Spätmittelalter und Reformation

The Complete Edition of the works of Johann Staupitz clearly reveals his significance as a key figure in the transition from late medieval reform to the Reformation. Previously unpublished writings and corrupt texts are presented in a critical edition for the first time, together with important new research findings.

The edition of the Consultatio (1523) refutes the view that Staupitz became a persecutor of heretics in Salzburg. The rediscovery of the records of the heresy trial against Stephan Kastenpauer (known as Agricola), which went missing in 1896, makes it possible to contextualise the 'advice' of the pastoral theologian Staupitz, to elucidate it with a detailed commentary, and to clarify the process of this unusual trial for heresy.

Further evidence of Staupitz' "interest in pastoral direction" (Wolfgang Günter) is provided by the Decisio, which was printed six times between 1500 and 1517, and in which Staupitz, although member of a mendicant order himself, took the side of parish clergy in the dispute between mendicants and secular clergy. The Franciscan Kaspar Schatzgeyer and his (as yet unpublished) opposing text probably influenced Leo X's surprising decision in this matter.

The painstaking edition and commentary of the Constitutiones of the German Reform Congregation of the Augustinian Hermits (which Staupitz helped to compose, and then took responsibility for, promulgating it in 1506) has recourse not only to the as yet unresearched constitutions of the Italian Reform Congregations but also to the early years of the order and the genesis of its legal constitution. In the view of Kaspar Elm (Zum Geleit) this process is of interest not only for research into religious orders but also for all disciplines dealing with problems of the institutionalisation of unorganised movements.