Radical Protestant Propaganda of the Thirty Years' War

Protestant Propaganda and the Jesuits
Before I begin my investigation of the propaganda campaign aimed at promoting Bethlen
Gabor of Transylvania, it is important to give a few background details on the Society of
Jesus, also known as the Jesuit Order. This is because the Order features in many of the
pieces of propaganda analyzed in this dissertation. They were considered to be symbols of
Catholic corruption and ambition at its very worst, and the activity of the Jesuits was used to
justify both of the foreign allies’ campaign in the Empire as well as to criticize German
Catholic leaders for allowing them to influence imperial policy.
Founded in 1540 by Pope Paul III in a bull entitled Regimini militantis ecclesiae, the Order of
the Jesuits was a new type of religious brotherhood that was not bound to the traditional
duties of other, older Orders that were often resident in monasteries. Far from retreating
from the worldly sphere and being bound by the duty of hourly prayer, these so-called
‘agents of the pope’ were assigned a much more active role in contemporary society.
Instructed to exert a direct influence on political and societal affairs, the Jesuit Order was
designed to represent and carry out the interests of the Holy See. It was to this Roman
Catholic court alone that each member of the Jesuit clergy swore an oath of allegiance. 113
The purpose of the Order was two-fold: first, to engage in missionary activities on all
continents known to the Europeans at the time and second, to modernize Catholic higher
education. 114 This second aim was, of course, linked to criticisms that had been levelled at
the Catholic Church during the Reformation because complaints regarding a corrupt and
113 Silvia Serena Tschopp, ‘Politik im theologischen Gewand: Eine jesuitisch-lutherische Kontroverse
im Kontext des Dreißigjährigen Krieges’ (Institut für Europäische Geschichte, Mainz, forthcoming),
fourth page of article. Henceforth Tschopp Politik.
114 Tschopp Politik, p. 4.
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