During the historical era known as the Reformation, new sects developed as reformers split off from the Catholic Church over issues of doctrine and issues of administration. Luther is credited with the development of Protestantism less from a desire to form a new religious movement than because of concerns over the way the Catholic Church was being administered, the corruptions that were being allowed, and similar matters. As divisions within the mother church developed, further divisions over doctrinal issues also developed, some over matters of form, some over issues of substance, and some over scriptural minutiae. Huldrich Zwingli (the first name is variously spelled) was a leader of one reform group in Switzerland who had differences with followers of Luther, and on the issue of baptism, they had further differences with a group headed by Konrad Grebel who would form the Anabaptists.
The development of humanism in the Renaissance involved a shift in how people thought, and this occurred at the same time that the horizons of the West were expanding, be they geographical, mental, social, economic, or political:
Whereas in earlier times, the life of the state was defined by inherited structures of power and law imposed by tradition or higher authority, now individual ability and deliberate political action and thought carried the most weight. The state itself was seen as something to be comprehended and manipulated by human will and intelligence. . . (Tarnas 227).
Tarnas sees this shift as a return to pagan (meaning classical) values. There was a new value placed on individualism and personal genius, and this was a shift from the more collectivist, social view of the medieval period (Tarnas 227).
In the broadest sense, humanism was an educational movement, and for the humanists the classical writings were unique instruments for extending the consciousness of human beings:
The great humanists of the Renaissance we...