NON-WORLDLY RADICALS?

Historical evidence suggests that the only group among the Radical Reformation (Anabaptists) who targetted and achieved a united purpose as a movement, were the Swiss Brethren (see previous post). This has a lot to do with them being the first. By the time the word spread to Central and North Germany, persecution had already been let loose. Menno Simons , pioneer and apostolic leader of the Northern wing, was left a fugitive with a bounty on his head, travelling to support and help isolated groups of fearful believers. Regional unity was impossible under such conditions. The same was true for the Hutterites in Central and Eastern Germany.

So let's look at the third thumbnail definition of a radical movement, as used by secular historians (see post of 17 June), and see if the Anabaptists fit it. Did the Radical Reformation have as its aim a change to the current system of power ?

In any welling up of mass protest in history, there will have been hawks and doves: those who wanted revolution at any price and those who sought peaceful means. Even the mainstream Lutheran reformers had their rabble-rousing wing, under such men as Andreas Karlstadt, who led the masses in the burning of statues and Roman Catholic trappings, and who was implicated in stirring up the Peasants' War.

The Anabaptists had them too, like the fiery and unpredictable Hans Hut. These did seek an overthrow of corrupt feudal systems and rampant social and religious injustice. The Peasants' War did happen and some Anabaptists took part. Then there were the events at Münster in Westphalia where, under prolonged siege, the Anabaptist inhabitants set up their own kingdom, appointed a ruler and made new laws - a kind of shellshocked version of Calvin's Christian Republic in Geneva. It ended bloodily and was all the established churches needed to condemn Anabaptism for evermore.

The bulk of the Radical Reformation leaders, however, were against such things. Central to their beliefs were a) the separation of Church and State , and b) Christian non-violence. They accepted that the State was corrupt and might use force against them, but they were not to do so in return. It was against all their priciples to accept worldly offices such as magistrate, so there were never going to be any William Wilberforces among them.

Theirs was indeed a refusal of the world's power systems, but by another means: by "coming out, being separate and touching nothing unclean" (the Bible, 2 Corinthians 6:17). While others might seek to change the political and social systems by legislation or revolution, the Radical Reformation by and large did not see a Spartacus-like Jesus of Nazareth, but one whose kingdom was "not of this world" (the Bible, John 18:36). Their alternative was a new way of living as a collective, based on love, forgiveness and all Christian virtues.

So the Radical Reformation cannot fit the letter of the historians' third criterion, for they neither agitated politically nor (in the vast majority of cases) took part in any revolutionary activity. But in another sense, the definition scarcely fits a movement which had a different concept of 'power' , 'rule' and 'authority'. That they insisted on full observance of their belief and practice by all members, on pain of being cast out of the fellowship, shows a degree of commitment that suggests group radicality. And let's not forget, in the eyes of the State, their actions were indeed revolutionary and subversive enough to warrant every attempt to snuff them out. That, at least, is radical!