Maximum Possible Spread of Protestantism?

Is that really true across Russia, Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria? It sounds like a massive simplification, but it's not my area of expertise.

In Serbia and Bulgaria, it's true that the urban middle class was relatively weak. More precisely: it wasn't a legal class of its own; the towns and their population was usually legally lumped in with the countryside and its lower class population. Only a minority of cities had autonomy. In Serbia these were the mining towns and a few coastal settlements; I believe there were a few such autonomous cities in Bulgaria as well, but I'm not sure. The process of greater urbanization and strengthening of the urban middle class was underway, but it was interrupted by the Ottoman conquest.

There are other issues that make it more difficult to "jump the barrier".

The Orthodox church didn't have indulgences, and other major types of corruption from Luther era's Catholic church were (mostly) absent. There was certainly corruption and materialism in the Orthodox church, but it manifested itself in different, usually less provocative ways. IIRC the most common form of corruption/materialism in the XIV and XV century Balkan Orthodox churches was when some monasteries doubled as long-term hotels: in exchange for some expensive gift from a noble, he and his family would be housed and provided for at the monastery if they need to leave their original home.

The Orthodox church wasn't as centralized as the Catholic church in the time of reformation. There were already national churches, which means rulers would have had far less reason to support some kind of a Protestant movement.

Also, the Orthodox church's relative closeness to state leaders had both bad and good aspects. For example, there was a law in medieval Serbia by which the monarch would depose any bishop or metropolitan who didn't provide food for the poor in churches under their jurisdiction. In that example, the state's power over the church was actually a positive influence on the church's "virtue".


XVI century Romania might be a bit more likely environment for some kind of Orthodox Protestantism, as it was not fully conquered by the Ottomans. Also, Moldova was briefly ruled by a Protestant prince, although that isn't the same thing.
 
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