The "New Zion" of Münster
Just as the specter of Jonestown brands anyone who tries
to live communally today, a far more serious tragedy darkened
the Anabaptist movement in the sixteenth century. Anabaptist
radicals seized the city of Münster in February 1534,
to create, by force, a "New Zion." It was actually a reign
of terror marked by enforced communism, forced "re-baptism," polygamy
upheld by the sword, and brutal enforcement of all laws,
many by execution on the spot. The Münster commune
lasted only a year, but its reverberations haunted Anabaptists
for many decades. It was the charge always hurled at them,
and it made Anabaptist the dirtiest name one could
be called in Europe.
Anabaptists maintained then, and historians agree now,
that the incident was entirely out of character for their
movement, which is historically known for renouncing the
use of the sword. Catholics and Protestants of that day,
however, saw the incident as revealing the true nature
of Anabaptism, if left unchecked. And to check it they
devoted great energies in hopes of utterly destroying it.
Most of the Anabaptists they killed didn't resist them,
believing, unlike the radicals of Münster, that they
were to imitate Christ, the Lamb of God.
The persecution of the Anabaptists is one of the darkest
episodes of European history. Accounts of it fill their
record of the time, Martyr's Mirror. The "New
Zion" of Münster, however, was another mirror. It
mirrored what was happening all over Europe!
Without justifying this evil, however, it must also be
pointed out that the Münsterites simply were doing
what was being done by Protestants and Catholics all over
Europe which was the coercion of people toward a religious
faith with the power of the sword. [1]
Judged so evil that the bodies and skeletons of the leaders
were displayed in cages for centuries, against whom do
they bear witness? Against the few militant Anabaptists
who used coercion, or against the society that hung them
there for practicing the same coercion on a continental
scale? The victors write the history and have the privilege
of being the pot that calls the kettle black!
[1] Walter Klaassen, Anabaptism:
Neither Catholic nor Protestant [Waterloo, ON:
Conrad, 1981]
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