The reformation in Poland

by Paul Fox

According to a statute of Casimir the Great of the year 1347 the mayors of ecclesiastical villages as well as the mayors of secular villages were required to participate in military expeditions.[413] This obligation was reaffirmed by the Constitution of 1538,[414] and again in 1550.[415] But, as we have already noted, the clergy succeeded in evading these statutory provisions not only throughout the fifteenth, but also in the sixteenth century. It is not strange, therefore, to find that as the burden of defense was increasing in weight the Polish nobility repeatedly demanded that the mayors of ecclesiastical villages take part in the country’s defense in compliance with the law. The first demand of this nature in the sixteenth century was made as early as 1510; then we find it repeated at the Diet of 1536-1537; and again in 1563. In 1510 the king referred the question at issue to the provincial synod for review, and the synod was to report on it at a subsequent general diet.[416] But the matter was evidently laid aside and remained so as long as it was possible to keep it from coming to the front again; for when it was brought up at the Diet of 1536-1537, it was again treated in a similar manner. The bishops agreed to comply with the law, provided it was proved to them that the mayors of their villages were subject to military service. Their special privileges, which they claimed to possess, were to be examined at the following synod, and then the matter was to be reported on at the general diet.[417] Presumably the matter stopped there as before; for at the Diet of 1558-1559 the Chamber of Deputies raised the old question again, and demanded of the bishops the presentation of their special privileges exempting the mayors of ecclesiastical villages from military service. But even then the clergy did not produce this documentary evidence until at the Diet of 1563; and when actually produced, it was found wanting, owing to its indefiniteness.[418]

The stubborn opposition of the Polish hierarchy to share in the burden of defense in this mild form caused the Polish nobility to stiffen its demands. Since the Polish bishops so strenuously objected to the participation of the mayors of ecclesiastical villages in the pospolite ruszenie, the szlachta came forward at the Diet of Thorn in 1520 with the demand that the clergy as a class be put on the same level as the secular nobility in regard to military service.[419] All the clergy in possession of landed estates were to participate in the pospolite ruszenie along with the szlachta. This demand was renewed and firmly insisted upon at a local diet of the nobility of Great Poland at Kolo in 1533, at the General Diet of 1535,[420] and even as late as 1562 at the Diet of Piotrków.[421] This summary demand on the part of the Polish nobility that the clergy as a landowning class share equally with the szlachta the burden of defense startled the clergy, and finally induced them to present their documentary privileges, on which they based their claim of exemption from the burden of defense at the subsequent Diet of Piotrków, which met in the fall of 1563. On examination these documents were found to be anything but explicit and clear; yet the nobility had relented by this time, and ceased pressing this particular demand any further.[422]

Owing to this stubborn opposition on the part of the clergy to their personal participation in military service and to that of the bailiffs of ecclesiastical villages as well, the Polish nobility turned its attack now directly upon the landed property and the incomes of the clergy. In 1534 and in 1535 it vehemently protested against the purchases of village bailiwicks by the clergy. In 1536-1537, at the Diet of Piotrków, it went still further, and urgently demanded the secularization of all ecclesiastical property. As a result of this determined stand, a plan was actually agreed upon between the Chamber of Deputies and the secular members of the Senate for partial secularization of church lands. According to this plan all ecclesiastical lands acquired by the clergy whether by gift or by purchase since Louis the Great, 1370-1382, were to be sold to the nobility.[423] The demand for the secularization of ecclesiastical estates was first made in the first half of the fifteenth century, then in 1524, with increasing vigor and insistence at the Diet of Piotrków in 1536-1537, and again in 1576.[424] How determined the Polish nobility was to get hold of the property of the clergy may be seen from the fact that in 1539, when the old king, Sigismund I, was critically ill, a conspiracy was actually formed, the purpose of which was not to recognize Sigismund Augustus in the event of his father’s death until he agreed to and sanctioned the confiscation of one-third of the church lands for purposes of national defense.[425] The leaders in this conspiracy, as well as in the rebellion of 1537, were Martin and Peter Zborowski, ardent advocates of the Reformation after 1550.

Nor were the incomes of the clergy to escape the Polish nobility’s attack. Whenever the country was in financial straits, the nobility in a general diet assembled voted special taxes to meet special emergencies. The clergy, however, were not liable to these special taxes voted by the diets. They claimed exemption from them. Yet they did come forward in each emergency with a voluntary contribution, known as “subsidium charitativum.” This was based on a general estimate of the clergy’s general income. As this estimate usually constituted only one-third and frequently one-eighth of the real income of the clergy, their voluntary contributions based on such estimates were obviously far below their ability to pay. Manifestly this was unfair and unjust to the nobility. It, therefore, demanded that the clergy pay a contribution based on an evaluation of their specific sources of revenue, such as their estates, their tithes, and other sources of income.[426]

To this demand of the nobility the clergy were most decidedly opposed. At the same time they were not a little apprehensive that it might result in consequences unfavorable to them. To safeguard themselves, they voted a liberal contribution of 40,000 florins in 1511 for the purpose of redemption of certain royal lands in Red Russia; and in exchange for this contribution they exacted from the king a solemn pledge that henceforth they would be free from military obligations and from all other burdens, with the exception of the customary subsidium charitativum, based on an evaluation of their general income, in cases of a pospolite ruszenie. A written document confirming the pledge of 1511 was issued to the clergy by the king, December 10, 1515.[427] This furnished the clergy a certain legal basis for their opposition to the nobility’s demands. When, therefore, the Diets of 1525 and 1527 imposed a tax on the specific sources of the clergy’s income, the clergy at their Synod of Łęczyce in 1527, owing to a threatening Tartar invasion, again voted a voluntary contribution to the country’s needs, but flatly refused to be taxed by the diets.[428]

But if the clergy were stubborn in their resistence to taxation by the diets, so were the diets in their insistence on such taxation of clerical property. At the Diet of 1525 a revaluation of ecclesiastical property was proposed. The bishops opposed this course resolutely, fearing that a precedent might be established for the diet to tax their tithes. Their fear was not groundless. In 1529 at the Diet of Warsaw the deputies refused to take up the business of the diet until the bishops declared what percentage of their tithes they would give as a contribution to the defense of the country. The bishops strenuously objected on the ground that the nobles did not tax their own incomes but insisted on taxing those of the clergy. The conflict reached a deadlock, and finally the whole question was referred to the king. When at the subsequent diet, called for November 11, 1530, at Piotrków, the Chamber of Deputies moved to impose a tax on the tithes of the clergy, its attempt encountered a determined opposition, not only on the part of the clergy, but also on the part of the king. In consequence of this combined clerical and royal opposition the Chamber developed an equally solid front against the immunities of the church, and demanded the passage of a law taxing the clergy in proportion to the real value of all their property. In case the clergy refused to comply, the deputies threatened to suspend all payments of tithes, and to put the proposed law through and in force at the very next pospolite ruszenie of the szlachta.[429]

Nor was this an empty threat. For more than a century and a half, ever since the reign of Casimir the Great (1333-1370), the Polish nobility had chafed under the burden of church tithes. In its relation to the king it was free from all special compulsory taxes for the benefit of the royal treasury, save a nominal tax of two grosze per łan kmiecy, paid in reality by the tenant peasants rather than by the landlords themselves. But in its relation to the church it was not as free. The burden of church tithes rested upon it. Originally voluntary, it became compulsory in the first half of the fifteenth century; and it was a burden that could not be shifted. It was, also, a burden which the clergy never failed to exact.

Conflicts over the payment of tithes were, therefore, frequent. They occurred as early as the reign of Casimir the Great,[430] and as time went on they grew more bitter and more frequent. Owing to the growth of the church in wealth and of the clergy in arrogance as a result of Wladislaus Jagiello’s great liberality and even subserviency, the nobility was forced to consider measures at the Convocations of Piotrków in 1406 and 1407 for protection against this exploitation.[431] By the Privilege of Czerwieńsk forced from the king in 1422 it further secured itself against the relentless exaction of tithes.[432] A decade later the special privileges concerning tithes given the clergy by Wladislaus Jagiello in 1433,[433] and the king’s assurance that he would assist in the collection of this tax, are evidence of the difficulties encountered. To force the clergy to desist from their pretensions, the nobility, under the leadership of Andrew Zbonsz, Spytek of Melsztyn, and John Strasz, decided at the Convocation of Piotrków, August 15, 1435, to withhold the payment of tithes altogether.[434] A similar resolution was adopted by the Confederation of 1439.[435] These decisions, however, were never fully carried out in practice. In the second half of the fifteenth century, influenced by the economic changes that were taking place and encouraged by such radical humanistic ideas as those of John Ostrorog, embodied in his “Monumentum pro reipublicae ordinatione congestum,” the Polish nobility moved still more resolutely toward the abolition of the tithes.[436]

In the sixteenth century this conflict became even more determined. If the nobility objected to the tithes in the preceding century, it did so now all the more. The wealth of the church had increased as a result of the economic changes in progress, the incomes of the clergy were princely, the needs of the country greater and more exacting; and yet the clergy shirked all public burdens and responsibilities. Naturally, therefore, the nobility began to withhold the payments of tithes. The situation was so serious that the clergy became very much concerned. At several of the provincial synods, notably those of 1544 and 1551, they gave a good deal of time to discussions of ways and means by which to force the nobility to pay tithes.[437] But the situation seemed to be beyond repair. Incensed at the immunities, pretensions, and exactions of the clergy, the nobility was turning away in great numbers from the established church to the Reformation after 1550, and thereby was cutting down ecclesiastical revenues.

This touched the clergy in the most tender spot, and aroused them to action. To save its revenues, the church began to resort to the use of its ecclesiastical jurisdiction; it summoned the rebellious nobles before its episcopal courts, and if they did not relent and penitently submit, they were placed under the ban of the church. This procedure put the nobility, their persons, their honor, their property, and their very lives at the mercy of the clergy. Their very existence, individual and collective, was in jeopardy as long as they were subject to the jurisdiction of episcopal courts. That such a situation could not last long soon became perfectly evident. The indignation of the nobility rose to a high pitch. The relation between the two estates became more tense and hostile than ever, and inevitably precipitated a bitter struggle over the fundamental question of ecclesiastical jurisdiction.