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Controversial and complex, without an understanding of Thomas Müntzer it is impossible to gain a full understanding of the Reformation.

Hitherto Müntzer has not been fully understood. He has often been characterised simply as an extremist: some have seen him as a theologian steeped in mystic piety, others as a rabid apocalyptic, or a relentless antagonist of Martin Luther, or an intrepid revolutionary. He has been deprecated as a restless fanatic and utopian; and just as often honoured as a selfless fighter for truth and justice.

Professor Goertz has found the key to understanding the many controversial aspects of Müntzer's life in Müntzer's extraordinary ability to relate social conflicts with theological thinking, in a world where changing medieval traditions took on profound spiritual dimensions, created new social conflicts, and ultimately revolutionised the social and spiritual lives of ordinary people.

Goertz shows how Müntzer was inseparably apocalyptic mystic and revolutionary.

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Scholars are at odds over Thomas Müntzer. Some condemn him as an 'unrestrained fanatic', while others defend him as a 'selfless fighter for truth and justice.' Responses to Müntzer are characterised by fascination and repulsion. It has been like this for some hundreds of years, and it was the case even during the course of his life. His name, in his own words, 'to the little band of the poor and needy, […] has the sweet savour of life, while to those who pursue the pleasures of the flesh it is a gruesome abomination presaging their speedy downfall.' Then as now, he polarises opinions. However, it is only in a precise theological sense that the battle-lines may be defined as the poor versus the pleasure-loving. For some time now the contrast between 'bourgeois' and 'socialist' judgements of society has entered the dispute about Müntzer and has lent a new and, to us, more immediate sense to the concepts of poverty and hedonism: in the former German Democratic Republic Müntzer was an historic hero, the visionary of a more just society, but in the West he is seen rather as a utopian hot-head, the very pattern of unheard-of recalcitance.

It is not possible to avoid this conflict, for it determines the context in which Thomas Müntzer addresses and challenges us today. Since his day we have come to a better understanding of the social struggles in which he was involved, and of the theological insights which he embraced. Anyone who wishes to portray Müntzer must be free of any compulsion to seek principles of interpretation based exclusively either on the social issues or on the movement of theological thought. This biography seeks to resolve this tension and use the best arguments of both approaches: Müntzer's theological reflections led him by their own logic into social action, and likewise, the social tensions of the early Reformation period created the atmosphere in which his thinking gradually took shape — not in a detached or arbitrary way, but closely related to the actual experiences of his time. And in this form his declarations and writings had in their turn an effect on the general course of events.

Müntzer wanted to bring about 'a full and final reformation in the near future' and placed his theology at the service of the 'transformation of the world.' From this sprang — for the first time on German soil — a theology of revolution. It was a sharp attack on the spirtual and temporal authorities; and Müntzer's way of reflectng on society's experiences confronts us today with a challenge which has yet to be taken up: 'the people will go free and God alone will be their Lord.' This is the challenge made by the 'theologian of revolution' to all who step within his circle of influence. We should not meet him either with our defences bristling, or with uncrtical adoration, but with critical sympathy.

Contents

List of Illustrations

Introduction

I Distorted Images

II Changing Times

III Blurred Tracks

IV In The Reformers' Camp

V An Early Movement

VI A Personal Manifesto

VII 'In the wretchedness of my expulsion'

VIII Pastoral Care and Political Correspondance

IX Lords, Commoners and Resistance

X Absolute Incompatibilty

XI 'Eternal Alliance' and 'Eternal Council'

XII Battle Under the Rainbow

XIII Apocalyptic Mystic and Revolutionary

XIV Unfinished and yet fulfilled

Bibliography

Index of Names and Places