Adventures of a Superheretic
This one doesn’t make sense without (even more) backstory, bear with me please.
So a long time ago in a university far far away, I attended a seminar on English religious prose. One of the first texts we read was a sermon held by John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester “agayn ye pernicious doctryn of Martin Luther”. Being really invested in the matter, Fisher gets all dramatic and conjures up the idea of a dark storm threatening the church:
“And now ſuche an other clowde is rayſed a loft, oon Martyn Luther a frere. the whiche hath ſtered a mighty ſtorme and tempeſt in the chirche. and hath ſhadowed ye clere lyght of many ſcryptures of god. ⁊ he maketh yſſue from hym a perylous lythnynge. yt is to ſay a falſe lyght of wrong underſtãdinge of ſcriptures.”
(I am maintaing the idiosyncrasies of early typesetting and EModE spelling in the transcript because they’re giving me such a kick. Look at those adorbsle ligatures! Ys everywhere! And the Tironian et!)
Now, jaded students that we were, we were going to just continue reading. Sure, we got it, Fisher was really worked up, let’s move on. But the professor made us pause. “I want you to stop and think about the wonderful imagery here. We, of course, are not going to take it literally, but the original audience might have. ‘He makes lightning issue from him’! It’s like something from a superhero comic!”
That naturally led to further discussion. Superhero? More like Superheretic! And what would he do aside from the lightning thing? Threaten to nail letters to your door?
The more we talked about it, the more traction the idea got. I mean, he’s even got a secret identity! By day, he’s the unassuming Squire George, but at night, he’s *dun dun dun* LUTHERMAN THE REFORMATOR!
And that’s as far as it got before we had to get back to John Fisher. I always meant to do a proper drawing of Lutherman (the stick figure doesn’t count), but there was always something more important to do. But now, on this day of days *insert another dramatic flourish here*, I went and did it!
There we go. Lutherman the Reformator, following the Luthersignal into action and casting forth a perilous lightning. Is he the hero or the villain? Up to you!
Original text from The Sermon of John the Bishop of Rochester Made Against The Pernicious Doctrine of Martin Luther, printed by Wynkyn de Worde, London 1521.
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