Understanding Long Reformation in Eastern Europe: The Case of Hungarian Puritanism Revisited

Abstract With the focus on Calvinist Reformation I propose a case study on Hungarian Puritanism that will allow further extrapolations, projections, and some general remarks regarding the entire process of the Hungarian Reformation. This paper draws on the findings of my research examining the reception of English Puritanism in early modern Royal Hungary and Transylvania. I intend to unearth the problematic aspects of cultural and intellectual transfers in an attempt to decipher the intricacies of how Puritan-Calvinist ideas were accepted and incorporated in the religious culture of Hungarian Calvinists. My concern is primarily related to the receiving Hungarian context and its historical evolution. For both the Hungarian Reformation and Hungarian Puritanism appear to have been newly emerging religious cultures resulting from a mixed tradition consisting of transferred ideas and native components. My contention is that the process of transfers and translations are not mechanical takeovers, borrowings or replacements, but a rather complex hermeneutical process of understanding, explaining and applying ideas to the needs of the receivers. One of the major findings of my article is that the application of the concept of long Reformation to the Hungarian case, in line with the latest developments of the field, will not only provide a more suitable historical framework, but it will put to use a repertoire of methodological novelties nurturing the understanding of the entire process of the Reformation based on the transfers of ideas and their consequent reception.