Die absolute Popularität der Bibel.

In his politico-historical essay “Die Christenheit oder Europa” (1799), Novalis execrates the Protestant Reformation for its orthodox return to sola scriptura. This fetishistic attachment to the text, he argues, results in a crudely abstract scheme of religion, devoid of any theological creativity, liturgical mysticism or cultural sediment. Perhaps faith is more than a bare skeleton of dead letters.