ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Proto-Protestantism

Proto-Protestantism is like when you go to school and your teacher teaches you things, but some of those things don't seem quite right to you. Maybe your teacher tells you that you can only learn about the world from one book, but you think there are many different books that can teach you things. So, you start to question what your teacher is telling you and think that there might be a better way to learn.

In the same way, Proto-Protestantism was a time long ago when people started to question some of the things that the church was teaching them. They believed that the church was taking things too far and not listening to what the Bible had to say. These people wanted to make changes to the church so that it was more in line with what they believed was right.

One of the big changes that the Proto-Protestants wanted to make was to put more emphasis on reading and studying the Bible. They believed that everyone should be able to read and understand the Bible for themselves, rather than having the church tell them what it meant.

Another thing that the Proto-Protestants wanted was to have a closer relationship with God. They believed that people shouldn't have to go through priests and the church to talk to God, but instead could do it themselves at home.

In the end, Proto-Protestantism was a time when people started to question some of the things that they had been taught and wanted to make changes to the church. These changes eventually led to the Protestant Reformation, which was a big movement that changed the way people thought about religion and the church.