Lecture 23: Anabaptists and the Radical Reformation
purposefully to stay away from the city church. Faith, for the Anabaptists,
meant the change of heart that led to obedient participation in the life of
the community. Ministers were elected by the community and, after the ¿ rst
generation, seldom had the privilege of a university education.Church discipline among the Anabaptists centered on excommunication
or the ban, which among the Mennonites included shunning. The ban, or
excommunication, was central to the Swiss Anabaptist view of the church.
The Mennonites developed a practice of shunning the excommunicated
member. Debates about the procedures and extent of shunning are the most
divisive issues facing early Mennonite communities.The left wing or radical Reformation includes many strands of theology
other than Anabaptism. A Rationalist strand, appealing to scripture against
the church fathers and the creeds, rejected the doctrine of the Trinity. Michael
Servetus, an anti-trinitarian theologian, was condemned throughout Europe
and ¿ nally burned at the stake in Calvin’s Geneva. Socinianism, another
anti-trinitarian theology, À ourished in Poland and eventually contributed to
18 th-century deism and Unitarianism.A spiritualist strand appealed to the inner voice of the Holy Spirit in a great
variety of ways. Sebastian Franck taught that the true church is inner and
spiritual, having no institutions or ceremonies, and avoiding all division over
doctrine. Thomas Müntzer was an apocalyptic prophet who led an army in
the peasant war of 1525, claiming to take orders from the voice of the Spirit.A violent apocalyptic strand once captured the imagination of Dutch
Anabaptists in the city of Münster. In an armed uprising, the Anabaptists
took over the city of Münster. They were besieged by both Catholics and
Protestants, defeated, and slaughtered. Menno Simons began his work
among the remnant of Dutch Anabaptists after the fall of Münster. Ŷ