JOHN REUCHLIN
The human being possesses, from the fact of its being of the same essence as all creation, a wonderful power. Truth can be made ever present to the eye of the soul. Time and space vanish before the eagle eye of the immortal soul. Her power is boundless.
— De Occulto Philosophia
All of these ideas, so contrary to the teachings of the Church, were gradually preparing the minds of the people for the coming battle. In the middle of the fifteenth century John Reuchlin appeared, the Imperial Councillor of Emperor Frederick III. In spite of his diplomatic duties, Reuchlin found time to study Neoplatonism, to perfect himself in several Oriental languages, and to write an interpretation of the Kabala in which he described the sevenfold constitution of the universe in detail. When he denounced the burning of the Hebrew Bibles he was expelled from Germany and his works were burned. But later, when Melacthon, Erasmus and Martin Luther came to him for instruction, Reuchlin lit the torch which set fire to the Christian world and became in fact the "Father of the Reformation." -- http://www.theos-world.com/archives/html/tw199804.html
these are the real, genuine Kabalists, who had their instructions from initiated Jewish Rabbis – affirm that if the two most learned Kabalists of the mediaeval period, John Reuchlin and Paracelsus, differed in their religious professions – the former being the Father of the Reformation and the latter a Roman Catholic, at least in appearance – the Zohar cannot contain much of Christian dogma or tenet, one way or the other. In other words, they maintain that the numerical language of the kabalistic works teaches universal truths – and not only one Religion in particular…There was a dread among the great masses of society in byegone days of the unseen – a dread, as recent events and phenomena show very clearly, not yet overcome in its entirety. Hence students of Nature and mind were forced into an obscurity not altogether unwelcome. . . . The Kabalistic reveries of a Johann Reuchlin led to the fiery action of a Luther, and the patient labours of Trittenheim produced the modern system of diplomatic cipher writing. . . . It is very worthy of remark, that one particular century, and that in which the Rosicrucians first showed themselves, is distinguished in history as the era in which most of these efforts at throwing off the trammels of the past (Popery and Ecclesiasticism) occurred. Hence the opposition of the losing party, and their virulence against anything mysterious or unknown. They freely organised pseudo-Rosicrucian and Masonic societies in return, . . . and these societies were instructed to irregularly entrap the weaker brethren of the True and Invisible Order, and then triumphantly betray anything they might be so inconsiderate as to communicate to the superiors of these transitory and unmeaning associations. Every wile was adopted by the authorities fighting in self-defence against the progress of truth, to engage, by persuasion, interest or terror, such as might be cajoled into receiving the Pope as Master – when gained, as many converts to that faith know, but dare not own, they are treated with neglect, and left to fight the battle of life as best they may, not even being admitted to the knowledge of such miserable aporrheta as the Romish faith considers itself entitled to withhold. -- http://www.theosophical.ca/TheRightAngle.htm#kabala
The human being possesses, from the fact of its being of the same essence as all creation, a wonderful power. Truth can be made ever present to the eye of the soul. Time and space vanish before the eagle eye of the immortal soul. Her power is boundless. (De Occulto Philosophia.)…All of these ideas, so contrary to the teachings of the Church, were gradually preparing the minds of the people for the coming battle. In the middle of the fifteenth century John Reuchlin appeared, the Imperial Councillor of Emperor Frederick III. In spite of his diplomatic duties, Reuchlin found time to study Neoplatonism, to perfect himself in several Oriental languages, and to write an interpretation of the Kabala in which he described the sevenfold constitution of the universe in detail. When he denounced the burning of the Hebrew Bibles he was expelled from Germany and his works were burned. But later, when Melancthon, Erasmus and Martin Luther came to him for instruction, Reuchlin lit the torch which set fire to the Christian world and became in fact the "Father of the Reformation." http://www.wisdomworld.org/setting/revival.html