ABSTRACT
This study of Staupitz’s life and work has sought to highlight ‘a piece of theological micro-history with world-historical consequences’.1 Staupitz was a reformer throughout his life: a reformer of the religious life in the friaries, of spirituality and pastoral care in general, and a reformator of the University of Wittenberg. As an organizer of the new university he relied for help on Christoph Scheurl and others. Scheurl was originally a sympathizer with the ‘evangelical cause’ of the reformed friars of the Order of St Augustine in Germany under Staupitz’s leadership. However, by 1530, that is about five years after Staupitz’s death, he had become an opponent of the Reformation.2 Scheurl’s turning away from the Reformation makes one wonder where Staupitz would have stood, had he still been alive at that point.
