Did The Protestant Reformation spread throughout Europe because Luther lived in Germany the European center for publishing and trade?

Answer 1

A case can be made for this. However, what was more important was that Luther lived under a prince, Frederick the Wise, who was determined to obtain for him a fair hearing, and the political turmoil provoked by the statecraft of the Papacy.

A century before Luther, Jan Hus had preached reform. The spiritual and temporal authorities moved as one against him. Hus was condemned at the Council of Constance in 1815, burned at the stake and his ashes thrown into the Rhine.

At the time of Luther, the Papacy and the Empire were at odds. The sitting Pope in 1517 was Leo X, from the de Medici family of Florence. He was also the head of a temporal state and intensely involved in Italian power politics. In terms of trade, Italy was the center of Europe, a leader in banking and where double-entry bookkeeping had been invented. Some monk having a snit over indulgences in a jerkwater town on the other side of the Alps would barely have shown up on Leo's radar. He had bishops to deal with noise like that.

In 1519, Maximilian, the Holy Roman Emperor, died. As both Leo and Francis I of France were completely surrounded by Habsburg possessions, they feared the accession of Charles as emperor. They schemed to block Charles' election to the throne for a time, giving Frederick, who was himself an Elector, increased influence that he used to provide protection to Luther.

Leo did not excommunicate Luther until 1521, at which time the Pope ordered the Emperor to move against Luther. But Luther was too strong for Charles to use ordinary civil means on Luther. Luther had the protection of Frederick and the support of other German princes. It is here that the effect of publishing was most pronounced. Luther had written To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation in 1520, and through the speed of distribution allowed by the printing press gained a following in central Germany. Along with this, the nobility and gentry were reading Bibles printed in the vernacular, available at one-tenth the cost of a transcribed document, and forming their own conclusions about their faith. Whereas Hus' followers were not strong enough to start a rebellion until after his execution, in one year Luther had circulated his ideas to a receptive audience that could nullify the Imperial will.

Charles found it necessary to summon the Imperial Diet at Worms in 1521, in reality to conduct a trial of Luther. Effectively, Charles was in need of support from the princes who were his retainers-in-chief and who would have to enforce an Imperial edict. Frederick was able to extract from Charles a guarantee of safe passage for Luther to and from the Diet. Frederick made good on this, going so far as to stage an abduction of Luther on the way back from Worms before the Emperor could revoke his promises.

As was foreordained, the Edict of Worms found Luther a heretic and placed him under the ban of the Empire, forbidding loyal subjects from giving Luther food or shelter and allowing anyone to kill him without legal consequence. However, the German princes and nobles were no longer loyal subjects, and the Edict could not be enforced in central Germany.

Charles was to be fully occupied by wars with France, the Ottomans and the Pope. With Charles busy and his subordinate princes actively opposed to the policy, there was no leadership in the Empire to move against Luther for the next decade. In 1531, the Reformation moved to a new phase when Philip of Hesse and Frederick's grandson formed the Schmalkaldic League, a defensive alliance for mutual protection among Protestant princes against Charles. The issue of religious obedience had become a question that could not be resolved by ordinary means, and wars of religion would consume Europe for over a century.