The largest cache of medieval liturgical furnishings that survives is in Protestant Germany. This survival has sometimes been attributed to Martin Luther’s doctrine of the ‘indifference’ of objects. Using several examples, one from south Germany (the altar at Rothenburg ob der Tauber) and two from women’s convents in the north (especially some devotional statues and their dresses from Kloster Wienhausen), this article argues not only that religious objects are far from indifferent but also that they alter our standard opinions about the Observant Reform of fifteenth-century Germany and the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century and suggest new understandings of continuity.

中文翻译：

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事情“无所谓”吗？物体如何改变我们对宗教历史的理解

现存最大的中世纪礼仪家具藏在新教德国。这种幸存有时被归因于马丁路德关于物体“冷漠”的学说。使用几个例子，一个来自德国南部（Rothenburg ob der Tauber 的祭坛）和两个来自北部的女修道院（特别是一些来自 Kloster Wienhausen 的虔诚雕像和她们的礼服），本文认为不仅宗教物品远非漠不关心但它们也改变了我们对 15 世纪德国的观察性改革和 16 世纪的新教改革的标准看法，并提出了对连续性的新理解。