# When Fathers Ruled : Family Life in Reformation Europe - Steven Ozment



## crhoades (Jun 1, 2006)

Amazon Link

Looks like a good read!

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Amazon Review:

"When Fathers Ruled" comes highly recommended by R. J. Rushdoony, and for good reason. (We should always take seriously the recommendations from a man who read 40,000 books in his lifetime). Steven Ozment begins this jewel of a work by informing us of the pathetic state of marriage at the dawn of the sixteenth century. Neo-Platonism* reigned supreme within the Church during the late Middle Ages (as it does today, except without the misogyny, that is, hatred of women--women were viewed then as less "spiritual" than were men, quite a contrast to Victorianism!), and this carried on past the Renaissance. Along with the neo-Platonic disdain for marriage (for "spiritual" reasons) among primarily the clergy, monks, and nuns was an equally unhealthy disdain from the lawless populace, those who preferred fornication and adultery in the local whorehouses. Not only did the Reformers have to contest neo-Platonism and its despising of the familial institution, but they also had to contest Roman Catholic marriage laws, which did more harm than good for European society. The Reformers found the allowance of "secret" marriages and the various "impediments" to marriage by the Roman Catholic Church to be most disruptive to European society, and they set about to change these laws. Reading this book is somewhat of an eye-opener if one tends to hearken back to the Reformation era with romantic notions of a near-perfect society. The Reformers, as Ozment teaches, faced much defiance during their perverse times. Ozment details many curiosities, including the "kidnapping" of nuns from convents and nunneries (Ozment calls them "cloisters") by their newly-converted, Protestant relatives. Perhaps the Reformers' best contribution to the family was the restoration of the biblical roles of husband/father and wife/mother. They attacked with equal vehemence the woman who usurped the role of her covenant head and the "lion" of a husband who terrorized his wife. Women were perhaps the largest beneficiaries of their reforms. With the help of the Reformers women began to see the convent, and its various abuses, as less than ideal, and they embraced biblical marriage instead. Prior to the Reformation some towns held eight times more cloistered women than men (this was primarily due to misogyny). Not so afterwards. Some, as previously mentioned, had to be "rescued" by loved-ones while a few escaped on their own. One thing was certain, though: there would no longer be convents and nunneries so full that many women had to be sent away for lack of room. The 1520s saw a transformation in how men viewed women. The young generation of women in the 1520s, at least in Lutheran Germany, shunned the convents and embraced covenantal marriage, arguably, unlike any time in centuries past. Ozment then goes on to detail the various marriage and divorce laws in several cities, e.g., Zurich, Basel, and Nuremberg, and their accompanying problems. He spends a whole chapter on wives' tales within the art of midwifery and early "medicine" and offers a fine chapter on child-rearing, which was then taught according to the Bible, for the most part. When Fathers Ruled represents the best historical work on the family that I've read. Ozment cites anecdotes that will make you scratch your head, laugh out loud, cringe with horror, and, perhaps, even cry. Ozment's main point of the book is this: if you want to reform the world, then you must first reform your own household. World-wide reformation will not occur as long as we fail to properly raise our children. The only deficiency of this book is that the discussion rarely extends beyond Lutheran Germany. 
* For a thorough understanding of neo-Platonism see Ignatius Loyola's various writings and study his behavior in particular. Neo-Platonism is characterized by an extreme exaltation of the eternal/spiritual over and against the temporal/physical. The spirit, soul, and body of man were all originally created good (as well as the created order in general), but neo-Platonists see the body and soul (even after salvific regeneration) as intrinsically inferior, if not evil (as well as the world); hence, they tend to be ascetic (self-abasers) and anti-intellectual. Moreover, neo-Platonists see man's problem as metaphysical rather than ethical. Man's not in rebellion to God; he is just trapped in an evil body. Thus, they reject biblical salvation. The telos (end) for neo-Platonists is their escape from the world (and all its responsibilities). For an excellent introduction to this idea, see R. J. Rushdoony's "The Flight From Humanity."


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## VirginiaHuguenot (Jun 2, 2006)




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## Scott (Jun 5, 2006)

Looks good


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