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The Radical German Reformer Thomas Müntzer (c. 1489–1525): The Impact of Mystical and Apocalyptical Traditions on his Theological Thought

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2016

E. M. V. M. Honée
E. M. V. M. Honée*
Affiliation:
Catholic Theological University, Utrecht
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Extract

Thomas Müntzer’s name is inseparably interwoven with the early history of the German Reformation. This reformer was active during the third decade of the sixteenth century and this mainly in Thüringen, an area in the eastern part of the German Empire belonging to the electorate of Saxony. As such it was to come early under the influence of the Lutheran reform movement initiated in Wittenberg.

Type
Part I: The Apocalypse
Information
Studies in Church History Subsidia , Volume 10: Prophecy and Eschatology , 1994 , pp. 65 - 74
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1994 

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References

1 Holl, K., ‘Luther und die Schwärmer’, Gesammelte Aufsätze, I (Tübingen, 1923), pp. 420–67Google Scholar.

2 Elliger, W., Thomas Müntzer, Leben und Werk (Göttingen, 1975)Google Scholar.

3 For an all-round overview of modern Müntzer research, see Lohse, B., Thomas Müntzer in neuer Sicht. Müntzer im Licht der neuern Forschung und die Frage nach dent Ansatzseiner Theologie (Berichte aus den Sitzungen der Joachim Jungius-Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften e. V., Hamburg; Hamburg Jg. 9, H. 2: (Göttingen, 1991)Google Scholar. This work also contains several chapters on the Marxist approach to Müntzer’s activity, which do not come under consideration here.

4 For what follows see: Schwarz, R., ‘Thomas Müntzer und die Mystik’, Bräuer, S. and Junghans, H., Der Theologe Thomas Müntzer. Untersuchungen zu seiner Entwickhung und Lehre (Göttingen, 1989), pp. 283–301, esp. pp. 285Google Scholarff.

5 This quotation comes from the Prager Manifest (1521): see Müntzer, Thomas, Schriften und Briefe. Kritische Gesamtausgabe, unter Mitarbeit von Paul Kirn; ed. Günther Franz (Gütersloh, 1968), pp. 498, 28fGoogle Scholar. (According to Schwarz, Müntzer und die Mystik, p. 291, n. 98, anspricht should be read ausspricht.) Müntzer’s writings are also available in an English translation: The Collected Works of Thomas Müntzer, ed. and translated by Peter Matheson (Edinburgh, 1988).

6 Franz, G. Schriften und Briefe, p. 538Google Scholar.

7 Stcinmctz, M., ‘Thomas Müntzer und die Mystik. Quellenkritische Bemerkungen’, in Blickle, P. (ed.), Bauer, Reich und Reformation. Festschrift für Franz, G., pp. 148–59Google Scholar.

8 ‘Bey mir ist das gezeugnis abatis Joachim groβ. Ich hab in alleine uber Jeremiam gelesen. Aber meine leer is hoch droben, ich nym sie von im nicht an, sundern vom ausreden Gotis, wie ich dan zurzeit mit aller schrift der biblien beweisen wil’, Müntzer to Heinz Zeiβ, Allstedt 2. 12. 1523. (Schriften und Briefe, p. 398.)

9 Reeves, Marjorie, The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages (Oxford, 1969Google Scholar).

10 Ibid., p. 397.

11 Bailey, R. , ‘The sixteenth century’s apocalyptic heritage and Thomas Müntzer’, Mennonite Quarterly Review, 57 (1983), pp. 27–44Google Scholar.

12 See Maron, Gottfried, ‘Thomas Müntzer als Theologe des Gerichts: das Urteil—ein Schlüsselbegriff seines Denkens’, Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 83 (1972), pp. 195—225Google Scholar.

13 Goertz, H.-J., Thomas Müntzer: Mystiker, Apocalyptiker, Revolutionär (Munich, 1989)Google Scholar. The same author devoted his dissertation to Müntzer’s spiritual origin in mysticism: lnnere und äusere Ordnung in der Theologie Thomas Müntzers (Leiden, 1967). Goertz presents the main thrust of his biography in a shorter form in an essay entitled, ‘Zu Thomas Müntzer’s Geistesverständnis’, Bräuer and Junghans, Theologe, pp. 84–9. The following is based on Goertz’s two 1989 studies.

14 For the mutual attraction of Luther and Müntzer to Tauler and German mysticism and for the different role of Tauler in their respective intellectual lives see Friezen, A., ‘Thomas Müntzer and Martin Luther’, Archive for Reformation History, 79 (1988), pp. 59—80Google Scholar and idem, Thomas Müntzer, Destroyer of the Godless. The Making of a Sixteenth-Century Religious Revolutionary (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and Oxford, 1990), chs. 1, 6, and 7.

15 Tübingen, 1977 (Beiträge zur historischcn Theologie, hrsg. v. G. Ebeling, 55). See also the recent study by Seebass, G., ‘Reich Gottes und Apokalyptik bei Thomas Müntzer’, Lutlier-Jahrbuch 58 (1991), pp. 75–99Google Scholar, in which this author aggressively distances himself from Goertz’s interpretation and introduces new arguments for an apocalyptic chiliastic clarification.

16 See Schwarz, Theologie, pp. 3ff. where exact references for the chiliastic sources used in the comparison are provided.

17 Ibid., p. 3.

18 The following is treated by Schwarz in the first chapter of his book, pp. 10–54.

19 Goertz, ‘Geistverständnis’, p. 95.