Page 20 - All About History - Issue 53-17

REFORMATION

Day in the life

A MÜNSTER ANABAPTIST

DISCOVER THE PRACTICES AND PERILS OF

LIFE DURING THE MÜNSTER REBELLION

GERMANY, 1534-35

In the aftermath of Martin Luther’s Reformation, the German city of
Münster had become the centre of radical Anabaptism, a Christian
movement that is an offshoot of Protestantism. Anabaptists had
flocked to the city after its bishop had granted them religious
freedom from persecution, but when he changed his mind they
were able to fight back and take control. They managed to hold
the city for around 16 months before succumbing to the
bishop’s brutal siege. The Anabaptist leaders were tortured
and executed in the marketplace, and their bodies placed
in cages that can still be seen hanging from
St Lambert’s Church today.
GET BAPTISED

Anabaptism is a faction of Protestantism that does
not recognise infant baptism. Instead, Anabaptists
believe that only adults who are able to make the
conscious decision to confess their faith in Christ
can be baptised. When the Anabaptists took control
of Münster in 1534, a mass baptism was held and
any adult citizen who refused to take part was
expelled from the city.

SPREAD THE WORD

With the Anabaptists in power, Münster
was declared as the seat of the ‘New
Jerusalem’, as chosen by God,
where the new Millennium would
be heralded from. Evangelical
Anabaptists began spreading this
news to encourage more people to
repent their sins and join them. The
message successfully reached the
oppressed Dutch Anabaptists, leading
many to travel to the city.
Dancers prophesied the
Anabaptist teaching on the
GO HUNGRY streets of Münster
Bishop Franz von Waldeck, who had been expelled
from Münster by the Anabaptists, gathered together
troops to launch a siege against the city. They
formed an ever-closer ring around the settlement,
cutting it off from the rest of the world in an
attempt to prevent the spread of the Anabaptist
faith and starve the citizens out. Many perished
from the resulting famine.
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