were considered eligible for the positions of bishop, abbot, or pastor. Non-boyars were allowed to act merely as assistants.

Yet, the Protestant Reformation in Lithuania was not directed against such existing abuses, nor against the preponderance of Polish-speaking clergy, because the Lithuanian-speaking lower classes took no active participation in the Revolt. The Church as an ecclesiastical organization possessed neither immense wealth nor enjoyed exceeding power. Ecclesiastical courts could not punish the magnates without the consent of the Grand Duke. The infiltration of the doctrines of the Reformation into the Grand Duchy can only be explained by the desire of some of the dissatisfied clergy to rid themselves of the burdens they had assumed, and to retain their benefices at the same time; and also by the conviction of the correctness of the Reformers' dogmas on the part of some of the magnates, who were influenced by their Protestant neighbors and the Protestant universities of the West.

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Thayer's Note:

a Properly, Lukiškės, a country estate of the Radvila family, now a botanical park within the city limits of Vilnius. The estate was given by the family to the Jesuit Order a few years later and has an interesting history.

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