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When Luther was excommunicated for insubordination on January 3, 1521, he lost the ability to say he was in the chain. You cannot succeed someone who has disowned you. Note the date to which most people would ascribe the "beginning of the Protestant Reformation" (a bad term since it was really a process that had been going on since the 1300s!) is October ...

As an Eastern Orthodox, I've never heard this line of reasoning. Instead, what is usually discussed is the difference between primacy and supremacy. In the Orthodox view, among all the bishops, there were five who were regarded as preeminent based on the importance of their sees. These were: Rome Constantinople Alexandria Antioch Jerusalem The ...

Henry Chadwick writes about this in his book The Early Church (Penguin, 1993), on page 50. First he explains that the role of the "bishop" (episkopos) evolved to be a primus among the elders (presbyters) in the late apostolic or early post-apostolic era. But it would take a while until the bishop received a more formal recognition as a separate tier of ...

1521 might be the Roman Catholic answer to this question, but the Eastern Orthodox answer is a bit harder to give. The Roman Catholic Church lost its apostolic succession in splitting off from the Orthodox Church (remember, this is the Orthodox perspective). As late as 1274 and then at 1438, there were still attempts at reunion between the Roman Catholics ...

Apparently different Lutheran churches have different practices, with two Scandinavian state churches being the most notable proponents of apostolic succession (source): Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Finland Church of Sweden These churches don't have the Sacrament of Holy Orders, as Luther rejected it. Still, bishops, priests and deacons are ordained, ...