Introducing Johan Georg Günther

By the time the Protestant Reformation should be rolling around, I've got my hands full and my ass handed to me.

Because by that point, the cumulative issues that have been set in motion by things have basically ensured that nobody recognizable's gonna be born. Even more seriously, even if the same analogues rise at about the same time, the ideas are gonna be different too, setting off which-came-first-the-base-or-the-superstructure arguments that ripple across the continuity.

For clarity's sake, I'm going to introduce one of those analogous figures now. His name is Johan Georg Günther, and he's the Antiluther.

John George in a Nutshell

• Luther in tone. At the most superficial levels, Günther bears a strong resemblance to Martin Luther. He has a fair number of the same personal features (no second thoughts or afterthoughts on his writing, for one thing, and not being enormously systematic for another), and what with his Germanness it's understandable (and somewhat desirable) that people assume that the similarities are deeper than that.
• Wesley in form. Because in practice, Günther isn't Luther, at all; the way he actually lives his life, and the theology that arises out of it, bears a much closer relationship to John Wesley. This is in no small part because of their experiences of life under vows. Luther burned out as an Augustinian clerk regular, and burned out thoroughly; even after his expulsion, Günther never stopped living like he was a Gonzalan friar.
• Muntzer in content. Underlying it all, the reasoning that Günther uses to get to the opinions he does is pretty broadly Anabaptist. (The Radical Reformation, especially its more apocalyptic voices, was an IRL example of steampunk social science: a fair bit of the theology was less the rejection of scholastic theology of magisterial Protestantism than its subversion, turning it back on Rome.)

Brief Biographic Notes

The man named Günther is born at some point in the 1480s, in the Free and Hanseatic City of Rostock. Growing up, he experiences a fair bit of political drama between Rostock, the Hansa, the Church, the Dukes of Meckelnborg, and the Holy Roman Emperor.

• Günther joins the Gonzalan Order. He spends a fair bit of time as such, during which time he becomes rather worldwise. He also gets ordained as a canon regular, and is raised for a scholastic education.
• Stuff happens...
• Günther does get formally condemned, and flees the Holy Roman Empire with a hefty price on his head. When he next sets foot on land, it's in Livonia, which is currently revolting.
• Günther is responsible for catechising the Prussians (Prussian Lithuanians), the Livonians, and a fair number of others. They, in turn, build the war-ravaged Order states into an unstoppable Baltic juggernaut that soundly defeats all comers.
• In his Baltic exile, Günther translates the Bible into Low German. This is promptly banned, but still does a thriving business across the Baltic, converting a fair number of Hanseatic cities.
• At some point after the Bible translation, Günther experiences the Stranderlebnis, a profound mystical experience. (This isn't universal across the Hansa, causing some interesting developments down the line.)

Gunther as the Anti-Luther

In a lot of significant ways, Günther is an Anti-Luther. As much as he fills the same niche, it's going to have wildly different consequences.

• Martin Luther was Augustinian. Günther, meanwhile, is the in-verse equivalent of a Dominican. The central role that Augustine himself plays in things is probably toned down slightly, replaced with the subtly different Logocentrism of the Dominicans. Theologically, at least, this is a different beast from the very beginning.
• Luther wrote in Kanzelrei. Günther, born into the Hansa and exiled into the Baltic, writes in the language he grew up with for the populations he has to work with - and that means Low German. This revitalization of Low German as the language of the Baltic (and of *Prussia in its short phase as an unstoppable juggernaut) does a great deal to establish Low German as a formal language, and one linked to the Güntherite cause - which eventually leads to the abortion of Germany as we know it, amongst other things.
• Martin Luther didn't think of himself as a political figure. Günther has no such illusions. Growing up in Rostock's struggle with the Duke of Meckelnborg, the Hansa, and the Holy Roman Emperor, he does have to think about his political values. He has to think about them a great deal more after his ban, when he coopts the Livonian Rebellion and has a hand in building a nation. I'm not sure how that works, but the political component is there from the start, and it's going to be
• Günther is a mystic. After his Stranderlebnis, he spends the rest of his life channeling something like Henry Suso, which sets a precedent for later theology in ways that are simply not there in IRL Protestantism.

Günther's legacy

As the man principally responsible for causing the *Reformation, it's hard to overstate John George Günther's legacy, but here's some of the tangible stuff.

• Theology: I'm not sure what I can say about this, exactly.
• Politics: A child of the Hansa, Günther is also very much responsible for the fairly democratic Pomeranian society that he establishes in its wake.
• Linguistics: Günther's most obvious and lasting linguistic impact is the establishment of Low German as a standard language; he's involved not only in the publication of the Bible, but of a few Low German dialectal thesauri too. Less obviously but still of note, he also significantly impacts the Baltic languages; Lettish and Prussian, for instance, are both generally written wtih the orthographic norms that he established.