Leigh T.I. Penman - Hope and Heresy - The Problem of Chiliasm in Lutheran Confessional Culture, 1570-1630-Springer Netherlands (2019)

Leigh
T.I. Penman
Hope and
Heresy
The Problem of Chiliasm in Lutheran
Confessional Culture, 1570–1630
Hope and Heresy
Leigh T.I. Penman
Hope and Heresy

The Problem of Chiliasm in Lutheran
Confessional Culture, 1570–1630
Leigh T.I. Penman
Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities
University of Queensland
St. Lucia, QLD, Australia
ISBN 978-94-024-1699-2 ISBN 978-94-024-1701-2 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2
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Acknowledgements
The present work concerns the problematic status of optimistic apocalyptic expec-
tations in early modern Lutheran confessional culture. It began life many years ago
in a very different form as a doctoral dissertation at the University of Melbourne
under the supervision of Charles Zika. It was in Charles’s courses as an undergradu-
ate that I first encountered the works of Robin Bruce Barnes, Johannes Wallmann
and Carlos Gilly, whose research influenced the development of my own interests.
During the research for this book, I was fortunate to spend time at the Herzog
August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel on multiple occasions, firstly as a guest
researcher under the auspices of the Dr. Günther Findel Stiftung and, secondly, with
a fellowship from the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD). In
Wolfenbüttel, I profited from the advice and friendship of numerous scholars whose
thoughts helped to shape this work, including Jill Bepler, Jürgen Beyer, Andreas
Corcoran, Warren Dym, Robert Hardwick Weston, Gizella Hoffmann, Grantley
McDonald, Alexander Nebrig, Cornelia Niekus-Moore, Beth Plummer, Theo
Pronk, Jenny Spinks and Douglas Shantz, as well as the fellow members and co-
founders of SAV Wolfenbüttel, especially Ilona Fekete and Márton Szentpéteri.
During the term of my DAAD grant, both Manfred Jakubowski-Tiessen and
Hartmut Lehmann gave me of their time at the former Max-Planck-Institut für
Geschichte in Göttingen, and I am grateful for their advice and interest.
It was not until a postdoctoral fellowship with the Cultures of Knowledge project
at the University of Oxford, however, that this book began to take its present shape.
This was largely due to the influence of Howard Hotson, as well as the convivial
discussions I had concerning matters apocalyptic with Brandon Marriott, Vladimír
Urbánek and James Brown. More recently, a fellowship with the Institute for
Advanced Studies in the Humanities (formerly the Centre for European Discourses)
at the University of Queensland allowed the time for the work to further mature in
an ideal intellectual environment, where I benefitted from the wisdom of Philipp
Almond, Peter Harrison and Ian Hesketh during the completion of the manuscript.
At a late stage, Howard Hotson read and critiqued several key chapters, improving
them immensely by asking the hardest of questions. I am grateful as well to the two
anonymous readers provided by the publisher; their reports were instrumental in
vii
viii Acknowledgements
shifting slightly the tone and focus of the analysis and adding further layers of
complexity.
I would like to collectively thank the staff of archives and libraries throughout
Australia, Europe and North America, especially in Wolfenbüttel, Erfurt, London,
Strasbourg, Wrocław, Prague, Copenhagen, Dresden, Görlitz, Rudolstadt, Steyr,
Budapest, Amsterdam, Karlsruhe, Tübingen, Nuremberg, Munich, Vienna and
Zittau, all of whom fielded requests for manuscripts, books, reproductions and
information helpfully and efficiently and whose own initiative led to the discovery
of many new sources which would otherwise have remained unknown to me.
Finally, I would like to thank my family, my parents, my brother and my late grand-
mother, whose patience, love and support have always been exemplary. To Ilona,
Samu and Kata, thanks for making every day amazing. This work is dedicated to the
memory of Walter Berezy (1924–2016), a pansophist in the tradition of Comenius
who, had he lived in an age not ruined by war and its consequences, might well have
written something like it.
Introduction
In 1621, Valentin Grießmann (d. 1639), Lutheran pastor in Wählitz near Magdeburg,
penned a book against a ‘sudden and inexplicable’ rash of heretical publications that
had caused him great concern. Over the last few years, Grießmann had seen more
than 100 printed pamphlets, together with many more manuscript works circulating
among the local populace, which convinced him that a ‘seditious conspiracy against
all good order’ was afoot in the Holy Roman Empire.1 Grießmann believed that
these tracts were authored by a ‘secretly confederated and corresponding mob’
(heimliche confoederirte vnd correspondirente Rotte)2 of Weigelians, Rosicrucians,
Paracelsians, visionaries, new prophets and theosophers. This ‘mob’ was responsi-
ble for ‘fanning the flames of war’ and accelerating the descent of the Empire into
chaos and destruction. Additionally, these works betrayed all manner of heresies,
ranging from Christological errors to misrepresentations of the nature of the Holy
Spirit. Yet there was one heretical doctrine which, Grießmann held, was common to
all these books; they anticipated that there would soon occur a golden Reformation
(güldene Reformation), a time of peace before the Last Judgment.3 As Grießmann
argued, this expectation was the result of a grave and pernicious heresy called
chiliasmus or chiliasm. But where Grießmann saw heresy, others saw hope.
The present study investigates the place of optimistic apocalyptic expectations—
that is to say, visions of an earthly future felicity before the Last Judgment—within
German Lutheranism between approximately 1570 and 1630. This time span is
deliberately chosen. Its starting point encompasses the time of the expansion of
Lutheran eschatological expectations following Luther’s death and the supernova of
1
Valentin Grießmann, Πρόδρομος εὐμενὴς, καὶ ἀποτρεπτικός Exhibens enneadem quaestionum
generalium De Haeresibus ex orco redivivis: Das ist: Getrewer Eckhart/Welcher in den ersten
Neun gemeinen Fragen/der Wiedertäufferischen/Stenckfeldischen/Weigelianischen/und Calvino-
Photinianischen/Rosen Creutzerischen Ketzereyen/im Landen herumbstreichende und streiffende
wüste Heer zu fliehen/und als seelenmörderische Räuberey zu meyden verwarnet. (Gera: Andreas
Mamitzsch, 1623), 14.
2
Grießmann, Getrewer Eckhart, 48.
3
Grießmann, Getrewer Eckhart, 48, 67.
ix
x Introduction
1572 and concludes following the aftermath of the many disappointed prophesies
that anticipated the commencement of the desired Golden Age sometime during or
after the great conjunction of 1623. It incorporates the first 12 years of the Thirty
Years’ War and the environmental, political and confessional crises which preceded
it. Within lay and clerical cultures, the extensive engagement with ideas of a time of
future felicity before the Last Judgment provoked a diverse range of opinions, from
approval to approbation.
Within Lutheranism, ideas of a future respite or Golden Age were often consid-
ered heretical because they butted up against the pessimistic apocalypticism that
was widely held in the faith.4 Many Lutherans believed that the Millennium of
Revelation 20:1–6, one of the great inspirations for visions of a future felicity, was
a period that had occurred historically. Orthodox Lutherans typically expected that
before the Judgment Day, conditions on earth would worsen, until the true church
was finally vindicated following the apocalyptic event. Thus, when Luke 18:8 posed
the question ‘when the Son of Man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?’, the
typical Lutheran response was ‘very little or none’.5 These expectations were ini-
tially encouraged by Martin Luther (1483–1546). Defending a fledgling faith
decried as heretical by its Catholic opponents, he promoted a historical interpreta-
tion of the apocalyptic books of the New Testament and considered the Last
Judgment imminent. As Robin Bruce Barnes has summarized: ‘For Luther, Christ
stood poised to return, to deliver his own, and to deal the final blow to a corrupt
world. The faithful could rejoice in the recovery of God’s word and the nearness of
their salvation. Meanwhile they were called upon to steel themselves against the
final ragings of Satan’s powers on earth’.6 Under the influence of the devil, the
world had begun to resemble the time of Noah, ripe for a new flood to wipe away
4
On the character of Lutheran eschatology, and more especially apocalypticism, see Hans-Henning
Pflanz, Geschichte und Eschatologie bei Martin Luther (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1939); Ulrich
Assendorf, Eschatologie bei Luther (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1967); Robin Bruce
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis: Apocalypticism in the Wake of the Lutheran Reformation (Stanford:
Stanford University Press, 1988); Gerhard May, ‘“Je länger, je ärger?” Das Ziel der Geschichte im
Denken Martin Luthers,’ Zeitwende 60 (1989), 208–218; Robin Bruce Barnes, ‘Der herabstürzende
Himmel: Kosmos und Apokalypse unter Luthers Erben um 1600,’ in Jahrhundertwenden: Endzeit-
und Zukunftsvorstellungen vom 15. bis zum 20. Jahrhundert. Manfred Jakubowski-Tiessen, et al.,
eds. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1999), 129–146; Volker Leppin, Antichrist und
Jüngster Tag. Das Profil apokalyptischer Flugshriftenpublizistik im deutschen Luthertum 1548–
1618. (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 1999); Matthias Pohlig, Zwischen Gelehrsamkeit und
konfessioneller Identitätsstiftung: lutherische Kirchen- und Universalgeschichtsschreibung 1546–
1617 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007).
5
Censuren und Bedencken Von Theologischen Faculteten und Doctoren Zu Wittenberg/Königsberg/
Jehna/Helmstädt Uber M. Hermanni Rahtmanni Predigers zu S. Catharinen binnen Dantzig
außgegangenen Büchern. (Jena: Birckner, 1626), 106.
6
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 3. On the development of Luther’s attitudes and interpretations, see
further the useful summary by Bernhard Lohse, ‘Eschatologie’ in Luthers Theologie in ihrer his-
torischen Entwicklung und in ihrem systematischen Zusammenhang (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht, 1995), 345–355.
Introduction xi
sin.7 For Luther, any amelioration of society in this apocalyptic last age was impos-
sible: ‘Now we see, that after this time in which the Pope has been revealed [as
Antichrist], there is nothing to hope for or to anticipate, than the end of the world’.8
On account of Luther’s historicist apocalypticism, the confession as a whole was
largely hesitant to embrace any form of meliorism.9 This pessimistic apocalypticism
was enshrined as a dogmatic article of belief in the Confessio Augustana (1530), the
earliest systematic creed of the Lutheran faith. Article 17 specifically forbade the
expectation that ‘there will be an end to the punishments of condemned men and
devils’, in addition to the idea that ‘before the resurrection of the dead the godly
shall take possession of the kingdom of the world, the ungodly being everywhere
suppressed’.10 Many Lutherans interpreted these statements—which had their ori-
gins in very specific social and doctrinal circumstances—as forbidding any expecta-
tion of a worldly felicitous future. To them, like Luther before them, there was
nothing left for the faithful to do but await the Last Judgment. The postulation of a
period of future felicity, no matter how short its duration, threatened to upset these
expectations.
Nevertheless, by around 1600, a vocal cadre of individuals raised within Lutheran
confessional culture was prepared to embrace a spectrum of optimistic expectations
concerning the Last Days. These expectations were promulgated in a variety of
ways: in scribal publications, preaching on the streets and through the printing
press. They called it by various names: the Millennium, the Golden Age, a New
Reformation, the Age of the Holy Spirit or the Time of Lilies. For some, this felici-
tous period would be terrestrial in nature; for others, it would be purely spiritual,
taking place in the heart of the true believer. Some would base their expectations on
scripture, finding inspiration in Revelation 20, Daniel 12, the apocryphal 2 Esdras
or the synoptic apocalypse of Matthew 24–25. Others would find their authority in
medieval prophecies, or in works of more contemporary figures—like Paracelsus or
visionary prophets—who claimed to be inspired by the Holy Spirit directly. Still
others claimed to base their expectations on their observations of God’s other cre-
ations, such as the celestial firmament. The duration of this future time was simi-
7
Hermann Rahtmann, Christlicher Tugentspiegel, in welchem ihre Art und Eygenschafften zur
Gottseligen ubung, nach Gottes Wort furgestellt und erkläret werden (Danzig: Hünefeldt, 1620),
128–129; P.E.N.H. [Paul Egard] Heller/Klarer/Spiegel der Jetzigen Zeit/deß Jetzigen
Christenthumbs/Glaubens/Lebens/und Wesens im Newen Testament so mit dem Judenthumb/im
Alten Testament/gar richtig ubereinstimmet. (No Place: No Printer, 1623); Georg Rost, Ninivitisch
Deutschland/Welchem der Prophet Jonas Schwerdt/Hunger/Pestilentz/und den endlichen
Untergang ankündiget (Lübeck: Hallevoord, 1624).
8
Martin Luther, Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Deutsche Bibel. 121 vols. (Weimar and Graz:
Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger, 1883–2009), vol. 11, part 2, 113; Melchior Ambach, Vom Ende der
Welt und zukunfft des Endtchrists. Wie es vorm Jüngsten tag in der Welt ergehn werde. (No Place:
No Printer, [c.1550]).
9
Pohlig, Zwischen Gelehrsamkeit und konfessioneller Identitätsstiftung; Barnes, Prophecy and
Gnosis.
10
Die Bekenntnisschriften der evangelisch-Lutherischen Kirche. 9th ed. (Göttingen: Vandenhoek
& Ruprecht, 1982), 72.
xii Introduction
larly contested. Some envisioned it lasting a few decades, others only several years
and still others mere months. Most announced that the longed-for felicitous period
would dawn in the wake of the great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 1623. As
might be expected, the literature concerning these optimistic expectations did not go
unnoticed by defenders of Lutheran doctrine, who attempted to refute the anticipa-
tions of a future felicity and condemn them as heretical. Yet there nevertheless
remained Lutherans, among them some clerics, who declared that a Golden Age
would soon dawn.
Where did this optimistic apocalypticism come from? How was it justified by its
proponents? What are the implications of the debates concerning these expectations
for our understanding of Lutheran confessional culture? These are the concerns of
the present work, which engages with the writings of Lutheran proponents and
opponents of the idea that a period of felicity, however conceived, would precede
the Last Judgment. As Robin Barnes first pointed out long ago, optimistic expecta-
tions were expressed within lay and clerical culture alike as Lutherans threw them-
selves into a search for their own insights into an apocalypse that seemed to recede
with the horizon.11 The boundaries between orthodoxy and heresy shifted constantly
as new insights were sought and defenders of the faith saw new excesses that had to
be curbed. Hope and Heresy documents this process of ongoing negotiation, provid-
ing insight into the unstable and at times chaotic disputes that shaped the boundaries
of confessional identity. What emerges from this study is that the Lutheran doctrinal
position on chiliastic heresy was never uniform. Optimistic apocalyptic expecta-
tions had always played a role in the faith. The history of these expectations became
entwined with heresy because, as Barnes has argued, what was at stake in these
visions was ultimately the issue of authority.12 Barnes’s argument chimes with the
incisive observation of the sociologist John R. Hall that ‘the apocalyptic’ is always
centred on ‘cultural disjunctures concerned with “the end of the world” and
thereafter’.13 The present work documents a particular kind of disjuncture within
Lutheran confessional culture. Despite its focus on a particular religious tradition,
the debates concerning chiliasm documented in this study have affected the charac-
ter of Protestant eschatology and thus European culture more broadly.
Because the present work pursues a diachronic study of apocalyptic ideas in flux,
it is important to precisely define the key terms it employs. The most significant of
these are Lutheranism and chiliasm. Although each term might appear, at first
glance, relatively unproblematic, both have been subject to varying historical, histo-
riographical and semantic interpretations.
Chiliasm is an eschatological doctrine, in as much as it relates to the Last Things,
but it is more especially an apocalyptic doctrine, for it concerns a particular under-
11
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis.
12
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis. On the significance of contestations of worldly authority as a spur
for denunciations of heresy, see the brilliant study of R.I. Moore, The Origins of European Dissent.
2nd ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994).
13
John R. Hall, Apocalypse. From Antiquity to the Empire of Modernity. (Cambridge and Malden,
MA: Polity Press, 2009), 2.
Introduction xiii
standing of the revelation of world history as standing before a final confrontation

between good and evil at the end of time.14 The word ‘chiliasm’ derives from the
Greek χίλιοι, meaning thousand. It entered the apocalyptic vocabulary because of
the thousand-year period prophesied in Revelation 20:5, in which Satan is cast into
the pit and the righteous reign with Christ for 1000 years. Yet its etymology is of
relatively limited importance in the context of Lutheran confessional culture of the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. For when Lutheran clerics spoke of chiliasts
(chiliastae) or used the term chiliasm (chiliasmus), they did so with reference to a
heresy that was protean in form. As Chap. 4 of this study documents, before ca.
1574, the word chiliast was by Lutherans to designate an ancient heresy proposed
by Church Fathers like Tertullian (160–220 CE) and Papias (70–163 CE), who
anticipated that before the Last Judgment, the elect would reign for a literal thou-
sand years on earth.15 But after this date, some clerics began to discuss the beliefs of
ancient chiliasts in connection with the expectations of more contemporary sects
and individuals. In 1614, the Stettin cleric Daniel Cramer (1568–1637) noticed the
circulation of a ‘new and subtle chiliastic opinion’ that did not require the expecta-
tion of a literal thousand-year time of peace. In 1622, the Jena theologian Johann
Gerhard (1582–1637) formally divided the heresy into two categories, chiliasmus
crassus and chiliasmus subtilis. The former applied to the ancient heresy, while the
latter forbade the anticipation of a future felicity of any duration or nature before the
Last Judgment. Given that the rapid expansion of this heresy took place in a polemi-
cal religious atmosphere, other, sometimes conflicting, definitions soon followed
and circulated simultaneously.
As such, when I use the term chiliasm in this study—and variants like chiliastic
and chiliasts—it is with reference to a heresy as understood and defined by Lutherans
at that specific time. When describing an expectation of a future felicity before the
Last Judgment, of whatever nature, I designate these with phrases like optimistic
apocalyptic expectation, expectation of future felicity, Golden Age or similar. These
formulations are cumbersome and likely not unproblematic. But they are not
intended to be analytical categories. Instead, they are used here to create a vocabu-
lary for analysis that does not draw upon the contemporary heresiological
terminology.
Because the analytical focus of this work is on the broader intellectual, social and
cultural factors that affected debates on chiliasm and optimistic apocalyptic expec-
tations within Lutheran confessional culture, the definitions applied in several
learned studies on Calvinist millenarianism by Howard Hotson and Jeffrey Jue will
not be employed here.16 These definitions—which distinguish between millenarian,
14
Catherine Wessinger, ‘Millennial Glossary,’ in The Oxford Handbook of Millennialism, Catherine
Wessinger, ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 717; Stephen D. O’Leary, Arguing the
Apocalypse. A Theory of Millennial Rhetoric (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994). On time,
evil, and authority see also Hall, Apocalypse, 47, 59–62, 127–130.
15
See further the discussion in Chap. 4.
16
Howard Hotson, Johann Heinrich Alsted 1588–1638. Between Renaissance, Reformation, and
Universal Reform (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 184, note 9; Howard Hotson, Paradise
xiv Introduction
quasi-millenarian and semi-millenarian strains of expectation—are essential for

understanding apocalyptic thought within Calvinism, where there exists a need to
differentiate between general pre-1627 meliorism and specific post-1627 literal mil-
lenarianism which emerged in the thought of Johann Heinrich Alsted (1588–1638)
and Joseph Mede (1586–1639). But the status of optimistic apocalypticism in
Lutheran confessional culture differed fundamentally to that within Reformed con-
fessional cultures. Within Lutheranism of the early seventeenth century, whether or
not any particular anticipation of a felicitous future was based specifically on
Revelation 20, was worldly or spiritual or numbered a literal thousand years or not
was immaterial to its potential status as chiliastic heresy. Designations used in
recent comparative literature on millennialism, such as ‘catastrophic millennial-
ism’, ‘progressive millennialism’, ‘avertive apocalypticism’ and ‘nativist millenni-
alism,’ among others, have also not been employed in this study, which focusses on
these ideas within a single confessional tradition.17
Another term that will be used throughout this work that requires discussion is
Lutheranism. Traditionally, in any particular historical period, this term has been
employed to designate a body of beliefs and practices based on the doctrines of
Martin Luther, defined in the symbolic books of the faith and adhered to by the
Lutheran church. But discourse on heresy, orthodoxy and their definition is inher-
ently discourse about the contestation of boundaries of faith, doctrine and identity,
and these do not always coincide.18 That there were debates about chiliastic heresy
within Lutheranism suggests something of the porous nature of the boundaries
between heresy and orthodoxy in this period, and therefore of the boundaries of
contemporary Lutheranism itself. Orthodox doctrine, belief and practice were stan-
dards to which a believer might strive, but certainly not the baseline of life and
existence within the culture which grew up around and supported the confessional
faith. Furthermore, doctrine was not static. As the present study shows, the defini-
tions of chiliastic heresy could expand and contract based on a variety of
circumstances.
Postponed. Johann Heinrich Alsted and the Birth of Calvinist Millenarianism (Dordrecht: Kluwer,
2000), 27, note 88; Jeffrey K. Jue, Heaven Upon Earth. Joseph Mede (1586–1638) and the Legacy
of Millenarianism (Dordrecht: Springer, 2006). Similarly, I do not employ postmillennial and
premillennial in this study, which would also threaten to confuse the terms of the debate. As early
as 1980, questions had been raised concerning their explanatory value, a view that has recently
intensified. See Ernest R. Sandeen, ‘The ‘Little Tradition’ and the Form of Modern Millenarianism,’
in The Annual Review of the Social Sciences of Religion. Bryan W. Wilson et al., eds. (The Hague:
Mouton, 1980), 165–167; Catherine Wessinger, ‘Millennialism With and Without the Mayhem,’ in
Millennium, Messiahs, and Mayhem. Contemporary Apocalyptic Movements. Thomas Robbins
and Susan J. Palmer, eds. (London and New York: Routledge, 1997), 47–59; Wessinger, ‘Millennial
Glossary,’ 721; Robert K. Whalen, ‘Postmillennialism’ in The Encyclopedia of Millennialism and
Millennial Movements. Richard Landes, ed. (New York: Routledge, 2000), 326–329; Robert
K. Whalen, ‘Premillennialism’ in Landes, ed., Encyclopedia of Millennialism, 329–332.
17
On these, see Wessinger, ed. The Oxford Handbook of Millennialism, 27–109; Richard Landes,
Heaven on Earth: The Varieties of Millennial Experience (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).
18
Volkhard Wels, Manifestationen des Geistes. Frömmigkeit, Spiritualismus und Dichtung in der
Frühen Neuzeit (Göttingen: V&R UniPress, 2014), esp. 51–55.
Introduction xv
Lutheran confessional culture of the early seventeenth century was not homog-
enous or monolithic.19 Since 1980, a somewhat different impression has been
encouraged in some scholarly literature by the influence of the confessionalization
thesis.20 One of the central tenets of the thesis, as postulated by Heinz Schilling, is
that through various processes of social discipline, confessions like Lutheranism,
Calvinism and Catholicism ‘developed into internally coherent and externally
exclusive communities distinct in institutions, membership and belief’.21 The con-
fessionalization thesis has proven invaluable for scholars investigating the synergis-
tic relationship between confessional identity and the territorial state in the Holy
Roman Empire and the roles played by state churches. However, its utility in other
areas has been questioned.22 One shortcoming, identified by Thomas Kaufmann, has
been the repercussions of the thesis for investigations of heresy.23 Namely, the pos-
tulation of homogenous confessional entities leaves little room for analysing the
nuances of identity negotiation or dissimulation in this period. Kaufmann has
instead argued that ongoing Lutheran debates concerning heresy contributed to pro-
cesses of inner-confessional self-definition (innerkonfessionelle
Selbstverständigung), and not necessarily processes of exclusion, as the confession-
alization thesis might predict. Kaufman argues persuasively that Lutheran doctrinal-
ists did not dismiss the Schwärmer, chiliasts and dissenters that they wrote against
19
The idea of Lutheran confessional culture has been adopted from the work of Thomas Kaufmann,
Dreißigjähriger Krieg und Westfälischer Friede. Kirchengeschichtliche Studien zur lutherischen
Konfessionskultur. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 1998), and Kaufmann, Konfession und Kultur.
Lutherischer Protestantismus in der zweiten Hälfte des Reformationsjahrhunderts. (Tübingen:
Mohr Siebeck, 2006), 14–21. I rely in this work on Clifford Geertz’s anthropologically derived
definition of culture as ‘an historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols, a
system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms by means of which men communi-
cate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about and their attitudes toward life’. See Geertz,
Interpretation of Cultures (New York: Basic Books, 1973), 89.
20
See Harm Klueting, ‘Die Reformierten in Deutschland des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts und die
Konfessionalisierungsdebatte der deutschen Geschichtswissenschaft seit ca. 1980,’ in Profile des
reformierten Protestantismus aus vier Jahrhunderten. M. Freudenberg, ed. (Wuppertal: Foedus
1999), 17–47.
21
Heinz Schilling, ‘Confessional Europe,’ in Handbook of European History 1400–1600. Thomas
A. Brady, Heiko Oberman, James D. Tract, eds. (Leiden: Brill, 1995), 641. See also Wolfgang
Reinhard, ‘Gegenreformation als Modernisierung? Prolegomena zu einer Theorie des konfessio-
nellen Zeitalters,’ Archiv für Reformationgeschichte 68 (1977): 226–252, and the essays collected
in Heinz Schilling, ed. Die Reformierte Konfessionalisierung in Deutschland. Das Problem der
“Zweiten Reformation.” (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus 1986).
22
Hartmut Lehmann, ‘Grenzen der Erklärungskraft der Konfessionalisierungsthese,’ in
Interkonfessionalität – Transkonfessionalität – binnenkonfessionelle Pluralität. Neue Forschungen
zur Konfessionalisierugsthese. Kaspar von Greyerz et al., eds. (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus,
2003), 242–250.
23
Thomas Kaufmann, ‘Nahe Fremde: Aspekte der Wahrnehmung der “Schwärmer” im früh-
neuzeitlichen Luthertum,’ in Greyerz, et al., eds. Interkonfessionalität, 181; Kaufmann, Konfession
und Kultur, passim; See also Anne Conrad, ‘Bald papistisch, bald lutherisch, bald schwenkfel-
disch. Konfessionalisierung und konfessioneller Eklektizismus,’ Jahrbuch für Schlesische
Kirchengeschichte 76/77 (1997/98): 1–25.
xvi Introduction
as ‘opponents without’ (äußere Gegner). Instead, they were recognized as ‘strang-

ers within’ (nahe Fremde).24 Kaufmann’s insight offers a useful paradigm with
which to consider the relationship between Lutheran confessional culture and its
supposed dissenters.
This still leaves us with the problem of how to position ‘heretics’ in relation to
doctrinal Lutheranism. In 1934, Arnold Schleiff (1911–1945) called attention to
traditions of ‘internal criticism’ (Selbstkritik) within early modern Lutheranism,
thereby drawing attention to the different ways that Lutheran doctrine was promul-
gated, understood and even challenged, by confessing Lutherans.25 In 1984, Russell
Hvolbek discussed the influential Lusatian theosopher Jacob Böhme (1575–1624)
as part of a tradition of ‘outsider Lutheranism,’ that is to say of a reform-oriented
culture within Lutheranism potentially receptive to Schwenkfeldian, Franckist or
Paracelsian doctrines, which never sought to break from the Lutheran church itself.26
Similarly, in a series of insightful studies concerning the Tübingen bookseller
Eberhard Wild (1588–ca. 1635), a Lutheran condemned in 1620 for publishing sus-
pect religious literature, Ulrich Bubenheimer and Dieter Fauth applied categories of
religiöse Devianz or Kryptoradikalität.27 These terms were coined to designate
those personalities who publicly confessed a particular faith—such as Lutheranism—
but who advocated beliefs that might have been considered heterodox by some doc-
trinal authorities.28 The Zschopau pastor Valentin Weigel (1533–1588) or the
24
Kaufmann, ‘Nahe Fremde’, 181–182.
25
Arnold Schleiff, Selbstkritik der lutherischen Kirchen im 17. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Junker &
Dünnhaupt, 1937).
26
Russell H. Hvolbek, ‘Seventeenth-Century Dialogues: Jacob Boehme and the New Sciences’.
Unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Chicago, 1984, 102–103.
27
Initially, Bubenheimer and Fauth proposed the terms Kryptoheterodoxie or Kryptodissidentismus
but ultimately abandoned them as being too reliant on a prevailing concept of orthodoxy. See
Ulrich Bubenheimer, ‘Von der Heterodoxie zur Kryptoheterodoxie. Die nachreformatorische
Ketzerbekämpfung im Herzogtum Württemberg und ihre Wirkung im Spiegel des Prozesses gegen
Eberhard Wild,’ Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte 110 (1993): 307–341; Ulrich
Bubenheimer, ‘Literatur- und Sozialprofil der Krypto-Heterodoxie in Tübingen und Württemberg
um 1620,’ Historical Social Research-Historische Sozialforschung 18 (1993): 135–141; Ulrich
Bubenheimer, ‘Rezeption und Produktion nonkonformer Literatur in einem protestantischen
Dissidentenkreis des 17. Jahrhunderts,’ in Religiöse Devianz in christlich geprägten Gesellschaften.
Vom hohen Mittelalter bis zur Frühaufklärung. D. Fauth and D. Müller eds. (Würzburg: Religion
& Kultur, 1999), 106–125; Ulrich Bubenheimer, ‘Schwarzer Buchmarkt in Tübingen und
Frankfurt: zur Rezeption nonkonformer Literatur in der Vorgeschichte des Pietismus,’ Rottenburger
Jahrbuch für Kirchengeschichte 13 (1994): 149–163; Dieter Fauth, ‘Die Typusentwicklung des
heterodox Gebildeten im Kontext der Hochorthodoxie: Zur Sozialgeschichte eines Tübinger
Kreises um 1620,’ Literaten-Kleriker-Gelehrte. Zur Geschichte der gebildeten im vormodernen
Europa. (Cologne: Böhlau, 1996), 245–268; Dieter Fauth, ‘Verbotener Bildung in Tübingen zur
Zeit der Hochorthodoxie: eine sozialgeschichtliche Studie zum Zensurfall des Buchhändlers und
Druckers Eberhard Wild (1622/23),’ Zeitschrift für württembergische Landesgeschichte 53 (1994):
1–17; Dieter Fauth, ‘Dissidentismus und Familiengeschichte. Eine sozial- und bildungsgeschich-
tliche Studie zum kryptoheterodoxen Tübinger Buchdrucker Eberhard Wild (1588-um1635),’
Rottenburger Jahrbuch für Kirchengeschichte, 13 (1994): 165–178.
28
Bubenheimer, ‘Von der Heterodoxie zur Kryptoheterodoxie,’ 308, 314. See further Perez
Zagorin, Ways of Lying. Dissimulation, Persecution and Conformity in Early Modern Europe
Introduction xvii
Lutheran devotional author Johann Arndt (1555–1621) are perhaps model examples
of the ‘cryptoradical’ personality.
All of these historians strove to define an analytical space in which to locate
persons who were raised within Lutheran confessional culture, who self-identified
as Lutherans and yet who, for whatever reason, might not have been regarded as
members of that faith by some guardians of orthodoxy. All cultures—social, reli-
gious, intellectual or otherwise—possess subcultures and countercultures, which
draw on and react to common impulses in the confessional ‘mainstream’. This
dynamic exchange is a feature of all cultures, historical and current.29
While the works of those Lutherans who anticipated a felicitous future before the
Last Judgment were often anticlerical and thus critical of institutionalized
Lutheranism, this hardly distances their authors from their backgrounds in the faith.
They were just as much a product of Lutheran confessional culture as a village pas-
tor or university-based theologian.30 With this in mind, I use terms like Lutheran and
Lutheranism in this study to designate defenders of Lutheran doctrine that com-
bated chiliastic heresy, as well as those who were raised within or otherwise adhered
to the faith but were critical of it. This definition recognizes the plurality of possible
experiences of seventeenth-century Lutheranism, the ‘fractions’ (innerlutherische
Fraktionen) that comprised broader Lutheran confessional culture.31 The question
of what was acceptable and who was or was not Lutheran between 1570 and 1630
is not always clear-cut. The example of the debates on chiliastic heresy and optimis-
tic apocalypticism demonstrate that the line dividing heretic and confessing mem-
ber of the faith was mutable.
While several scholars have engaged with the role of pessimistic apocalypticism
in early seventeenth century Lutheranism, there has been little attention paid to
optimistic expectations.32 A reason for this lack of attention may be historical.
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990); Günther Mühlpfordt and Ulman Weiß,
‘Kryptoradikalität als Aufgabe der Forschung,’ in Kryptoradikalität in der Frühneuzeit. Günther
Mühlpfordt and Ulman Weiß, eds. (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2009), 9–16.
29
Cass R. Sunstein, Why Societies Need Dissent (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,
2003).
30
Kaufmann, Dreißigjähriger Krieg und Westfälischer Friede, 139–154. Further the essays in
Greyerz, et al., eds. Interkonfessionalität – Transkonfessionalität – binnenkonfessionelle Pluralität
(2003).
31
Uwe Korde and John Brian Walmsely, ‘Eine verschollene Gelehrtenbibliothek. Zum Buchbesitz
Wolfgang Ratkes um 1620,’ Wolfenbütteler Notizen zur Buchgeschichte 20/2 (1995), 133–171 at
135.
32
See Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis; Hartmut Lehmann, ‘Endzeiterwartungen im Luthertum im
späten 16. und im frühen 17. Jahrhundert,’ in Die lutherische Konfessionalisierung in Deutschland.
Hans-Christoph Rublack, ed. (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1992), 545–554; Leppin,
Antichrist und Jüngster Tag. Compare however the literature on Northern Europe, much of which
has fruitfully engaged with optimistic and pessimistic apocalyptic expectations; Henrik Sandblad,
De eskatologiska föreställningarna i Sverige under reformation och motreformation. (Uppsala:
Almqvist, 1942); Sten Lindroth, Paracelsismen i Sverige till 1600-tallets mit. (Uppsala: Almqvist,
1943); Hans Joachim Schoeps, Philosemitismus im Barock. Religions- und Geistesgeschichtliche
xviii Introduction
Because chiliasm was a heresy, chiliasts were per definitionem not proponents of
Lutheran doctrine and therefore were excluded from many considerations of the
history of the church by confessional historians. As such, the earliest consideration
given to optimistic expectations was restricted to heresiographies like Heinrich
Corrodi’s still-valuable Kritische Geschichte des Chiliasmus (1781–1783) or Johann
Christoph Adelung’s Geschichte der menschlichen Narrheit (1785–1789), manifes-
tations both of the desire to create an Enlightenment pathology of heresy.33 Yet the
need for further interrogation of this material is glaring. One recent article consid-
ered the terms chiliasmus crassus and chiliasmus subtilis—designations introduced
by Lutheran theologians in the seventeenth century—to be an anachronistic distinc-
tion first coined in the 1930s.34
It is only recently that scholarly attention has been devoted to the specific issues
raised by expectations of a felicitous future within Lutheran confessional culture.
The majority of these studies have concentrated on expectations within Pietism,
particularly after circa 1675, when Philipp Jakob Spener (1635–1705) introduced
the doctrine of a ‘hope for better times’ (Hoffnung besserer Zeiten) into Lutheranism.
Spener’s expectations were a clear departure from doctrinal norms and, as such,
ignited ferocious contemporary debate about the potential value that such ideas
could play within Lutheranism.35
The first notable study on chiliasm and Lutheranism in the period before 1675
was authored by Johannes Wallmann, one of Pietism’s most distinguished scholars.
His landmark 1982 article ‘Zwischen Reformation und Pietismus’ provided an ini-
tial survey of the place of chiliastic heresy within Lutheranism between 1597 and
ca. 1691.36 In addition to providing an initial sketch of the various doctrinal state-
Untersuchungen (Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1952); Pentti Laasonen, ‘Chiliastische Strömungen

aus dem Baltikum nach Skandinavien im 17. Jahrhundert,’ in Makarios-Symposium über das
Gebet. J. Martikainen and H.-O. Kvist, eds. (Åbo: Åbo Akademis Forlag, 1989), 158–168; Pentti
Laasonen, ‘Die Anfänge des Chiliasmus im Norden,’ Pietismus und Neuzeit 16 (1993): 19–45.
33
See Simone Zurbruchen, ‘Heinrich Corrodi’s Critical History of Chiliasm, 1781–1783,’ in
Histories of Heresy in Early Modern Europe. For, Against, and Beyond Persecution and Tolerance.
Johann Christian Laursen, ed. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), 189–203.
34
Hans-Joachim Müller, ‘Kriegserfahrung, Prophetie und Weltfriedenskonzepte während des
Dreißigjährigen Krieges,’ Jahrbuch für Historische Friedensforschung, 6 (1997): 33–34.
35
Kevin R. Baxter, ‘From Cooperative Orthodox Optimism to Passive Chiliasm: The Effects of the
Evolution in Spener’s Zukunftshoffnung on his Expectations, Ideas, Methods and Efforts in Church
Renewal’. Ph.D. dissertation, Northwestern University, 1993; Heike Krauter-Dierolf, Die
Eschatologie Philipp Jakob Speners. Der Streit mit der lutherischen Orthodoxie um die ‘Hoffnung
besserer Zeiten’. (Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 2005); Heike Krauter-Dierolf, ‘Die Hoffnung künft-
iger besserer Zeiten: Die Eschatologie Philipp Jakob Speners im Horizont der zeitgenössischen
lutherischen Theologie,’ in Geschichtsbewusstsein und Zukunftserwartung in Pietismus und
Erweckungsbewegung. Wolfgang Breul and Jan Carsten Schnurr, eds. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht, 2013), 56–68.
36
Johannes Wallmann, ‘Zwischen Reformation und Pietismus. Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus in der
Lutherischen Orthodoxie,’ in Verifikationen: Festschrift für Gerhard Ebeling zum 70. Geburtstag.
(Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1982): 187–205. A revised version of this article was printed as
Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus in der lutherischen Orthodoxie,’ in Wallmann, Theologie
und Frömmigkeit im Zeitalter des Barock. Gesammelte Aufsätze (Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck),
Introduction xix
ments on chiliasm authored by Lutheran theologians during the period, Wallmann

identified a trend among authors of devotional literature toward the expression of
optimistic apocalyptic ideas. The most important figure in this regard was perhaps
Paul Egard (ca. 1578–1655), pastor in Nortorf, Holstein. According to Wallmann, in
1623, Egard became the first Lutheran cleric to attempt to reconcile apocalyptic
meliorism with doctrinal Lutheranism.37 The present study confirms Wallmann’s
conclusions to a large extent, but it also demonstrates that there were a variety of
sources and individuals, both lay and clerical, who advocated optimistic expecta-
tions within Lutheranism of this period. Wallmann’s survey, which has inspired a
host of studies on the role of apocalypticism in Pietism, demonstrated that fresh
questions had to be asked of the relationship between Lutheranism and optimistic
apocalypticism and simultaneously showed that Lutheran apocalypticism of the
early seventeenth century was far more nuanced than generally recognized. This
view has been deepened by more recent studies of Pietism and chiliasm.38
Many of the implications of Wallmann’s study have been taken up by the
American historian Robin Bruce Barnes. Barnes’s careful work has drawn attention
to the diverse roles played by apocalyptic expectations in the formation of Lutheran
confessional identity and also provided key insights into the role of discourse on
chiliasm and optimistic apocalyptic expectations during this period. In his Prophecy
and Gnosis (1988), Barnes embedded the polemical struggle of doctrinal Lutherans
against chiliastic error within the broader matrix of Lutheran confessional culture,
emphasizing that the categorization of optimistic apocalyptic visions as a heresy
was part of a broader conflict concerning authority and its limits within the Lutheran
church.39 This is a key insight that provides perspective on the ‘sudden’ emergence
of heresiological discourse on chiliasm in the 1610s, when religious, political and
environmental pressures converged on an already-embattled Lutheranism. One part
of this conflict was a concerted effort by Lutheran theologians to curb apocalyptic
speculations that had once enjoyed ‘virtual doctrinal sanction’ in the sixteenth cen-
tury. Barnes noted that although the influence of apocalypticism was largely conser-
vative, apocalyptic awareness suffused every aspect of early modern Lutheranism
and, as a result, produced members of the confession perfectly happy to entertain
scenarios of a future ‘world reformation’.40 Such individuals, as Barnes notes, could
1995), 105–123. I cite from the revised version in the present study, except where the original
contains unique information.
37
Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,‘117–119.
38
See, for example, Inge Mager, ‘Chiliastische Erwartungen in der lutherischen Theologie und
Frömmigkeit des 17. Jahrhunderts. Niedersächsische ‘Gewährsmänner’ für Speners Hoffnung
besserer Zeiten in der Kirche,’ Zeitschrift für bayerische Kirchengeschichte 69 (2000): 19–33; Udo
Sträter, ‘Philipp Jakob Spener und der Stengersche Streit,’ Pietismus und Neuzeit 18 (1992):
40–79; Martin Friedrich, Zwischen Abwehr und Bekehrung. Die Stellung der deutschen evange-
lischen Theologie zum Judentum im 17. Jahrhundert. (Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1988).
39
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 228–260, 240, 318 n. 29. The topos of authority as a key aspect of
apocalyptic rhetoric has since been emphasized by O’Leary, Arguing the Apocalypse and Hall,
Apocalypse.
40
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 227.
xx Introduction
be found in clerical as well as lay circles. In a later study, Barnes used the example
of astrology to demonstrate the depth of the Lutheran pursuit of insight into the End
Times, revealing a picture of a porous confessional and intellectual culture eventu-
ally pulled apart by ‘centrifugal forces,’ with all sides issuing competing claims to
divine authority.41
A different approach to the Lutheran engagement with apocalyptic thought was
taken by the German theologian and historian Volker Leppin. In his Antichrist und
Jüngster Tag (1999)—a survey of the content of a selection of apocalyptic
Flugschriften issued between 1548 and 1618—Leppin portrayed the varieties of
historicist readings of eschatology and prophecy within Lutheranism as attempts to
reduce uncertainty by bringing all events, whether natural, political or theological,
within a flexible framework of interpretation.42 For Leppin, apocalyptic expressions
were central to Lutheran processes of social discipline as well as confessional iden-
tity. While Leppin’s argument is impressively documented, its bibliometric focus
means it passes over the specific circumstances of the production of the apocalyptic
expressions it characterizes. Equally, Leppin’s categorization of apocalyptic writ-
ings risks obscuring the chaotic and diverse reality of these expressions initially
documented by Barnes and demonstrated further in the present study. Indeed, the
debates concerning chiliasm play only a minor role in Leppin’s representation of
Lutheran apocalypticism, which otherwise provides an impressive survey of the
apocalyptic material and attitudes during this period.
While Matthias Pohlig similarly emphasized the conservative influence of apoc-
alyptic ideas within confessional contexts in an essay on patterns of eschatological
interpretation during the Thirty Years’ War,43 Walter Sparn showed the importance
of optimistic apocalypticism as a framework for interpretation of contemporary
events in an article devoted to the social and psychological appeal of such ideas in
the seventeenth century.44 For Sparn, these expectations were product of a series of
interlocking ‘crises’, social, military and economic, experienced during the early
seventeenth century.45 When these perceived crises collided with new devotional
strategies and understandings of the role of the self in devotional practice, an entry
point was created for ‘individualistic’ apocalyptic hopes within Protestant confes-
sions.46 While there has since been much work conducted on the impact of the crises
of the late sixteenth century and its ramifications for the seventeenth, Sparn’s short
study added to prior attempts to explain the appeal of optimistic eschatological
41
Robin Bruce Barnes, Astrology and Reformation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).
42
Leppin, Antichrist und Jüngster Tag, 289–90.
43
Matthias Pohlig, ‘Konfessionskulturelle Deutungsmuster internationaler Konflikte um 1600:
Kreuzzug, Antichrist, Tausendjähriges Reich,’ Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 93 (2002):
278–316.
44
Walter Sparn, ‘Chiliasmus crassus und Chiliasmus subtilis im Jahrhundert Comenius,’ in Johann
Amos Comenius und das moderne Europa. Norbert Kotowski, Jan B. Lasek, eds. (Fürth: Flacius-
Verlag 1992), 122–129.
45
Sparn, ‘Chiliasmus crassus und Chiliasmus subtilis,’ 124.
46
Sparn, ‘Chiliasmus crassus und Chiliasmus subtilis,’ 126.
Introduction xxi
ideas with reference to events of the Thirty Years’ War, as in the widely cited doc-
toral theses of Roland Haase and Herbert Narbuntowicz.47 However, as Barnes has
argued powerfully and the present study further demonstrates, Lutheran interest in
and debate about optimistic eschatology was a result of features of the confessional
culture which existed well before 1618.
Other recent research has drawn attention to the dynamic nature of these negotia-
tions by examining the early modern reformatio mundi as an expression of ‘outsid-
ers, dissenters, and competing visions of reform’ reaching back to the Middle
Ages.48 In this particular view of the ‘long Reformation’ figures like Johann Valentin
Andreae (1586–1654), Jacob Böhme and many of the individuals discussed in this
volume stand alongside magisterial reformers like Luther, Jean Calvin (1509–1564)
and Huldrych Zwingli (1484–1531) as representatives of an ameliorative desire to
better the world through the articulation of platforms of religious and worldly
reform. The Reformation of Luther and his followers and the debates concerning
heresy that followed were an almost inevitable result of the slippage created between
colliding philosophies of reform. Seen in this way, Lutheranism’s native pessimistic
apocalypticism can be understood as a paradoxical reflection of a melioristic
impulse at the heart of the reforming agenda.
Whatever their differences in approach and conclusions, all of the studies men-
tioned above demonstrate that apocalyptic doctrines occupied an important, though
inherently volatile, basis for confessional identity in the seventeenth century. Hope
and Heresy builds on these works to portray the chaotic debates concerning chilias-
tic heresy and optimistic expectations that took place within Lutheran confessional
culture between 1570 and 1630. At the heart of the study is a paradox. Where pro-
ponents of optimistic expectations were often inspired to propose their visions in
order to impose order on the world, defenders of Lutheran doctrine were arguably
moved by a similar impulse to establish order by curbing these same expressions. A
defining factor was authority. Although it focuses specifically on the contested doc-
trine of chiliasm and its relationship to optimistic expectations, the implications of
this study are broad. This study not only contributes to scholarly debates concerning
the status, role and place of eschatological and apocalyptic ideas in European his-
tory but also contributes to testing the limits of early modern efforts of confession-
47
Roland Haase, Das Problem des Chiliasmus und der Dreißigjährige Krieg (Leipzig: Gerhardt,
1933); Herbert Narbuntowicz, ‘Reformorthodoxe, spiritualistische, chiliastische und utopische
Entwürfe einer menschlichen Gemeinschaft als Reaktion auf den Dreißigjährigen Krieg’. PhD
dissertation. Albert-Ludwigs-Universität zu Freiburg im Breisgau, 1994.
48
Hans Leube, Die Reformideen in der deutschen lutherischen Kirche zur Zeit der Orthodoxie
(Leipzig: Francke, 1924); Hans Leube, Orthodoxie und Pietismus. Gesammelte Studien. Dietrich
Blaufuß, ed. (Bielefeld: Luther-Verlag, 1975), 19–35; Fred A. van Lieburg, ‘Conceptualising
Religious Reform Movements in Early Modern Europe,’ in Confessionalism and Pietism. Religious
Reform in Early Modern Europe. Fred A. van Lieburg, ed. (Mainz: Verlag Philipp van Zabern,
2006), 1–10; Howard Hotson, ‘Outsiders, Dissenters, and Competing Visions of Reform,’ The
Oxford Handbook of Protestant Reformations. Ulinka Rublack, ed. (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2016), 301–328.
xxii Introduction
alization, as well as calling attention to the pluralities of experience possible in early

modern religiosity.
∗∗∗

The present study is based upon the evaluation of a selection of contemporary
print and manuscript sources. They are listed in the bibliography. These sources
were accessed mostly on site in European archives and libraries but also through
digitizations accessible through bibliographical databases like Das Verzeichnis der
im deutschen Sprachraum erschienenen Drucke des 17. Jahrhunderts (http://www.
vd17.de), among others. Throughout this study, I have made use of the extensive
secondary literature on religious debates of the seventeenth century. In addition to
the scholarly contributions mentioned in the survey of prior research above, I found
a great deal of relevant material in more obscure local history journals from the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, many of which reprinted manuscripts that are
no longer extant.
At the heart of this study is the idea, first postulated by Robin Barnes, that
Lutheran confessional culture experienced an intensification and an ever-deepening
quest for apocalyptic insight around the turn of the seventeenth century. This inten-
sification was built on the back of the search for deeper insights into the Last Days
that defined the sixteenth century.49 It manifested itself in the establishment of ad
hoc correspondence networks of like-minded individuals and led to the creation of
subcultures of scribal publication dedicated to distributing materials in a manuscript
form. But this intensification of interest is most apparent when tabulating the num-
ber of printed works concerning optimistic apocalyptic thought issued between
1600 and 1630. During these three decades, some 367 printings (both issues and
editions) of 300 unique works addressing the topic circulated both, commercially,
through booksellers and, privately, through networks of trust.
A list of these works—which represents some, but certainly not all, of the mate-
rial actually printed during this period—is presented in the appendix. This list pro-
vides an indication, however impressionistic, of the intensity and intensification of
Lutheran engagement with apocalyptic expectations of a future felicity between
1600 and 1630. It does not take into consideration the large quantity of scribal pub-
lications circulating at this same time. In total, at least 53 individual critics of
Lutheran culture wrote and printed 202 books, pamphlets and broadsheets that
advocated optimistic expectations, which appeared in 260 separate issues. During
the same period, no less than 46 Lutherans printed some 83 books against these
works, which went through at least 95 issues. The profile and trajectory of this
intensification are demonstrated in Fig. 1. It demonstrates that publications concern-
ing optimistic apocalyptic expectations were circulating well before the outbreak of
the Bohemian Revolt in 1618. Equally, it indicates an intensification in the printing
of books on these subjects between 1617 and 1623, during the early phase of the
revolt and the lead up to the great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 1623. The
49
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis; Barnes, Astrology and Reformation.
Introduction xxiii
28
26
24
22
20
18
16
14
12
10
1630
1600
1628
1601
1602
1603
1604
1605
1606
1607
1608
1609
1610
1611
1612
1613
1614
1615
1616
1617
1618
1619
1620
1621
1622
1623
1624
1626
1627
1629
1625
Lutheran Pro Calvinist Lutheran Contra
Fig. 1 Printed works concerning optimistic Apocalypticism, 1600–1630
comparatively late voicing of opposition to the growing expression of these ideas by

clerics and others is also evident. This delayed onslaught, in combination with the
disappointment of expectations concerning a felicitous future after 1623, led to a
decline in the printing of books concerning optimistic apocalyptic expectations in
the lead up to 1630.
As Jonathan Green has recently pointed out, prophecy, which relied on divine
speech, is foremost a social and media phenomenon: ‘what defines a prophet is not
the prediction of future events but the communicative claims made by the prophet
and accepted by his or her audience’.50 Apocalyptic works contained a plethora of
prophetic claims which naturally concerned future events, and with the tendency of
some representatives of optimistic expectations within Lutheranism to define them-
selves as members of a ‘School of the Holy Spirit’, these figures also sought to
define themselves as mediators between God and the average person. Convictions
held privately die with their thinker. What is significant about the optimistic apoca-
lyptic literature of the period between 1600 and 1630 within German Lutheranism
is that arguments about prophetic authority, and therefore religious authority, were
rehearsed in public.
The promulgation and contestation of these prophetic visions in print is likely the
tip of the iceberg when it comes to engagement with optimistic apocalypticism
within Lutheran confessional culture. The circulation of printed works was
Jonathan Green, Printing and Prophecy: Prognostication and Media Change 1450–1550 (Ann
50
Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2012), 1.

xxiv Introduction
s upported and underwritten by the circulation of scribal publications. As the bibli-

ography to the present volume indicates, such publications today survive haphaz-
ardly in libraries throughout the world. They are often difficult to date reliably, let
alone to attribute to specific compilers or copyists. Nevertheless, their existence
provides conclusive evidence that textual cultures existed around anticlerical and
optimistic apocalyptic expectations. The survival of scribal publications, and of
more than three dozen or so copiously annotated copies of printed works issued
between 1600 and 1630—featuring manicules, underlining, comments and nota
bene—show that these books, pamphlets, broadsheets and manuscripts were not
only being produced but were read. They circulated in proactive reading communi-
ties that consumed, interpreted, shared, communicated and engaged with these
works in manners both sympathetic and sometimes adversarial.51 This community
of readers did not merely absorb the doctrines they encountered; it was also inspired
by them. The cases of Paul Felgenhauer, Paul Egard, Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser and
numerous others discussed in the following chapters demonstrate that exposure to
preexisting prophecies played a key role in inspiring the optimistic expectations of
lay Lutherans.
Hope and Heresy is divided thematically into two separate halves, consisting of
chapters arranged both thematically and broadly chronologically. The first half of
the volume—comprising Chaps. 1, 2 and 3—concerns the origins of the optimistic
apocalyptic expressions of the early seventeenth century and how and why these
beliefs were taken up by some within Lutheran confessional culture. The focus in
this section is almost entirely on lay persons. The second half—comprising Chaps.
4, 5 and 6—concerns both the reaction of Lutheran clerics to these expressions and
the optimistic expectations expressed by clerical critics. It is these later chapters in
particular that demonstrate the extent of the confusion that reigned in the debates
concerning chiliasm and offer insight into the subsequent problems of confessional
self-definition this entailed.
Chapter 1 traces the immediate background, both in terms of its sources and its
various contexts, to the Lutheran interest in visions of a coming felicity of the early
seventeenth century. It demonstrates the decisive impact of Paracelsian and non-
Lutheran ideas upon Lutheran apocalypticism, the engagement with which was
encouraged by a series of interlocking crises in the final decades of the sixteenth
century. This prolonged search for further insight into the End Times among
Lutherans led, in the first decades of the seventeenth century, to a flurry of publica-
tions both printed and scribal which promoted optimistic expectations of a coming
Golden Age. These publications, and their authors, are subjects of Chap. 2, which
aims to give an impression of the diversity of expectations being circulated during
51
Perhaps the most interesting example of an annotated text is the copy of Johann Germanus, Der
siebenden Apocalyptischen Posaunen, von Offenbarung verborgener Geheimnussen Heroldt …
sampt Etlich tracts über die Newen Propheten. (Newenstadt: Johann Knuber 1626), in Halle,
Universitätsbibliothek, shelfmark AB 153266, which contains several hundred marginal notations,
in inks of various colours, evidently as an aide to navigating and engaging with the ideas of the
text.
Introduction xxv
this period. Chapter 3 presents detailed case studies of two prominent lay Lutherans
that published widely their optimistic apocalyptic expectations: Paul Nagel (ca.
1575–1624) and Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser (fl. 1583–1626). Despite their radical dif-
ferences, both were motivated by a desire to posit order in the face of chaos and
elaborated an apocalyptic vision subject directly to the inspiration of the Holy
Spirit, therefore impervious to critique by worldly theologians.
These expressions did not go unnoticed by defenders of Lutheran doctrine, some
of whom sought to condemn them as manifestations of chiliastic heresy. Chapter 4
provides a diachronic account of the evolution of the definitions of this heresy
between ca. 1570 and 1630 and draws attention to the circulation of conflicting and
contradictory definitions. Although these condemnations sought to define and
defend confessional identity, they ultimately sowed confusion and led to the retro-
spective condemnation of doctrines once considered orthodox. The fallout of this
situation is treated in Chap. 5, which examines the cases of four clerics who pro-
moted optimistic apocalyptic scenarios. This chapter shows that optimistic apoca-
lypticism could appeal to clerics as well as lay Lutherans. But there were also other
outcomes; the sad case of the Danzig preacher Hermann Rahtmann (1585–1628)
demonstrates that attempts by Lutherans to articulate blanket or unspecific defini-
tions of chiliasm could lead to the creation of heretics even where they did not exist.
Chapter 6 examines a text that probably comprises the first attempt to incorporate
optimistic apocalyptic expectations into orthodox Lutheranism: Paul Egard’s
Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes (1623). Extensively familiar with con-
temporary heterodox literature, Egard was one of the few Lutheran clerics who
advocated not the suppression but the promotion of expectations of a felicitous
future as a means of bridging the growing gap between doctrine and devotion.
Finally, a brief chapter is devoted to the aftermath of the mass disappointment of
prophecies and expectations for the year 1623. This chapter also includes a consid-
eration of the later history of optimistic expectations within Lutheran confessional
culture and points to the epochal shift that the failures of 1623 caused, not only
within Lutheranism but within Protestant apocalyptic expectations more broadly.
These disappointments, together with the efforts of doctrinal opponents of
Lutheranism, created a turn toward a more personal eschatology within Lutheranism
that rubbed shoulders with soteriology. As such, Lutheran apocalyptic culture
largely retreated, for at least a little while, from grand-scale predictions informed by
events of an apocalyptic scale. The aftermath of the mass prophetic disappointments
of the 1620s demonstrate that Lutheran engagements with optimistic eschatology
would possess wide-ranging consequences for Protestant culture of the seventeenth
century as a whole. Equally, however, the place and status of optimistic eschatologi-
cal narratives is by no means a question of mere historical interest. If ideas of prog-
ress and of modernity prevalent in the West today have been informed by these
narratives and expectations—in particular emerging from within Protestant confes-
sional cultures—then the investigation of the history of the struggle between hope
and heresy can contribute to current debates about the role of apocalyptic thought in
shaping modernity.
Contents
1 The Three Mirrors �� 1

The Mirror of Belief – Kirchen Spiegel �� 2
The Eschatology of Paracelsus and His Followers�� 7
Lutheran Syntheses�� 13
The Rosicrucian Brotherhood�� 18
Devotional Authors in search of Certainty�� 22
The Mirror of Nature – Natur Spiegel�� 28
The Mirror of Worldly Affairs – Welt Spiegel�� 32
2 The School of the Holy Spirit�� 37
Paul Felgenhauer�� 38
Philipp Ziegler �� 42
Johann Kärcher�� 46
Jacob Böhme�� 48
Paul Kaym�� 51
Heinrich Gebhard alias Wesener �� 53
Some Minor Prophets�� 56
Scribal Publication and Manuscript Collectors�� 59
The Reach of Printed Books�� 63
Conclusion �� 71
3 Two Prophetic Voices �� 73
The Prophet of Torgau �� 73
Crisis and Transcendence�� 79
The Universal Instrument�� 81
The Role of Hope�� 84
A Prophet Between Utopia and New Jerusalem�� 85
The Seven Laws of the Holy United Roman Empire�� 92
The Reception of Neuheuser’s Works�� 96
xxvii
xxviii Contents
4 Optimism Outlawed�� 99

The Doctrinal Position �� 101
Paths to a Heresy�� 103
The Creation of a Heresy �� 106
A Confusion of Heretics�� 113
The Changing Status of Lutheran Devotional Literature�� 120
Reaping the Whirlwind�� 125
5 Heretics in the Pulpit �� 127
The Rahtmann Dispute�� 128
Rahtmann’s Gnadenreich�� 129
Rahtmann’s “Chiliasm” �� 132
The Opinions of the Theological Faculties�� 134
The Pastor of Nuremberg�� 137
Nicolaus Hartprecht �� 139
Tuba Temporis�� 140
Joachim Cussovius and the Reception of Hartprecht’s
Tuba Temporis�� 142
The Messianic Turn�� 146
6 A Lutheran Millennium�� 153
Paul Egard�� 153
Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes (1623) �� 156
An Unanticipated Millennium �� 160
Some Sources of Egard’s Posaune�� 161
The Reception of Posaune �� 164
Egard’s Apocalypticism After 1623 �� 167
7 Failed Prophecies �� 171
Failed Prophecy, Failed Prophets�� 173
8 Conclusions�� 189
Appendix �� 197
Bibliography �� 211
Index of Scriptural Passages �� 261
General Index �� 263

List of Figures
Fig. 1 Printed works concerning optimistic Apocalypticism,

1600–1630�� xxiii
Fig. 2.1 Paul Nagel, Tabula aurea (No Place: No Printer, 1624).
(Title page. Courtesy of Houghton Library,
Harvard University)�� 68
Fig. 3.1 Paul Nagel, portrait from the title page of his Prognosticon
astrologicum (1619). Woodcut. Courtesy of Houghton
Library, Harvard University�� 77
Fig. 4.1 The tree of heresy. Engraving. From Daniel Cramer, Arbor
hæreticæ consanguinitatis (1623). Courtesy of Houghton
Library, Harvard University�� 177
xxix
Chapter 1
The Three Mirrors
In 1579 Helisäus Röslin (1544–1616), son of a Lutheran pastor in Württemberg,

completed the first part of a lengthy apocalyptic opus Speculum et Harmonia
Mundi.1 In this first part, Röslin examined the prophetic consequences of contempo-
rary political machinations. Inspired by the astronomical portents of the supernova
of 1572 and the comet of 1577, Röslin predicted that a super-confessional meeting
of European powers would soon be convened in order to institute a ‘freedom of
religion’ throughout the world, probably by 1614. Following this meeting, Röslin
believed, prospects were primed for the onset of a ‘golden, celebrated and everlast-
ing Age.’2 Although the Speculum contained only the first part of Röslin’s opus,
namely the Welt Spiegel (mirror of the world), he planned two additional volumes:
a Natur Spiegel (mirror of nature), and finally, the Kirchen Spiegel (mirror of
1
Halle, Universitätsbibliothek, Ms. 23 B 3. An abridged version was printed as Helisäus Röslin,
Speculum Et Harmonia mundi: Das ist/ WeltSpiegell Erster theil: Mit vergleichung der Monarchien
unnd WeltRegimenten durch die Umbstende der Orter Zeitten und Personen auß Gottes Rathschlag
mit denselbigen nach seinem Werck der Creation unnd Schöpfung fürgenommen von anfang der
Welt biß zu End gefürt. (Lich: Kezelius, 1604). Further editions were issued in Frankfurt by Johann
Carl Unckel in 1616 and 1617. Cf. Carlos Gilly, ‘“Theophrastia Sancta.” Paracelsianism as a
Religion, in conflict with the established Churches,’ in Paracelsus. The Man and his Reputation,
His Ideas and their Transformation. Ole Peter Grell, ed. (Leiden, Brill, 1998), 151–185 at 162. On
Röslin see Paul Diesner, ‘Der elsässische Arzt Dr. Helisaeus Röslin als Forscher und Publizist am
Vorabend des dreißigjährigen Krieges,’ Jahrbuch der Elsaß-Lothringischen Wissenschaftlichen
Gesellschaft zu Straßburg 11 (1938): 192–215; Miguel A. Granada, ‘Helisaeus Röslin on the eve
of the appearance of the nova of 1604: his eschatological expectations and his intellectual career
as recorded in the ‘Ratio studiorum et operum meorum (1603–1604)’ Sudhoffs Archiv 90/1 (2006):
75–96; Wilhelm Kühlmann, ‘Eschatologische Naturphilosophie am Oberrhein: Helisaeus Röslin
(1554–1616) erzählt sein Leben,’ in Erzählende Vernunft, Günter Franck, ed. (Berlin: Akademie
Verlag, 2006), 153–174; Miguel A. Granada, ‘Helisaeus Röslin y la libertad de religión,’ Anales
del Seminario de Historia de la Filosofia 31/1 (2014): 69–88.
2
Cited in Susanna Åkerman, ‘Helisaeus Roeslin, the new Star, and the Last Judgment,’ in
Rosenkreuz als europäisches Phänomen im 17. Jahrhundert. Carlos Gilly and Friedrich Niewöhner,
eds. (Amsterdam: In de Pelikaan, 2002), 339–359 at 347.
© Springer Nature B.V. 2019 1

L. T.I. Penman, Hope and Heresy,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_1
2 1 The Three Mirrors
churches). Each volume would therefore be dedicated to explicating the providen-

tial and prophetic significance of events in the political world, the natural world, and
the world of faith.3
This chapter applies Röslin’s three prophetic ‘mirrors’ to outline the major reli-
gious, natural philosophical and political ideas and circumstances that contributed
to the circulation of optimistic apocalyptic expectations within Lutheran confes-
sional culture in the sixteenth century. A point of departure for this chapter is Robin
Barnes’s observation that early modern Lutherans were engaged in a constant quest
for insight into the Last Days. As Barnes has convincingly demonstrated, this quest
was given ‘virtual doctrinal sanction’ by Lutheran theologians in the sixteenth cen-
tury, a circumstance which created a confessional culture highly receptive to ideas
couched in eschatological rhetoric.4 This chapter shows that as the Lutheran quest
for prophetic insight intensified following Luther’s death, some Lutherans encoun-
tered apocalyptic literature that promoted the idea of a coming felicitous future.5
The ever-broadening search for insight led Lutherans to consider sources including
medieval prophecies, visions of contemporaries, and writings of non Lutherans, in
order to win knowledge, and establish certainty, about the nature of the Last Days.
This chapter provides an account of some of the material available to seekers, in
later chapters, we shall consider the implications of the circulation of this material.
The majority of attention in this chapter is devoted to matters of religion, for
although natural and political events influenced the expression of eschatological
ideas, and occasionally the directions in which Lutherans searched for answers, the
intellectual origins of visions of a felicitous future derived primarily from the world
of faith.
The Mirror of Belief – Kirchen Spiegel
Confident that the End was imminent, Martin Luther considered a search for the
signs of the times to be largely superfluous.6 As he wrote in his commentary on
Daniel (1526): ‘I am sure that the Day of Judgment is just around the corner. It
doesn’t matter that we don’t know the precise day ... perhaps someone else can
figure it out. But it is certain that time is now at an End.’7 Yet as time wore on and
the anticipated Judgment failed to occur, Luther’s expectations of imminent apoca-
lypse became less serviceable to the institutionalised church which came to bear his
3
It appears that Röslin only managed to complete the ‘Kirchen Spiegel.’ See Gilly, ‘Theophrastia
Sancta,’ 162.
4
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 3–7; Leppin, Antichrist und Jüngster Tag.
5
6
7
Luther, preface to Daniel (1526), cited in Gerald Strauss, ‘The Mental World of a Saxon Pastor,’
in Reformation Principle and Practice. Essays in Honour of Arthur Geoffrey Dickens. Peter
Newman Brooks, ed. (London: Scholar Press, 1980), 159.
The Mirror of Belief – Kirchen Spiegel 3
name. Accordingly, some Lutherans abandoned Luther’s caution and took up his
implicit invitation to ‘figure out’ the precise date of the coming Judgment.8 The
appeal of such an undertaking was manifold, but above all it granted the power to
posit certainty in a constantly shifting political and religious landscape, and to lend
renewed meaning and purpose to the mundane world. While some of this material
could be found in medieval exegetical and prophetic texts, other traditions were
more radical and far more contemporary. Both found receptive audiences among
Lutheran clerics and lay persons alike.
There were two major medieval traditions which influenced optimistic apocalyp-
tic visions of early modern Lutherans. Each detailed an apocalyptic scenario in
which a period of felicity preceded the Last Judgment. The first was the thought of
the Calabrian abbot Joachim of Fiore (c.1135–1202).9 In three major works, Joachim
introduced a novel historicist understanding of worldly progression which he
achieved by dividing time into three ages. The first age was that of the father, and
spanned the period between the Mosaic covenant and the ministry of Jesus. The
second age was that of the Son, inaugurated by Jesus’s new and everlasting cove-
nant. The third and final age, that of the Holy Spirit, was yet to come, and would
dawn in the middle-distant future. Joachim predicted that it would involve a time of
an outpouring of divine grace, love and spiritual fulfillment, as well as the defeat of
Antichrist. Then, after a short period of tribulation, the Last Judgment would occur.
Joachim’s crucial innovation was not his expectation of a felicitous period to come,
but rather his historicization of the apocalyptic drama. This appealed greatly to
Lutherans, who, following Luther himself, cleaved to historicist interpretations of
scripture. Several of Joachim’s works were printed during the early Reformation,
and were thus available to interested readers.10
A second important tradition was that of the ‘refreshment of the saints.’11 The
first postulator of this idea was perhaps the Dalmatian theologian Jerome (347–
420 CE). While commenting upon the Old Testament book of Daniel, Jerome iden-
tified a problematic ‘extra’ 45 day period during the Last Days in Daniel 12:11–13.
There Daniel wrote that the abomination of desolation would endure 1290 days,
before cryptically adding ‘blessed is he that waiteth and come to the 1135 days.’12
8
Wolfgang Sommer, ‘Luther – Prophet der Deutschen und der Endzeit. Zur Aufnahme der
Prophezeiungen Luthers in der Theologie des älteren deutschen Luthertums,’ in Zeitenwende –
Zeitenende. Beiträge zur Apokalyptik und Eschatologie. Wolfgang Sommer, ed. (Stuttgart:
Kohlhammer, 1997), 109–128.
9
For a survey of literature on Joachim as well as a series of insightful contributions see Matthias
Riedl, ed., A Companion to Joachim of Fiore (Leiden: Brill, 2017); On Joachim and Lutheranism,
see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 22–24.
10
Several of Joachim’s important works were printed in the early years of the Reformation, includ-
ing Liber de concordia (1517); Expositio in Apocalypsin (1527); Psalterium decem chordanum
(1527).
11
Robert Lerner, ‘Refreshment of the Saints. The Time after Antichrist as a Station for Earthly
Progress in Medieval Thought,’ Traditio 32 (1976): 97–144 at 117. Joachim of Fiore also engaged
with this tradition, see Herbert Grundmann, Neue Forschungen über Joachim von Fiore (Marburg:
Elwert, 1950), 79.
12
Lerner, ‘Refreshment of the Saints,’ 101; John P. O’Connell, The Eschatology of St. Jerome
(Mundelin, Ill.: Sem. S. Mariae ad Lacum, 1948), 64–72.
After undertaking a thorough study of biblical chronology, Jerome concluded that it

was not possible to accommodate this ‘extra’ 45 days before Last Judgment. He
therefore concluded that the period represented a time after that event, in which the
saints would be refreshed while waiting for the descent of the New Jerusalem
(Revelation 20:5). Although later commentators like Bede (ca. 672–735 CE) fol-
lowed Jerome’s interpretation, other medieval authorities thought differently. Both
Haimo of Auxerre (d. ca. 878 CE) and Adso (ca. 910–992 CE) equated Daniel’s
‘refreshment’ with the 40 days between Jesus’s death and ascension. They argued
that, following this refreshment, humanity could anticipate another ‘lengthy time’
before the Last Judgment that would be felicitous in character and that would occur
on earth.13
Both traditions would find some reception within Lutheranism. As mentioned
above, Joachim’s three ages and historicist character mapped onto the apocalyptic
expectations of Luther, and his books circulated in print during the early
Reformation.14 As Robert Lerner has shown, the refreshment of Daniel was adopted
by some Lutheran clerics as a prediction of a future period of happiness, albeit one
that, due to its short duration and the promise of further tribulations, still broadly
conformed to Lutheran eschatology. The influence of these ‘mini-millenniums,’ to
employ Lerner’s memorable designation, was product of their durability as well as
their lack of specificity.15 They did not contravene the pessimistic apocalyptic tenets
of the Augsburg Confession, for each ‘mini-millennium’ was only a short felicitous
interval in the apocalyptic drama, which did not impede the imminent Judgment
Day. Furthermore, each could be invoked independently of Revelation 20. As such,
the age of the Holy Spirit and the Refreshment of the Saints provided useful pastoral
motifs in a bleak social, political and religious landscape.
The Nuremberg theologian Andreas Osiander (1498–1552) provides an example
of the receptivity of some early Lutherans to these and other medieval traditions.
Osiander’s works mentioned Hildegard von Bingen (1098–1179) and other medi-
eval mystics,16 promoted the ‘refreshment of the saints,’17 and claimed that the work
of the Reformation had not yet been completed.18 For Osiander, the period of the
‘refreshment’ identified by Jerome was a time in which man would be purified
13
Lerner, ‘Refreshment of the Saints’, 106–110.
14
Green, Printing and Prophecy, 13, 30, 35, 40, 48, 56, etc.
15
Green, Printing and Prophecy, 123.
16
Andreas Osiander, Sant Hildegardten Weissagung über die Papisten/ und genanten geistlichen/
wilcher erfullung zu unsern zeiten hat angefangen, und volzogen sol werden (Wittenberg: Rhau,
1527); Andreas Osiander, Eyn wunderliche Weyssagung von dem Babstumb/ wie es ihm biz an das
endt der welt gehen sol/ in figuren oder gemal begriffen/ gefunden zu Nürmberg in Cartheuser
Closter, und ist seher alt. (Nuremberg: No Printer, 1527); cf. Herbert Grundmann, ‘Die
Papstprophetien des Mittelalters,’ Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 29 (1929): 77–159.
17
Andreas Osiander, Vermutung von den letzten Zeiten und dem Ende der welt aus der heiligen
Schrifft gezogen. (Nuremberg: Petreius, 1545).
18
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 117. Such a claim was not untypical of early-Reformation
Lutherans.
by God’s love. Osiander also wrote about a thirteenth-century prophecy, often
attributed to Joachim, which predicted the arrival of an ‘angelic pope’ who would
reform the world in the last times. Osiander identified this figure not as any member
of the Catholic Church, but instead with Martin Luther.19 On account of his support
of a version of the ‘refreshment of the Saints’ prophecy, in 1619 Nicolaus Hunnius
(1585–1643) argued that Osiander was a major influence on Valentin Weigel’s apoc-
alyptic outlook.20
These scenarios were circulated within a religious culture that recognised medi-
eval prophecies as a potential source of insight into the Last Judgment.21 Writing in
1550, the Frankfurt am Main preacher Melchior Ambach (1490–1559) authored
summaries of numerous medieval prophets, sibyls and commentators for the benefit
of his congregation.22 Many of these sources, especially sibylline prophecies and
more or less ‘Lutheranised’ medieval prophecies, were readily available on book-
stalls in the mid to late sixteenth century. Their popularity was assisted by Luther’s
early interest in such sources. For example, Luther used sibylline oracles—Christian
imitations of the Greek books of the sibyls—to praise the prophetic role of Friedrich
III (1463–1525) of Saxony as an agent of reform. A consequence of Luther’s interest
in these prophetic traditions was that later generations also tended to view them as
legitimate sources for their own apocalyptic expectations.23
As Barnes argues, the Lutheran desire for further insight into the Last Times
explains why optimistic apocalyptic expectations continued to circulate among
Lutherans despite the generally pessimistic tenor of the confession’s eschatology.
Following Luther’s death in 1546, some representatives of doctrinal orthodoxy
attempted to curb this optimism; a process described more fully in Chap. 4.24
Nevertheless, the attempts of Lutheran clerics to marginalise certain apocalyptic
expectations meant that their promoters could be forced into contact with even more
radical ideas and individuals. For as Barnes has remarked, whatever the doctrinal
19
Hélène Millet, Les successeurs du pape aux ours: histoire d’un livre prophétique médiéval illus-
tré (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004); Marjorie Reeves, The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle
Ages: A Study in Joachimism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), 453–462; Marjorie Reeves,
‘The Vaticinia de Summis Pontificibus: A Question of Authorship,’ in Intellectual Life in the Middle
Ages: Essays Presented to Margaret Gibson. L. Smith and B. Ward, eds. (London: Oxford
University Press, 1992), 145–156.
20
Nicolaus Hunnius, Christliche Betrachtung der Newen Paracelsischen und Weigelianischen
Theology, darin durch viertzehen Ursachen angezeiget wird. (Wittenberg: Heiden, 1622), 47–48.
21
22
Ambach, Vom Ende der Welt, (ca.1550), a collection which included material by Hildegard of
Bingen, Joachim of Fiore and sibylline prophecies.
23
Heribert Smolinsky, ‘Apokalyptik und Chiliasmus im Hochmittelalter und der Frühen Neuzeit.
Beobachtungen zur Ideengeschichte,’ Rottenburger Jahrbuch für Kirchengeschichte 20 (2001):
13–26; Sommer, ‘Prophet der Deutschen und der Endzeit,’ 109–128; Barnes, Prophecy and
Gnosis, 20; Green, Printing and Prophecy, passim.
24
Robert D. Preus, The Theology of Post-Reformation Lutheranism. A Study of Theological
Prolegomena. (St. Louis: Concordia, 1970), 40; Werner Elert, The Structure of Lutheranism.
Walter Hansen, trans. 2 vols. (St Louis: Concordia, 1962), vol. 1, 3.
status of these expectations ‘the traditional medieval conception of a short triumph

after the defeat of Antichrist was too attractive to remain unexplored.’25
Before addressing this ‘radical turn,’ there remains another medieval tradition,
albeit non-eschatological, that would prove significant for Lutheran apocalyptic
expressions of the period: the harvest of medieval mysticism. Appropriately, the
attractiveness of mystical doctrines for Lutherans of the seventeenth century can
again be traced back to Luther. His early occupation with the mystics was intensive.
He not only edited two editions of the fourteenth century Theologia Deutsch, but
also praised it broadly. Concerning the Dominican mystic Johannes Tauler (ca.
1300–1361), Luther wrote that ‘neither in the Latin nor the German language have
I ever found a purer or more wholesome teaching, nor any that so agrees with the
gospel.’26 Like his appeal to pessimistic eschatology and his emphasis on scripture,
Luther’s early engagement with mysticism reflected a need to recognise those tradi-
tions which supported the idea of an ecclesia spiritualis and the decisive break with
Catholicism. Yet Günther Mühlpfordt (1921–2017) has argued that Luther’s spon-
sorship of the mystics may well have encouraged the spiritualist platform of refor-
mation radicalism and optimistic apocalyptic expectations.27 For the mystical
inheritance in early Lutheranism carried with it a distinct anticlerical strain readily
accommodated by apocalyptic thinkers.
This anticlericalism was prominent among representatives of the so-called radi-
cal reformation. In the 1520s, reformers like Caspar Schwenkfeld von Ossig (ca.
1489–1561), Sebastian Franck (1499–1543), Andreas Karlstadt von Bodenstein
(1486–1541), Hans Denck (1495–1527) and Johann von Staupitz (1420–1524) took
up the Theologia Deutsch and other mystical writings in fashioning their reforming
platforms.28 Karlstadt, for example, identified his religious philosophy as encapsu-
lating ‘nothing other than the German theology.’29 With Hans Denck’s edition of the
Theologia Deutsch (1528) and a Latin paraphrase of the text by Sebastian Franck
(ca. 1541–2), mystical ideas gradually became associated with the radical fringes of
Protestantism. An emphasis on Gelassenheit, a surrendering or abandonment of
one’s spirit to God, proliferated in works of the radical reformers as they moved
deeper into subjective personal religion and further away from the structured theol-
ogy of an institutionalised church. In other words, these spiritualist reformers sought
to establish their authority by appealing to the Holy Spirit and direct inspiration.
This position is elegantly articulated by Sebastian Franck. An early follower of
25
26
Cited in Rufus M. Jones, Spiritual Reformers of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. 2nd ed.
(New York: McMillan, 1924), 7.
27
Günther Mühlpfordt, ‘Der frühe Luther als Autorität der Radikalen. Zum Luther-Erbe des
“linken Flügels,”’ in Weltwirkung der Reformation. 2 vols. M. Steinmetz and G. Brendler, eds.
(Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1969), vol. 1, 205.
28
For an account of these and other radical reformers, see George Huntston Williams, The Radical
Reformation. 3rd ed. (Kirksville: Truman State University Press, 2000).
29
Siegfried Wollgast, Philosophie in Deutschland zwischen Reformation und Aufklärung 1550–
1650. 2nd ed. (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1993), 633.
Luther, by the time he authored his Türkenchronik (1530) and Chronica, Zeitbuch
und Geschichtsbibel (1531), Franck was already inclined toward a purely inner
Christianity. In both works he criticized the worldly trappings of ‘external’ Christian
worship:
In our time there are already three distinct faiths, which have a large following: the Lutheran,
Zwinglian and Anabaptist. A fourth is well on the way to birth, which will dispense with
external preaching, ceremonies, sacraments, excommunications and its offices as unneces-
sary, and which seeks solely to gather amongst all peoples an invisible, spiritual church in
the unity of the Spirit and of faith, to be governed wholly by the eternal, invisible Word of
God, without external means, as the apostolic church was governed before its apostasy.30
Like Schwenckfeld, Franck held that the bare letter of scripture had to be supple-
mented by inspired intuitive understanding, thus rubbing against the Lutheran creed
of sola scriptura. Franck’s source might have been Luther himself, for in his preface
to the Magnificat (1521), the Reformer wrote:
No one can understand God or God’s word unless he has it revealed immediately by the
Holy Spirit, but nobody can receive anything from the Holy Spirit unless he experiences it.
In experience the Holy Spirit teaches as in his own school, outside of which nothing of
value can be learnt.31
As documented in Chaps. 2 and 3, the impact of these early Lutheran, radical refor-
mation, and medieval mystical ideas upon later expressions of optimistic apocalyp-
ticism is substantial. Weigel quoted mystics like Meister Eckhart (ca. 1260–1328),
and cited Luther’s mystically-influenced early works. In 1618, Karlstadt’s famous
tract Von der Gelassenheit was printed under Weigel’s name.32 Wilhelm Eo
Neuheuser, Paul Nagel and Christianus Theophilus also dabbled with mystical
sources, and claimed inspiration from the Holy Spirit.
The Eschatology of Paracelsus and His Followers
Optimistic apocalyptic expectations circulated in sixteenth century Lutheranism in

the form of medieval prophecies and the ‘mini-millenniums’ of scriptural interpre-
tation. At the same time, Lutherans began to encounter a variety of anticlerical lit-
erature concerning the inspiration of the Holy Spirit as an alternative to the doctrine
of sola scriptura. Both themes came together in the works of the Swiss physician
Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, better known as Paracelsus (1493–
1541).33 In his theological writings, Paracelsus combined mystical ideas of interior
Christianity with optimistic eschatological expectations to produce a body of work
30
Sebastian Franck, Türkenchronik (1530) cited in Jones, Spiritual Reformers, 49.
31
Cited in Jones, Spiritual Reformers, 6.
32
P. Wernle, ‘Ein Traktat Karlstadts unter dem Namen Valentin Weigel,’ Zeitschrift für
Kirchengeschichte 24 (1903): 319–320.
33
On Paracelsus see most recently Charles Webster, Paracelsus. Medicine, Magic and Mission at
the End of Time (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008) and the literature cited therein.
that would become enormously influential among Lutherans. As Amadeo Murase

has recently documented in striking detail, Paracelsus’s eschatological writings
would exercise a decisive influence on Lutheran apocalyptic thought throughout the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.34
According to Kurt Goldammer, the fundamental principle of Paracelsus’ escha-
tology was the conviction that, before the Last Judgment, a messianic realm of jus-
tice for the pious and the poor would be established on earth.35 This period would be
accompanied by advances in knowledge religious and natural philosophical, with
distinctly worldly consequences. Of the handful of Paracelsus’s works printed dur-
ing his lifetime, only one, the profusely-illustrated Prognosticatio ad vigesimum
quartum usque annum duratura (1536), included hints towards this time of earthly
felicity.36 According to Marjorie Reeves (1905–2003), the text was one of several
illustrated prophecies composed as a ‘radical-Catholic’ answer to Andreas
Osiander’s Weyssagung von dem Babstum (1527), which, as remarked above, iden-
tified Luther as the prophesied ‘angelic Pope’ of the Last Days.37
Paracelsus’s Prognosticatio was printed as an octavo pamphlet containing 32
prophetic verses, each accompanied by an emblematic woodcut intended to repre-
sent an apocalyptic event that would come to pass before the year 1560. The prophe-
cies describe a series of disasters that would engulf Europe. Paracelsus saw the
dedicatee of the Prognosticatio, Emperor Ferdinand I (1503–1564), as a savior who
could heal these ruptures and unite Christianity. The pamphlet concluded with two
verses that envisioned a time of ‘renewal’ (Erneuerung) and ‘change’ (Verenderung),
culminating in a ‘Golden World’ (güldene Welt) in which the sufferings of humanity
would be ameliorated.38 In this Golden World, which evidently preceded the Last
Judgment, the world would be transformed into a paradise and man would return to
34
Amadeo Murase, ‘Paracelsismus und Chiliasmus im deutschsprachigen Raum um 1600,’ PhD
diss. University of Heidelberg, 2013, 67–239.
35
Kurt Goldammer, ‘Paracelsische Eschatologie, II, Der Reich-Gottes-Glaube,’ in Goldammer,
Paracelsus in neuen Horizonten: Gesammelte Aufsätze (Vienna: Verband der wissenschaftlichen
Gesellschaften Österreichs, 1986), 123–152; Kurt Goldammer, ‘Friedensidee und Toleranzgedanke
bei Paracelsus,’ in Goldammer, Paracelsus in neuen Horizonten, 153–176; Walter Pagel, ‘The
Paracelsian Elias Artista and the Alchemical Tradition,’ in Kreatur und Kosmos. Internationale
Beiträge zur Paracelsusforschung. Rosemarie Dilg-Frank, ed. (New York & Stuttgart: Gustav
Fischer Verlag, 1981), 6–19.
36
Paracelsus, Prognosticatio ad vigesimum quartum usque annum duratura ... Anno XXXVI. (No
Place: No Printer, 1536). The text was printed in both Latin and German in numerous editions. See
further Will-Erich Peuckert, Das Rosenkreutz. 2nd ed. (Berlin: Erich Schmidt Verlag, 1972), 12ff;
Udo Benzenhöfer and Kathrin Pfister, ‘Die zu Lebzeiten erschienenen Praktiken und
Prognostikationen des Paracelsus,’ in Paracelsus (1493–1541) “Kein andern Knecht ... .”
H. Dopsch, K. Goldammer and P.F. Kramml, eds. (Salzburg: Anton Pustet, 1993), 235–242.
37
Marjorie Reeves, ‘Some Popular Prophecies from the fourteenth to the seventeenth Centuries,’ in
Popular Belief and Practice. G.J. Cuming and Derek Baker, eds. (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1972), 122–3.
38
Paracelsus, Prognosticatio, 615–616.
an Adamic state, undergoing ‘such a total renewal and change that they will be as
children that know nothing of the cunning and intrigues of the old.’39
While the precise apocalyptic scenario in Paracelsus’s Prognosticatio was vague,
the physician was more explicit in his corpus of unpublished theological works.40 In
the Buch der natürlichen Dinge (c.1526), Paracelsus wrote of the Last Days that
‘the estates must fall and be eliminated (ausgerottet). Then shall come the Golden
World, in which humanity shall achieve its rightful understanding.’41 Part of the
apocalyptic event would thus be the acquisition of divine wisdom that would
enlighten all members of society, no matter their estate. But the most intriguing
aspect of Paracelsus’s vision was its pneumatic dimension and its commitment to an
apocalyptic increase in knowledge. These convictions are mirrored in Paracelsus’s
writings concerning Elias Artista, a natural-philosophical messiah. This figure was
inspired by biblical prophecies of End-time prophets who would appear in the Last
Days, and was anticipated in a variety of medieval alchemical tracts.42 Paracelsus
expected Elias Artista to be an ‘adept philosopher’ able to perform incredible feats
in natural philosophy. The role of Elias was simultaneously that of prophet—his
coming signified the arrival of the Golden World—as well as a savior, who would
perfect the sciences and therefore all of existence. In his Philosophia sagax,
Paracelsus predicted that Elias’s return would also initiate the purification of souls.43
The revelation of new knowledge and the sanctification of the individual were
linked in a tight nexus. As Paracelsus wrote in his Von den natürlichen Dingen,
‘many arts are withheld from us because we have not ingratiated ourselves to God
so that he would make them manifest ... only what is lesser, has God allowed to
emerge. What is sublime is still hidden and shall remain so up to the time of the arts
of Elias.’44 The idea of the progressive revelation of new knowledge at the end of
time possesses a synergy with the quest of many Lutherans to possess deeper insight
into the circumstances of the Last Days.
Paracelsus argued that his theological works presented an alternative to the stale
and corrupt dogma of the Mauerkirchen, those churches of mere walls and mori-
bund doctrine that lacked any spiritual authority. A typical statement of his position
appears in his De imaginibus: ‘Once Luther arrived with his teachings then one
seemingly Lutheran sect after another appeared, and indeed [so it shall be] end-
lessly, because there are still more sects to come, and each believes it is right and
that its doctrines are better and holier than [those of] the others. Therefore there
shall be no unification and peace in religion or amongst the churches until the Last
and Golden Age.’45 De imaginibus was part of a large corpus of theological writings
39
Paracelsus, Prognosticatio, 615.
40
Webster, Paracelsus, 227–228; Murase, ‘Chiliasmus und Paracelsismus,’ 11–19.
41
Paracelsus, ‘Buch der Natürlichen Dinge’ (c.1526) in Paracelsus, Sämtliche Werke. Karl Sudhoff,
ed. (Berlin and Munich: Oldenbourg, 1931). Erste Abteilung, II, 164–5.
42
Pagel, ‘Paracelsian Elias’, 6.
43
Paracelsus, ‘Buch der natürlichen Dinge’, 333.
44
As cited, with modifications, in Pagel, ‘Paracelsian Elias’, 7.
45
Paracelsus, Sämtliche Werke, 1. Abteilung, vol. 13, 373, cited in Gilly, ‘Theophrastia Sancta’,
153–4.
that the physician circulated in manuscript. According to Carlos Gilly, Paracelsus

hoped that these tracts would ultimately support the foundation of a religious move-
ment of ‘Theophrastians.’46 This was a revelatory creed, inspired by divine wisdom,
but also the knowledge that God had encoded in the natural world. Paracelsus
insisted that the true adept must be able to see the world under the twin lights of
grace and nature.
Paracelsus’s theological works circulated as scribal publications among dissent-
ing personalities of all stripes throughout the Holy Roman Empire, where they were
collected and passed on, by like-minded individuals.47 In these ad hoc manuscript
repositories, they rubbed shoulders with printed and unprinted writings of still other
critics, some of whom espoused similar apocalyptic ideas.48 One of these was the
Nuremberg painter Paul Lautensack (1478–1558).49 In 1529, Lautensack experi-
enced a series of visions which echoed scenes from Revelation, a Biblical book that
Lautensack felt was unfairly maligned by all religious factions.50 In order to expli-
cate the text more clearly, he authored several lavishly-illustrated works that he
circulated widely.51 Reactions were mixed. Andreas Osiander declared the represen-
tations ‘foolish,’ while Luther, who allegedly found nothing especially wrong with
them, is nevertheless supposed to have attempted to suppress the writings.52 To no
avail. As Berthold Kress’s expert study of Lautensack and his works has docu-
mented, copies of Lautensack’s tracts circulated in large numbers, and dozens are
still extant.53 In 1614, his works were praised by the editor of a publication by
Valentin Weigel, who compared Lautensack’s insights to those of Paracelsus.54 In
1619 the firm of Lucas Jennis (1590–1630) in Frankfurt printed one of Lautensack’s
46
Paracelsus, Sämtliche Werke, 1. Abteilung, vol. 8, 56; cf. Goldammer, ‘Friedensidee’, 64ff.
47
See Gilly, ‘Theophrastia Sancta,’ 154; Joachim Telle, ‘Kurfürst Ottheinrich, Hans Kilian und
Paracelsus. Zum pfälzischen Paracelsismus im 16. Jahrhundert,’ Salzbürger Beiträge zur
Paracelsusforschung 22 (1981): 130–146; Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘Ein Liebhaber des Mysterii, und
ein großer Verwandter desselben.’ Toward the Life of Balthasar Walther, a Wandering Paracelsian
Physician,’ Sudhoffs Archiv 94/1 (2010): 73–99.
48
Further concerning the circulation of dissenting manuscripts see Caroline Gritschke, Via media:
Spiritualistische Lebenswelten und Konfessionalisierung. Das süddeutsche Schwenckfeldertum im
16. und 17. Jahrhundert. (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 2007), 123–148.
49
On Lautensack see the definitive work by Berthold Kress, Divine Diagrams. The Manuscripts
and Drawings of Paul Lautensack (1477/78–1558) (Leiden: Brill, 2014); Frank Muller, ‘Artistes
dissidents dans l’Allemagne du seizième siècle: Lautensack—Vogtherr—Wiedlitz,’ Bibliotheca
Dissidentium. Répertoire des non-conformistes religieux des seizième et dix-septième siècles 21
(2001): 11–124.
50
See Gottfried Arnold, Unparteyischen Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie. 4 vols. (Frankfurt: Thomas
Fritschens sel. Erben, 1729), vol. 3, 7; Muller, ‘Artistes dissidents,’ 12.
51
On the circulation of Lautensack’s texts, see Kress, Divine Diagrams.
52
Muller, ‘Artistes dissidents,’ 13.
53
Kress, Divine Diagrams.
54
Valentin Weigel, Gnothi Seauton ... Erkenne dich selbst: Zeiget vn[d] weiset dahin/ daß der
Mensch sey ein Microcosmus, das gröste Werck Gottes/ vnter der Himmel ... (Newenstadt: Johann
Knuber, 1615), 3.
explications of Revelation alongside a pseudo-Weigelian commentary.55 It is diffi-

cult to say if Lautensack’s work would have been as popular had he not illustrated
his interpretations with such magnificence, particularly given their inchoate struc-
ture. Still, Lautensack praised the intuitive spirit above the ‘dead letters’ of scrip-
ture, and, although he did not go so far as to predict a felicitous future himself, his
obsession with Revelation and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit endeared his
thoughts to later critics of Lutheran confessional culture.
As the search for insight into the Last Days deepened in the course of the six-
teenth century, still other writings came to the attention of Lutherans. Like
Paracelsus, many of these emerged from sources foreign to the confessional culture.
One of the most influential of these foreign authorities was Guillaume Postel (1510–
1581).56 A French humanist scholar, Postel developed ideas of a future period of
respite while an instructor at the Sorbonne. His sources were Joachimite and
Hebraic.57 Inspired to shape these visions of world reformation into a practical
social program, he left Paris and embarked on a mission to find ‘the great instrument
of the renovatio mundi.’58 A stint with the Jesuits ended in expulsion and disillu-
sionment; the French monarchy was similarly unimpressed after being identified by
Postel as prophetically significant.59 Briefly, Postel attached himself to Johanna, an
elderly Venetian nurse whom he believed embodied the divine kabbalistic sheki-
nah.60 Then, in 1551, Postel experienced a vision and came to believe that he would
be reborn as the Holy Spirit, to lead ‘the instauration of all things by the hand of
Elijah the Prophet.’61 A frenzy of activity followed. Postel urged the Holy Roman
55
Paul Lautensack, Offenbahrung Jesu Christi: Das ist: Ein Beweiß durch den Titul uber das
Creutz Jesu Christi/ und die drey Alphabeth/ als Hebreisch/ Graegisch/ und Lateinisch/ wie auch
etliche wunderbahre Figuren: Welcher gestalt der einige Gott auff underschiedene Arth/ und weiß/
und endtlich ohne einige Figur warhafftig und vollkömlich in der Person Jesu Christi sich geoffen-
bahret habe (Frankfurt: Jennis, 1619).
56
On Postel see Yvonne Petry, Gender, Kabbalah and the Reformation. The Mystical Theology of
Guillaume Postel (1510–1581) (Leiden: Brill, 2004); Marion Leathers Kuntz, Venice, Myth and
Utopian Thought in the Sixteenth Century (Brookfield: Ashgate, 1999).
57
Marjorie Reeves, Joachim of Fiore and the Prophetic Future (London: SPCK, 1976), 121;
François Secret, ‘Guillaume Postel et les courants prophétiques de la Renaissance,’ Studi francesi
1 (1957): 375–395 at 377.
58
Reeves, Joachim of Fiore and the Prophetic Future, 122.
59
On these convictions see Marion Leathers Kuntz, ‘Guillaume Postel and the World State:
Restitution and the Universal Monarchy;’ History of European Ideas 4 (1983): 229–323 and
445–465.
60
Marion Leathers Kuntz, ‘The Virgin of Venice and the concept of the Millenium [sic] in Venice,’
in The Politics of Gender in Early Modern Europe. J.R. Brink, A. Coudert and M.C. Horowitz, eds.
(Kirksville: Sixteenth Century Studies Society, 1989), 111–130; Marion Leathers Kuntz, ‘Lodovico
Domenichi, Guillaume Postel and the Biography of Giovanna Veronese,’ Studia Veneziani 16
(1988): 33–44.
61
Kuntz, ‘Guillaume Postel and the World State,’ 300. Although his teachings endeared him to
many Lutherans, the Swede Johann Buraeus rejected Postel’s self-identification as Elijah because
he was not Lutheran: ‘Hic Postellius non est Elias, quia Anti-Lutheranus.’ See Åkerman, Rose
Cross Over the Baltic, 174.
Emperor to take up the teachings of his ‘World State,’ but when his predictions for
1556 were disappointed, Postel turned back to the French monarchy. It may have
been of significance for Postel’s Lutheran readers, who encountered his works in
print and manuscript, that the Frenchman believed that the crucial moment in the
eschatological struggle would occur in Germany.62
The basis of the coming messianic kingdom was Postel’s idea of Ecclesia, a
harmonious rule of secular and religious authorities. Postel saw contemporary
Europe as a godless place, filled with political and religious sectarians. The most
significant of the guilty parties was the Papacy—lending his views further credence
to Lutherans63—‘because of its insurrection against the true meaning of the ...
Priesthood.’64 Postel declared that outward signs of the restitutio omnium would be
difficult to observe, for they would occur inside the human being: ‘There is no dif-
ference or natural change between the past world of Satan and the days of the
Messiah except in our hearts, since there the microcosm has been destroyed.’65
Following the destruction of the sinful Adamic microcosm, the human being could
be exalted in the divine macrocosm; Christian, Jew and Muslim would live together
in peace and harmony, united in true belief. During the time of the universal monar-
chy, the world would be ruled by a triumvirate—a sovereign king, a sovereign pope
and a sovereign judge—who would coordinate the governance of twelve ‘sees.’ In
addition to a single religion, Postel aimed to abolish private property and introduce
a universal language.66 Throughout his career, the prophet established numerous
contacts with radical Protestants, including David Joris (1501–1556) and
Schwenckfeld, which imbued his works with an authentic Protestant spirit.67 Postel’s
texts were known to later critics of Lutheran confessional culture like Weigel,
Röslin, Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, and Paul Nagel, among numerous others.68
Another significant source of optimistic apocalyptic expectations encountered
by Lutherans were the works of Jacopo Brocardo (d. 1594).69 In 1563, Brocardo,
62
Åkerman, Rose Cross Over the Baltic, 183.
63
Petry, The Mystical Theology of Guillaume Postel, 37.
64
Kuntz, ‘Guillaume Postel and the World State,’ 305.
65
Postel, Restitutio rerum omnium, quoted in Kuntz, ‘Guillaume Postel and the World State,’ 305.
66
Reeves, Joachim of Fiore and the Prophetic Future, 123.
67
Petry, The Mystical Theology of Guillaume Postel, 37.
68
[Pseudo-]Valentin Weigel, Moise tabernaculum Cum Suis Tribus Partibus Zum Gnōthi Seauton
Führende/ Auß Rechten Apostolischen Fundament tractirt unnd erkelret. (Newstatt: Johan Knuber,
1618), sig. D2r; Helisäus Röslin, Zu Ehrn der Keyserlichen Wahl und Krönung Matthiae deß I ...
Ein Tabella des Welt Spiegels. Darinnen Geistliche Göttliche unnd Politische Weltliche Sachen in
einer Harmonia und Vergleichung gegen einander gestellt werden. (Frankfurt am Mayn: de Bry,
1612).
69
Jürgen Moltmann, ‘Jacob Brocard als Vorläufer der Reich-Gottes-Theologie und der symbolisch-
prophetischen Schriftauslegung des Johann Coccejus,’ Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 71 (1960):
110–129; Antonio Rotondò, ‘Brocardo, Jacopo.’ Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani. (Rome,
1972), vol. 14, 385–389. Concerning Postel’s influence upon Brocardo see Marion Leathers Kuntz,
‘Venezia portava el fuocho in seno’: Guillaume Postel before the Council of Ten in 1548: Priest
turned Prophet,’ Studi Veneziani 33 (1997): 95–121 at 117.
then a private tutor, experienced an epiphany as he walked through the streets of

Venice. Racing home, he threw open the bible in a desperate bid for guidance, and
was met with the words of Haggai 1:2–8. Duly recognising himself as the prophe-
sied man who would construct the Lord’s house upon earth, Brocardo began to
author a series of works in which he attempted to calibrate scripture with astronomi-
cal phenomena. His efforts soon came to the attention of authorities, and, in 1565,
he fled from the inquisition into Germany, finding temporary refuge in Straßburg,
Heidelberg, Bremen and finally, Nuremberg. Brocardo also visited the United
Provinces and England, where several of his works were translated and printed. He
died in Nuremberg in 1594.70 In his three major works, De prophetia libri duo (Lyon
1581), Mystica et prophetica libri Geneseos interpretatio (Bremen 1585), and his
Commentarius in Apocalypsin (n.d.), Brocardo argued that Luther’s arrival had ini-
tiated Joachim’s third age of the Holy Spirit. He predicted a military alliance
between French, German and Dutch Protestants, who would then wage war against
a corrupt papacy. Following the defeat of Catholicism, a general council would
convene in Venice, where a plan for world reformation would be adumbrated in
anticipation of the descent of the Heavenly Jerusalem. With his Catholic back-
ground, Brocardo’s writings introduced many Lutheran readers to new prophetic
sources, such as Girolamo Savonarola (1452–1498). Given the fact that several of
his works were printed in Bremen, and that his ideas were championed, above all,
by some of the more radical Calvinists, he attained a certain prominence within
Protestant prophetic literature, that extended to an influence on some scenarios of a
future restitution postulated by Lutherans.71
Lutheran Syntheses
In the final decades of the sixteenth century, ideas and teachings from the works of
Franck, Lautensack, Brocardo, Postel, Paracelsus and the medieval ‘mini-
millenniums’ began to appear in syncretic prophetic works composed by Lutherans
and published in print and manuscript. All of these were indebted to the thinkers or
traditions described above. Heavily influenced by medieval speculations, the
Courland cleric Adam Nachenmoser’s influential Prognosticon theologicum (1588,
further editions in 1595, 1612), predicted a felicitous time for the Lutheran church
after 1590.72 The Lüneburg school-teacher Paul Grebner (fl. ca. 1550–1590?) circu-
70
Moltmann, ‘Jacob Brocard als Vorläufer der Reich-Gottes-Theologie,’ 113, 115.
71
Moltmann, ‘Jacob Brocard als Vorläufer der Reich-Gottes-Theologie,’ 114; Hotson, Paradise
Postponed, 147, 161. Brocardo’s doctrines are particularly noticeable in the works of Neuheuser
and Johann Permeier. Paul Nagel possessed a German translation of at least one of Brocard’s
works, see his manuscript collection preserved in London, Wellcome Medical Library, Ms. 150,
fols. 1r–15v.
72
Adam Nachenmoser, Prognosticon theologicum. Das ist: Gaistliche Grosse Practica auß
Hailiger Biblischer Schrifft und Historien (Leiden: Jobsson, 1588), sigs. 86v–87r. Further on
Nachenmoser, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 121–124.
lated several influential prophecies in manuscript, such as his Blutfahnen, which

predicted a future earthly paradise and political union in Europe.73 Printed editions
of his prophecies were issued in 1619 and 1625.74 A further influential theorist was
Eustachius Poyssel of Loifling in Bavaria.75 From the late 1580s he authored a series
of books and pamphlets that predicted the fall of the papacy and the dawning of a
golden age in 1623.76 Poyssel was perhaps the first Lutheran to point to the signifi-
cance of this date, although, unlike later prophets, he appears not to have drawn on
the coming great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn to underwrite his expectations.
Instead, he used biblical chronology, and kept a careful eye on contemporary
publications and signs of the End in the natural world. One of his 1592 tracts
reprinted selections from Andreas Osiander’s Vermutung von den letzten Zeiten und
dem Ende der Welt (1545) as an appendix.77 As in Paracelsus’s works, issues of
knowledge also conditioned Poyssel’s expectations. He was convinced that there
existed a magical ‘key of David’ that could unlock the secrets of the world in the
Last Days. Paracelsus’s influence may well have been crucial: in 1609 Poyssel
declared that a Protestant Messiah would soon arrive to lead the required ‘universal
reformation’ in the lead up to the crucial date of 1623.78
Another Lutheran author writing during this period was Paul Linck of Zeitz in
Electoral Saxony. Linck is well known as a collaborator in the production of Johann
Huser’s ten volume edition of Paracelsus’s works, which was produced in Glogau.79
As Amadeo Murase has pointed out, several editions of Paracelsus works contained
occasional poetry authored by Linck, who travelled extensively in order to hunt
73
Paul Grebner, Canticvm Canticorvm Salomonis, Et Threni Hieremiae Prophetae Elegiaco
Carmine Redditi. ([Antwerp]: [Diest], 1563); Åkerman, Rose Cross Over the Baltic, 105; Carlos
Gilly, ‘Las novas de 1572 y 1604 en los manifiestos rosacruces y en la literatura teosófica y escha-
tológica alemana anterior a la Guerra de los Trienta Años,’ in Novas y cometas entre 1572 y 1618:
Revolución cosmológica y renovación política y religiosa. Miguel A. Granada, ed. (Barcelona:
University of Barcelona Press, 2012), 275–337.
74
Paul Grebner, Conjecturen oder Muhtmassungen, welche Herr Paulus Gräbner publicirt
(Warmünster [Amsterdam?]: No Printer, 1619); [Joachim Morsius, ed.], Magische Propheceyung
aureoli Philippi Theophrasti Paracelsi von Entdeckung seiner 3. Schätzen ... . (Philadelphia
[Amsterdam]: No Printer 1625).
75
Leppin, Antichrist und Jüngster Tag, 73–74 identifies Poyssel as a pseudonym of the Leipzig
theologian Christoph Wilhelm Walpurger (1540–1611), but it is unclear on what grounds this iden-
tification is secured.
76
77
See Eustachius Poyssel, Etliche tractetlein Eustachij Poyssels. Von verenderung etlicher ver-
lauffner Zeit/ Auch wie lang die Welt noch zustehen habe. (Frankfurt an der Oder: Fluum, 1592),
sigs. L2r-T2v.
78
[Eustachius Poyssel], Magischer Beweiß Alles deß jenigen/ was der Autor dieses Tractats/ seyd-
hero deß verschinen 1583. Jahrs unnd deß Newen Calenders anfang/ in dem offen druck hat außge-
hen lassen: Und sonderlich/ Von dem zustand der jetzigen gegenwertigen zeit/ diesem gegenwertigen
1609. und den hernach folgenden jahren (No Place: No Printer, 1609); Barnes, Prophecy and
Gnosis, 223.
79
On Linck see Karl Sudhoff, Versuch einer Kritik der Echtheit der Paracelsischen Schriften, Theil
II: Die Handschriften. (Berlin: Georg Reimer, 1898), 7–12, 534; Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica,
20, 44; Murase, ‘Paracelsismus und Chiliasmus,’ 153–167.
down manuscripts employed in Huser’s edition.80 In 1599 and 1602 Linck laboured
on the completion of a manuscript work titled Rechter Bericht von den dreÿen
Seculis (1602). Adopting a Joachite scheme of history, Linck criticized the tradi-
tional Lutheran expectations of an imminent Judgment Day, arguing that they
ignored the consummatio seculi prophesied by Paracelsus and others.81 Linck con-
tested the argument of many Lutheran theologians, among them Luther himself, that
the Millennium of Revelation 20 had occurred historically.82 Instead he expected a
Golden Age to dawn around 1636.83
The thousand years in John’s Revelation (understood kabbalistically) has not yet begun.
But it is to hope that it shall have its beginning and continuation after the great sadness
(which shall encompass the whole world), and those that live shall experience this Aureum
Seculum, or the testament of the Holy Spirit.84
Linck’s reliance on ‘kabbalistic’ methods—whatever these may have been—reflects

at one level his desperation to establish certainty in the face of contemporary uncer-
tainties. But the claim to being privy to secret knowledge, granted by God, also
provided him with a platform to undertake criticism of ‘our [Lutheran] preachers’.85
Indeed, Linck aimed to correct Lutheranism. The diverse doctrines of Christian kab-
balism lent themselves to such an aim, for as Johannes Reuchlin (1455–1522)
wrote, kabbalah was devoted to nothing less than the ‘universal restoration, follow-
ing the primordial fall of the human race, which is called salvation.’86 To support his
argument, Linck drew upon doctrines from a variety of contemporary sources.
Among them were Paul Grebner, whom Linck apparently knew personally,
Paracelsus––from whom Linck utilized the already discussed Prognosticon and
several unpublished theological works––Joachim of Fiore, St. Brigitte, Hildegard of
Bingen, Tauler, Joseph Grünpeck (1473–1532), Johann Trithemius (1462–1516)
and Sebastian Franck. Guillaume Postel was another favourite of Linck.87 Linck’s
discussion of Postel’s plans for world reformation was well informed, drawing both
on printed books, as well as manuscripts in his private possession that were ‘perhaps
not yet printed.’88
80
Murase, ‘Paracelsismus und Chiliasmus,’ 153.
81
Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek [hereafter HAB], 981 Helmst., fol. 5r.
82
Wolfenbüttel, HAB, 981 Helmst., 153r: ‘Der Millenarius Cabalisticus in Apocalypsis Joann:
Cap. 20. wird aus den Historien bewiesen, das er noch nicht seinen Anfang erlanget habe. Darneben
auch die unrechten meinungen Lutheri ... refutirt werdenn.’
83
Wolfenbüttel, HAB, 981 Helmst., 155r-v, 164r.
84
Wolfenbüttel, HAB, 981 Helmst., 170v–171r: ‘Die 1000 Jahr in Apoc: Joh: (ihr doch cabalist-
ischer Art nach zuverstehen) noch nicht angefangen: Sondern es haben ihres anfang undt continu-
ation zu hoffen, die jenigen die nach der großen Trübsall (welche über des ganzes Erdkreÿs ergehen
soll) daß Aureum Seculum, oder Testamentum Sp: Scti erleben werden.’
85
Wolfenbüttel, HAB, 981 Helmst., 171r.
86
Johann Reuchlin, De arte cabalistica (Hagenau: Thomas Anshelm, 1517), sig. vii r.
87
Wolfenbüttel HAB, 981 Helmst., 183v–184r, 192r-v, 197v–199v, 203r–208r.
88
Wolfenbüttel HAB, 981 Helmst., 222v.
Linck’s apocalypticism was echoed in the works of one of his contemporaries,

Julius Sperber (ca. 1540–ca. 1610). Sperber was a second generation Lutheran, the
son of a Lutheran pastor and superintendent in Seebergen. He appears to have been
educated as a jurist and was employed as a councilor in the principality of Anhalt-
Dessau, where, among other duties, he participated in at least one witch trial.89
Sperber was, both before and after a spiritual awakening in 1599, convinced that a
golden age was imminent.90 He knew the suppressed theological works of Paracelsus,
as well as texts by Brocardo, Postel, and Valentin Weigel.91 His works engaged
extensively with scripture and the church fathers.92 Sperber’s uniqueness, however,
derived from his attempt to unify various statements from these sources into a sin-
gular vision of a coming tempus restitutionis omnium.93 Echoing the traditions of
the medieval ‘mini-millenniums,’ he argued that Revelation 20 prophesied an
earthly Millennium, but as the cryptic verses of Isaiah 25:8, John 5:29, and 1
Corinthians 15:22 indicated, the thousand-year period itself was merely symbolic.94
This Golden Age would see the restitution and renewal of all things and the unifica-
tion of all religions.95 Following Brocardo, Sperber envisioned a twofold return of
Christ during the third and golden age, one physical (based on Isaiah 24:21–23, with
all its ominous implications for worldly institutions) and one spiritual (based on
Revelation 20).96 Drawing on the apocryphal Baruch 5:4, Sperber declared that
there will be ‘peace and unity within the spiritual and worldly regiments, and all of
89
Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 14 states that Sperber died in 1616, perhaps influ-
enced by the printing of one of Sperber’s tracts in [Julius Sperber, et al], Echo der von Gott hocher-
leuchteten Fraternitet dess löblichen Ordens R.C. Das ist: Exemplarischer Beweis, Das ... was jetzt
in der Fama und Confession der Fraternitet R.C. ausgebotten. (Danzig: Hünefeld, 1615). However
Paul Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologo-Cabalisticum auff das jahr MDCXX. Beschrieben. (No Place
[Halle]: No Printer [Bißmarck], 1619), 28 reported that the Echo was printed ‘viel jahr nach sei-
nem [sc. Sperber’s] todt’ and that Sperber ‘von der Fraternitet noch nichts gewust hat.’ Concerning
Sperber’s employment, see Julius Sperber, Ein ausserlesenes Regiment. Wie man sich fur der
grawsamen Seuch der Pestilentz, sicherlich beware[n]. (Erfurt: No Printer, 1598), and Manfred
Wilde, Die Zauberei- und Hexenprozesse in Kursachsen. (Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2003), 502.
90
Julius Sperber, Kabalisticæ Precationes, siue selectiores sacrosancti Nominis Divini
Glorificationes e Sacrorum Bibliorum fontibus, & præsertim ex medulla Psalmorum (Magdeburg:
Johann Franck, 1600). I have used the translation printed as Sperber, Kabalisticae precationes,
Das ist: Außerlesene schöne Gebet/ so aus der H. Schrifft und vornembsten Psalmen des
Königlichen Propheten Davids zusammen getragen und also zugerichtet (Frankfurt am Main and
Amsterdam: Betkius, 1675), sig.)(2v.
91
Sperber’s debts to Paracelsus are examined in detail in Murase, ‘Chiliasmus und Paracelsismus,’
127–152.
92
Many of these manuscripts were printed after 1660 by followers such as Benedict Bahnsen in
Amsterdam. See Dietrich Hakelberg, ‘Die fanatischen Bücher des Benedikt Bahnsen. Leben und
Bibliothek eines religiösen Dissidenten,’ Bibliothek und Wissenschaft 48 (2015): 113–146.
93
Julius Sperber, Ein Geheimer Tractatus Iulii Sperberi Von den dreyen Seculis oder Haupt-zeiten,
von Anfang biß zum Ende der Welt. (Amsterdam: Bahnsen 1660), 221.
94
Sperber, Ein Geheimer Tractatus, 134.
95
Sperber, Ein Geheimer Tractatus, 218–235.
96
Sperber, Ein Geheimer Tractatus, 93.
this will encourage God to pour out the spirit of grace and of prayer over the house
of David and the citizens of Jerusalem.’97
This outpouring of grace was a crucial part of Sperber’s apocalyptic vision that
he combined with the expectation of an increase of knowledge in the Last Days. It
was also an idea that contained a distinctly anticlerical connotation. Elsewhere he
argued that Jesus founded a ‘magical school’ during his ministry, the doctrines of
which had been scattered following the death of St. Paul.98 On account of the power
of the Holy Spirit, the teachings of this school had occasionally resurfaced, and thus
could be found in the writings of Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153), Paracelsus,
Tauler, Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa (1486–1535), Pietro Galatino (1460–1540),
Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499), Guillaume Postel, Aegidus Guttmann and others.
Indeed, the frequency with which these teachers of divine truth had proliferated in
the last century was for Sperber itself a proof of the imminence of the Golden Age.99
The suppression of this eternal doctrine by the ‘three Estates’ created a situation in
which all knowledge transmitted through worldly channels, particularly religious
knowledge, was imperfect, a mere caricature of ‘true magical and kabbalistic’
Christianity.100 Although the vast majority of his prophetic manuscripts would not
appear in print until the 1660s, Sperber’s texts were well known among Lutherans
in the early seventeenth century.101
Similar to Linck and Sperber, and arguably more influential than both, was the
Württemberg school instructor Simon Studion (1543–c.1605).102 Educated primar-
ily in mathematics, Studion studied Lutheran theology in Tübingen before being
overlooked for a pastorate on account of a speech impediment; an affliction also
shared, it might be noted, by Paracelsus. Taking solace in prophecy and mystical
numerology, in 1592 he began work on an opus titled Naometria, or ‘temple mea-
surement’ (cf. Revelation 11), a text he claimed to have authored ‘with the inspira-
tion of the Holy Spirit.’103 Later, Studion rewrote many of his conclusions as a
dialogue between Nathaniel and Cleophas, all while retaining the same title.104 Both
versions of Naometria draw on authorities like Brocardo, Postel, Poyssel, Sperber
97
Sperber, Kabalisticæ Precationes, sig. 15v.
98
Julius Sperber, ‘Von dem höchsten allerbesten unnd thewresten Schatze so ein Mensch in diesem
Leben erlangen kan’ in [Sperber et al], Echo der von Gott hocherleuchteten Fraternitet dess löbli-
chen Ordens R.C., sig. 9r. The marginal notation next to this passage reads, ‘Christus hat eine newe
Magische Schule aingerichtet.’
99
Sperber, ‘Von dem höchsten allerbesten unnd thewresten Schatze,’ 9v–10r, 11r, 12r.
100
Sperber, Von den dreyen Seculis, 167–8.
101
Hunnius, Christliche Betrachtung der Newen Paracelsischen und Weigelianischen Theology, 8.
102
On Studion see Eberhard Kulf, ‘Der Marbacher Lateinschullehrer Simon Studion (1543–16?)
und die Anfänge der Württembergischen Archäologie,’ Ludwigsburger Geschichtsblätter 42
(1988): 45–68; Martin Brecht, ‘Chiliasmus in Württemberg im 17. Jahrhundert,’ Pietismus und
Neuzeit 14 (1988): 25–49. Carlos Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica. Die Rosenkreuzer im Spiegel
der zwischen 1610 und 1660 entstandenen Handschriften und Drucke. 2nd ed. (Amsterdam: In de
Pelikaan, 1994), 21, 43.
103
The original version may be found in Stuttgart, Württembergische Landesbibliothek [hereafter
WLB], MS Cod. theol. 2° 34.
104
Stuttgart, WLB, MS Cod. theol. 4° 23a-b.
and Grebner. In a letter to Tobias Hess (1586–1614) in Tübingen, Studion com-

mented that he considered his prophetic project consonant with that of Brocardo.105
Studion’s apocalyptic expectations were optimistic. Following the execution of the
last pope in 1612 or 1613, Studion predicted the dawn of a ‘Kingdom of Grace’ in
1621. Like Grebner, he believed this kingdom would be initiated by a union of
European rulers, as well as the readers of the Naometria itself, who would band
together as the cruce signati. Access to mystical knowledge played a key role in
Studion’s scenario. Like Poyssel, he wrote of a ‘Key of David,’ a mystical instru-
ment capable of measuring the secrets of existence. Studion’s ideas were assured an
influential afterlife in Lutheran confessional culture by means of their influence on
Hess, a figure at the centre of the Rosicrucian furore of the 1610s.
The Rosicrucian Brotherhood
The various apocalyptic expectations of the late sixteenth century surveyed above
might be said to have come to a head sometime between 1608 and 1610, with the
authorship of an unusual tract titled Fama Fraternitatis. This powerful expression of
Lutheran eschatological expectation was authored by one or more members of a
religious conventicle in Tübingen, centered on the Paracelsian physician Tobias
Hess and his young disciple, Johann Valentin Andreae.106 Like the works of Sperber,
Linck, and other syncretic apocalypticists of the late sixteenth century, the Fama
united many of the expectations of prior eschatological literature into a prediction
and program for world reformation.
Hess was a physician born in Nuremberg, who had relocated to Tübingen in
middle age where he was attracted to the intellectual activity around the university.
His library contained books by Paracelsus, Sebastian Castellio (1515–1563), Postel,
Reuchlin, and Brocardo, among others.107 He knew the aforementioned Simon
105
Cited in Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, 21.
106
The authorship of the manifestos has been the subject of strenuous debate, however the recent
research of Carlos Gilly has established to a high degree of certainty that Hess and Andreae were
involved in its authorship. The literature on the Rosicrucians is vast. Starting points that emphasize
the apocalyptic dimension of the Lutheran expectations at the core of the manifestos include
Peuckert, Das Rosenkreutz; Richard van Dülmen, Die Utopie einer christlichen Gesellschaft:
Johann Valentin Andreae (1586–1654) (Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog, 1978); Carlos Gilly,
Adam Haslmayr: Der Erster Verkünder der Manifeste der Rosenkreuzer (Amsterdam: In de
Pelikaan, 1994); Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, and in particular Volkhard Wels, ‘Die
Frömmigkeit der Rosenkreuzer-Manifeste,’ in Ideengeschichte um 1600. Wilhelm Schmidt-
Biggemann & Friedrich Vollhardt, eds. (Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: fromman-holzboog, 2017), 173–
208. Carlos Gilly’s eagerly anticipated Bibliographia Rosicruciana (6 vols.) will provide a
landmark starting point for further research on this fascinating subject.
107
Carlos Gilly, ‘Iter Rosicrucianum. Auf der Suche nach unbekannten Quellen der frühen
Rosenkreuzer,’ in Das Erbe des Christian Rosenkreuz. Franz Janssen, ed. (Amsterdam: In de
Pelikaan, 1988), 63–89 at 65. An inventory of Hess’ library from 1614 has been preserved in
Tübingen, Universitätsarchiv [hereafter UA], 285/91 (A X VII 26). Cf. Gilly, Cimelia
Rhodostaurotica, 44.
Studion, and corresponded with him concerning apocalyptic prophecy.108 In his

youth, and again in 1605, Hess was tormented by visions. These experiences
coalesced with his hopes concerning the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 1623
and Hess came to believe that some imminent change—a further reformation—was
at hand.109 For Hess, it would be the roaring lion of Revelation who announced the
downfall of the Papacy around 1620—a calculation directly influenced by Studion—
when the snarling beast would break open the final seal and usher in a time of spiri-
tual peace for the true faith.110 As Carlos Gilly has pointed out, Hess was prepared
to attribute the role of this Lion to his patron, Duke Friedrich I of Württemberg
(1557–1608), thereby ensuring that this vision of spiritual felicity possessed dis-
tinctly worldly aspects.111 Johann Valentin Andreae was a student of philosophy in
Tübingen. The son of a Lutheran pastor and grandson of Jakob Andreae (1528–
1590), one of the drafters of the Formula of Concord, as a young man he was
entranced by Hess’ charismatic personality and mastery of scripture and prophecy,
and fell under his spell.112 He also fraternized with the jurist Christoph Besold
(1577–1638), who in 1614 issued an optimistic apocalyptic work titled Signa
Temporum, in which he predicted the imminent conversion of the Jews and the
destruction of Antichrist.113
The audacious goal of the Rosicrucian Fama was nothing less than the perfection
of society and mankind. In order to stimulate the necessary ‘universal and general
reformation of the whole wide world,’ Hess and Andreae situated the call within an
elaborate fiction. The Fama related the tale of Father C.R. (later identified as
Christian Rosencreutz), who, as a youth, left his native Germany in the late fifteenth
century to begin decades of study of the alchemical arts in Arabia, where he was
prophetically greeted, ‘not as a stranger, but just as one whom they had long
awaited.’114 It was there that C.R. learnt Arabic, and in his further travels in Africa
he ‘collected a treasure [of wisdom] surpassing that of Kings and Emperors,’ per-
fecting his knowledge of physics, medicine, mathematics and kabbalah. Realising
that this knowledge was ‘agreeable with the harmony of the whole world,’ he
108
See Martin Crusius, Diarium Martini Crusii, 1596–1597. Wilhelm Göz and Ernst Conrad, eds.
4 vols. (Tübingen: Laupp, 1927–1961), vol. 2, 135; Stuttgart, WLB, Cod. HB XI 42.
109
Tübingen, UA, 12/17 Nr. 42; Brecht, ‘Chiliasmus in Württemberg’.
110
See Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, 44–45.
111
Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, 44.
112
On Andreae see Roland Edighoffer, Rose-Croix et société idéale selon Johann Valentin Andreae.
2 vols. (Neuilly-sur-Seine and Paris: Arma Artis, 1982–87); van Dülmen, Die Utopie einer christ-
lichen Gesellschaft; Martin Brecht, Johann Valentin Andreae, 1586–1654. Eine Biographie.
(Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008).
113
Christoph Besold, Signa Temporum, seu succinta et aperta, rerum post religionis Reformationem,
ad hoc ævi in Europâ gestarum, diiudicatio. (Tübingen: Cellius, 1614); Hans-Martin Kirn, ‘“Nicht
nur eine Vermutung …”. Der Topos der endzeitlichen Judenbekehrung bei Christoph Besold
(1577–1638),’ in Frömmigkeit, Theologie, Frömmigkeitstheologie: Contributions to European
Church History. Litz Gudrun, ed. (Leiden: Brill 2005), 519–536.
114
Johann Valentin Andreae, Gesammelte Schriften Bd. 3: Rosenkreuzerschriften. Roland
Edighoffer, ed. (Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: frommann-holzboog, 2010), 141.
returned to Europe in order to pass on the benefits of the wisdom he had acquired.115
However, C.R.’s efforts were greeted with consistent scorn. Humiliated, he returned
to Germany and formed a society which would work in secret for a ‘universal refor-
mation’: this was the Rosicrucian brotherhood.
Yet all did not go according to plan. Over the centuries, the original reforming
mission of C.R.’s brotherhood had gone awry: its doctrines were corrupted and for-
gotten. Its initiates lost contact with one another. However, in 1604, the tomb of
C.R. was rediscovered by the ‘third succession’ of the order. The burial chamber
comprised ‘a microcosm [of the world] … a compendium of things past, present
and to come.’116 In addition to the wisdom gathered by C.R. and his brethren, the
sepulchre also contained the miraculously uncorrupted corpse of the order’s founder.
By utilising the contents of the tomb, the brethren promised to continue C.R.’s work
in a Europe cleansed by the religious and natural philosophical reforms of Luther
and Paracelsus. The Fama concluded with an appeal to all those interested in effect-
ing the general reformation to contact the brotherhood, ‘either individually or
together, in print,’ so that the great work could begin again.117 The arrival of the
heavenly Jerusalem was nigh, and the universal and general reformation of the
whole wide world was imminent.
The Fama was a daring combination of a variety of apocalyptic expectations.
Within the manifestos, there are references to Paracelsus, to the new star of 1604
and the great conjunction of 1603. Equally, we are informed that C.R. died 1484;
the year in which some Lutherans believed Luther himself had been born, as well as
the great conjunction of 1484.118 C.R.’s incorruptible corpse recalls medieval proph-
ecies of the Last Emperor and the incorruptibility of the bodies of the saints. The
‘third succession’ of the brotherhood that rediscovers C.R.’s sepulchre is perhaps a
tip-of-the-cap to the third age of Joachim. The idea of a learned group who would
contribute to the betterment of society before the Last Judgment is Postellian in
nature. Similarly, would-be members of the Rosicrucian fraternity also could be
understood collectively as the Paracelsian Elias Artista, as the Sprottau (Szprotawa)
physician Adam Brux (1572–1639) argued in a 1616 pamphlet.119 Like the works of
Nachenmoser, Linck and Studion before them, the Fama represented a work of
syncretic Lutheran prophecy par excellence.
The Fama was joined in 1614 or 1615 by a second manifesto, the Confessio
Fraternitatis, which may not have been authored before mid 1614.120 Both were
printed, likely without the knowledge of their authors, in Kassel in Calvinist
115
Andreae, Gesammelte Schriften, vol. 3, 143–145.
116
117
118
Luther was born in either 1483 or 1484, a date disputed on account of its potential prophetic and
astrological significance. See further the discussion in Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 147, 298,
313.
119
Adam Brux, Helias Tertius. Das ist: Urtheil oder Meinung von dem Hochlöblichen Orden. (No
place: No Printer, 1616).
120
Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, 40–41.
Hessen.121 Other editions quickly followed, the last of them in 1617. Unaware that
the Rosicrucian fraternity was an elaborate fiction, many members of the public—
both Lutheran and Reformed—found its promises irresistible, and soon more than
five hundred responses in print and manuscript appeared in circulation, addressed
to the fraternity by friends and foes alike.122 Volkhard Wels has argued convinc-
ingly that the Fama and Confessio expressed typical Lutheran apocalyptic expec-
tations, a circumstance obscured by the reprinting of these texts with Paracelsian,
Calvinist, and other paratexts.123 These sundry texts diluted the original Lutheran
character of the manifestos, and prompted a variety of ‘Rosicrucianisms.’124 Some
reactions praised the Lutheran mission of the fraternity, others its Calvinist
meliorism. Some responses agreed that a golden age was nigh, others did not.
Both the manifestos and their replies were, however, widely read by Lutheran
apocalypticists. For example, both Paul Nagel and Philipp Ziegler (fl. ca. 1580–
ca. 1626) propounded eschatological Rosicrucianisms within their respective
optimistic visions. Ziegler declared himself the ‘Rosicrucian King of Jerusalem,’
while Nagel saw the distribution of the manuscript Fama Fraternitatis in 1611—
evidently the year in which he read the text—as being prophetically significant,
and included maxims drawn from the same manifesto in his Tabula aurea
(1624).125
The tracts of the Rosicrucian fraternity and figures like Nachenmoser, Poyssel,
Linck, Sperber and Studion demonstrate that by around 1600 Lutherans were
aware of a variety of texts that supported the idea of a forthcoming Golden Age.
Some of these were interpretative traditions postulated by Lutheran theologians.
Others were traditions that had emerged at the edges, or indeed outside the bound-
aries of the confession. Lutherans encountered these works while on a quest for
ever greater knowledge concerning the events of the Last Days, a quest that seemed
to intensify with time. This is an anxiety that is perhaps reflected in the recurring
motif, inspired by Paracelsus and scripture, of the revelation of new or increased
knowledge at the End of time. The End would bring not only deliverance from
danger, but also certainty about the world itself. Another theme present in these
121
The full background to the printing of the manifestos is related in Carlos Gilly, Fama
Fraternitatis. Das Urmanifest der Rosenkreuzer Bruderschaft – nach den zeitgenössischen
Manuskripten bearbeitet von Pleun van der Kooij. (Haarlem: Rosekruis Pers, 2004), 41–54.
122
Gilly’s Bibliographia Rosicruciana will document these responses in detail. In the meantime, an
indication of the diversity of opinion on the Rosicrucian fraternity is provided in Gilly, Cimelia
Rhodostaurotica, and August Wolfstieg, Bibliographie der freimaurerischen Literatur. 4 vols.
(Burg bei Magdeburg: Selbstverlag, 1911–13 and Leipzig: Verein Deutscher Freimaurer, 1926).
123
Wels, ‘Die Frömmigkeit der Rosenkreuzer-Manifeste,’ 173–208, esp. 200–201.
124
See further Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘“Sophistical Fancies and Mear Chimaeras?”: Traiano Boccalini’s
Ragguagli di Parnaso and the Rosicrucian Enigma,’ Bruniana & Campanelliana 15 (2009):
101–120.
125
Munich BSB, MS Cgm 4416/9, fol. 219r; Paul Nagel, Tabula aurea M. Pauli Nagelii Lips.
Mathematici, Darinnen Er den Andern Theil seiner Philosophiae Novae proponiren vnd fürstellen
thut. (No Printer: No Publisher 1624), sig. B4v.
works was anticlericalism. For these Lutheran commentators not only anticipated
a forthcoming period of peace; they held that the traditional churches were stag-
nant and moribund, and did not teach true Christianity.
Devotional Authors in search of Certainty
The search for an apocalyptic certainty is mirrored in another contemporary devel-

opment in Lutheran confessional culture, one that Winfried Zeller has designated as
the Frömmigkeitswende or ‘devotional turn’.126 Zeller’s idea was similar to Hartmut
Lehmann’s later argument that the various plagues, economic downturns, meteoro-
logical events, and wars of the late sixteenth century created a widespread ‘mental-
ity of fear’ in early modern Europe.127 As a result of this, Zeller argued, Lutherans
were inspired to author tracts providing spiritual guidance and solace, a circum-
stance itself reflective of a broader meditative turn and individualisation of the reli-
gious experience. Although historians have since contested virtually every aspect of
these arguments concerning this alleged ‘turn’ and its religious implications—espe-
cially when expressed in its alternative formulation; that of a ‘devotional crisis’—
the works of early modern Lutherans indicate that their thoughts were indeed
conditioned by the acute perception of external circumstances.128 As we have seen
in the works of Sperber, Linck, and others, at least some Lutherans perceived crises
of authority and epistemological certainty. These same concerns are present in the
works of two of the major authors associated with Zeller’s Frömmigkeitswende,
Valentin Weigel and Johann Arndt. Weigel’s example demonstrates how concerns
126
See Winfried Zeller, ‘Lutherische Lebenszeugen. Gestalten und Gestalt lutherischer
Frömmigkeit,’ in Evangelisches und orthodoxes Christentum in Begegnung und Auseinandersetzung,
E. Benz and L.A. Zander, eds. (Hamburg: Agentur des Rauhen Hauses, 1952), 180–202; Winfried
Zeller, Der Protestantismus des 17. Jahrhunderts (Bremen: Dietrich, 1962), vii; Winfried Zeller,
‘Die “alternde Welt” und die “Morgenröte im Aufgang”: Zum Begriff der “Frömmigkeitskrise” in
der Kirchengeschichte,’ in idem., Theologie und Frömmigkeit: Gesammelte Aufsätze (Marburg:
Elwert, 1978), 1–13; Johannes Wallmann, ‘Zur Frömmigkeitskrise des 17. Jahrhunderts,’ in
Wallmann, Pietismus-Studien. Gesammelte Aufsätze (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), vol. 2,
118–131.
127
Hartmut Lehmann, Das Zeitalter des Absolutismus: Gottesgnadentum und Kriegsnot (Stuttgart:
Kohlhammer, 1980), 105–113.
128
The most prominent critic is Markus Matthias, ‘“Gab es eine Frömmigkeitskrise um 1600?” in
Frömmigkeit oder Theologie. Johann Arndt und die “Vier Bücher vom wahren Christentum”.’
Hans Otte and Hans Schneider, eds. (Göttingen: V&R unipress, 2007), 27–42. Other objections
have been raised concerning the character of Zeller’s insights by Elke Axmacher, Praxis
Evangeliorum: Theologie und Frömmigkeit bei Martin Moller (1547–1606) (Göttingen:
Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1989), 314–318 and Klára Erdei, Auf dem Wege zu sich selbst: Die
Meditation im 16. Jahrhundert: Eine funktionsanalytische Gattungsbeschreibung (Wiesbaden:
Harrossowitz, 1990); Udo Sträter, Meditation und Kirchenreform in der lutherischen Kirche des
17. Jahrhunderts (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1995), 30–34.
apocalyptic and soteriological possessed a natural affinity during this period, while
Arndt gives a sense of the existence of a large audience for this material.
Valentin Weigel studied theology in Leipzig and Wittenberg before his appoint-
ment as pastor in Zschopau in 1567.129 He generated little controversy during his
tenure, with one notable exception; in 1572, he was accused of naming Luther an
‘impure’ executor of the faith. In 1577 Weigel signed the Formula of Concord and
was appointed ‘visitor’ within the Chemnitz diocese. Administering to the needs of
his Zschopau congregation alongside deacon Benedikt Biedermann (ca. 1545–1621?)
and organist Christoph Weichart (fl. 1576–after 1604), he lived out his life quietly,
and died in 1588. However, from around 1609, a series of works written by Weigel
began to find their way into print in Halle an der Saale and Magdeburg. These books
indicate that, beneath the surface of normalcy in Zschopau, Weigel and his colleagues
led double lives. Between 1570 and 1584, Weigel, Biedermann and perhaps also
Weichart composed upwards of 20 tracts that drew upon magical and Paracelsian
ideas and which expressed a deep-seated anticlericalism.130 The goal of these works
was simple; to identify what Weigel described as true Christian belief. The project
was informed by Weigel’s background. His early career was defined by upheavals
within the Saxon church, including the debates concerning crypto-Calvinism which
raged after Luther’s 1546 death.131 Weigel’s pursuit of true belief led him to create a
new, speculative form of practical devotional Christianity, which internalized the
struggles of the true Christian. Weigel’s advocacy of a spiritualist individualism was
further provoked by the lack of solace he took from the works of fellow Lutheran
clerics. He sought in vain for a doctrine upon which he ‘might have built something
... I took up and read the books of many authors, but they were not enough. My heart
was always hesitant. Alas, I could find neither solid ground nor the truth.’132
The pursuit of firm foundations of belief led Weigel well beyond the ambit of
orthodox Lutheran doctrine. He claimed that the key to the revelation of true
wisdom were in the individual, as his tract Gnothi seauton (‘know thyself’),
129
On Weigel see Andrew Weeks, Valentin Weigel (1533–1588). German Religious Dissenter,
Speculative Theorist, and Advocate of Tolerance (Albany: SUNY Press, 2000); Wollgast,
Philosophie in Deutschland, 510–11; Horst Pfefferl, ‘Das neue Bild Valentin Weigels – Ketzer
oder Kirchenmann? Aspekte einer erforderlichen Neubestimmung seiner kirchen- und theologieg-
eschichtlichen Position,’ Herbergen der Christenheit. Jahrbuch für deutsche Kirchengeschichte 18
(1993/94): 67–79; Horst Pfefferl, ‘Die Rezeption des paracelsischen Schrifftums bei Valentin
Weigel. Probleme ihrer Erforschung am Beispiel der kompilatorischen Schrift ‘Vierlei Auslegung
von der Schöpfung,’ in Neue Beiträge zur Paracelsus-Forschung. Peter Dilg & Hartmut Rudolph,
eds. (Stuttgart: Akademie der Diözese Rottenburg, 1995), 151–168.
130
On the collaborations see Fritz Lieb, Valentin Weigels Kommentar zu Schöpfungsgeschichte und
das Schrifttum seines Schülers Benedikt Biedermann. Eine literaturkritische Untersuchung der
mystischen Theologie des 16. Jahrhunderts. Zurich: EVZ Verlag, 1962) and, definitively, Horst
Pfefferl, ‘Die Überlieferung der Schriften Valentin Weigels’ (Teildruck). Philipps-Universität
Marburg/Lahn, 1991, and his edition of Weigel’s Sämtliche Schriften.
131
Weeks, Valentin Weigel, 19–39.
132
Valentin Weigel, Der güldene Griff/ Alle Ding ohne Irrthumb zu erkennen/ vielen Hochgelährten
unbekandt/ und doch allen Menschen nothwendig zu wissen (Halle: Bißmarck für Krusicke,
1616), 65.
likely written in collaboration with Biedermann, made clear.133 Weigel stressed a

radical interiorisation of Godly authority, for in the future, there would exist ‘no
writings, rules, laws, ceremonies, baptisms or communions.’ The death of the
earthly, sinful Adam was essential for the rebirth of the individual in Christ.134 The
individual could improve themselves through prayer, penance, and other practical
activities. The interiority of Weigel’s devotional philosophy also impacted on his
apocalyptic expectations, for the changes in the individual had worldly implica-
tions.135 In Weigel’s anticipated apocalyptic kingdom, all churchly offices would
become a ‘contradiction in terms’ (contradictio in adiecto), and the true church
would be formed by a community of reborn Christians.136 Drawing on Luke 1:32–
33, Weigel argued that at an unspecified future time, ‘Christ will be revealed and
will reign over his holy people here upon the earth for a lengthy time (gute Zeit),
when the empires of the world are gone, and all estates, spiritual and worldly, no
longer exist.’137 Weigel’s works combined aspects of the ‘devotional turn’ in
Lutheranism with the expanding search for apocalyptic insight, wrapped up in an
anticlerical ideology. Within his works, philosophies devotional and apocalyptic
played the same role of offering certainty for the reading public. This public
expanded dramatically after 1609, when Weigel’s books began to appear in print in
Halle and elsewhere.
One of the keenest readers of Weigel’s works was Johann Arndt, author of Wahres
Christenthum, one of the most influential works of Christian religiosity in early
modernity.138 Like Weigel, Arndt combined apocalyptic and devotional ideas into
a literature of solace. Arndt was born into a pastor’s family in 1555 in Ballenstedt.
While Arndt may have visited the occasional theological lecture during his studies
in Helmstedt, Wittenberg, Straßburg and Basel, his actual education was in medi-
cine.139 Arndt’s lack of formal theological education was later cited by the Jena
133
Valentin Weigel, Gnothi Seauton ... Erkenne dich selbst: Zeiget vn[d] weiset dahin/ daß der
Mensch sey ein Microcosmus, das gröste Werck Gottes/ vnter der Himmel ... (Newenstadt: Johann
Knuber, 1615).
134
Siegfried Wollgast, ‘Chiliasmus und soziale Utopie im Paracelsismus,’ in Neue Beiträge zur
Paracelsus-Forschung. Peter Dilg, ed. (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994), 111.
135
Wollgast, ‘Chiliasmus und soziale Utopie,’ 111.
136
Valentin Weigel, Ein nützliches Tractätlein Vom Ort der Welt. (Halle: Krusicke, 1613), 82;
[Pseudo-] Valentin Weigel, Kirchen Oder Hauspostill Uber die Sontags und fürnembsten Fest
Evangelien durchs gantze Jahr/ auß dem rechten Catholischen und Apostolischen Grunde und
Brunnen Israelis vorgetragen und geprediget (Newenstatt: Knuber, 1617), 155.
137
Weigel, Kirchen oder Haus Postill, vol. 1, 37.
138
On Arndt see generally the collection edited by Hans Otte and Hans Schneider, eds. Frömmigkeit
oder Theologie. Johann Arndt und die “Vier Bücher vom wahren Christentum.” (Göttingen: V&R
Unipress, 2007); Hermann Geyer, Verborgene Weisheit: Johann Arndts “Vier Bücher vom Wahren
Christentum” als Programm einer spiritualistisch-hermetischen Theologie (Berlin: De Gruyter,
2001); Wilhelm Koepp, Johann Arndt. Eine Untersuchung über die Mystik im Luthertum (Berlin:
Trowitzsch und Sohn, 1912).
139
Heinrich Schneider, ‘Johann Arndts Studienzeit’ and Schneider, ‘Noch einmal: Johann Arndts
Studienzeit’ in Der fremde Arndt. Studien zu Leben, Werk und Wirkung Johann Arndts (1555–
1621). (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2006), 83–134.
theologian Johann Gerhard as a potential reason for his later susceptibility to con-
troversial theological formulations.140 Arndt’s early years were defined by contact
with heterodox religious thinkers. In Basel, he exchanged letters with Theodor
Zwinger (1533–1588)—himself a correspondent of Postel—and the French
Paracelsian Bernard Gilles Penot (1519–1617). Arndt’s Ikonographia (1597), con-
cerning the Calvinist Bilderstürz, drew upon works by Agrippa and the early theoso-
pher Heinrich Khunrath of Leipzig (ca. 1560–1605).141 In an unpublished
manuscript, Arndt praised the virtues of the ancient Egyptian magi, and is even
supposed to have operated an alchemical laboratory during his later life as Lutheran
superintendent in Celle.142
More intriguing is Arndt’s interest in Weigel’s works. According to Johann
Angelius Werdenhagen (1581–1652), the young Arndt ‘established a good friend-
ship with Valentin Weigel,’ and exchanged letters with him.143 While this claim is
doubted by many historians, Arndt nevertheless demonstrated familiarity with writ-
ings of both Weigel and Paracelsus’s manuscript theologica in a 1599 letter.144
Around the same time, Arndt also occupied himself by editing and publishing sev-
eral editions of mystical writings, such as Theologia Deutsch (1597) and Thomas a
Kempis’s (ca. 1380–1471) Imitatio Christi (1605).145 In other words, Arndt’s though
drew upon many of the same sources that informed the speculations of Lutheran
apocalypticists.
Arndt was widely cited and discussed by optimistic apocalypticists of the early
seventeenth century, mainly on account of his magnum opus of practical Christianity,
Wahres Christenthum (4 vols., 1605–1610).146 While its sources were mostly uncon-
troversial, the second volume reproduced sections from Weigel’s then unprinted
‘Gebetbuchlein.’ The fourth and final volume was cobbled together from several of
140
Letter of 2 February 1625 to Nicolaus Hunnius, cited in Johann Andreas Gleich, Trifolium
Arndtianum seu B. Ioannis Arndti tres epistolae hactenus ineditae, de libris verum Christianismum
concernentibus. (Wittenberg: Apud Viduam Gerdesianam, [1714]), 13.
141
Johann Arndt, Ikonographia. Gründtlicher und Christlicher Bericht/ von Bildern, ihrem
Ursprung/ rechtem gebrauch und misbrauch. (Halberstadt: [1597]), sig. 32v.
142
Carlos Gilly, ‘Hermes or Luther? The search for Johann Arndt’s De Antiqua Philosophia et
Divina Veterum Magorum Sapientia Recuperanda,’ in Magia, alchimia, scienza dal ‘400 al ‘700:
l’influsso di Ermete Trismegisto. 2 vols, Carlos Gilly and Cis van Heertum, eds. (Florence: Centro
Di, 2002), 376–398; Johann Franz Buddeus, Commentario academica de Concordia religionis
christianae statusque civilis (Halle: Waisenhaus, 1712), 544–46; Philippus Julius Rehtmeyer,
Historiae ecclesiasticae inclytae urbis Brunsvigae, Oder: Der berühmten Stadt Braunschweig
Kirchen = Historie (Braunschweig: Ludolph Schröder, 1720), vol. 4, 334.
143
Halle, Bibliothek der Franckeschen Stiftungen, MS B17a, 193r. I owe this reference to Gilly,
Adam Haslmayr, 131. On Arndt’s friendship with Werdenhagen see Heinrich Schneider, ‘Johann
Arndt als Lutheraner?’ in Die lutherische Konfessionalisierung in Deutschland (Gütersloh:
Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992), 73.
144
Schneider, ‘Johann Arndt als Lutheraner?’, 68–70.
145
Schneider, ‘Johann Arndt als Lutheraner?’, 70–71.
146
Johannes Wallmann, ‘Johann Arndt und die protestantische Frömmigkeit,’ Chloe 2 (1994):
50–74 at 56.
Paracelsus’ natural philosophical works.147 Arndt was aware of the controversial

nature of these texts, and his borrowings were accordingly unattributed. Their inclu-
sion appears to have been inspired by 1 Thessalonians 5:21: ‘Prove everything and
hold fast that which is good.’148 Once his borrowings were discovered, more than 20
Lutheran theologians wrote books condemning Arndt’s actions, decrying his text as
a Trojan Horse for foreign theological doctrines.149 One of the more perceptive
judgments upon the Wahres Christenthum was offered by the Dresden court-
preacher Polycarp Leyser (1586–1633), who cautiously declared that ‘if its reader
is good, so is the book.’150
Leyser’s viewpoint appears to have been justified, as Arndt’s work not only
appealed to Lutherans, but also to readers outside the confession or at its boundar-
ies. In 1620, a Gießen theologian complained that many Schwenkfelders saw their
doctrines confirmed by Wahres Christentum.151 In 1618, the pseudo-Weigelian Soli
Deo Gloria listed Arndt’s book as a source for those seeking greater insight into
Weigel’s thought.152 Around 1621, Paul Nagel identified Arndt as the third angel of
Revelation 14:9,153 while in Brandenburg both Pantel Trapp and Johann Bannier (d.
1625) identified him as the Paracelsian Elias Artista.154 In the anonymously-printed
147
In detail concerning these borrowings see Christian Braw, Bücher im Staube. Die Theologie
Johann Arndts in ihrem Verhältnis zur Mystik (Leiden: Brill, 1986); Schneider, ‘Arndt als
Lutheraner?’
148
Johann Arndt, Zwey Sendschreiben. H. Johann Arendts darinnen er bezeuget/ daß seine Bücher
vom wahren Christentumb/ mit des Weigelij und dergleichen Schwärmer Irthummen/ zur uebge-
bühr bezüchtiget werden (Magdeburg: Johann Francke, 1620), sigs. A8v-B1r.
149
Lukas Osiander, Theologisches Bedencken, und Christliche treuhertzige Erinnerung, welcher
Gestalt Johann Arndten genandtes Wahres Christenthumb ... seye (Tübingen: Werlin 1624), 29.
For a review of the contemporary Arndt literature see Johann Georg Walch, Historische und
Theologische Einleitung in die Religions-Streitigkeiten, welche sonderlich ausserhalb der
Evangelisch-Lutherischen Kirche entstanden. 5 vols. (Jena: Johann Mayer, 1735), vol. 3, 171–241
and vol. 5, 1123–1161.
150
Cited in Wilhelm Koepp, Johann Arndt. Eine Untersuchung über die Mystik im Luthertum
(Berlin: Trowitzsch und Sohn, 1912), 68.
151
Balthasar Mentzer to Johann Arndt, letter of 11 July 1620, reprinted in Melchior Breler,
Warhafftiger, Glaubwürdiger und gründlicher Bericht von den vier Büchern vom Wahren
Christenthumb (Lüneburg: Stern, 1625), 20.
152
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Soli Deo Gloria. Drey Theil einer gründlichen/ und wol Probirten Anweisung
und Anleitung der Anfahenden / einfeltigen Christen zu der Rechten Schulen Gottes (Newenstadt:
Knuber, 1618), 80.
153
Munich, BSB, Cgm 4416/9, fol. 214r.
154
Georg Goetzius (praes.) C. H. von Elßwich (resp.), Dissertatio Historico-Theologica, Errores,
qvos Joh. Bannier, Sartor Stargardiensis, Lubeckæ an. MDCXXV. proposuit, exhibens & refutans
(Lubeck: Schmalhertz, 1707); Ehre-Gott Daniel Colberg, Das Platonisch-hermetische
Christenthum. Begreiffend die historische Erzehlung vom Ursprung und vierlerley Secten der heu-
tigen Fanatischen Theologie. 2nd ed. (Leipzig: Gleditsch, 1710–1711), vol. 1, 227–232; vol. 2,
300; Matti Repo, ‘Astrologische Alchemie als Vorbild der Neuen Geburt bei Johann Arndt. Ein
Beitrag zu den frühesten Einflüssen Arndts im schwedischen Königreich,’ in Johann Arndt-
Rezeption und Reaktion im Nordisch-Baltischen Raum (Lund: Lund University Press, 1999),
57–84; Carlos Gilly, ‘Johann Arndt und die ‘dritte Reformation’ im Zeichen des Paracelsus,’ Nova
Acta Paracelsica, NF 11 (1997): 60–77 at 69–70.
Colloquium Rhodo-Stauroticum (1621), Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum was recom-

mended alongside texts by Lautensack and Sperber as a signpost to secret magical
wisdom.155
This approbation was present even though Arndt’s apocalyptic expectations were
thoroughly orthodox. Arndt conceived of the Godly kingdom as an eternal ongoing
Gnadenreich in the hearts of the true Christian.156 In his Paradiesgärtlein (1614) he
implored his readers to pray fervently for the Judgment Day.157 The appeal of
Arndt’s works among apocalypticists, as among Lutherans more generally, arguably
drew instead on its utility as a devotional text as well as its subtle anticlericalism. In
his edition of the Theologia Deutsch (1597), Arndt wrote that the flood of dogmatic
writings that followed Luther’s Reformation had not bettered the lives of true
Christians. He suggested that Lutherans should abstain from dogmatics and polem-
ics and ‘seek another path.’158 The opening words of Wahres Christenthum appear to
describe the consequences of this behaviour:
That the holy Gospel is subjected, in our time, to a great and shameful abuse is fully proved
by the impenitent life of the ungodly who praise Christ and his word with their mouths and
yet lead an unchristian life [...] Such ungodly conduct gave me cause to write this book to
show simple readers wherein true Christianity consists, namely, in the exhibition of a true,
living faith, active in genuine godliness and the fruits of righteousness.159
The true Christianity of the book’s title was the practice of leading a godly life and
interiorizing divine attributes, something quite different from the ‘pharisaic hypoc-
risy’ that Arndt felt was practised by those who defended God’s word with zeal, but
blasphemed him through their actions.160
The overwhelming success of Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum during the seven-
teenth century—more than 70 editions in Latin and German are known—ensured
that Lutherans had ready access to a book that encouraged ideas of further reform,
albeit refracted through the devotional practices of the individual. There can also be
little doubt that his work encouraged some Lutherans to seek out other works which
encouraged further reform, including those containing optimistic apocalyptic
doctrines.
The confluence of apocalyptic and devotional ideas in the works of both Weigel
and Arndt at the turn of the seventeenth century indicates that both the
Frömmigkeitswende and the growing interest of Lutherans in optimistic apocalyptic
scenarios were product of related quests to establish certainty in a time of crisis.
155
Colloquium Rhodostauroticum. Das ist: Gespräch dreyer Personen/ von der wenig Jahren/
durch die Fama & Confessionem etlicher massen geoffenbarten Fraternitet deß Rosen Creutzes.
(No Place: No Printer, 1621), 108–9.
156
Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 114–115.
157
Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 114, citing the Nuremberg 1762 edition of Arndt’s
Paradiesgärtlein.
158
Johann Arndt, ed., Die Deutsche Theologia ... . (Halberstadt, 1597).
159
Johann Arndt, True Christianity. Peter C. Erb, trans. (Philadelphia: Paulist Press, 1978), 21.
160
Johann Arndt, Von wahrem Christenthumb. Die Urausgabe des ersten Buches (1605). Johann
Anselm Steiger, ed. (Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 2005), 9, 13.
These scenarios were present in the works of clerics and lay persons alike. They
were transmitted by medieval prophecies, and traditions of scriptural interpretation,
such as the ‘mini-millenniums’ of the Old and New Testaments. They were also
present in widely-circulated works of non-Lutherans like Brocardo, Postel, and
Paracelsus. By the final decades of the sixteenth century, these expectations were
complemented by the visions and research of Lutherans like Poyssel, Weigel,
Nachenmoser, Sperber, Linck, and others, whose distinctly anticlerical works united
many of the religious themes found in contemporary devotional literature with the
anticipation of a felicitous apocalyptic future. The perception expressed in these
works that an imminent, decisive change was at hand was intensified by events in
the political and natural world. To these we now briefly turn.
The Mirror of Nature – Natur Spiegel
Strange and miraculous events within the natural world provided inspiration for the
burgeoning Lutheran quest for insight into the Last Days. Apparitions, prodigies,
ghosts, floods, disease, eclipses, strange births, parhelia, new stars, comets and
other events all contributed to the idea that some form of Godly intervention was
imminent, just as Luke 21:11 foretold: ‘And great earthquakes shall be in divers
places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be
from heaven.’161 Within the Lutheran outlook, such events were interpreted apoca-
lyptically, as part of God’s plan of gradually revealing the delivery of the true church
from Babylon. As such, miraculous and strange events in natural world had the
power to inspire apocalyptic writings, even if the substance of the eschatologies
therein expressed were tangential to the character of the expectations. New prophets
and other dissidents mentioned prodigies, apparitions, bizarre animals, floods and
other unusual occurrences in their writings, yet these wonders did not explicitly
inform the worldview they supported. Instead, as Barnes and others have argued,
such events contributed to a general atmosphere of expectation.162 There is far too
little space to give adequate treatment to these complex topics here. Instead, the
present section gestures towards some of the more significant phenomena that occu-
pied the thought of Lutheran apocalypticists at the turn of the seventeenth century.
Many apocalypticists shared the opinion of Paracelsus and Weigel that the ‘book
of the heavens’ was another kind of scripture. Since Aristotle, the heavens were
161
The scholarly literature on these phenomena, and Protestant reactions to them, is vast. As an
orientation see Jennifer Spinks and Charles Zika, eds. Disaster, Death and the Emotions in the
Shadow of the Apocalypse, 1400–1700 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016); Jennifer Spinks,
Monstrous Births and Visual Culture in Sixteenth-Century Germany (London: Pickering and
Chatto, 2009); Ken Kunihara, Celestial Wonders in Reformation Germany (London: Pickering and
Chatto, 2014); Philip M. Soergel, Miracles and the Protestant Imagination: The Evangelical
Wonder Book in Reformation Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).
162
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 141ff; Barnes, Astrology and Reformation, passim; Åkerman,
‘Helisaeus Roeslin, the new Star, and the Last Judgment,’ 341–2.
The Mirror of Nature – Natur Spiegel 29
thought to be fixed and immovable, composed of solid spheres upon which the
heavenly bodies were forced to wander ceaselessly their well-trodden paths. In
1572, however, a new star suddenly and inexplicably appeared in the night sky,
undermining confidence in the Aristotelian worldview.163 In the scramble to erect
new frameworks to explain the change in the heavens, some chose to regard the new
star as a miraculous occurrence, the better to reconcile an ‘impossible’ event with
established natural philosophical wisdom.164 Since the 1400s there had been a
renewed interest in astrology and astrological prediction that, following the
Reformation, was also adopted by some Lutherans.165 In the following years, further
celestial events would occur, such as the comets of 1576, 1577, 1585 and 1596.
Together with the propagation of new heliocentric doctrines, the seemingly miracu-
lous changes in the heavens prompted Lutherans to examine their prophetic
significance.166
One of the most keenly observed astronomical events of prophetic significance
was that of the great conjunctions that occurred in 1603 and 1623.167 The doctrine
of the great conjunctions traced the passage and influence of the most malign of the
planets, Saturn, with the most benign, Jupiter, through the heavens. Because the
planets orbited the sun at varying speeds, approximately once every 20 years they
stood in conjunction under a different sign in the zodiac. Around once every
200 years, the conjunctions progress into the next zodiacal trigon, and every
800 years, an entire cycle of conjunctions would be complete, an event which astrol-
ogers believed had often brought significant changes in worldly order.168 In 1603,
the great conjunction took place under the water signs of Pisces, Cancer and Scorpio,
but in 1623 it shifted to the trigon of fiery signs Aries, Leo and Sagittarius. If the
world was less than 6000 years old––as biblical chronologists concurred––then this
would be only the seventh time that such an event had occurred. In the past, the
conjunctions were believed to have presaged astonishing events. As Howard Hotson
has pointed out, the Calvinist Johann Heinrich Alsted (1588–1638) showed that a
conjunction had occurred in 4000 BCE, a generally accepted date for creation, and
other conjunctions had supposedly presaged the great deluge, the flight of the cho-
sen people into Israel, the birth of Christ, and the division of the Roman Empire
163
See the exhaustive work by Michael Weichenhan, ‘Ergo perit cœlum ...’ Die Supernova des
Jahres 1572 und die Überwindung der aristotelischen Kosmologie (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag,
2004).
164
Instead of a lengthy literature review, I point readers to Charlotte Methuen, “This comet or new
star’: theology and the interpretation of the nova of 1572,’ Perspectives on Science 5 (1997): 499–
515, with extensive further literature cited therein.
165
See the excellent recent analysis in Barnes, Astrology and Reformation.
166
Patrick Bonner, ed., Change and Continuity in Early Modern Cosmology (Dordrecht: Springer,
2011).
167
Literature on the great conjunction of 1623 is surprisingly sparse. See Margaret Aston, ‘The
Fiery Trigon Conjunction: An Elizabethan Astrological Prediction,’ Isis, 61 (1970): 158–187;
Åkerman, ‘The Great Conjunction,’ 1–8; Hotson, Paradise Postponed, 41–46.
168
Hotson, Paradise Postponed, 41–46.
under Charlemagne (742–814 CE).169 ‘It is well established from the annals of his-
tory,’ Alsted commented, ‘that a great conjunction never appears without some
extraordinary mutation of polity and church.’170 The appeal of the great conjunction
for Lutherans lay in the fact that, by manner of its regular and circuitous movement
through the heavens, it embodied a predictable system that generated prophetic
importance, to which hopes––including eschatological hopes––could be readily
attached.171 In the coming chapters, we shall see that numerous apocalypticists drew
on the great conjunctions in their predictions of a coming Golden Age, many of
them linking the event to the supernova of 1604.172
Another major astronomical event that influenced optimistic apocalyptic expec-
tations was the comets of 1618.173 Coming as they did on the heels of the Bohemian
Revolt—the first skirmish in a conflict which would eventually become the Thirty
Years’ War—and shortly before the great conjunction of 1623, these comets were
seen as a confirmation of preexisting eschatological expectations, and a spur to the
views of Lutheran apocalypticists. In his printed reaction to the comet, the evangeli-
cal theologian Elias Ehinger (1573–1653) wrote that it portended not only a ‘great
change of government’ and ‘terrible wars and rebellions’ but also that the world
would suffer through a time of undiluted misery, of ‘great dearth, hunger and
plague.’174
We shall come to the pressures of changing governments, wars and rebellions
that defined this period shortly. However it is important to note that Ehinger’s
prophecy of dearth and hunger could also be understood as a description of a pro-
cess of climatic change that had been crippling central Europe for almost a century.
Since 1550, average temperatures in Europe had dropped significantly––between
one and two degrees celsius––in a period commonly designated as the ‘little ice
169
Hotson, Paradise Postponed, 43.
170
Cited in Hotson, Paradise Postponed, 43.
171
Hotson, Paradise Postponed, 43. Cf. Åkerman, ‘The Great Conjunction,’ 1–8; Barnes, Astrology
and Reformation, 23–4, 272–274, 289–290.
172
Gilly, ‘Las novas de 1572 y 1604 en los manifiestos rosacruces,’ 275–331.
173
The literature on the comet is vast. See Ernst Zinner, Geschichte und Bibliographie der
Astronomischen Literatur in Deutschland zur Zeit der Renaissance. 2nd ed. (Stuttgart: Hiersmann
1964), s.d.; C. D. O’Malley, The Controversy of the Comets of 1618 (Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania, 1960); Tabitta van Nouhuys, The Ages of Two-Faced Janus: The Comets of 1577 and
1618 and the Decline of the Aritotelian Worldview in the Netherlands (Leiden: Brill, 1998); Marion
Gindhart, Das Kometenjahr 1618: Antikes und Zeitgenössisches Wissen in der frühneuzeitlichen
Kometenliteratur des deutschsprachigen Raumes (Wiesbaden: Reichart, 2006); Vladimír Urbánek,
‘The Comet of 1618: Eschatological Expectations and Political Prognostications during the
Bohemian Revolt,’ in Tycho Brahe and Prague. J. R. Christianson, A. Hadradowá, P. Hadrava,
M. Solc, eds. (Frankfurt: Verlag Harri Deutsch, 2002), 282–291; Andreas Bähr, Der grausame
Komet. Himmelszeichen und Weltgeschehen im Dreißigjährigen Krieg (Munich: Rowohlt, 2017).
174
Cited in Andrew Cunningham and Ole Peter Grell, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse:
Religion, War, Famine and Death in Reformation Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2000), 182.
The Mirror of Nature – Natur Spiegel 31
age.’175 Bitterly cold winters combined with cooler springs to reduce crop yields,
shorten harvest times, and shrink the geographical areas in which crops might grow;
conditions all that hastened famine. In Schleswig, a Danish province beyond the
northern reaches of the Empire, glacial expansion and storms caused catastrophic
flooding at regular intervals in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, just as else-
where monsoon rains and lingering, unseasonable snow drifts hampered commerce,
engendered sleeplessness and depression and impacted on the general health of the
population. As the number of beggars on the roadways increased, so too did the
desperation of many, breeding crime and lawlessness.176 Reduced yields from crops
affected larger cities, where bakers and millers found themselves struggling to make
a living. In addition to melancholy and depression, the little ice age also prompted
prophetic speculation.177 Prophetic significance was granted to unusual agricultural
finds, such as to an ear of wheat bearing 27 spikelets discovered in 1622 in Bamberg;
the author of this work believed that its discovery predicted a coming time of felicity
to dawn in 1627.178 Broader consequences for Lutheran religiosity were also seen.
In the grip of the little ice age in the late sixteenth century, traditional Lutheran
Good Friday celebrations were established, in which pastors emphasized to their
congregations the necessity of the imitatio Christi. Justified by the use of medieval
mystical sources, this idea was proponed as a method not only to ameliorate the
pains of the individual, but also to provide a general hope to the populace.179 A
change of this nature appears at least superficially similar to the hope offered in the
work of optimistic apocalypticists of the late sixteenth century, as well as in the
devotional works of Johann Arndt.180
The environmental impact of the little ice age was compounded by political
instabilities and the ruinous contravention of minting privileges by various political
bodies within the Empire. Inflation had already been a problem in Europe since the
1590s, however after 1610 several territories actively abused their minting rights by
175
See Brian Fagan, The Little Ice Age. How Climate Made History, 1300–1850 (New York: Basic,
2001), and the essays published in Wolfgang Behringer, Hartmut Lehmann and Kathrin Pfister,
eds., Kulturelle Konsequenzen der ‘Kleinen Eiszeit’—Cultural Consequences of the ‘Little Ice
Age.’ (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2005).
176
Geoffrey Parker, Europe in Crisis, 1598–1648, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001), 13.
177
On melancholy and clinical depression during the little ice age, see H.C. Erik Midelfort,
‘Melancholische Eiszeit?’ in Behringer et al., Konsequenzen, 239–254. On Paul Gerhardt’s rhyme
‘Die Wolken gießen allzumal, die Tränen ohne Maß und Zahl’ see Dietrich Korn, Das Thema des
Jüngsten Tages in der deutschen Literatur des. 17. Jahrhunderts. (Tübingen: Niemayer, 1957),
123; Rienk Vermij, ‘A Science of Signs. Aristotelian Meteorology in Reformation Germany,’ Early
Science and Medicine 15 (2010): 648–674.
178
Abbildung einer Wunderlichen vilfeltigen Khorn-äheren welche auff einem stupfel oder Halm
den ii. tag Octob: dieses hinlauffenden 1622 Jahrs in einen Acker zu der Wildensorg negst bey
Bamberg ligend in diser gestald und bluend ist gefunden worden. (Bamberg: Peter Iselburg, 1622).
179
See Manfred Jakubowski-Tiessen, ‘Das Leiden Christi und das Leiden der Welt’ in Behringer,
et al., Konsequenzen, 195–213.
180
Cf. Siegfried Wollgast, ‘Mystische Strömmungen in Literatur und Philosophie der ersten Hälfte
des 17. Jahrhunderts in Deutschland,’ Daphnis 21 (1992): 269–303.
deliberately circulating devalued coins.181 At the end of 1621, Emperor Ferdinand II

(1578–1637) actively encouraged the practice amongst a consortium of buyers for
lands confiscated during the early Thirty Years’ War.182 This exploitation had cata-
strophic consequences. Inflation, famine and discontent added not only to social
strain, but also to the desire for delivery and escape for many people.183 The so-
called Kipper und Wipper period, as the days of hyper-inflation were known, came
to an end in 1623. But by this point, following years of enduring corruption, hopes
among Lutherans for delivery from environmental, epistemological and political
turmoil—spurs all to the expression of optimistic apocalyptic expectations—had
already been sown.184
The Mirror of Worldly Affairs – Welt Spiegel
Political prophecy has long been a mainstay of European eschatological traditions.

The identification of popes, emperors and potentates as messianic deliverers of
nations or ethnicities flourished due to ideas of divine right and monarchical abso-
lutism. The middle ages was awash with expectations concerning the Last Emperor
(Endkaiser) or an angelic pope, who would lead their followers to an apocalyptic
triumph.185 Such prophecies circulated in Luther’s time, with predictions of a return
of the Hohenstaufen dynasty in the person of medieval Emperor Friedrich I (1122–
1190) receiving some publicity.186 Luther himself viewed Duke Friedrich the Wise
of Saxony (1463–1525), the man who had sponsored and protected him, as the Last
Emperor spoken of in Sibylline oracles.187 Yet these prophecies could not only be
understood as predictions of stasis, but also of further reformation. Paul Linck, for
example, associated political prophecy with folk traditions and optimistic expecta-
tions when he linked the fate of the children stolen by the pied piper of Hamelin
181
Fritz Redlich, Die deutsche Inflation des frühen siebzehnten Jahrhunderts in der zeitgenös-
sischen Literatur. Die Kipper und Wipper (Cologne: Böhlau, 1972); Cunningham and Grell, Four
Horsemen, 213, 234.
182
Parker, Europe in Crisis, 129.
183
Redlich, Die deutsche Inflation des frühen 17. Jahrhunderts; Martha White Paas, The Kipper
und Wipper Inflation, 1619–1623. An Economic History with Contemporary German Broadsheets
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012).
184
Gustav Freytag, ‘Die Kipper und Wipper und die öffentliche Meinung,’ in Bilder aus der
deutschen Vergangenheit. Band 2. Reformationszeit und Dreißigjähriger Krieg. Heinrich Pleticha,
ed. (Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1998), 299–318.
185
Hans Möhring, Der Weltkaiser der Endzeit. Entstehung, Wandel und Wirkung einer tausendjäh-
rigen Weissagung. (Stuttgart: Thorbecke, 2000).
186
187
The Mirror of Worldly Affairs – Welt Spiegel 33
with the story of King Arthur and the Last Emperor Friedrich I in a vision of
Paracelsus’ Golden Age.188
Lutherans kept a watchful eye on the apocalyptic significance of political events,
especially in Bohemia and Saxony. Waking anxieties of a coming war brought fur-
ther focus and depth to once vague political Messianic prophecies. Since 1614,
some of the more pessimistic territorial leaders within the Empire had begun to fear
an imminent conflagration. Everywhere, territories were rushing to expand military
budgets as relationships between many states, like the climate, cooled.189 Fractures
emerged along political but also confessional lines, and tensions broke on 23 May
1618, when two Catholic diplomats acting on behalf of the incumbent King of
Bohemia, Ferdinand of Styria (1578–1637), were defenestrated from a window of
the imperial chancellery in Prague by Protestant sympathisers, fearful of losing the
right to practice their religion granted to them by Rudolf II (1552–1612).190 Bohemia
was in revolt, and an apocalyptic conflict that would ultimately engulf the entire
Empire was set in train. The pseudo-Paracelsian prophecy of the Lion of Midnight,
a saviour of evangelical Christianity, began to exercise a pervasive influence.
Already in 1612 Adam Haslmayr (1562–ca. 1630) thought the Calvinist prince
August of Anhalt-Plötzkau (1575–1653) could be this lion, while even earlier Tobias
Hess had attempted to convince Duke Friedrich of Württemberg to accept the same
prophetic role.191 Following the outbreak of war, however, some identified Friedrich
V of the Palatinate (1596–1632), who was elected king of Bohemia in the winter of
1619, as the Midnight Lion. In one contemporary prophetic vision, he was hailed as
‘the lion who took the Eagle’s scepter’ who would initiate a time of ‘tranquility and
unity’ before the Last Judgment.192 Characterised by Brennan Pursell as an arch-
irenicist, Friedrich V was apparently aware of the propagandic value of his rulership
in Bohemia for the Protestant cause, whether or not he also acknowledged the
prophecies which were attached to his rule. In official documents of the Bohemian
court Friedrich V always indicated that he was ‘Protestant,’ and never simply
Calvinist, a circumstance that lent him some appeal to Lutherans.193 A pro-Friedrich
broadsheet depicted Luther, the Bohemian reformer Jan Hus (ca. 1369–1415) and
Calvin together, united over a copy of the Bible, emphasizing Friedrich’s potential
appeal among all Protestants.194
188
Wolfenbüttel HAB, Cod. Guelf. 981 Helmst., 214r–224v.
189
Geoffrey Parker, The Thirty Years’ War, 2nd ed. (New York: Military Heritage Press, 1987), 12.
190
A readable history of the beginning of the war is provided by Peter H. Wilson, The Thirty Years
War: Europe’s Tragedy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012).
191
Gilly, Adam Haslmayr, 89.
192
Gilly, ‘The Midnight Lion,’ 49.
193
Brennan C. Pursell, The Winter King. Frederick V of the Palatinate and the Coming of the Thirty
Years’ War (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), 19.
194
Currier Mit guter und tröstlicher newen Zeitung vor das betrübte Königreich Böhmen. (No
Place: No Printer, 1619).
Yet Friedrich V would only rule for a winter, crushed by Imperial troops within
a matter of hours at the battle of White Mountain on 8 November 1620.195 A conse-
quence of Friedrich’s defeat was the dissolution of the Protestant Union in May of
1621, which brought further anxiety to Protestants.196 Yet his defeat did not mean
the end of his prophetic significance. Paul Felgenhauer (1593–1661) prophesied
Friedrich’s restoration and the descent of the New Jerusalem to the hills of Prague
for 1623. The Lutheran Christoph Kotter (1585–1646), a friend of Jacob Böhme and
later of Jan Amos Comenius (1592–1670), remained a staunch supporter, offering
his visions of restitution to the exiled leader on several occasions.197
Quite aside from expectations surrounding Friedrich V, the events of the
Bohemian revolt had significant ramifications for Protestant communities for an
entirely different reason: namely, Lutheran Saxony’s opportunistic and ‘unconscio-
nable behaviour’. Since around 1600, Saxony had practised a foreign policy some-
times referred to as ‘political papism.’198 The Electorate had maintained close
diplomatic ties with the Habsburgs, a circumstance that disillusioned those who felt
that Luther’s legacy was being betrayed for decidedly worldly political reasons. In
1602 the Dresden court preacher Polycarp Leyser Sr. (1552–1610) rushed a theo-
logical justification for Saxony’s position into print, declaring that it was ‘better to
be Papist than Calvinist.’199 Leyser’s justification deepened popular mistrust of
Saxony’s intentions. Leyser seemed to personify Johann Arndt’s critique of a con-
temporary Lutheran faith that preached about true Christianity, but betrayed its con-
fessed faith through its deeds. The Saxon position was noticed by apocalypticists,
such as Eustachius Poyssel.200
Outrage appears to have been compounded by a perceived hypocrisy. A 1617
broadsheet issued in Saxony for the Reformation Jubilee depicted Luther, Philipp
Melanchthon, their protector Friedrich III and the incumbent Elector of Saxony
(1463–1525), Johann Georg I (1585–1656), as guardians of the Lutheran faith.201
For critics of Lutheran culture, this kind of self-justifying propaganda made
Saxony’s diplomatic stance following the beginning of the Bohemian Revolt all the
more unpalatable. In 1620 and 1621, having been attacked by Lutherans and dissi-
dents alike, Leyser’s successor, Dresden court preacher Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg
195
Olivier Chaline, La Bataille de la Montagne Blanche (8 Novembre 1620). Un mystique chez les
guerriers (Paris: Noesis 1999).
196
Parker, The Thirty Years’ War, 64.
197
See M.E.H.N. Mout, ‘Chiliastic Prophecy and Revolt in the Habsburg Monarchy during the
Seventeenth Century,’ in Prophecy and Eschatology. M. Wilks, ed. (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1994), 93–109 at 100–102.
198
Ludwig Schwabe, ‘Kursächsische Kirchenpolitik im Dreißigjährigen Kriege, 1619–1622,’
Neues Archiv für sächsische Geschichte und Altertumskunde 11 (1890): 282–318.
199
Polycarp Leyser, Christianismus, Papismus et Calvinismus. (Dresden: Stöckel, 1602).
200
[Poyssel], Magischer Beweiß (1609). Cf. Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 314.
201
Charles Zika, ‘The Reformation Jubilee of 1617: Appropriating the Past in European Centenary
Celebrations,’ in Charles Zika, Exorcising our Demons. Magic, Witchcraft and Visual Culture in
Early Modern Europe (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 197–236 at 198.
The Mirror of Worldly Affairs – Welt Spiegel 35
(1580–1645), staunchly defended Saxony’s allegiance to the Habsburgs during the

Bohemian Revolt.202
Questions of good conscience regarding religion played a comparatively minor
role in a much larger political program devised by Elector Johann Georg I and his
councilors, which was designed foremost to secure the integrity of the electorate’s
territories. Saxon support for the Habsburgs was offered as a service in exchange for
guarantees of the right to incorporate Lusatia, a territory of the Bohemian crown,
into the electorate.203 Yet while Saxony’s borders were secured by such measures,
we shall see in future chapters that some observers inclined to apocalyptic predic-
tions felt that Saxon concern for territorial integrity was a betrayal of Protestantism.
The circumstances of the war, and especially Saxony’s diplomatic policy and the
complicity of its leading theologians, offered concrete proof to some Lutherans that
the Mauerkirchen were corrupted by worldliness.
To those not blinded by the despair of the ensuing combat, the signs in the natural
and political realms apparently confirmed for many Lutherans, both clerics and lay
alike, the rectitude of prophecies of a coming Golden Age; a time of respite, rest and
true spirituality. Inspired by the ‘mini-millenniums’ of scriptural interpretation,
Joachite prophecies of an age of the Holy Spirit, the writings of Postel, Brocardo,
Poyssel, Sperber, Linck, Nachenmoser, and Studion, by the turn of the seventeenth
century some Lutherans believed that the time was ripe for a new school of true
Christian belief to emerge and to show society the way.
202
Erasmus Treulich, Wohlmeinende Missiv. Eines Christlichen Trewhertzigen Freundtes. An Herrn
D. Hoe Oberhoff-Prediger (No Place: No Printer, 1619); Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg, Eine wich-
tige und in diesen gefährlichen Zeiten sehr nützliche Frag: Ob, wie und warumb man lieber mit
den Papisten gemeinschafft haben, und gleichsam mehr vertrawen zu ihnen tragen solle, den mit,
und zu den Calvinisten (Leipzig: Lamberg und Klosemann, 1620); Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg,
Augenscheinliche Prob/ Wie die Calvinisten in Neun und Neuntzig Puncten mit den Arrianern und
Türcken ubereinstimmen (Leipzig: Abraham Lamberg, 1621). Cf. Schwabe, ‘Kursächsische
Kirchenpolitik,’ 313–315; M.E.H.N. Mout, ‘Calvinoturkismus und Chiliasmus im 17. Jahrhundert,’
Pietismus und Neuzeit 14 (1988): 72–84; Trewhertzige Warnung An alle Lutherische Christen In
Bohmen, Mähren, Schlesien, und andern Ländern, Daß sie für Annehmung der irrigen und hoch-
schädlichen Calvinischen Religion bestes fleisses sich hüten sollen. (Wittenberg: Gormann, 1620).
203
See the anonymous Aperta Frons, Apertissimorum Lutheranorum, oder Copia Schreibens an
den Herren Churfürsten zu Sachssen etc. (No Place: No Printer, 1620).
Chapter 2
The School of the Holy Spirit
Between 1600 and 1630 Lutheran confessional culture experienced a dramatic

intensification of interest in ideas concerning an apocalyptic felicitous future. These
were inspired by eschatological anxieties at the core of Lutheran identity, fired by
unprecedented occurrences in the natural world, and furthered by perceived injus-
tices and inequalities in religion and politics. Literature of hope and comfort had
begun to circulate in manuscript and print in the form of devotional writings and in
predictions of an imminent Golden Age. Eventually, some Lutherans began to con-
ceive of themselves as part of a prophetic vanguard who would play key roles in the
unfolding drama of the End. Even though its various representatives disagreed on
all manner of specifics, they remained united in their anticlerical and apocalyptic
convictions, and sometimes used terms such as ‘the School of the Holy Spirit’ to
designate their shared convictions. To one anonymous supporter, this was the ‘the
Pentecostal or Whit-school (Pfingstschule) of the Holy Spirit.’1 Paul Nagel called it
the ‘School of the Holy Spirit.’ To Philipp Ziegler it was known as the ‘Most
Sublime School of the Cross of the Holy Spirit.’2
Although there were hundreds, and perhaps even thousands, of Lutherans who
held optimistic apocalyptic expectations, there were only a vocal few who were
prepared to advocate such ideas in print or manuscript. At present, we know of the
works of at least 53 individual authors who did so during this period (see appendix
1
Schola Spiritus Sancti, Das ist/ Die Schule des H. Geistes: darin als in ultimo Saeculorum
Saeculo, gelehret wirdt/ Das Ewige Evangelium: wie nemblichen/ Der AntiChrist und
Falschgesalbter Prophet erkennet und gezeiget/ Christus aber/ der Herr vom Himmel/ in den
Wolcken seines Himmels offenbahret und verkündiget werd (No Place: No Printer, 1624), 10.
2
Nagel, Tabula Aurea M. Pauli Nagelii, sig. A2r; Philipp Ziegler, AntiArnoldus et AntiNagelius,
Das ist: Grundlicher Beweiß, das weder die Zehen Grunde M. Philippi Arnoldi … die Dritte und
güldene Zeit des Heiligen Geistes umbstossen/ Noch die eilff Gegengründe M. Pauli Nagelli (No
Place: No Printer, 1622), 49. Concerning the idea of a ‘school of the Holy Spirit’ in early
Protestantism see Dieter Fauth, ‘Lernen in der “Schule Gottes” dargestellt vor allem an Quellen
von Martin Luther und dem protestantischen Dissidentismus,’ Paedegogica Historica: International
Journal of the History of Education 30/2 (1994): 476–504.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_2
38 2 The School of the Holy Spirit
one).3 Many of these individuals were condemned by their theological opponents as

‘new prophets.’4 This was a designation aimed at stressing the illegitimacy of their
message, since the age of prophecy and miracles had, in the Lutheran imagination,
ended long ago. The tracts of these new prophets, although diverse in their expecta-
tions, exploited the religious, natural philosophical and political anxieties of the
period. This chapter has two major aims. The first is to introduce the life and works
of several lay Lutherans who held and expressed optimistic apocalyptic expecta-
tions in print and manuscript in the period between 1600 and 1630. The accounts of
their lives and writings provides some sense of the diversity of apocalyptic views in
circulation during this period, as well as something of the individual paths to dissent
which shaped the outlooks of the prophets themselves. The second part of the chap-
ter examines the trade in manuscript and print that supported and made possible the
expression and dissemination of these ideas. Taken together, the material presented
in this chapter indicates that optimistic expectations were not only being written by
Lutherans, they were also being sold, read, traded and engaged with both in private
and commercial settings.
Paul Felgenhauer
The prophetic trajectory of the German-Bohemian Paul Felgenhauer mirrors that of

his spiritual forefather, Valentin Weigel.5 Born into a pastor’s family in Bohemian
Puschwitz (Buškovice) in 1593, Felgenhauer was educated at Latin schools in
Annaberg, Braunschweig and Seehausen before studying liberal arts and theology
in Wittenberg.6 There Felgenhauer lodged with Erasmus Schmidt (1570–1637), the
university’s professor of mathematics.7 By 1616, Felgenhauer had demonstrated
enough promise in his studies to have won a stipend and to be invited to preach in
3
The number is approximate on account of the many anonymous and pseudonymous publications
issued during these periods.
4
Beyer, Lay Prophets in Lutheran Europe, 11, 28; P.V. Brady, ‘The ambiguous “Newer Prophet.”
A sixteenth-century stock figure,’ Modern Language Review 62 (1967), 672–679.
5
On Felgenhauer see Vladimír Urbánek, Eschatologie, vědění a politika. Příspěvek k dějinám
myšlení pobělohorského exilu (Prague: Česke Budějovice, 2008), 104–144; Schoeps,
Philosemitismus im Barock. The following account is based on ‘Peinliche Verurteilung des Paul
Felgenhauer wegen Ketzerei und seine Gefangenschaft zu Syke,’ Niedersächsisches
Hauptstaatsarchiv, Hanover, Cal. Br. 23 no. 654 (henceforth cited as ‘Peinliche Verurteilung’).
Felgenhauer’s testimony was utilised in Ernst-Georg Wolters, ‘Paul Felgenhauers Leben und
Wirken,’ Jahrbuch für niedersächsische Kirchengeschichte 54 (1956): 63–84, and Johannes
Göhler, Wege des Glaubens. Beiträge zu einer Kirchengeschichte des Landes zwischen Elbe und
Weser (Stade: Landschaftsverband Stade, 2006), 217–35; Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘A Seventeenth-
Century Prophet Confronts his Failures. Paul Felgenhauer’s Speculum Poenitentiae, Buß Spiegel
(1625),’ in Angels of Light. Sanctity and the Discernment of Spirits in the Early Modern Period.
Clare Copeland and Jan Machielsen, eds. (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 169–200.
6
‘Peinliche Verurteilung,’ fols. 57r-v; Bernhard Weissenborn, ed. Album Academiae Vitebergensis.
Jüngere Reihe. Theil 1. (1602–1660). (Magdeburg: 1934), 74, 136. Felgenhauer registered in 1608
and again in 1613.
7
On Schmidt see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis 173–174; Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, vol.
32, 27–8.
Paul Felgenhauer 39
Wittenberg’s castle church. Following a recommendation by the university provost

Wolfgang Frantzius (1564–1628), he was promptly offered a position as deacon.8
But from late 1616, Felgenhauer suffered from doubt and depression. He attempted
to console himself by reading the works of Johann Arndt, and even wrote to Arndt
in an effort to alleviate his sufferings.9 Shortly thereafter, he encountered Philipp
Ziegler, a wandering new prophet, who was sojourning in Wittenberg. He may well
have dipped into the prophetic volumes of Eustachius Poyssel and others found in
Erasmus Schmidt’s study.10 Then, on 17 January 1617, the Archangel Gabriel
appeared to him in a dream. Later, Felgenhauer would claim that Gabriel bestowed
upon him ‘godly wisdom,’ which allowed him, with the guidance of the Holy Spirit,
to see the hidden truths of the Bible and interpret its meanings infallibly.11 The
doubts which plagued him suddenly disappeared.
At least, this is what Felgenhauer claimed in an account written some 20 years
after the fact. His initial printed works, however, demonstrate that he knew not what
to make of his visionary experience. His Speculum Temporis (1619, 1620) was an
apocalyptic scriptural chronology in the Lutheran tradition, which exhorted readers
to do penance and to wait for the coming Judgment Day.12 In a second chronological
work, the Rechte Warhafftige und gantz richtige Chronologia (1620), Felgenhauer
was even firmer in his interpretation of scripture. Based on a series of calculations,
he determined that the Last Judgment would occur within the next century.13 But
Felgenhauer also felt acutely the plight of his fellow Bohemians in the unfolding
political drama of the revolt. In particular, he was incensed by Lutheran Saxony’s
support for the Habsburgs, which he considered a betrayal. That Saxony’s court
theologians justified this political stance with garbled theological arguments pro-
8
‘Peinliche Verurteilung,’ fols. 58r–59r.
9
Wolters, ‘Paul Felgenhauers Leben und Wirken,’ 63–64.
10
On Schmidt’s sources, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 173–4.
11
‘Peinliche Verurteilung,’ fols. 58r–59r.
12
Paul Felgenhauer, Speculum Temporis Zeit Spiegel/ Darinnen neben Vermahnung aller Welt wird
vor Augen gestellet/ was für eine Zeit jetzt sey unter allerley Ständen/ besonders unter den meisten
Geistlich genanten und Gelerten (No Place: No Printer, 1620). No copies of the 1619 edition
appear to be extant. The best bibliographies of Felgenhauer’s work are in Čeněk Zíbrt, Bibliografie
české historie. vol. 5. (Prague: Nákladem České akademie cisaře, 1912), 801–16; Wolters, ‘Paul
Felgenhauers Leben und Wirken,’ 71–84; Gerhard Dünnhaupt, Personalbibliographien zu den
Drucken des Barock, 2nd ed., 2 vols. (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1990–93), vol. 2, 1457–77. Further
tracts by Felgenhauer are listed in Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, 175 and Jana Hubková, Fridrich
Falcký v zrcadle letákové publicistiky. Letaký jako pramen k vývoji vnímání České otázky v letech
1619–1632 (Prague: Prague: Univerzita Karlova v Praze, Filozofická fakulta, 2010), 356–58, 379–
84. See also Penman, ‘A Prophet Confronts his Failures,’ concerning Dutch, Swedish, and English
translations of Felgenhauer’s books.
13
Paul Felgenhauer, Rechte/ Warhafftige und gantz Richtige Chronologia, Oder Rechnung der Jare
der Welt/ Von der Welt und Adams Anfang an/ biß zu diesem jetzigen Jahr Christi/ M.DC.XX. (No
Place: No Printer, 1620).
vided proof to Felgenhauer that the Lutheran church had devolved into a church of
mere walls, which lacked true divine authority.14
Late in November 1620 Felgenhauer became a prophet of the Bohemian Revolt.
This discovery broadly coincided with the defeat of Friedrich V at White Mountain
on 8 November 1620. Exiled thereafter from his homeland, Felgenhauer began to
issue pamphlets predicting Friedrich’s restoration to the Bohemian throne, an event
that would simultaneously augur a Golden Age.15 His first work of this type, Decisio
prophetica belli Bohemici (The Prophetic Decision of the Bohemian War, 1620)
appeared under the pseudonym ‘Christianus Crucigerus.’16 A call for the restoration
of a pure evangelical faith in Bohemia according to the teachings of Jan Hus, the
Decisio articulated Felgenhauer’s troubles with contemporary Lutheranism. He
alone, inspired by the Holy Spirit, carried Luther’s legacy against the Mauerkirchen:
‘Oh Luther, you blessed and true man,’ he lamented, ‘if you could but see, hear, and
read the words of your disciples and how they lust after the Roman whore.’17
Felgenhauer’s desire for insight into the Last Days, product of the Lutheran faith in
which he was raised, had collided with political realities to create in him an enemy
of ‘worldly’ Lutheranism. Instead, he claimed his prophetic authority from spiritual
illumination.
Further tracts, like Flos Propheticus (1622) followed, in which Felgenhauer also
predicted a Protestant restitution in Bohemia.18 In addition to the works of Postel,
Poyssel and Erasmus Schmidt, which he cited in his books, Felgenhauer appears to
have been influenced by popular astrological expectations for the year 1623. He
accordingly revised his apocalyptic expectations of a Last Judgment, and instead
predicted a brilliant return to the New Jerusalem (Prague) by the deposed Friedrich
V for 1623.19 Felgenhauer also undertook a series of journeys, making connections
14
The subtitle of Christianus Crucigerus [Paul Felgenhauer], Decisio prophetica belli Bohemici.
Eine sehr nothwendig und nützliche Frage zu diesen letzten Zeiten, Darinnen dediciret wird, Mit
wem man es (das Böhmische Wesen betreffend) halten oder nicht halten solle ... . (No Place: No
Printer, 1620) played on that of Polycarp Leyser, Eine wichtige/ und in diesen gefährlichen Zeiten
sehr nützliche Frag: Ob/ wie/ und warumb man lieber mit den Papisten gemeinschafft haben/ und
gleichsam mehr vertrawen zu ihnen tragen solle/ denn mit/ und zu den Calvinisten (Leipzig:
Lamberg, 1620).
15
See Urbánek, Eschatologie, vědění a politika, 120–124.
16
[Felgenhauer], Decisio Prophetica belli Bohemici; See also Urbánek, Eschatologie, vědění a
politika, 120–24.
17
[Felgenhauer], Decisio Prophetica belli Bohemici, sig. G1r: ‘O Luthere, du seeliger vnd werther
Mann/ wenn du soltest deine Discipulos sehen/schreiben vnd rathen hören/ wie sie nach der
Römischen Huren geülen/ du dörfftest ihnen nicht unbillich einen guten derben vnd scharffen
product abstreichen.’
18
Urbánek, Eschatologie, vědění a politika, 124–127.
19
[Paul Felgenhauer], Complement Bon Avisorum. Das ist, Special Neue Avisen/ Welche der
Postilion des grossen Löwens vom geschlecht Juda hat gesehen in seinem Flore Prophetico. (No
Place: No Printer, 1622). On Felgenhauer’s prophecies for 1623 see the summary in Urbánek,
Eschatologie, vědění a politika, 124–127 and Alexander Hamilton, The Apocryphal Apocalypse:
The Reception of the Second Book of Esdras (4 Ezra) from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 182–183.
Paul Felgenhauer 41
with other Lutheran critics, including the lay prophet Hans Engelbrecht (1599–
1642) in Braunschweig, and the printer of seditious materials in Halle, Christoph
Bißmarck (d. 1624).20 He also visited the astrologer and mathematician Paul Nagel
in Torgau. According to Nagel, Felgenhauer was ‘slender and of a small stature, of
fine appearance with long curly white hair, and well spoken both in German as well
as Latin.’21 Felgenhauer would also establish contact with the Leipzig physician
Arnold Kerner (ca. 1590-in or after 1627) and the Silesian lay prophet Christoph
Kotter.22 At around the same time, he entered into a debate with the evangelical
court preacher in Lübz, Georg Rost (1582–1629), who contested the orthodoxy of
Felgenhauer’s expectations, and denounced him as a heretical chiliast.23
In 1623 and 1624, however, Felgenhauer’s prediction that the New Jerusalem
would descend to the hills of Prague was disappointed.24 He refused to give up his
hopes. Inspired by prophecies of Sigmund Gartamar (fl. 1524) and the Horologium
Hussianum (1621 and later editions) Felgenhauer recast his expectations and
announced that a ‘golden peace’ would dawn in Bohemia during a ‘year of
Jubilation’ (JübelJahr) sometime in 1625 or 1626. But he would soon turn his back
on these expectations, too.25 Late in 1625, following exhortations by Hans
Engelbrecht and a growing recognition of his own ‘criminal arrogance,’ Felgenhauer
20
Wolters, ‘Paul Felgenhauers Leben und Wirken,’ 73. On Engelbrecht see Beyer, Lay Prophets in
Lutheran Europe, 105–108, 281–284. The best work on Engelbrecht remains August Friedrich
Wilhelm Beste, ‘Hans Engelbrecht. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Mystik des 17. Jahrhunderts,’
Zeitschrift für die historische Theologie, Neue Folge 14 (1844): 122–155.
21
Nagel to Kerner (22 November 1622), Leipzig, Universitätsbibliothek, Ms 0 356, 66v: ‘Ist einer
kleinen statur und mager, eines feinen ansehens mit einen lang weißen Krausen Haar, wohl beredt
so wohl in Latein und Teützsch.’
22
Leipzig UB, Ms. 0356, 98r; Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘Prophecy, Alchemy and Strategies of Dissident
Communication. A 1630 Letter from the Bohemian chiliast Paul Felgenhauer to the Leipzig
Physician Arnold Kerner,’ Acta Comeniana 23/24 (2011): 115–132.
23
Georg Rost, Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten, oder gründlicher und apologetischer Bericht von
den newen himlischen Propheten, Rosenkreutzern, Chiliasten und Enthusiasten, welche ein new
irrdisch Paradiß und Rosengarten auff dieser Welt ertrewmen, ... benamentlich M. Valentinus
Weigelius ... M. Paulus Nagelius ... Paulus Felgenhawer, (Rostock: Hallervord, 1622); Georg Rost,
Apologie des Heldenbriefes wider die Lästerschrift des Theosophisten P. Felgenhauer... (Rostock:
Hallervord, 1623); Paul Felgenhauer, Apologeticus contra invectivas aeruginosas Rostii: Darinnen
Georgius Rostius Mechelburgischer Hoffprediger zu Lüptz neben andern auch wieder meinen Zeit
Spiegel vermeint ein gewaltiger Held zu werden. (No Place: No Printer, 1622); Paul Felgenhauer,
Disexamen vel examen examinis seu responsio modesta ad Examen vexamen Rostianum contra
Apologiam suam. ([Amsterdam?]: No Printer, 1623); Urbánek, Eschatologie, vědění a politika,
108–109.
24
[Felgenhauer], Decisio Prophetica belli Bohemici, sig. F2r.
25
Penman, ‘A Prophet Confronts his Failures,’ 176–179; [Paul Felgenhauer], Alerm Posaun.
Welche der Postilion des großen Löwens vom Geschlecht Juda in einem Gesicht im Traum hat
hören blasen. (No Place: No Printer, 1624); [Paul Felgenhauer], Calendarium Novum-Propheticum
Iubilaeum Super Annum iam dum Novum verè Novum incipientem M.DC.XXV. (No Place: No
Printer, 1625); [Paul Felgenhauer], Leo Septentrionalis ... der Löwe von Mitternacht. (No Place:
No Printer, 1625); [Paul Felgenhauer], Tuba Visitationis ... Posaune der Heymsuchung. (No Place:
No Printer, 1625).
decided to abandon his prophecies of a worldly godly kingdom altogether.26 After

acknowledging his errors in his Speculum Poenitentiae (1625), Felgenhauer became
a convinced pacifist and embarked on a new course of spiritual teachings, influ-
enced by Arndt, which centered on the idea of a future paradise, albeit one of a more
spiritual kind, that eschewed entirely political ramifications.27
Felgenhauer’s mature apocalypticism remained optimistic, but was folded into
contemplative notions of practical Christianity; a circumstance that suggests again
the consonance of the appeal of devotional and apocalyptic ideas during this peri-
od.28 Developing a deep-reaching theosophical worldview, Felgenhauer would go
on after 1625 to win adherents in the United Provinces and throughout northern
Germany both by means of epistolary contact as well as through the establishment
of a religious conventicle in Bremen.29 According to Felgenhauer, all physical
churches were Babel. It was only in and through the workings of the Holy Spirit,
that a true complete reformation, such as the one that Luther had initiated, could be
completed. After a long career, and authoring dozens of books, Felgenhauer died in
Bremen late in 1661.30
Philipp Ziegler
A somewhat different case is that offered by a man who at one point announced
himself the ‘Rosicrucian King of Jerusalem,’ Philipp Ziegler.31 Ziegler was born in
Würzburg in the early 1580s. He studied law at the University of Freiburg from
26
Penman, ‘A Prophet Confronts his failures,’ 169–200.
27
The first product of this viewpoint appears to have been [Paul Felgenhauer], Prodromus Evangelii
Aeterni seu Chilias Sancta: In welchem/ auß Heyliger Göttlicher Schrifft ... erwiesen werden/ Die
Heyligen Tausendt Jahr/ Deß Sabbaths unnd Ruhe deß Volckes Gottes/ im Reich Christi/ neben
einer Allgemeinen Bekehrung/ aller Jüden/ und der Zehen verlohrnen Stemme Israël (No Place:
No Printer, 1625), although this text may well have been authored several years earlier.
28
See further Patrick J. O’Banion, ‘The Pastoral Use of the Book of Revelaton in Late Tudor
England,’ Journal of Ecclesiastical History 57 (2006): 693–710.
29
Urbánek, Eschatologie, vědění a politika, 108–109.
30
For the date of death, which has previously been the subject of some speculation, see Ole Borch,
Olai Borrichii itinerarium. The Journal of the Danish Polyhistor Ole Borch. H.D. Schleppern, ed.
4 vols. (Copenhagen & Leiden: Brill, 1983), vol. 1, 227 and Penman, ‘A Prophet Confronts his
Failures,’ 198.
31
On Ziegler see Gilly, ‘Iter Rosicrucianum,’ 82–83; Ron Heisler, ‘Philip Ziegler: The Rosicrucian
King of Jerusalem,’ The Hermetic Journal (1980). unpag.; Kenneth Gibson, ‘Apocalyptic and
Millenarian Prophecy in Early Stuart Europe: Philip Ziegler, Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil and the
Fifth Monarchy,’ in Prophecy: the Power of Inspired Language in History 1300–2000. Tim
Thornton, ed. (London: Sutton 1997), 71–84; Kenneth Gibson, ‘Eschatology, Apocalypse and
Millenarianism in Seventeenth Century Protestant Thought.’ Unpublished PhD dissertation.
Nottingham Trent University, 1999, 222–243; Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘Between Utopia and New
Jerusalem: Eschatological Projectors and Lutheran Confessional Culture in the Seventeenth
Century,’ Early Science and Medicine 21 (2016): 470–491.
Philipp Ziegler 43
1597,32 and between 1606 and 1609 was employed as a private tutor to the children
of the Augsburg patrician Johann Carl Relinger.33 In 1611, however, Ziegler was
torn from the ‘half paradise’ of the Relinger household and compelled by a ‘divine
experience’ to travel to Switzerland.34 Upon arrival in Zürich he announced his first
prophetic utterance and, in unclear circumstances, thereby earned 3 years in pris-
on.35 Upon emerging from his ordeal in 1614 he learnt of the Fama Fraternitatis and
promptly proclaimed himself ‘Origen the great of Germany, King of Jerusalem,
brother of the Rosy Cross and sceptre of the kings of Sion.’36 Ziegler used his role
as this ‘sceptre’ of the heavenly kingdom to enforce an explicitly apocalyptic man-
date. He embarked on a restless period of itinerancy and active political preaching.
Ziegler believed that the completion of Luther’s Reformation was nigh, and sought
to hasten it by convening a conference of all the leaders of European Christendom
to take place in Constance.37 Should this not occur, Ziegler planned to encourage the
murder of 300,000 members of the European nobility, the class who provided the
greatest impediment to the work of further Reformation.38
On his journeys Ziegler encountered other Lutherans inclined to optimistic apoc-
alyptic expectations. One friend was the Frankfurt engraver Matthäus Merian
(1593–1650) who in the 1630s and 1640s would be a member of Johann Permeier’s
(1597–ca.1644) epistolary group, Societas Regalis Christi.39 Perhaps due to this
connection with Merian, in 1616 Ziegler was tasked with preparing an account of
the discovery of America; his interest in new worlds, it appears, was not simply
apocalyptic.40 In December 1617 Ziegler was in Straßburg where he met with the
Franconian alchemist Benedict Figulus (1567–1619?), a devotee of Paracelsian
Christianity, who possessed connections to the city’s Schwenkfelders.41 In 1618,
32
Hermann Mayer, ed., Die Matrikel der Universität Freiburg, 2 vols. (Freiburg: Herder, 1907–
1910), vol. 1, 683.
33
Philipp Ziegler, Harmonia und Harpffe Davids ... Einhellige zusammenstimmung von dem
Wandel, Lehr und Leben ... Jesu Christi. (Frankfurt: Hofer, 1620), sig.):():(2r.
34
Ziegler, Harmonia und Harpffe Davids, sig.):():(2r-v.
35
Gilly, ‘Iter Rosicrucianum,’ 82–83.
36
Gilly, ‘Iter Rosicrucianum,’ 82–83; Heisler, ‘Philipp Ziegler.’
37
A summary of papers found in Ziegler’s possession during his arrest in London in 1626 is pre-
served in Kew, National Archives, State Papers Domestic 16/540/4, 148r.
38
Kew, National Archives, State Papers Domestic 16/540/4, 148r.
39
On Merian see Heinrich Wüthrich, Matthaeus Merian d.Ä. Biographie (Frankfurt: Museum für
Kunsthandwerk, 1993), 5–19. Concerning Merian’s religious sympathies see Theodor Wotschke,
‘Matthäus Merian,’ Neue kirchliche Zeitschrift, 42 (1931): 57–64, 185–192; Noémi Viskolcz,
Reformációs Könyvek. Tervek az evangélikus egyház megújítására (Budapest: Országos Széchényi
Könyvtar and Universitas Kiado, 2006), 189–212; Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘A Heterodox Publishing
Enterprise of the Thirty Years’ War. The Amsterdam Office of Hans Fabel,’ The Library 15/1
(2014): 3–44 at 29–30.
40
Philipp Ziegler, America: Das ist/ Erfindung und Offenbahrung der Newen Welt (Frankfurt:
Hoffman and de Bry, 1617).
41
Gilly, ‘Iter Rosicrucianum,’ 82; Joachim Telle, ‘Benedictus Figulus. Zu Leben und Werk eines
deutschen Paracelsisten,’ Medizinhistorisches Journal 22 (1987): 303–329.
Ziegler and the pedagogical reformer Wolfgang Ratke were expelled from Basel,
having been accused of spreading seditious religious ideas when Ziegler claimed to
be the ‘king of the Rosicrucians.’42 In 1619 Ziegler confronted Emperor Matthias I
(1557–20 March 1619) in Frankfurt and predicted the imminent destruction of the
Holy Roman Empire.43 The Frankfurt incident proved the spark for a burst of pro-
phetic activity. In the same year he was forced to leave Nuremberg after prophesy-
ing the death of Matthias I; according to Ziegler, the emperor was indeed struck
dead on the date he named.44
It appears that Ziegler was taken by the prophetic spirit in fits and starts. Moments
of heated prophetic inspiration were interspersed with cooler, lucid—even schol-
arly—periods, during which Ziegler appears to have dedicated his time to address-
ing the problems faced by true Christians in the Last Days. A product of one such
lucid interval was the Harmonia und Harpffe Davids (1620), a folio-volume collat-
ing scriptural commentaries by different contemporary and historical authorities.
According to Ziegler, although many biblical texts might appear to contradict one
another, a careful comparison almost always revealed an underlying unity. In addi-
tion to comparing passages from the Old Testament prophets with the gospels and
apostolic writings, Ziegler also included commentaries from authorities like Luther,
Melanchthon, Johannes Werner (1468–1522) and even the Calvinist irenicist David
Pareus (1548–1622). The world required a new perspective on scripture, Ziegler
argued, because theologians approached the Bible with an emphasis on the letter of
scripture rather than its spirit. They sought to produce interpretations that served a
particular confession, instead of serving an eternal and singular truth.45
Insight into Ziegler’s apocalyptic views is provided in a tract titled Anti-Arnoldus
et Anti-Nagelius, which Ziegler wrote in Hamburg in 1622. In this text Ziegler
refuted the views on the apocalypse advocated by fellow ‘new prophet’ Paul Nagel
and one of Nagel’s opponents, the Königsberg cleric Philipp Arnoldi. According to
Ziegler, Nagel’s views were unacceptable because he adduced extra-biblical proofs
to support his prophesies. Meanwhile, Arnoldi, whom Ziegler held to be a
‘Narristotler’—a pun on ‘foolish Aristotelian’—was all too prepared to misuse
scripture in order to castigate his opponent. In presenting his own argument, Ziegler
reprinted many of the scriptural commentaries initially presented in his Harmonia
und Harpffe Davids.46 The Kingdom of God, Ziegler declared, would begin with a
great outpouring of grace; exactly when this outpouring would occur, was however
known to God alone. Later that same year, Ziegler petitioned Jacob Fabricius Jr.
42
Carlos Gilly, ‘Campanella and the Rosicrucians,’ in Gilly and Niewöhner, eds., Rosenkreuz als
europäisches Phänomen, 190–211 at 207.
43
Philipp Ziegler, AntiArnoldus et AntiNagelius, Das ist: Grundlicher Beweiß, das weder die
Zehen Grunde M. Philippi Arnoldi … die Dritte und güldene Zeit des Heiligen Geistes umbstossen/
Noch die eilff Gegengründe M. Pauli Nagelli. (No Place: No Printer, 1622), 3–4.
44
Ziegler, Anti-Arnoldus et Anti-Nagelius, 4.
45
Ziegler, Harmonia und Harpffe Davids, sig.):():(2r
46
Ziegler, Anti-Arnoldus et Anti-Nagelius, 93–94.
Philipp Ziegler 45
(1589–1645) in Schleswig concerning the finer points of his faith.47 In one of the
manuscripts he gave to Fabricius, Ziegler predicted that before the Last Judgment
the Kingdom of Israel would be reestablished. He also identified himself as the
prophet Elias who would give law and shape to this kingdom. Furthermore, this
period would also witness the defeat of Antichrist. The conversion of the Jews
would presage a general reformation and the coming of a Golden Age.48 Ziegler’s
debts to Paracelsian expectations as well as the syncretic works of prior Lutherans
are obvious. He attempted to establish his authority to pronounce on such matters
by identifying himself with the prophet of the restitution of all things, who would
destroy the wicked before the Last Judgment (Acts 3:21–3).
Ziegler’s later career took him overseas. In 1622, he sojourned in Scandinavia,
and then in the United Provinces.49 He made contacts with the collegiant Adam
Boreel (1604–1667) in Amsterdam.50 In 1626 or shortly before, Ziegler arrived in
London, where he appealed to King Charles I (1600–1649) to establish a ‘third
ecumenical council’ together with other Protestant rulers of Europe, in a union
‘neither Lutheran nor Calvinist.’51 This was an idea drawn directly from the writ-
ings of Jacopo Brocardo. Ziegler never received his audience. He was arrested,
and his papers confiscated.52 Despite the hardships of what must have been a near
penniless existence, Ziegler remained true throughout his life to his goal of
preaching and introducing the teachings of the School of the Holy Spirit to the
world. A letter written from Gießen University on 16 October 1622, describing
what might have been one of his final outrages before he finally departed the Holy
Roman Empire, reports that Ziegler had argued that in the future Golden Age,
47
These are mentioned in J.M. Krafft, Ein zweyfaches Zwey-Hundert-Jähriges Jubel-Gedächtnis
(Hamburg: Fickweiler, 1723), 415–16. The titles included: ‘Gottes dreyfacher Gnaden-Bund’ (also
printed in Anti-Arnoldus et Anti-Nagelius, 52–97); ‘Ωrigenische Argument, darin der Inhalt und
Begriff des künfftigen Regiments bis auf das jüngste Gericht verfasset, gestellet von M. Philippo
Zieglero, E.C. von Würtzburg, Anno 1622’ (a Latin translation appears to be preserved in Oxford,
Bodleian Library, Ms. Ashmole 1149, VI. fols. 1–34); and finally, an autobiographical text,
‘Apocalypsis, oder Offenbahrung M. Philippi Ziegleri, Exulis Christi von Würtzburg, vom jetzigen
und künftigen Regiment und Zeiten an bis an den jüngsten Tag, etc. Ps. 107:42 Dan: 12:10.
Schleswig 1622 in Decemb,’ a manuscript copy of which is preserved in Hamburg, Staats- und
Universitätsbibliothek, Cod. alchim. 684, fols. 158r–179r .
48
Krafft, Ein zweyfaches Zwey-Hundert-Jähriges Jubel-Gedächtnis, 415.
49
Åkerman, Rose Cross Over the Baltic, 132.
50
Oxford, Bodleian Library, Ms. Ashmole 1149 V, fols. 1–91. ‘Responsio et Cynosura sive vera
Prophetarum proba Philippi Ziegleri exulis Christi’. Cf. Govert Snoek, De Rozenkruisers in
Nederland in de 17. eeuw (Haarlem: Rozekruis Pers, 2006), 396–99; Gilly, ‘Iter Rosicrucianum,’
88.
51
Gibson, ‘Apocalyptic and Millenarian Prophecy in Early Stuart Europe’, 76; Ziegler, Anti-
Arnoldus et Anti-Nagelius, 50.
52
Letter of Joseph Mede to Martin Stuteville, 2 December 1626 printed in Thomas Birch, The
Court and Times of Charles I. 2 vols. (London: Henry Colbourn, 1848), vol. 1, 178; Penman,
‘Between Utopia and New Jerusalem,’ 472–474.
‘students and teachers will no longer be required.’53 It was rather the Holy Spirit
that would reveal the inherent truth of a Christian faith that took no notice of con-
fessional boundaries.
Johann Kärcher
One of the most prolific of the apocalyptic propagandists of the 1620s was Johann
Kärcher (fl. 1616–1630), a Lutheran hailing from Bern who issued tracts under
pseudonyms Johann Plaustrarius von Kaiserslautern and Johann Spinesius
Anglicus.54 Although his prophetic tracts circulated widely Kärcher was not held in
high regard by contemporaries. To the Hanau physician Isaac Habrecht (1589–
1633), Kärcher was a ‘mere thief and cheat’ (loser dieb und leutbescheisser),55
while to Paul Nagel, Philipp Ziegler and Esajas Stiefel, Kärcher’s prophecies repre-
sented, at the very least, a severe misunderstanding of the signs of the times.56 This
was an opinion shared by clerics and some civil authorities, who at one point were
compelled to expel the prophet from Zürich.57
Kärcher was foremost a political prophet whose expectations were influenced by
Paracelsian ideas of restitution as expressed in the Rosicrucian writings.58 Drawing
53
Gibson, ‘Apocalyptic and Millenarian Prophecy in Early Stuart Europe,’ 74.
54
For the identification of Plaustrarius with Kärcher, see Carlos Gilly, ‘Der “Löwe von Mitternacht,”
der “Adler” und der “Endchrist”: Die politische, religiöse und chiliastische Publizistik in den
Flugschriften, illustrierten Flugblättern und Volksliedern des Dreißigjährigen Krieges,’ in Gilly
and Niewöhner, eds. Das Rosenkreuz als europäisches Phänomen, 234–268 at 254. Previously
Plaustrarius had been identified with a certain Johann Wagner; see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis,
226–227. Narbuntowicz, Reformorthodoxe, spiritualistische, chiliastische und utopische Entwürfe,
dedicates an extensive discussion to Kärcher’s works.
55
Gilly, ‘Der ‘Löwe von Mitternacht’, der ‘Adler’ und der ‘Endchrist,’ 258 citing a letter of Johann
Gnan to Isaac Habrecht from 27 September 1625.
56
Leipzig, UB Ms 0 356, 31v, 34v etc.; Ulman Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, oder,
Vom Umgang mit Dissidenten (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2007), 14, 455, 561.
57
Matthias Ehinger [Abraham Scultetus], ‘Urtheil Matthiae Ehingers/ von den Grundfesten oder
Beweißthemben/ welche in ihren Weissagungen gebrauchen die Neuwe Propheten in Teutschlandt,’
in Johannes Germanus, Der siebenden Apocalyptischen Posaunen, von Offenbarung verborgener
Geheimnussen Heroldt … sampt Etlich tracts über die Newen Propheten. (Newenstadt: Johann
Knuber 1626), 104–112, 112; Georg Rost, Dreyfacher theologischer Spiegel: I. newer Ketzer
Spiegel, darinnen unterschiedene Quaestiones proponirt werden, von der newen und zuvor uner-
hörten Secte der Septenisten, derer Anfänger ist Christianus Theophilus ... ob auch noch eine
bessere Zeit vor dem Jüngsten Tage zu hoffen, und was man von der Plaustarij Prognostico soll
halten? (Rostock: Hallervord, 1623). On Kärcher in Zürich see Kurtze, grundtliche Offenbarung,
der vermessne, auffblassne und frefne, so in einem Tractat begriffen und unter dem Nammen
Johannis Plaustrarij von Keyserslautern nüwlich aussgangen. ([Zurich]: No Printer, 1621); Urs
B. Leu, ‘Chiliasten und mystische Spiritualisten des 17. Jahrhunderts in Zürich,’ in Gegen den
Strom: Der radikale Pietismus im schweizerischen und internationalen Beziehungsfeld. J. Jürgen
Seidel, ed. Ergänzte Nachauflage. (Zürich: dreamis Verlag, 2011), 38–77 at 54–55.
58
Cf. Andreae, Gesammelte Schriften, vol. 3192–193.
Johann Kärcher 47
on the works of Poyssel and others, Kärcher saw the years between 1618 and 1625
as crucial for true Protestant belief. He predicted the fall of the Habsburgs in 1624,
following which a golden age would dawn under the leadership of a ‘new
Barbarossa,’ an apparent update of the medieval hopes for an Endkaiser. Writing
from Breslau in 1620, Kärcher believed that this figure was the Calvinist Friedrich
V, who would adopt Lutheranism as the true religion of the coming kingdom.59
Kärcher held that no other possibility was tenable, for Luther’s faith represented the
true catholic religion.60
Kärcher’s apocalyptic insights relied extensively on sources external to scripture.
He occasionally had visions, and was deeply affected by the Rosicrucian manifes-
tos.61 His Prognosticon oder Weissagung auff diese jetztige Zeit (1620) paraphrased
the Fama and Confessio Fraternitatis at several points, mentioning, for example,
that the lion of 2 Esdras would begin to roar after the ‘donkey’s braying
(Eselgeschrey)’ had been silenced, just as the Confessio stated.62 His prophetic mis-
sion was also encouraged by the comet of 1618 and authorities like Joseph
Grünpeck.63 Kärcher also seems to have known Nagel’s works.64 His major pro-
phetic inspirations were, however, biblical. In addition to Revelation 20, Kärcher
cited Daniel 12 and 2 Esdras 13 to demonstrate the imminence of the golden age.
Although he gained notoriety specifically because of the political nature of his con-
troversial tracts, his apocalypticism was also conditioned by contemplative ideas of
self-reflection and Gelassenheit. He cited the Theologia Deutsch in support of his
arguments for the flourishing of free will––that is, the correct practice of
59
Johann Plaustrarius [Johann Kärcher], Wunder- und Figürlich Offenbahrung ... Von dem endli-
chen Untergang und Zerstörung der grossen Statt Babylon/ das ist Rom. V. Von dem newen König
Friderico Pfaltzgrafen/ [et]c. oder brüllendem Löwen auß dem Waldt/ im 4. Buch Esdrae am 11.
und 12. Capitel (No Place: No Printer, 1620), 47–50.
60
[Kärcher], Wunder- und Figürlich Offenbahrung, 44.
61
Johann Plaustrarius [Johann Kärcher], Prognosticon, Oder Weissagung auff diese jetzige Zeit:
darinn vermeldet/ wie Gott der Allmechtige die gantze Welt/ ihrer Sünde wegen daheim suchen
wolle mit allerley Plagen und Straffen ... Und was alßdann auff diese Verstörung vor ein Herrschafft
unnd Königreich erfolgen: Was man ins künfftig/ von Anno 1620. 1621. 1622. 1623. 1624. biß zu
ende des 1625. Jahrs/ zugewarten habe (No Place: No Printer, 1620), 4, 14, 19; [Kärcher], Wunder-
und Figürlich Offenbahrung, 25, etc.
62
[Kärcher], Prognosticon, Oder Weissagung auff diese jetzige Zeit, 4. Cf. Andreae, Gesammelte
Werke, vol. 3, 208–209; ‘Seinem Eselgeschrey [sc. the Pope’s] durch eine newe Stimme, eine Ende
gemacht werden ...’. For other paraphrases from the Rosicrucian manifestos, see [Kärcher],
Prognosticon, 3, ‘Also hat ihm der allein Weise und Allmechtige GOtt noch einmal der Welt Lauff
zusammen geführt ...’. Cf. Andreae, Gesammelte Werke, vol. 3, 192–3: ‘Der Herr Jehovah ist es,
welcher (nachdem die Welt nunmehr fast den Feyerabend erreicht und nach vollendetem Periodo
oder Umblauff wieder zum Anfang eilet) den Lauff der Natur umbwendet ...’.
63
[Kärcher], Prognosticon, Oder Weissagung auff diese jetzige Zeit, 4; [Kärcher], Wunder- und
Figürlich Offenbahrung, 54.
64
Compare [Kärcher], Wunder- und Figürlich Offenbahrung, 4, where the prophet discusses the
three ages of Daniel 12, with Paul Nagel, Prognosticon astrologicum aus rechtem warhafftigen
astronomischen Grunde gestellet vnd gerichtet auff das Jahr nach Christi Jesu vnsers lieben Herrn
vnd Erlösers seligen Geburt. M.DC.XX. (Leipzig: Nerlich [1619]), 18–19 and 26.
Gelassenheit––and the coming rebirth from an Adamic state that would soon to be

enjoyed by humanity.65
Kärcher’s future kingdom was to be worldly in nature, and would dawn in or
after 1624.66 This golden age for the Lutheran church would endure for as long as
185 years, rubbing against the traditional Lutheran commitment to an imminent
Day of Judgment. Unlike Felgenhauer, Kärcher was no pacifist: blood would have
to be spilled in order for the true faith to triumph over its enemies (Amos 9:10).67
Not only did Kärcher author pamphlets and short books to spread his message, he
also dabbled in the production of illustrated broadsheets. Precisely where and when
he died is presently unknown, but like several other prophets of this period, he was
never heard from again following the disappointment of his predictions.
Jacob Böhme
The Lusatian Theosopher Jacob Böhme is well known, although his optimistic
expectations have rarely been discussed.68 Born in Alt-Seidenberg in Upper Lusatia
in 1575, Böhme was by trade a cobbler, until after 1600 he experienced a series of
revelations which led him to believe he had been granted insight into nature by God.
By this time he was based in Görlitz, the largest city of Upper Lusatia, and a centre
since the last decades of the sixteenth century for radical Paracelsian thought.69 In
more than 30 manuscript tracts which followed his initial revelations—including his
‘Morgen Röte im Aufgang’ (1612) and ‘Mysterium Magnum’ (1623), among oth-
ers—Böhme outlined an implicitly anticlerical vision of spiritual Christianity which
65
66
67
68
Exceptions are Wilhelm Schmidt-Biggemann, ‘The Apocalypse and Millenarianism in the Thirty
Years’ War,’ in 1648. War and Peace in Europe. Karin Bussmann and Heinz Schilling, eds. 3 vols.
(Münster: Westfälisches Landesmuseum, 1998), vol. 1, 259–263; Douglas H. Shantz, ‘Radical
Pietist Eschatology as a Complex Phenomenon. Differing Chiliastic Views in Jakob Böhme,
J.W. Petersen, and Conrad Bröske,’ in Breul and Schnurr, eds., Geschichtsbewusstsein und
Zukunftserwartung, 103–114 at 104–106.
69
The Paracelsian background in Görlitz has been documented by Ernst Koch, ‘Moskowiter in der
Oberlausitz und M. Bartholomäus Scultetus in Görlitz,’ Neues Lausitzisches Magazin (1907):
1–90; 84 (1908): 41–109; 85 (1909): 255–290; 86 (1910): 1–80; Ernst-Heinz Lemper, ‘Görlitz und
der Paracelsismus’, Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 18 (1970): 347–360; Kurt Goldammer,
‘Aus der Werkstatt der Paracelsisten des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts,’ Theophrast von Hohenheim
genannt Paracelsus, Theologische und religionsphilosophische Schriften, Supplement, Kurt
Goldammer, ed. (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1973), xxix–lxiv; Wilhelm Kühlmann, Joachim
Telle, Corpus Paracelsisticum: Der Frühparacelsismus, 3 vols. (Tübingen and Berlin: Max
Niemeyer Verlag and De Gruyter, 2001–2013); Leigh T.I. Penman, “Böhme’s Intellectual Networks
and the Heterodox Milieu of His Theosophy, 1600–1624,’ in An Introduction to Jacob Boehme:
Four Centuries of Thought and Reception. Ariel Hessayon and Sarah Apetrei, eds. (New York:
Routledge, 2014), 57–76.
Jacob Böhme 49
focused on cosmogony and the problem of evil. At the time of his death in November
1624 only one small selection of his devotional writings on practical Christianity,
largely uncharacteristic of the rest of his output, had appeared in print.70
While studies of Böhme’s works from philosophical, literary and theological
viewpoints have tended to emphasize his innovative contributions to thought in
these fields, a study of Böhme’s networks demonstrates that he was intensely con-
nected to a variety of Lutherans that held optimistic apocalyptic expectations. In
1620 Böhme corresponded with the Liegnitz toll collector Paul Kaym (1571/2–
1635) and the Torgau-based Paul Nagel, both of whom anticipated a future golden
age.71 Another friend, the Langenau visionary Christoph Kotter, also predicted the
restoration of Friedrich V to the Bohemian throne as part of a scenario of future
felicity.72 During the 1610s, one of Böhme’s foremost patrons, Kaspar von Fürstenau
(1572–1649)—also a patron of Nagel—was a dedicated student of spiritualist litera-
ture, an interest which might have led him to support Böhme.73 These figures, as
well as others were in a position to discuss their ideas with Böhme but also to influ-
ence Böhme’s expression of them.74
Jacob Böhme’s mildly negative reaction to the speculations of Paul Kaym has
generally been accepted as evidence that Böhme himself did not hold optimistic
apocalyptic expectations.75 It is true that Böhme’s approach to the mysteries of the
End—his doubtful attitude toward the authority of 2 Esdras, his insistence that God
alone was privy to the time of the Last Judgment, and his rejection of Revelation 20
as a basis for imagining a felicitous future—were hallmarks of orthodox Lutheran
eschatological thought. Yet although he rejected a literal Millennium, in his first let-
70
On Böhme’s biography see Will-Erich Peuckert, Das Leben Jakob Boehmes (Jena: Diederichs,
1924); Ernst-Heinz Lemper, Jakob Böhme. Leben und Werk (Berlin: Union Verlag, 1976); Andrew
Weeks, Böhme: An Intellectual Biography of the Seventeenth Century Philosopher and Mystic
(Albany: SUNY, 1991).
71
Jacob Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften. Faksimile-Neudruck der Ausgabe von 1730 in elf Bänden. 11
vols. Will-Erich Peuckert, ed. (Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog, 1955–1961), vol. 5 and vol. 9,
23.7, 34.20, 71.6.
72
On Kotter see Jana Hubková, ‘Comenius, Görlitz, und der Prophet aus Sprottau,’ Görlitzer
Magazin 22 (2009): 45–53; Blekastad, Comenius, 88, 121–132, 140–149, 578–580, 619–627;
Beyer, Lay Prophets in Lutheran Europe, 155–158. Kober’s letter to Adam and Johann Sigismund
von Schweinichen dated 21 November 1624 documents Kotter’s presence at Böhme’s deathbed.
See Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 10, 41.
73
Christoph Richter, Firmum ac indissolubile amoris vinculum … Bey Bestattung Des weyland
Woledlen/ Gestrengen/ Vesten/ Hoch- und Wolbenamten H. Caspars von Fürstenaw … Welcher
Anno 1649, den 4 Februarii … sanfft in HERRN entschlaffen (Görlitz: Martin Hermann, [1649]),
sig. h3v: ‘Den er [sc. von Fürstenau] zur selbigen Zeit sich belieben lassen/ etwas in
Weigelianische[n] und andern dergleichen tieffsinigen Schrifften/ so auff den interiorum hominem
gehn/ wie auch der Fratrum Rosæ Crucis, zu lessen/ und etliche secretiora Studia zu tractiren.’
74
See further Penman, ‘Jacob Boehme’s Intellectual Networks,’; Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘Jacob Böhme
and his Networks,’ in Jacob Böhme and his World. Bo Andersson, Lucinda Martin, Leigh
T.I. Penman and Andrew Weeks, eds. (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 98–120.
75
See for example Heinrich Corrodi, Kritische Geschichte des Chiliasmus. Oder der Meynungen
über das Tausendjähriges Reich Christi, 4 vols. (Zürich: No Printer, 1794), vol. 3, 392.
ter to Kaym (14 August 1620) Böhme argued that there would be a reprieve for true
Christians before the Last Judgment, a time in which an interior, spiritual ‘Zion
shall indeed be discovered, and heaven will give its dew, and the earth its fat, but not
to the extent that evil shall cease altogether.’76 Böhme here appears to be describing
a heavenly and earthly reprieve, similar to the ‘mini-millenniums’ of medieval
prophecy.
In 1621 Böhme experienced an ecstatic vision during which he learned that a new
Reformation, as a prelude to what he called an aureum seculum (golden age), would
soon dawn. This vision followed the arrival of war in Lusatia, and appears to date
from a period of intense illness. At the same time, the intensification of his optimistic
eschatology appears to have been an organic extension of his own intellectual com-
mitment to practical Christianity. This turn is documented by his statements in
Mysterium Magnum, written during 1622 and 1623, in which Böhme wrote of the
coming age of ‘Napthali’ or ‘the time of great wonders’ in which the individual com-
munes directly with God.77 In mid-1624 when Böhme was persecuted by the Görlitz
pastor primarius Gregor Richter (1560–1624), he announced that this ‘Reformation’
was now in progress, and that Babel was burning.78 Here, practical and personal
circumstances played a crucial role in actualizing previously nascent hopes.
Although Böhme never directly articulated his expectations of what the antici-
pated golden age would bring with it—aside from the destruction of Babel and the
defeat of his enemies—he nevertheless linked his vision to the works of other opti-
mistic apocalypticists. In May 1624, for example, he informed the Görlitz physician
Tobias Kober (1587–1625) that similar books to his, concerning the ‘last days and
the new birth,’ were available at the Leipzig Book Fair.79 In a subsequent letter, he
declared that these books were also available in Dresden bookshops.80 In an over-
looked passage in yet another letter to Kober written shortly after Pentecost 1624,
Böhme hints at which books these were. There, he declared that ‘identical theologi-
cal grounds’ of the ‘great Reformation soon to come’ were taught ‘entirely cor-
rectly’ not only by himself, but also ‘by many others in Meißen, Saxony, Thuringia
and the Hanseatic towns.’81 This is an explicit reference to the output, both printed
and manuscript, of the likes of Paul Nagel in Saxony, Johann Rehefeldt (1590–
1648) and the former followers of Esajas Stiefel in Thuringia, and Joachim Morsius
(1593–1642), Leonhard Elver (d. 1649) and Balthasar Walther (d. ca. 1631) in the
Hanseatic cities of Hamburg, Lübeck and Lüneburg, which informed the progres-
sion of his apocalypticism.
76
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9, 8:24–25.
77
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 4, 33. See further the discussion in Eberhard H. Pältz, ‘Zu
Böhmes Sicht der Welt- und Kirchengeschichte,’ Pietismus und Neuzeit 6 (1980): 133–163 at
144–145.
78
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9, 58.13, 13.2.
79
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9, 61.8 (Letter to Kober, 15 May 1624).
80
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9, 62.8. (Letter to Kober, “Sonntage nach Christi Himmelfahrt”
1624).
81
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9, 63:9.
Paul Kaym 51
Paul Kaym
As mentioned above, one of Böhme’s correspondents who also cleaved to optimistic

eschatology was the Liegnitz toll collector Paul Kaym. Kaym was born, probably in
Liegnitz, around 1571. By 1599, he occupied the position of imperial toll collector
in the city, a major trading centre of some 8000 residents located in Lower Silesia.
That same year, his son Paul Jr. was baptised at the church of Sts. Peter and Paul.82
The godfathers (Paten) of his son were Liegnitz’s Bürgermeister, Burghard Matthäus
(d. April 1600) and the rector of the city Gymnasium, Nicolaus Ludwig (1550–
1617), a circumstance that suggests Kaym kept company with some of the town’s
elite. In addition to being employed as an imperial toll collector, Kaym was also
utilized by the city and principality of Liegnitz to survey land and assess tax and
customs excises under a variety of imperial and ducal legislations.83
Kaym’s apocalyptic convictions appear to have been prompted by two interde-
pendent circumstances. Firstly, there appears to have been a welter of controversial
eschatological works available in Liegnitz in both print and manuscript, which
Kaym studied avidly. His access to this material was eased by his connections to
prominent families in the city’s book trade.84 As we have seen, such interests were
not unusual for Lutherans of this period. And like others, Kaym’s search for insight
concerning the Last Judgment led him into contact with authors like Paul Lautensack,
Pseudo-Weigel, Julius Sperber, Johannes Tauler and the pastor of Hohen- und
Thalebra in rural Thuringia, Nicolaus Hartprecht, whose expectations we shall dis-
cuss futher in chapter five. Yet Kaym’s reading of these works, in particular
Hartprecht’s, did not lead him to a desired certainty, but instead to further doubts.
These doubts are documented in Kaym’s letters to Böhme of 20 July 1620 and
13 October 1620, copies of which were recently discovered by the author in the
British Library in London.85 They offer a rare witness to the psychological aspects
of prophecy belief in the first decades of the seventeenth century. In his first letter to
Böhme, Kaym reflected at length on Hartprecht’s Tuba Temporis, published earlier
in 1620 in Erfurt.86 Hartprecht’s work claimed to provide a new and entirely correct
chronology, and to demonstrate that the Holy Spirit would usher in a Golden Age
82
Kress, Divine Diagrams, 284.
83
Adalbert Hermann Kraffert, Chronik von Liegnitz. Zweiter Theil, zweiter Band, 1547–1675.
(Liegnitz: Krumbhaar, 1869), 134.
84
Helmut Bahlow, ‘Aus der Frühzeit des Liegnitzer Buchhandels und Buchgewerbes,’ Mitteilungen
des Geschichts- und Altertums-Vereins zu Liegnitz 16 (1938): 219–270 at 236, 239, 242.
85
London, British Library, MS Sloane 2702, fols. 163r–168v. Concerning the discovery of these
documents see Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘Statt “Briefe Böhmes an ...” nun eine erste “Korrespondenz mit
…” Nachricht von der Entdeckung zweier Briefe Paul Kayms an Jacob Böhme,’ in Morgenröte im
Aufgang. Beiträge einer Tagung zum 400. Jahrestag der Entstehung von Böhmes Erstschrift.
Günther Bonheim and Thomas Regehly, eds. (Berlin: Weißensee Verlag, 2017), 197–208.
86
Nicolaus Hartprecht, Tuba Temporis oder Wahrhafftige, unfehlbare Zeitrechnung, dergleichen
die Welt noch nie gesehen hat, darinnen augenscheinlich demonstrieret und erwiesen wird, wie die
Welt von Anfang bis in das laufende 1620. Jahr ein ganz vollkommenes Seculum … erfullet. (Erfurt:
Philip Wittel für Johann Birckner, [1620]).
shortly after the great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 1623. Kaym agreed with
this view of a coming ‘day of light’ (lichten Tagk), but was upset by Hartprecht’s
statements concerning errors in scripture. For Kaym, this conclusion left the
unhappy possibility that ‘the Bible might be incorrect on account of its authors.’87
For him, this discovery of inconsistencies in the Old Testament was the beginning
of a slippery slope:
If the Bible should be discovered to be incorrect and a falsity, everything written therein
must be considered false and dubious. And because Christ draws on Moses and the Prophets,
he must also have spoken on false grounds. Where then might we find the foundation and
the truth of the Holy Spirit, if Christ’s work is discovered to be false?88
For figures like Hartprecht, who had formally studied Lutheran theology at major
universities—and therefore felt competent to critically engage with scripture philo-
logically—the idea that ‘false,’ contradictory or corrupted passages were present in
the bible was not particularly troubling. For lay persons like Kaym, however, who
had no access to this type of critical-scriptural education, such revelations provoked
doubts.
Kaym sought solid ground by following a ‘driving feeling’ (empfundenen Trieb)
imbued in him by the Holy Spirit. He authored his own chronology, a manuscript
‘Biblische Rechnung,’ in which he attempted to reconcile the thousand years of
Revelation 20 and the 400 years of the messiah prophesied in 2 Esdras 7:28. The
tract, or tracts, Kaym sent to Böhme do not appear to have survived. But Böhme’s
replies indicate that Kaym placed stock in these prophecies representing both an
earthly and spiritual period of peace. For Böhme, Kaym’s preoccupation with histo-
ria represented an engagement with worldly and fallible matters that led inevitably
to doubt and to Babel. What mattered instead was revelatio, the eternal truth of the
Holy Spirit, which might be found in Böhme’s own works, among those of
others.89
While Carlos Gilly has suggested that Kaym revised his expectations according
to Böhme’s critique, quite the opposite seems to have occurred.90 We have already
seen that after 1621 Böhme inclined more to historia with his declaration of an
imminent General Reformation with all its distinct worldly repercussions. And
despite Böhme’s critique, Kaym himself would hold fast to his convictions for
87
London BL, MS Sloane 2702, 165v: ‘[...] die bibel hette auch durch die schreiber künnen
Verfehlscht werden.’
88
London BL, MS Sloane 2702, 166r: ‘[S]olte die Bibel sträfflich vnd ligen haftig erfunden werden
so würde alles waß darin geschrieben falsch vnd zweiffelhaftig. Vnd weil Christus auff Mosen vnd
die Propheten weiset, so hette er muß auf einen falschen grund gewiesen, wo bleibt den der grundt
vnd die warheit deß H. geistes, so sein werck falsch erfunden wird?’
89
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 5, 399–422 (Böhme to Kaym, 19 August 1620); 423–440
(Böhme to Kaym, 19 November 1620).
90
Carlos Gilly, ‘Wege der Verbreitung von Jacob Böhmes Schriften in Deutschland und den
Niederlanden,’ in Theodor Harmsen, ed. Jacob Böhmes Weg in die Welt. Zur Geschichte der
Handschriftensammlung, Übersetzungen und Editionen von Abraham Willemsz van Beyerland
(Amsterdam: In de Pelikaan, 2007), 410.
Heinrich Gebhard alias Wesener 53
another several years, as a manuscript work of 1627 attests.91 However, shortly

before his death at the end of 1635, Kaym began to promote a more spiritualised
optimistic eschatology that shunned day and date apocalypticism.92 This particular
optimism was not expressed through the accomplishment of an exterior victory of
true Christianity, but the discovery of internal peace in the heart and soul.93 As we
have seen in the case of Felgenhauer, and shall see again later in this study, this was
an evolution in the nature of apocalyptic expectations typical of Lutheran confes-
sional culture as a whole.
Heinrich Gebhard alias Wesener
The works of the Reuß jurist and councilor Heinrich Gebhard, called Wesener (1578–
1653), provide a counterpoint to the figures discussed above. For Gebhard was a
layman and a homo politicus, who saw apocalyptic discourse as part of a distinct
intellectual program which concerned historical, as much as theological, questions.
Gebhard’s works were printed under the pseudonym ‘Gottlieb Heylandt,’ a nom-de-
plume perhaps implying that ‘love of God leads to salvation.’ Gebhard was born in
Erfurt, as the eldest son of a prominent family in the city.94 Between 1595 and 1599
he studied a variety of subjects at the universities of Wittenberg and Erfurt, among
them philosophy, law and history, before finding employment as a tutor to sons of
Thuringian nobility. In 1607–1608 he returned to Jena and earned a promotion to
the title of juris doctor from the University of Jena. From 1609 he was employed as
an extramural councilor to Heinrich II von Reuß-Gera (1572–1635), and in 1611 he
was appointed chancellor at the Reuß court in Gera.
91
See Kaym’s tracts in Copenhagen, Kongelige Bibliothek, Ms. Thott 2o 39. This manuscript and
its provenance are described in detail by Kress, Divine Diagrams, 377–379. See further Gilly,
‘Wege der Verbreitung von Jacob Böhmes Schriften,’ 410.
92
Kaym’s date of burial on 29 December 1635 is established in Bahlow, ‘Liegnitzer Buchhandels,’
236.
93
[Paul Kaym], ‘Religions-Spiegel’ in Bekäntnüs eines vnpartheyischen Christen Wegen des eini-
gen seeligmachenden Glaubens. ([Amsterdam]: [Hans Fabel], 1646); [Paul Kaym et al],
Helleleuchteter Hertzens-Spiegel ... (Frankfurt: Bielcken, 1680).
94
On aspects of Gebhard’s biography in this paragraph see Ernst Koch, ‘Chiliasmus am Reußischen
Hof im 17. Jahrhundert,’ Zeitschrift für bayerische Kirchengeschichte 69 (2000): 48–60 at 53;
Johann Caspar Zopff, Göttliche SterbensOrdinantz ... Bey ... Sepultur Des ... Herrn D. Heinrich
Gebhards/ genandt sonst Wesener/ auff Selmnitz/ Fürnehmen und berühmten Iuris Consulti, Fürstl.
Sächs. ... Geheimbten Raths und Cantzlers zu Altenburgk/ Welcher am 29. April. instehenden 1653.
Jahrs ... im 75. Jahr seines Alters/ allhier zu Gera von Gott gnädig abgefordert/ und darauff am
folgenden 6. Maii ... beygesetzet worden, (Gera: Mamitzsch, 1653), 60–84; Barnes, Prophecy and
Gnosis, 125–126, 229, 294; Andreas Gößner, ‘Die Gutachten der Theologischen Fakultät Leipzig
von 1540 bis 1670. Einführung-Übersicht-Register,’ in Kirche und regionalbewusstsein in Sachsen
im 16. Jahrhundert. Regionen bezogene Identifikationsprozesse im Konfessionellen Raum.
M. Beyer, A Gößner and G. Wartenburg, eds. (Leipzig: Leipzig Universitätsverlag, 2003),
189–262.
In 1622, Gebhard issued the first of several works which espoused an optimistic
apocalypticism. Printed under the name ‘Gottlieb Heylandt’ and titled Examen
chronologicum (1622, other eds. 1623, 1625), in this work he drew on scripture, the
Thirty Years’ War, and doctrine of the great conjunctions, to argue that the seventh
and terminal phase of history was about to begin. Gebhard engaged with the views
of a number of authorities, like Nagel, Johannes Kepler (1571–1630), Erasmus
Schmidt, Hartprecht, and others.95 His extensive research—more historical than
religious in its orientation—led him to the conclusion that ‘all the various periods
and timeframes concerning the Last Times which can be found here and there in
scripture—as well as in the works of prominent theologians, like Nicolaus Selnecker
[...] and Philipp Nicolai—converge, or at least appear to converge, in this present
year 1623, or in a year shortly thereafter.’96 Gebhard expanded upon this conviction
in a series of further chronological works. In his commentary on Revelation,
Enarratio chronologico-historica apocalypseos (1623), Gebhard confirmed that the
culminating period of human history would be felicitous. The Millennium of
Revelation 20, Gebhard wrote, would not be a period of a literal thousand years, but
would instead consist of a ‘demonstration and presence of God’s power, benevo-
lence and salvation, also [of] his protection and governance of his blessed and
believers in the love of Christ.’97
Gebhard’s expectations in his Enarratio drew upon the doctrine of the
Refreshment of the Saints, and thus resembled those espoused by some contempo-
rary Lutheran clerics. With reference to Daniel 12, Gebhard calculated that the
anticipated period of respite would last around four and a half years, which he
equated with 12 angelic years.98 While he cited a variety of authorities for these
conclusions, he explicitly disavowed any and all interest in the ‘golden age’ (gül-
dene Zeit) predicted by Paracelsus, the Rosicrucians, the Calvinist Thomas
Brightman (1562–1607), and their ilk.99 The coming period was a simple fact of
chronological history, and confirmed by all the best sources, including the books of
nature and of scripture. In other words, Gebhard argued that his optimistic apoca-
lyptic expectations had nothing to do with any contemporary religious heresy.
There is little evidence that Gebhard adopted these views on account of anything
other than intellectual conviction. There was no decisive tragedy in his life which
95
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 125–6.
96
Gottlieb Heylandt [Heinrich Gebhard], Examen Chronologicum: Oder Gründliche Anleitung/ zu
dem rechten eigentlichen Hauptverstande der H. Offenbahrung S. Johannis und anderer
Weissagungen Göttlicher Schrifft. (No Place: No Printer, 1622), 154–155.
97
Gottlieb Heylandt [Heinrich Gebhard], Enarratio Chronologo-Historica Apocalypseōs
S. Johannis: Das ist: Historische Außlegung/ derer Figuren/ Zeiten unnd Kirchen Geschicht/ so in
der heiligen Offenbahrung S. Johannis der Kirchen Gottes fürgebildet und verkündiget werden.
(No Place: No Printer, 1623), 145–146. Cf. Gottlieb Heylandt [Heinrich Gebhard], Verosimilia
historico-prophetica, De Rebus In Novissimo Die Futuris: Pro Excitanda Doctiorum
Sapientiorumq[ue] industria ad pie investigandum magnum illud mysterium. (No Place: No
Printer, 1625).
98
[Gebhard], Enarratio Chronologo-Historica Apocalypseōs S. Johannis, 149.
99
[Gebhard], Enarratio Chronologo-Historica Apocalypseōs S. Johannis, 153.
Heinrich Gebhard alias Wesener 55
prompted him to investigate eschatological doctrines, nor any evidence of existen-

tial doubt in the rectitude of his faith. What little of his manuscript effects remain do
not link him to other personalities who held similar views. Instead, appropriate to
his position at the Reuß court, Gebhard was merely a zealous reader of the literature
which circulated in Gera, as well as on the bookstalls of nearby Erfurt. As Valentin
Grießmann’s Getreuer Eckhart suggests, by 1623, there was a significant amount of
this material available in the region, both in print and manuscript.100
But although intellectual conviction played a major part in inspiring Gebhard’s
chronological works, his apophatic mentions of the Rosicrucian brotherhood and
others indicates that he was aware both of their existence as well as the controversial
nature of his own views. This is additionally suggested by the fact that Gebhard
issued his works under a pseudonym, and is supported by Ernst Koch’s observation
that some of the most controversial passages in his books were printed in Latin.101
And yet, Gebhard welcomed the circulation of his ideas among the learned, explic-
itly stating that he had his works printed at his own expense in order to be circulated
among ‘right-thinking (rechtgläubiger) theologians and the best historians,’ to gar-
ner their reactions.102 In 1624, Gebhard corresponded with the Jena theologians
Johann Gerhard and Balthasar Meisner (1587–1626), sending them copies of his
books and asking for their opinions on the ‘political, theological and historical
fundaments’ of his opinions.103 This move was undertaken explicitly in order to
quell ‘long-standing suspicions’ concerning his religious orthodoxy which had
apparently been raised in Reuß.104 Somewhat remarkably, the responses from
Gerhardt and Meisner were complimentary. The theologians praised Gebhard’s dili-
gence in gathering and weighing so many sources concerning the final days, and for
offering an unsensational explication of the secrets of the bible.105
However, by 1628, Gebhard’s relationship with authority had soured, when
Caspar Facius (1573–1646), then secretary to the privy chancellery in Altenburg,
attacked him in print, denouncing him as a purveyor of chiliastic heresy.106 Gebhard
was suspended from his duties at the Reuß court pending the collection of opinions
100
Grießmann, Getreuer Eckhart (1623), 2–8, 14–15 et passim.
101
Koch, ‘Chiliasmus am Reußischen Hof,’ 48–63.
102
Gottlieb Heylandt [Heinrich Gebhard], Historische uberaußtröstliche Erklärung/ Des hohenli-
edts Salomonis/ des allerweissesten Königs Juda/ des Sohns David. (No Place: No Printer, 1624),
sig. A1v.
103
These are reproduced in Philipp Jakob Spener, Gründliche Vertheidigung seiner Unschuld und
der unrecht beschuldigten sogenannten Pietisten gegen Herrn D. Val. Alberti. (Stargard: Ernst,
1696), 50–52.
104
Spener, Gründliche Vertheidigung, 50–52. See also Fortgesetzte Sammlung von Alten und Neuen
Theologischen Sachen (1742), 564–565.
105
Spener, Gründliche Vertheidigung, 51–52.
106
Caspar Facius, Admonitoria ad verosimilia Historico-prophetica de rebus in Noviss. Die even-
turis. M. Gottlieb Heilands … (Altenburg: Johann Meuschke, 1628). See also Depulsio Epistolica
Weseneriana: Iusta, aequa, modesta Criminationum Iniquissimarum, quibus scatent Admonitoria
Faciana ad Vero similia Historico-Prophetica de rebus in novissimo die futuris, &c. Scripta pri-
mum ad quosdam Dn. Fautores & amicos. (Gera: Mamitzsch, 1628).
of theologians at Jena and Leipzig. The reports of 1628 ultimately condemned

Gebhard as a ‘hardened chiliast.’107 This was a reversal of the previous encourage-
ment he had received from Jena, but unsurprising in light of the contemporary
polemic against chiliastic heresy (see chapter four). Ultimately the debate concern-
ing Gebhard’s beliefs lasted well into 1632, at which time, under pressure from
theologians in Wittenberg, Jena and Leipzig, as well as at court, Gebhard publicly
recanted his convictions, and was restored to his position.108 He lived out his life
without further controversy.
This controversy, it seems, was the key to Gebhard’s troubles. Although his ini-
tial approaches to theologians in Jena in 1624 didn’t spark the trouble which visited
him in 1628, this may be on account of Gebhard’s self-evident ‘good intentions’ in
composing his writings, a fact remarked upon by the theologian Johann Gerhard in
his thorough report concerning Gebhard’s beliefs.109 Gebhard’s apocalypticism was
something intended only as a demonstration of Christ’s convictions, goodness and
grace, and not as an expression of a heretical desire to lead others astray from the
path of true religion.
Some Minor Prophets
The above survey suggests the diversity of possible views among Lutherans con-
cerning the nature of the forthcoming period of felicity. It also suggests several of
the different motivations which could move people to express them. That many of
these expressions were prompted by contact with doctrines surveyed in chapter one,
or indeed with those of contemporaries, emphasizes that literature containing opti-
mistic expectations was not only being written and published by Lutherans, it was
also being read. Yet Felgenhauer, Ziegler, Kärcher, Gebhard, Kaym and Böhme
were not the only authors who publicized such ideas. There were several other, more
obscure figures, who also contributed their voices to the debates.
In 1621, a certain Jan Henuriades de Verdun––a pseudonym that concealed the
identity of an unidentified Lutheran of Saxony––authored a tract that drew not only
on the astrological excitement of 1623, but also on works of ‘many enlightened and
blessed men who have been led by the spirit of God (spiritu Dei singulariter
107
Christian Grübel, Thesauri Consiliorum Et Decisionum Appendix Nova, Continens quaedam
inserenda Operi Dedekenno-Gerhardino: Das ist: Vornehmer Universitäten/ Hochlöblicher
Collegien ... Rath/ Bedencken/ Antwort/ Belehrung/ Erkentnüß/ Bescheide und Urtheile in und von
allerhand schweren Fällen und wichtigen Fragen: belangend so wohl Religions- Glaubens-
Gewissens- Kirchen- Ampts- und Ehe−/ als Bürgerliche und andere Sachen ... Neuer Anhang/
Darinnen Was von Anno 1623. biß auff itzige Zeit an Consiliis von Nachbenahmten ausgearbeitet/
und zu dreyen Voluminibus des Dedekenni gehöret/ begriffen (Hamburg: Hertel, 1671), 476–489.
108
See further Koch, ‘Chiliasmus am reußischen Hof,’ 54–55.
109
Johann Gerhard, Tractatus Theologicus, in quo praecipua Chiliasmi Fundamenta solide destru-
untur: pariterq[ue] de Gog & Magog, item de Universali Judaeorum conversione uberius disseri-
tur (Jena: Bauhofer, 1667).
Some Minor Prophets 57
ducti).’110 Verdun cited persons like Helisaeus Röslin, Paul Nagel, Nicolaus
Hartprecht and others, but also Calvinists, such as Thomas Brightman and John
Napier.111 Conscious of Saxony’s political power within the Holy Roman Empire
and significance to the Lutheran cause, Henuriades argued that Lutheran Germany
needed to abandon ‘political papism’ and support the cause of Calvinist Friedrich V
of Bohemia.112 Verdun argued that Eustachius Poyssel’s identification of the Lion of
Midnight in 2 Esdras 11–12 with Saxony was false, and that the prophecy instead
pointed to Friedrich V.113 Verdun predicted that Saxony’s reconciliation with
Bohemia would cause the fall of Antichrist by 1625, if not earlier, after which time
the ‘holy evangelical church’ would flourish. Like Felgenhauer and Kärcher,
Verdun’s scenario united the political and religious discords of his day in a prophecy
of coming peace.
In the same year, a lengthy tract concerning 2 Esdras was published by the math-
ematician and musician Abraham Bartolus (fl. 1608–1628), a resident of the village
of Beutha in the Erzgebirge.114 In this work, Bartolus engaged with the arguments of
Paul Nagel and other contemporary optimistic apocalypticists who held that a
Golden Age would dawn in or shortly after 1624. Yet Bartolus was no orthodox
Lutheran thinker on these matters. He rejected the traditional Lutheran interpreta-
tion that the Millennium had occurred historically, and instead believed that it would
commence sometime around 1744, or alternatively ‘in two or three hundred years’
time.115 Bartolus’s Millennium—a time of security and peace for the Lutheran
faith—would endure for only a short time.116 Then, shortly before the Last Judgment,
the Devil would renew his torments for the church.117 Thus Bartolus retained some
traditional aspects of Lutheran apocalyptic expectation; the world would experience
a time of future felicity, but this would be short-lived.
Other Lutherans added their voices and also expressed optimistic expectations,
their works were available from bookstalls. Among them were pamphlets, broad-
110
Jan Henuriades de Verdun, Apocalyptische Satzstück und Ursachen von jtzo instehender grossen
Veränderung vieler mächtigster Regimentern. (No Place: No Printer, 1623), 4.
111
Verdun, Apocalyptische Satzstück, 4: ‘Brichtmanus, Grassetus & Napier. Iu. Apo. Roselius
Hagauoen. Nagelius, Herlicius, Huberinus, Alban Marius. Joh. á Münster in seiner Postill über den
2 Advent. Hartprech. in Tuba [Temporis].’
112
Verdun, Apocalyptische Satzstück, 4.
113
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 313–14; Hubková, Fridrich Falcký v zrcadle letákové publicis-
tiky, 383.
114
Abraham Bartolus, Aquila Esdraea: Das ist: Historische Außlegung und Erklärung des
Gesichtes Esdrae, so ... in seinem Vierdten Buch im 11. 12. und 13. Capitel beschrieben. (No Place:
No Printer, 1621). Bartolus was not a Lutheran cleric, as suggested in Hamilton, Apocryphal
Apocalypse, 189. On Bartolus see Klaus-Dieter Herbst, ‘Bartolus, Abraham,’ in Bibliographisches
Handbuch der Kalendermacher von 1550 bis 1750. Located online at https://www.presseforsc-
hung.uni-bremen.de/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=bartolus_abraham <Accessed 11 November 2018 > .
115
Bartolus, Aquila Esdraea, 228–229.
116
117
sheets and tracts by the likes of Röslin, Jakob Tilner (fl. 1613),118 Christianus
Theophilus,119 Valesius Minymus Urbinensis,120 Johann Bannier,121 the wandering
prophet Matthias Schubart of Meissen (fl. 1620–1622),122 and the Zittau physician
Johann Dobricius (1576–1654).123 Put succinctly, there was no shortage of potential
118
Jakob Tilner, Chronologische Zeit Rechnung, und gewisse Beweissung das die … Jüngste Tag
jnnerhalb 44. Jahren … kommen werde. (No Place: No Printer, 1613). Cf. Albert Hitfeld,
Jegenbeweiß Das die Welt nicht noch 42 Jahr stehen könne/ wie Jacobus Tilnerus von Weissenfels
jetzo zu Halle auffm Newenmarckt in etlichen Reimen beweisen will. ([Magdeburg?]: No Printer,
1613); Johannes Kepler, Kanones Pueriles: Id est, Chronologia Von Adam biß auff diß jetz
lauffende Jahr Christi 1620 ... Der newlich in Truck außgegangenen Chronologiae Pauli
Felgenhawers Puschwizensis Bohemi. (Ulm: Johann Meder, 1620).
119
Christianus Theophilus, Y Dias Mystica ad monadis simplicitatem. Ein nutzbares zweifaches
Tractätlein/ so einem einfeltigen Christlichen Hertzen den Weg weiset zur ewigen Seeligkeit.
(Christianopoli [i.e. Erfurt]: Johan Bischoffen, 1620); Christianus Theophilus, Liber Vitae aureus.
Gülden Büchlein des Lebens/ mit sieben eröffneten Siegeln. (Erfurt: Johann Bischoff, 1621).
Although the name of this author would appear to be a pseudonym, there was a certain Christian
Theophilus (d. 1625) of Greifswald, who was resident in Görlitz and a distant member of the cir-
cles around Jacob Böhme. See Cornelia Wenzel, ‘Die Görlitzer Bürgerrechte von 1600 bis 1700,’
in Idem: Beiträge zur Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte der Stadt Görlitz im 17. Jahrhundert,
(Görlitz: Herausgegeben von der Stadtverwaltung Görlitz, 1993), 153.
120
Valesius Minymus Urbinensis, Hoch nötiges und zu dieser betrübten zeit allen bedrängeten
Christen tröstliches bedencken/ Uber der beschaffenheit itziger Zeit/ sonderlich aber deß instehen-
den Jahres 1623 ... Vornemlich auß der betrachtung der grossen Conjunctionen der Obern
Planeten. (No Place: No Printer, 1622).
121
Johann Bannier, Lutherischer Spiegel in welchen zu sehen/ was der rechte lutherische Glaube ist
vnd was er in den Menschen wircke die ihm überkommen haben. (No Place: No Printer 1625);
Michael Schippan, ‘Zwei Havelberger Weigelianer aus der Zeit des Dreißigjährigen Krieges:
Pantaleon Trappe und Johann Bannier,’ in Europa in der frühen Neuzeit. Festschrift für Günter
Mühlpfordt. Erich Donnert, ed. 7 vols. (Weimar: Böhlau, 1997), vol. 2, 383–404; Goetzius (praes.),
Dissertatio Historico-Theologica; Colberg, Das Platonisch-hermetische Christenthum, vol. 1,
227–232; vol. 2, 300.
122
Several of Schubart’s tracts are preserved in Dresden, Sächsisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Geheimer
Rat 10024 Loc. 10026/6, among them his ‘Vnwiedersprechlicher Discurs vber das Vierdte Reich,
so weit der Prophet Daniel im Geist gesehen.’ Paul Nagel encountered Schubart in Torgau before
10 March 1622, see his letter to Arnold Kerner in Leipzig, UB, Ms. 0356, fols. 50v–51r: ‘An ietzo
gibt sich der dritte Elias vnd letzten großen propheten am Tag zu Meißen Matthaus Schubbartt
genennet hat an die gantze Landschaftt Zweÿmal geschrieben, vndt Ihm einen Landt oder gerichts
tag angekündiget den 26 Martÿ hiezu angesetzt, sagt von neuen offenbarungen, von eine andern
Zeit von großen wundern, von straffen, von Müntzwesen weißaget hefftig, vnd sie sollen vnd
müßen Ihm anhören, wz der geist G. durch Ihm Ihnen alle ankündigen laßen, er müße Elias sein,
er seÿ [fol. 51r] der große prophet von welchen Mose geweißaget/ Einen Propheten wie mich wird
Euch Got der Herr erwecken/ der prophet muß er sein, etc. Ist lange mit disen dingen vmbgangen,
wird von iederman verlacht, haben pasquill auff ihn geschrieben. Was drauff erfolgen werde, wird
die Zeit geben.’
123
Johann Dobricius, Chronomēnytōr das ist/ Zeiterinner: In welchem durch anleitung einer
Astrologischen der nechst vollnbrachten siebenfächtigen grossen Conjunction der oberen zweien
Planeten/ und des darauff erfolgten neuen Sternes zugleich ... und was nun mehr unfehlbar der
Welt und uns schierkünfftig zugewarten (Leipzig: Schneider für Dobricius, 1612); See further Nils
Lenke, ‘Johannes Dobricius (1576–1653)—ein Alchemist aus der Oberlausitz,’ Neues Lausitzisches
Magazin 136 (2014): 103–110; Viskolcz, Reformációs Könyvek, 70, 95, 100–102, 115–117 & pas-
sim; Hotson, Paradise Postponed, 44–53.
Scribal Publication and Manuscript Collectors 59
apocalyptic literature written by Lutherans, which expressed the hope that the future
would bring with it a period of felicity.
Scribal Publication and Manuscript Collectors
Works written by Lutherans concerning a coming Golden Age were distributed in

both scribal and print publications. If there was a distinctive difference between
print and manuscript cultures, it concerns the social environment in which the texts
were reproduced. The production of scribal copies was a communal experience, for
a copyist first had to make contact with the author or another possessor of a work in
order to reproduce it.124 Such exchanges were undoubtedly accompanied by discus-
sions, and there had to exist an economy of trust between contacts. The correspon-
dence of Paul Nagel and Arnold Kerner, undertaken between 1618 and 1624,
contains frequent references to the practicalities of sourcing, copying and sending
on manuscript tracts—including works by Jacob Böhme and others—and provides
an example of the kind of relationship necessary to engender such an exchange.125
Similarly, a four-volume collection of prophetic and spiritualist manuscripts by
Weigel, Nagel, Böhme, Paracelsus, Kotter and others, created by Gottfried Gloger
von Schwanbach (fl. 1621–1630) and preserved today in Leipzig, includes
correspondence concerning the sharing and procurement of works by dissenting
religious figures.126 Some of the works copied by Gloger were made from texts that
had already appeared in print, suggesting that the movement of optimistic apocalyp-
tic tracts was unidirectional.
Some authors of optimistic apocalyptic works, such as Jacob Böhme, carefully
managed the distribution and circulation of scribal publications. Böhme’s extant
correspondence documents his efforts to coordinate the scribal publication of his
works between multiple scribes based throughout Upper Lusatia and Lower
Silesia.127 Böhme’s interpersonal and epistolary networks, which encompassed at
least 138 individuals, provides a snapshot of the efforts of one person to curate their
image and cultivate their audience by managing scribal publication and distribution.
And yet, Böhme was consistently surprised when new persons contacted him who
had read his works in manuscript, a natural outcome of the distribution of scribal
publications undertaken without his express knowledge by other members of his
network.128 Ultimately, some of Böhme’s manuscript work would even appear in
print without his consent; Paul Nagel’s Prodromus astronomiæ apocalypticæ (1620)
124
On the concept of scribal publication see Harold Love, Scribal Publication in Seventeenth-
Century England (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993).
125
Leipzig UB, MS 0356.
126
Leipzig UB, MS Resp. 106, vols. I-IV.
127
Jacob Böhme, Die Urschriften. Werner Buddecke, ed. 2 vols. (Stuttgart: Friedrich Frommans
Verlag, 1963–1966), vol.2, 379, etc.
128
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9, 10.25 (Böhme to Abraham von Sommerfeld, 1620).
incorporated portions of Böhme’s unpublished ‘Morgen Röte im Auffgang’ (1612)

without attribution.129
The existence of manuscript volumes and collections which contain eschatologi-
cal material might therefore be considered prima facie evidence of social communi-
ties which formed around ideas of a felicitous future. Jonathan Green has pointed
to the handwritten notes of early readers in printed prophecies as evidence of
‘meaning-making’ in early modernity.130 With little exaggeration, the existence of
handwritten copies of prophetic works in the seventeenth century might be consid-
ered not only evidence of making meaning, but also of building communities.
Manuscript collectors and distributors played key roles in maintaining epistolary
networks of interested individuals, and formed collections which could also be uti-
lised by printers, other copyists or readers. Carlos Gilly has shed important light on
the Augsburg manuscript collector Carl Widemann (1568–1638).131 Widemann, a
physician, was connected to numerous figures, both inside and outside Lutheran
confessional culture, who promoted optimistic apocalyptic expectations, like the
Tyrolean Paracelsian Adam Haslmayr and the Calvinist Prince August von Anhalt-
Plötzkau. Since at least 1580 Widemann collected the works of Paracelsus and
assorted alchemical and theological manuscripts, in order to preserve, enjoy, and
sell them.132 For many years he lived from profits earned supplying tracts to regents
and nobles throughout Europe.133 By the very nature of his work, Widemann traf-
ficked with authors, copyists, collectors and other dealers who preserved similarly
marginalised texts.134 Thereby, textual communities were formed along grounds of
common interest. The physician could count among his contacts Tobias Hess, co-
author of the Rosicrucian Fama Fraternitatis, among numerous others.135 As Carlos
Gilly has documented in detail, in 1612, Widemann assisted August von Anhalt-
Plötzkau in the latter’s establishment of a secret printing press in Zerbst, created in
order to elude censors and set in print spiritualist and dissident material for wider
distribution.136
129
Paul Nagel, Prodromus Astronomiae Apocalypticae, Welcher vns fürstellet die gewisse warhaff-
tige fundament der Weissagung: Handelt auch Von den beyden Bewegungen des hellgestirnten
Firmaments so wol des Kirchen Himmels was solche seynd (Danzig: Martin Rode 1620), sigs.
C1r-C3v; Penman, ‘Paul Nagels Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae (1620)’, 101–130.
130
Green, Printing and Prophecy, 152.
131
See further Gilly, Adam Haslmayr, 106–117.
132
Karl Sudhoff, Versuch einer Kritik der Echtheit der Paracelsischen Schriften. 2 vols. (Berlin:
Georg Reimer, 1896–1898), vol. 2, 12; Gilly, Adam Haslmayr, 106–112.
133
Julian Paulus, ‘Alchemie und Paracelsismus um 1600. Siebzig Porträts,’ Analecta Paracelsica.
Studien zum Nachleben Theophrast von Hohenheims im deutschen Kulturgebiet der frühen Neuzeit.
Joachim Telle, ed. (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994), 335–406 at 339.
134
Gilly, ‘Theophrastia Sancta’, 160; Herzog August d.J. to Philipp Hainhofer, 16 June 1621, in
R. Gobiet, ed. Der Briefwechsel zwischen Philipp Hainhofer und Herzog August d.J. (Munich:
Deutscher Kunstverlag, 1984), no. 576 contains details of Widemann’s attempt to interest the Stern
brothers in Lüneburg in printing works of Valentin Weigel.
135
Gilly, Adam Haslmayr, 134–5.
136
Gilly, Adam Haslmayr, 134–5.
Scribal Publication and Manuscript Collectors 61
Another important manuscript collector was the Hamburg librarian, historian

and religious dissenter Joachim Morsius.137 In 1614 Morsius wrote a response to the
Rosicrucian brotherhood, and in 1625 he printed a pamphlet containing the pseudo-
Paracelsian prophecy of the Lion of Midnight.138 Morsius’s collecting is docu-
mented by a catalogue of around 230 spiritualist manuscripts he had printed in 1626
and later offered for sale to Herzog August in Wolfenbüttel.139 Gilly’s careful detec-
tive work has demonstrated that these manuscripts were authored by the likes of
Haslmayr and Helisäus Röslin; Morsius’s own manuscripts, preserved in Lübeck,
include works by Paracelsus, Johann Staricius (fl. 1580–after 1626), and still oth-
ers.140 Morsius provides a link between the learned, orthodox and respectable
aspects of society on the one hand, and the dissenting aspects on the other. His
album amicorum contained the signatures and messages not only of noted Lutheran
dissidents like Philipp Ziegler, Balthasar Walther, Johann Angelus Werdenhagen
and others, but also of Lutheran clerics like Peter Hinckelmann (1571–1622) of
Rostock and Paul Egard of Nortorf.141
While Widemann and Morsius attempted to parlay their manuscript collections
into patronage arrangements or sale, others collected for their own enjoyment or
edification. Inventories of manuscript and book collectors like Gebhardt Johann von
Alvensleben (1576–1631), a minor noble based in Erxleben near Magdeburg,142 or
the director of the secret laboratory in Electoral Saxony, Benedikt Hinckelmann
(1588–1659), contain numerous works of Böhme, Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil
(1595–1661) and other optimistic apocalypticists.143 As documents recently discov-
ered by Nils Lenke show, Alvensleben was a patron of the Weigelian publicist
137
See Heinrich Schneider, Joachim Morsius und sein Kreis. Zur Geistesgeschichte des 17.
Jahrhunderts (Lübeck: Quitzow Verlag, 1929), 7–72.
138
[Joachim Morsius], Epistola Sapientissimae FRC Remissa. (No Place: No Printer, [1618]);
[Joachim Morsius, ed.], Magische Propheceyung aureoli Philippi Theophrasti Paracelsi von
Entdeckung seiner 3. Schätzen. (Philadelphia [Amsterdam?]: No Printer 1625).
139
Morsius’s Nuncius Olympicus, reprinted in facsimile in Gilly, Adam Haslmayr, 243–290.
140
Penman, ‘Ein Liebhaber des Mysterii,’ passim.
141
Schneider, Joachim Morsius, 79–110 includes a list of most signees. See also June Schlueter,
‘Lost and Found: Ben Jonson’s Autograph in Joachim Morsius’s Album Amicorum,’ Ben Jonson
Journal 20 (2013): 260–272.
142
The inventory of Alvensleben’s collection is preserved in Hannover, Niedersächsisches
Landesarchiv, Dep. 83B, Nr. 90(1). See further Nils Lenke, Nicolas Roudet, Hereward Tilton,
‘Michael Maier—Nine Newly Discovered Letters,’ Ambix 61/1 (2014): 1–47 at 3, 4 note 16.
143
On Alvensleben’s library see Berthold Heinecke and Reimar von Alvensleben, eds., Lesen.
Sammeln. Bewahren. Die Bibliothek Joachims von Alvensleben (1514–1588) und die Erforschung
frühneuzeitlicher Büchersammlungen. Tagung auf Schloss Hundisburg vom 11.9. bis 13.9.2014.
(Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 2016). Concerning Hinckelmann see Schneider,
Gläubiger Christen Hertzens-Freude (1662); Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘Böhme’s Intellectual Networks,’
64, 68; Penman, ‘Jacob Böhme and his Networks,’ 116–117. For a catalogue of Hinckelmann’s
manuscripts, see Tetzel, Monatliche Unterredungen Einiger Guten Freunde (April 1692). (Leipzig
& Thorn: Johann Christian Laurer, 1692), 258–275.
Johann Staricius, as well as the alchemist Michael Maier (1568–1622).144

Hinckelmann, on the other hand, hosted Böhme during the latter’s visit to Dresden
in the summer of 1624. These collectors thus not only collected manuscripts, they
supported figures critical of contemporary mainstream Lutheranism.
One particularly interesting collector of prophecies and other apocalyptic mate-
rial was Johannes von Schönaich (d. 1639), who after 1619 was Majorat of Carolath-
Beuthen in Lower Silesia. He was the nephew of Georg Freiherr von Schönaich
(1557–1619), founder of the famous Gymnasium Schönaichianum in Beuthen an
der Oder (Bytom Odrzańsky). In 1624, a disgruntled instructor at the Gymnasium,
Balthasar Exner (1576–1624), informed Catholic authorities in nearby Glogau that
Johannes was not only a supporter of the deposed Friedrich V of Bohemia, but that
he also
toted about all manner of prophecies, and has copied out as many of these as he can lay his
hands on, like those of [Johannes] Lichtenberger, Johann Hus’s little box [sc. the Horologiam
Hussianum],145 and the Sprottau prophecies. He had the prophet [sc. Christoph Kotter]
called before him together with the pastor of Sprottau [sc. Abraham Menzel] and offered
that, if he [sc. Kotter] spoke the truth, he would pay all of his debts.146
Schönaich later admitted to collecting prophecies, and not only those named by
Exner, but also prophecies of Sebastian Franck, the sybils, Joachim of Fiore,
Johannes Capistranus, Melanchthon’s edition of Johann Carion, and of Paracelsus,
‘to say nothing of the works of Nagelius, and still others. But what of it?’147 The
collection and reading of prophetic and apocalyptic material was not a crime in
itself, as Schönaich knew. Schönaich’s crime, however, was rather his supposed
support for Kotter, and by inference his support of the deposed Bohemian king,
Friedrich V of the Palatinate. This meant that his intellectual interests strayed into
the realm of the political, a dire error in recently recatholicized Glogau, which
144
Lenke et al., ‘Michael Maier,’ 1–47; Nils Lenke, ‘Forschen im Geheimen: Der alchemistische
Zirkel um Gebhardt Johann von Alvensleben, Sebastian Alstein und Johann Staricius,’ in Wettstreit
der Künste. Der Aufstieg des praktischen Wissens zwischen Reformation und Aufklärung. Berthold
Heinecke, Ingrid Kästner, eds. (Aachen: Shaker Verlag, 2018), 193–222.
145
A broadsheet prophecy printed as Gründtliche Offenbarung und eigentliche Abbildung/ einer
geheimen denckwürdigen Prophecey/ welche in diesem 1621 Jahr/ zu Prag bey S. Jacob in der
Bibliothec/ auff und in einem kleinen silbern vergüldten Lädlein oder Kästlein gefunden worden
(1621, 1624). The text of the broadsheet was also reprinted in [Felgenhauer], Leo Septentrionalis,
5. See the classic study of Josef Volf, ‘Horologium Hussianum—Orloj husitsky,’ Časopis musea
královstvi českého 86 (1912): 305–312; Hubková, Fridrich Falcký, 371–373, 839; Urbánek,
Eschatologie, vědění a politika, 115 note 381.
146
Christian David Klopsch, Geschichte des Geschlechts von Schönaich. Viertes Heft, das Leben
Johannes des Unglücklichen und Sebastians darstellend (Glogau: Julius Gottschalk, 1856), 58:
‘Der Freiherr schlepped sich mit allerlei Wahrsagereien, und habe deren abschreiben lassen, so
viele er nur Erlangen können, als Liechtenbergers, Johann Hussens Lädlein, und die sprottische
Prophezeiung, habe den Propheten zu sich fordern lassen nebst dem Pfarrer zu Sprottau, und sich
erboten, wenn er wahr redete, wolle er alle seine Schulden bezahlen. Hieraus sei zu schließen, wie
gering seine Ergebenheit gegen den Kaiser sei.’
147
Klopsch, Geschichte des Geschlechts von Schönaich, 63.
The Reach of Printed Books 63
counted his tiny principality of Carolath among its territories.148 In 1627, Christoph
Kotter would be charged with treason on account of his prophecies in support of
Friedrich V; Schönaich was perhaps fortunate not to suffer the same fate.
These examples of manuscript collectors who emerged from different levels of
society blur the boundaries of authorship, production, and patronage. The trade in
scribal publications fostered the establishment of communication networks and
communities of trust that allowed interpersonal relations among Lutherans inter-
ested in apocalyptic works to flourish. Nevertheless it was not primarily through
these scribal publications and their exchange among the cognoscenti that expecta-
tions of a felicitous future proliferated and entered public discourse in German
Lutheranism. Rather, the repositories of manuscript collectors served as reservoirs
of apocalyptic knowledge, awaiting a vector to carry them out into society at large.
This vector was the medium of print.
The Reach of Printed Books
One of the central motifs of apocalyptic expectations of a felicitous future held by

Lutherans was the conviction that a further reformation was to occur, in which the
worldly Mauerkirchen would be defeated and true Christianity would triumph.
There were several biblical prophecies which suggested that such a reformation
would be accompanied by an increase in knowledge. Daniel 12:4 prophesied that
before the End ‘many would run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.’149
Matthew 5, Matthew 10:26 and Luke 12:2 promised that ‘there is nothing that is
concealed that will not be disclosed.’ Paracelsus played on the parable of the mus-
tard seed in Mark 4:30–34 as a metaphor for an increase in apocalyptic knowledge
and the ‘revelation of all things.’150 As we have seen above, several Lutheran apoca-
lypticists claimed to be students of the ‘School of the Holy Spirit’ likewise staking
an epistemological claim to new knowledge through revelation, like the apostles
experienced at Pentecost (Acts 2:1–13). The spread of knowledge in the Last Days
was thus simultaneously a prophecy to be fulfilled as well as a sign of the times
itself. Those Lutherans hoping to hasten the Last Judgment could thus spread their
doctrines in open print, and thereby contribute to the increase of knowledge of the
End Times, reinforcing their own expectations.151
148
Jörg Deventer, Gegenreformation in Schlesien. Die habsburgische Rekatholisierungspolitik in
Glogau und Schweidnitz 1526–1707 (Cologne: Böhlau, 2003), 170, 217, 253.
149
Robert Lerner, ‘Pertransibunt plurimi: Reading Daniel to Transgress Authority,’ in Knowledge,
Discipline and Power in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honour of David Luscombe. Joseph Canning
et al., eds. (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 7–28; J.R. Webb, ‘“Knowledge Will be Manifold”: Daniel 12:4
and the Idea of Intellectual Progress in the Middle Ages,’ Speculum 89/2 (2014): 307–357;
Mordechai Feingold, ‘“And Knowledge shall be Increased.” Millenarianism and the Advancement
of Learning Revisited,’ The Seventeenth Century 28 (2014): 363–393.
150
Murase, ‘Chiliasmus und Paracelsismus,’ 13–15.
151
On this dynamic see further Penman, ‘Between Utopia and New Jerusalem,’ 470–491.
Once a controversial book was set in print, ideas set down in considerable isola-
tion could reach a multitude of people of divergent beliefs, in diverse circumstances,
conditions and geographic locations, and at that simultaneously. As a tangible
object, a book could be destroyed, but the ideas it contained could not. As Johann
Arndt wrote of his Wahres Christenthum: ‘My little book, being a physical witness
to the interior Kingdom of God might be easily wrested from the hands of the peo-
ple, but the inner testimony of the spirit is not so easily eradicated.’152 As the sample
of books in appendix one demonstrates, optimistic apocalyptic expectations circu-
lated in printed books in a variety of genres, from prophecy to poetry to astronomy
to practical devotional literature. These were mostly small quarto or smaller in for-
mat, and typically between four and forty pages in length. These prints were thus
easy to carry, easy to communicate via post, and, if necessary, easy to conceal. It is
impossible to determine the average print run for such works, but it clearly varied
from anywhere between 100 copies—ideal for limited private distribution—and
1,000 copies. In 1624, for example, the Langensalza antinomian Esajas Stiefel
wished to have printed 400 copies of three separate books; a total of some 1,200
exemplars, which he would then distribute privately.153 During an inquisitorial trial
during the 1650s, Paul Felgenhauer claimed that his books were printed in varying
quantities, but that it was not unusual for him to receive between 25 and 50 exem-
plars from printers as an honorarium.154 Assuming that Felgenhauer received up to
10% of the print-run of each of these editions, the production of 500 copies of each
of his many works would not be unreasonable. In Tübingen, Eberhard Wild regu-
larly trafficked in editions of 1,000 copies.155 Other projects were decidedly more
modest: Jacob Böhme’s Der Weg zu Christo (1624) was issued in Görlitz by Johann
Rhambau (1563–1634) in a very small edition, ostensibly in order to ease the neces-
sity of scribal publication.156
The evidence of substantial print runs problematizes August Tholuck’s (1799–
1877) suggestion that the trade in printed heterodox religious books in the early
seventeenth century was carried out privately, via epistolary and interpersonal net-
works, and possessed little or no commercial dimension.157 There is indeed plentiful
evidence that controversial works were being sold in commercial quantities, and
that this was one reason for the controversy they occasioned among Lutheran doc-
trinalists. John Bruckner has provided evidence concerning the sale of optimistic
152
Cited in Gilly, ‘Johann Arndt und die “dritte Reformation”,’ 60–77.
153
Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Stiefel, 488.
154
Hannover, Niedersächsisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Cal. Br. 23 no. 654, 64v.
155
Stuttgart, Landeskirchliches Archiv, Ms. A 26 Bd. 728, 20 Nr. 10; Tübingen Universitätsarchiv,
Ms. I. 8/1, fols. 176–177. This document is reprinted in Dülmen, Die Utopie einer christlichen
Gesellschaft, 278.
156
Böhme, Die Urschriften, vol. 2, 379 (Böhme to Christian Bernhard, 27 December 1623): ‘Mein
büchlein [...] werden in etlichen tagen von der presse kommen/ den sie sind zum drucke geferttiget/
dürffet euch wegen der selben mit nach schreiben nicht mehr bemühen / den man wirt sie vmb ein
geringe Geld können haben.’
157
August Tholuck, Lebenszeugen der lutherischen Kirche aus allen Ständen vor und während der
Zeit des dreißigjährigen Krieges (Berlin: Wiegandt & Grieben, 1859), 267.
apocalyptic books of Paul Felgenhauer at the Lübeck Christmas market of 1632, but
there is also evidence from earlier decades.158 On 11 February 1619 an Electoral
order forbidding the sale of works by Paul Nagel and Valentin Weigel was promul-
gated in Wittenberg by the Saxon Elector, because these writings were causing con-
sternation.159 The same year the Lutheran cleric Johann Valentin Andreae—by this
time having abandoned his Rosircucian hopes—complained about the number of
books concerning the ‘New Jerusalem’ offered for sale by booksellers.160 The pastor
Christian Gilbertus de Spaignart (d. 1635) wrote in his Theologisch Wächterhornlein
(1620) of a ‘torrent’ of Rosicrucian books circulating among his congregation.161
We have additionally seen that Jacob Böhme encountered optimistic apocalyptic
expectations in books he encountered in Dresden.
The printing of optimistic apocalyptic expectations occurred largely in a legal
grey zone.162 As will be documented in chapter four, there circulated in the early
seventeenth century a variety of conflicting definitions of chiliastic heresy. How
these were supposed to be understood and applied, if at all, in the pre-publication
censorship systems in the various territories of the Empire, remains unknown.163
There certainly existed a disconnect between the expectations of theologians and
censors. Several works issued by clerics during the 1610s and 1620s contained ref-
erences to the need for stricter censorship to control the amount of controversial
theological material reaching the marketplace.164 But the issue might not have been
the lack of zeal of censorial bodies; rather, it may have been the nebulous boundar-
ies of the ‘heresy’ that doctrinalists sought to eradicate.
There were other compounding issues. The first of these is that optimistic
expectations could be expressed in a variety of genres. If they were given voice in
158
John Bruckner, A Bibliographical Catalogue of Seventeenth–Century Books Published in
Holland (The Hague & Paris: Mouton, 1971), ix-xii.
159
Walter Friedensburg, ed. Urkundenbuch der Universität Wittenberg. (1611–1813). (Magdeburg:
Selbstverlag für die Provinz Sachsen und für Anhalt, 1927), vol. 2, 37.
160
Johann Valentin Andreae, Mythologiae Christianae sive Virtutum & vitiorum vitae humanae
imaginum. Libri Tres (Straßburg: Zetzner, 1619), 259.
161
Christian Gilbertus de Spaignart, Theologisch Wächterhörnlein/ oder Warnung/ Wider das
eingelegte Fewer/ der selbst gewachsenen newen Propheten und Rosencreutzbrüder/ damit sie sich
unterstehen die Christliche Kirchen anzuzünden/ und abzubrennen (Wittenberg: Berger, 1620),
sig.)()(iir.
162
See the thorough study by Allyson F. Creasman, Censorship and Civic Order in Reformation
Germany, 1517–1648: ‘Printed Poison and Evil Talk’ (London: Routledge, 2016).
163
Bubenheimer, ‘Schwarzer Buchmarkt in Tübingen und Frankfurt,’ 149–63; Ulrich Eisenhardt,
Die kaiserliche Aufsicht über Buchdruck, Buchhandel und Presse im Heiligen Römischen Reich
Deutscher Nation (1496–1806). Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Bücher- und Pressezensur.
(Karlsruhe: C.F. Müller, 1970); H.-P. Hasse, ‘Bücherzensur an der Universität Wittenberg im 16.
Jahrhundert,’ in 700 Jahre Wittenberg: Stadt–Universität–Reformation. S. Oehmig, ed. (Weimar:
Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger, 1995), 187–212.
164
Andreas Merck, Trewhertzige Warnung fürm Weigelianismo Darinn angezeigt Grund und
Ursach/ Worbey und warumb man den Weigelianischen Schwarmgeist/ für irrig und verdampt
erkennen und halten/ auch ernstlich und eyferig hassen und meiden solle (Halle: Peter Schmidt für
Michael Oelschlegel, 1620); Spaignart, Theologische Wachterhörnlein, sig.)()(iir.
political, poetic, or astrological writings, then these ‘worldly’ texts were typically not
submitted to a theological censor, but to an authority responsible for ‘mundane’
books. An example of is provided by annual astrological practica.165 These were
pamphlet-sized calendars, showing phases of the moon, eclipses, feast days, and
other practical matters. Often the Schreibkalender were accompanied by prognostica-
tions of an astrologer, who would include meteorological predictions concerning the
harshness of the forthcoming winter, damaging storms, the meaning and significance
of the various eclipses, and other matters. As Johannes Kepler observed, ‘No kind of
book under the sun sells so many copies, each and every year, as the Schreibkalender
and prognostications of a celebrated astrologer.’166 Yet an astrological calendar could
also transmit more controversial material. The popular annual Prognostications and
Schreibkalender of Paul Nagel, for example, regularly contained optimistic apoca-
lyptic material after ca. 1617, and thus placed controversial religious ideas in the
hands of thousands of unsuspecting purchasers of each edition. Robin Barnes has
shown how the works of David Herlicius (ca. 1557–1636) were similar in their
nature.167 A second issue was that some authors of controversial writings, such as
Paul Nagel, took advantage of personal connections to usher works into print. In
1621, Nagel authored a Wächterbuchlein, an extensive apologia against a series of
attacks by the Danzig astronomer Peter Crüger (1580–1639).168 Although it contained
a substantial quantity of theological material, including optimistic apocalyptic expec-
tations, Nagel sent the work to the minor poet and censor Cunrad Banau, who was
employed by the Leipzig city council to read and approve ‘worldly’ publications.169
A third compounding issue was that there were several printers who were all too
willing to print controversial theological works for prophets and profits. Their activ-
ities are often documented by theologians and after-market censorial bodies who
detected ‘heterodox’ doctrines in printed works and hunted down those responsible.
The most well-known example is the case of the Tübingen printer and bookseller
Eberhard Wild. In 1622, Wild’s assets were frozen and his possessions seized fol-
lowing an inquisitorial trial led by theologians at the University of Tübingen.
Documents in Wild’s possession revealed that he had sold or was in possession of at
least 278 deviant religious titles in the period between 1614 and 1622, including
many eschatological works—such as Rosicrucian books and a text by Wilhelm Eo
165
Concerning these practica see Barnes, Astrology and Reformation; Green, Printing and
Prophecy; Klaus-Dieter Herbst, Verzeichnis der Schreibkalender des 17. Jahrhunderts (Jena:
HKD, 2009).
166
Johannes Kepler, Tertius Interveniens. Das ist/ Warnung an etliche Theologos, Medicos und
Philosophos, sonderlich D. Philippum Feselium, daß sie bey billicher Verwerffung der
Sternguckerischen Aberglauben/ nicht das Kindt mit dem Badt außschütten/ und hiermit ihrer
Profession unwissendt zuwider handlen (Frankfurt: Tampach, 1610), sig. A3v. On the close nexus
between these practica and the distribution of prophecies in the pre-reformation period see Green,
Printing and Prophecy, 109–130 and passim.
167
Barnes, Astrology and Reformation, 279–283.
168
See Peter Crüger, Send-Brief an den achtbaren und wohlgelahrten Herrn M. Paulum Nagelium,
weltberühmten Theologastronomum Cabaloapocalypticum in Meissen (Danzig: Hünefeldt 1621);
Peter Crüger, Rescriptum Auff M. Pauli Nagelii Buch Dessen Titel Astronomiae Nagelianae
Fundamentum verum & principia nova (Danzig: Hünefeldt 1622), sig. Dd3v.
169
Leipzig UB, Ms. 0356, fols. 52v–53r (Nagel to Arnold Kerner, 29 April 1621).
Neuheuser—which he had vended ‘in large quantities’ (Ballen weiß) to more than
90 customers in Tübingen, as well as in Leipzig, Stettin, Rostock, and in Austria.170
That Wild possessed customers abroad suggests, on the one hand, that optimistic
apocalyptic literature might have been difficult to purchase in some areas of the
Holy Roman Empire. However, it also demonstrates that networks of communica-
tion, linked by post or by person, existed specifically in order to distribute contro-
versial religious publications.
Wild’s enterprise returns us again to the question of the commercial distribution
of controversial religious writings. There is a variety of evidence that indicates the
widespread availability of these works to the public. First, many pamphlets, such as
almost all those of Paul Nagel, Felgenhauer, and Johann Kärcher, were printed with
woodcut illustrations on their title pages. (Fig. 2.1) This suggests not only that it
was worth a not-insubstantial investment on behalf of the printer or publisher to
commission a unique woodblock for any one pamphlet, but also that the resulting
pamphlets were displayed openly to prospective customers in public places. This is
a circumstance confirmed by Jacob Böhme’s observations in Dresden in May 1624,
when he saw these books displayed publicly.171
A second indication that optimistic apocalyptic works were available to the pub-
lic was that the trade in eschatological literature was demonstrably profitable to at
least some printers, publishers, and booksellers. Some firms were in a position to
commission or pay authors for producing original controversial works. The Halle
printer Christoph Bißmarck, for example, paid a fixed rate (Gebühr) for the provi-
sion of texts by Paul Nagel, which was evidently paid in addition to a percentage of
the profits after the works were printed and sold.172 It was thus worth Bißmarck’s
while to ensure a steady flow of vendible copy from the controversial prophet.
Thirdly, other printing practices incorporated paratextual techniques to heighten
what might be described as brand recognition. For example, the success of Valentin
Weigel’s books on the commercial market appears to have prompted numerous
imitations, including the printing of pseudo-Weigelian works and texts issued under
similar names, like ‘Uldriacus Wegweiser.’173
170
Stuttgart, Landeskirchliches Archiv, A 26, Bd. 728, 20 Nr. 10; Bubenheimer, ‘Von der
Heterodoxie zur Kryptoheterodoxie,’ 307–311. See further the studies of Bubenheimer and Dieter
Fauth cited in the introduction and the bibliography.
171
Böhme, Sämtliche Schriften, vol. 9, 61.8 (Letter to Kober, 15 May 1624), 62.8. (Letter to Kober,
“Sonntage nach Christi Himmelfahrt” 1624).
172
Leipzig, Universitätsbibliothek, Ms. 0356, 76r (Nagel to Kerner, 4 November 1623) concerning
a withheld payment for his pseudonymously-printed Trigonus Igneus (1623), and Bißmarck’s
retention of profits from sales of one of his Schreibkalender.
173
Stuttgart, Landeskirchliches Archiv, A 26, Bd. 728, 20 Nr. 10. For example, the Latin tract
Astrologia Theologizata, Hoc Est: Quod Externus Homo Cum Omnibus Operibus, Quantumvis
lumine naturae in omni scientiarum genere splendidus, deponi, abnegari & plane emori: Internus
Autem Per Lumen Gratiae Assumi, Confessione & vita praedicari, & soli Deo ad regni coelestis
haereditatem capiendam vivere debeat (Frankurt: Johann Bringer 1617), authored by an ‘anony-
mous theosopher’, was printed in German translation as [Pseudo-]Valentin Weigel, Zweiter Theil
deß Gnothi Seauton/ Heisset Astrologia Theologizata, Auff den Andern Theil des Menschen die
Seel nemblichen/ so auß dem firmament formieret/ geführet und gestellet. (Newenstadt: Knuber,
1618). See also Wernle, ‘Ein Traktat Karlstadts,’ 319–320. On the production of Pseudo-Weigelian
literature more generally see Pfefferl, ‘Die Überlieferung der Schriften Valentin Weigels,’ passim.
Fig. 2.1 Paul Nagel, Tabula aurea (No Place: No Printer, 1624). (Title page. Courtesy of Houghton
Library, Harvard University)
The evidence strongly indicates that optimistic apocalyptic expectations were

not only finding their way into print, but they were being sold to persons with no
access to scribal publications. A final piece of evidence helps to show that these
publications were not only being read, but were also being engaged with, and
actively inspiring the expression of further optimistic expectations among a broader
public. This evidence is provided by the intensification in the production of printed
works concerning optimistic apocalyptic ideas between 1600 and 1630 (Fig. 1, p.
xxiii). Only one edition arguing for a coming future felicity was printed in 1600, yet
by 1620, this production reaches a peak of 26 editions of such works. This suggests
not only an increased market for the literature, but a corresponding increase in indi-
vidual authors prepared to set their ideas in print additionally suggests that others
were reading and responding to them in kind. This uptake is mirrored in the accounts
of several Lutherans, including Paul Kaym and others discussed above, who in their
books and letters mentioned the works of other contemporary prophets, and who
collected apocalyptic manuscripts, pamphlets and broadsheets.
The evidence available concerning the printing of controversial apocalyptic
material suggests that some interest beyond profit on the part of the printer and
publisher was common, if not a precondition, for its production. Penalties for print-
ers subverting censorship laws were stringent, and could involve fines, confiscation
of equipment, and other penalties.174 The decision to print works without prior
approval of censors was one not taken lightly. In November of 1623, Andreas
Mamitzsch (d. 1652) in Gera was approached by Abraham von Einsiedel (1571–
1642) a patron of Paul Nagel, in order to set in print several works, including an
attack on the theologian Georg Rost. Mamitzsch refused, perhaps considering the
rewards which came with the production of this material too small to risk his liveli-
hood.175 Mamitzsch was not alone; Matthäus Merian in Frankfurt was similarly
wary of the consequences of publishing such tracts in the 1630s.176
Yet there were others who threw themselves wholeheartedly into the production
of such literature. There was, for example, Johann Francke in Magdeburg,177 or
Christoph Bißmarck, whose profitable enterprise in Halle an der Saale has already
been mentioned.178 Hailing from Dahlenwarsleben, Bißmarck arrived in Halle as the
successor of Erasmus Hynitsch (d. 1611), a printer of mathematical and astronomi-
174
See further Creasman, Censorship and Civil Order, passim; Bubenheimer, ‘Schwarzer
Buchmarkt’.
175
Leipzig UB, Ms. 0356, 76v (Nagel to Kerner, 4 November 1623); ‘Ich hab ihm [sc. Abraham
von Einsiedel] etzlicher schön tractaten mit nach Geraw geben, ob er sie in truck bringen könte. In
einen wird den Rostio auff seinem Heldschatz ausführlich geantwortet und 62 errores im selben
buch erweisen.’ On Mamitzsch see Christoph Reske, Die Buchdrucker des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts
im deutschen Sprachgebiet. Auf der Grundlage des gleichnamigen Werkes von Josef Benzing. 2.
überarbeitete und erweiterte Auflage (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2015), 314.
176
See Merian to Unknown (Johann Theodor von Tschesch?), 24 October 1637 in Matthaeus
Merian d.Ä. Briefe und Widmungen. Lucas Heinrich Wüthrich, ed. (Hamburg: Hoffmann und
Campe, 2009), 40–42.
177
On Francke, see Albrecht Kirchhoff, ‘Ein speculativer Buchhändler alter Zeit: Johann Francke
in Magdeburg,’ Archiv für Geschichte des deutschen Buchhandels 13 (1890): 115–176; H. Schletter,
‘Ein Preßproceß gegen den Magdeburger Buchhändler J. Franck in der Leipziger Ostermesse
1591. Beitrag zur Geschichte des Buchhandels und der Literatur aus der Periode der kryptocalvin-
istischen Streitigkeiten. Nach den Akten,’ Mitteilungen der Deutschen Gesellschaft zur Erforschung
vaterländischer Sprache und Alterthümer in Leipzig 1 (1856): 16–30; Leigh T.I. Penman,
‘Paraluther. Explaining an Unexpected Portrait of Paracelsus in Andreas Hartmann’s Curriculum
vitae Lutheri (1601),’ in Religion, the Supernatural and Visual Culture in Early Modern Europe.
An Album Amicorum for Charles Zika. Jennifer Spinks and Dagmar Eichberger, eds. (Leiden:
Brill, 2015), 161–186 at 176.
178
On Bißmarck see Reske, Buchdrucker, 354; Karl Gustav Schwetschke, Vorakademische
Buchdruckergeschichte der Stadt Halle (Halle: Gebauer, 1840), 65–66.
cal material who had issued works by Johannes Kepler. Some of these books were
published by Joachim Krusicke (fl. 1601–1620), a publisher with offices in both
Halle and Danzig.179 In 1609 Krusicke commissioned Hynitsch to print works by
Valentin Weigel. Bißmarck, who married Hynitsch’s widow and inherited his print-
ing presses in December 1611, continued Krusicke’s program. Yet because these
publications proved theologically controversial, after 1614 Weigel’s works began to
appear with a false address and publisher on title pages, ‘Neustadt für Johann
Knuber.’180
The earliest publications under the Knuber imprint were Weigel’s Gnothi Seauton
(1615), followed by his Informatorium (1616) and two editions of his Dialogos de
Christianismo (1616 and 1618). The false ‘imprint’ expanded. The Swede Johann
Bureus’s (1568–1652) work of apocalyptic Rosicrucianism, Ara Foederis Theraphici
F.X.R. (1616), and a reprint under Weigel’s name of Andreas Karlstadt’s Principal
und Haupt Tractat von der Gelassenheit, originally written in 1522, followed shortly
thereafter. Lucas Jennis in Frankfurt also issued books under the ‘Neustadt’
imprint.181 In 1625 and 1626, however, the Knuber name was co-opted by opponents
of the new prophets and Welt reformatorn, and at least two works were issued under
the imprint which indicted them and their expectations.182
The use of a false printer’s addresses represents what Gerard Génette has
described as a ‘threshold’ of perception, a marker extraneous to the text itself that
nevertheless influences a reader’s approach to its content.183 But it also represents a
practical effort by printers and publishers to mislead and confound censorial author-
ities, as well as to communicate matters of symbolic value. Between 1610 and 1626,
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser had nearly all of his tracts printed under the fictive address
‘Friedwegen bei Samuel Ehafft’ and variants.184 As documents relating to
Neuheuser’s expulsion from Straßburg in 1626 demonstrate, several of these pam-
phlets were printed in that city by Marx von der Heyden (1593–after 1648).185 A
179
On Krusicke see Josef Benzing, ‘Die deutschen Verleger des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts. Eine
Neubearbeitung,’ Archiv für Geschichte des Deutschen Buchwesens 18 (1977): 1077–1322 at
1196; K. Lohmeyer, ‘Geschichte des Buchdrucks und Buchhandels im Herzogtum Preußen (16.
und 17 Jahrhundert),’ Archiv für Geschichte des deutschen Buchhandels 18 (1896): 29–140; 19
(1897): 179–304.
180
Variants include ‘Newenstadt’, ‘Neuwenstadt’ and similar.
181
Bubenheimer, ‘Schwarzer Buchmarkt’, 149–163; Viskolcz, Reformációs Könyvek, passim.
182
Jeorg Brenna, Krempel-Marckt Der Hochwitzigen/ Glarwürdigen Gottweisen Welt reformatorn,
und tiefferleuchten Brüdern vom Rosen-Creutz: Auff welchem Allerhand ubel gute/ verlegne/ und
längst verdampte Ketzerwaaren außgelegt/ und außgebutzt/ bloß umb einen Schilling/ allen
hochtrabenden fürwitzigen Feld- und Weltkindern verkaufft werden / dem wahren Christenthumb
zu trewhertziger warnung entdeckt (Newenstatt: Knuber, 1625); Germanus, Der siebenden
Apocalyptischen Posaunen, von Offenbarung verborgener Geheimnussen Heroldt.
183
Gérard Genette, Paratexts: Thresholds of Interpretation (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1997).
184
Derivations include ‘Fridberg’, ‘Friedberg’, etc.
185
Strasbourg, Archives de la Ville, 1 R 108 fol. 185r. On Marx von der Heyden see Reske,
Buchdrucker, 978.
Conclusion 71
typographical comparison of these with Neuheuser’s other tracts bearing the

‘Friedwegen’ imprint, demonstrates that at least three other printers, their locations
unknown, had also availed themselves of the imprint. Felgenhauer’s polemical
works against the Lübz court preacher Georg Rost were probably printed in
Magdeburg, but carried the name ‘Wahrenburgk’ on their title pages. The three vol-
umes of Felgenhauer’s Flos Propheticus (1621–22) were printed in ‘Neostadt’ by
‘Johann Piscator.’186 Not only do the ‘Neustadt’, ‘Neostadt,’ ‘Friedberg’ and
‘Wahrenburgk’ addresses evoke images of liberation, truth, and freedom—one of
the central messages of new prophets—but also the ultimate city, the celestial New
Jerusalem of Revelation 21. As such, these addresses comprise in themselves a
coded optimistic apocalyptic expectation.
Conclusion
By the early seventeenth century there were numerous proponents of optimistic

eschatology within Lutheran confessional culture. The paths to the expression of
such convictions were diverse, ranging from perceived personal crises of faith to
intellectual inclinations. In all cases, their proponents were influenced by the tradi-
tions discussed in chapter one. The ideas of these figures flourished within textual
communities that engaged in scribal publication, but which also reached the broader
public through the medium of print. The consumption of this published material by
readers inspired in turn the further expression of optimistic apocalyptic expecta-
tions. But although the prophecies and the intricacies of their convictions varied,
this was a time in which, as Philipp Ziegler wrote in 1624:
All prophets are of the opinion that the ruin of the Roman Empire is imminent, the destruc-
tion of the spiritual antichrist, the universal reformation of the world is rushing onward
bringing with it the constitution of the kingdom of Israel, both spiritual and corporeal in the
most holy third age of the Holy Spirit, otherwise the time of messianic peace.187
The lot of Lutheran critics was not easy, as one anonymous figure lamented in 1624:
‘the reborn Christian is made out to be a devil or a fool, despised, and is hounded
from his land and people.’188 But to the supporters of their message of a coming
felicity, their goal was both noble and essential for the flourishing of true Christianity:
‘See! This is the Pentecostal School, the Whit-School of the Holy Spirit, in which
all men should be raised and become true Christians and Enthusiasts.’189
186
[Felgenhauer], Flos Propheticus. In quo adaperitur Testimonium de veritate Jesu Christi, in
Leone Silentij et Rugiente. 3 vols. (Newstadt: Piscator, 1622), sig. A1r.
187
Cited in Gibson, ‘Apocalyptic and Millenarian Prophecyin EarlyStuart Europe,’ 75.
188
Schola Spiritus Sancti (1624), 11.
189
Schola Spiritus Sancti (1624), 10.
Chapter 3
Two Prophetic Voices
Optimistic apocalyptic expectations could vary considerably in their nature and

scope. The present chapter considers in detail the expectations of two major new
prophets of the early seventeenth century; the Torgau astrologer Paul Nagel and the
wandering prophet Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser. In a series of printed and manuscript
works authored from around 1600, both men articulated dramatically different
expectations concerning the nature and character of the coming Golden Age. Where
Nagel anticipated a time of spiritual respite, Neuheuser awaited wide-scale political
change. Both prophets, however, drew extensively on ruptures in the ‘three worlds’
of religion, politics and nature to inform their visions, and cited with regularity the
works of prophetic contemporaries and older authorities like Paracelsus and Julius
Sperber. The apocalypticism of both figures appears to have existed in a space
between eschatological expectation and devotional supplication. A consideration of
their cases emphasises that apocalyptic expectations could create a point of cer-
tainty in an unstable social, political, and natural world, which could provide solace
and hope in a time of crisis.
The Prophet of Torgau
In September of 1617 Saxon church inspectors arrived in the picturesque town of

Torgau on the river Elbe.1 Shortly after commencing their inquiries, the inspectors
heard talk of a certain Magister Paul Nagel, an astrologer who had recently begun
to express ‘strange paradoxes.’ This Nagel had not partaken in the sacraments for
several months. He had not attended church services. It was said that he studied the
books of Valentin Weigel and the German mystics. It was also said that he made
1
Wernigerode, Landesarchiv Sachsen-Anhalt, Abteilung Magdeburg, Rep. A 29b, II Nr. 35, 578r-v,
581v-582v. (Hereafter cited as Wernigerode Ms.).

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_3
74 3 Two Prophetic Voices
prophecies, and regarded himself as the ‘third Elias.’2 Naturally, Nagel himself
could explain everything. His absence from church was due to illness, and, although
he had heard of them, Nagel denied all knowledge of Weigel’s heretical theology.3
Concerning the mystics, Nagel admitted that he was an avid reader. He urged his
interrogators to practice Gelassenheit, and to read the Theologia Deutsch, a work
for which, Nagel reminded them, Luther himself had written an edifying preface.
Nagel insisted that true Christianity ‘was not wholly dependent on its outward rites.’
In order to be truly devout, he claimed, one had to allow Christ to dwell bodily in
the believer. Apparently satisfied with these responses —if not entirely convinced
by them— the inspectors cautioned the astrologer to attend church more regularly.
They allowed him to go free with a stern warning, although they reserved the right
to refer the case to the head superintendent.4
Yet where there is smoke, there is often fire. A few short months after their visit,
Nagel published a Prognosticon Astrologo-Cabalisticum for the year 1618 which
‘touched upon several secrets and arcana of astronomy.’5 This was a tract that, in the
author’s own words ‘even seemed to raise the ire of the Devil.’6 Less than a year
later, after a mighty comet had burned brilliantly in the night skies above Europe in
November and December of 1618, Nagel issued his Stellae Prodigiosae (1619), a
two part work in which he sketched a complex astrological-prophetic system. Based
on proofs derived from scripture and the heavens, Nagel argued that a time of future
felicity for the church, led in spirit by Christ himself, would dawn in the wake of the
great conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter in the fiery trigon of Leo, Aries and
Sagittarius in 1623.7 This Golden Age would endure just 42 years, until the Last
Judgment occurred in 1666. Nagel went on to publicise his expectations in a series
of more than thirty books and pamphlets, most of which found print between 1619
and 1627. Outraged theologians and natural philosophers stridently condemned his
works, and Nagel quickly became one of the most notorious contemporary critics of
orthodox Lutheranism. And all of this, from a man who was raised as a devout
Lutheran, and who at one point was a student in Leipzig and Wittenberg, twin bas-
tions of Lutheran orthodoxy in Saxony, the homeland of Luther’s Reformation.
Nagel’s apocalyptic worldview was not a spontaneous reaction to a comet or the
beginning of the Thirty Years’ War. Nor was it prompted by a feeling of being mis-
treated by Lutheran authorities in 1617. The roots of his worldview had instead been
2
Wernigerode Ms., 581v.
3
Wernigerode Ms., 582r.
4
Wernigerode Ms., 582v.
5
Paul Nagel, Ander Theil Complementum Astronomiae und Ausfürliche Erklerung des fünffjähri-
gen prognostici 1619. (Halle: Bißmarck 1620), sig. C4v.
6
No exemplars appear to be extant. For the assessment see Paul Nagel, Prognosticon astrologicum
aus rechtem warhafftigen astronomischen Grunde gestellet vnd gerichtet auff das Jahr … M.
DC.XX. (Leipzig: Nerlich [1619]), 14. Cf. Leipzig UB Ms. 0356, 97r (Nagel to Kerner, 20
November 1618).
7
See especially Paul Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologo-Harmonicum Super tres vel plures etiam
annos conscriptum. Ausfürliches Prognosticon vber drey oder mehr Jahr beschrieben von 1620.
(Halle: Bißmarck, n.d. [1620]).
The Prophet of Torgau 75
growing for decades. Nagel was born in Leipzig sometime between 1575 and 1580.
He matriculated at Leipzig university in 1593 in order to study liberal arts.8 On 24
September 1605, he received his magister artium in mathematics in Wittenberg.9
Shortly thereafter, he found employment as an astrologer and private tutor.10 A typi-
cal product of his Lutheran background and education, already by this time Nagel
possessed a deep eschatological awareness. In 1605, while in the tiny estate of
Dallwitz in Saxony, he printed his first tract, Himmels Zeichen, which was a belated
reaction to the new star of 1604 and the great conjunction of 1603. Demonstrating
his adoption of the pessimistic eschatology inherent in the Lutheran worldview,
Nagel suggested that the coincidence of the astronomical events confirmed that the
Last Judgment was imminent.11
In all that it diverges from his later expectations, Nagel’s Himmels Zeichen estab-
lished an enduring feature of his apocalyptic expectations; a belief in the influence
of heavenly bodies as an alternative to scripture. This approach was undoubtedly
shaped by the literature Nagel collected, read and absorbed during his university
years, much of which emphasized the interdependence of the twin books of scrip-
ture and of nature. Since at least 1603 Nagel had read, copied, and authored astro-
logical and natural philosophical tracts, including texts on magic and alchemy.12 A
manuscript volume penned by Nagel and preserved today in Halle contains excerpts
from Gerolamo Cardano (1501–1576) on astrological practice, portions of the
pseudo-Paracelsian Archidoxes magica, excerpts from Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa’s
De occulta philosophorum Libri tres (1533) concerning magical languages, and an
alchemical-astrological-metallurgical recipe for smithing a sword identical to that
carried by Paracelsus. Thus by 1605 Nagel was already in contact with genres of
writing that had the capacity to inform a quest for greater insight into the End Times,
as well as to challenge his pessimistic apocalypticism.
In 1609 Nagel arrived in Torgau.13 In addition to producing annual astrological
practica for the city of Leipzig, Nagel also authored works of predictive astrology
influenced by Paracelsian cosmology, such as Catoptromantia Physica (1610) and
Chiromantia Meganthropi (1611). Toward the end of 1611 Nagel established con-
tact with Prince August of Anhalt-Plötzkau, a reader and collector of Rosicrucian
and controversial religious works. In the Plötzkau castle library, Nagel encountered
8
Georg Erler, Die jüngere Matrikel der Universität Leipzig, 1559–1809. Band I. Die
Immatrikulationen vom Wintersemester 1559 bis zum Sommersemester 1634 (Leipzig: Giesecke &
Devrient, 1909), vol. 1, 310. On patronage from the city of Leipzig, see Paul Nagel, Catoptromantia
physica. Divinatio ex speculo astrologico. Das ist: Gründlicher Bericht und natürliche Weissagung
aus der … umbwaltzung des kugelrunden himlischen Gewelbes und gestirneten Firmaments, etc.
(Leipzig: Nerlich, 1610), sig. B4r.
9
Bernhard Weissenborn, ed. Album Academiae Vitebergensis. Jüngere Reihe. Theil 1. (1602–1660).
Magdeburg: Niemeyer, 1934), vol. 1, 35.
10
Paul Nagel, Astronomiae Nagelianae Fundamentum verum & principia nova: In welchem durch
etzliche Fragen sonderliche Geheimnus proponirt und reserirt werden. (No Place: No Printer,
1622), sig. L2r.
11
Nagel, Astronomiae Nagelianae Fundamentum verum, sig. C4r.
12
Halle UB, Ms. 14 B 31.
13
Nagel, Catoptromantia Physica, sig. B4r.
writings that would change his apocalyptic expectations decisively. In 1612 or 1613,
more than a year before its first printing, Nagel there transcribed a copy of the
Rosicrucian Fama Fraternitatis from a manuscript provided by the Tyrolean Adam
Haslmayr.14 He also prepared copies of anonymously-authored explications of
Revelation and Daniel, as well as anticlerical works directed not only against
Calvinists and Catholics, but against doctrinal Lutheranism.15 Nagel’s Explicatio
oder Auszwicklung der himmlischen Kräffte (1613) demonstrates that he had gener-
ous access to the works of Valentin Weigel, both genuine and spurious, several years
before they first appeared in print. There he implored his readers to ‘read studiously
and attentively the Gebetbüchlein of that most learned man Valentin Weigel, con-
cerning how one may pray in spiritu & veritate; Also his little tract about the old and
new Jerusalem, which reports on how the stars and signs of heaven govern us.’16
Although Nagel here emphasized the devotional and astrological significance of
these books, both Weigel’s Gebetbüchlein and the pseudo-Weigelian Von dem
Himmlischen Jerusalem contained apocalyptic musings concerning a future felicity,
to which Nagel was also undoubtedly exposed. In a portrait first prepared in 1614,
and recut for a later Prognosticon of 1619, Nagel boldly advertised his advocacy of
Weigel’s mystical theology (Fig. 3.1) by prominently displaying the maxim γνῶθι
σεαυτόν (know thyself), which derived from Weigel’s work of the same name.17 By
late 1612 or early 1613, therefore, Nagel was already espousing a philosophy at the
very least influenced by Weigelian principles, and was reading optimistic apocalyp-
tic tracts.
Nagel had learned of these works through contact with networks of scribal pub-
lishers, prophets, and manuscript traders. He had known the Silesian physician
Balthasar Walther since at least 1610, and it was likely Walther who introduced
Nagel to the Thuringian antinomian Esajas Stiefel.18 In addition to the Leipzig phy-
sician Arnold Kerner, Nagel also knew Abraham von Einsiedel in Tieffenau bei
Wülknitz, a Saxon noble who periodically experienced terrifying apocalyptic
14
London, Wellcome Institute, Ms. 150, 129r-139r. On August’s court see further Gilly, Adam
Haslmayr, passim.
15
Most critical of contemporary Lutheranism is a tract titled ‘Der Menschen Zustandt, so künftig
ist,’ in London, Wellcome Institute, Ms. 150, 42v-51v.
16
Paul Nagel, Explicatio oder Auszwicklung der himmlischen Kräffte/ Aus rechtem Fundament und
Grunde der Astrologischen Kunst/ ohn alle Superstition, Heucherley und Argwohn oder
Aberglauben … gerichtet auff das Jahr … IVDICIVM. (Leipzig: Nerlich, 1613), sig. D1r. The
works referred to are Valentin Weigel, Ein schön Gebetbüchlein, Welches die Einfeltigen vnter-
richtet. (Newenstatt: Johann Knuber, 1617), and [Pseudo-]Weigel, Vom Alten und Newen Jerusalem
Das ist/ Das alle Gleubige beydes im Alten und Newen Testament mit ihren Füssen stehen müssen
in den Thoren Jerusalem/ das ist in der Stadt Gottes wandeln unnd nicht darneben. (No Place: No
Printer, 1619), A4vff.
17
Weigel, Gnothi Seauton (1615).
18
Walther contributed a piece of occasional poetry to Nagel’s Chiromanthia meganthropi sive sig-
nature microcosmi. Das ist: wie aus der Signatur oder Zeichen der grossen Welt der Macrocosmi
erwiesen wird. (Leipzig: Nerlich, 1611), sig. [D4v], signed as ‘B.VV. Jun.’
The Prophet of Torgau 77
Fig. 3.1 Paul Nagel,

portrait from the title page
of his Prognosticon
astrologicum (1619).
Woodcut. Courtesy of
Houghton Library, Harvard
University
visions.19 By 1618 or 1619, Walther had introduced Nagel to figures surrounding the
Lusatian theosopher Jacob Böhme.20 In addition to printing several sections of
Böhme’s unprinted ‘Morgen Röte im Aufgang’ (1612) in his Prodromus astrono-
miae apocalypticae (1620), Nagel prepared handwritten copies of Böhme’s tracts,
and dedicated several works to Böhme’s noble supporters.21 It is tempting to con-
nect these individuals to the development of Nagel’s optimistic expectations,
inasmuch as many of them advocated similar views on the apocalypse, and tracts
were copied and shared among the group.
Like many other Lutherans, Nagel also searched far and wide for insight into the
Last Days, including in sources by members of other religious confessions. His
works cited sixteenth-century authorities like Sperber, Eustachius Poyssel,
Guillaume Postel, and Philipp Nicolai. In 1618, he sought out works by Robert
Fludd (1574–1637) and the Jesuit Ludovico Carbone (1545–1597) to illuminate his
expectations.22 The ultimate result of this searching and pondering are clear. Nagel
19
On Einsiedel see Valentin König, Genealogische Adels-Historie oder Geschlechts-Beschreibung.
3 vols. (Leipzig: Deer, 1727–1736), vol. 1, 280–282. His visions are briefly referenced in Colberg,
Das Platonisch-hermetische Christenthum, vol. 1, 264.
20
See Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 36r (30 September 1621) and fol. 40r (21 October 1621) describ-
ing visits by Walther.
21
Nagel, Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae, sigs. C1r–C2v; Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 21r
(18 November 1620); Penman, ‘Paul Nagels Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae,’ 101–130.
22
Ludovico Carbone, Interior Homo, Vel De Suiipsius Cognitione: Opus novum. (Cologne: Peter
Henning, 1617–18) is mentioned by Nagel in a letter of 20 November 1618 (Leipzig, UB Ms.
0356, fol. 98v) and additionally in Paul Nagel, Philosophia Novae Astronomiae nostrae particular
insignis. Von dem Reich der Natur (No Place: No Printer, 1621), sig. A4v.
ultimately developed optimistic apocalyptic expectations. Simultaneously, his faith

in the Lutheran church and doctrine soured. As his manuscript Löwen Gebrüll (c.
1620-1) demonstrates, although Nagel recognised Luther as an important prophetic
figure, he believed—like his contemporary Paul Felgenhauer—that the Reformer’s
mission had been betrayed by the institutionalized church that bore his name.23
Nagel’s adoption of optimistic expectations was likely conditioned not only by
his intellectual convictions and the contacts he had made. The desirability of antici-
pating a time of future felicity was perhaps accelerated by worsening conditions in
Europe. The Bohemian Revolt broke out in 1618, and would turn into the Thirty
Years’ War. The appearance of a foreboding comet in the night sky at the end of
1618 only encouraged Nagel’s public expression of his convictions, and he issued a
handful of tracts concerning the changes it portended.24 External pressures were
paired with Nagel’s personal circumstances. In his letters to Kerner after 1618,
Nagel made frequent reference to reoccurring illnesses that left him myopic, with
‘great pains in his hands, arms and legs.’25 These illnesses threatened not only
Nagel’s physical integrity, but also his finances, for it meant that he was unable to
provide astrological nativities for clients, or collect revenue earned from the sale of
his annual astrological calendars.26 In September 1621, Nagel complained to Kerner
that the entire town was suffering under ‘inflation that ever worsens,’27 product of
the infamous Kipper und Wipper period. Nagel also occupied a precarious social
position in Torgau. In 1617 he complained that ‘the people here accuse me of so
many things that I can scarcely believe it when I hear about them.’28 Nagel’s letters
to Kerner offer a bleak picture of social ostracism. In 1619 he remarked that he
battled not only against his illnesses, but also against his ‘many enemies’ in the
town.29 In the early months of the same year, Nagel was summoned to Wittenberg to
account for his convictions before authorities.30 Pressure from church authorities
not only provoked spiritual and personal angst: heavy financial punishments were
also meted out, which Nagel found impossible to pay.
23
Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Ms. Cgm 4416/9, fols. 41r, 191r-191v & passim.
24
Paul Nagel, Stellae prodigiosae seu Cometae per oculum triplicem observation & explication:
Das ist: Des newen Cometen und Wunder Sterns im October, November und December 1618
erschienen/ warhafftige Deutung und Außlegung per Magiam insignem. 2 vols. ([Halle]:
[Bißmarck], 1619); Paul Nagel, Des newen Cometen und Wundersterns im October, November und
December 1618. erschienen/ wahrhafftige Deutung und Außlegung per Magiam insignem, derglei-
chen zuvor nicht gesehen: Allen Menschen auff Erden zur guten Nachrichtung und Warnung fürg-
estellet, ([No Place]: [No Printer],1619).
25
Some examples from Nagel’s correspondence include Leipzig UB Ms. 0356, 7r (24 July 1619)
and 52r (29 April 1622).
26
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, 8r, 10v, 19v, 74v, 76r refer to Nagel’s provision of nativities, the final
reference being to a set of three ordered by the alchemist Michael Sendivogius for the princely sum
of 100 Reichsthalers. On 38v, Nagel makes reference to teaching ‘Geometria’ at the home of
Abraham von Einsiedel. Although the assertion is repeated throughout the secondary literature,
Nagel was never Headmaster of the Torgau Latin School.
27
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 37r (21 September 1621).
28
Wernigerode Ms., fol. 582v.
29
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 7r (24 July 1619).
30
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 7r.
Crisis and Transcendence 79
Gradually, as Nagel refused to heed the warnings of his interlocutors, friends,

and neighbours, and continued to issue pamphlets which promoted his vision of a
future golden age, the noose tightened. In early September 1622, Nagel voiced a
fear that his mail was being intercepted by parties conspiring against him.31 He may
have been right. Scarcely 10 days later, following an inquisitorial procedure, Nagel
had to endure the humiliation of a second public hearing and penance. He narrowly
avoided expulsion from Saxony. Worst of all, his wife Maria, perhaps finally tired of
the troubles of conscience and social pressures provoked by her husband’s activi-
ties, had betrayed his true beliefs to the inquisitors.32 According to his own account,
Nagel was effectively alone, mired in depression and under ‘attack from friend and
foe alike.’33
Despite this, Nagel never gave up hope that his apocalyptic predictions for 1623
would ultimately prove correct. Early in 1623, Nagel celebrated the imminent
change in humanity’s fortunes in his Trigonus Igneus (1623), a pamphlet issued
under the pseudonym ‘Paul Sonnenschein,’ in which he announced that the golden
age had begun to dawn, but may take until 1630 to reach its zenith.34 Nagel didn’t
live to see the disappointment of his expectations. He died late in 1624, perhaps as
the cumulative result of his many illnesses, and was interred without ceremony in
Torgau on 4 December 1624.35
Crisis and Transcendence
The foregoing sketch provides a case in point for recognizing the nuanced impact of
crisis on expressions of optimistic apocalyptic expectations. Much of the ground-
work of his eschatological expectations was laid in Plötzkau and elsewhere well
before the more general crises of war, inflation and famine that struck the Holy
Roman Empire after 1618, and seemingly even before his life as disrupted by a
series of personal crises. However, if crisis therefore played only a limited role in
encouraging Nagel’s early interest in dissenting religious doctrines, I contend that it
played a substantial role in influencing Nagel’s decision to openly publicize these
ideas in print, as well as the form of their expression.
31
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 62r (12 September 1622).
32
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fols. 64r-64v (22 September 1622), describing the hearing to Kerner.
33
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 64v.
34
Paul Sonnenschein [Paul Nagel], Trigonus Igneus, Was derselbe mit sich bracht in vergangenen
Zeiten. Und was auch solcher fewriger Triangul, neben der grossen Conjunction … bringen werdt
(No Location: No Printer, 1623). Nagel confirms his authorship of the tract in Leipzig, UB 0356,
fol. 76r (4 November 1623).
35
On Nagel’s death and burial, see Dresden, Sächsische Landes- und Universitätsbibliothek, MS
d1, fol. 487r (Michael Böhme, Chronik von Torgau (ca. 1627). Further J. Chr. A. Bürger, Friedrich
Joseph Grulicks Denkwürdigkeiten der altsächsischen kurfürstlichen Residenz Torgau
aus der Zeit der Reformation. second ed. (Torgau: Friedrich Jakob Wienbrack, 1855), 130.
The nature and characteristics of Nagel’s mature prophetic system itself com-
prised a reasoned reflection of and response to the crises around him. If crisis means
chaos, disorder, and uncertainty, then Nagel in his apocalyptic expectations sought
to find the antitheses of these conditions. In each of his printed works, beginning
with the Prognosticon astrologo-cabalisticum of 1617, the chief recurring element
in Nagel’s prophetic work was a desire to posit order by identifying infallible ‘rules’
that demonstrated beyond doubt that a period of spiritual felicity, and thus release
from the anxieties of the time, would commence shortly after 1623. While a desire
for astrological certainty was also a feature of traditional Lutheran eschatological
reckonings, the quest to impose order upon chaos in Nagel’s works drew upon two
separate experiential factors.36 Firstly, there were external factors. These consisted
of prophetic patterns Nagel identified in the natural world, such as the twin books of
nature and scripture, parts both of a prophetic continuum documented with refer-
ence to Daniel, Revelation and 2 Esdras. Second, there were internal factors: a per-
sonal, deep-seated dissatisfaction with the state of the world and Lutheran orthodoxy,
which arguably reflected the new emphasis on individual Christian practice follow-
ing the Frömmigkeitswende.
Troubles in both areas would be overcome in Nagel’s apocalyptic kingdom,
which was based on the inspiration of the School of the Holy Spirit. Drawing on the
works of Julius Sperber and others, Nagel saw this school, which he believed had
existed, invisibly, since the time of Christ, as the ultimate answer to the deficient
state of the world: ‘It is the duty of the Holy Spirit to provide us with comfort, to
remind us of what Christ said, to lead us to truthfulness, and to tell us what the
future awaits,’ declared Nagel.37 Nagel was relentlessly critical of the quotidian
world. For Nagel, the teachings of ‘heathen’ astronomers and orthodox Lutheran
doctrinalists was faulty and incomplete, and in no way described true religiosity.
Nagel compared Lutheran scholastics with the fractious scorpions of Revelation
9:3. Their wisdom was directed not toward revealing the truth about the coming
times and preparing the faithful for them, but instead for the glorification of their
own reputations. By passing on to his readers the insights into nature and scripture
that he had learned in the School of the Holy Spirit, Nagel offered to readers a hope-
ful vision that bypassed the corruptions of worldly authority.
As such, the majority of Nagel’s works after 1617 predicted that the great con-
junction of 1623 would initiate a spiritual Golden Age in the hearts of true Christians.
He described the precise nature of the event variously, which was partly a function
of its inherent mystery. Nagel’s coming apocalyptic kingdom, the ‘regal summer’ in
which ‘all devout Christians will be redeemed’ was, like that of Weigel, one to be
36
Barnes, Astrology and Reformation; Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 154–155. This ‘distinctive
Lutheran attitude toward astrology arose from the need to retain prophetic certainty in a time when
the whole evangelical heritage seemed increasingly threatened. Luther’s heirs sought comfort in
the idea that every event, no matter how upsetting, was necessary for the completion of the divine
plan.’
37
Nagel’s Prognosticon for the year 1621 as cited in Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3,
54: ‘Nota bene, das amt des heiligen Geistes ist, daß er uns tröstet, alles erinnert was Christus
geredet, in alle wahrheit leitet, und uns verkündiget, was künfftig ist.’
The Universal Instrument 81
understood spiritually, albeit with worldly repercussions.38 Heralded by the ‘roaring

lion’ of Revelation 10, it would last only a short time comprising ‘a Golden Age, a
true golden time […] in which the golden peace, love, fidelity, justice, understand-
ing, wisdom, truth, modesty, holiness and fear of the Lord will exist.’39 This future
time was partly supported by the prophecy of the Millennium in Revelation 20.
Nagel rejected the notion that this Millennium had occurred historically, for not all
prophecies concerning the Last Days had yet come to pass.40 With a pure heart, a
reader of his works could see ‘that Christ will possess a special kingdom or order
upon earth.’41 Those who believed that this vision consisted of chiliastic heresy,
Nagel claimed, spoke against the most manifest testimony of scripture.42
Nagel’s prophetic trump card was the book of nature. Nagel argued that the fir-
mament was also a scripture, and God had used it to describe the whole course of
human history.43 With reference to Agrippa, Nagel declared that in the Book of the
Heavens one could ‘read the Scriptura Malachim, the true writing of the Angels‚’
which, however, ‘no man can understand until he lives angelically, and follows in
the footsteps of Christ.’44 Indeed, Nagel’s apocalyptic goal was to bring knowledge
of the stars and scriptural prophecy ‘in harmony and consensus.’45 Or, as he stated
in another tract, ‘Revelation is our true astronomy, and our astronomy is the true
Revelation.’46
The Universal Instrument
Nagel attempted to prove and to test the rectitude of his expectations in several
ways. Outside of his theosophical masterpiece the Tabula aurea (1624), rarely did
Nagel’s books present anything radically different from those they followed. They
38
Nagel, Prognosticon astrologicum aus rechtem warhafftigen astronomischen Grunde gestellet
vnd gerichtet auff das Jahr … M.DC.XX., sig. B2v; Cf. Nagel, Tabula Aurea, sig. C4v.
39
Paul Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologicon Auffs Jahr 1625 In Welch nicht allein die vier zeiten des
Jahrs…beschrieben, sondern auch aus apocaliptischer Astronomia mit fließ beschrieben wird, was
in diesem und nachfolgenden Jahren zu gewarten. (Erstlich Gedruckt zu Hall in Sachsen/ bey und
in verlegung Christoff Bißmarck [1624]), sig. B3r: ‘so wird hierauff folgen und angehe[n] auff
eine kleine zeit/ ein gewünschtes Seculum so wir nen[n]en ein secula aureum, eine recht güldene
Zeit … ein Seculum temperantissimum, darin floriren wird die gülde Fried/ Lieb und Trew/
Gerechtigkeit/ Verstand/ Weisheit und Warheit/ Keuschheit/ Heiligkeit und Furcht des HErren.’
40
Leipzig, UB, Ms. 0356, fol. 97v (20 November 1618).
41
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologo-Cabalisticum auff das jahr MDCXX, 27.
42
Leipzig, UB, Ms. 0356, fol. 98v (20 November 1618).
43
Nagel, Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae, sig. C3v.
44
Nagel, Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae, sig. C4r. The alphabet is also in Nagel’s MS com-
pilation in Halle, UB, Ms. M 14B 31, fol. 13r.
45
Nagel, Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae, sig. D1r.
46
Nagel, Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae, sig. D1v: ‘Denn die Apocalypsis ist unser war-
hafftige Astronomia, und unsere Astronomia ist die wahrhafftige Apocalypsis.’
were all filled with a bewildering selection of geometrical, kabbalistic and

mathematical figures, culled from the Bible and elsewhere, dedicated to proving
that the Golden Age would soon dawn. Already in 1622 Nagel could write, with
some justification, that he had ‘tested these matters [concerning the Golden Age] so
diversely in my writings that I can scarcely believe that there are some who remain
blind, and cannot acknowledge or see the certainty and truth of my prophecies.’47
Nagel’s intricate chronological investigations were admired by some contempo-
raries, including, it is said, by Johann Arndt himself.48 By tethering the mysteries of
the Holy Spirit to a series of complex numerical equations, Nagel reduced, in a
conceptual sense, the mysteries of the Godhead to a sort of spiritual mathematics.
However, there was one numerical object that Nagel prized above all others. This
was a mystical number that would provide the answer to the riddle of life, the uni-
verse and everything. Nagel called this the ‘royal instrument’ (königliches
Instrument). It may be seen as the ultimate manifestation of the axiomatic trend in
Nagel’s thought, and therefore the clearest manifestation of his desire to discover
and impose order, purpose and hope in the phenomenal world.
As Reinhard Breymayer (1944–2017) has pointed out, the idea of a universal
instrument appears to have stemmed from religious literature of the late sixteenth
century.49 Nagel’s initial inspiration appears to have been the pseudo-Paracelsian
Archidoxis magicae (c.1570), which contains mention of a speculum constellatione,
a tool of catoptromantic divination prepared under specific zodiacal influences and
called elsewhere in that work a ‘königliches Instrument.’50 It is likely that Nagel
associated this Paracelsian speculum with other traditions. For example, he also
knew works of Eustachius Poyssel, who wrote of a Key of David (Schlüssel Davids)
in several tracts that seemed to possess similar qualities.51 In 1621, the pseudo-
Weigelian Zwey schöne Büchlein […] von dem leben Christi, which may have
been circulating in manuscript for some years prior, referred allegorically to a
47
Paul Nagel, Wächterbuchlein vnd Letztes Stundgeschrey wie hoch es am Tage sey, vnd vmb
welche Stunde des Nachts … Wird auch zu Ende M. Philippo Arnoldi … geantwortet (No Place: No
Printer, 1622), sig. G2v.
48
Friedrich Breckling, ‘Catalogus testium veritatis post Lutherum continuatis huc usque.’ [n.d.,
1690s?] in Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 4, 1096: ‘M. Paulus Nagelius ein Adeptus
Astrologus, der viele wunderbahre schrifften zum verstand der mystischen Astrologie herauß
gegeben, und darin von dem sel. Joh. Arnd hochgehalten ist.’
49
Reinhard Breymayer, ‘Das Königliche Instrument. Eine religiös motivierte meßtechnische
Utopie bei Andreas Luppius (1686), ihre Wurzeln beim Frührosenkreuzer Simon Studion (1596)
und ihre Nachwrikung beim Theosophen Friedrich Christoph Oetinger (1776),’ in: Das andere
Wahrnehmen. Beiträge zur europäischen Geschichte. August Nitschke zum 65. Geburtstag gewid-
met. M. Kintzinger et al., eds. (Vienna: Böhlau, 1991), 509–532.
50
For the text see Paracelsus, Sämtliche Werke, vol. 14, 479–485; Nagel copied this interesting
section in one of his manuscripts, see Halle UB, Ms. M 14b, 31ff.
51
Paul Nagel, Cursus Quinquenalis mundi. Wundergeheime Offenbarung, deß trawrigen unnd
betrübten zustands, welcher in Nechstkünfftigen Jahren sich begeben soll (Halle: Bißmarck 1620),
sig. E2v.
The Universal Instrument 83
plumb-line, right-angle and divider, ‘by which all things might be measured, be they
in the kingdom of God, or whether they stem from it.’52
It must be said that Nagel’s conception of the universal instrument, which was
informed by his close reading of Revelation 11:1-2, was more coherent than any of
his forerunners. Nagel identified it as a golden rule (güldene Meßstab) that could
reveal the deepest secrets of heaven and earth, including the homo interior and
scripture. Nagel stated that this omnipresent instrument reached from the earth right
up to the upper waters of creation, it exceeded the powers of all human tools, and
could not be bought with gold or silver. Connecting directly to Nagel’s ruminations
on the School of the Holy Spirit, he declared that possession of the instrument was
a gift of God, and that it could only be grasped by those who had studied Valentin
Weigel’s Gnothi Seauton.53 The discovery of the golden measure was therefore the
ultimate confirmation of the rectitude of Nagel’s prophetic system. It was the proof
of an imminent release from the chaos and crises of the world; a guarantee of hope.
Although Nagel had suspected the existence of an apocalyptic ‘golden measure’
as early as 1619, he was consistently unable to identify it, and occasionally expressed
doubts concerning its existence.54 But in December and January of 1619 and 1620,
Nagel realized that the number he required was hidden in plain sight. Just as Nagel
had concluded that the heavens were ‘nothing other than a book written by the glory
of God,’55 he determined that the basis of his reckonings must have something to do
with the physical size of the planet earth. Nagel calculated the circumference of the
earth’s equator to 5,614 German miles (approximately 35,930 kilometres). Vastly
inaccurate though it was, this result proved to be revelatory. For the number 5,614
coincided precisely with Nagel’s chronological conjecture that the world would
endure 5,614 years between creation and the Last Judgment. This coincidence of
geography, sacred history, chronology, biblical prophecy and astronomy was
impossible for the prophet to overlook, and confirmed 5,614 as the güldene Meßstab,
the ‘secret wonder-number’ which he had so long sought.56
Nagel’s discovery was written up in a lengthy manuscript composed in 1620,
under the dramatic title Raptus Astronomicus (Astronomy seized).57 Although an
abbreviated version appeared posthumously in 1625, the text was printed in its
entirety in 1627 in two small octavo volumes.58 Within its pages, the significance of
52
See further the remarks by Breymayer in Oetinger, Biblisches und emblematisches Wörterbuch,
vol. 2, 327–328.
53
Nagel, Cursus Quinquenalis mundi, sig. B3r.
54
Nagel Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae, sig. B1v-B2r, F1v.
55
Nagel Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae, sig. C3v, F1v.
56
For further ‘proofs’ see Nagel, Philosophia Novae Astronomiae, sig. K2v.
57
Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Cod. 15,392 Nr. 1, fols. 1r-151r.
58
Paul Nagel, Raptum Astronomicum, Das ist: Hinderlassene Entdeckung und Beschriebung eines
rechten und uber Königlichen Instruments … (No Place: No Printer, 1625); Paul Nagel, Raptus
Astronomicus Das ist Astronomische gewisse warhafftige Prophecey und Weissagung/ aus dem
Ersten/ Andern und Dritten Himmel/ wie solche darinn befunden worden. 2 vols. ([Lüneburg?]:
[Stern?], 1627).
5,614 as the ‘key’ to prophecy was demonstrated by numerous kabbalistic, gemat-

ric, magical and mathematical arguments. For example, with reference to the time,
times and half time of Daniel 12:7, Nagel began with the year 1604 (the date of the
new star and great conjunction) as the ‘time’, added 3,208 (twice 1,604, the ‘times’)
and finally 802 (half a time) in order to again confirm the 5,614 years which creation
would supposedly endure.59 For Nagel, these interdependent ‘kabbalistic proofs’
demonstrated beyond all reasonable doubt the existence of an underlying magical
system of the world which, when combined with eschatological expectations, justi-
fied any and all of Nagel’s pronouncements. His was a self-legitimating, infallible
holy system that united all fields of thought and religions, and was a far cry from the
hypocrisy, the ‘disputes and squabbling (Schwätzerey)’ conducted by representa-
tives of the ‘churches of mere walls’ (Mauerkirchen), all of whom insisted on per-
secuting Nagel and his readers for a variety of heresies.60 In short, Nagel offered his
readers hope for the future, and a delivery from chaos.
The Role of Hope
Nagel’s vision of a coming Golden Age was by no means elitist. While some of his
prophetic contemporaries, like Esajas Stiefel, abandoned themselves to messianism,
Nagel shunned the attention that came with his revelations, and turned away would-
be disciples who visited him in Torgau.61 Between 1617, when he first expressed his
hopes for the future in open print, and 1624, when he died, Nagel printed more than
thirty books and pamphlets on the subject of the forthcoming paradise. While these
works often contained polemic against his many enemies, as a whole they might be
considered as a herald to a new kind of Lutheran practical piety. In the last work
printed during his lifetime, his Prognosticon auffs Jahr 1625, Nagel wrote to his
audience of the necessity of possessing the ‘divine gold’ (aurum divinum), which,
in a sense similar to alchemical transmutation, could redeem and purify the indi-
vidual in a new birth, allowing him to leave behind the old Adam and be reborn in
Christ.62 According to Nagel, there could be no other way forward. For those who
do not strive for this gold and rebirth ‘are desirous to remain resigned in Sin and in
the old birth […] they shall have no part in this [forthcoming new] age, and there-
fore they will be judged alongside the beasts.’63
Although Nagel polemicized against individual theologians who opposed his
work, and against the stale doctrinal disputes that dominated the Lutheran faith, he
59
Nagel, Raptus Astronomicus, vol. 1, sig. D4r.
60
Nagel, Prognosticon Auffs Jahr 1625, sig. A4v.
61
Leipzig UB, 0356, fol. 31v (Nagel to Kerner, 30 July, 1621).
62
On the role of rebirth in Nagel’s though and those of his contemporaries, see Mike A. Zuber,
‘Spiritual Alchemy from the Age of Jacob Boehme to Mary Anne Atwood, 1600–1900’,
Unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Amsterdam, 2017, 114–129.
63
Nagel, Prognosticon Auffs Jahr 1625, sig. B3r.
A Prophet Between Utopia and New Jerusalem 85
never outright rejected the Lutheran confession in which he was raised. Like
Valentin Weigel before him, Nagel’s vision of a future spiritual harmony was not
intended to function in opposition to the general teachings of Lutheranism, but
rather to reform, nuance, and improve them. Some of Nagel’s doctrines were con-
sidered heretical by his orthodox counterparts, including Philipp Arnoldi (1582–
1642), Georg Rost, and others. However, Nagel himself never stated that he was
anything other than a Lutheran, and although his vision of future harmony and felic-
ity was decidedly influenced by spiritualist doctrines, Nagel’s apocalyptic faith
thrived precisely because of its roots in Lutheranism.
A Prophet Between Utopia and New Jerusalem
In 1584, the Austrian city of Steyr, located on the banks of the river Enns south-east
of Linz, was in a state of constant and unbearable uncertainty. Fear of marauding
Ottoman platoons had necessitated the implementation of Turkgebete––prayers
against the Turks––to be recited daily.64 A year prior the thriving mining industry
which had comprised Steyr’s economic backbone since antiquity had been debili-
tated by a trade monopoly operated by the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, who
was simultaneously engaged in a bid to eradicate Lutheranism from Steyr. The city
had been visited regularly by pestilence, flooding and flame. Even the incontrovert-
ible march of time itself seemed suddenly under attack: in 1583 the Gregorian cal-
endar reforms were implemented throughout Styria.65 To the relatively young
Lutheran community of the area the atmosphere was one of intense anxiety. The
persecution of this community by the Babylonian Catholic church was surely a sign
that the Last Judgment was near.
History has demonstrated that many great quests to make sense of the divine
begin with a single, inexplicable moment: a bolt of inspiration, a premonition, or a
flash of mystical light. From Ignatius Loyola’s (1491–1556) epiphany in Manresa to
Jacob Böhme’s insight into nature granted by the sheen of a pewter vessel in morn-
ing sunshine, these moments have inspired lifetimes’ work. And so it was in the
midst of Steyr’s uncertainty that a young metallurgist walking on the bank of the
river Enns heard the voice of God.66 Given the uncertain nature of Steyr’s economic,
social and religious future, this encounter with the numinous was also fittingly lim-
inal. It took place just outside the city’s heavily fortified walls, in the village of
Ennsdorf. The voice emerged from the churning waters of the Enns, Styria’s princi-
pal boundary marker, at its confluence with the river Steyr.
64
Franz Xaver Pritz, Geschichte der Stadt Steyr und ihrer nächsten Umgebung (Steyr: Ennsthaler,
1967; original ed. 1837), 147.
65
Pritz, Geschichte der Stadt Steyr, 222.
66
The episode is recounted in Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Mysterium tabulae quinque vocalium … Das
it/ Das Geheimnus der Taffel/ der fünff vocalien A.E.I.O.V. insonderheit deß E der königlichen
Teutschen Stimmen des Lebens/ so mir EO im Jahr Christi 1584. Bey dem Ensfluß in Oesterreich/
erst geoffenbaret worden. (Friedwegen: Samuel Ehehafft, 1619), 3–5.
The audient was a young man named Wilhelm Eo, called Neuheuser. For some
three years prior to this audition, Neuheuser had spent much of his time poring over
scripture, in an attempt to find answers to the chaos that engulfed his world.67 When
he later wrote an account of this vision in his Mysterium tabulae quinque vocalium
of 1619, 35 years after its occurrence, Neuheuser announced that he was chosen on
that day to become an instrument of God. Indeed, he was none other than the second
Noah prophesied by Luther, who would erect Daniel’s fifth monarchy and establish
the Kingdom of God on earth.68 The corruption and chaos of Steyr demonstrated
that the fall of the Holy Roman Empire was imminent, and Neuheuser believed that
in its place there would rise a new political body: for where ‘one empire ends,
another begins, and the first raises the next to a true Christian empire of God.’69
Neuheuser’s account in the Mysterium suggests that he emerged from his revela-
tion of 1584 with a fully-conceived vision of a future political kingdom, as well as
his role as its prophet. But the account of 1619 cannot be trusted, inasmuch as it
reflects Neuheuser’s mature apocalyptic worldview. In a different work, written
some 20 years earlier, he recalled a ‘voice of life’ that opened the heavens and
revealed to him a vision not of a future apocalyptic kingdom, but of the mysterious
powers of the five vowels and yet more things ‘unintelligible or seemingly without
sense.’70 And it was indeed ‘without sense’ that Neuheuser emerged from his audi-
tion in 1584. The questions that plagued him were probably typical for anyone who
believes they have come into contact with the numinous. What was he to do with this
Godly message? What did it all mean? Neuheuser would admit that his experience
of 1584 had caused him immense doubt, anxiety, joy and depression. He had been
awoken to a godly mission, and ‘already understood powerful, important things,
which prophesied a great change.’ But while being thus chosen made Neuheuser
joyful, ‘after this beginning there was a long time, consisting of many years of work
and toil, before I finally understood its essence,’ and only then ‘all could be fulfilled.’71
67
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Consideratio et enarratio brevis de nova stella seu cometa: Das ist, Sehr
wichtige Betrachtung doch in mögeligster kurtze Erklährung uber den newen Stern oder Cometen.
(Friedwegen: Ehafft, 1619), 3. Neuheuser stated that he had pored over the secret figures of the
Bible ‘von meiner jugendt auff, bevor nun in acht und dreissig Jahr her, fleissig geübt.’
68
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Mystica tempora patefacta, das ist: Gründliche Erklärung und
Offenbahrung der geheimen unnd Verborgenen Zeit unnd Zahl, in heyliger Schrifft mehr Orten
gemelt … biß zu dem friedelichen Reiche und Stande gantzer Christenheit … erfüllet worden.
(Friedenburg: Ehafft, 1623), sig. D4v; Neuheuser, Mysterium tabulae quinque vocalium, 4–5.
69
Neuheuser, Mysterium tabulae quinque vocalium, 4–5.
70
Neuheuser, Consideratio et enarratio brevis de nova stella seu cometa, 7.
71
Neuheuser, Mystica tempora patefacta, sig. A2r-v: ‘Als ich nun vor vierzig Jahren von 1584. an/
durch GOttes Gnade diß lernete verstehen/ bey anderen geheimen Sachen so auch ihre Zeit haben/
da machete ich mir ein Symbolum/ oder Spruch und Schluß von der Zeit so mich antraff/ Das laut
also: Zeit hat weile/ Weile hat Zeit. Diß sagte und dichtete ich teils mit frewdigkeit/ und theils mit
Trawrigkeit unnd Verlangen/ dann ich verstunde damals schon mächtige grosse Sachen/ die wol da
Zeits zu grosser Verenderung geweissagt/ den Christen zu gutem ein Anfang hatten/ und deßhalben
mich erfreweten/ aber nach dem Anfange war doch noch ein lange Zeit/ die viel Jahr und Tages
Zeit in sich begreifft/ so mir viel Mühe und Arbeit Werde machen/ ehe und dann die Hauptsache
so mir bewust/ noch aller konnte erfüllet werden/ […] jedoch mit Hoffnung shickete ich mich inn
die Zeit/ daß ich mit Frewden die heylsame Zeit vorher nach benannts hohe Werck zu gantzer
Christenheit Heyl/ erreichen werde.’
Neuheuser’s path from his divine audition in 1584 to his later revelations concerning
the Holy United Roman Empire was therefore not straightforward. An examination
of the nature of Neuheuser’s journey from confused audient to apocalyptic prophet
affords considerable insight into the preconditions that might have contributed to the
development of Neuheuser’s views of a forthcoming felicitous future.
Neuheuser left Steyr shortly after his divine encounter. For the next decade he
wandered Europe, supporting himself from income earned from his natural-
philosophical expertise. In 1587 Neuheuser was in Braunschweig dealing in amu-
lets that could supposedly cure illnesses and protect its wearers from evil. The next
year, he found a fist-sized lump of eye-agate off Barth in the Baltic Sea, which he
presented to Duke Boguslow XIII (1544–1606) after subjecting it to chymical puri-
fication.72 Around 1589 Neuheuser worked in mines in Eisleben, Mansfeld and
‘Karlswasserbad’ (Karlsbad, Karlovy Vary) in Bohemia.73 Thereafter he appeared,
often only briefly, in Nuremberg, Marburg, Balingen, Schwäbisch Gmünd, the
Wetterau district, Heidelberg, Speyer, Straßburg, Ansbach, and Basel.74 Neuheuser’s
experience in matters alchemical and metallurgical was so great that, in 1612, he
was reportedly in possession of a ‘secret minting order’ in the Palatinate.75
Neuheuser also likely earned money by offering his services as a lay physician
and healer. His medical talents, so he claimed, were honed by practical experience
(viel geübter Erfahrung), and daily study of Paracelsus’ works, which he harmon-
ised with Galenic principles.76 During his travels Neuheuser not only sold amulets,
regularly he had cause to create and sell medicaments to treat various illnesses.77 In
written works, Neuheuser cited chemists and physicians like Paracelsus, Galen (2nd
century CE), Johannes Montanus (1531–1604) of Striegau (Strzegom), Oswald Croll
(ca. 1563–1609), Hieronymus Bock (1498–1554), Anselm de Boot (1550–1632),
72
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima. In Drey Theil getheilt. Das ist, Eine
Natürliche aus wol und viel geübter Erfahrung aller fürnemsten Edlengesteinen Beschreibung:
Welcherley Naturen ein jeder Edelgestein/ aus der Physica, als Inneren seiner Eigenschafft und
Wesen/ mit anderen Gewächssen/ bevor den Metallen und Mineralien/ befreundet/ und ihnen ein-
verleibt sey (No Place: No Printer, 1621), 132.
73
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Declaratio, oder Erklärung. Uber eines Fürtrefflichen Türcken
Prophezeyung/ so der Türcken Untergang unnd Bekehrung zum Christlichen Glauben meldet: in
seiner eigen Sprach vor vielen Jahren selbst gestelt und hinderlassen (No Place: No Printer, 1605),
sig. B3r-v; Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima, 62.
74
Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima, passim.
75
Hannover, NLB, Ms. IV 341, 315: ‘Wilhelm Eö Neüheuser zue Heidelberg. Will Kaiser sein,
author summj et sanctj Imperij, so anno 1607 angangen. Spiritum phantasticum habet, hat ein
bsondere Müntzordung vnder der handen, dixit Benedictus Figulus anno 1612. Obijt.’ See further
Paulus, ‘Alchemie und Paracelsismus um 1600,’ 341.
76
Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima, 61, 46–47. Of Paracelsus and Galen, Neuheuser wrote
‘daß beyderley Medici recht haben.’ Cf. Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Das Regal auch Tav. T ‫ ת‬Siegfahnen
und Kriegsheer Büchlein … (Friedwegen [Straßburg]: Samuel Ehafften [Marx von der Heyden],
1620), 60.
77
Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima, 73, 134, with mention of ‘täglich Praktik der
Medicorum.’
Conrad Khunrath (ca. 1555–1613), Hermes Trismegistus, and others.78 He even

made occasional reference to a small but handsome library that must have contained
choice medical, alchemical and metallurgical tracts.
It was in 1593 that the decisive prophetic turn occurred, as Neuheuser was in
Leipzig.79 Inspired by Daniel 11, Neuheuser began to prophesy that the war against
the Ottomans that had recently commenced, now known as the ‘Long War’ (1593–
1606), would soon conclude. Neuheuser’s declaration was based on a supposedly
ancient Turkish prophecy which declared that Constantinople would fall after a
1000 years of dominance.80 As Mohammed had appeared ca. 600 CE, Neuheuser
prophesied that the war would end in 1600. This optimistic prophecy created a small
sensation in Leipzig. Buoyed by his positive reception, in early January 1594
Neuheuser set his thoughts in print ‘for the good of all Christians.’81 During a visit
to Basel later that same year, he purchased from booksellers a number of prophetic
tracts and broadsheets that would decisively shape his vision of the Holy United
Roman Empire. Informed by his Lutheran upbringing, Neuheuser increasingly
began to see the world and history itself as a matrix of prophetic possibilities. Yet
how Neuheuser himself fit into these plans remained unclear. Although he claimed
to speak with God’s ‘spirit of truth’ (John 16:13), and set pen to paper several times
in the late 1590s, these works demonstrate that Neuheuser experienced significant
anxiety concerning his own role in these divine plans, if any.
This can be demonstrated with reference to Neuheuser’s second major work, Tau
‫ ת‬The est vox vitae signum veritatis (1602).82 Following the success of his Turkish
prophecy and inspired by the writings of Jacopo Brocardo, Neuheuser began a
series of abstruse investigations of scripture utilising a rudimentary Christian kab-
balism. As its title suggests, Tau argued that the Hebrew ‫ ת‬was a ‘sigil of Godly
truth.’83 Examining Revelation, Neuheuser posited that ‫ת‬, as the final letter of the
Hebrew alphabet, was equivalent to the German z and the Greek Ω. Thus, when
Christ declared that he was ‘the first and the last, the alpha and the omega’
(Revelation 1:8, 22:13) Neuheuser argued that he was expressing a divine truth
immediately transferable across tongues. For Neuheuser, this correlation demon-
strated the existence of an underlying harmonic structure in history, language and
faith. However dubious the evidence for this conviction may have been, we can
78
Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima, 103, 121 and passim.
79
For the following see Neuheuser, Declaratio, oder Erklärung. Uber eines Fürtrefflichen Türcken
Prophezeyung, sig. B3r-v.
80
Bartholomaeus Georgijévic, Erzelung der Türckischen Keiser/ Namen/ Empter/ Leben/ Sitten
und Tyranney in irem Reich/ daraus zusehen/ wie einrechtig sie bey samen halten/ alle die jenigen
auszurotten un[d] zu dempffen (Wittenberg: No Printer, 1560), 106–116.
81
Two editions of Declaratio are extant. The first is dated 2 January 1594 (sig. C1v), exemplars of
which are preserved in Harvard, Göttingen and Regensburg. A second, corrected edition was
printed in ‘Erfordt’, and is dated 19 January 1594 (sig. C2r), an exemplar of which is in Budapest,
Országos Széchényi Könyvtár, Röpl 338. Cf. Reske, Die Buchdrucker des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts,
225.
82
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Tau ‫ ת‬The est vox vitae signum veritatis (Speyer: Vivet, 1602), sig. A1r.
83
Neuheuser, Tau ‫ ת‬The est vox vitae signum veritatis, 4.
perceive here one of the building blocks of what would eventually become an elabo-
rate prophetic system. Yet while his two earliest works contained vague ideas of
unity and a coming peace, Neuheuser was still some way away from formulating the
precise utopian program of the Holy United Roman Empire.
A major step in the development of Neuheuser’s expectations occurred in
Straßburg in 1604. There he made several enduring friends, and enemies, within the
city’s Schwenkfelder community, which centered on Daniel Sudermann
(1550-ca.1631).84 Reflecting upon Neuheuser’s visit some 20 years later, Sudermann
reported that ‘several years ago a rather learned man, named Wilhelm Eo, visited me
here in Straßburg. This man spoke of a revelation and stated that, without a shadow
of a doubt, within a short time a single belief would exist throughout the whole
world, or at least among all Christians.’85 While the prophecy of harmony was not
new within Neuheuser’s expectations, there is evidence to suggest that it was in
Straßburg that the prophet began to link his desire for concord with visions of a
felicitous future. Like Nagel before him, in 1604 Neuheuser issued a distinctly
Lutheran pamphlet interpreting the new star of 1604 and great conjunction of 1603
as a sign of the impending Last Judgment. However, scarcely a month after its pub-
lication, on 8 November, he authored a letter to a Straßburg patron that was very
different in tone.86 In it, Neuheuser openly expressed his desire for a ‘universal
Christian religious peace,’ the core belief of his later Holy United Empire project.87
Following Zwingli’s commentary upon Romans 11, Neuheuser argued that the con-
version of the Jews was imminent. This event would preface the defeat of the Turk,
resulting in a ‘universal consensus in religion.’88 Supporting his vision entirely with
Old Testament sources, Neuheuser made clear that the Judgment Day could not
come until all biblical prophecies had been fulfilled.89 In other words, Neuheuser’s
felicitous future would be worldly, and would take place before the Last Judgment.
84
On Sudermann and the community see Gritschke, Spiritualistische Lebenswelten; Monica
Pieper, Daniel Sudermann (1550-ca.1631) als Vertreter des mystischen Spritualismus (Stuttgart:
Franz Steiner Verlag, 1985), 36–39; Michael Schilling, ‘Flugblätter religiöser Dissidenten in der
Frühen Neuzeit,’ in Literatur und praktische Vernunft. Frieder von Ammon et al., eds. (Berlin and
Boston: De Gruyter, 2016), 61–84; Ernst Eylenstein, ‘Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil: Zum mystischen
Separatismus des 17. Jahrhundert in Deutschland,’ Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte XLI (1922):
1–62. Eylenstein’s work must be used with some caution.
85
Halle, Archiv der Franckeschen Stiftungen [hereafter Halle, FS] MS B20, fol. 110v: ‘Es ist vor
Jahren ein zimlich gelerter mann allhie zu Straßburg gewesen, auch zu mir kommen, mit namen
Wilhelm Eo, welcher sich einer Revelation berühmete, also, daß für gewiß, in Kurtze, durch die
gantze Welt, oder Christenthums, ein einzigen Glaube sol werden.’
86
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Tractatus: De Nova Stella; Oder Von dem newen Abent Stern Scheinende:
Durch sondere geheime eröffnungen heiliger Schrifft/ und dann auch in gleichheit der Zeit befun-
den erklert; Einem vertrawten Herren und guten in Kunte ersuchten Freundliebenden N. Offerirt,
(No Place: No Printer, 1604). The November letter was printed as an appendix to Wilhelm Eo
Neuheuser, Christus optimus aenigmaticus est: Ein … Tractat. Uber den Spruch Christi, Lucae am
18. capitel, erkläret … das derhalben vom heutigen Tag an, ein allgemeine Glaubens vereinigung
Göttliches Words in der gantzen Welt anfänget. (Marburg: [Hutwelcker], 1606), sig. C3v-D1v.
87
Neuheuser, Christus optimus aenigmaticus est, sig. C3v-C4r.
88
Neuheuser, Christus optimus aenigmaticus est, sig. C4v-D1r.
89
Neuheuser, Christus optimus aenigmaticus est, sig. C4r.
Unsurprisingly, this vision was not met with universal praise. Ignored by
Straßburg’s divines, Neuheuser was challenged by the Schwenkfelders. One of
these was the former Lutheran pastor Daniel Friedrich (d. bef. 1610). In a 1607
report circulated to Daniel Sudermann, he rejected Neuheuser’s vision of a future
‘consensus religionis throughout the entire world’ as reeking of Catholic universal-
ism and comprising a ‘secret unity and community with Satan’ (verborgene
Einigkeit und gemeinschafft mit dem Sathan).90 Neuheuser appears to have departed
Straßburg shortly thereafter, although he maintained lasting contacts in the city,
such as with the printer Marx von der Heyden. By May 1605, he was living in
Marburg, where he remained until mid 1607.91 There Neuheuser authored several
tracts ultimately printed by Rudolf Hutwelcker (d. 1621), in which he preached
about the imminent conversion of the Turks and Jews, and, inspired by Luke 18,
elaborated an irenic program that combined Lutheran and Zwinglian theology.92 In
one of these works, Neuheuser insisted that if all confessions recognized that scrip-
ture prophesied a unification of belief before the end of time, then the work of uni-
fication itself shall be ‘already half finished.’ This is because all sides will possess a
‘unified knowledge (Wissenschaft)’ by which to approach the problem, that itself
was granted by God.93
90
Halle, FS MS B20, fols. 101r-110v at 102r-103v; Daniel Friedrich, ‘Begreift in sich eine
Widerlegung des Vorgebens Wilhelmi Eo, von außerlicher Reformation der Kirchen; darin auch
angezeigt wird, was der einfältige Wille Gottes des Menschen halber gewesen sei, und wie selbiger
bei heutigen Reformieren der Kirchen wenig in Acht genommen werde. Datum Gerstein 1607, 30
April an D[aniel] S[udermann].’ On Friedrich see Gritschke, Spiritualistische Lebenswelten, pas-
sim; Ernst Eylenstein, ‘Daniel Friedrich (†1610). Ein Beitrag zum mystischen Separatismus am
Ende des 16. Jahrhunderts in Deutschland,’ Inaugural-dissertation. University of Tübingen, 1930.
91
Neuheuser, Consideratio et enarratio brevis de nova stella seu cometa, 20–21; For his presence
in Marburg before May 1607, see Neuheuser, Declaratio, oder Erklärung. Uber eines Fürtrefflichen
Türcken Prophezeyung (1605).
92
Neuheuser, Consideratio et enarratio brevis de nova stella seu cometa, 21. The Hutwelcker
tracts include Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Argumentum und General grundlicher Beweiß von dem
voreinigten Nachtmal Christi. Jtem, Wie jetzunt … alle Christlichen Religions Partheyen, in die-
sem General Wege … albereit viel einig sein (Marburg: No Printer [Hutwelcker], 1606); Neuheuser,
Christus optimus aenigmaticus est (1606); Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, De tribus fidei statibus muta-
bilibus. Oder Die drey wandelbaren Stende Christlichen Glaubens betreffende in H. Schrifft vor-
lengst Geweissaget. (No Place [Marburg]: No Printer [Hutwelcker], 1606). A further tract, Tuba:
Ein Tractat und nützliche Erklärung uber den Spruch Pauli, I Corinth. 11. Es müssen Irrfal oder
Secten kommen (Marburg: Hutwelcker, 1606) is no longer extant. See Georg Draud, Bibliotheca
librorum germanicorum classica, das ist: Verzeichnuß aller und jeder Bücher, so fast bey denckli-
chen Jaren in Teutscher Spraach von allerhand Materien hin und wider in Truck außgangen.
(Frankfurt: Johann Saurn for Peter Kopff, 1611), 247. On Hutwelcker, see Reske, Die Buchdrucker
des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts, 657–658.
93
Neuheuser, De tribus fidei statibus mutabilibus, sig. A2r: ‘Das wen man eigentlich auß Heiliger
Schrifft unnd deroselben weißagungen eröffnung/ weiß und vorstehen kan/ Das solche Universalis
Glaubens vor Einigung noch hie auff Erden/ Laut dem scheinlichen Willen Gottes volnbracht
müße werden/ und so man das bey jeder Christlichen Religions Parteyen und sonst allen Völckern/
klar verstehet/ unnd erwegen kan/ so ist die Einigung schon halber gemacht … Weil darinne
gedachte Parteyen unnd alle Völcker/ als balt [sic] einerley Wissenschafft können haben/ unnd also
hiemit haben werden.’
By 1606 Neuheuser’s apocalyptic expectations had become even more specific.

In his De tribus fidei statibus mutabilibus (1606), he linked Psalms 96 with Daniel 7
and 12 in order to argue that shortly ‘The Lord shall come to judge the earth, a mat-
ter which he will undertake justly, with respect to the people.’ Yet this did not repre-
sent the Day of Judgment, as Neuheuser might have declared as recently as 1604,
but instead a time of unification.94 Neuheuser’s optimistic expectations were strongly
informed by non-biblical traditions. For example, he employed the Talmudic idea of
the ‘world week,’ and wrote that the earth would stand only for 6,000 years. He also
employed a Joachite scheme to divide history into three separate ages.95 The most
recent of these, Neuheuser argued, had begun with the reforms of Luther,
Melanchthon, Zwingli and Calvin.96 This third and final age possessed two distinct
phases. The first phase, in which Neuheuser lived, embodied fragmentation and divi-
sion, which Neuheuser correlated with the prophecies in 2 Thessalonians 2:3 and
Daniel 11:4. The second phase, which would occur in the future, would witness the
prophesied period of concordia occasioned by the Word of God.97 By 1606, there-
fore, Neuheuser understood himself as a key prophetic figure in the apocalyptic
drama who would deliver the world to its ultimate phase. Indeed, he considered his
own pamphlets to be the fulfillment of the prophecy of the two witnesses of
Revelation 11:3. Neuheuser’s apocalyptic expectations reached their mature state in
the following year. After observing a comet blazing across the night sky while he
was in Marburg, Neuhueuser believed that his divine mission, which ‘had its begin-
ning in Austria’ could transition into its ultimate form.98 The year 1607, he declared,
was the first year of the Holy United Roman Empire. What Neuheuser meant by his
declaration was not that the prophesied future monarchy of Daniel had actually
dawned, but that this was the year in which he ‘first understood the doctrine or sub-
lime teaching of the Holy United Roman Empire, and began to articulate it.’99
94
Neuheuser, De tribus fidei statibus mutabilibus, sigs. A4v-B1v.
95
Neuheuser, De tribus fidei statibus mutabilibus, sigs. A2vff. The first age, lasting from 30 CE-ca.
800 CE represented a status evangelicus purus (A2v). The second period, lasting until the
Reformation, was designated the status permixtionis, sive abominationis, sive permiscibilis [sic],
an era of confusion, during which God’s word was set aside by Christians, and Islam came into
being (A3v).
96
Neuheuser, De tribus fidei statibus mutabilibus, sig. A3v.
97
Neuheuser, De tribus fidei statibus mutabilibus, sig. A4r.
98
Neuheuser, Mysterium tabulae quinque vocalium, 6: ‘Das erste heiligen Reichs Jahr / Da erkant
ich seine Lehr gar. / Zu Marpurg werth in Hessen Landt: / Da ich die erste machte bekandt. / Im ein
thousant sechs hundert rund / Und siebenden Jahr gemercket stund/ Am Himmel hoch ange-
schrieben/ Die Zeit gabs/ und ist verblieben: / Was in Osterreich Anfang nahm.’
99
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Ein Ewiger Beweiß unnd bleiblicher Grund, auß heiliger Schrifft zusam-
men gezogen, wie heiliger Schrifft Geheimnussen und Weissagungen recht zuverstehen, und dem-
selben hiedurch weiter nachzudencken sey (Friedberg: Ehafft, 1616), sig. A4r: ‘[S]intemal ich im
1607. Jar Christi/ gleich damalen empfangenen Doctrina oder hohenleher [sic]/ wissentlich entp-
fangen und verstanden/ unnd damit das erste Jahr heiligen Reichs gemelt und beschrieben habe.’
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Sacrosanctum et unitum Imperium sive Definitio quaedam singularis
de illo sacrosancto Imperio eiusque doctrinâ à Deo et ex sacris literis in tempore praesenti primum
plenariè patefacta atque cognosta. (No Place: In Officina Samueliana, 1618), 40–48.
The Seven Laws of the Holy United Roman Empire
It took more than 20 years for Neuheuser to develop a worldview in which he could
reconcile his divine audience of 1584 with the signs of the times. Between 1607 and
1626, Neuheuser issued at least twenty pamphlets, books, and broadsheets in both
Latin and German that advertised the Holy United Roman Empire. While this
expectation was clearly unorthodox, in many ways Neuheuser’s apocalypticism,
even during its mature phase, remained typically Lutheran. Neuheuser shared
Luther’s conviction that the entire human experience represented a time of unstint-
ing misery. Similarly, he insisted that the exact date (gewisse Jahrzahl) of the Last
Judgment could not be identified. Unlike many Lutherans who held optimistic
expectations, the prophet therefore found no comfort in, and refused to engage with,
chronological speculations. But Neuheuser’s expectations deviated from typical
Lutheran attitudes in other ways. He rejected, for example, the notion that the
Millennium of Revelation 20 had occurred historically.100 Inspired by the prophecy
of the world week, he awaited a Sabbath in which the ‘holy kingdom of Israel and
of Grace’ would dawn.101 This was the time of the Millennium that would com-
mence with the establishment of the Holy United Roman Empire.102
At a time when some apocalypticists preached the destruction of worldly institu-
tions as the necessary path to future felicity––consider Philipp Ziegler’s plan to
execute 300,000 members of the European nobility––Neuheuser’s utopian political
project was exceptional, and may have drawn on Postel and Brocardo. For him, the
most efficient path to establishing the Holy United Empire rested with winning the
support of rulers, electors and governors of the existing political order. Once this
was achieved, the necessary administrative infrastructure would be available to
implement his utopian plans. For this reason the majority of his works after 1607
were practical in nature, suggesting implementable social and legal measures neces-
sary for the establishment of the Holy United Empire. A prime example is one of
Neuheuser’s final works, a six-page quarto pamphlet titled Index Sacrosancti et uniti
Imperii (1626). On its opening page, Neuheuser declared that the fundamental dif-
ference between the forthcoming Holy United Empire and its ‘heathen’ predeces-
sors would be its foundation upon two pillars: godly and natural law.103 An Empire
100
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Vera quaedam temporis definitio, das ist: Ein gründtlicher Bericht, und
Erklärung uber die Sechstausendt Jahr, welche in dreyen Seculis … von der Schöpffung Anfange
… inn gemeiner Gloß muthmassende, darvor gehalten werden, daß die Welt so lang 6000. Jar auff
die ersten sechs Wercktage Genes. 1. stehen werde …. (Friedenberg: Samuel Ehafft 1616), sig.
A4v, an assertion supported by Peter 3:8. Cf. Leppin, Antichrist und Jüngster Tag, 132–136.
101
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, De lapide fortissimo qui imaginem Danielis capite II. devastabit, expli-
catio: Das ist: Erklärung von dem starcken Steine, der das grosse Bild Danielis … verstrewen wird
… welche das gegenwertige Röm: Teutsch zweyträchtige Reiche, zu … Verenderung gebracht …
werde. (Friedenburg: Ehafft, 1623), sig. D1v.
102
Neuheuser, Mystica tempora patefacta, sig. B1r.
103
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Index Sacrosancti Et Uniti Imperii, Sive Sanctae Monarchiae. Das ist/
Gründliche Anzeigung und Inhalt/ was unnd welches das heilige Haupt und vereinbarte Reich oder
Monarchia in seiner nothwendigen Beschreibung und Unterscheidt … an wichtigsten Sachen habe
…. (No Place [Straßburg]: No Printer [Marx von der Heyden], 1626), sig. A2r.
The Seven Laws of the Holy United Roman Empire 93
founded on these laws would enjoy a spiritual (geistliche) and political (politische)
perfection previously unattainable. To this end Neuheuser presented ‘seven rules of
the holy empire’ that would form the basis of the practical project to erect the Holy
United Empire.
These rules were each based upon a scriptural authority or informed by other
sources, such as Neuheuser’s visionary experiences.104 Inspired by Matthew 28:19,
the first established that a universal Christian belief would provide the foundation of
the Empire. The second postulated the introduction of a universal code of ‘natural
laws’ within all Christian nations, to be drafted by a committee of jurists who would
create a code of law ‘recognised as serving the natural policies’ of the Holy United
Empire. The first of these improvements, and the third rule, insisted upon the stan-
dardization of minting regulations, which would finally create a universally-
accepted currency according to a stable index of precious metals. This was a clear
reaction to the chaos caused by the hyperinflation of the Kipper und Wipper of the
early 1620s.105 The second improvement, and fourth rule, postulated the implemen-
tation of a universally accepted calendar, to be produced by a committee of
astronomical experts. The fifth law stated that the status of Christian rulers and their
successors in all provinces of the Holy United Roman Empire would be recognised
and respected by all other rulers. The sixth postulated that the sacred covenant of the
Empire would be based on a universal legal code of divine law that would be unal-
terable. Finally, the seventh mandated that the Imperial Chamber would not meet in
a single location (such as Speyer for the Holy Roman Empire) but instead would
have chambers located throughout Christendom, ensuring the uniform application
of imperial law. As we might gather from these seven rules, Neuheuser’s Holy
United Roman Empire was first and foremost a guarantee of freedom from the
uncertainties that not only defined his early life, but also from those issues that
plagued the Holy Roman Empire in general.
Yet while these measures were practical, there remained some pressing ques-
tions. Perhaps the most significant of these was the ‘universal Christian belief’
under which the Holy United Roman Empire would be established. Being of a
Lutheran background, Neuheuser naturally insisted that this faith would be
Protestant.106 Yet orthodox Lutheranism itself would not do. For Neuheuser believed
that although Luther had initiated the reformation, it was through Zwingli that the
Wittenberg reformer’s doctrines had been corrected, reformed and enlightened. The
disputes that engulfed the Holy Roman Empire following the Reformation consti-
tuted, according to Neuheuser, the threefold division of the great city (Revelation
16:19) into Lutheran, Catholic and Zwinglian parties. Division was intensified by
other factions, such as Neuheuser’s hated Calvinists, as well as Schwenckfelders,
104
Neuheuser, Index sacrosancti imperii, sigs. A2v-A3r.
105
See further chapter one and Charles Kindleberger, ‘The Economic Crisis of 1619 to 1623,’
Journal of Economic History 51 (1991): 149–175; Parker, Europe in Crisis, 27, 129.
106
See Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Victoria christianorum verissimorum universalis, Das ist: Ein
gründtliche Beschreibung, welcher gestallt alle waare Evangelische Christen von heutiger zeit an,
über und wider alle Widersacher Göttliches worts, zu reinem Christlichen Glauben, Sieg unnd
Uberwindung erhalten werden. (Fridwegen: Ehehafft, 1618), 22.
Anabaptists, Manists ‘and many others.’ All of these, Neuheuser held, represented
the ten horns of the Beast (Revelation 17:3).107 In other works, Neuheuser made
reference to still other factions impeding the work of the Holy United Roman
Empire. These included the followers of Hermes Trismegistus ‘that are called
Paracelsians,’ as well as sects of Weigelians and Rosicrucians. The last two, the
prophet argued, presumed to know the future without due authority.108 If peace and
harmony was to reign, Neuheuser contended, all of these factions had to be con-
verted to a harmonious Christian doctrine. Neuheuser insisted that the fundamentals
of the new Christian belief had to be agreed upon by all parties:
Because there are so many litigants or disputing faiths, wise judges and adjudicators
(Scheidsleute) from all faiths must come together. At this meeting, they shall not only judge
in matters of their own faith, but also on behalf of all Christian faiths search for a peaceful
decision, and offer it to the council in order that all Christianity may receive comfort, and
that God the almighty and Christ may be honoured eternally.109
It is paradoxical that although Neuheuser was deeply critical of the contemporary

world order, he still trusted that its mechanisms could produce a just result. It was
for this reason that, in a single tract, Neuheuser could express support for both the
Calvinist Friedrich V of Bohemia and the Lutheran Johann Georg I of Saxony, those
two rulers who had been the subject of so much polemic from other prophets.
Neuheuser believed that once these two leaders were united by a common belief and
goal, their respective governments, as the most significant Protestant powers in the
Empire, would then be willing to perform the most important administrative tasks
of the Holy United Roman Empire.110
Neuheuser supported his predictions through scripture and with reference to the
works of contemporary and historical prophetic figures, a circumstance that he
shared with other Lutherans searching for apocalyptic insight. In 1611 Neuheuser
published a list of twenty scriptural authorities that supported his vision of the Holy
United Roman Empire.111 Eleven derived from the Old Testament and eight from the
New Testament. Four were from Revelation—including the prophecy of the
1000 years of Revelation 20—while Neuheuser’s final source was 2 Esdras 12,
which predicted the apocalyptic final battle.112 Neuheuser supplemented this list
with a further series of extra-biblical authorities. Among these were Luther’s com-
107
Neuheuser, Victoria christianorum verissimorum universalis, 6.
108
Polemic against these sects is contained in Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima, 113 and
Neuheuser, De lapide fortissimo qui imaginem Danielis capite II. devastabit, sig. A3r.
109
Neuheuser, De lapide fortissimo qui imaginem Danielis capite II. devastabit, sig. A4r-v: ‘Wo so
viel Litigantes oder streittige Glaubens Partheyen seyn/ da müssen auß allen Partheyen weise
Richter unnd Scheidsleuthe zusammen kommen/ welche jeder nicht allein das Recht vor seine
Glaubens Parthey suche und felle/ sondern vor jedere unnd allen Christlichen Glaubens Partheyen
zugleich/ ein guten friedlichen Schluß suche/ unnd dem Rath beylege/ gantzer Christenheit zu
Troste/ und Gott dem allmächtigen unnd Christo zu ewigen Ruhm und Ehren.’
110
Neuheuser, Das Regal auch Tav. T ‫ ת‬Siegfahnen und Kriegsheer Büchlein, 27, 36.
111
Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen zweyerley
Beschreibungen … Begreifft in sich XX. Testimonia oder Zeugnüß heiliger Schrifft: Sampt etlicher
Hochgelahrter Theologorum vaticinia. (No Plade: Friedwegen: 1611), sigs. C1r-C3r.
112
Neuheuser, Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen, sig. C3r.
The Seven Laws of the Holy United Roman Empire 95
mentary on Daniel and 2 Thessalonians 2—which intimated that all the secrets of
the world would be revealed before the Judgment Day—as well as Zwingli’s inter-
pretation of Romans 2.113 Additionally, Neuheuser claimed that the prophecies of
Joseph Grünpeck, Bartholomaeus Georgijévic (ca. 1506-ca.1566), Johann
Lichtenberger and finally, Paracelsus’s Prognosticatio.114
Neuheuser was also a keen follower of more contemporary prophetic literature.
He commented, for example, on the pseudo-Paracelsian Lion of Midnight prophe-
cy.115 He had read melioristic Calvinist works, the books of Jacopo Brocardo, and
texts by other new prophets concerning their expectations for 1623. He commented
on their ubiquity.116 Although Neuheuser rejected the doctrines of Weigel and the
Rosicrucians, he nevertheless appropriated some of the optimistic apocalyptic
vocabulary of his contemporaries when he described the Holy United Roman
Empire as a manifestation of a ‘universal reformation,’ a statement that echoes the
Rosicrucian Fama Fraternitatis.117 In his later works, Neuheuser indeed spoke of
the forthcoming Empire as an ‘Empire of Grace’ which ‘is in fact also the seculum
spiritus sancti, that is, the awaited time in which the spirit of God most richly reveals
his greatest of doctrines and the secrets of Holy Scripture, which mankind and the
faithful Christians will put into effect (wircken) and reign upon earth.’118 It was per-
haps this shared vocabulary which prompted one contemporary, Johann Oswald of
Montbéliard, to identify Neuheuser as the author of a pro-Rosicrucian booklet,
Fama remissa ad Fratres Rosae Crucis (1615).119 However, in speaking of a time of
113
Neuheuser, Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen, sigs. C3v-C4r.
114
Neuheuser, Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen, sigs. C3v-C4r.
115
Neuheuser, De lapide fortissimo qui imaginem Danielis capite II. devastabit, sig. B3v citing 2
Esdras 11–13.
116
See Neuheuser, Mystica tempora patefacta, sigs. E1v, B4r: ‘Jetzund so viel Vaticinia Omnia
oder weiser Leute Weissagungen und Mutmassungen mit ihren Deutungen seyn, wegen deß gegen-
wertigen Kriegswesens in Europa unter der Christen schwebende, welche vaticinia auff diß 1622.
und dann weiter 1623. 1624. biß auffs 1626. Jahr lauffen und deuten.’ Brocard’s influence is most
noticeable in Neuheuser, Aenigmatum Christi Resolutio seu explicatio, Das ist: Kurtzer jedoch
Gründlicher und sehr nützlicher Tractat und Erklerung über den Spruch Christi/ Luce am 18.
Capitel/ da er saget: Doch wenn deß Menschen Sohn kommen wird/ Meynestu/ das Er auch werde
Glauben finden auff Erden? (No Place: No Printer, 1617).
117
Neuheuser, Victoria christianorum verissimorum universalis, 18–22.
118
Neuheuser, Mystica tempora patefacta, sig. D3r.
119
H.Ar.No:R., Fama Remissa ad Fratres Rosae Crucis. Antwort auff die Famam und Confessionem
der Löblichen Brüderschafft vom RosenCreutz. (No Place: No Printer, 1616). The attribution was
made by Oswald in December 1621, however a comparison of Neuheuser’s apocalyptic expecta-
tions and those of the author of Fama Remissa demonstrates that they were written by two different
men. In particular, Neuheuser’s ubiquitous discussion of the Holy United Roman Empire, the
central element of his apocalypticism, is entirely absent from Fama Remissa. Fama remissa
divided the history of the world into forty-nine periods, the last of which would begin in 1630 (sigs.
E6v-E7r). A similar opinion appears nowhere in Neuheuser’s texts. Equally, Fama Remissa con-
tains several sections in excellent Greek, a language that Neuheuser did not use in any work. The
author of Fama Remissa also claims to have studied Lutheran theology for a period of 12 years,
during which he attended learned disputations (sig. B7v), a claim that could hardly apply to
Neuheuser. Finally, there is no mention in Fama Remissa of reconciling Lutheranism with
spiritual reform before the end, Neuheuser may simply have been crafting the
vocabulary that he saw as most effective in promoting the Holy United Empire to
those that comprised his audience, namely disaffected Protestants.
The Reception of Neuheuser’s Works
For his time, Neuheuser’s proclamations were not entirely unusual. The Habsburg
monarchy had long been the subject of political prophecies, and there was no short-
age of prophets of doom––and glory––who insisted on addressing the Emperor with
their visions.120 At the imperial diet in Frankfurt am Main in 1612, Neuheuser
petitioned delegates with several tracts. He was not the only person who distributed
prophetic material at the event. Helisäus Röslin’s Dissertatio (1612), dedicated to
Emperor Matthias I provides a contemporary example of a work in which the author
demanded religious peace and political unity based upon doctrines derived from
Paracelsus’ suppressed religious writings.121 Neuheuser was clearly familiar with
his work.122 Additionally there was the renowned pedagogue and educator Wolfgang
Ratke, who also in 1612 addressed a Memorial to delegates of the Frankfurt diet, in
which he stressed the essentiality of establishing a sole language, a sole government
and a sole religion within its boundaries.123 Some of these tracts were reprinted by
the jurist Melchior Goldast (1578–1635) in a massive 1614 compilation of political
Zwinglianism, which was a central focus of Neuheuser’s theology after 1608. Instead, the focus in
Fama Remissa is on reconciling Rosicrucian expectations with doctrinal Lutheranism. Oswald’s
identification has been taken up in several scholarly works, including Walter E. Schäfer, ‘Neuheuser,
Wilhelm Eon [sic],’ Nouveau dictionnaire de biographie alsacienne 28 (1982): 2831; Gilly,
Johann Valentin Andreae, 51.
120
R.J.W. Evans, The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1550–1700. An Interpretation. (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1979), 396–8; Mout, ‘Chiliastic Prophecy and Revolt,’ 93–109.
121
Helisaeus Röslin, 1572. Prodromus. 1604. Dissertationum Chronologicarum: Das ist der Zeit
Rechnung halben ein außführlicher und gründlicher Teutscher Bericht an unsern aller gnädigsten
Herrn Matthiam den I. erwehlten römischen Keysern / alles auch in einer Lateinischen Chronologia
und Zeitrechnung vor Augen gestellt… (Frankfurt/Main: Matthias Beckern for de Bry, 1612).
Concerning this tract see Gilly, ‘Theophrastia Sancta,’ 162–3.
122
Neuheuser cited Johannes Kepler and Helisäus Röslin, Grundlicher Bericht und Bedencken/ Von
einem ungewöhnlichen Newen Stern. (Amberg: Michael Forstern, 1605), on several occasions.
Neuheuser also discussed Röslin’s apocalypticism in Neuheuser, Vera quaedam temporis definitio,
sig. B1r-v.
123
See Schleiff, Selbstkritik der lutherischen Kirche, 71, 73; Gilly, ‘Campanella and the
Rosicrucians,’ 206. Ratke’s project was one reason why Andreas Libavius, Wolmeinendes
Bedencken/ Von der Fama vnnd Confession der Brüderschafft deß Rose[n] Creützes: eine Vniversal
Reformation vnd Vmbekehrung der gantzen welt vor dem Jüngsten Tage/ zu einem jrdischen
Paradeyß … betreffent. (Erfurt: Rohbock, 1616), 91 saw the educator as an inspiration for the
Rosicrucian Fraternity.
The Reception of Neuheuser’s Works 97
texts.124 This collection introduced Neuheuser’s doctrines to even broader audi-

ences, and, although Goldast himself did not endorse the prophet’s convictions, his
commentary on them nevertheless demonstrates that they found an audience:
Also included are Neuheuser’s tracts, not because we approve of them, or consider them of
any value, but because they are esteemed and taken up by others … [also] so that the good
reader has everything that has been published concerning the matters of the Holy Roman
Empire before him, even if they are riddled with fantasy, and not entirely filled with politi-
cal understanding.125
Despite Goldast’s comment, it is notable that Neuheuser and his works are rarely
mentioned in contemporary polemical literature.126 There may be several reasons for
this, foremost being that Neuheuser’s goals were in their character more political
than religious. Of the reactions that do survive, readers complained that his ideas
were changeable and ‘unclear’ (dunkel). The charge is understandable, as the exam-
ple of the two witnesses of Revelation 11:3 demonstrates. In 1606 Neuheuser identi-
fied these with his prophetic writings. In 1619 he identified them with the Old and
New Testaments, and finally, in 1623, with Luther and Zwingli.127 Still, Neuheuser’s
124
Melchior Goldast, Politica Imperialia, sive Discursus Politici, Acta Publica, et Tractatus gene-
rales de D. Imperatoribus et Regis Romanorum, Pontificis Romani, Electorum, Principum et
Communium Sacri R. G. Imperii Ordinum Juribus, Privilegius, Regalibus, Dignitatibus,
Praeeminentiis aliisque rebus generalibus ad Italum Publicum S. Imp. pertinentibus, tam religio-
sis, quam profanis etc. (Frankfurt am Main: Johann Bringer, 1614), 746–752; Melchior Goldast,
Politische ReichsHändel Das ist/ Allerhand gemeine Acten/ Regimentssachen/ und Weltliche
Discursen: Das gantze heilige Römische Reich/ die Keyserliche und Königliche Majestäten/ den
Stul zu Rom/ die gemeine Stände deß Reichs/ insonderheit aber das geliebte Vatterlandt Teutscher
Nation betreffendt. (Frankfurt am Main: Johann Bringer, 1614), 223–232. The Tübingen jurist
Christoph Besold encountered Neuheuser’s ideas through Goldast’s collection. See Christoph
Besold, Discursus Politici: I. De Monarchia. II. De Aristocratia. III. De Democratia. generatim
tractantes. IV. De Reipublicae Statu subalterno: ubi de Comitibus, Baronibus, Civitatibus
Imperialibus, & Libero Equestri Ordine, ex profeßo prolixe[que] disputatur. V. De Reipublicae
formarum inter sese comparatione; & quaenam praestantior existat? (Straßburg: Zetzner, 1623),
245.
125
Goldast, Politische ReichsHändel, 221: ‘Doch seind hierbey deß Newhäusers Tractätlein gesetzt
worden/ nicht daß wir sie der Widerwertigkeit halten/ oder approbirn: sondern allein weil sie von
andern angezogen vnnd æstimirt werden … damit der Günstige Leser alles das jenige für die
Augen gestelt erfinde/ was in diesen Reichssachen ist außgangen/ vnd publicirt worden/ darinn
dann nicht allweg Politischer verstandt/ sondern auch Phantasey mit vnderlauffen.’
126
An exception is Matthias Ehinger [Abraham Scultetus] Iudicium De fundamentis, quibus in
praedictionibus suus utuntur Novi Prophetae in Germania, Nagelius, Zieglerus, Geigerus,
Plaustrarius, Praetorius, Stifelius, Faulhaberus, Wilhelmus Eo, etc. (No Place: No Printer, 1624),
which mentioned Neuheuser in its title. A German translation was issued as Matthias Ehinger
[Abraham Scultetus], Bedencken und Urtheil Matthiae Ehingeri, Von den fürnehmen gründen
derer sich in Ihren weissagungen dick und offt gebrauchen Die NEWE PROPHETEN In
Deudschland, Nagelius, Ziegler, Geiger, Felgenhawer, Praetorius, Stifel, Faulhaber, Wilhelm Eo
und andre Fladder und Wirgeistere. ([Berlin]: No printer, 1624).It was reprinted in Germanus, Der
siebenden Apocalyptischen Posaunen (1626), 104–112.
127
Neuheuser, Victoria christianorum verissimorum universalis, 7. On this tradition, see further
Rodney L. Petersen, Preaching in the Last Days: The Theme of the “Two Witnesses” in the
Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993).
expectations ensured that his works would be misrepresented by contemporaries. In

1612, for example, the Paracelsian Benedictus Figulus claimed that he ‘wants to be
Emperor’ (will Kaiser sein).128 Despite his critical attitude to Rosicrucian and
Weigelian ideas and personalities expressed throughout his works, in August 1622
Neuheuser was expelled from Nuremberg following accusations of spreading
Weigelian ideas.129 In the inquisitorial trial which resulted in his expulsion from
Straßburg in September 1626, Neuheuser’s interrogators suspected that he was a
vehement supporter of the deposed Friedrich V of Bohemia, for one of his tracts
featured the Bohemian lion upon its title-page.130 Be that as it may, in the same year
at least one anonymous observer noted that Neuheuser appears to have desired to
build up the contemporary world order at least as much as he wanted to tear it down,
for which reason his vision of a Holy United Roman Empire ‘might not be all bad.’131
This particular reaction communicates something of the struggle of contemporary
Lutherans to reconcile their desires for deliverance from the chaos of the world with
the doctrines that defined their confessional culture, in particular apocalyptic visions.
Conclusion
Although the idea of crisis played a key role in the development of both Nagel and
Neuheuser’s optimistic apocalyptic expectations, their motivations and impulses to
turn to prophecy were product of personal convictions and antecedent pressures. Both
of these factors can be understood more clearly against the background of the unfold-
ing quest by Lutherans for ever greater insight into the circumstances of the Last
Days. Their prophetic outlooks both aimed at creating certainty by anchoring the
present within specific conceptions of the unfolding of apocalyptic time. Both men
relied on scripture, nature, as well as sixteenth- and seventeenth-century prophetic
writings to fuel and support their conclusions. Based on these authorities, both postu-
lated that a time of future felicity was at hand; Nagel predicted this period would
commence after 1623, while Neuheuser never specified a date. Both justified their
expectations with reference to Revelation 20, although they did not anticipate a literal
Millennium of peace that would be followed by the Last Judgment. Yet the specifics
of their expectations could hardly have been more different. Nagel’s expectations
were primarily spiritual, Neuheuser’s primarily worldly. While Neuheuser was
inspired by a divine audience, Nagel laid claim to no such encounter with the numi-
nous. Nevertheless, the claims laid to divine authority by both prophets soon brought
them into conflict with guardians of Lutheran doctrine, who understood their very
different expectations to be manifestations of the same pernicious heresy: chiliasm.
128
Hannover NLB, Ms. IV 341, 315; Paulus, ‘Alchemie und Paracelsismus’, 341.
129
[Scultetus], ‘Neuwe Propheten’, 112; Richard van Dülmen, ‘Schwärmer und Separatisten in
Nürnberg (1618–1648). Ein Beitrag zum Problem des ‘Weigelianismus,’ Archiv für Kulturgeschichte
55 (1973): 109–110.
130
Strasbourg, Archives de la Ville, 1 AST 77, fol. 93v.
131
Germanus, Der siebenden Apocalyptischen Posaunen, 101.
Chapter 4
Optimism Outlawed
In a landmark 1994 study on the rhetoric of apocalyptic discourse, Stephen O’Leary

argued that prophetic pronouncements concerning the End Times relied on the three
topoi of time, evil, and authority.1 Time and evil were naturally inherent in the apoc-
alyptic drama, which imagined all of history as a process culminating in a final
confrontation between Christ and Antichrist, following which good would finally
triumph and the righteous would be vindicated. Authority was a natural corollary to
these topoi. As O’Leary pointed out, if apocalyptic discourse is to possess any claim
to attention, ‘then it must present itself as authoritative.’2 As we have seen in the
prior chapters, Lutherans employed a variety of strategies to assert their authority
when articulating optimistic expectations. This was especially necessary because
their views dissented from those of mainstream Lutheran doctrine. Some expecta-
tions were expressed in a distinctly anticlerical idiom; frequently, hope for a felici-
tous future was expressed in opposition to the Mauerkirchen.
Optimistic apocalyptic expectations therefore represented a challenge to estab-
lished authority in the Lutheran church. Like any challenge, they were met with sus-
picion by some representatives of the faith. In the first three chapters of this study, we
have examined the engagement of lay Lutherans with expectations of a felicitous
future. The next three chapters concern positions adopted by clerics. The present
chapter concerns one of the ways that defenders of Lutheran doctrine engaged with
these expressions; by condemning them as manifestations of the ancient heresy
chiliasmus or chiliasm.3 The link between the expectations of Church Fathers like
Irenaeus (140–202 CE), Cerinthus (fl. ca. 100 CE), Papias, Justin (100–165 CE),
Tertullian, among others, to those of the optimistic apocalypticists of Lutheran con-
fessional culture was tenuous at best. But the conflation of this ancient error with
1
O’Leary, Arguing the Apocalypse, 20–60.
2
O’Leary, Arguing the Apocalypse, 51. See further Gallagher, ‘Millennialism, Scripture, and
Tradition,’ in The Oxford Handbook of Millennialism, 133–149.
3
Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 105–123; Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis; Barnes,
Astrology and Reformation.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_4
100 4 Optimism Outlawed
hopes for a better future in the sixteenth and seventeenth century would
have far-reaching consequences. Some Church Fathers believed, largely on the basis
of Revelation 20 and with the possible influence of Jewish messianic doctrine, that
Jesus would return before the Last Judgment and establish an earthly kingdom in
which he would reign with the elect for a thousand years, enjoying all manner of
pleasures.4 On account of the duration of their expectations, holders of this belief
came to be called millenarii (millenarians) in Latinate texts or chiliastae (chiliasts) in
Greek works.5
Our survey has shown that expectations of this nature were virtually unknown
among Lutherans. While certain aspects of the ancient expectations could be
detected in some scenarios of a felicitous future—among them the anticipation of a
time of worldly felicity—what lacked in all cases was the temporal condition that
lent the heresy its very name. That expectations of a felicitous future could come
within the ambit of chiliastic heresy in the early decades of the seventeenth century
at all was product of the convergence of several factors. First there was a concerted
attempt within Lutheran confessional culture to curb eschatological expectations.
Second, as early as the 1570s clerics began to link the ancient heresy of the chiliasts
with article seventeen of the Augsburg Confession, and thereby with ‘new’ heresies
like Anabaptism. This tendency began to snowball in the early seventeenth century,
finally resulting in the recognition of a class of ‘new-antique opinions’ (nov-
antiquae opinioni) under the rubric chiliasmus subtilis.6 In distinction to the ancient
heresy, chiliasmus subtilis extended the purview of the error to include almost any
variety of expectation of future felicity. Eventually, the term Neochiliastae began to
appear in dogmatic works.7
The expansion of the categories of the error was driven by fear concerning chal-
lenges to the authority of the Lutheran church posed by new prophets and others.
However, the zeal of some clerics to castigate chiliasm in all its forms meant that
conflicting definitions of the heresy began to circulate. By the mid-1620s, there was
a chaos of opinions concerning which expectations, precisely, constituted chiliastic
heresy, and therefore where the boundaries of orthodox Lutheran belief actually lay.
How could true doctrine be defended, when even its guardians could not agree on
its content? Compounding the problem was the fact that the confession lacked a
definitive dogmatic touchstone for the rejection of the heresy. This chapter docu-
4
On the expectations of the Church Fathers, see Brian E. Daley, The Hope of the Early Church: A
Handbook of Patristic Eschatology, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991); Brian
E. Daley, ‘Apocalypticism in Early Christian Theology,’ in The Encyclopedia of Apocalypticism. 3
vols. Bernard McGinn, John J. Collins and Stephen J. Stein, eds. (New York and London:
Continuum, 2000), vol. 2, 3–47; Charles E. Hill, Regnum Caelorum. Patterns of Millennial
Thought in Early Christianity. 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2001).
5
Augustin, De civitate Dei, book 20: 6–9; Bernhard Lohse, ‘Zur Eschatologie des älteren Augustin,’
Vigilliae Christianae 21 (1967): 221–240; Johannes van Oort, ‘The End is Now: Augustine on
History and Eschatology,’ Teologiese Studies 68/1 (2012): 1–7.
6
Johann Affelmann (praes.) Daniel Spalchaver (resp.), Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum hep-
tas … VI. Quantum nov-antiquae opinioni, de felicitate Novi instantis in his terris millenarii,
tribuendum sit? (Rostock: Ferberus, 1618).
7
Johann Micraelius, Syntagma Historiarum Ecclesiæ omnium. (Stettin: Georg Goez, 1630), 1033.
The Doctrinal Position 101
ments the expansion of the boundaries of the error by Lutheran doctrinalists in the
period between roughly 1570 and 1630. This expansion led not to certainty con-
cerning the boundaries of the error, but instead to confusion. Furthermore, the
attempt by clerics to limit apocalyptic speculation would have the effect of retroac-
tively hereticizing once orthodox opinion.
The Doctrinal Position
Generally speaking, the character of apocalyptic expectation in sixteenth century

Lutheran confessional culture was largely, albeit not completely, pessimistic. As
indicated earlier in this study, Luther held that the world was at its end, and that the
true church would suffer in the Last Days before being rewarded following the Last
Judgment. Many Lutherans therefore expected no period of respite, however brief,
before the Last Judgment. The de facto doctrinal position on acceptable apocalyptic
expectations was stated in the seventeenth article of the Augsburg Confession
(1530), one of the chief symbolic books of the Lutheran faith. This article stated that
the church held ‘that at the Consummation of the World Christ will appear for judg-
ment, and will raise up all the dead. He will give to the godly and elect eternal life
and everlasting joys, but ungodly men and the devils He will condemn to be tor-
mented without end.’ Appended to this positive statement was a negation of certain
expectations which the confession did not accept:
They condemn the Anabaptists, who think that there will be an end to the punishments of
condemned men and devils. They condemn also others who are now spreading certain
Jewish doctrines, that before the resurrection of the dead the godly shall take possession of
the kingdom of the world, the ungodly being everywhere suppressed.8
As this statement makes clear, these were condemnations of specific expectations;

those held by the anabaptists, as well as ‘Jewish’ expectations of a worldly kingdom
of felicity. Lutherans interpreted the reference to ‘Jewish’ expectations variously.
While some thought it referred to the ancient expectations of the likes of Maimonides
(1135–1204), others saw in it a condemnation of Judaising Protestant sects.9 The
8
Bekenntnisschriften der evangelisch-Lutherischen Kirche, 72: ‘(1) Item docent, quod Christus
apparebit in consummatione mundi ad iudicandum, (2) et mortuos omnes resuscitabit, piis et elec-
tis dabit vitam aeternam et perpetua gaudia, (3) impios autem homines ac diabolos condemnabit,
ut sine fine crucientur. (4) Damnant Anabaptistas, qui sentiunt hominibus damnatis ac diabolis
finem poenarum futurum esse. (5) Damnant et alios, qui nunc spargunt Iudaicas opiniones, quod
ante resurrectionem mortuorum pii regnum mundi occupaturi sint, ubique oppressis impiis.’
9
On the Lutheran engagement with Anabaptist belief see John S. Oyer, Lutheran Reformers
against Anabaptists: Luther, Melanchthon, and Menius and the Anabaptists of Central Germany.
(The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 2012); Gerhard Maier, Die Johannesoffenbarung und die Kirche,
(Tübingen: Möhr (Siebeck), 1981), 273–4. On the link between Arianism and optimistic apocalyp-
ticism, see Howard Hotson, ‘Arianism and Millenarianism. The Link between two Heresies from
Servetus to Socinus,’ in Millenarianism and Messianism in Early Modern European Culture:
Continental Millenarians: Protestants, Catholics, Heretics. J.C. Laursen and R.H. Popkin, eds.
Variata (1531) of Philipp Melanchthon, one of the drafters of the Confession, pro-
vides additional context. There, Melanchthon wrote that the seventeenth article was
intended to ensure that ‘Christians are bound to be obedient to the government under
which they live,’ and furthermore that ‘the Church in this life is never to attain to a
position of universal triumph and prosperity, but is to remain oppressed, and subject
to afflictions and adversities, until the period of the resurrection of the dead.’10 Thus
the seventeenth article of the Augsburg Confession was not directed against an ancient
heresy, but instead against expectations of a worldly felicitous future held by a handful
of contemporary sects. Lutherans feared that these convictions may have encouraged
the disturbance of political order and authority.11 The seventeenth article of the
Augsburg Confession had nothing at all to do with ancient chiliasts, nor did it con-
demn expectations of a felicitous future that did not draw on Anabaptist or Jewish
sources. The issue for Melanchthon, and others, was one of authority.
The pessimism of Lutheran expectations was emphasised elsewhere. While
Luther’s works were filled with references to an impending Judgment Day, the pes-
simistic nature of Lutheran apocalyptic expectations was reinforced among the
populace in his Bible edition. Luther’s 1545 foreword to Revelation made clear that
nothing but suffering awaited the true Church in the Last Days, as well as his belief
that the Millennium of Revelation 20 ‘commenced at the time that this book [sc.
Revelation] was written, at the same time that the devil was bound.’12 As such, the
Millennium was an event that had been fulfilled historically. This interpretation was
again set before the eyes of Bible readers in a marginal note to Revelation 20:1–3,
where Luther’s gloss stated ‘the thousand years must begin when the book was writ-
ten [by John], because the Turk only appeared one thousand years later.’13 Later
Lutheran commentators agreed with Luther, although they identified very different
times concerning the commencement of the thousand years.14 The Millennium of
Revelation 20 was thus not something that Lutherans could look forward to; it had
instead been revealed historically.
(Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2001), 9–35. Further Howard Hotson, ‘Antisemitismus, Philosemitismus und
Chiliasmus im frühneuzeitlichen Europa,’ Werkstatt Geschichte 8 (1999): 7–36; Lutz Greisiger,
‘Chiliasten und “Judentzer”: Eschatologie und Judenmission im Protestantischen Deutschland des
17. und 18. Jahrhunderts,’ Kwartalnik Historii Żydów 220 (2006): 535–575. On the problematic
term ‘Judaising’, see Róbert Dán, ‘“Judaizare.” The Career of a Term,’ in Antitrinitarianism in the
Second Half of the Sixteenth Century. Róbert Dán and Antal Pirnát, eds. (Leiden and Budapest:
Akadémiai Kiadó and E.J. Brill, 1982), 25–34.
10
Cited in Joseph Augustus Seiss, The Last Times and the Great Consummation. An Earnest
Discussion of Monumentous Themes. (Philadelphia: Smith, English & Co. 1863), 331.
11
See also Philipp Jakob Spener, Erfordertes Theologisches Bedencken/ über den Von Einigen des
E. Hamburgischen Ministerii publicirten Neuen Religions-Eid (Ploen: Schmidt, 1690), sig.
C2v-C3r.
12
Luther, Werke, vol. 14, 137.
13
Luther, cited in Daniel Cramer, Biblia Das ist Die gantze H. Schrifft Nach der Dolmetschung
Vorreden und Marginalien D M. Lutheri/ mit mehrern Concordantien (Straßburg: Zetzner, 1619–
20), sig. Qa3v.
14
See further Irena Backus, Reformation Readings of the Apocalypse: Geneva, Zurich, and
Wittenberg. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 131–133, and the discussion below.
Paths to a Heresy 103
Neither Luther’s statements nor the Augsburg Confession offered a clear and
defensible dogmatic position concerning the heretical status of optimistic apocalyp-
tic expectations. Furthermore, each was motivated by very different exegetical pres-
sures. Luther’s statement was apocalyptic and historical. Melanchthon’s article in
the Augsburg Confession was inspired by contemporary challengers to Lutheran
authority. Nevertheless, both traditions would come to occupy important places in
the early seventeenth century polemic against chiliastic heresy.
Paths to a Heresy
Optimistic apocalyptic expectations had been expressed within Lutheran confes-

sional culture since at least the mid sixteenth century. By 1600 they circulated
widely in print and scribal publications. As Johannes Wallmann has observed, the
growth in interest among Lutherans in these scenarios was largely ignored by doc-
trinalists.15 This is presumably because none believed that they warranted sanction,
or, alternatively, that the doctrine of the faith did not outlaw such speculations. The
lack of concern is manifested in, among other places, the Formula of Concord
(1577), the second major symbolic book of the Lutheran faith, which contained no
condemnation of optimistic apocalyptic expectations or mention of chiliastae.
Nevertheless, it is clear that some clerical authorities were aware of the potential
problems posed by these expectations. The majority of early discussions appeared in
university dissertations concerning the nature of the Kingdom of God. So far as I am
aware, it was in 1574 that the anticipation of a coming Millennium and the impreca-
tions of the Augsburg Confession were first linked with the word chiliastae, a term that
until this point had been used with almost exclusive reference to the errors of the
Church Fathers. In that year Jakob Andreae of the University of Tübingen supervised
a theological dissertation De Regno Christi, that explicitly engaged with the expecta-
tions of chiliasts (chiliastae). According to this text, these chiliasts dreamt of reigning
for a literal thousand years with Christ on earth, a clear reference to the Millennium of
Revelation 20.16 The text then invokes the Augsburg Confession in noting that
Anabaptists as well as those ‘inspired by the Jewish prophets’ could be counted
among these chiliasts,17 firmly linking the ancient heresy to more contemporary chal-
lenges to Lutheran authority. Striking in this discussion is its anticipation of later
conceptual ellisions between different apocalyptic expectations. But not all discus-
sions of chiliasm followed the same logic. Zacharias Schilter’s De Regno Christi
15
16
Jakob Andreae (praes.) Zacharias Greins (resp.), Disputatio de Regno Christi. Deo Patre
Servatoris & Liberatoris nostri unici Iesu Christi, virtute Spiritus S. nos adiuuante. (Tübingen:
1574), 4: ‘Errant etiam circa Regnum Christi Chiliastæ, qui pios in prima, quam fingunt, resur-
rectione, per mille annos cum Christo in terris regnaturos, somniarunt.’
17
Andreae and Greins, Disputatio de Regno Christi, 4: ‘Quòd verò Anabaptistæ unâ cum Iudæis
Prophetaru[m] testimonia preoferunt, quibus Meßiæ Regnum tanquam mundani describerer viden-
tur, magis sua somnia sequuntur carnalia, quàm Prophetarum mentem attendunt.’
capita (1581), for example, engaged with the refutation of ancient chiliastic heresy
without reference to contemporary religious movements.18
The next engagements with contemporary optimistic expectations date to the
1590s. In 1597 Ägidius Hunnius (1550–1603) supervised a dissertation De Regno
Christi Propositiones at the University of Wittenberg, which dedicated thirty-five of
its propositions to refuting chiliastic error.19 According to Hunnius, ancient chiliasts
anticipated a literal thousand year reign of the elect with Christ on earth before the
Last Judgment (ante novissumum diem).20 Hunnius argued that scripture proved that
Christ’s reign would not be worldly, but spiritual, and that this kingdom would
occur after the Last Judgment.21 He invoked the historical fulfilment of Revelation
20 in order to strike the deathblow to expectations of ‘chiliasts’ but, interestingly,
also of ‘Anabaptists.’ Yet while Luther argued that the Millennium commenced with
John of Patmos, Hunnius argued that the period commenced with the reign of
Constantine in 300CE, and ended with the rise of the Ottoman Empire in the middle
ages.22 Although Hunnius’s discussion was largely uncontroversial, it nevertheless
linked the heresy of Anabaptists to the chiliasts of antiquity, by claiming that both
were inspired by Revelation 20.
Another link between heresies ancient and modern was adduced in another pub-
lication of 1597, authored by the pastor Andreas Schoppe (1538–1614) of Lebenstedt
near Braunschweig. His Christliche Warnung comprised a ‘warning’ for readers
against chronological reckoning, in which he condemned attempts of Lutheran cler-
ics and new prophets to predict the time of the Last Judgment.23 Schoppe’s work is
a witness to efforts by Lutherans to curb apocalyptic speculation in the faith, but it
also offers further evidence of a tendency to conflate ancient chiliasm with contem-
porary expectations. Schoppe argued that the chiliasm of the Church Fathers and
more modern attempts to reckon the precise date of the Last Judgment were under-
written by a criminal arrogance that presumed to know the will of God.24
Chronological speculation, according to Schoppe, was grounds not only for the pro-
liferation of ‘many sins,’ but also ‘the corruption of fragile consciences,’ that would
ultimately lead ‘to a wrestless existence and to all manner of disorder.’25 According
18
Zacharias Schilter, De Regno Christi Capita Ad Dispvtandvm Proposita In Academia Lipsensi, a
Zacharia Schiltero, S. Theologiae Doctore & eiusdem Academiae Vicecancellario. Ad diem Augusti
XXV. (Leipzig: Georg Deffner, 1581), sigs. A2r-A4r.
19
Ägidius Hunnius (praes.) Laurentius Laelius (resp.) De Regno Christi Propositiones …
(Wittenberg: Gronenberg, 1597), sigs. B2rff; Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 108–109.
20
Hunnius and Laelius, De Regno Christi Propositiones, sig. B2r: ‘Ex ijsdem propè fundamentis
refellitur Chiliastarum error, qui electos, cum Christo in his terris, ante novissimum diem, regna-
turos opinati sunt annos mille.’
21
Hunnius and Laelius, De Regno Christi Propositiones, sig. B2v.
22
Hunnius and Laelius, De Regno Christi Propositiones, sigs. B2v-B3r.
23
Andreas Schoppe, Christliche und nötige Warnung für dem erdichten Lügen Geist der falschen
Propheten und fürwitzigen Leute, so die gewisse zeit des jüngsten Tages auszurechnen, zu nennen
und zu Weissagen sich bemühen. (Wittenberg: Johann Dörffer, 1597).
24
Schoppe, Christliche und nötige Warnung, sigs. G2r-G4v.
25
Schoppe, Christliche und nötige Warnung, sig. J1v: ‘Die Weissagungen von der gewissen zeit
des jüngsten Tages geben ursach und anreitzungen zu vielen Sünden/ verwirrung der zarten gewis-
sen/ zu einem ruhelosen Leben und zu allerley unordnung/ wie die erfahrung erzeuget.’
Paths to a Heresy 105
to Schoppe, chiliasts and modern chronologers did not love or fear God, they mis-
used God’s word, they let themselves be seduced by enthusiasm, they actively led
others astray from God’s teachings, and furthermore they squandered their time lost
in meditation on ‘secrets’ to which they never had access.26
The works of Hunnius and Schoppe demonstrate that by around 1600 a handful
of Lutheran clerics were linking the name of an antique heresy to contemporary
optimistic expectations among Anabaptists, but equally, to practices prevalent
within Lutheran confessional culture itself. As in article seventeen of the Augsburg
Confession, the primary concern in these works appeared to be one of authority: the
anticipation of a felicitous future was, both historically as well as in the present, a
potential spur to disorder. Nevertheless, by the end of the 1590s there existed no
formal denunciation of optimistic expectations as heretical. But in the pages of
these books the heretical taxonomy of ancient chiliasm began to rub shoulders with
the expectations of modern apocalypticists.
A crucial change occurred early in the first years of the seventeenth century,
prompted by the rash of optimistic expectations that appeared in print following the
new star and great conjunction of 1603 and 1604. The arbiter of change was Johann
Wolther (also Wolter, fl. 1605–1623), pastor of Lichtenhagen near Königsberg
(Jablonewka, Russia). In 1605, Wolther issued an influential German-language
commentary on Revelation that was reissued twice in the 1620s.27 Wolther defined
the ‘childish and false’ heresy of chiliasm as the belief that ‘the elect and the saints
would be resurrected before the Judgment Day and reign with Christ in Jerusalem
for one thousand years.’28 Like Luther and Hunnius, Wolther argued that the expec-
tations of a future Millennium held by ancient chiliasts could not possibly be cor-
rect, because the prophesied thousand years had already occurred.29 However,
Wolther obviously kept a careful eye on contemporary prophetic literature. In a
further discussion, he remarked that some ‘Anabaptists’ expressed ‘almost the same
opinion’ as the ancient chiliasts, because they believed that ‘before the Last
Judgment there will be an aureum seculum or golden age.’30 The trend toward the
conflation of various apocalyptic expectations, traditions, and terminologies already
evident in the works of Andreae, Hunnius, and Schoppe, continued with Wolther.
Within this hodge-podge conception of a possible heresy related to optimistic
26
Schoppe, Christliche und nötige Warnung, sigs. J1v-J2r.
27
Johann Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung über die heimliche Offenbahrung
Johannis Evangelista/ und das zwölffte Capitel Danielis. (Rostock: Hallervord, 1629). The text
was first printed in 1605 and reprinted in 1624 and 1629. I have only had opportunity to consult the
1629 edition.
28
Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung, 180; ‘Von diesen tausent Jahren haben die
Chiliasten gar kindische auch irrige Gedancken gehabt … alß daß die Außerwehlten unnd Heiligen
vor dem jüngsten Tage aufferstehen und zu Jerusalem tausent Jahr in allen Frewden und Wollust
mit Christo leben würden.’
29
Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung, 179–180.
30
Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung, 184: ‘Die Wiedertäuffer sind fast auch der
meinung/ daß noch vor dem Jüngsten Tage ein aureum seculum, eine güldene Zeit seyn werde.
Aber diß alles ist dem Worte Gottes und täglicher Erfahrung zuwider.’
expectations, the boundaries of what was acceptable, and what was not, were any-
thing but clear.
The Creation of a Heresy
In 1612 a cleric and rector of the Stettin Gymnasium, Daniel Cramer, presided over
a scholarly disputation concerning the Kingdom of God.31 This text represented a
major progression in the Lutheran engagement with chiliastic error by establishing
a move away from the expectation of a future literal Millennium as a central ele-
ment to the heretical expectations of chiliastae. The dissertation rehearsed several
common arguments against the futility of such expectations, including the standard
argument that the Millennium had occurred historically.32 It concluded with the
identification of four separate inspirations for chiliastic opinions. These were:
1 . Jewish and political dreams of the kingdom of Christ.
2. Fantasies of Anabaptists and Judaising Chiliasts.
3. Catholic conceptions of the militant ecclesia imagined as a political body.
4. Calvinist commentaries in which the internal kingdom of Grace and the external things are
separated.33
Categories one, three, and four demonstrate a keen awareness of contemporary
apocalyptic literature that, as we have seen, lacked in most Lutheran engagements
with chiliastic heresy. The third category was almost certainly inspired by the works
of Jacopo Brocardo and of the circulation of medieval prophecies, while the fourth
was likely inspired by the Presbyterian John Napier’s (1550–1617) commentary on
Revelation, which was first printed in German translation in 1611.34 Between these
was the second category, which derived directly from the seventeenth article of the
Augsburg Confession. In other words, in this text the ancient heresy of the chiliasts
was inflected by contemporary expectations and doctrinal considerations. The
boundaries of the heresy were being readied for expansion.
31
Daniel Cramer (praes.) Christianus Reineccius (resp.), Theses De Regno Christi/ quibus
Succincta Ac Methodica Anakephalaiosei, quae pluribus hactenus, hoc de Articulo, publice tradita
sunt, repetuntur, & altioris indaginis ergo, ad disputandum proponuntur (Stettin: Kelner, 1612). I
have consulted the text as reprinted in Daniel Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi Regis Regum &
Domini Dominantium semper-invicti. (Stettin: Kelner für Eichorn, 1614), 399–422.
32
Cramer and Reineccius, Theses De Regno Christi, 414. Cf. Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi,
316–318. In these books the Millennium was located between 300 CE and 1300 CE.
33
Cramer and Reineccius, Theses De Regno Christi, 414, 421. ‘1. Judaica & Politica de regno
Christi somnia. 2. Deliria item Judaisantium Chiliastarum & Anabaptistarum. 3. Pontificiorum
item, qui regnum Christi in militante Ecclesia, ad politicam planè formam configurant. 4.
Calvinianorum commenta, qui regnum Gratiae internum & externum re & quidem tempore
divellunt.’
34
John Napier, Entdeckung aller Geheimnüssen in der Apocalypsi oder Offenbarung S. Johannis
begriffen […] Zuvor zwar niemals gesehen noch gehört/ wiewol von vielen vornehmen/ gelährten
unnd erleuchteten Männern/ wie von dem seligen Mann D. Luthero selbsten/ gewündschet worden
(Gera: Spiess, 1611).
The Creation of a Heresy 107
In 1614 Cramer revisited the topic in his De Regno Jesu Christi, a volume num-
bering more than 400 octavo pages. Much had changed in the intervening years. The
Rosicrucian Fraternity had issued their Fama Fraternitatis, the writings of Valentin
Weigel and Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser were available on bookstalls throughout
Germany. Numerous chronological pamphlets about the potential apocalyptic
significance of the years 1612 and 1613 had been issued. Where once apocalyptic
expectations of future felicity were rare, they now appeared to be everywhere. Much
of this literature was well known to Cramer. In the course of De Regno Jesu Christi
he reveals that he had read apocalyptic works by a slew of recent authors, including
Michael Stifel (1487–1567), the Antitrinitarian Johannes Erasmus or Erasmi of
Antwerp,35 Guillaume Postel, and Eustachius Poyssel.36 This is to say nothing of
still more recent though unnamed ‘epicureans,’ ‘conjectural chronologers,’ ‘compu-
tational astrologers’ and the like who, Cramer declared, attempted in their tracts to
replicate the ‘numerical suppositions of the Rabbis.’37 In other words, Cramer was
reading much the same literature as the figures discussed in the prior two chapters.
But where they found hope, Cramer found heresy.
As far as Cramer was concerned, this mania for insight into the End Times traced
a peculiarly heretical curve back to the ancient heresy of chiliasm. For Cramer, the
error had its roots in Jewish thought, but flourished with the rise of Christian chilia-
stae, who derived their name from the expectation that in the future ‘the kingdom of
Christ on earth shall endure for one thousand years.’38 After examining in some
detail the chiliastic opinions of the Church Fathers like Cerinthus, Justin, and oth-
ers, Cramer remarked on the appearance of a ‘new and subtle chiliastic opinion’
(nova et subtilis opinio Chiliastica) expressed by a certain commentator on scrip-
ture.39 Although Cramer did not identify this commentator, it was apparently the
aforementioned Johannes Erasmi.40 Cramer wrote that this commentator anticipated
an earthly kingdom of God similar to that of Cerinthus, with the exception that the
elect would not reign for a literal thousand years, but instead for a ‘lengthy time’
35
In a work titled Tyræum Giesuitern, which I have not seen. On Erasmi see Johann Gerhard,
Locorum Theologicorum … Tomus nonus und ultimis: In quo continentur haec Capita: 31. De
extremo Iudicio. 32. De Consummatione seculi. 33. De Inferno seu Morte æterna. 34. De Vita
æterna. (Jena: Steinmann, 1622), vol. 9, 455; Jöcher, Gelehrten-Lexicon vol. 2, 1947; Christoph
Sand, Bibliotheca Anti-Trinitariorum sive Catalogus Scriptorum, & succincta narratio de vita
eorum Auctorum, qui praeterito & hoc seculo, vulgo receptum dogma de tribus in unico Deo per
omnia aequalibus personis vel impugnarunt vel docuerunt solum Patrem D. N. J. Christi esse illum
verum seu altissimum Deum. (Freistadt: Johannem Aconium, 1684), 87–88; Corrodi, Kritische
Geschichte des Chiliasmus, vol. 3, 6.
36
Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi, 280.
37
38
Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi, 294: ‘enim hoc Regnum Christi mille annos in terra duraturum
esse.’
39
40
The identification is from Johann Affelmann (praes.) Daniel Spalchaver (resp.), Illustrium quaes-
tionum theologicarum heptas … VI. Quantum nov-antiquae opinioni, de felicitate Novi instantis in
his terris millenarii, tribuendum sit? (Rostock: Ferberus, 1618), sig. D2v-D3r.
(tempus bene longum), during which the enemies of the church would be defeated.41
The ‘subtle’ aspect of this particular heretical expectation was, it appears, its tem-
poral innovation. As far as Cramer was concerned, even if the thousand years were
to be understood symbolically, the heresy remained a version of chiliasm identical
in spirit to that of the Church Fathers.
The floodgates of interpretation were beginning to open. Elsewhere in the work,
Cramer held that there were four rationes by which people were seduced by
chiliasm. These included the misunderstanding of prophecies in the Old Testament,
the songs of the Sibyls, the traditions of the Church Fathers, and Revelation.42 But a
reason that might be added to these is that the definitional boundaries of the heresy
itself were expanding. For Cramer, the expectation of a future period of felicity
represented a direct challenge to the authority of the Lutheran church. Speculation
of this kind needed to be curbed. The claim to insight into the Last Days presumed
knowledge that according to scripture was reserved for God alone (1 Thessalonians
5:2). To demonstrate the falsity of claims to this knowledge, Cramer listed the
apcoalyptic reckonings of various chronologers that he had encountered in his
reading. That the predictions of so many had long been proven false by time itself
was for Cramer ample proof of their wrong-headedness.43
The issue of authority was also central to a denunciation of chiliastic heresy
authored by Andreas Libavius (1550–1616). Libavius was not a cleric, but rather a
fiercely orthodox chymist and instructor at a Lutheran Gymnasium in Coburg.44 In
41
Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi, 310: ‘Porro memini & alicubi novam & subtilem quandam opin-
ionem Chiliasticam commentatoris cujusdam in Apocalypsin de Regno Evangelico. Qui statuit,
futuram esse omnimodam Antichristi, tum Turcici tum Romani, Panolethriam, ante finem mundi:
Et Ecclesiam futuram esse oecumenicam, & Catholice Evangelicam, deletis omnibus Hæresibus,
cessantibus omnibus Persecutionibus, pressuris, bellis, Tyrannide; idque per mille annos, h.e. tem-
pus bene longum, sed praecise Deo notum. In quo Regni Evangelici statu tamen rejicit quicquid
Judaismum sapit.’
42
Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi, 311: ‘Fundamenta, quibus Chiliastæ innituntur, Quatuor sunt
genera Rationum, quibus in hunc errorem seducti sunt. 1. Vaticinia quædam Prophetica malè intel-
lecta. 2. Carmina Sibyllina. 3. Traditiones. 4. Apocalypsis Joannis.’
43
Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi, 282–283, 284; ‘Nam in conclusione primo differunt, quia
quidam illorum, ut hactenus recitavimus, Dei Extremo terminum ponunt annum Christi 400.
quidam annum Christi 490. quidam annum Christi 500. quidam annum Christi 527. quidam annum
Christi 601. quidam annum ab ascensione Christi 1000. quidam annum à nativitate Christi 1530.
quidam annum Christi 1533. Quidam A.C 1588. quidam annum Christi 1599. Quidam A.C. 1600.
Quidam A.C. 1612. Quidam A.C. 1621. Quidam A.C. 1630. Quidam A.C. 1645. Quidam A.C.
1656 […] 1662, 1673, 1675, 1682, 1688, 1699.’ In a marginal note on p. 284 Cramer mocked
Eustachius Poyssel’s fondness for the number forty, as well as his claims to inspiration by the Holy
Spirit.
44
On Libavius see Bruce T. Moran, ‘Medicine, Alchemy and the Control of Language: Andreas
Libavius versus the Neoparacelsiansm,’ in Paracelsus. The Man and his Reputation, his Ideas and
their Transformation, Ole Peter Grell, ed. (Leiden: Brill, 1998), 135–150; Peter J. Forshaw,
‘“Paradoxes, Absurdities, and Madness”: Conflict over Alchemy, Magic and Medicine in the
Works of Andreas Libavius and Heinrich Khunrath,’ Early Science and Medicine 13 (2008):
53–81. Libavius’s theological learning was praised by clerical contemporaries. See de Spaignart,
Theologisch Wächterhörnlein, 76; Theodore Thumm, Impietas Wigeliana, Hoc Est, Necessaria
Admonitio de centrum et viginti erroribus novorum prophetarum coelestium (Tübingen: Johan-
Alexander Cell, 1622), 248.
1616 Libavius presided over a thesis titled De Millenariorum Haereticorum Secta.

This work began with a lengthy discussion of the chiliastic heresy of the Church
Fathers, who expected a worldly kingdom of Christ. He then turned his attention to
Paracelsus, who anticipated that before its End the world would return to a state
approaching Paradise, in which the elect would dwell in all happiness.45 For
Libavius, Paracelsus was the ‘father’ of the expectations of the ‘new sect of
Rosicrucians,’ whose manifestos, the Fama and Confessio Fraternitatis, promised a
‘future general reformation of politics, theology, and the arts in the years 1621,
1622, 1623 etc.’46 As far as Libavius was concerned, the expectations of a reforma-
tion of the world and an ensuing period of harmony and felicity on earth to occur in
a Joachite tertium seculum was nothing other than the repetition of errors derived ex
sententia Chiliastarum.47 Libavius argued that a whole host of ‘sects’ could be con-
nected to chiliastic error in the same way, among them ‘kabbalists,’ ‘magicians,’ and
‘Necromancers.’ To give an example of Libavius’s zeal in discovering and
condemning chiliastic error, he even saw the heresy lurking behind the Rosicrucian
Fraternity’s distinctively innocuous tessera, ‘Jesus mihi omnia.’48
Although he appears not to have known Cramer’s De Regno Jesu Christi,
Libavius applied precisely the same logic as his Stettin counterpart when consider-
ing the definition of chiliastic error, identifying it as a common thread running
through a variety of beliefs incompatible with doctrinal Lutheranism. Like many
conservative figures of his day, Libavius was convinced that the world of learning
had already reached a state of perfection and that nothing ‘new’ remained to be
discovered.49 Such an idea meshed perfectly with pessimistic Lutheran apocalypti-
cism. For Libavius innovation of any stripe was potentially a sign of heresy. The
hope of a coming Golden Age or an apocalyptic increase in knowledge was there-
fore as ridiculous in matters religious as it was in matters scientific. The very idea
contravened Godly order, which, according to Libavius, was instituted in the struc-
ture of Lutheran society itself.50
Another step toward the recognition of a ‘subtle chiliastic opinion’ identified by
Cramer and Libavius as a separate category of heresy occurred in 1618. The key discus-
45
Andreas Libavius (praes.) Jakob Michael (resp.), De Millenariorum Haereticorum Secta. Quae
videtur nostris temporibus ex Paracelsi deliramentis, & Arabum Mauritanorumq[ue]Magia
infami, & Diabolica, Per fratres Societatis Roseae crucis, & horum vesanos adulatores, item
Magos, Cabalistas, Mathematicos, Necromanticos &c. fumo Paracelsico, quasi Tabaci, dementa-
tos in seculum reduci…. (Coburg: Bertsch, 1616), sig. [A4r]: ‘Patrum memoria Paracelsus simili-
ter pronunciavit revolutis astris mundum debere ad primordium recurrere, & in hoc seculo futuram
esse Paradisum cum summa felicitate (campo Elysio).’
46
Libavius and Michael, De Millenariorum Haereticorum Secta, sig. A4r.
47
Libavius and Michael, De Millenariorum Haereticorum Secta, sig. A4r.
48
Libavius and Michael, De Millenariorum Haereticorum Secta, sig. A4r: ‘Ibi tessera est: Jesus
mihi omnia: hoc est, Rex in millenaria felicitate et post in æternitate.’
49
See Carlos Gilly, ‘The “Fifth Column” within Hermetism: Andreas Libavius,’ in Magia, alchi-
mia, scienza dal ‘400 al ‘700: l’influsso di Ermete Trismegisto. Carlos Gilly and Cis van Heertum,
eds. 2 vols, (Florence: Centro Di, 2002), vol. 1, 406–415 at 414.
50
Andreas Libavius, Variarum controversiarum … inter nostri temporis, Philosophos et Medicos
Peripateticos, Ramaeos, Hippocraticos, Paracelcicos … libri duo. (Frankfurt am Main: Kopff,
1600), 298.
sion took place in yet another dissertation, this time supervised by the Rostock theolo-
gian Johann Affelmann (1588–1624) and defended by Daniel Spalchaver (d. 1651).51
This text embodied the scholastic polemical-orthodox (Schul- und Streitorthodox) atti-
tudes of his time. Since the publication of Cramer’s De Regno Jesu Christi in 1614,
optimistic apocalyptic expectations had been circulating in ever greater numbers.
Numerous texts by Weigel had found their way into print, new prophets like Paul Nagel
and Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser had found their voices, and rumours of strife in Bohemia
and its apocalyptic repercussions had begun to filter into correspondence networks, pro-
viding yet more fodder for prophetic exclamations. Affelmann and Spalchaver therefore
confronted the problem of chiliastic heresy in rather different, and perhaps rather more
urgent, circumstances than their forerunners.
Question VI of Affelmann’s work concerned the subject of the Millennium.
Affelmann initiated his discussion by denouncing the expectations of church fathers
like Cerinthus, Eusebius, Lactantius and others. Announcing a categorical distinc-
tion, he described their expectations of an epicurean earthly Millennium as compris-
ing the doctrine of chiliasmus crassus or ‘vulgar chiliasm,’ a name intended to
convey that, historically, this was the most common form of the heresy. It is also
probably the first use of the term chiliasmus in Lutheran heresiological literature of
the seventeenth century.52 As far as Affelmann was concerned, chiliasmus crassus
could represent a fundamental error that would exclude an individual from the
brotherhood of Christian faith.53
It is for this reason that Affelmann’s notion that the expectations of the Church
Fathers were now being supplemented by ‘new enthusiasts’ (novi Enthusiastae)
becomes so important.54 Referring to the Augsburg Confession, these enthusiasts,
Affelmann claimed, maintained beliefs similar to the Anabaptists concerning a
coming worldly felicity, sometimes described in a Joachite register as a ‘third age of
the Holy Spirit.’ Among them the theologian listed followers of the Thuringian anti-
nomian Ezechiel Meth, who in 1614 had caused a sensation on account of his radi-
cal antinomian beliefs.55 Citing Libavius, Affelmann also accused the Rosicrucian
Fraternity of drawing on ancient semina sententiæ huic Chiliasticæ, given that they
anticipated a time of future earthly felicity.56
Affelmann identified five different expectations that were manifested in what he
described as the ‘new-antique’ (nov-antiqua) chiliastic heresy. These included (1)
the expectation that Christ and the elect would reign on earth for a literal thousand
51
Affelmann and Spalchaver, Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum heptas (1618). The disputa-
tion was reprinted in 1623 and 1674. On Affelmann see Jöcher, Gelehrten-Lexicon I, 131–2;
Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, vol.1, 134–5.
52
Cf. Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 108.
53
Affelmann and Spalchaver, Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum heptas, sig. D2r.
54
Affelmann and Spalchaver, Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum heptas, sigs. D2r-D3r.
55
Affelmann and Spalchaver, Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum heptas, sig. D3r. On Meth see
further the nuanced discussion in Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, passim, and below,
chapter five.
56
Affelmann and Spalchaver, Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum heptas, sigs. D3v-D4r. ‘…
regnum novum Chiliasticum, quod, si fratribus hisce credimus, futuris adhuc temporibus, in terris
spectabimus.’
years before the Judgment Day (Revelation 20; 1 Thessalonians 4:17); (2) the
expectation that this time would witness the Jews led back to the Holy Land; (3) that
the Martyrs of the church would be resurrected bodily and reign for a thousand
years; (4) the expectation that the future felicity will be spiritual in nature, and flour-
ish with the defeat of the Turks and other enemies of the church and the expansion
of the evangelical faith across the world; (5) the expectation of a partly worldly,
partly spiritual period of great blessedness before the Last Judgment, in which the
world will be once more as it was before the fall.57 Like Libavius and Cramer before
him, Affelmann’s tract strengthened the association of recent expectations of a
future felicity with the ancient heresy of chiliasm, as well as the imprecations of the
seventeenth article of the Augbsurg Confession. In Affelmann’s understanding, nov-
antiqua Chiliasmus was a heresy that butted against the fundamental beliefs of the
Lutheran faith, and could comprise virtually any melioristic expectation, be it
worldly or spiritual, before the End.
A host of Lutherans read Affelmann’s work with interest. The jurist Christoph
Besold in Tübingen, in particular, utilised Affelmann’s formulation of a nov-antiqua
heresy to condemn the expectations of Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser and Valentin Weigel
as being of a piece with those of Paracelsus, Jacopo Brocardo, Tomasso Campanella
(1568–1639), various Calvinists, and the chiliasts of antiquity.58 But it was only in
1622 that the connection between ancient and modern chiliastic heresy was for-
malised, when the Jena theologian Johann Gerhard established the category of
chiliasmus subtilis in the ninth and final volume of his influential dogmatic opus,
Loci theologici (1622). This was the first significant discussion of chiliastic heresy
to take place outside the context of a theological disputation since Cramer’s De
Regno Jesu Christi (1614). By this time, even more apocalyptic material was circu-
lating in print and manuscript. Like his forbearers, Gerhard was concerned to con-
nect the vocabulary of the ancient heresy of chiliasm with recently voiced
expectations of a future felicity. He initiated his discussion with a definition of the
57
Affelmann and Spalchaver, Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum heptas, sig. D4r: ‘Sententiarum
facta enumeratio ostendit, novos hos Chiliastas, diversas & quinque quidem occupasse classes, &
sub quintuplici militantes vexillo prodiisse in publicum. Ad primam classem refero eos, qui
Christum corporaliter ante diem novißimum è cœlo rediturum scribunt, & hac terra tale regnum
terrenum per mille annos instituturum contendunt, quale Th. I. descripsimus. Ad secundam illos,
qui auæ generalius de terra à nonnullis dicuntur, specialus ad terram Canaan, in quamJudæos
reducendos ajunt, restringunt. Ad tertiam illos, qui solis Martyribus ante extremum diem resusci-
tandis, millenarij alicujus felicitatem ascribunt. Ad quartam illos, qui spiritualiter felicitatem hanc
ita accipunt, ut ad deletum Antichristum, extinctum Turcam, eversos hæreticos, cessantes persecu-
tiones, & ecclesiam Catholicè evangelicam hæc referant. Ad quintam illos, qui & spiritualiter &
corporaliter felicitatem hanc interpretantur, eandemque nobis tantam, quanta ante lapsum fuit in
paradiso, ante extremum judicium, pollicentur.’ Affelmann refutes each of these expectations in a
discussion occupying sigs. D4r-F1r.
58
Christoph Besold, Discursus Politici: I. De Monarchia. II. De Aristocratia. III. De Democratia.
generatim tractantes. IV. De Reipublicae Statu subalterno: ubi de Comitibus, Baronibus, Civitatibus
Imperialibus, & Libero Equestri Ordine, ex profeßo prolixeq[ue] disputatur. V. De Reipublicae
formarum inter sese comparatione; & quaenam earum praestantior existat? (Straßburg: Zetzner,
1623), 240–249.
common view of the error, namely that Christ would return before the Last Judgment
and initiate an earthly, physical kingdom on earth, and would resurrect the faithful
to rule with him for one thousand years.59 But Gerhard was determined to show that
there was the potential for significant variation on these expectations. He linked
several to article seventeen of the Augsburg Confession.60 While Daniel Cramer had
suggested in 1614 that the expectation of an earthly future felicity for a ‘symbolic’
thousand year period was the substance of ‘new and subtle’ chiliastic opinions,
Gerhard’s scheme did away with the thousand years as a measure of the heresy
altogether. Within his new scheme, chiliasmus crassus was the expectation of a
future period of physical or bodily felicity of an epicurean nature. Chiliasmus sub-
tilis, on the other hand, comprised any expectation of a time of justice, reprieve from
persecution, a universal spread of doctrine, or era of peace for the church.61 As long
as the anticipated period was to occur before the Last Judgment, the expectation
constituted a grave heresy.62
Gerhard’s postulation of the category chiliasmus subtilis in 1622 provided a dog-
matic touchstone for debate concerning the heretical nature of a broad variety of
expectations of a future felicity. Even though many of these expectations had no
relationship at all with the apocalyptic beliefs of the Church Fathers like Cerinthus,
they were nevertheless conceptualised by some Lutheran dogmatists as intrinsically
related. Furthermore, the elision of stable boundaries of the error also led to the
invocation of article seventeen of the Augsburg Confession as a key document in the
condemnation of these expectations, a result that its drafters arguably never intended.
Beginning with Cramer, or perhaps Libavius, these Lutherans were keen to associ-
ate chiliastic heresy with all manner of allegedly heretical ideologies. That is not to
say, however, that the position on chiliastic heresy among clerics was uniform. The
Rosicrucian fraternity provides a telling example. Despite Libavius’s protestations
against them, several Lutheran clerics expressed support for the fraternity. In 1616,
one anonymous cleric wrote in his Fama remissa ad Fratres Rosæ Crucis that he
‘despised the errors of the chiliasts’––as represented in the writings of the Church
Fathers and revivified by Calvinist commentators––although he supported the
Rosicrucian fraternity’s vision of a future harmony and felicity.63 In the same year,
David Meder (1545–1616), pastor of the community of Nebra in Thuringia, had
59
Johann Gerhard, Loci theologici, vol. 9, 442: Chiliasts, ‘vulgò appellantur Millenarii, docent
enim, Christum ante diem novissimum è coelo in terram rediturum, pios defunctos resuscitaturum
ac cum illis, uti etiam iis, quos vivos inveniet, oppressis omnibus impiis, vitam corporalibus deli-
ciis abundantem per mille annos in his terris exacturum, inchoato terreno, corporali, ac visibili
regno et finitis demum mille annis illius regni consummationem seculi et universalem omnium
resurrectionem esse secuturam.’
60
Gerhard, Loci theologici, vol. 9, 453–454.
61
Gerhard, Loci theologici, vol. 9, 462: ‘Quidam [e]n[im] chiliasmum subtilem in pace ecclesiae,
perfecta justitia, quiete à tentationibus, fidei orthodoxae conformitate universali &c. consistentem:
quidam v[ero] chiliasmum crassum in corporalibus deliciis ac voluptatibus fluitantem
propugnant.’
62
Gerhard, Loci theologici, vol. 9, 462–463.
63
H.Ar.No:R., Fama Remissa ad Fratres Rosae Crucis, sigs. E8v-F3r.
A Confusion of Heretics 113
‘joy and hope’ awoken in him by the Rosicrucian manifestos, declaring that there
was nothing in them contrary to Lutheran doctrine.64 Even among clerics, to say
nothing of the diversity of opinion among lay Lutherans, the doctrinal position on
chiliastic heresy was hardly monolithic or unified.
The expansion of the understanding of chiliastic heresy in learned dogmatic
works between 1574 and 1622 was driven by a perception of the proliferation of
heretical expressions that represented a challenge to the authority of the Lutheran
church. This perception is at least partially attributable to the rash expansion of
heretical taxonomies. Yet the dilution and expansion of the boundaries of chiliastic
heresy would have two distinct consequences. First, it would create confusion con-
cerning what actually constituted chiliastic heresy. Second, it would problematize
the status of a number of Lutheran theological and other works that were once con-
sidered orthodox.
A Confusion of Heretics
The optimistic apocalyptic hopes of the ‘subtle chiliasts’ that appeared new to
Lutherans like Daniel Cramer, Andreas Libavius and Johannes Affelmann, were in
fact anything but. We have seen in the first three chapters of this study that expecta-
tions of a felicitous future were common in Lutheran confessional culture since the
sixteenth century. The evidence from learned disputations as well as other sources
suggests that it was during the 1600s that guardians of Lutheran doctrine began to
conceive of these heresies as a threat to authority and social order. In 1620 Andreas
Merck (1595–1640), then an Archdeacon in Halle an der Saale, complained that
heterodox ‘wolves’ had ‘attacked’ his city, and ‘having introduced themselves, both
in person with lively voices, and with their fervent writings (the publication of
which is carried out secretly by otherwise praiseworthy printers in various places
throughout the territories of Magdeburg), they make their blasphemous power
known, especially among the simple.’65 In Danzig in 1621 the pastor Johann
Corvinus (1583–1646) complained to several theological faculties that no less than
seven Lutheran preachers in Danzig were secretly Rosicrucians (heimliche
Rosenkreutzer).66 In Nuremberg in 1623, the pastor Zacharias Theobald (1584–
1627) believed that at least three-hundred Weigelians had infested the city, and that
64
David Meder, Iudicium Theologicum, Oder Christlichs und kurtzes Bedencken von der Fama Et
Confessione der Brüderschafft des löblichen Ordens deß Rosencreutzes: Ob ein Christe mit gutem
Gewissen und ohne verletzung der Ehren Gottes/ sich in dieselbe Fraternitet begeben könne.
(Danzig: Hünefeld, 1616), sig. A2r.
65
Merck, Trewhertzige Warnung fürm Weigelianismo, sigs. A7v-A8r. On Merck, see Bubenheimer,
‘Orthodoxie – Heterodoxie – Kryptoheterodoxie’; Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, 8–9,
449–451, 464, 507–509, 569.
66
Cited in Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 116.
they had even infiltrated the schools, where they actively corrupted the youth.67
Although an investigation by the Nuremberg city council revealed that Theobald
had massively inflated this figure, the fact that he publicized it at all gives a sense of
the threat he perceived to his community.68 In 1624, the Langensalza preacher
Valentin Wallenberger (1582–1639) complained to theologians in Wittenberg that
‘the people, even the most learned among them, believe these fanatics much more
than my own preaching and exhortations.’69 The Lübz court preacher Georg Rost
declared in 1622 that what was being experienced was no ordinary spate of hetero-
dox enthusiasm: it was an all-consuming cancer that would not stop until society
was destroyed.70
The reality was rather less dire than portrayed by these churchmen, who appear
to have believed that an alarmist approach was the best way to mobilise opposition
against chiliastic heresy. To borrow the words of R.J.W. Evans, they advocated ‘a
militant simplification of ideas.’71 Nevertheless, metaphors of insatiable predators,
of infection and corruption, point to an underlying anxiety that characterised the
Lutheran polemical response to optimistic expectations. According to them, chilias-
tic heretics were not merely spreading doctrinal errors, they were corrupting the
foundational institutions of the church and state, and thereby Godly order. In 1620,
the pastor Christian Gilbert de Spaignart castigated ‘these new unnamed
Ordensleut[e],’ thereby referring to Rosicrucians and others, ‘who not only attack
God’s word, but also the Christian evangelical religion.’72 For de Spaignart the
onslaught of chiliasts and Rosicrucians appeared to be coordinated by a malevolent
power. Valentin Grießmann in Wählitz near Magdeburg also understood the prolif-
eration of heresies and heretics as evidence of a ‘clandestine and seditious con-
spiracy contra magistratum politicum.’73 In addition to the fictional Rosicrucian
fraternity, ideas of conspiracy were supposedly confirmed by the discovery of
actual conventicles that met in order to plan seditious activities and repudiate soci-
ety’s norms. In Langensalza, Esajas Stiefel, Ezechiel Meth, and their followers not
only denied the authority of the church, but also that of the Prince-Elector of
Saxony.74 There was also the ‘Arndtiana, Wigeliana et Stenckofeldiana societas’
around bookseller Eberhard Wild in Tübingen, who as we have seen sold seditious
67
Zacharias Theobald, Widertauffischer Geist/ Das ist: Glaubwürdiger und Historischer Bericht/
was Jammer und Elend die alten Widertauffer gestifftet und angerichtet/ Darauß zu schliessen:
Was man von den newen genandten Weigelianern/ Rosencreutzern und Pansophisten zugewarten
hab. (Nuremberg: Simon Halbmeyer, 1623), 112.
68
On the background to Theobald’s pronunciations and the subsequent investigation of his claims
by the city council, see Richard van Dülmen, ‘Schwärmer und Separatisten in Nürnberg (1618–
1648). Ein Beitrag zum Problem des ‘Weigelianismus,’ Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 55 (1973):
107–137.
69
Cited in Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 47.
70
Rost, Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten, sigs. A4v, 15v.
71
Evans, Rudolph II and his World, 289.
72
Spaignart, Theologisch Wächterhörnlein, sig. )(3r-v.
73
74
Spaignart, Theologisch Wächterhörnlein, sig. )()( 2r.
literature to students, academics and known Schwenkfeldians in the city and

abroad.75
Anxieties engendered by the Thirty Years’ War and heavenly portents not only
affected Lutherans who held allegedly heterodox inclinations. Events in the natural
and political world, as well as the false prophets they inspired (cf. Matthew 7:15–20
& 24:11–24, Mark 13:22, 2 Peter 2:1, 1 John 4:1), were accepted by clerics as
apocalyptic portents. It is no accident that the Hamburg preacher Nicolaus Hunnius,
drawing on the anxieties of the Thirty Years’ War, employed the metaphor of
Lutheranism as a threatened city in order to stress the danger posed by heterodox
thought to godly order. Yet as his metaphor of traitors (Verrähter) within a city’s
walls suggests, Hunnius was aware that chiliastic heresy was a distinctly Lutheran
problem. Equally, his comment suggests that while some adherents had lost faith
with the apocalyptic doctrines of the church, the church itself, or at least some of its
representatives, had lost confidence in its followers.76
In addition to complaining of the threat posed by heresy, Lutheran doctrinalists
employed several different strategies to combat its spread. Firstly, the proliferation
of expression of the errors needed to be halted. Noting that heretical ideas were
‘circulated openly in print,’ several clerics targeted the print industry in their
works.77 Where pre-press censorship existed in some territories, clerics like Andreas
Merck urged censors and local authorities to act with more vigilance, or to introduce
stricter controls.78 Equally, post-press censorship was advocated. De Spaignart pro-
posed that at least minimal information be required by imperial law to appear on
title-pages of printed books, in order to ease the process of locating, censoring and
punishing reprobate printers and authors.79 Such calls to vigilance were not entirely
without result, as the case of Wild in Tübingen demonstrates.
Outside of halting the flow of printed literature, clerics also attempted to publi-
cise the dangers of chiliasm. This meant, in the first instance, writing against the
error in the vernacular. In 1622, Nicolaus Hunnius issued a Christliche Betrachtung
der newen Paracelsischen und Weigelianischen Theologie. This work was in fact a
translation of an academic disputation that Hunnius had supervised at the University
of Wittenberg in 1619. In the preface, Hunnius related that the text had been trans-
lated ‘because the Weigelian, Paracelsian and Rosicrucian books all appear in
German.’80 Hunnius’s book, and texts like it, offered the opportunity for clerics to
75
Tübingen, Universitätsarchiv, Cgm. 1259, 500r. (Letter of Theodor Thumm to Konrad Dietrich,
5 July 1625).
76
Nicolaus Hunnius, Außführlicher Bericht Von Der Newen Prophepheten/ (die sich Erleuchtete/
Gottesgelehrte/ und Theosophos nennen) Religion/ Lehr unnd Glauben/ damit der Satan die
Kirche Gottes auffs newe zu verunruhigen sich unterstehet (Lübeck: Johann Embs, 1634), sig.
A2v-A3r.
77
Nicolaus Hunnius, Christliche Betrachtung der Newen Paracelsischen und Weigelianischen
Theology, darin durch viertzehen Ursachen angezeiget wird (Wittenberg: Heiden, 1622), sig.):(4v.
78
See further the discussion in chapter two, above.
79
Spaignart, Theologisch Wächterhörnlein, 19.
80
Hunnius, Christliche Betrachtung, sigs. A2r-v. The original dissertation is Nicolaus Hunnius
(praes.) Valentino Legdæus (resp.) Principia Theologiae Fanaticae, quam Theophrastus Paracelsus
genuit, Weigelius interpolavit, Succinctis thesibus sub examen revocata (Wittenberg: Johann
Richter, 1619).
present Lutheran doctrine concerning optimistic apocalyptic expectations clearly

and simply. Yet the polemical atmosphere created by widespread perception of
growing heresy would lead inevitably to complications. These complications can be
demonstrated with reference to Georg Rosts’s Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten (1622).
Dedicated to refuting the teachings of the Rosicrucians, Valentin Weigel, Paul
Felgenhauer, Paul Nagel and others, Rost claimed that the common thread to their
beliefs was a ‘new enthusiastic and chiliastic anti-theology (Untheologie).’ This
manoeuvre was intended to simplify the issue of dismissing all of their doctrines,
and coincided to some extent with the learned denunciations of chiliastic heresy
since Libavius. However, instead of going on to discuss the issue of ‘subtle’ chilias-
tic expectations, Rost provided a definition of the error that reflected ancient expec-
tations of chiliasmus crassus, and which manifestly never appeared in any of the
works he castigated. According to Rost, the central motivating belief of the new
Untheologie was the expectation that
following Christ’s magisterial return, he and his elect will rule for a thousand years upon the
earth. Crushing their enemies under their feet, they will live mightily and magnificently in
Epicurean fashion, filling their bellies with delicious dishes, sweet beverages, and
magnificent feasts. As Philastrius tells, they will also be sated in all varieties of carnal plea-
sure, and shall rejoice in great joy and ecstasy.81
As we have seen in prior chapters, not even the most ardent, or misguided, Lutheran
believer in a future felicity came close to advocating such a position. In 1626 one
Lutheran cleric noted that, despite surveying a large number of heretical works, that
he had ‘never read’ of an expectation of this kind being expressed by new
prophets.82
Rost’s definition reflects two strands of the Lutheran offensive against chiliastic
heresy. On the one hand, it continues the conflation of the ancient heresy of chiliasm
with contemporary expectations of a future felicity as part of a heretical continuum.
This was a view that would ultimately lead Daniel Cramer to argue that all heresies,
past and present, were intrinsically related in his arbor hæreticæ consanguinitatis
(Fig. 4.1).83 On the other hand, Rost’s decision likely also represents a conscious
strategy of warning the public about the dangers of heresy in a simplified fashion.
As Andreas Kesler’s (1595–1643) handbook on the conversion of heretics high-
81
Rost, Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten, 16r: ‘Christus, mit seinen Reichsgenossen allhier auff
Erden/ nach seiner Majestetischen Widerkunfft vnd erscheinung/ Tausent Jahr werde herschen/
alle Feinde vnter ihre Füsse zwingen vnd bringen/ vnd sie gar prächtig vnd mechtig halten/ auch
mit köstlichen Gerichten/ süssem Getranck vnd herrlicher Speise auff gut Epicurisch erfüllen/ vnd
mit allerley Wollust/ wie es Philastrius erzehlet/ vberschütten/ vnd mit grosser Frewde vnd Wonne
ergetzen.’ A similar definition is offered on sig. A4v.
82
Germanus, Der siebenden Apocalyptischen Posaunen, 93.
83
Daniel Cramer, Arbor Haereticae Consanguinitatis, Hoc est, Haereseologica Descriptio, In
Qua Praecipuae Haereses Veterum Ex Uno post Christum natum principio deductae (Straßburg:
Zetzner, 1623). See the similar assessment in Andreas Merck, Nothwendige Schutzschrift …
gegen Ezechiel Meths unlangst uber ihn geführte Beschwerung (Halle: Schmidt für Oelschlegel,
1621), 26.
Fig. 4.1 The tree of heresy. Engraving. From Daniel Cramer, Arbor hæreticæ consanguinitatis
(1623). Courtesy of Houghton Library, Harvard University
lighted, counselling of the populace and unlearned heretics could only begin with
basic cognition:
Concerning the uneducated and the simple, one should handle them in the simplest fashion
possible, but in a manner correct and with a solid foundation in the truth. The use of subtle-
ties and termini logici is both unnecessary and unwise, for the more simply one presents a
matter, the more serviceable it is for the common people.84
But there was a tension between the proliferation of complex definitions in Latinate

disputations and dogmatic compendia like Gerhard’s Loci theologici and the simpli-
fications of polemical literature. The expansion of chiliastic error into categories of
‘crass’ and ‘subtle’ and the simultaneous terminological lumping with Weigelianism
resulted in confusion, both in clerical and lay cultures, concerning the boundaries of
the heresy.
A unified position on the definition of chiliastic heresy was thus not only desir-
able for the Lutheran confession, it was essential. In 1622 this was acknowledged
by the theological faculty of the University of Wittenberg. Confronted with the task
of adjudicating dubious accusations of chiliastic heresy levelled against the Danzig
preacher Hermann Rahtmann—to be examined in the next chapter—the Wittenberg
theologians declared that:
Some draw a distinction within these new doctrines between chiliasmus crassus, which
Cerinthus and others defended, who fancied that the Kingdom of God will consist of unbri-
dled sinful excess, including gluttony and drunkenness; and chiliasmus subtilis, which was
allowed by the fathers of the church, who are said to have described a respite more spiritual
than worldly, or of a worldly desire (Lust) that was without sin. […] Because the doctors of
orthodoxy disagree among themselves on this point, and because thereby it is not possible
to reach a consistent and infallible certitude, it would be best if one would set this dispute
aside [in this case], especially for the benefit of the unlearned.85
Although the theologians here commented on accusations of chiliastic heresy in a

specific case, their judgment that ‘it is not possible to reach a consistent and infal-
lible certitude’ could be applied to the more general question concerning the
84
Andreas Kesler, Methodus Haereticos convertendi: In zweyen Theilen verfasset. 2 vols. (Coburg:
Gruener, 1631), vol. 2, 311–12: ‘Belangend die Vngelehrten vn[d] Einfeltigen/ sol man mit
denselbe[n] auff dz. aller einfeltigst doch gleichwol richtig vnd mit gutem Grund der Warheit ha[n]
deln. Subtilisirn vn[d] die terminos Logicos gebrauchen ist nicht nötig/ auch nicht rathsam/ sonder
je schlechter man die Sachen fürbringt je dienlicher ists für gemeine Leut … Also laß die subti-
liteten, item die Terminos Philosophicos, die für die Gelehrten gehören/ aussen.’
85
Christian Grübel, Thesauri Consiliorum Et Decisionum Appendix Nova, Continens quaedam
inserenda Operi Dedekenno-Gerhardino, 154: ‘Unter den newen Lehren machen etliche einen
Unterscheid inter Chiliasmum crassum, welchen Cerinthus un[d] andere Schwermer vertheidiget/
und lauter fleischliche sündliche Wollust/ als Fressen unnd Sauffen im Reich Christi ihnen einge-
bildet haben: Et inter Chiliasmum subtilem, welchen die Patres statuiret, und mehr von geistlichen
als leiblicher Frewde, oder doch von leiblicher Lust ohne Sünde, sonderlich was Christum selber,
und die aufferweckten Heiligen anlanget, geredet haben sollen. […] Weil dann Orthodoxi Doctores
hierinnen selber discepiren, und man deshalben zu einer unfeilbaren gleichförmigen Gewißheit
nicht wohl gelangen kan/ wäre am besten/ man stelte das disputiren ein über dieser Frage/
sonderlich bey den Einfältigen.’
allegedly heretical character of optimistic expectations within Lutheran confes-

sional culture in the early seventeenth century.
For if clerics could not agree upon what exactly comprised chiliastic heresy, how
could they effectively warn or counsel the lay public against it? How was any indi-
vidual to know if the doctrines they supported were heterodox or not? These ques-
tions were not merely theoretical. Heinrich Gebhard’s vision of future felicity in his
Enarratio chronologo-historica apocalypseos (1623) specifically rejected a worldly,
earthly or even fleshly kingdom of God as ‘dreamed-up’ (geschwermet) by ancient
chiliasts like Cerinthus.86 He rejected any notion that his expectations contravened
article seventeen of the Augsburg Confession.87 Gebhard’s anticipation of an
‘ephemeral demonstration and presence of God’s power’ before the Last Judgment,
however, might have been condemned as chiliasmus subtilis as defined by
Affelmann.88
Another example is offered by Paul Nagel. Late in 1621 he was accused of being
a heretical chiliast. He vehemently denied the claim with reference to a definition of
chiliasmus crassus similar to that postulated by Rost, arguing that he didn’t antici-
pate that the forthcoming Golden Age would see the bodily and worldly reign of
Christ on earth, and that any suggestion to the contrary was a bald lie.89 As we have
seen in our survey of Nagel’s expectations, these were lies indeed. In September of
the next year, Nagel informed a correspondent that he had been falsely accused by
Saxon authorities and Wittenberg theologians of holding chiliastic expectations
(chiliastica), because he supposedly believed ‘that Christ would occupy a worldly
Empire,’ and that he anticipated ‘a golden age like Cockaigne (Schlaraffenland).’
Furthermore, Nagel was accused of anticipating that ‘the beast of the Papist Empire
shall be defeated before the Judgment Day, and that the elect shall rule here [on
earth].’90 Again none of these charges were true. The full suite of accusations adum-
brated by Nagel suggests strongly that the trumped-up charges of chiliasm were
prompted by his radical rejection of ecclesiastical authority. He was also accused of
seducing his family and ‘many other prominent people’ (viell andere fürnehmer
Leüt) with his alleged heresy, as well as of ‘wanting to know more than God,’ of
‘wanting to become a saint,’ of ‘paying more attention to visions, prophecies and
dreams’ than the teachings of the Lutheran church, and claiming ‘to be taught
86
[Gebhard] Enarratio Chronologo-Historica Apocalypseōs S. Johannis, 145–146, 158.
87
[Gebhard] Enarratio Chronologo-Historica Apocalypseōs S. Johannis, 158.
88
[Gebhard] Enarratio Chronologo-Historica Apocalypseōs S. Johannis, 153.
89
Nagel, Alter vnd neuer Schreib Calender (Halle: Christoph Bißmarck, 1622), cited in Hartmut
Sührig, ‘Die Entwicklung der niedersächsischen Kalender im 17. Jahrhundert,’ Archiv für
Geschichte des Buchwesens 20 (1979): 330–794,466: ‘Daß […] ich statuierte mit den Chileasten
eine sichtbare/ fleischliche Wiederkunfft Christi/ der werde ein Weltlich Reich mit seinen Heiligen
auff Erden anfahen/ mit einander essen/ trincken/ vnd in Wollust leben/ seynd lauter Lügen.’
90
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 64r (Nagel to Arnold Kerner, 22 September 1622): ‘5. Het chiliastica,
es solte Christus noch ein Weldlich Reich anfahen. 6. Hoffte auff eine güldenen Zeit, gleich dem
schlaraffenland. 7. Dz Thier dz. Röm: Reich solte fort für dem Jungsten Tage, die heiligen solten
allhier regiren.’
directly by God and the Holy Spirit.’91 Authorities appear to have been less
concerned with the specifics of Nagel’s expectations than the threat to good order
that they represented.
Gebhard, Nagel and their ilk had a lot to lose should they have been punished for
supporting a heresy like chiliasm, so it is only natural that they would vehemently
deny all charges.92 But looking beyond the question of personal interest in the out-
come of their cases, their objections to accusations of chiliastic heresy were not
only understandable, they were completely justified: which definition of the error, if
any, would apply to their particular cases? And who had the power to say so?
The Changing Status of Lutheran Devotional Literature
In addition to the circulation of conflicting definitions, another unexpected by-

product of the expansion of the category chiliastic heresy between 1614 and 1625
was that some earlier Lutheran works, previously considered orthodox, began to be
regarded with suspicion. This was especially true of any work that suggested the
possibility of a period of future felicity, no matter how vague such a suggestion may
have been. As Robin Barnes has pointed out, this was an almost inevitable outcome
of the placement of restrictions on apocalyptic speculation that once been encour-
aged within the faith.93 The most noticeable and significant casualties of the chang-
ing definitions of chiliastic error concerned those authors of Lutheran devotional
literature (Erbauungsliteratur).94
This change was not because these works themselves contained or advocated
optimistic apocalyptic expectations. In chapter one we touched on the works of
Johann Arndt, whose influential Wahres Christenthum was emblematic of what
Winfried Zeller has described as the Frömmigkeitswende, a ‘devotional change’ that
attempted to fill the gulf between Lutheran doctrine and Christian life at the turn of
the seventeenth century.95 Lutheran devotional literature and optimistic apocalyptic
expectations appear to have both drawn on a desire to posit certainty and provide
91
Leipzig, UB Ms. 0356, fol. 64r (Nagel to Arnold Kerner, 22 September 1622): ‘1. het ich Weib
undt Kindt vnd viell andere fürnehmer Leüt verführet, aber mein Weib undt Kindt würden diese
heiligen Lügen straffen. 2. Ich wolte mehr wißen denn Got. 3. Ich het viel papistica wolte ein
Werck heiliger sanct sein. 4. Het Enthusiastica, wolte noch auff gesicht weißagung und träume
acht haben, und ohne mitell von Got und seinen H. Geiste gelehret sein.’
92
Korn, Das Thema des Jüngsten Tages, 4 suggests, somewhat cynically, that Felgenhauer and oth-
ers were involved in systematic obfuscation concerning their expectations.
93
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 257–258 and passim.
94
On the genre of Erbauungsliteratur, see John Procopé, Rudolf Mohr, Hans Wulf,
‘Erbauungsliteratur I. Alte Kirche II. Mittelalter bis Neuzeit III. Reformations- und Neuzeit
IV. Die Erbauungsliteratur in der Gegenwart,’ in Theologische Realenzyklopädie. 36 vols. (Berlin:
De Gruyter, 1976–2004), vol. 10 28–83. The relationship between Erbauungsliteratur and opti-
mistic apocalypticism was first noted by Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus.’
95
Winfried Zeller, Der Protestantismus des 17. Jahrhunderts (Bremen: Dietrich, 1962), xvii ff.
The Changing Status of Lutheran Devotional Literature 121
comfort and solace in the Last Times. But as we have seen in chapter one, Arndt,
and authors like him, didn’t advocate expectations of a coming Golden Age. For
Arndt, the Golden Age was now, in the heart of the true Christian. It is for this very
reason, perhaps as a riposte to the optimistic apocalypticists who so readily invoked
his name, that Arndt issued a collection of the devotional works of Stephan Praetorius
(1536–1603) under the remarkable title Von der gülden Zeit (1622).96 For Arndt, the
Golden Age was now, not in the future, and the product of dedicated prayer and pen-
ance, not the result of Godly intervention in human affairs. Nevertheless, Arndt’s
occasional reliance upon the theological works of Weigel and Paracelsus made him
a darling of optimistic apocalypticists and did little to help his reputation among
guardians of orthodoxy.
Perhaps the most significant author of devotional literature to be suspected of
supporting optimistic apocalyptic expectations was the Hamburg pastor Philip
Nicolai.97 In 1596 and 1597 Nicolai issued his Commentarius de regno Christi
vaticiniis propheticis et apostolicis accomodatus in two volumes. A German trans-
lation followed in 1598 under the title Historia deß Reichs Christi, and a score of
editions appeared in various European languages throughout the seventeenth centu-
ry.98 Regarded as a shining example of orthodox devotional literature in the decade
or so after its release, Nicolai’s work was studied industriously and cited with
approval by theologians including Cramer, Rost, and Hunnius. But Nicolai’s apoca-
lyptic expectations were problematic.
Nicolai expressed several orthodox Lutheran apocalyptic expectations in his
work. He located the Millennium firmly in the past, believing that it had come to an
end in 1517, in anticipation of the imminent Last Judgment and the final ragings of
Satan.99 Nicolai also held fast to the idea that the exact time of the Judgment Day
could not be calculated, but was instead known to God alone.100 Furthermore, the
‘eternal kingdom of God’ of his book’s title was a ‘hope focussed on the afterlife,’
96
Stephen Praetorius, 58 Schöne, Außerlesene Geist- und Trostreiche Tractätlein, von der gülden
Zeit &c. (Lüneburg and Goßlar: Vogt für Stern, 1622). Further Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und
Chiliasmus,’ 115 note 42.
97
On Nicolai see Rudolf Rocholl, Das Leben Philipp Nicolais. (Berlin: Schlawitz, 1860), Martin
Lindström, Philipp Nicolais Verständnis des Christentums, (Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1939); Peter
Zimmerling ‘Philipp Nicolai (1556–1608). Mystik und Eschatologie,’ in Evangelische Mystik
(Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015), 58–61. Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’
113–114. For very different conclusions concerning Nicolai’s eschatology see Staehelin, Ernst,
Die Verkündigung des Reiches Gottes in der Kirche Jesu Christi. Zeugnisse aus allen Jahrhunderten
und allen Konfessionen. 7 vols. (Basel: Reinhardt, 1951–1964), vol. 4, 89–109; Felix Blindow,
‘Der unbekannte Philipp Nicolai: Apokalyptiker am Vorabend des Dreißigjährigen Krieges,’
Jahrbuch für westfälische Kirchengeschichte 93 (1999): 39–64.
98
I refer to Philipp Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi: das ist: Gründtliche Beschreibung der
wundersammen Erweiterung, seltzamen Glücks, und gewisser bestimpter Zeit der Kirchen Christi
im Neuwen Testament … Jetzt aber verteutschet, durch M. Gothardum Artus. (Franckfurt: Speis,
1598) in the following discussion. For a listing of the numerous editions of this work see Blindow,
‘Der unbekannte Philipp Nicolai,’ 39–64.
99
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 562–3.
100
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 488. 1 Thessalonians 5:2; Revelation 3:3, 16:15.
as Johannes Wallmann has characterised it.101 But Nicolai’s book also contained
more questionable material. Drawing on Daniel 12, Nicolai added the 1290 pro-
phetic ‘years’ to the date 335 CE, which he held as the year in which the Romans
accepted Christianity.102 As a result of this calculation, Nicolai deduced that 1625
would be a crucial year for the church. In this year the tyranny of Antichrist would
intensify.103 Following Revelation 11:3, the terrors of 1625 would last 1,260 days,
and therefore end in 1629, in which year the two witnesses—being the Old and New
Testaments—would be preached throughout all the earth (cf. Matthew 24:14).104 At
his point would commence a ‘mini-millennium,’ celebrated with ‘jubilation and
cries of joy from the Elect,’ during which time true Christianity would gain the
upper hand over Satan.105 According to Nicolai, this was the time prophesied in
Zachariah 12:10, in which the spirit of grace is poured out upon the house of David.
Despite the conjectural nature of Nicolai’s work—everything, he emphasized, was
conditional upon God’s will—the prophesied period between 1629 and 1670 was
unmistakably a prediction of a felicitous period for the church on earth. While this
expectation was uncontroversial when first postulated in the 1590s, his expectations
might well have been considered a ‘new and subtle chiliastic opinion’ after around
1614.
Nicolai’s works were not spared criticism. In 1624 the Rostock theologian Paul
Tarnow (1562–1633), a great opponent of Arndt and Lutheran devotional literature
in general, designated authors like Nicolai as ‘new evangelists,’ where the term
‘new’ was to be understood as an indicator of illegitimacy, as in the case of the new
prophets.106 In 1633 Nicolai’s speculations concerning a felicitous future were chal-
lenged by a ‘Lover of Truth’ in a volume printed in Hamburg under the title Kurtzes
Bedencken vber das Buch Herrn Philippi Nicolai vom Reich Christi. Its author was
a Lutheran with a strong grasp of dogmatic theology, almost certainly a cleric.
Throughout the tract he cited the works of the Tübingen theologians Theodor
Thumm (1586–1630) and Lucas Osiander the younger (1571–1638), designating
101
102
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 459. Blindow, ‘Unbekannte Nicolai’, 51–56, has bravely
detailed Nicolai’s reckoning methods in detail.
103
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 439ff, 442.
104
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 442.
105
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 445.
106
See Paul Tarnow, De Novo Evangelio, quod sit caussa omnium calamitatum, universum
Christianorum orbem inundantium & submergentium, Dissertatio. (Rostock: Pedanus, [1624]). I
have used the later German edition translated by Heinrich Ammersbach; Paul Tarnow, Pandora
Tarnoviana. Das ist/ Beschreibung des Neuen Evangelij, welches eine Uhrsach ist alles Unglücks
in der werthen Christenheit/ Hiebevor Anno Christi 1624 auff der Universität Rostock in einer
Lateinschen Oration öffentlich fürgestellet. (Quedlinberg: Ockell, 1663). See further Johann
Tarnow, Tres Eliae, hoc est, Comparatio trium Ecclesiae Dei Reformatorum Eliae Thesbitae,
Iohannis Baptistae, Martini Lutheri. (Rostock: Fueß 1618); Paul Rossow, Jesu praelucente …
judicii extremi prodromis, Das ist: Kurtzer und gründlicher Beweis daß nunmehr der grosse
erschreckliche Gerichtstag des Herrn … zu erwarten sey. (Rostock: Fueß [1621]); Leppin,
Antichrist un Jüngster Tag, 136ff.
The Changing Status of Lutheran Devotional Literature 123
them as the ‘two heroes’ of the confession.107 The Kurtzes Bedencken was prefaced
by Matthew 7:21–23, in which Jesus stated that false prophets—here to be under-
stood as Nicolai himself—would have no part of the heavenly kingdom. In the text
proper, Nicolai was accused of misrepresenting scripture, of relying on non-
Lutheran authorities—both Calvinist and Catholic—in his chronological reckon-
ings, and of displaying a presumptuous arrogance in identifying 1670 as the date of
the Last Judgment.108 Concerning Nicolai’s optimistic expectations for 1629, the
Kurtzes Bedencken was scathing. Time itself had demonstrated the falsity of the
prophecy, the church was not enjoying a period of felicity, and on this basis alone
Nicolai’s predictions could be derided as ‘impure,’ and as ‘a brand new interpreta-
tion [of God’s word], of which Christ, the apostles and pure teachers (reine
Kirchenlehrer) knew nothing.’109 With time, and changing dogma, the majority of
Nicolai’s apocalyptic speculations had come dangerously close to heresy and to
charges of false prophecy and divine imposture. While Nicolai’s devotional works
remained indispensible aids for the pursuit of practical Christianity for many
Lutherans, the Kurtzes Bedencken insisted that Nicolai’s apocalyptic reckonings
were ‘not considered the best explanations by most Evangelical authorities.’110
Another Lutheran cleric who became suspected of promoting chiliastic heresy
after the 1610s was the Lichtenhagen pastor Johann Wolther. In some respects, we
might see in Wolther the architect of his own misfortune. We have already seen that
his Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung über die heimliche Offenbahrung
(1605) contained an early condemnation of the proliferation of doctrines of a forth-
coming Golden Age, which Wolther linked to the ancient heresy of chiliasm.111 In
the same work, however, Wolther postulated an expectation of a brief period of
future felicity before the Last Judgment, based largely on the Nicolai’s apocalyptic
reckonings.112 After mulling over the calculations of Nicolai and the writings of the
medieval spiritualist Nicholas of Lyra (1270–1349) about the End of Days, Wolther
concluded that
[…] the Judgment Day will not occur in intra profligatione, with the defeat of the Turks, or
even shortly thereafter. Instead a short time (kleine Zeit) will occur. These are the days of
security, of which Lyra and all the others therefore write, that following the fall of Antichrist,
the world will live in freedom.113
107
Kurtzes Bedencken vber das buch Herrn Philippi Nicolai vom Reich Christi. Sonderlich aber
vber die Propheceyung/ so auff jetzige Zeit gerichtet ist. (Hamburg: Heinrich Karstens Erben,
1633), 22, 26, 29, 34; for Thumm and Osiander as ‘zween Helden’, see 120.
108
Kurtzes Bedencken vber das buch Herrn Philippi Nicolai vom Reich Christi, 3–4, 6–7, 15, 123.
109
Kurtzes Bedencken vber das buch Herrn Philippi Nicolai vom Reich Christi, 112.
110
Kurtzes Bedencken vber das buch Herrn Philippi Nicolai vom Reich Christi, 106.
111
See above, pp. 107–108.
112
Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung, 195.
113
Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung, 195: ‘Also halte ichs dafür/ daß auch nicht
in intra profligatione, in der Niederlage des Türcken/ oder bald darauff/ der Jüngste Tag herein
brechen/ sondern noch/ wiewol eine kleine Zeit damit werde verzogen werden. Und dis werden
seyn die Tage der Sicherheit/ davon Lyra und alle andere also sagen/ Daß nach des Antichrists Fall/
die Welt wird frey leben.’
Once more, this was an expectation of a future felicity, one that appears to have had
its roots in the medieval tradition of the Refreshment of the Saints. In accordance
with Lutheran teachings, Wolther believed that the Last Judgment would occur
unexpectedly, after the world, happy in its security, would again begin to indulge in
ungodly pleasures, as in the time of Noah (cf. 1 Thessalonians 5:1–4).114 In other
words, the period would be ephemeral. As in the case of Nicolai, Wolther’s expecta-
tions were thoroughly orthodox when first expressed in 1605, but could be consid-
ered with suspicion after 1614.
Despite the fact that Wolther issued an attack on optimistic apocalyptic expecta-
tions of the Calvinist John Napier and Paul Nagel in his Gulden Arch (1624),115 his
works, along with Nicolai’s, were cited by optimistic apocalypticists in support of
their own visions. Pamphlets containing extracts from Nicolai’s prophecies appeared
for sale in Germany throughout the 1620s, divorced entirely from their original
devotional context.116 Paul Nagel cited Nicolai on several occasions.117 So too did
Heinrich Gebhard.118 In 1626, Nicolai’s Historia deß Reichs Christi featured on a
list of heretical works inspirational to Rosicrucians and new prophets, alongside
books by Felgenhauer, Nagel, Neuheuser, Kärcher and others.119 In 1629, a pam-
phlet was printed featuring Nicolai’s optimistic apocalyptic speculations supple-
mented with material culled from Luther’s works, perhaps an attempt to elaborate
an alternative prophetic tradition within mainstream Lutheranism.120 Similar collec-
tions had already been printed in Wittenberg in 1619 and 1629, and both Wolther
and Nicolai’s prophecies concerning a future ‘period of respite’ were printed along
with extracts from Luther in Rostock in March of 1628.121 In 1632, the Ulm math-
ematician Johann Faulhaber (1580–1635) cited Nicolai in support of his messianic
114
Wolther,, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung, 195, 195–6.
115
Johann Wolther, Gulden Arch: Darinn der wahre Verstand und Einhalt der wichtigen
Geheimnussen/ Wörter und Zahlen/ in der Offenbahrung Johannis/ und im Propheten Daniel/
reichlich und überflüssig gefunden wird. (Rostock: Hallervord, 1624).
116
See Blindow, ‘Der unbekannte Philipp Nicolai,’ 61–2.
117
See for example Munich BSB, Cod. germ. 4416/9, 184r (Paul Nagel, ‘Leo Rugiens oder Lewen
Gebrüll’ (c.1620–1).
118
[Gebhard], Examen Chronologicum, 154.
119
Germanus, Der siebenden Apocalyptischen Posaunen, 174–5
120
Warhafftige Weissagung des letzten Deutschen Propheten D. Martini Luthers, welcher schon vor
hundert Jahren diesen jetzigen erbärmlichen … Zustand beklaget … hat. Auch ist noch eine kurtze
Weissagung was D. Philippus Nicolai … dem Römischen Antichrist im 1629. Jahr für ein Urtheil
fellet. (No Place: No Printer, 1629).
121
Philipp Schmidt, Geistreiche prophetische Weissagungen, die wir innerhalb Sechzig- und
Siebentzig-Jahren ipso Eventu augenscheinlich in der Christenheit erfüllet gesehen, und was wir
… noch in Teutschland zugewarten. (Wittenberg: Schmidt, 1619). Eigentlicher Prophecey und
Geistreiche Verkündigung Jtziges Hochkläglichen und allerbetrübtesten Zustands unsers allge-
meinen lieben Vaterlandes Deutscher Nation/ etc. … Auß Herrn 1. Doctoris Martini Lutheri &c.
2. D. Philippi Nicolai, weyland zu Hamburg/ etc. 3. Und Johannis Woltheri, zu Liechtenhagen in
Preussen gewesenen Pastorn/ Theologischen Schrifften … (Rostock: Augustin Ferber, 1628).
According to Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 345, a similar collection had appeared under the aegis
of Philipp Fabri in Wittenberg in 1615.
Reaping the Whirlwind 125
vision of the Lion of Midnight.122 Finally, in the anonymous collection of prodigies,

prophecies, and portents titled Unterschiedliche Paßporten (1632), Nicolai’s expec-
tations were synthesized with 129 other prophecies by the likes of Paracelsus,
Capistranus, the Rosicrucians, Nagel, and Hans Engelbrecht.123 Here, Nicolai’s pre-
dictions of a felicitous future after 1629 were mobilised in support of the messianic
character of the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus (1594–1632).
Reaping the Whirlwind
In the sixteenth century, numerous individuals within Lutheran confessional culture

were engaged in an obsessive quest to unlock the secrets of the End Times. As
Robin Barnes has observed, this apocalyptic pursuit was granted ‘virtual doctrinal
sanction’ by church authorities.124 Yet by the early seventeenth century, Lutheran
doctrinalists were seeking to impose limitations on this pursuit. There were many
reasons for this. The Catholic Counter Reformation movement was zealous in its
intent to win back Lutheran territories. Calvinism had made stunning inroads among
once-Lutheran communities in the Holy Roman Empire, all the while advocating a
philosophical meliorism tied to apocalyptic knowledge. That new Calvinist rulers
often advertised their conversion alongside mandates for a ‘Reformation’ or ‘new
Reformation’ of their territorial churches naturally made claims of a forthcoming
‘general Reformation’ unpalatable to many Lutherans.125 As we saw in chapter one,
to this complex was added political instability, signs in the heavens, massive infla-
tion, and reduced crop yields, a product of the Little Ice Age.
According to the theologian Robert D. Preus (1924–1995), the decreasing zeal for
these apocalyptic ideas was only natural as later generation clerics ‘lost some of the
intense spirit and original dynamic’ of Luther’s own teachings and began to lay the
groundwork for an enduring worldly institution, a circumstance described by Werner
122
Johann Faulhaber, Vernunfftiger Creaturen Weissagungen, Das ist: Beschreibung eines Wunder
Hirschs, auch etlicher Heringen und Fisch, ungwewohnlicher Signaturen und Characteren, so
underschiedlicher Orten gefangen. (Augsburg: No Printer, 1632).
123
Unterschiedliche Paßporten, deß auß Mitternacht adelichen und antadelichen, eylenden im
Teutschland ankommenden Post-Reuters, darinnen seine bißher unterschiedliche abgelegte
Frewdenposten, mit mehr als 130 … Weissagungen und Wunderzeichen außführlich beglaubet und
bestärcket werden. Erstlich gedruckt in der erlösten (Magdeburg: No Printer, [1632]), 28–30.
124
125
See for example Drey Schrifften Von der Anhaltischen Reformation (Newstadt an der Hardt;
Schramm, 1606); Guthertziges Bedencken Uber etliche und New entstandene 24. Glaubens
Artickel Calvinischer Reformation: Welche auß dem Lande zu Hessen noch vor wenig Tagen/ an
die Benachbarte Chur: und Fürsten gelanget (No Place: No Printer, 1614); Churfürsten von
Brandenburg Aussschreiben/ wegen einer Reformation in Religions Sachen: Benebenst vier und
zwantzig Artykel der Reformation/ sollen nachfolgenden Inhalts seyn (No Place: No Printer, 1614).
Elert (1885–1954) as a ‘truncation of genuine Lutheranism.’126 But the retreat would

not be without distinct consequence. James P. Martin has remarked on the growing
‘neglect of the apocalyptic’ that characterised doctrinal Protestant eschatology from
the late sixteenth century.127 Martin has argued convincingly that ‘the effect of this
neglect […] was that the millennial idea was rejected in the Protestant confessions to
the detriment of their total eschatological outlook. Thus eschatology lacked an ele-
ment which would have counteracted the excessive individualism of Protestant sote-
riology and eschatology.’128 One manifestation of this ‘excessive individualism’ was
arguably the growth in claims to apocalyptic insight granted by the Holy Spirit. At
the other end of the spectrum, we may find in this dynamic an explanation for the
nexus between the Frömmigkeitswende and optimistic apocalypticism.
This circumstance led to an inevitable impasse concerning the issue of authority.
Into the breach stormed Lutheran defenders of doctrine, like Andreae, Cramer,
Libavius, and others. They used the heresy of ‘chiliasm’ as a blunt weapon against
heretical expressions, reifying the significance of an expectation in a forthcoming
felicitous future as the hallmark of ‘new-antique’ chiliastic heresy. But in so doing,
they failed to provide an adequate substitute for the beliefs they sought to quash.
Namely, if expectations of a future felicity were being expressed as the result of the
perils of the age, then outlawing their expression hardly got at the heart of the mat-
ter, which was providing solace and comfort for individuals in order to soothe their
passage toward the Last Judgment.
Armed with an ever-broadening definitions, by the beginning of the 1620s the
Lutheran pursuit of chiliastic heretics had become so vigorous, or so indiscriminate,
that alleged chiliasts were not only being discovered among the lay populace, but
also within the church itself, actively and retroactively. The Lutheran response to
the heresy was far from monolithic. As we have seen, tracts written against chiliastic
heresy produced a variety of conflicting definitions. This confusion hampered,
rather than helped, the Lutheran attempt to define sharp borders between orthodoxy
and heterodoxy. Confusion concerning the nature of the heresy meant confusion
concerning the boundaries of acceptable doctrine. This situation was not unantici-
pated. ‘What shall we do,’ complained Johann Valentin Andreae as early as 1622,
‘when through the fear of heresy we won’t even recognize our own doctrine, nor be
able to portray it in our lives?’129 But not all clerics saw the expression of optimistic
apocalyptic expectations as a challenge to authority. By the 1620s there were sev-
eral who recognized the appeal of these beliefs, and who themselves advocated
visions of a felicitous future, thereby risking accusations of promoting chiliastic
heresy. It is to their stories that we now turn.
126
Robert D. Preus, The Theology of Post-Reformation Lutheranism. A Study of Theological
Prolegomena (St. Louis: Concordia, 1970) 40; Werner Elert, The Structure of Lutheranism. Walter
Hansen, trans. 2 vols. (St Louis: Concordia, 1962), vol. 1, 3.
127
James P. Martin, The Last Judgment in Protestant Theology from Orthodoxy to Ritschl (Grand
Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1963), 13–17, esp. 15.
128
Martin, The Last Judgment, 4.
129
Johann Valentin Andreae, Theophilus, Sive de Christiana Religione sanctius colenda, Vita tem-
perantius instituenda, Et Literatura rationabilius docenda Consilium (Stuttgart: Kautt, 1649), 46.
Chapter 5
Heretics in the Pulpit
In 1638 the Dresden court preacher Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg issued the final
volume of his Commentariorum in Apocalypsin. Writing on Revelation 20, Hoe
addressed the question of chiliastic heresy in substantial detail, engaging with prior
dogmatic literature as well as its key conceptual division between chiliasmus subti-
lis and chiliasmus crassus.1 In the course of his discussion, Hoe mentioned a num-
ber of familiar names as representatives of this heresy, among them Paul Felgenhauer,
Paul Nagel, and Julius Sperber. But to this list Hoe added another name, that of a
person whom he adjudged one of the vilest heretics of the age: Hermann Rahtmann.
Yet Rahtmann was neither a new prophet, nor a self-proclaimed dissenter. He was
instead a Lutheran preacher in the Prussian metropolis of Danzig.2
Hoe’s condemnatory opinion was prompted by the so-called ‘Rahtmann dispute’
(Rahtmannischer Streit), one of the more strident and controversial debates that
engulfed early seventeenth-century Lutheranism.3 The dispute began as an a rgument
between a Danzig pastor and one of his deacons over an assortment of personal and
theological matters, but soon spiralled into a heated controversy involving theologi-
cal faculties from throughout the Holy Roman Empire. The dispute was prompted
by a complex of anxieties concerning chiliastic error, the place of devotional litera-
ture within Lutheran culture, and most contentiously, on the correct doctrine of the
extent and power of the word of God, and thereby the authority of the individual.
1
Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg, Commentariorum In Apocalypsin Beati Apostoli Ac Evangelistae
Johannis, Liber Septimus … Tripudium Coeleste, Super iudicio Meretricis magnae, Bestiaeq[ue]
apprehensio & in stagnum ignis coniectio (Leipzig: Schürer and Götz, 1638), 230.
2
Hoe, Commentariorum in Apocalypsin, 228–229, 231–233.
3
On the dispute see M. Engelhardt, ‘Der Rahtmannische Streit,’ Zeitschrift für historische
Theologie 24 (1854): 43–131; Richard H. Grützmacher, Wort und Geist. Eine historische und
dogmatische Untersuchung zum Gnadenmittel des Wortes (Leipzig: Deichert, 1902), 220–261;
Johann Anselm Steiger, ‘“Das Wort sie sollen lassen stahn …” Die Auseinandersetzung Johann
Gerhards und der lutherischen Orthodoxie mit Hermann Rahtmann und deren abendmahlstheolo-
gische und christologische Implikate,’ Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 95 (1998): 338–365.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_5
128 5 Heretics in the Pulpit
After burning brightly for several years, the debate was only extinguished with
Rahtmann’s death in 1628.
The key role played by the accusation of chiliastic heresy in the Rahtmann con-
troversy brings to a boil some of the tensions simmering in the Lutheran engage-
ment with expectations of a future felicity in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
More specifically, it demonstrates the clear divisions that existed among Lutheran
clerics concerning the permissibility of such expectations. The present chapter com-
pares Rahtmann’s complex case with those of several other Lutheran clerics who
advocated, or were accused of advocating, optimistic apocalyptic expectations in
the early seventeenth century, including Nicolaus Hartprecht, Wolfgang Siebmacher,
and Joachim Cussovius. What emerges from these cases is a picture of the varie-
gated role played by expectations of a felicitous future within Lutheran confessional
culture. In an environment where there existed no consensus concerning the accept-
ability of apocalyptic expectations, lay people and clerics alike forged their own
way through the perils of time.
The Rahtmann Dispute
Hermann Rahtmann (also Rathmann, Rahtman, etc) was born in Lübeck in 1585
as the son of a merchant.4 His unusual intelligence was discovered early, and he
attended Latin schools and gymnasia in Lübeck, Ratzeburg, Magdeburg, Rostock
and Leipzig.5 Immediately following the completion of his primary education,
Rahtmann moved to the Catholic city of Cologne. According to his friend and
biographer Michael Blancke (d. 1637), this was in order to acquire first-hand
knowledge of the ‘secrets and methods of disputation’ practised by the Jesuits.6
From 1610 Rahtmann studied at the University of Leipzig, where he created a
sensation by challenging his professors upon various doctrinal points: more than
twenty dissertations defended by Rahtmann in logic, philosophy and theology
4
Michael Blanckius, Christliche Leich-Predigt/ Aus der I. Cor. IV. v. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. Bey der
Begräbniß Des … M. Hermanni Rathmanni … welcher im 1628. Jahr/ am 30. Iunii, seliglich im
Herrn entschlaffen/ und den 3. Iulii, mit Christlichen Ceremonien/ zur Erden daselbst bestattet: Im
Zeugniß wird die streitige Lehre von der Krafft Göttliches Worts/ und der Erleuchung deutlich
erörtert. (Frankfurt an der Oder: Thorn, 1628), 19–22; Georg Dedeken, Thesauri Consiliorum et
Decisionum … Das ist: Vornehmer Universitäten/ Hochlöblicher Collegien … Rath/ Bedencken/
Antwort/ Belehrung/ Erkentnüß/ Bescheide und Urtheile. 3 vols. (Hamburg: Hertel, 1671), vol. 3,
150–388; Christopher Hartknoch, Preussische Kirchen-Historia (Frankfurt and Leipzig: Simon
Beckenstein, 1686), vol. 3, 790, 798–816; Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 115–122;
Johann Moller, Cimbria literata, sive Scriptorum ducatis utriusque Slesvicensis et Holsatici histo-
ria literaria triparta, (Copenhagen: Orphanotrophium Regium, 1744), vol. 1, 513; vol. 2, 559–66;
Walch, Historische und Theologische Einleitung in die Religions-Streitigkeiten, vol. 1, 524–531;
vol. 4, 577–613.
5
Engelhardt, ‘Rahtmannischer Streit,’ 49.
6
Blanckius, Christliche Leich-Predigt, 19–20.
Rahtmann’s Gnadenreich 129
are still extant.7 In 1612 Rahtmann was appointed deacon at St. John’s church in
Danzig. In 1617 he transferred to the same post in the Pfarrkirche, where he
served under pastor primarius Johann Corvinus until 1626. During this time
Rahtmann authored several devotional works in the spirit of Johann Arndt,
including his Gnadenreich (1621), which ultimately prompted accusations of
chiliastic heresy, and Theosophia fidei antiquæ et vitæ verè Christianæ (1619), a
lengthy discussion of the relevance of Tertullian and Cyprian’s (ca. 200–258CE)
teachings for contemporary Lutheranism.8 Despite the long-lasting and bitter
nature of the dispute which erupted over his devotional writings in 1621,
Rahtmann enjoyed the support of many of his church colleagues in Danzig, and
in 1626 he was promoted to chief pastor in the church of St. Katharine. According
to Blancke, Rahtmann exercised his duties there ‘unimpeachably,’ preaching
zealously to the public about the need to remain patient in the quest for inner
freedom and peace. He died on 30 June 1628.
Rahtmann’s Gnadenreich
In 1621, shortly after his appointment as deacon of Danzig’s Pfarrkirche, Rahtmann

was struck by a life-threatening bout of malarial fever. After several months of
intense illness and anxiety, Rahtmann miraculously recovered. He attributed his
recovery to hope. Hope, he explained, had sustained him and comforted him in his
darkest hours. Believing that his illness was a microcosmic reflection of the state of
the Holy Roman Empire, Rahtmann came to believe that hope was also the key for
the recovery of the sickly Empire.9
In the wake of his recovery, Rahtmann penned a devotional work titled Jesu
Christi deß Königs aller Könige und Herren aller Herren Gnadenreich (1621). In
this fat octavo volume Rahtmann promoted hope as a Christian virtue, linking its
desirability and efficacy to concerns about the state of Christian belief as well as
external political uncertainties. In the dedicatory preface, Rahtmann wrote that his
book had two major purposes. The first was to redress with hope the ‘sad and
pathetic condition’ which reigned in Europe on account of ruling powers, whose
actions condemned ‘many thousands of men, won through the blood of Christ’ to
death, and which had furthermore ‘ruined the land and people, and burned and
destroyed cities, villages and settlements.’10 The second was to counteract the resul-
tant despair and destruction. Moved by the lamentations of Jeremiah, Rahtmann felt
that people could find solace in the counsel of the Holy Spirit, precisely as he had
done during his illness, when ‘living comfort was created and grew within my con-
7
Blanckius, Christliche Leich-Predigt, 20. A near complete listing of Rahtmann’s many disputa-
tions can be found in VD17.
8
Hermann Rahtmann, Theosophia fidei antiquæ et vitæ verè Christianæ certa et salutaria tradens
documenta (Wittenberg: Berger, 1619), sig. A1v.
9
Hermann Rahtmann, Jesu Christi deß Königs aller Könige und Herren aller Herren Gnadenreich.
(Danzig: Hünefeldt, 1621), sig. ):( 2r.
10
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 2v.
fused being’ as a result of Godly enlightenment.11 The eternal, inner kingdom of

God was not subject to the capriciousness of worldly fortunes, but comprised an
eternal kingdom ruled by Christ and maintained in the hearts of his believers.12
Through careful prayer, penance, and taking heed of scripture and the teachings of
the Holy Spirit, Rahtmann presented in his Gnadenreich the keys for every Christian
to access this interior kingdom, and thus aimed to bring hope to the world.
However, the preface reveals another motivation behind Rahtmann’s Gnadenreich;
his desire to provide an alternative doctrine of hope to Lutherans at risk of falling
under the spell of heretical chiliasm. Rahtmann began his discussion with an account
of the heresy in the writings of the Church fathers (alten Chiliasten).13 Recognising
that the Fathers had expressed a variety of opinions on the subject, Rahtmann con-
demned Cerinthus of ‘godless’ expectations of a worldly Millennium. At the same
time, however, he sought to exonerate Papias of the heresy.14 While many theolo-
gians, based on the account of Eusebius, had condemned Papias, Rahtmann believed
that his expectations for the Millennium were spiritual in nature. The orthodoxy of
this expectation, Rahtmann pointed out, was supported by Augustine (354–430CE),
who wrote in his De civitate Dei that chiliasm would not be objectionable ‘if it were
believed that the future joys of the saints in that Sabbath would be spiritual as a
result of the presence of God.’15 Rahtmann argued that because Lutherans failed to
recognize Augustine’s support of the idea of a spiritual Millennium, the works of
Papias had been unfairly maligned.16
Rahtmann then turned his attention to the many books circulating in the Empire
that ‘chimed in various ways’ with the heretical opinions of the alten Chiliasten.
This included works by a number of figures already familiar to us, like Cardano,
Campanella, Brocardo, Postel, Brightman, Poyssel and Cellarius that Rahtmann
claimed had based their expectations ‘partly on the passage of the heavens, partly on
the Revelation of St. John.’17 He also mentioned a 1620 pamphlet Onus ecclesiae,
11
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 2v–3r.
12
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 3r.
13
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 4r–5r.
14
15
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 5r; Augustine, De civitate Dei, 20, 7.
16
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 5r-v: ‘Denn belangende die alten Väter/ unter welchen Papias,
der den H. Johannem gesehen und predigen gehöret/ und deß Irenai und Polycarpi Gesell gewesen/
schreibet von ihm Eusebius lib. 3. historiarum cap. 36 daß ers dafür gehalten/ nach der
Aufferstehung der Todten/ würde Christus allhie auff Erden sein Reich leiblich haben in den seinen
tausendt Jahr. Diese Wort ziehen etliche Theologi dahin/ als wann Papias und viele andere Väter
lehreten/ es würden die Außerwehlten mit Christo tausend Jahr nach der Aufferstehung der todten
modo mundano acorporali, nach weltlicher unnd leiblicher Art regieren/ unnd in aller Wollust deß
Leibes sich ergetzen. Aber salvo asserentium honore meines Wissens/ geschieht den alten grawen
Häuptern/ da man sie allhie in eine meynung zusammen zeucht/ sehr ungütlich.’
17
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 4v: ‘Haben also die vater ihre sonderliche Sententz gehabt vom
Reich Christi/ welche heutiges tages/ wiewol unterschiedlich widerumb affermiret und bejahet
wird/ davon Cardanus, Camp[anella] Broc[ard] Post[el] Brigthman [sic]: Cell[arius] … zu consul-
tiren, die Theils auff den Lauff deß Himmels/ theils auff die Offenbahrung Johannis sich gründen.’
Rahtmann’s Gnadenreich 131
reputedly authored by the Catholic bishop Berthold Pirstinger of Chiemsee (1465–

1543), which prophesied a reformation to come before the Last Judgment.18
According to Rahtmann, these critics of the contemporary social order had been
misled by ‘godless’ Church Fathers like Cerinthus and Justin, their brains confused
by fallible worldly sciences like astrology, and faulty understandings of scripture.19
Rahtmann hoped, therefore, that his Gnadenreich would provide a corrective to
these misguided dreams, by contrasting expectations of a future, ephemeral Golden
Age with the eternal benefits of an indwelling kingdom of God.20 Such a kingdom
would not dawn in the future, but could be accessed here and now in the heart of the
devout believer.
This was all somewhat uncontroversial. However, to these statements Rahtmann
added several adiaphora that proved a spur to controversy. For example, although
Rahtmann did not believe in a future felicitous time for the church, he did anticipate
that the Jews would be converted and that the Turk would be defeated before the
Last Judgment.21 As we have seen in previous chapters, this was an expectation seen
by several clerics as an inspiration for chiliastic heresy.22 Furthermore, Rahtmann
offered some advice to fellow clerics, arguing that theologians were wrong to attack
the ‘new heretics’ in open print, for this only publicized heretical opinion among a
wider audience. Confident that the many prophecies for a Golden Age to dawn in
1623 would all prove false, Rahtmann argued that ‘[t]he best method of refutation
is not to write many books about whether their prophecies are true or not true, but
to wait until the prophesied time itself has been fulfilled.’23 Ultimately, the Danzig
deacon should have taken his own advice concerning writing about optimistic apoc-
18
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 4v. Berthold Pirstinger, Onvs Ecclesiae Temporibvs Hisce
Deplorandis Apocalypseos Svis Aeqve Conveniens, Tvrcarvmqve Incursui iam grassanti accomo-
datum, non tam lectu, quam contemplatu dignissimum (No Place: No Printer, 1620) that was com-
posed in 1531.
19
20
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 5r-v.
21
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 6r; Censuren und Bedencken Von Theologischen Faculteten und
Doctoren Zu Wittenberg/ Königsberg/ Jehna/ Helmstädt Uber M. Hermanni Rahtmanni Predigers
zu S. Catharinen binnen Dantzig außgegangenen Büchern. (Jena: Birckner, 1626), 12.
22
See chapter four, and further the opinions of Christoph Besold discussed in Hans-Martin Kirn,
‘“Nicht nur eine Vermutung …”. Der Topos der endzeitlichen Judenbekehrung bei Christoph
Besold (1577–1638)’, in Frömmigkeit, Theologie, Frömmigkeitstheologie: Contributions to
European Church History. Litz Gudrun, ed., (Leiden: Brill 2005), 519–536; Christoph Besold, De
Hebraeorum, ad Christum salvatorem nostrum conversione, conjectanea. (Tübingen: Cellius,
1620).
23
Rahtmann, Gnadenreich, sig. ):( 6r: ‘Weil nun diese Puncta von dem künfftigen Reich Christi/
als vieler alten Lehrer meinung mir bekant waren/ unnd jetzo wiewol unterschiedlich auff die Bahn
gebracht/ unnd auff gewisse Zeit gezogen würden/ (die nicht besser als durch der Zeit Erfüllung/
die kurz ist/ und nicht mit vielen Büchern/ ob sie wahr oder nicht wahr geweissaget haben/ zu
widerlegen)/ Als ward ich bey mir selbs raths/ vom Reich Christi auß der Schrifft zu differiren/ und
mir selbst zur Lehre und Underweisung/ diß Schrifftlein zusamen zutragen.’ Wallmann, ‘Reich
Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 115 misrepresents this statement when he writes that Rahtmann declared
tracts against chiliasm as ‘falsch und nutzlos.’
alyptic expectations. For shortly after the first copies of his Gnadenreich came off
the presses of printer Andreas Hünefeldt (1581–1666) in Danzig, Rahtmann himself
was accused of chiliastic heresy.
Rahtmann’s “Chiliasm”
The accuser was Johann Corvinus, a man who, awkwardly enough, was Rahtmann’s
superior at the Danzig Pfarrkirche. Corvinus was by all accounts a fractious person-
ality who had already clashed with his deacon on several occasions.24 The
Gnadenreich represented something like a last straw in their troubled relationship.
The same week that the book was published, Corvinus preached against it in a pub-
lic sermon. But he did not let the matter lie there. Simultaneously, he authored a list
of eleven theological objections to be found in Rahtmann’s work, which he wrote up
in the form of eleven questions that were subsequently circulated to the theological
faculties of Wittenberg, Jena, Königsberg and Helmstedt, in order to solicit their
expert opinion. In a letter accompanying these questions, Corvinus indicated that
Rahtmann was one of seven preachers in Danzig whom he suspected of abandoning
Lutheranism and become instead ‘Rosicrucians.’25 The questions thus arrived at
their intended destinations firmly embedded in a polemical context.
It is worth remarking at this point that only the first two questions concerned
Rahtmann’s teachings on the subject of chiliasm. The remaining nine addressed
Corvinus’s objections to Rahtmann’s teachings concerning the power of the Word
and the Holy Spirit. As this division suggests, the major motivating factor in the
dispute was the issue of authority: for if an individual could claim direct enlighten-
ment by the Holy Spirit, then what role remained for the offices of the Lutheran
church? This particular aspect of the debate has been considered in detail by prior
scholars, and further consideration of the issues it raises would take us well beyond
the goals of the present study.26 We shall therefore concentrate on Corvinus’s objec-
tions concerning Rahtmann’s alleged chiliastic heresy.
In early 1622, Rahtmann reprinted Corvinus’s ‘odious’ questions for the benefit
of the public at large in a small duodecimo volume titled Quaestiones Undecim ex
quodam, De Regno Jesu Christi, Libello.27 In this work, the German-language ques-
tions were paired with Rahtmann’s Latin responses. The audience for this pamphlet
24
On Corvinus see Moller, Cimbria Literata, vol. 1, 151–153; vol. 3, 560; Engelhardt,
‘Rahtmannische Streit,’ 54; Jöcher, Gelehrten-Lexicon, vol. 2, 1750; Christian Krollmann, ed.
Altpreußische Biographie. 3 vols. (Königsberg: Gräfe & Unzer, 1941–1975), vol. 1, 305;
Hartknoch, Preussische Kirchen-Historia, vol. 3, 798–799.
25
Walch, Einführung in die Religions-Streitigkeiten, vol. 4, 580, 581.
26
Engelhardt, ‘Der Rahtmannische Streit’; Grützmacher, Wort und Geist, 220–261; Steiger, ‘“Das
Wort sie sollen lassen stahn …”.’
27
Hermann Rahtmann, Quaestiones Undecim Ex quodam, De Regno Jesu Christi, Libello, Odio
Magis, Quam Ex Fide, conceptae, Ac Academiarum quarundam illustrium Censuris subiectae,
(Goslar: Johann Vogt für Lüneburg: Stern, 1622). Another edition was printed in Danzig in 1623.
Rahtmann’s “Chiliasm” 133
was not therefore the people of Danzig, but educated Lutherans everywhere. Even
the most cursory inspection of Corvinus’s questions indicates that they were based
on deliberately misconstrued readings of the Gnadenreich. His first question
addressed Rahtmann’s opinions on the apocalyptic expectations of the Church
Fathers. More specifically, Corvinus enquired after a definite response from his
deacon concerning whether Papias and others anticipated that the thousand year
reign of Christ on earth would be spiritual or worldly in nature.28
In response to the first question, Rahtmann restated his conviction that some
Church Fathers had anticipated a spiritual Millennium, and had seen nothing wrong
in such an expectation. In addition to adducing passages from Augustine and Juan
Luis Vives (1493–1540) from the Gnadenreich, Rahtmann paraded a further author-
ity by pointing out that Johann Gerhard’s recently-printed Loci theologici had
also exonerated several Church Fathers of chiliastic heresy.29
The second question concerned Rahtmann’s recommendations concerning the
refutation of chiliastic heresy. It asked ‘Should we refute the opinions of the afore-
mentioned Church Fathers, several Catholics, and the prophecies of older and newer
fanatics like Paracelsus, [Paul] Lautensack, etc., who state that they will be ruled by
Christ in a worldly kingdom and await a great Reformation of his church and the
church of God? Or should one wait for the event itself, which are predicted to occur
within a few years, to pass?’30
In his response, Rahtmann accused his opponent of posing deceptive questions
concerning assertions he had never made. For example, Rahtmann stated that he had
nowhere mentioned Paracelsus or Lautensack in his Gnadenreich, nor had he ever
said that the expectations of the Church Fathers, which he variously defended or
refuted, were identical to, or to be conflated with, those of contemporary optimistic
apocalyptic expectations.31 Rahtmann stated that he defended instead the doctrines
of Papias specifically in order to deny chiliastic innovators (novatores) a potential
source and justification for their expectations with reference to the ancient traditions
of the church. Concerning the second part of the question, which asked whether
chiliasts were best refuted by time, Rahtmann appeared to have changed his tune
28
Rahtmann, Quaestiones, 9. ‘Ob die alten kirchen Lehrer Papias, Irenaeus, Tertullianus, Lactantius
&c. wenn sie dafür gehalten/ daß Christus nach der ersten Aufferstehung mit den gleubigen in aller
Frewd vnd wollust 1000. Jahr auff Erden herschen werde/ solches allein von Geistlicher wollust
oder aber von Leiblicher / wie sie in Essen/ Trincken/ Kinderzeugen (doch ohne Sünde) mag emp-
funden werden/ verstanden haben?’
29
Rahtmann, Quaestiones, 10. See also the nuanced discussion of Papias in Gerhard, Loci theo-
logici, vol. 9, 445–448.
30
Rahtmann, Quaestiones, 10–11: ‘Ob die Meynung der genanten KirchenLehrer/ auch etzlicher
Bäpstler vnnd der Alten vnnd Newen Fanaticorum Weissagung/ als Paracelsi, Lautensacks/ &c. die
sie von Christi leiblichem Reich allhie auff Erden/ vnd einer grossen reformation seiner Kirchen/
die noch zugewarten/ ausgeben/ in der Kirchen GOttes auch sollen widerlegt werden/ Oder/ ob
man den Eventum derselben/ weil ihr etzliche gewisse Jahr/ wenn diß alles geschehen werde/
Nahmkündig machen/ erwarten soll?’
31
Rahtmann, Quaestiones, 11–12.
somewhat, and wished luck to those who desired to condemn chiliastic heresy.32
This was not necessarily a contradiction of his earlier position, as Corvinus would
later accuse him, for Rahtmann had never stated that these books should not be writ-
ten, but that the practice was not optimal.33
With these responses, Rahtmann might have felt that he had successfully parried
Corvinus’s questions. He was allowed to keep his position at the Danzig Pfarrkirche,
albeit having been refused permission to deliver sermons.34 The controversy, how-
ever, was only just beginning.
The Opinions of the Theological Faculties
As previously noted, Corvinus dispatched the eleven questions to several universi-

ties for expert consideration and adjudication. The decidedly mixed opinions that
were returned to Danzig provide further insight into the disunity inherent in the
contemporary Lutheran position on chiliasm.35 Ultimately, none of the universities
produced the scathing condemnation of Rahtmann’s expectations that Corvinus so
longed for. Although the theologians of Wittenberg and Jena considered the ques-
tion of Rahtmann’s alleged chiliasm in some detail, their counterparts in Königsberg
and Helmstedt refused to offer any opinion, evidently thinking the accusations
insignificant.36
In response to Corvinus’s first question concerning the chiliasm of the Church
Fathers, the theologians in Jena chose not to engage with the issue any deeper than
simply dismissing Rahtmann’s interpretation, which they held as imprudent, and
perhaps impudent, particularly because it did not conform with the opinion of most
Lutheran theologians.37 More concerning, however, was Rahtmann’s stance on the
necessity of refuting contemporary chiliasts. They held that to allow chiliastic doc-
trines to spread unchecked could destroy the Lutheran world-order. They stressed
that ‘invigilation and warnings are more necessary than excuses or secret complic-
ity, all the more so […] because the people like to scratch their itching ears’ with
prophecies of future felicity.38 The Jena theologians harboured suspicions that
Rahtmann’s opinions were motivated by his admiration of chiliastic doctrine, for
‘such rubbish has certainly also found its way to Danzig’ and intimating that the
32
Rahtmann, Quaestiones, 12–13: ‘Veritati dissentaneam moliuntur, contra eat, seque opponat,
quisquis hic pollet viribus; ego manibus illius bipennem hic non extorquebo, quin potius, quod
felix faustumque sit, lubens laetusque acclamabo.’
33
Censuren und Bedencken, 16.
34
Engelhardt, ‘Der Rahtmannische Streit,’ 70–84.
35
Two versions of the Censuren und Bedencken are known, the latter of which, VD17 1:082512R,
is prefaced by a forty-two page selection of additional documents.
36
Walch, Einführung in die Religions-Streitigkeiten, vol.4, 582.
37
Censuren und Bedencken, 106–7.
38
The Opinions of the Theological Faculties 135
works of Paracelsus, Paul Linck, Weigel, Lautensack, Nagel and the Rosicrucians,
were ‘not unknown’ to Rahtmann.39 They speculated that these works awoke in the
Deacon a ‘zeal and dedication above and beyond that required by his office.’40 This
was unpalatable, especially given that chiliastic heretics had proliferated in recent
years, ‘destroying everything around them like a cancer.’41 Nevertheless, despite
these grave reservations, the theologians of Jena were unprepared to condemn
Rahtmann himself as a chiliast.
The response from the Wittenberg theologians was similar. In chapter four we
saw that they believed the lack of consensus concerning the definition of chiliastic
heresy meant that Corvinus’s charges on the matter should be dropped from the
dispute, ‘especially for the benefit of the unlearned.’42 Nevertheless, having been
paid to offer an opinion on the questions concerning chiliasm, they did so. The first
question, concerning Papias and the Church Fathers, was of little import to the theo-
logians, who thought the matter a ‘question of history, not of dogma’ (quaestio
historica, non dogmatica).43 Nevertheless, in a brief and dismissive discussion, the
Wittenbergers indicated that it was not possible, as Rahtmann had tried, to prove the
orthodoxy or heterodoxy of Papias’s expectation merely ‘with reference to the
works of [Juan Luis] Vives and Gerhard.’44 The Wittenberg theologians thought that
Rahtmann rather had misrepresented Gerhard’s arguments in the preface to the
Gnadenreich.45
While Corvinus’s second question also did not concern dogma, the Wittenbergers
determined that a response would nevertheless assist ‘the edification of the simple’
(dienet […] zu Erbawung der Einfältigen). Like their counterparts in Jena, they
suspected that Rahtmann’s reluctance to refute chiliasts constituted de facto support
for their doctrines. The point of such refutations was not simply to demonstrate the
error of chiliastic expectations, they opined, but to protect the public from perni-
cious heresy.46 Although they agreed that there was much of value in Rahtmann’s
Gnadenreich, the Wittenberg divines felt that there was still too many dubia in its
39
Censuren und Bedencken, 108: ‘Was Paracelsus, der M. Rathmanno nicht gar unbekant/ mit
seinem Untheologischen Tractätlein vber Apocalypsin, vom Ebenbilde Gottes/ und andern/ für
schöne Früchtlein vnd Nachfolger an Lincken/ Weigelio, Lautensack/ Nagelio, Rosencreutzern/
und vielen andern/ wo nicht erwecket/ doch ihme verlassen/ das ist mehr/ dann gut ist/ vor Augen.’
40
Censuren und Bedencken, 108: ‘[…] und weil solches Geschmeiß in Dantzig gewißlich auch
umgekrochen/ hette M. Rathmann Amptshalben gebühret/ einen andern Eyffer/ dann aus gedachter
Dedication erschienet.’
41
42
Dedeken, Thesauri Consilii … Appendix nova, 154; see further above, p. 119.
43
[Corvinus], ‘Theologische Schlußreden’ in Censuren und Bedencken, sig. (∗)3v: ‘Das über
angezeigter Frage in der Kirchen Gottes viel gestritten/ und disputiret werde/ ist gantz unnöhtig/
dienet auch nicht zu Erbawung der Einfältigen. Denn es so ists Quaestio Historica, non
dogmatica.’
44
[Corvinus], ‘Theologische Schlußreden’ in Censuren und Bedencken, sig. (∗)3r.
45
46
statements about chiliasm that required clarification before the work could be rec-
ommended to the lay public without reservation.47
The responses from Jena and Wittenberg indicate that although Rahtmann’s
statements concerning chiliastic heresy in the Gnadenreich contained some suspect
statements, the deacon himself could hardly be condemned as a chiliast. To an extent,
then, their opinions suggest that the charges of chiliasm levelled by Corvinus were
frivolous. Several months after securing opinions from Wittenberg and Jena, author-
ities in Danzig received a belated response from Helmstedt. This lamented the fact
that the church in Danzig had been consumed by a ‘dangerous and damaging
dispute.’48 Thus while two theological faculties expressed reservations about
Rahtmann’s statements concerning optimistic apocalypticism, another found the
accusations too frivolous to respond to, while a fourth expressed reservations at the
potential damage that the affair was doing to the fractured Lutheran community in
Danzig.49 Not only was there a problem of definition concerning chiliastic heresy in
the early 1620s; there was also very different understandings among theologians of
the gravity of the error.
Shortly after receiving the opinions from Wittenberg and Jena, Rahtmann com-
posed a lengthy rejoinder. While this work initially circulated in manuscript, extracts
from the text finally saw print in 1626.50 This text is perhaps most significant for
directing our attention, once more, to the chimerical basis of the entire affair.
Throughout Rahtmann accused his counterparts of mangling his words and of offer-
ing nonsensical judgments. For example,
the Wittenberg censure both misrepresents me and contradicts itself […] in as much as it
states that in my foreword I forbade the refutation of chiliastic opinions. But at another
point, it states that these very same words were somewhat dubious; two statements which
hardly fit together. For if they doubt that I forbade [writing against the chiliasts], how can
they categorically state that I did indeed forbid [writing against them]? If I did forbid writ-
ing against the chiliasts, as they state […], why would they then doubt it?51
In actuality, the Wittenberg censure had never accused Rahtmann of ‘forbidding’ the
writing of texts against chiliastic heresy at all; they had only quoted the deacon’s own
passage from the Gnadenreich. Nevertheless, such misunderstandings—deliberate
47
48
Censuren und Bedencken, 553–563 at 553.
49
Walch, Einführung in die Religions-Streitigkeiten, vol. 4, 581.
50
Rahtmann’s ‘Extract des Gegenberichts, was in der Wittenbergischen unnd Jehnischen Censur so
wohl bedenkliches als irriges vorleufft (c.1625)’ was printed together with Corvinus’s pointed
‘Widerlegung’ in Censuren und Bedencken, 192–552. Rahtmann answered accusations of chiliasm
on pp. 276–279.
51
Censuren und Bedencken, 277: ‘Die Wittenbergische Censur thut mir unrecht pag.16 und redet
wider sich selbst/ in dem sie einmal p. 16 lehret: Ich habe verboten in der Vorrede die Opinion vom
Chiliastischen Reich zu widerlegen/ zum andernmal aber pag. 14 schreibet/ das eben dieselbige
Wort der Vorrede ihnen düncken etwas zweiffelhafftig zu seyn: welche ihre beyde Reden übel
zustimmen. Denn zweiffelt sie über meine Wort/ ob ich verbiete/ wie kan sie denn categoricè set-
zen/ ich verbiete? Verbiete ich aber zu widerlegen die Chiliasten/ wie sie categoricè pag. 16 aus-
saget/ wie zweiffelt sie denn/ ob ich verbiete?’
The Pastor of Nuremberg 137
and otherwise—constituted the very essence of this dispute. For the substance of the
debate was not about a positive commitment to optimistic apocalyptic expectations,
it was a dispute engineered by Johann Corvinus that, at its heart, was based on ill will
and a determined misconstruing of word and context.
The case of Hermann Rahtmann provides us with an example of the hair-trigger
sensitivity that surrounded the issue of optimistic apocalyptic expectations within
Lutheran confessional culture of the 1620s. Although Rahtmann never postulated an
expectation of a future felicity either worldly or spiritual, the very fact that he wrote
on the subject of chiliastic heresy, and made the cardinal error of not zealously con-
demning it, was enough to attract suspicion. In his Gnadenreich, Rahtmann offered
an alternative to Lutheran apocalypticism that marginalised a hope of respite before
the Last Judgment, by positing in its stead access to an eternal, spiritual and indwell-
ing kingdom of God. By identifying hope as an essential element of the teachings of
the Lutheran church in the Last Days, Rahtmann attempted to prepare his readers
for the Last Judgment with a sense of joy in their hearts that could counteract the
fear and uncertainty of the contemporary world. He believed that this strategy would
provide a far more effective counter to chiliastic heresy than the publication of con-
tradictory definitions of the doctrine. From this perspective, then, Rahtmann’s case
was entirely different from other Lutheran clerics of the early 1620s like Wolfgang
Siebmacher, Nicolaus Hartprecht, and Joachim Cussovius, each of whom antici-
pated the coming of a felicitous future based on their own insights into the signs of
the times.
The Pastor of Nuremberg
One of the more obscure cases of an office holder of the Lutheran church who pro-
moted optimistic apocalyptic expectations is that of Wolfgang Siebmacher (also
Cribarius, 1572–1632). A native of Nuremberg, Siebmacher studied in Altdorf from
1592 and received his M.A. in Jena in 1597.52 In March 1604 he was appointed pas-
tor of St. Leonhard, a Lutheran church outside the city walls of Nuremberg.53
52
Matthias Simon, Nürnbergisches Pfarrerbuch. Die evangelisch-lutherische Geistlichkeit der
Reichsstadt Nürnberg und ihre Gebieten, 1524–1806 (Nuremberg: Selbstverlag des Vereins für
Bayerische Kirchengeschichte, 1965), 1326; Andreas Würfel, Diptycha ecclesiae Leonardinae,
das ist: Verzeichnis und Lebensbeschreibungen der Herren Pfarrer bey St. Leonhard … mit
Zusätzen vermehret von Johann Paul Röder. (Nuremberg: Christoph Melchior Roth, 1760), 13;
Andreas Würfel and Karl Christian Hirsch, Diptychorum ecclesiarum Norimbergensium succincta
enucleatio: das ist Ausführliche Beschreibung aller und jeder Kirchen, Klöster, Capellen […]
benebst genauer Verzeichniß sämtlicher Herren Geistlichen (Nuremberg: Christoph Melchior
Roth, 1766), 476.
53
Paulus, ‘Alchimie und Paracelsismus,’ 383; Leonhard Friedrich Sattler, Kurzgefasste Geschichte
der Pfarrei St. Leonhard vor Nürnberg (Nuremberg: Riegel & Wießner, 1832), 11. Christine
Maillard, ‘Alchimie et hétérodoxie: critiques et mises en cause du “christianisme chymique” dans
l’espace germanique au xviie siècle,’ Aries 3/1 (2003): 1–24; Tara Nummedal, ‘Alchemy and
Religion in Christian Europe,’ Ambix 60 (2013): 311–322.
Siebmacher’s intellectual interests were evidently broad, and extended to alchemi-

cal practice, a matter which might have brought him into contact with radical reli-
gious doctrines.54 Before 1618 he prepared a recipe for the preparation of the
philosophers’ stone, and he may well have been related to the Johann Siebmacher
who was author of Wasserstein der Weisen (1619), an alchemical tract read and
recommended by, among others, Jacob Böhme.55
In 1622 Siebmacher came under suspicion of harbouring Weigelian ideas, a
term used broadly in contemporary Nuremberg to identify any oppositional reli-
gious opinions. After investigations by city officials and local clerics, rumour led
investigators to Siebmacher’s dwelling, where among his effects they discovered a
lengthy manuscript ‘concerning the glorious kingdom of God in this mundane
world and the final return of Christ to judgment’ (de glorioso Regno Christi in hoc
seculo Mundano et Vltimo Adventu Christi ad Judicium.)56 Although it bore a Latin
title, the text was written in German, and numbered some forty-six folio sheets.
Upon further inquiry, authorities learned that the work had been dictated to
Siebmacher by a Jewish convert to Christianity, Paul Joseph—formerly Joseph
Hezech—of Posen (Posnán).57 The text, which is no longer extant, appears to have
described a worldly reign of Christ before the Last Judgment, possibly deriving
from expectations inherent in Hezech’s native Judaism and the works of
Maimonides. The precise reasons why Siebmacher would cleave to such a belief
are unknown, but after several hearings with Nuremberg spiritual authorities he
was unwilling to repudiate the convictions expressed in the work, unless they could
be disproved to his satisfaction by scriptural authority.58 Siebmacher was dismissed
from his position on 16 April 1623, at the height of Lutheran concerns about
chiliastic heresy.59 His expectations provide one of the only known cases of the
influence of ‘Jewish expectations’ condemned under article seventeen of the
Augsburg confession. Siebmacher demonstrates that the eclectic sources available
to lay Lutherans—alchemical, Jewish, or otherwise—could also influence the
apocalyptic expectations of Lutheran clerics.
54
Paulus, ‘Alchemie und Paracelsismus,’ 383.
55
Wasserstein der Weisen; Paulus, ‘Alchimie und Paracelsismus,’ 383; Hamburg, SUB, Cod.
alchim. 651, 480–486. On Johann Siebmacher see Zuber, ‘Spiritual Alchemy,’ 91–113. Concerning
the possible influence of the work on Böhme see Mike A. Zuber, ‘The Alchemy of Jacob Böhme:
A Transmutation in Three Stages,’ in Jacob Böhme and his World, 262–285.
56
The description of the work is quoted from the archival sources discussed in Dülmen, ‘Schwärmer
und Separatisten,’ 108, 111.
57
Franz Ludwig von Soden, Kriegs- und Sittengeschichte der Reichsstadt Nürnberg vom Ende des
sechzehnten Jahrhunderts bis zur Schlacht bei Breitenfeld. 3 vols. (Erlangen: Theodor Bläsing,
1860–1862), vol. 2, 232.
58
Munich, BSB, MS cgm. 1259, 3r (Letter, Johann Saubert to Konrad Dietrich, 27 August 1624).
59
Soden, Kriegs- und Sittengeschichte der Reichsstadt Nürnberg, vol. 2, 232.
Nicolaus Hartprecht 139
Nicolaus Hartprecht
As the furore in Danzig over Rahtmann’s Gnadenreich was underway, and the drama
surrounding Siebmacher was about to unfold in Nuremberg, another Lutheran pastor,
Magister Nicolaus Hartprecht, was struggling with his own demons as he confronted
the ills of the time.60 Hartprecht was born around 1585 into the family of a Lutheran
pastor in Steinbrücken, Thuringia.61 A gifted student, Nicolaus studied at the University
of Leipzig (1609) and then in Jena (from 1614) as part of an extensive philosophical
and theological education.62 In February 1615 he was elected to the pastorate in the
tiny villages of Hohenebra and Thalebra in the rural church district of Sondershausen,
Thuringia.63 It was there, it seems, that Hartprecht’s troubles began.
There can be little doubt that Hartprecht felt somewhat under-appreciated in his
village post. The learning he had acquired at two of Germany’s major universities
gradually faded into the mundane reality of a pastoral position in a location that,
even today, in the rolling hills of the Thuringian countryside, seems remote from
civilization. The pastor himself described his everyday existence as ‘quiet and
introspective.’64 Some relief may have come from his lively friendship with local
noble Caspar von Dacheröden (1585–1633), who fancied himself a poet.65 But
Hartprecht was also drawn to matters more arcane. Sometime before 1618 he
befriended Georg Graman (†1654),66 a Paracelsian and physician-in-ordinary to the
Countess Erdmute Juliane of Gleichen (1587–1633) at Schloß Ehrenstein in the
market town of Ohrdruf.67 Erdmute Juliane was at this time under the spell of the
60
On Hartprecht see Paul Meder, ‘Der Schwärmer Esaias Stiefel. Ein kulturgeschichtliches Bild
aus Erfurts alter Zeit,’ Mitteilungen des Vereins für die Geschichte und Altertumskunde von Erfurt
20 (1899): 93–128 at 116–117; Ulman Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident. Ein schwar-
zburgisches Pfarrerschicksal aus der Zeit des Dreißigjährigen Krieges,’ in Europa in der Frühen
Neuzeit. Festschrift für Günter Mühlpfordt. Erich Donnert, ed. (Weimar: Böhlau Verlag, 1997),
vol. 1, 359–382; Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, 483, 503–505, 543; Barnes, Prophecy
and Gnosis, 124–5, 138–9, 222, 224.
61
While a specific date of birth lacks, the date above seems likely if we assume that Hartprecht
matriculated at Leipzig University around the age of sixteen.
62
Rudolstadt, Thüringisches Staatsarchiv [hereafter TSA], VIIb Nr.224; Weiß, ‘Ein dogmengetreu
drapierter Dissident,’ 360; Erler, Matrikel Leipzig, 163; Georg Mentz, ed. Die Matrikel der
Universität Jena. Band I. 1548 bis 1652. (Jena: Gustav Fischer Verlag, 1944), 142.
63
Bernhard Möller, ed. Thüringer Pfarrerbuch. Band II. Fürstentum Schwarzburg-Sondershausen.
(Neustadt: Degener, 1997), vol. 2, 40, 177.
64
Rudolstadt, TSA, VIIb Nr. 225, 13v, 148r.
65
Caspar von Dacheröden. Ingenii, luctus tempore, Ludus erat. Distichon Chronohexametri
Numerum continent. (Erfurt: Philipp Wittel für Johann Birckner, 1621), 12–13 features an occa-
sional poem by Hartprecht.
66
Their friendship is witnessed by the laudatory verse Hartprecht composed for Georg Graman,
Ein sonderliche Chymische Reise und HaußApoteca: Sampt außführlichem Bericht/ was für
Unterscheid zwischen der Galenischen und Paracelsischen Medicin sey. (Erfurt: Birckner, 1618),
sigs. C3v-C4r.
67
On Erdmute Juliane see Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, 464–506; Lebrecht Wilhelm
Heinrich Heydenreichs, Historia des ehemals Gräflichen nunmehro Fürstlichen Hauses
Schwartzburg (Erfurt: Carl Friedrich Jungnicols erben, 1743), 22–23; Guido Reinhardt, Geschichte
Rosicrucian fraternity. In 1616, the Countess had employed the pedagogue Wolfgang
Ratke to acquire Rosicrucian literature for her personal library.68 Through Graman,
Hartprecht probably met others that frequented the Ohrdruf court, including the
Silesian physician Balthasar Walther, who as we have seen was a friend of Paul
Nagel and Jacob Böhme.69 Additionally, the antinomian Ezechiel Meth was often
present in Ohrdruf, and in 1621 was appointed as court chemist.70
Tuba Temporis
Evidently, some of the ideas that Hartprecht encountered in this heady environment
rubbed off on him, and, as a result, in 1620, he produced the lengthy chronological
tract, Tuba Temporis, published in Erfurt by Johann Birckner (1587–1658). This
was the book which, as we have seen in chapter two, influenced the prophetic awak-
ening of Paul Kaym in Liegnitz. As Hartprecht remarked in the introduction to this
book, he began work on the Tuba, which he conceived of as an ‘infallible’ chronol-
ogy, sometime in 1618. Hartprecht declared that it had been written with the benefit
of God’s grace, without which we ‘may attempt nothing and would look fruitlessly
upon the world.’71 And indeed, a gift of grace, of divine inspiration––or perhaps
simple imagination––seemed to play a large role in Hartprecht’s reckonings, which
the pastor claimed were based upon numbers both explicit and implicit in scrip-
ture.72 According to Hartprecht, chronologers had wrongly neglected the non-
des Marktes Gräfentonna (Langensalza: Wendt & Klauwell, 1892), 59–61, 153; Gideon Vogt,
‘Ratichianismus in den Fürstenthümern Waldeck und Pyrmont,’ Beiträge zur Geschichte der
Fürstenthümern Waldeck und Pyrmont. 2 vols. J. Curtze, ed. (Arolsen: Waldeck’scher hist. Vereins,
1869), vol. 2, 115–133, 122–127.
68
Vogt, ‘Ratichianismus’, 122–127. Details of Ratke’s Rosicrucian tasks may be found in Dessau,
Hauptstaatsarchiv, Abt. Köthen C 18 Nr. 34, 270–90, and Nr. 35, 19–23; Cf. Gilly, Adam Haslmayr,
151; Günther Hoppe, ‘Zwischen Augsburg und Anhalt. Der rosenkreuzerische Briefwechsel des
Augsburger Stadtarztes Carl Widemann mit dem Plötzkauer Fürsten August von Anhalt,’
Mitteilungen des Vereins für Anhaltische Landeskunde 6 (1997): 26–56; Uwe Korde, Wolfgang
Ratke (Ratichius, 1571–1635): Gesellschaft, Religiosität und Gelehrsamkeit im frühen 17.
Jahrhundert. (Heidelberg: Winter, 1999), 71.
69
Penman, ‘Ein Liebhaber des Mysterii,’ 73–99.
70
Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol.3, 42; Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel,
445–449.
71
Nicolaus Hartprecht, Tuba Temporis oder Wahrhafftige, unfehlbare Zeitrechnung, dergleichen
die Welt noch nie gesehen hat, darinnen augenscheinlich demonstrieret und erwiesen wird, wie die
Welt von Anfang bis in das laufende 1620. Jahr ein ganz vollkommenes Seculum … erfullet. (Erfurt:
Philip Wittel für Johann Birckner, [1620]), sig.A3r.
72
Hartprecht, Tuba temporis, sigs. A4r-v; ‘So müssen wir nicht unser eigenen Vernunft folgen/
sondern auff die geheimen Zahlen/ die beydes implicite und explicite in H. Schrifft zu finden/
mercken/ und dieselben vberlegen.’
Tuba Temporis 141
canonical 2 Esdras for insight into the Last Days. Although the book had been
adjudged ‘a fable and foolishness’ by the learned, Hartprecht believed it contained
‘infallible secret numbers’ necessary for an accurate chronology.73 It is possible that
Hartprecht’s assertion influenced Daniel Cramer’s decision to include the apocry-
phal apocalypse in his 1621 Bible edition. In his preface to the book, Cramer noted
that he reprinted the text not on account of its edifying value, but in order to dispel
popular misconceptions about the work’s alleged secrets.74
As far back as 1596, the Wernigerode pastor Andreas Schoppe had warned that
chronological studies were a wasteful distraction to Lutheran pastors.75 According
to Schoppe, these men ‘uselessly squander their valuable time on introspective pon-
dering, which they conduct in preference to devout prayer. They refuse to prepare
and do the necessary study for their sermons, fail to tend to their affairs and raise
their children. Instead … they wander about lost in unnecessary thought.’76 While
objections might have been raised concerning how Hartprecht had been spending
his time, the pastor’s expectations in the Tuba conformed with Lutheran doctrine.
For instance, Hartprecht maintained that it was impossible to reckon the exact time
of the Last Judgment. In strict accordance with the Lutheran exegetical tradition, he
located the Millennium of Revelation 20 in the past, arguing that the thousand-year
period commenced in 621CE, which Hartprecht reckoned to be the year of
Mohammed’s revelations. He justified this calculation with reference to Philip
Nicolai and Johann Wolther, but it was also informed by a prophecy, publicized in
the works of Philipp Melanchthon, that the Ottoman Empire would endure for
exactly one thousand years.77
But Hartprecht was also an industrious reader of contemporary prophetic litera-
ture. He implored readers to study not only the Bible, but also ‘the many wonderful
prophecies which are found everywhere amongst the people, which, if you are spiri-
tual, you should not despise. On the contrary, following the warning of 1 John 4 you
are required to test all such prophecies to see if they are from God.’78 Many of these
‘wonderful prophecies,’ by the likes of Paul Nagel and Sebastian Franck, he men-
73
Hartprecht, Tuba temporis, sig. A2v.
74
Cramer, Biblia, 478–9. Further Hamilton, Apocryphal Apocalypse; Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und
Chiliasmus,’111.
75
On the Lutheran interest in chronology, see Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 100–140, 182ff.
76
Schoppe, Christliche und nötige Warnung, sig. J2v: ‘Sie bringen viel guter zeit unnützlich zu mit
ihrem grüblen/ die sie auffs andechtige gebet zu Gott […] Denn sie gehen mit unnötigen gedanken/
rechen/ schreiben/ reisen und anderen wercken umb/ und achten ihres nötigen studieren und
præparation auff ihr Predigt nicht/ verseumen jr haushaltung und Kinderzucht.’
77
Hartprecht, Tuba temporis, sig. F1r; Bartholomaeus Georgijévic, Erzelung der Türckischen
Keiser/ Namen/ Empter/ Leben/ Sitten und Tyranney in irem Reich/ daraus zusehen/ wie einrechtig
sie bey samen halten/ alle die jenigen auszurotten un[d] zu dempffen (Wittenberg: No Printer,
1560).
78
Harptrecht, Tuba temporis, sig. A3r: ‘so wohl der viel wunderbahren Propheceyungen/ so allen-
thalben unter dem Volcke gemein seyn, welche, so jemand Geistlich ist, nicht zu verachten/
sondern die Geister, nach ermahnung des Apostels Johann. I. Epist. 4 ob sie auß Gott seyn/ zu
probieren pfleget.’
tioned in Tuba Temporis.79 Hartprecht also cited the thirty-second figure of Paracelsus’
Prognosticon (1536), a cornerstone of Paracelsian optimistic apocalyptic expecta-
tions. Hartprecht was almost certainly aware of their controversial nature, but he
thought that they deserved to be tested against scriptural data like any other opinion.
Influenced by these sources, Hartprecht certainly anticipated a period of future
felicity that was imminent, and which would be followed shortly thereafter by the
Last Judgement. He prophesied that the Joachite Third Age would begin in 1620, to
be followed by the time of the Holy Spirit, in which ‘all the enemies of God would
be plagued, punished and made desolate for eternity.’80 He envisioned the final
defeat of the Turks would occur in or after 1624.81 The Last Judgment would then
follow, although Hartprecht was ambiguous on this point. As we have seen, this
anticipation idea of a brief ‘refreshment’ or respite before the Last Judgment had
been common within Lutheran confessional culture since the sixteenth century.
Nevertheless, after the articulation of the error of chiliasmus subtilis in the 1610s,
there were many Lutherans prepared to condemn this expectation as a heresy.
The publication of the work was not uncontroversial. In November of 1620
Hartprecht was summoned before the Lutheran Ministerium in Sondershausen.82
They were concerned that they had not seen an exemplar of Tuba Temporis before it
was printed. Hartprecht indicated that the text had been submitted to, and approved
by, Lutheran censors in Erfurt, as required by territorial legislation. There is no
reason to doubt Hartprecht’s claim, and the approval of the Erfurt censors suggests
that both the author and his readers believed Tuba Temporis contained nothing con-
trary to Lutheran doctrine.83 Nevertheless, the Sondershausen divines requested that
Hartprecht concentrate on his pastoral duties and refrain from authoring
chronological works, a demand to which he acquiesced.84 The intervention of the
Sondershausen divines demonstrates well the contested place of chronological and
apocalyptic expectations in contemporary Lutheran confessional culture.
J oachim Cussovius and the Reception of Hartprecht’s Tuba

Temporis
A major example of the almost immediate impact of Hartprecht’s tract is provided

by a consideration of the life and thought of another Lutheran cleric, Joachim
Cussovius. In the course of Hartprecht’s November 1620 hearing in Sondershausen,
the divines mentioned a certain manuscript tract titled ‘Tuba propheciae’ which had
79
Harptrecht, Tuba temporis, sig. F1r.
80
Harptrecht, Tuba temporis, sig. E4v, A1r.
81
Harptrecht, Tuba temporis, sig. F2v.
82
Rudolstaat, TSA, C. VIIb Nr. 225, 5r–6v.
83
On censorship in Erfurt and surrounds see Wilhelm Stieda, Büchermarkt an den Hochschulen
Erfurt, Wittenberg und Halle in der Vergangenheit (Cologne: Schmidt, 1934); Bubenheimer,
‘Orthodoxie – Heterodoxie – Kryptoheterodoxie,’ 257–274.
84
Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident,’ 365.
Joachim Cussovius and the Reception of Hartprecht’s Tuba Temporis 143
been circulating in Thuringia, and which contained heretical expectations concern-

ing the Last Days. This work was of concern to authorities because its author, a
certain Joachim Cussovius, wrote not only that he conceived of his tract as a con-
tinuation of Hartprecht’s Tuba Temporis, but also claimed that he was a friend of
Hartprecht’s.85 For his part, Hartprecht denied any knowledge of both ‘Tuba proph-
eciae’ and its author, a claim that the Ministerium apparently believed.
However, in the final months of 1620, a book titled Clangor Buccinae Propheticae
de Novissimis temporibus (1620) was printed somewhere in northern Germany. The
title, it appears, took inspiration from an alchemical work anthologised several
times in the sixteenth century.86 This book, which predicted an imminent period of
future felicity, praised the works of Johann Arndt and Paul Nagel, but also lauded
Nicolaus Hartprecht, describing him as meus intimus & in Christo frater.87 Some
issues of this book include a dedication to the Hamburg schoolmaster Johann
Docemius (d. 1638) which was signed by a certain ‘I.C.C.H,’ a former student.88
These initials almost certainly concealed the identity of ‘J[oachim] C[ussovius]
C[amminensis] H[amburgi].’89 It is thus likely that the text of Clangor Buccinae
Propheticae was closely related to the ‘Tuba propheciae’ mentioned in the
Sondershausen hearing.
Cussovius hailed from Cammin in Pommerania (Kamień Pomorski). After study-
ing in Frankfurt an der Oder, he spent time as a tutor in Pyrmont, before living in
Hamburg in 1620 and matriculating at the University of Tübingen in 1621 where he
studied liberal arts and theology.90 In 1622 Cussovius appeared in records of the
85
86
‘Clangor Buccinae ad philosophos sublimiores,’ in De Alchimia opuscula complura veterum
Philosophorum (Frankfurt/Main: No Printer, 1550), 20–68.
87
[Joachim Cussovius], Clangor Buccinae Propheticae De Novißimis temporibus, Das ist:
Trommetenschall wie der Eyver unnd Zorn Gottes werde rauchen … für dem letzten Gericht. (No
Place: No Printer, 1620), sig. B8v, G4v.
88
See the edition preserved in Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, shelfmark Exeg.203m
(VD1712:118911L). The anonymous author of the Verzeichnis der Bücher so gesamlet Johann
Christian Gottfried Jahn Königl. Poln. und Churfl. Sächß. Commißions-Rath Autor (Frankfurt &
Leipzig: Heinsius’s Erben, 1755), vol. 1, 684 identified Cussovius as author of Clangor, albeit on
unclear grounds. On Docemius, who would later correspond with Johann Amos Comenius and
translate several of his works into German, see Blekastad, Comenius, 200–202.
89
[Cussovius], Clangor Buccinae Propheticae, sig. [A1v], where the dedication was signed
‘Dabam Hamburgi è Musaeo meo in ædibus Domini Petri à Sprekelsen Anno recuperatæ salutis
1620.’ Sprekelsen (ca. 1570–1630) was a member of the Hamburg city council.
90
Ernst Friedländer, Georg Liebe and Emil Thenner, eds. Ältere Universitätsmatrikeln.
I. Universität Frankfurt a. O. 3 vols. (Leipzig: S. Hirzel, 1887), vol. 1, 549: ‘Joachimus Cussovius
Julinensis Pomeranus’ (21 November 1610). Julin (Wolin Pomorski) was a neighbouring town to
Cammin; A. Bürk and W. Wille, eds. Die Matrikeln der Universität Tübingen (Tübingen:
Universität Tübingen, 1953), vol. 2, 135. Stuttgart, Württembergische Landesbibliothek, Cod. hist.
2o 889–46, fol. 37v. Cussovius’s presence in Pyrmont is documented by his entry in the Stammbuch
of Cornelius Amsinck of 28 May 1620 preserved in Hamburg, Museum für Hamburgische
Geschichte, Bibliothek, Ms. Gen VIII 5077, 91r. A result of his studies appears to have been the
work Joachim Cussovius, Speculum Utriusq[ue] Religionis Christianae S. Romani Imperii
Constitutionibus recepta, nimirum Romano-Catholicae & Confessionis Augustanae (Gera:
Spiesse, 1621).
inquisitorial trial against Eberhard Wild, where he was identified as a Weigelian and
a chiliast who was also interested in angelic languages.91 In his possession were
discovered ‘some magical works, written according to Weigelian principles’ that he
had not only read, but also ‘propagated throughout the countryside.’92
Information soon came to light from Hessen that Cussovius was in contact with
the wandering prophet Philipp Ziegler, another proponent of optimistic apocalyptic
ideas.93 Although Cussovius was forced to depart Tübingen and break off his studies
there, it appeared not to affect his career in the Lutheran church negatively. On 23
February 1623 he was ordained as Lutheran pastor in the village of Hecklingen near
Bernburg, where he also occupied the post of schoolmaster.94 This location, it might
be noted, was only twenty kilometres distant from August von Anhalt’s court in
Plötzkau. The following year he defended a theological disputation concerning the
power of God’s word at the University of Helmstedt.95 This tract featured a section
in which Cussovius repudiated the teachings of Caspar von Schwenckfeld, the
Anabaptists, Weigelians, Calvinists et aliorum fanaticorum.96
Although Cussovius here rejected the doctrines of Weigelians and others in open
print, he apparently never abandoned his optimistic apocalyptic expectations. In
addition to his pastoral duties in Hecklingen, he circulated manuscript works con-
cerning the Joachite Third Age, and the rebirth of man in the Holy Spirit.97 These
quickly came to the attention of his colleagues in the County of Waldeck who
decried him as a ‘wolf in sheep’s clothing,’ determined to corrupt the laity and
spread heresy.98 Cussovius was eventually ejected from his pastorate, and fled the
territories of the Holy Roman Empire. He appears to have found refuge in Sweden,
where in 1632 he made his living practising medicine.99 Cussovius provides us with
a sketch of a Lutheran cleric who remained convinced of the rectitude of his apoca-
91
Ms. I. 8/1, fols. 176–177. This document is reprinted in Dülmen, Die Utopie einer christlichen
Gesellschaft, 278.
92
Ms. I. 8/1, fols. 176–177. Reprinted in Dülmen, Die Utopie einer christlichen Gesellschaft, 278.
93
Marburg, Stadtarchiv, 115.7 Gen. 60: Letter of Count Wolrad IV to Balthasar Mentzer in Gießen,
5. October 1622.
94
Paul Zimmermann, ed. Album Academiae Helmstadiensis, Band I Album Academiae Juliae,
Abteilung 1: Studenten, Professoren etc. der Universität Helmstedt von 1574–1636 (Hannover:
Selbstverlag der Historischen Kommission, 1926), 298.
95
Heinrich Julius Strube (praes.) Joachim Cussovius (resp.), Disputatio Theologica, de virtute et
efficacia verbi Dei quam Adjuvante Domini Spiritu (Helmstedt: Lucius, 1624).
96
Strube and Cussovius, Disputatio Theologica, sig. B3r.
97
One of these tracts, concerning ‘Die wesentliche Einwohnung oder Vereinigung Christi in oder
mit seinen heiligen Gliedtmaßen, den newgebornen Menschen’ is preserved in Marburg, Hessiches
Staatsarchiv, Fonds 115/01 no. 2308.
98
See the account of Jacobus Pannekoek, Theologie und Frömmigkeit in der Grafschaft Waldeck in
der ersten Hälfte des 17. Jahrhunderts besonders bei Jeremias Nicolai und Johannes Heinemann
(Bad Arolsen: Waldeckischer Geschichtsverein e.V., 2004), 220–3 at 220.
99
Jan Drees, Deutschsprachige Gelegenheitsdichtung in Stockholm zwischen 1613 und 1719
(Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1986), 195. There is no mention of Cussovius in the thorough
study of Lindroth, Paracelsismen i Sverige.
Joachim Cussovius and the Reception of Hartprecht’s Tuba Temporis 145
lyptic expectations, even when these beliefs had brought him into conflict with
defenders of doctrinal Lutheranism on multiple occasions. Equally, it reinforces the
impression won in previous chapters that these expectations were partly product of
exposure to potentially heterodox writings.
Cussovius’s manuscript ‘Tuba propheciae’ and Clangor buccinæ propheticæ
indicate the rapid spread of Hartprecht’s tracts and the reception of his optimistic
expectations. As we have seen in a previous chapter, Paul Kaym read the book in
Liegnitz in the year of its release, and wrote about its arguments in a letter to Jacob
Böhme. Heinrich Gebhard mentioned the text in his Examen Chronologicum
(1623).100 Philip Ziegler critiqued it in his Anti-Arnoldus et Anti-Nagelius (1622),
while a 1626 book by an anonymous cleric writing under the name ‘Johannes
Germanus’ pinpointed Tuba Temporis as a major spur to the circulation of heretical
religious doctrines in the Holy Roman Empire.101 Accordingly, Hartprecht’s tract
was soon condemned by guardians of Lutheran orthodoxy. In 1623 Valentin
Grießmann condemned the work in his Getrewer Eckhart as a dangerous chiliastic
tract.102 The year prior, in 1622, Georg Rost had denounced Hartprecht’s tract in his
influential Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten, counting Hartprecht among the most
hardened disseminators of heretical chiliastic ideas of the age:
Quite against the will of God, these new chiliasts and enthusiasts like Nagel, Felgenhauer
and Hartprecht, want to transform the Christian vale of tears into a hall of joy (FrewdenSaal),
and dream of a worldly kingdom in which Christ will live in all manner of worldly pleasures
with his elect here upon the earth for a thousand years, and in which they will reproach their
faith with vast quantities of food and drink, and defeat all of their enemies.103
As we have seen, Tuba Temporis contained no such anticipation of a literal worldly

Millennium, or anything even remotely resembling Rost’s idiosyncratic definition
of chiliastic heresy. As a matter of fact, Rost’s other references to Hartprecht in his
Heldenbuch indicate that he had not actually read Tuba Temporis at all, but had
targeted the work after seeing Hartprecht’s name in Cussovius’s Clangor Buccinae
Propheticae.104 Apparently, Rost was so desperate to condemn heresy that he failed
to read the doctrines that he lambasted.
100
See Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 125.
101
Ziegler, Anti-Arnoldus et Anti-Nagelius, 34; Germanus, Der siebenden Apocalyptischen
Posaunen, 175.
102
103
Rost, Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten, A4v: ‘Die newen Chiliasten vnd Enthusiasten, Nagelius,
Felgenhawer, vnd Hartprecht/ der Christen Jammerthal wider Gottes wort vnd willen/ zu verwech-
selen in einen FrewdenSaal/ vnd ertrewmen ein solch Fleischlich Königreich/ in welchem Christus
alhier auff Erden 1000. Jahr mit seinen Reichßgenossen sol in allerley wollust leben/ vnd seine
Gleubigen mit statlichen essen vnd trincken veberschütten/ vnd alle ihre Feinde vnter ihre Füsse
zwingen vnd bringen.’ For further mentions of Hartprecht see sigs. 173v, 182r.
104
Rost, Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten, 182r. The mention of Hartprecht in Clangor buccinae pro-
pheticae would effectively brand Hartprecht’s historical reputation. See for example Nicolaus
Baring, Trewhertzige Warnung an alle fromme Christen gegen den newen Propheten (Hannover:
Glaser, 1646), 127, whose reference was apparently repeated by Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-
Historie, vol. 3, 56; Johann Georg Selden, Chiliasmus elenchomenos. Das ist: Gründliche
The Messianic Turn
If Hartprecht was a friend of Cussovius, as the latter claimed, then he was likely mov-
ing in circles in which the discussion of allegedly heterodox doctrine was quotidian.
When he appeared before the Sondershausen Ministerium in late 1620, Hartprecht
was forced to swear that he would never again author a work concerning biblical
chronology. He remained true to his word. Until his death around 1637, he neither
printed nor wrote another work concerning the Last Judgment and what might pre-
cede it. However, archival sources uncovered by Ulman Weiß and Paul Meder dem-
onstrate that Hartprecht’s hopes for a future felicity were not consigned to his past
after 1620. Tuba Temporis was a herald of what would follow. His search for insight
into the Last Days was about to take a remarkable twist.
Sometime in 1622 or 1623, if not earlier, Hartprecht became intrigued by the
radical antinomian teachings of the notorious messianic pretenders Esajas Stiefel
and his nephew Ezechiel Meth. As Weiß has shown in a superb study, the essence of
Stiefel’s doctrines was Christological and eschatological. Stiefel claimed that it was
possible for followers of his doctrines to purify their beings (Wesen) through prayer,
penance, and the power of the Holy Spirit, and to such an extent that they could
become incapable of committing sin.105 As such, both Stiefel and Meth believed that
they had themselves become of the same substance as Christ. Stiefel envisioned
Meth as the apocalyptic great prince Michael (Daniel 12:1) who would fight for his
holy people against the power of the corrupt Mauerkirchen in the last days. In cor-
respondence with authorities and within the sect which quickly formed around
them, the two men signed their names as ‘Esajas Christus’ and ‘Ezechiel Christus.’
In one of his printed books, Stiefel concluded a dedicatory epistle with the formula
‘I am a Christ, blasphemed by Esajas Stiefel.’106
Convinced of his own messianic significance, Stiefel was keen to distance him-
self from other sects of the time: ‘All religious parties and sects, including the
Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists, Schwenkfelders, Photinians,
Paracelsians, Weigelians, followers of Johann Arndt, and the disciples of Jacob
Wiederlegung des vermeinten tausendjährigen Reichs Christi/ welches noch vorm Jüngsten tage in
einer güldenen Zeit/ und sonderbaren seculo Spiritus Sancti etliche alte und newe Schwermer zu
behaupten sich unterstanden (Zerbst: Andreas Betzeln, 1652), 10, 12–13, 71; August Pfeiffer,
Antichiliasmus oder Erzehlung und Prüfung des betrieglichen Traums Derer so genannten
Chiliasten (Lübeck: Peter Böckmann, 1691), 31.
105
Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, passim; Theophilus Haeresimachus, Zwölff
Teuffelische Träum und Einbildungen oder Speculationes. Welche der vermäinte Grossfürst
Michael/neben seinen Adhaerenten, (so sich Purianer nennen) mit Vngrund außgeben. (Freyberg:
Hoffman, 1614). See also the anonymous account of Meth’s tribulations in Zittau, Christian-
Weise-Bibliothek, Ms. B 103, fols. 161r–163v.
106
Esajas Stiefel, Kürtzlicher Gründlicher Verlauff in heiligen Religion-Sachen: So mit Christlicher
Persohn Esaias Stieffels, Nun in die zwantzig Jahr, von anno 1604 biß in das jetzige vier und
zwantzigste, sich begeben und zugetragen. (No Place [Halle]: No Printer [Christoph Bißmarck],
1624), 18.
The Messianic Turn 147
Böhme, deny the idea of the indwelling Christ.’107 But contemporaries like Paul
Nagel and Andreas Merck had little doubt that his beliefs crystallised under the
influence of the very personalities that he castigated.108 Stiefel’s teachings concern-
ing the perfection of the earthly human condition in the Last Days lent themselves
to apocalyptic explications. For if a person could be perfected and become not
merely Christ-like, but of the same substance of Christ, then why not all of society?
Stiefel’s doctrines quickly evolved to embrace ideas of a coming worldly felicitous
future.
Stiefel believed that the New Jerusalem of Revelation 21:2 had already descended
to earth, and that he himself was the bride of Christ, an anthropomorphic form of the
Heavenly Jerusalem that would cleanse humanity of its sins.109 As Stiefel proclaimed
in his Gründlicher Verlauff in heiligen Religions-Sachen (1624), the present was a
joyous time in which the failures of the Mauerkirchen were revealed and Babylon
was ripe for the fall, to be replaced by the reborn individual who would join Christ
in his earthly kingdom.110 Armed with these teachings, the Methianer—or Purianer
(denoting ‘the purified’) as Stiefel’s sect was often called—began to attract follow-
ers, firstly among labourers in Thuringia, but then as far afield as Saxony, Lusatia,
Lower Silesia and the Swiss Confederation. Their proselytising also attracted mem-
bers of the learned classes, like the student Adrian Schäffer (d. 1654) of Meissen.
Under the influence of their doctrines, Schäffer adopted the title ‘Levi Christ’, and
spread word of Stiefel and Meth’s beliefs in Nuremberg and Switzerland.111
Hartprecht was undoubtedly also one of Stiefel’s learned followers. For although we
don’t know when he first encountered Stiefel’s doctrines, in the winter of 1623 he
allowed Stiefel to dwell at his house in Hohenebra for several weeks.112
107
Stiefel, Kürtzlicher Gründlicher Verlauff, 18. Stiefel’s patron Erdmute Juliane wrote a tract in
support of Stiefel’s doctrines directed against the Ohrdruf court preacher Johann Weber, in which
she repeated these claims. See Erdmute Juliane, Christliche Verantwortungs Schreiben Der
Hochwohlgebornen Gräffin und Frawen Erdehmut Julianen. (No Place [Halle]: No Printer
[Christoph Bißmarck], 1624), 14–15, where she wrote that Stiefel’s teachings concern ‘der rechten
göttlichen wesentlichen Vereinigung Christi Jesu mit allen Glaubigen/ und nicht Osiandri und
Weigeli Meynung nach/ recht Christlich helt’, and on pp. 125–6; ‘Verflucht sey Osiandri, Weigelii,
Theophrasti, Rosencreutzer/ Jacob Behmens und aller ketzer falsche untüchtige Meynung der wes-
entlichen Einwohnung Christi.’
108
See Merck, Nothwendige Schutzschrift, 28 and passim; Leipzig UB, Ms 0 356, fol. 32r (Paul
Nagel to Arnold Kerner, 30 July 1621): ‘[Stiefel hat] erst viell schrifften Weigelÿ colligirt, lieb undt
wehrdt gehalten, do er doch jetzt bekendt er seÿ niemalß dem Weigel zugethan gewesen.’
109
Esajas Stiefel, Apologia und RettungsSchrifft des Heiligen Namens Jesu Christi in Syhon. (No
Place [Halle]: No Printer [Bißmarck], 1624), 403, 404.
110
Stiefel, Kürtzlicher Gründlicher Verlauff, 185.
111
On Schäffer (also Scheffer) see Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, 425–6. On his activi-
ties in the Swiss Confederation see Jacob Vollenweider, Examen der newen Lehr eines/ der sich
nen[n]et Levi Christen/ einen Priester Gottes nach der ordnung Melchisedeck … (Zurich: Hans
Balthasar Beuggers, 1622); Samuel Gränischer, Historische Notizen und Anekdoten von Zoffingen
(Zoffingen: Daniel Sutermeister, 1825), 153.
112
See Meder, ‘Der Schwärmer Esaias Stiefel,’ 116, 121; Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte
Dissident’, 366–69.
In 1627, the year of Stiefel’s death, Hartprecht again attracted the attention of
Lutheran authorities, this time for supposedly disseminating ‘Weigelian’ ideas,
though these were probably Stiefelian in nature.113 According to reports received by
Solomon Glass (1593–1656), Superintendent in Sondershausen, in the course of
1626 Hartprecht had begun to insert unusual statements into his sermons concern-
ing the indwelling spirit and substance of Christ.114 An interrogation conducted by
church officials, however, could find nothing amiss with Hartprecht’s opinions, let
alone any hints of Weigelianism.115 Glass was satisfied, and, sensing a certain rap-
port, the men became friends. There were no further complaints emanating from the
villages in which Hartprecht preached. All seemed once again in order.
Then, early in 1629, an agitated Hartprecht sought out Glass in Sondershausen.
He gave Glass a copy of one of Stiefel’s books, and declared that Countess Erdmute
Juliane of Gleichen was soon to bear a child. This was not just any child, however,
but the ‘prince of peace’ prophesied in Isaiah 9:6 who would return at the End of
Time, ultimus Christi in gloriam et ad judicium adventus.116 The remarkable
Erdmute Juliane, as we know, had welcomed Stiefel and Meth to Ohrdruf in the
early 1620s, and was a fiery defender of their antinomian doctrines. The pregnancy
itself was a miraculous filfilment of one of Stifel’s own prophecies. Shortly before
his death, the prophet had convinced the previously childless countess that she
would bear the first and final fruit of his doctrines of individual purification.
Approximately fifteen months after Stiefel’s death in August 1627, Erdmute Juliane
miraculously fell pregnant.117
Although salacious contemporary opinion beggared chronology to assert that the
child was Stiefel’s own,118 Erdmute Juliane’s pregnancy was probably a case of
pseudocyesis, or phantom pregnancy. If true, then Hartprecht’s insistence on its
miraculous nature was not only earnest, but in light of contemporary medical knowl-
edge, entirely justified.119 The countess’s desperation to conceive, not just a child,
113
Rudolstadt, TSA, VIIb Nr. 225, 13r; Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident’, 368.
114
The account below is based on Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident’, 368–382; Weiß,
Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, 504–505, as well as the original documents preserved in
Rudolstadt.
115
Rudolstadt, TSA, VIIb Nr. 225, 13r-v.
116
117
Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, 50; Georg Michael Pfefferkorn, Merkwürdige und
Auserlesene Geschichte von der berümten Landgrafschaft Thüringen (Frankfurt am Main and
Gotha: Johann Caspar Bachmann für Augustus Boetius, 1684), 245 provides a somewhat garbled
version of these events. The contemporary chronicle by Friedrich Christian Lesser, ‘Hohnsteinische
Geschichte,’ preserved in Weimar, Thüringisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, F19 fol. 193v–195r, reprinted
in Friedrich Christian Lesser, Historie der grafschaft Hohnstein. Nach dem Manuskript im
Thüringischen Hauptstaatsarchiv zu Weimar. Peter Kuhlbrodt, ed. (Nordhausen: Friedrich-
Christian-Lesser-Stiftung, 1997), 93–4, claims that Erdmute Juliane ultimately gave birth to a boy
named, appropriately enough, Christian. This is not documented in any other source and is almost
certainly in error.
118
Zacharias Hogel (1574–1635), ‘Chronikon’ cited in Meder, ‘Der Schwärmer Esajas Stiefel’, 120.
119
Paul M. Paulman and Abdul Sadat, ‘Pseudoceyesis,’ Journal of Family Practice 1 (1990):
575–582.
The Messianic Turn 149
but a saviour, could only have been intensified by the fact that she was the last of her
noble line, who had failed to produce an heir after more than twenty years of
marriage.120 The fact that Stiefel had predicted exactly such an event prior to his
1627 death provided to Hartprecht conclusive proof of both the miraculous nature
of the pregnancy, as well as the rectitude of Stiefel’s doctrines.
Following Hartprecht’s revelation, Glass and the Sondershausen Ministerium
initiated several attempts to counsel the pastor out of his errant beliefs, albeit with-
out result. And little wonder. For if Hartprecht was half as convinced as his wife of
Stiefel’s messianic character, he would not have been at all likely to give up his
hopes. To illustrate the strength of conviction that the Hartprechts felt for Stiefel’s
mission, in 1626 the pastor’s wife visited Stiefel in Erfurt. Upon meeting him, she
dropped to her knees and cried: ‘God be praised and thanked that I have seen the
living God upon earth.’121 The saga continued into 1630. Summoned again to
Sondershausen in early February of that year, Hartprecht defended both his beliefs
and Stiefel’s reputation, declaring the deceased prophet ‘a devout, Christian, sincere
and blessed man.’ In another hearing the pastor claimed Stiefel’s works were as
authoritative as the Bible itself, as they were thoroughly informed and inspired by
the Holy Spirit.122
However in June 1630, when Hartprecht was confronted with the possibility of
losing his pastorate, his convictions wavered. Although he declared that he rejected
Stiefel’s doctrines, the Sondershausen Ministerium had heard enough. Unwilling to
entertain Hartprecht any longer, they removed him from his pastorate and expelled
him from Thuringia.123 Perhaps it is only surprising that it had taken them this long.
Hartprecht thereafter attempted in vain to prove the orthodoxy of his belief, at one
point authoring a lengthy supplication that systematically refuted all of Stiefel’s
doctrines, and underlined his commitment not simply to the works of Luther but
also to the Augsburg Confession.124 In 1633, following the death of a still-childless
Erdmute Juliane and the ultimate, irrefutable disappointment and ruination of his
apocalyptic expectations, Hartprecht applied to authorities in Erfurt to be once more
accepted into the brotherhood of the faith. While his application was refused,
Hartprecht was at least allowed to receive communion. Finally, against all expecta-
tions, in 1636 Hartprecht was appointed pastor to the tiny village of Wenigentennstedt
in Franconia. Whether or not his heterodox tendencies again manifested themselves
there remains unknown. Hartprecht was dead by July 1637.125
120
Lesser, Historie der Grafschaft Hohnstein, 93–94.
121
Meder, ‘Der Schwärmer Esajas Stiefel,’ 121.
122
Rudolstadt, TSA, VIIb Nr. 225, 21r–22v; Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident,’
372–3.
123
Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident,’ 359, 372–4.
124
Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident,’ 374ff; Erfurt, Bibliothek des evangelischen
Ministeriums, Ms 21, fols. 4r–115r.
125
For Hartprecht’s position in Franconia and his subsequent death see Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des
Esajas Stiefel, 505.
There can be little doubt that Hartprecht’s early contact with heterodox ideas
hastened his later susceptibility to Stiefel’s antinomian prophecies. In Tuba tempo-
ris Hartprecht cited a number of potentially heterodox sources to support his vision
of the imminent Golden Age to dawn in 1625. His familiarity with such material
was probably encouraged by his contact with Paracelsian and other doctrines by
personalities at Erdmute Juliane’s court in Ohrdruf.126 This exposure to controver-
sial apocalyptic ideas likely festered during Hartprecht’s ‘introspective and quiet’
existence as a country pastor, during which time he pored over ‘wondrous prophe-
cies’ that he purchased from booksellers. If Joachim Cussovius did seek out
Hartprecht in Thalebra, then from around 1620 the pastor was also keeping com-
pany inclined toward Weigelianism, prophetic opinions and angelic magic.
What made these ideas so attractive? Tuba Temporis clearly demonstrates that
Hartprecht was engaged on a quest to discover insights into the Last Times. This
may have been prompted by external circumstances, particularly those caused by
the Thirty Years’ War.127 After the commencement of the conflict Thuringia became
a parade-ground for decamping troops. There is evidence that Hartprecht felt vul-
nerable in his pastorate: the Erfurt chronicler Zacharias Hogel (1574–1635) recorded
that at least once in 1627 Hartprecht and his family retreated to Erfurt due to cir-
cumstances caused by the war.128 This was around the same time that Hartprecht
revealed his convictions to Solomon Glass. Esajas Stiefel once stated that he
intended to demonstrate to the world the sins and misdeeds of pastors, princes and
their lackeys, and to do so with frequent reference to Luther’s own works.129 With
the fall-out of combat elsewhere foisted upon innocent Thuringians, Hartprecht
might have felt his turn to an inner strength prompted by Stiefel’s unique Christology
to be justified.130 That Hartprecht would eventually declare that Erdmute Juliane
would give birth to a redeeming figure in the Last Days appears to be a culmination
of his own quest for certainty concerning the End Times, which was established not
only by studying scripture, contemporary prophecy, and the pronouncements of a
self-proclaimed messiah, but also by external circumstances. This was a hope that,
although nowhere supported by Lutheran doctrine, was nevertheless desperately
needed.
126
Meder, ‘Der Schwärmer Esajas Stiefel,’ 120.
127
See Berg, Military Occupation under the Eyes of the Lord, 50–53, 75–94 and passim.
128
Zacharias Hogel, cited in Meder, ‘Der Schwärmer Esajas Stiefel’, 121. For other contemporary
accounts of the depredations of war in Thuringia, see Pfefferkorn, Merkwürdige und Auserlesene
Geschichte, 509–544.
129
See Weiß, ‘Der dogmengetreu drapierte Dissident,’ 367.
130
Arnold, Kirchen und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 38.
Conclusion 151
Conclusion
The cases of Cussovius, Siebmacher, Hartprecht, and Rahtmann represent very dif-
ferent manifestations of clerical interest in optimistic apocalypticism in Lutheran
confessional culture. In Rahtmann’s case, accusations of heterodoxy were inspired
by his failure to condemn chiliastic heresy in a sufficiently robust manner, as well
as his utilization of sources considered heterodox by some of his fellow churchmen.
Hartprecht’s case, on the other hand, vindicated the opinions of Johann Corvinus,
who insisted Rahtmann was wrong in not wanting to combat chiliastic error aggres-
sively. Left in comparative isolation, with few checks on the orthodoxy of his tradi-
tions, Hartprecht developed an optimistic apocalyptic expectation tinged with
antinomian and messianic sentiments. Cussovius, it seems, remained convinced his
entire life of the imminence of a coming felicitous future, a conviction that not even
an education in Lutheran theology at several universities could shake, and may well
have encouraged. The limited information available concerning Siebmacher pro-
vides a slightly different story. Here was a pastor in an urban environment who
appears to have chanced across optimistic expectations in the course of his interest
in matters alchemical, ultimately ending with exposure to the apocalyptic expecta-
tions of Judaism.
All of these cases demonstrate that visions of a felicitous future could serve a
variety of ends, even inside the church, and Lutheran clerics were susceptible to the
same pressures and influences as any other member of society. Equally, they indi-
cate the confusion, or ignorance, that abounded within Lutheran culture concerning
the boundaries of chiliastic heresy; a matter no better demonstrated than by Hermann
Rahtmann’s sad treatment at the hands of his Danzig colleagues. What was lacking
in the apocalyptic visions of clerics like Hartprecht and Cussovius however, was a
programmatic attempt to incorporate hopes for a felicitous future into mainstream
Lutheran apocalyptic doctrine. That would be a project undertaken by a pastor from
the northernmost reaches of the Empire, Paul Egard of Nortorf in Holstein.
Chapter 6
A Lutheran Millennium
In the years before the great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 1623 visions of a
felicitous future circulated among lay and clerical circles in Lutheran confessional
culture alike. In 1623 a pastor in northern Germany issued a book which comprised
a systematic attempt to wed optimistic apocalyptic expectations with practical
Christianity and weave the result into orthodox Lutheran doctrine. The author of
this work was Paul Egard of Nortorf in Holstein, and his controversial book was
titled Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes. In prior chapters, we have seen
that optimistic apocalyptic expectations could be, and were, employed by Lutherans
as a means of supplication to escape the ravages of the Last Days. In this, they
shared some of the same traits of devotional literature, which also aimed at provid-
ing solace and hope. The tight nexus between these two genres of religious literature
seems to have been one of the reasons that Hermann Rahtmann attracted accusa-
tions of promoting chiliastic heresy. Unlike Rahtmann, however, Egard attempted to
combine optimistic apocalyptic and devotional tropes into a novel Lutheran litera-
ture of supplication.
Paul Egard
Paul Egard was born in 1578 or 1579 as the son of a church organist in
Kellingshusen in the Duchy of Holstein.1 In May 1599 he matriculated at Rostock
University, but was forced to abandon his studies on account of financial
1
The following account is based upon Moller, Cimbria literata, vol. 1, 151–154; Johann Moller,
Isagoge ad historiam chersonesi cimbricae (Hamburg: Bredenckius für Liebezeit, 1691), vol. 2,
169–170; Tholuck, Lebenszeugen der lutherischen Kirche, 397–408; Dieter Lohmeier, ‘Paulus
Egardus,’ in Schleswig-Holsteinisches Biographisches Lexikon. (Neumünster: Wachholtz Verlag,
1991), vol. 9, 102–104; Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, vol. 5, 655–656.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_6
154 6 A Lutheran Millennium
hardship.2 He briefly served as deacon in Kellingshusen in 1600, before taking

up the same post at the church of St. Mary’s in Rendsburg in 1601, where he was
also served as headmaster of the Latin school.3 In mid-1610, on account of his
lucid and inspiring sermons, Egard was recommended by a local nobleman to
King Christian IV of Denmark (1577–1648), and was thereafter appointed on
royal authority to the pastorate of Nortorf in Holstein.4
There exists no reliable source of information documenting Egard’s life between his
appointment in Nortorf in 1610 and 1623, when he published Posaune. During this
period, however, the young pastor appears to have established a reputation as a zealous
and exemplary preacher, who addressed his congregation both in Low and High
German, and whose ministry was coloured by his interest in doctrines of practical
Christianity promoted by Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum.5 Egard’s earliest printed works,
like Agonia Christi (1620) and Theologia practica (1622) were authored in Latin, and
several were dedicated to nobility and members of the Danish royal family.6
Egard’s early publications detailed a practical outline for leading a good Christian
life, drawing upon the examples of Jesus’s suffering during the passion as an exam-
ple for the devout.7 Other writings, however, provide evidence of Egard’s familiarity
with marginally heterodox religious doctrines. This is especially true of his Gnothi
Seauton (1621), an eight-hundred page treatise in small quarto concerning the micro-
cosm and macrocosm and the interdependence of the human and divine realms.8
Egard apparently conceived of the book as a Lutheran corrective to Valentin Weigel’s
1615 text of the same name, although Weigel himself is not mentioned therein. In
any event, the content of Egard’s early literary output betrays a complex of distinct
Lutheran devotional and Weigelian influences, both apophatic and cataphatic.9
Egard’s interest in these subjects was not merely literary. In addition to first-hand
knowledge of heterodox religious literature, Egard was also personally acquainted
2
Adolph Hofmeister and Ernst Schäfer, eds., Die Matrikel der Universität Rostock. vol. 2.
(Rostock: Nusser, 1891), 263a.
3
Ernst Feddersen, Kirchengeschichte Schleswig-Holsteins. 3 vols. (Kiel: Mühlau, 1907–1938),
vol. 1, 295. Concerning his teaching appointment see Paul Egard, Medulla SS Theologiae sive
Meditationes piae & utilissimae in S. Catechesin propositae (Hamburg: Heinrich Carsten, 1622),
sigs. A3v, B1r.
4
G. Reimer, ‘Wie Pastor Paulus Egardus nach Nortorf kam,’ Die Heimat (Kiel) 33 (1923), 204–5.
5
Feddersen, Kirchengeschichte Schleswig-Holsteins, 454.
6
7
Paul Egard, Agonia hoc est, Passio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi, Explicata practicè et paraphras-
ticè. (Hamburg: Heinrich Carsten, 1621); Paul Egard, Theologia practica sapientiss. Regis
Israelitarum seu Salomon ecclesiastes exhibens microcosmum describens totum hominem, Qualis
olim fuerit, jam sit, esse debeat, deo, proximo, sibi et tandem futurus sit, in lucem per lucem exposi-
tus Logicè, mysticè, practicè, paraphrasticè. (Hamburg: Carsten, 1622).
8
Paul Egard, Gnōthi Seauton Sive Tractatus Utilissimus De vera Microcosmi Cognitione Tum
Naturali, Tum Supernaturali, Vel De Scientia Illa Divina maxime necessaria, optima & difficilima.
2 vols. (Hamburg: Carsten, 1621–1622)
9
Cf. Martin Brecht, ‘Das Aufkommen der neuen Frömmigkeitsbewegung in Deutschland,’ in Der
Pietismus vom siebzehnten bis zum frühen achtzehnten Jahrhundert. (Geschichte des Pietismus,
Band 1). Martin Brecht, ed. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 1993), 113–204 at 147.
Paul Egard 155
with known lay critics of contemporary Lutheranism, including the Husum lay
prophet Nicolaus Teting (c.1590–c.1642), Hans Engelbrecht of Braunschweig, the
Böhme-follower Johann Angelius Werdenhagen, and the Hamburg scholar and
manuscript collector Joachim Morsius. In May 1622 Morsius traveled to Nortorf
expressly to converse with Egard. While there, Egard made an entry in Morsius’s
Album Amicorum, in which he praised his visitor as ‘a lover of divine wisdom.’10 It
is almost certain that the two men discussed their mutual interest in controversial
religious literature. Be that as it may, an association with potentially heterodox ideas
and personalities did not harm Egard’s impeccable reputation. In 1622, he was
described in glowing terms by Werdenhagen as a ‘spiritually zealous Christian, who
thinks highly of true Christianity […] and according to his talents, seeks to free it
from the oppressions of heathenism, and its shameful Babylonian captivity.’11
Early in 1623 Egard became convinced that an imminent change was at hand for
humanity. A passage in his Gülden Christenthumb des Himlischen Adelers (1623)
suggests that he experienced a spiritual awakening prompted by the Holy Spirit,
which granted him new insight into the interpretation of scripture.12 Egard had long
been dissatisfied with the scriptural commentaries of fellow Lutheran clerics, which,
he contended, offered little insight into the true spirit of the Word. Inspired by his
interest in the works of Arndt, Egard asserted that it was essential to unite scripture
with true Christian practice. True Christianity, Egard asserted, existed not in ‘titles,
reputations, or mere words, but in truth and in deed, in the true living recognition of
Christ, in an active and living belief.’13
Following his experience, Egard stopped issuing tracts in Latin, and instead
turned his hand to German-language publications, so that his teachings might reach
the widest audience possible. These works offered a melange of Arndtian and
vaguely Weigelian devotional teachings. They resonated among readers, and Egard’s
works began to inspire a burgeoning commercial demand.14 In 1624, Egard defended
the doctrines of Johann Arndt in print, thereby joining the vociferous contemporary
10
See Schneider, Joachim Morsius und sein Kreis, 45, 78, 86. Egard signed Morsius’ album on 22
May 1622. Although the original has been lost, his message was reprinted in Moller, Cimbria
Literata, vol. 1, 443: ‘Bene te novi de nomine & animo, etiamsi non te norim de facie. Novi ego te
optimorum studiorum amatorem, quod in te magnum; novi te amatorem divinæ sapientiæ, quæ in
Macro- & Microcosmo, atque in ipso Christo, ob oculos posita, quod majus; Novi te amatorem
Jesu, ejusque vitæ, quod omnium maximum & pulcherrimum. Prius redit te in mundo clarum &
celebrem, alterum bonis, & sapientiæ studiosis, gratum & acceptum; sed posterius divinum & Deo
proximum.’
11
[Johann Angelus Werdenhagen] Chilobertus Jonas Westphalus, Zwey Nützliche Vnd jetziger Zeit
bey diesem leider sehr betrübten vnd bedrengtem Zustande des Christenthumbs hochnötige
Erinnerungs Tractätlein Gottes außgefertiget (No Place: No Printer, 1622), 98.
12
Paul Egard, Gülden Christenthumb des Himlischen Adelers/ Das ist: Die Erste/ Edle und
Geistreiche Epistel S. Johannis … Darin das Göttliche Liecht und Leben oder Ware Christenthumb/
aus Christi Hertz/ Sinn und Geist/ uberaus herrlich und lieblich wird beschrieben. (Lüneburg:
Stern, 1623), sig. A5r.
13
Egard, Gülden Christenthumb des Himlischen Adelers, sigs. A4r-v.
14
Paul Egard, Soliloquia. Das ist: Acht und dreyssig schöne Andächtige Bekänntnisse (Lüneburg:
Stern, 1626), sigs. A2r-A2v.
debate concerning the orthodoxy of Arndt’s teachings. He attracted the ire of fellow
clerics Paul Tarnow in Rostock and Georg Rost in Lübz, the latter of whom, as we
have seen, was a tireless opponent of chiliastic heresy.15 A highlight of Egard’s later
work, and perhaps his most well-known publication, is his commentary on the
ancient Germanic golden horns found in 1639 at Gallehus in Denmark. Despite the
ancient pagan provenance of these artefacts, Egard insisted that the strange figures
carved upon the horns actually depicted the rites and practices of ancient Christians.16
This eccentric and intriguing interpretation demonstrated Egard’s creativity in expli-
cating unusual sources and applying them for the spiritual benefit of Lutherans. This
was a motivation that also stood behind his appropriation of contemporary optimistic
apocalyptic expectations in his Posaune. Egard’s existence in Nortorf being other-
wise uneventful, he continued to author devotional literature until his death in 1655.
Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes (1623)
Egard’s Posaune, a small octavo volume some 182 pages in length, was published
by Heinrich (1592–1665) and Johann Stern (1582–1656) in Lüneburg sometime in
or shortly before September 1623.17 It was probably printed in Goßlar by Johann
Vogt (d. 1626).18 As Hans Dumrese has shown, the Stern brothers specialised in
publishing vernacular religious literature, and enjoyed a strong relationship with
authors of devotional works. They published several editions of Philipp Nicolai’s
Historia des Reichs Christi, and enjoyed a close relationship with Johann Arndt.
Arndt contributed a foreword to a 1620 folio bible published by the firm, and the
Sterns also issued editions of Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum and Paradiesgärtlein.
But the Sterns also possessed connections to figures who dealt in controversial reli-
gious material, including optimistic apocalypitc tracts. In the 1610s they issued sev-
eral responses addressed to the Rosicrucian fraternity, and in 1621 were involved in
a project headed by Carl Widemann to set in print various works of Valentin
15
Georg Rost, Amica ac fraterna Admonitio Super Controversiis De Vero Dn. Joannis Arndten,
generalis in Ducatu Luneburgico Superintendentis, p.m. Christianismo, inter D.D. Lucam
Osiandrum & M. Henricum Varenium, Dn. Paulum Eggardum, aliosq[ue] Theologos & politicos
ortis (Rostock: Hallevord, 1626).
16
Paul Egard, Theologische und Schrifftmässige Gedancken/ Und Außlegung über das wunder-
bare/ köstliche und kunstreiche gülden Horn/ … welches nicht so gar vor langen funden/ und
hierbey eigentlich abgebildet ist (Lüneburg: Stern, 1642).
17
On the Sterns see Reske, Die Buchdrucker des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts, 618–620; Hans
Dumrese, Lüneburg und die Offizin der Sterne: Der Sternverlag im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert
(Lüneburg: Stern’sche Buchdruckerei, 1956).
18
Cf. Dumrese, Lüneburg und die Offizin der Sterne, 23 who suggests that the work was printed in
Lüneburg by Andreas Michelsen (d. 1627) concerning whom see Reske, Die Buchdrucker des 16.
und 17. Jahrhunderts, 618–619.
Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes (1623) 157
Weigel.19 The project was never realised. The publishing program of the brothers
Stern was thus a perfect fit for Egard’s work, in particular his controversial Posaune.
As its full title indicates, Posaune was a commentary on Revelation 20, in par-
ticular what was to be expected from the thousand year period mentioned therein.
Egard’s position on this was clear. Breaking with the general sentiment, he outlined
a scenario in Posaune of a coming felicitous period for the Lutheran church before
the Last Judgment, in which the Holy Spirit and the true teachings of Christ would
flower and grow in the hearts of the devout. This purification and rebirth of the
‘inner’ Christian would be accompanied by a concomitant purification of the ‘outer’
Christian. After the devout had purified themselves, the Heavenly Jerusalem, the
kingdom of God, would be established in the hearts and minds of true Christian
believers. Egard anticipated that this period of spiritual felicity would begin in 1625.
It was to last for approximately three years, thus roughly until the beginning of
1629, after which date the Day of Judgment would occur.
According to Egard, in 1623 the world faced a decisive moment. Society stood
at a crossroad, and the Last Judgment was imminent. In several works written before
his Posaune Egard likened the present state of the world to that preceding Noah’s
flood.20 Egard’s vision was suffused with a patriotic conviction that, because of
Luther’s reformation, the Germans were God’s chosen people.21 Nevertheless,
despite the Reformer’s efforts, by the 1620s Lutheranism could not be said to pos-
sess more than a skerrick of true Christian spirituality. According to Egard, the faith
had devolved into nothing more than a ‘masque and charade’ (Larvenwerck und
Affenspiel). For Egard, the Germans were worse-off than the Hebrews at the time of
the great flood, on account of the simple fact that they had rejected God’s teachings
even after Luther had shown them the true path.22
In the introductory preface to Posaune, Egard declared that he had written the
work not only to ‘increase the light and grace’ among his readership, but also to
‘unlock the prophecies’ and ‘to recognize and test (prüfen) the [final] age in which
we live.’23 The Nortorf preacher was well aware that the decision to write on
Revelation 20, the most controversial chapter of the most difficult book in the Bible,
was fraught with danger. Egard anticipated—correctly, as it turned out—that the
most negative reaction would come from his fellow learned clerics. Wary of the
19
Gobiet, ed. Der Briefwechsel zwischen Philipp Hainhofer und Herzog August d.J., 334. Gilly,
Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, nos. 190, 192, 193.
20
Egard, Medulla SS Theologiae, sig. A5v.
21
Paul Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes: Das ist/ Offenbahrung unnd Entdeckung
deß Göttlichen Geheimnüß im Apocalypsi, von den tausend Jahren/ darinn die Lebendig gemachten
Heiligen/ mit Christo sollen herrschen. Oder Erklärung deß Zwantzigsten Capittels der
Offenbarung Jesu Christi. … (Lüneburg: In Verlegung Johann und Heinrich Stern, 1623), sig. A2r.
22
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, sig. A5v.
23
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, 7; ‘Ich habe kein ander warumb, oder ursa-
che, denn dz Liecht und warheit, Gott zu ehren, möge nach der Gnade, die mir in Christo Jesu
gegeben ist, erkant werden, unnd das Geheimnüß und Weissagung, die bißher verschlossen und
versiegelt gewesen, eröffnet unnd ins Liecht gesetzt werden, zu erkennen und prüfen die Zeit,
darinn wir leben.’
controversy attracted by ‘innovation’ in matters of religion, he explicitly stated that,

however it might seem to readers, what was affirmed in Posaune was not a new and
therefore heretical teaching—it had nothing to do, he declared, with the ‘preten-
sions of the brothers of the Rosy Cross.’24 Instead, it was devoted to continuing
Johann Arndt’s mission of spreading the divine light in the Last Days.
Egard began the first chapter of Posaune with an unequivocal proposition: who-
ever will truly understand the hidden mysteries of future things must be inspired by
the light and grace of the Holy Spirit:
Who does not possess the spirit of truth, recognition, and prophecy, out of which the Word
has flowed forth, he shall not see the sense, light and truth of God. Nobody knows the intent
(Sinn) of the Holy Spirit without the Holy Spirit, which is the key to all prophecies.25
Although this declaration sounds rather like something that a new prophet like
Felgenhauer might have written, there was a twist. According to Egard, the true
powers of the Holy Spirit and of prophecy could not be attained by anyone through
personal illumination. Instead, revelation through the Holy Spirit was collective,
and mediated through the offices (Ämpter) of the Lutheran church. Egard thus
stressed that his interpretation of Revelation was part of a time-honoured tradition,
beginning with Luther, of clerics being inspired by the Holy Spirit. His was no
attempt at prophetic charisma or oppositional philosophy: ‘Here [in this book] is no
new revelation and prophecy, but a godly explanation and discovery of … the proph-
ecies and hidden secrets by means of the spirit of God.’26
Egard’s vision of a coming felicitous future was entirely spiritual in character.
The world was entering a distinctively Joachite third age, the time of the evening,
following which a dim light would begin to shine, like an aurora (Zachariah 14:1–
21).27 This age was identical to the conclusion of the ‘time, times, and half a time’
described in Daniel 12, which Egard understood as describing the present rule and
decline of Antichrist’s power on earth.28 Egard believed that ‘God did not build his
church through worldly, earthly action, power and strength, but through his heav-
enly light, through his spirit, through keys and chains.’29 The true Christian must
absorb this heavenly light so that the seeds of the kingdom of God, sown in his
heart, might flower.30 The light of God was also essential to understanding
24
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, 12: ‘Darnach solstu wissen/ das diß werck
keine Verwantnis mit dem nichtigen vnd ruhmrettigen fürgeben der Brüder deß Rosen Creutzes
habe.’
25
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, 3–4: ‘Wer nicht den geist der Weißheit/
Erkändtnüß und Weissagung hat/ daraus das Wort geflossen/ der wird den Sinn/ Liecht und Warheit
GOttes nicht sehen. Niemand weiß des heiligen Geistes Sinn/ ohn den heiligen Geist/ welcher ist
der Schlüssel zu allen Propheceyen.’
26
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, 7.
27
28
29
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, 43 with reference to Revelation 20:1–2.
30
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, 45, 62.
Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes (1623) 159
chronology, the key element in Egard’s interpretation of the crucial verses of

Revelation 20 concerning a forthcoming Millennium.
As we have seen in prior chapters, the traditional Lutheran interpretation of
Revelation 20 located the Millennium in the historical past. Egard did not agree, and
placed the Millennium in the future. The key to this interpretation, Egard argued,
was provided by the ‘times, time, and half a time’ of Daniel 7:25 and 12:7.31
Understanding the prophecies of Revelation as describing the growth of the Lutheran
faith, Egard argued that in 1517 the world had entered the final ‘half time’ described
by Daniel.32 During this ‘half time,’ Antichrist, in the form of the ‘Pope and a papist
emperor’ had been revealed, and waged war against the true church of Lutheranism.
The beast of Revelation 14, Egard contended, represented the influence of Antichrist
and the disunity of the contemporary world. Its fearful magnificence accounted for
Antichrist’s seemingly irresistible qualities, which had led the world into conflict. It
is only because of the love of God that the Lutheran faithful had been able to with-
stand and endure this unholy attack.33 In order to gauge the duration of this third age
and final ‘half time,’ Egard looked to the prophetic 1290 days of Daniel 12:11–13.
These days, the pastor declared, represented calendar months, and therefore indi-
cated a specific duration of around 109 years.34 Adding these 109 years to the impor-
tant year of 1517 brought Egard, only slightly testing the boundaries of acceptable
mathematical calculation, to 1625. The year 1625 was thus to be the time ‘in which
the new honesty and purification will commence, and the great light of grace
(Gnadenliecht) shall everywhere be seen.’35 In other words, it was the year in which
the Millennium of Revelation 20 would dawn.
However, this time of ‘fulfillment and completion’ during which Satan would be
imprisoned and the Lutheran church would flourish would be only short, for in the
eyes of God ‘a thousand years are as a day’ (Psalm 90:2, 2 Peter 3:8). Echoing the
sentiments of Nicolaus Hartprecht, Egard stated that the thousand years ‘should not
be understood according to the ordinary course of time, but rather mystically (mys-
ticè), as a particular time of grace, in which godly light and life shall rule.’36 To
calculate the duration of the Millennium Egard again turned to Daniel 12:12 where
the prophet declared ‘blessed is he that waiteth, and cometh to the thousand three
hundred and five and thirty days.’ Those patiently waiting for the Millennium would
thus, Egard reasoned, experience a respite that would endure a literal 1335 days.
The prophesied Gnadenzeit would therefore last until sometime in 1629, when the
light of grace would shine most brilliantly.37 From this point on, the ‘light would
begin to fade, and darkness would again fall, so that when the Son of God shall
31
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, 9–10.
32
33
34
35
36
37
come, he would find little belief on earth (Luke 18:8).’38 Like the medieval traditions
of the Refreshment of the Saints, Egard thus expected that the future Millennium
would not endure until the Last Judgment, but comprise only a brief period of
respite. Egard’s commentary concluded with a familiar trope of pessimistic Lutheran
apocalypticism; the specific date of the Last Judgment and Christ’s return could be
known to God alone.
An Unanticipated Millennium
Unlike contemporary new prophets Egard did not intend to whip up public excite-
ment concerning this future time of spiritual grace. Instead, he wanted to undercut
anticipation of the event. Simply relegating the godly kingdom to a spiritual realm
of belief, however, was not enough to achieve this end. Paul Nagel, for example, had
also proposed a spiritual period of future felicity. His expectations attracted numer-
ous readers and, eventually, imitators. Furthermore, his expectations were vocifer-
ously condemned by some Lutheran clerics, including the theological faculty of
Wittenberg, as heretical.
If Egard was to avoid charges of heresy, he had to defuse potentially heterodox
elements inherent in his scenario of future respite, and ensure that his vision was
received by his audience in the right fashion. Egard strived throughout the Posaune
to make clear that the Millennium would come and go, but only a few ‘true
Christians’ would realise it, just as few realized that the angel with the key and
chains that would shackle Antichrist and initiate the Millennium (Revelation 20:1–
3) should be identified with Johann Arndt.39 For Egard, the future 1335 days of glory
for the Lutheran church would be a product of the joy in the hearts of its adherents,
a preview of the glorious future of the church in eternity.
By tethering expectation of the Millennium to an ephemeral spiritual glory of
the Lutheran church, Egard created an optimistic vision in service to Lutheran
belief, if not doctrine. Although, as we have seen, several prior clerics had incorpo-
rated expectations of a period of respite for the church before the Last Judgment,
they never linked this to the Millennium of Revelation 20. Instead they associated
it, like Egard, with Daniel 12, or the brief period described in Revelation 20:9,
when the throne of God briefly appeared in the sky immediately before the Last
Judgment.40 Such conceptions of a future felicity could not inspire revolutionary
enthusiasm because the rewards of the kingdom arrived only after the horrors of the
Last Days.
38
39
40
See further Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 123.
Some Sources of Egard’s Posaune 161
Some Sources of Egard’s Posaune
Egard’s stated goal in writing Posaune was simply ‘to awake the world to the light.’41
That is to say, like Rahtmann before him—or even critics like Nagel, Felgenhauer
and others—to provide some semblance of hope to a suffering German populace. In
order to do so, Egard played on the attractiveness of optimistic apocalyptic expecta-
tions connected to Revelation 20, and subsumed them into a specifically Lutheran
scenario. Egard’s strategy suggests that he was intensely familiar with contempo-
rary literature critical of Lutheran confessional culture. An examination of the
sources of his vision demonstrates conclusively that contemporary optimistic apoc-
alyptic literature informed his conjectures.
Egard’s expectations for the years 1625 to 1629, and his interpretations of Daniel
and Revelation, appear to have been inspired by Philipp Nicolai’s Historia deß
Reichs Christi (1598), discussed in a prior chapter.42 Contrary to Egard, Nicolai saw
the period between 1625 and 1629 as one of great tribulation for the church, mainly
because his vision was influenced by the fate of the two witnesses of Revelation
11:3.43 For Nicolai, it would be 1629 that would mark the beginning of a new period
of expansion and growth for Lutheranism, a felicitous age in which the true evan-
gelical religion would be made mighty (gewaltig) before the Last Judgment, which
he expected to occur around 1670.44 Egard relied on precisely the same calculations,
but inverted their significance. Despite this, it is probable that Egard’s chief
source for his apocalyptic chronology was Nicolai’s book.
Egard’s other inspirations are rather more difficult to identify. The pastor himself,
however, provides us with two definite clues in Posaune’s preface. Firstly, he there
declared that he wrote the work in order to honour and promote Arndt’s doctrines.45
Arndt himself was, of course, no apocalyptic controversialist, but he did provide two
key notions that were important for Egard. The first was the idea of the Gnadenreich,
the indwelling, eternal kingdom of God as the fundamental basis of his devotional
philosophy. The second stemmed from Arndt’s untypical view about the increase in
prospects for the Lutheran church before the Last Judgment. Arndt wished that peo-
ple would look forward to the End, rather than fear it, and in his ‘Prayer against the
fear of the Judgment Day,’ he implored Jesus to let the people ‘wait daily with joy’
for his second coming.46 A strong nexus existed between the practices of Christianity
and hope for a better time, it is likely that Egard had similar views.
41
Reprinted in Hans Engelbrecht, Christlicher Wunderreicher Bind-Brieff auff S. Johannis Tag den
24. Junij ders vergangenen 1638. Jahrs gestellet (No Place: No Printer, 1639), sig. K5v. On this
letter, which Engelbrecht carried with him as a testimony to his character, see further Beyer, Lay
Prophets in Lutheran Europe, 215 n. 63.
42
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 551–2.
43
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 442, 444.
44
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi, 445, 459, 488, 551–552.
45
46
Wallmann, ‘Zwischen Reformation und Pietismus’, 196, citing the Nuremberg 1762 edition of
the Paradiesgärtlein.
Further clues concerning the inspirations for Egard’s optimistic apocalyptic out-
look are decidedly more obtuse, though no less revealing. In the preface to the
Posaune, Egard insisted that his interpretation of Revelation had nothing at all to do
with the pretences of the Rosicrucians (nichtigen und ruhmrettigen fürgeben der
Brüder deß Rosen Creutzes), but was dedicated alone to the exaltation of God.47 A
careful reading of Posaune suggests that Egard drew on some heterodox literature
in order to inform his vision of future felicity. For example, Egard’s inversion of
Nicolai’s expectations for the period between 1625 and 1629 appear to have been
influenced by the numerous prophecies relating to a Golden Age following the great
conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 1623. Like Hermann Rahtmann before him,
Egard may have hoped that his vision of an ephemeral future felicity would provide
an alternative to the hopes of Rosicrucians and new prophets. Yet Egard did not
hesitate to draw upon the writings of alleged heretics in the course of his writing. In
his Ehrenrettung (1624), Egard defended Arndt’s use of Weigel in Wahres
Christenthum by citing, like Arndt himself, 1 Thessalonians 5:21: ‘Prove everything
and hold fast that which is good.’48 Or, as Egard stated:
When here and again a heretic has a thought which is good, one may borrow it from him,
not because it is his, but because it is good, and conforms to the truth and to the word of
God. Because truth is always truth, regardless of who spoke it … [and] one should take
greater note of what is said, rather than who said it.49
This passage may be read as an apologia for Egard’s own useof heterodox religious
sources. His defence of Arndt opened with an argumentative vignette based on 1
Corinthians 16:9; ‘For a great door and effectual is opened unto me, and there are
many adversaries.’ Egard used this verse to justify his expectation of ‘a felicitous
(glückliche) course of evangelism’ before the Last Judgment.50 As we have seen,
Egard believed Arndt to be a prophetic figure, the angel of Revelation 20:1–3 who
would shackle Antichrist, and who was awoken by God to restore ‘true Christianity’
before the Last Judgment.51 If Arndt drew on Weigel or the writings of other authori-
ties in order to do so, then it was justified in the name of the Lutheran faith.
Another influence on Egard’s expectations was the exhortations of the
Braunschweig lay-prophet Hans Engelbrecht.52 Engelbrecht’s fame derived partly
47
48
Johann Arndt, Zwey Sendschreiben. H. Johann Arendts darinnen er bezeuget/ daß seine Bücher
vom wahren Christentumb/ mit des Weigelij und dergleichen Schwärmer Irthummen/ zur ungebühr
bezüchtiget werden (Magdeburg: Johann Francke, 1620), sig. A8v-B1r.
49
Paul Egard, Ehrenrettung Johannis Arndten/ Das ist/ Christliche und in Gottes Wort wolgegrün-
dete Erinnerung/ was von D. Lucae Osiandri, Theologiae Professoris zu Tübingen Urtheil und
Censur, über Johan Arndten wahres Christenthumb/ sey zu halten (Lüneburg: Stern, 1624), 32, 76:
‘Was denn nu ein Ketzer guts hat/ das kan man ja von ihm entlehnen/ nicht als es sein ist/ sondern
als es gut ist/ und Warheit und dem Wort Gottes gemäß ist. Denn Warheit sol allezeit Warheit sein/
ohn ansehen der Person … Man sol mehr in acht haben was gesaget wird/ als wer saget.’
50
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, sig. A2r.
51
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes, sig. A3r.
52
Feddersen, Kirchengeschichte Schleswig-Holsteins, 296; On Engelbrecht, see Beste, ‘Hans
Engelbrecht,’ 122–155; Penman, ‘A Prophet Confronts his Failures,’ 184–188; Beyer, Lay Prophets
in Lutheran Europe, 214–217.
Some Sources of Egard’s Posaune 163
from the fact that his visions first began following his temporary ‘death’ in 1622.
When he returned to consciousness, he brought with him ostensibly first-hand
visions of heaven and hell, which he then used to preach a message of repentance to
audiences throughout the Holy Roman Empire. Having met and spoken with
Engelbrecht, Egard became convinced that the prophet used ‘no deceit or guile,’ but
was in fact a genuine witness to the visions he pronounced, ‘moved by a good Spirit,
and by God himself.’53 Such a remarkable man, Egard attested in a letter of recom-
mendation he authored for Engelbrecht, could become a valuable tool for the
Lutheran faith, for he did not seek by his proclamations to lead people away from
the ministry, but instead to it; he was an advancer of the cause of true Christianity,
and a builder of ‘many hearts in Christ.’54 Egard saw Engelbrecht, along with Arndt,
as one of a vanguard of figures illuminated by God who would appear in the Last
Days. They would be shunned on account of their teachings, yet they played a cru-
cial role in the apocalyptic drama. In Posaune, Egard wrote that these figures would
reveal knowledge and wisdom, and ‘discover those secrets so long sealed away and
hidden.’55 Such a conviction derived from, among other places, Daniel 12:4, but as
we have seen was also featured in the writings of Paracelsus and in the Rosicrucian
manifestos.56 We have seen that Egard explicitly distanced himself from the
Rosicrucian fable, but his expectations were largely consonant with its core themes.
Yet even if Egard was prepared to draw on ‘truth’ wherever he found it, he was
equally eager to place it in service of the Lutheran ministry. It is for this reason that
Egard felt secure in elaborating a new interpretation of the Millennium by drawing
upon extra-biblical, Rosicrucian and Weigelian material, while simultaneously
denouncing the apocalyptic ruminations of the likes of Nicolaus Teting.57 Because
Egard crafted his own unique response to the conflicting ideas that surrounded him
in an effort to save souls through the power of the church, what has been said about
53
See Egard’s letter in Engelbrecht, Christlicher Wunderreicher Bind-Brieff, sig. K6r: ‘Was anlan-
get Brieffes Zeiger Hanß Engelbrechten/ so habe ich nun etzliche mahl mit ihme geredet/ und
befunden/ so viel ich erkennen kan/ das an ihme kein Betrug noch Falschheit sey/ sondern durch
den guten Geist Gottes getrieben und geführet werde/ und suchet die Fortpflantzung des wahren
Christenthumbs/ und Erbauung vieler Hertzen in Christo/ das aber die Welt ihn nicht kan leiden ist
nicht zuverwundern/ denn sie nicht alleine ihn/ sondern auch andre Heilige Lehrer verwirfft/ ver-
ketzert und verflucht GOtt wolle ihn durch seinen guten Geist stärcken und erhalten.’
54
Engelbrecht, Christlicher Wunderreicher Bind-Brieff, sig. K6r.
55
56
In addition to explicating this verse in Posaune, Egard also used it to open his Informatorium
Christianum, Das ist/ Kurtze und nützliche Erinnerung/ von der dreyfachen Schule: als Der
Göttlichen/ Der Menschlichen/ Der Teufflischen. Zu dem Ende gerichtet/ daß Gott/ Mensch/ Teuffel
Desto besser erkandt werden (Lüneburg: Stern, 1628), sig. A2v.
57
[Nicolaus Teting] N.T.H., Ein kurtze Sermon Vom REiche GOttes. Dediciert und offeriert hier-
mit. Allen Brüdern in Christo/ zum Zeugnisse/ Ihr Dienstwilliger und umb deß Zeugnisses Jesu
Christi willen vertriebener Bruder in Christo (No Place: No Printer, 1625); Krafft, Ein zweyfaches
Zwey-Hundert-Jähriges Jubel-Gedächtnis, 488–492. On Teting see Allgemeine Deutsche
Biographie, vol. 37, 570; Moller, Cimbria Literata, vol. 1, 677–680; D.C. Carstens, ‘Zur Geschichte
der Sectirer Nicolaus Teting und Hartwig Lohmann,’ Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft für Schleswig-
Holstein-Lauenburgische Geschichte 21 (1891): 374–383; Dieter Lohmeier, ‘Nicolaus Teting,’ in
Schleswig-Holsteinisches Biographisches Lexicon. (Neumünster: Karl Wachholtz Verlag, 1976),
vol. 4, 216–218.
Johann Arndt could apply equally to the pastor of Nortorf: ‘he forged his own path
between Luther, orthodoxy and radical Protestant spiritualism.’58
The Reception of Posaune
Perhaps predictably, the publication of Posaune occasioned signififcant controver-

sy.59 That this response was almost wholly negative is attested by a letter of Egard
to an unknown recipient dated 22 August 1624, one year after the book first appeared
in print:
Concerning my Posaune, which I wrote in order to awake the world to the light, I note that
it has been evilly misconstrued by many, and, as you are no doubt aware, so too have my
intentions. [It has been treated] as if I spoke of a new teaching, but that is something that I
never intended, only alone to bear witness that the light, which now becomes ever greater,
and more especially so that what was begun by the deceased Johann Arndt, may become
more glorious.60
As this passage makes clear, the ire concerning Posaune was not only directed at
Egard’s interpretations, but also at Egard himself. The diary of Jacob Fabricius Jr.
(1588–1645), adjunct Generalpropst and court preacher in Gottorf in Schleswig,
located some fifty kilometres north of Nortorf, provides several important refer-
ences to the controversy.61 On 16 September 1624, Fabricius recorded that the
promising young cleric Johann Clüver (1593–1633) had recently visited Johann
Affelmann in Rostock, who as we have seen was one of the major theorists of
chiliastic heresy. Egard’s Posaune was discussed by the two clerics, for after this
meeting, Clüver declared his intention to write a tract directed against the book.62
58
Berndt Hamm, ‘Johann Arndts Wortverständnis. Ein Beitrag zu den Anfängen des Pietismus,’
Pietismus und Neuzeit 8 (1982): 43–73 at 73.
59
Cf. Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 120, who states that Egard was never attacked on
account of his convictions.
60
Reprinted in Engelbrecht, Christlicher Wunderreicher Bind-Brieff, sig. K5v: ‘Was sonst anlanget
meine Posaune/ die ich zur Erweckung der Welt an das Licht gegeben/ so mercke ich/ daß dieselbe
von Vielen übel außgelegt wird/ wie ihr ohne Zweiffel wisset/ und mir es von vielen wird übel
außgelegt/ als sagte ich von einer neuen Lehre/ welches mir nicht in den Sinn kommen/ sondern
zeuge daß das Licht/ welches itzt ist/ werde herrlicher und grösser werden/ und sonderlich was
durch S. Johann Arenten ist angefangen/ werde herrlicher werden.’
61
Jacob Fabricius, Jacob Fabricius den Yngres Optegnelser 1617–1644. Anders Andersen, ed.
(Copenhagen: Danske Boghandleres Kommissionsanstalt, 1964), 239, 244, 250, 260, 263, 267,
282, 284; On Fabricius see Moller, Cimbria Literata, vol. 1, 165; Anders Andersen, ‘Fabricius,
Jacob d.J.,’ in Schleswig-Holsteinisches Biographisches Lexikon (Neumünster: Wachholtz Verlag,
1971), vol. 2, 135–6.
62
Fabricius, Optegnelser, 239: ‘M. Clüverus dixerat Rostochii, er wolte schreiben wieder Egardi
Tractatum von offenbarung der göttlichen Majestat’ (16 September 1624). On Clüver see
Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie, vol. 4, 352–353; Moller, Cimbria Literata, vol. 1, 103; Erik
Pontoppidan, Annales ecclesiæ Danicæ diplomatici, Oder nach Ordnung der Jahre abgefassete
und mit Urkunden belegte Kirchen-Historie Deß Reichs Dännemarck. 4 vols. (Copenhagen: Andr.
Möllers Witwe, 1741–52), vol. 3, 807.
The Reception of Posaune 165
Clüver’s decision was apparently prompted by an earlier exchange with Egard

himself. Sometime in 1624, after acquiring a copy of Posaune and recognizing the
thread of chiliastic error that ran through it, Clüver wrote to Egard concerning the
‘vanity’ of his interpretations, and admonished him to correct his stance. Egard,
however, refused to recant his position, and maintained that time would see his pre-
dictions fufilled.63 Following this exchange, Clüver began work on a thorough refu-
tation of Egard’s apocalyptic expectations, in order to force Egard to relinquish his
‘obscure’ revelations. The controversy expanded. Shortly after Clüver’s declaration,
Fabricius acquired a copy of Egard’s book, and, after reading through it carefully,
concluded that it was a mess of ‘hypocritical doctrines.’ ‘Truly I say,’ wrote Fabricius
in his diary, ‘that either the devil possessed him and dictated these things to him, or
he is a very learned hypocrite.’64 Fabricius also passed the book on to other col-
leagues, and its content was hotly debated among clerics in Gottorf, Rostock and
beyond.
The waking controversy over Posaune was intensified by suspicions—hardly
deniable, as we have seen—that Egard had been fraternizing with visionaries and
critics of Lutheranism, including the likes of Morsius, Werdenhagen, Engelbrecht,
and in particular with members of the circle that surrounded Nicolaus Teting. All of
these figures were, at one time or another, accused of Weigelianism or similar
charges. On 4 September 1624, only days after Clüver had announced his intention
to write against the Posaune, Egard revealed in a letter to the Husum pastor Peter
Danckwerth that he had indeed spent time in Teting’s company, although the two
men had discussed only their mutual admiration for Arndt’s works on practical
Christianity.65 Egard’s advocacy of Hans Engelbrecht’s visions also gave Fabricius
pause, for Engelbrecht himself stayed in Husum in August and September of 1624,
where he was hosted by members of Teting’s circle.66 For a ‘devout and exemplary’
pastor, Egard was not only expressing some strange opinions, but was also keeping
some strange company.
By early November 1623, numerous figures in northern Germany agreed that
Egard’s Posaune communicated several grave theological errors.67 Fabricius’s diary
indicates that the dissenters in Husum had read Egard’s work, although Engelbrecht
63
Johann Clüver, Diluculum Apocalypticum seu commentarius in B. Apostoli et Evangelistae
Johannis Apocalypsin. Michael Clüver, ed. (Lübeck and Stralsund: Schernwebel & Meder, 1646–
1647), 101: ‘Scripsi ad ipsum Autorem [sc. Egard] anno 1624, deque hujus expositionis vanitate
multis argumentis admonui: Sed perstitit ille in suavi suo somnio, meque rogavit, ut quod minus
mihi placeret, omitterem. Sibi enim integrum esse perinde atque aliis, suam de obscurâ hac pro-
phetiâ sententiam publici juris facere. Sed tempus ipsam propheticam sat maturè redarguit, quan-
tum quidem cordatiores judicant. Interim ne autor sibi & aliis de novo hoc regno imponere pergat,
paucula haec subjicere volui.’
64
Fabricius, Optegnelser, 263–4: ‘Perlegi scriptum Egardi super Apoc. 20. Nescivi prostare. Vere
dico aut Diabolum illum occupasse ipsique hæc dictasse, aut doctissimum hypocritam’ (26
September, 1624).
65
66
Fabricius, Optegnelser, 243–253.
67
Fabricius, Optegnelser, 282, 284.
claimed that he ‘did not understand’ it.68 More disturbingly, the book was causing
something of a sensation at the ducal court in Gottorf, where Fabricius resided. In
November, copies were being passed around by figures like Johann Winter and
Heinrich Gladovius, and the text was even brought to the attention of the marshall
of court, Dionysius von Podewils (1590–1647), who apparently read it with relish.
A refutation of some type would have appeared to be necessary, not only in light
of the interest provoked by Egard’s tract, but also on account of the recent dogmatic
condemnation of chiliasmus subtilis by Johann Gerhard. Although Clüver’s prom-
ised volume never appeared in print in the form announced, the Rostock theologian
Paul Tarnow was happy to step into the breach.69 In 1624, Tarnow delivered a fiery
oration against Egard and other supporters of Arndt’s works, a group that he desig-
nated—in distinction to, but in company with, the new prophets—as ‘new
evangelists.’70 Although Tarnow did not specifically mention Posaune, Egard’s tract
probably inspired his screed concerning the preoccupations of these ‘new evange-
lists’ with ‘unusual opinions’ about the Last Judgment. Such teachings, Tarnow
proclaimed, opened a Pandora’s Box of errors that led the Lutheran faithful away
from God. According to Tarnow, the fundament of Lutheran religion was the ability
to approach God with a compliant heart, something which the ‘new evangelists’
hindered: ‘The result of this is that their teachings are also to be considered a reason
for God’s fury and all the present unhappiness upon us.’71
No other contemporary cleric, it seems, was prepared to condemn Egard as a
chiliast. Even Clüver’s promised condemnation of the Posaune, when it eventually
appeared in print in his posthumously-published Diluculum Apocalypticum (1646–
47), was weak in its judgments. Despite containing several pages of discussion of
various errors and misconceptions put forward by a certain ‘P.E. Holsatus,’ which
was of course Egard, the condemnation it issued was not particularly severe.72 By
1646 Egard and his claims were no longer current. His prophesied Millennium had
already ‘occurred’ between 1625 and 1629, and the passage of time itself meant that
the work hardly required refutation. As such, except for Clüver and Tarnow, Egard’s
optimistic apocalypticism generally escaped scrutiny in print.73 Egard was men-
tioned briefly in a tract by Georg Rost’s concerning Johann Arndt’s works, where
Rost linked Arndt and Egard’s ideas to those of Weigel, Felgenhauer and Nagel.74
However, the issue of Egard’s alleged chiliastic heresy was otherwise obscured by
the chaotic shuffle of opinions concerning new prophets, political disaster, raging
war and the orthodoxy of Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum. His case, then, stands in
remarkable contrast to that of Hermann Rahtmann barely three years previously.
68
Fabricius, Optegnelser, 250.
69
Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzerhistorie, vol. 2, 476 describes Egard’s dispute with Tarnow.
70
I have used the later edition by Heinrich Ammersbach; Tarnow, Pandora Tarnoviana, sig. A1r.
71
Tarnow, Pandora Tarnoviana, sig. B4r.
72
Clüver, Diluculum Apocalypticum, 101–107.
73
Cf. Feddersen, Kirchengeschichte Schleswig-Holsteins, 296. Moller, Cimbria Literata, vol.1,
153 contains details of later theologians who discussed Egard’s works.
74
Rost, Amica ac fraterna Admonitio Super Controversiis De Vero Dn. Joannis Arndten, 234–235.
Egard’s Apocalypticism After 1623 167
Egard’s Apocalypticism After 1623
Despite the critical reactions of fellow clerics, Egard was reluctant to abandon his
optimistic expectations. In a letter of 22 August 1624, Egard still believed that the
‘light’ of his prophesied Gnadenzeit was growing greater and more magnificent.75
However, by 1625, he seems to have had something of a change of heart. This is
demonstrated by Geheimnuß des Reichs Gottes (1625), an Arndtian tract authored
by Egard that defended the idea of an indwelling kingdom of God, without making
reference to his previously postulated Millennium. In this new book Egard concen-
trated not on the question of when the godly Kingdom—perhaps now standing in for
the previously-postulated Gnadenzeit—would dawn, but instead, on the question of
how.76 Egard made clear that although the seeds of the indwelling kingdom were
planted in temporal reality (in die Zeit) by the Holy Spirit working through the
Gospels and scripture, the consequences of personal grace and transcendence, that
is to say the kingdom of God itself, flowered in eternity.77
Egard’s failure to mention Posaune in this work is not necesarily evidence that he
had abandoned his apocalyptic expectations. He may well have believed that the
prophesied Gnadenzeit had already commenced. In Geheimnuß des Reichs Gottes,
Egard cited Romans 4:18 to demonstrate that hope begets hope: ‘Who against hope
believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that
which was spoken, so shall thy seed be.’ Hope was, as part of Egard’s pastoral and
devotional program, exactly what Lutheran readers needed during a time of war,
inflation, famine and unrest. The issue of theologians like Tarnow, Osiander and
other opponents of Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum, Egard argued, was not whether
the ‘new evangelists’ were actually heretics, Rosicrucians, chiliasts, Weigelians,
Schwärmer or whatever other title they were forced to bear. Rather, the issue was
that they were not Osiandrists or ‘Tarnowians’; that is to say, they did not share the
exact same picture of Lutheranism as those clerics.78
Egard’s sermon-collection Praxis Fidei Salvificae (1627) indicates that his move
away from the apocalyptic prophetic spirit of Posaune in his Geheimnuß was indeed
more rhetorical than substantial. In the preface to this work, Egard included a list of
his earlier German-language books in which he ‘demonstrated and planted in the
human heart’ doctrines of the grace of God and the power of the Holy Spirit.
Notably, Egard’s Posaune was missing from this list. This is noteworthy given that
Egard previously viewed Posaune as the cornerstone of his entire devotional pro-
75
Engelbrecht, Christlicher Wunderreicher Bind-Brieff, sig. K5v.
76
Paul Egard, Geheimniß des Reichs Gottes im Menschen. Das ist/ Die edle/ süsse und hochtröstli-
che Lehre/ von dem Reich Gottes/ was es sey/ wie es komme/ wo es zu finden sey/ wie es erfunden/
erkandt und geschmücket werde (Lüneburg: Stern, 1625), 13.
77
Egard, Geheimniß des Reichs Gottes im Menschen, 3.
78
Paul Egard, Ehrenrettung Johannis Arndten/ Das ist/ Christliche und in Gottes Wort wolgegrün-
dete Erinnerung/ was von D. Lucae Osiandri, Theologiae Professoris zu Tübingen Urtheil und
Censur, über Johan Arndten wahres Christenthumb/ sey zu halten (Lüneburg: Stern, 1624), 24.
gram.79 While the omission of the work could mean that Egard had abandoned his
expectations, the intellectual continuities between Posaune and his sermons sug-
gests, on the contrary, that Egard believed that his apocalyptic hopes were actually
being realised. An example of continuity between the two tracts is provided by the
idea of inspiration from the Holy Spirit. In his Praxis Egard maintained the possibil-
ity that God had the power to send ‘true teachers,’ who would in turn ‘enlighten and
refresh humankind … through the medium of … the Word of God,’ although he
emphasized that it was through the office of the pastor that the Holy Spirit was most
effectual.80 This echoed sentiments in Posaune. More striking, however, was Egard’s
position concerning the Millennium. In his end of year sermons, which in the litur-
gical calendar traditionally focus upon the Last Judgment, Egard confirmed that the
Gnadenzeit had commenced, precisely as he predicted. In a prayer printed in Praxis,
he asked God to
give me the power to truly take note of the current Gnadenzeit, and through your great
benevolence, patience and forebearance lead me to do penance. And because the Lord Jesus
Christ shall shortly appear in the clouds of the heavens, and come like a thief in the night,
so by means of your spirit rule in me, that I may live and be converse in blessed being, who
awaits and desires your future return from the heavens, so that I may spend eternity in the
new heaven and new earth.81
This passage anounces the transition of his expectations from the apocalyptic to the
broadly eschatological. In other words, by 1627 Egard continued to believe that
there was to be a brief spiritual respite before the Judgment Day, even though he no
longer promoted his controversial Posaune as a herald to this age, and discussed the
matter in terms more palatable to doctrinal Lutheranism.
The evidence from several of Egard’s letters and printed works thus suggests
that, despite the controversy over Posaune, the pastor never abandoned his optimis-
tic apocalyptic expectations. What Egard had shed, however, was the historicist
apocalyptic framework for expressing these hopes. In its place, Egard confined him-
self to an Arndtian conception of an eternal inner Kingdom of God, whose existence
would be emphasized in a Gnadenzeit to be experienced by Lutherans
everywhere.82
79
Paul Egard, Praxis Fidei Salvificae, Das ist: Ubung des Seligmachenden Glaubens/ un[d]
Ernewrung des innern Menschen/ durch die Früchte des Geistes/ nach den Sontages Episteln.
(Lüneburg: Stern, 1627), sig. )o(7r.
80
Egard, Praxis Fidei Salvificae, 660.
81
Egard, Praxis Fidei Salvificae, 902: “Gib daß ich gegenwertige Gnadenzeit recht in acht nehme/
und durch deine grosse Güte/ Gedult und Langmuth mich lasse zur Busse führen. Und weil den
HERR Jesu Christe/ bald wilt in den Wolcken des Himmels erscheinen/ und kommen wie ein Dieb
in der Nacht/ so regiere mich durch deinen Geist/ daß ich im heiligen Wandel unnd gottseligem
Wesen/ dein stets aus dem Himmel warte und nach deiner Zukunfft ein Verlangen habe/ auff daß
ich in dem newen Himel und Erden […] ewiglich möge seyn.’
82
Egard, Geheimniß des Reichs Gottes im Menschen, 13, 16; cf. Egard, Praxis Fidei Salvificae,
900, 902.
Conclusion 169
Conclusion
Although Hermann Rahtmann was accused of encouraging chiliastic heresy, and

Nicolaus Hartprecht was seduced by the apocalyptic visions of an antinomian mes-
siah, Paul Egard was the first Lutheran cleric to attempt to create a Lutheran devo-
tional program based on optimistic apocalyptic expectations, and to defend this
belief as an article of faith. His inspiration for so doing derived from his zeal to
formulate a pastoral and devotional philosophy for his congregation, as well as
readers throughout the Holy Roman Empire, which could provide comfort and sol-
ace under what were incredibly difficult circumstances. His method was to equate
the Millennium of Revelation 20—which Lutherans typically interpreted as being
realized historically—with a Gnadenzeit or time of grace that would dawn in the
course of 1625. The respite provided by this period would be brief, but glorious.
The content of Posaune suggests that Egard’s apocalyptic scenario stemmed
from his reading of Nicolai, Arndt, and perhaps also his familiarity with texts like
the Rosicrucian manifestos. Perhaps his contact with the likes of Morsius,
Werdenhagen, Engelbrecht and Teting also played a role. In Posaune, the pastor
attempted to tether optimistic expectations—as well as the inspiration of the Holy
Spirit—to the offices of the Lutheran faith. Apocalyptic expectations were for Egard
useful as a devotional tool, and a spur to the practices of true Christianity. Egard’s
unanticipated Millennium as articulated in Posaune and other works provides
further evidence that the boundaries of Lutheran confessional culture, at least so far
as the heresy of chiliasm was concerned, were porous.
Chapter 7
Failed Prophecies
The Golden Age did not dawn in 1623. The Turk and the Pope did not fall in 1624.
King Friedrich V of the Palatinate was not restored to the Bohemian throne in 1625.
The New Jerusalem did not descend to the hills of Prague. A Gnadenzeit did not
reign between 1625 and 1629. The world was not united as one flock under one
shepherd in 1626. The much longed-for felicitous future never eventuated. Indeed,
the depredations occasioned by a war that rapidly expanded to engulf many parts of
the Holy Roman Empire in the course of the 1620s ensured that Europe was mired
in misery for almost two more decades. Time proved that all of these prophecies for
a future felicity were false. The optimistic apocalyptic vision foundered, and along
with it the entire edifice of Lutheran apocalypticism.
The social and psychological effect of failed prophecy on groups and individuals
has long been of interest to social psychologists, anthropologists and, of course,
historians—particularly historians of religion—who are frequently tasked with
understanding the complex aftermath of failed prophecy. The classic formulation of
the problem was conceived by Leon Festinger (1919–1989), Henry W. Riecken
(1917–2012), and Stanley Schachter (1922–1997), in their classic work When
Prophecy Fails (1956): ‘Suppose an individual believes something with his whole
heart; suppose further that he has a commitment to this belief, that he has taken
irrevocable actions because of it; finally, suppose that he is presented with evidence,
unequivocal and undeniable evidence, that his belief is wrong: what will happen?’1
This influential book documented the reactions of members of a 1950s UFO cult to
a failed messianic prophecy. Yet where the researchers expected the failure of the
prophecy to result in widespread disaffection from the cult and its expectations, the
opposite was the case:
1
Leon Festinger, Henry W. Riecken & Stanley Schachter, When Prophecy Fails. A Social and
Psychological Studyof a Modern Group that Predicted the Destruction of the World. 2nd ed.
(London: Pinter and Martin, 2008), 3.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_7
172 7 Failed Prophecies
The individual will frequently emerge [from the failure of the prophecy], not only unshaken,
but even more convinced of the truth of his beliefs than ever before. Indeed, he may even
show a new fervor about convincing and converting other people to his view.2
Festinger and his co-authors argued that the reason for this unexpected reaction was
cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance arises when the ‘beliefs, values, or opin-
ions individuals hold (that is, their cognitions) come into conflict with their experience
of reality.’3 In terms of failed prophecy, the fact that ‘the predicted events did not occur
is dissonant with continuing to believe both the prediction and the remainder of the
ideology of which the prediction was the central item. The failure of the prediction is
also dissonant with all the actions that the believer took in preparation for its fulfillment.’4
One of the core assumptions of Festinger’s theory is that the prediction and the
‘remainder of the ideology’ that went into supporting it comprises the ‘central item’
of the ideology of the prophet. However, if prophecy is understood as a social phe-
nomenon, then the prediction must be considered as an expression of, and congruent
with, intellectual, social and religious considerations embedded in a broader cultural
context. While this culture, in the case of a new religious movement, might be brittle,
the same assumption need not be made of confessional Protestantism in early moder-
nity.5 In the context of Lutheran confessional culture, we have seen that the postula-
tion of optimistic expectations took place within the context of a deepening quest for
insight into the Last Days. Optimistic expectations were one possible expression of
the Lutheran interest in this quest, which occupied the mainstream of believers.
Second, Festinger’s theory posits that the cognitive dissonance created by failed
prophecy leads not only to a renewed dedication to the truth of the prophecy on the
part of an individual—for the dissolution of dissonance by admitting failure would
be more painful than maintaining the prophetic ideology—but also that, following
the failure, the prophet will seek to convert others to his cause by proselytizing. This
hypothesis is only partially vindicated by an examination of prophets of optimistic
apocalypticism who emerged from within Lutheran confessional culture. Indeed, as
we shall see, Lutheran culture as a whole undertook a surprising change in direction
concerning apocalyptic expectations following the widespread disappointment of
prophecies for the mid 1620s.
2
Festinger et al., When Prophecy Fails, 3.
3
Jon R. Stone, ‘Introduction,’ in Expecting Armageddon. Essential Readings in Failed Prophecy
(London: Routledge, 2000), 4. For other perspectives on the subject of cognitive dissonance and
prophecy, see Leon Festinger, A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance (Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 1957); Leon Festinger and James M. Carlsmith, ‘Cognitive Consequences of Forced
Compliance,’ Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 58 (1959): 203–210; Robert P. Carroll:
When Prophecy Failed: Cognitive Dissonance in the Prophetic Traditions of the Old Testament.
(New York: Seabury Press, 1978); E. Harmon-Jones and J. Mills, Cognitive Dissonance. Progress
on a Pivotal Theory in Social Psychology (Washington, DC: American Psychological Association,
1999); Diana G. Tumminia, When Prophecy Never Fails. Myth and Reality in a Flying-Saucer
Group (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005).
4
Festinger et al., When Prophecy Fails, 4.
5
On the social dynamics of prophecy in early modernity, see Green, Printing and Prophecy.
Failed Prophecy, Failed Prophets 173
The present chapter has two major aims. The first is to provide an account of the
reactions of Lutherans to the failure of their optimistic expectations to come to fruition.
The second is to sketch out a history of optimistic apocalyptic and eschatological
expectations in Lutheranism in the decades before Pietism. This period represents the
exit of Lutheran confessional culture from what Richard Landes has described as the
‘temporal hothouse’ of apocalyptic expectation.6 This was a period in which, in the
words of John R. Hall, the apocalyptic mindset—collective and individual—transitions
back to a ‘social temporality’ consisting of a ‘collective synchronic time’ in which the
irruption of apocalyptic excesses are briefly quelled.7 The negotiation of the cognitive
dissonances created by failed prophecy would have enduring consequences both for the
character of Lutheran eschatology, as well as Protestant culture more broadly.
Failed Prophecy, Failed Prophets
Lutheran critics dealt with the disappointment of their expectations in several ways.
Some disappeared from public view altogether. We hear, for example, little or noth-
ing from the likes of Philipp Ziegler, Wilhelm Eo Neuheuser, or Johann Kärcher
after around 1626. While there could be any number of reasons for their silence—
including imprisonment or death—it is also possible that the general disappoint-
ment not just of their own dreams, but those of all prophets who fastened their hopes
to a transformation of the world between 1623 and 1630, might have played some
role in their withdrawal from public discourse. Whether they continued to maintain
their hopes, or abandoned them, is unknown.
Not all critics shied away from disappointment. Convinced of the rectitude of
their beliefs, they threw themselves into new or different apocalyptic scenarios. In a
prior chapter we saw how the pastor Nicolaus Hartprecht, after the failure of his
predictions in Tuba temporis (1620), engaged in a messianic reverie concerning the
miraculous pregnancy of Countess Erdmute Juliane as a salve for the disappoint-
ment of his expectations.8 After his predictions of a glorious restoration of Friedrich
V to the Bohemian throne in the year 1623 failed to come to fruition, Paul
Felgenhauer realigned his hopes and focussed on anticipating a ‘year of Jubilation’
to occur across 1625 and 1626. It was only after Felgenhauer heeded the words of
the Braunschweig lay prophet Hans Engelbrecht to abstain from his ‘criminal arro-
gance’ that he finally abandoned his prophetic expectations altogether, admitting his
errors in a manuscript tract titled Speculum Pœnitentiæ (1625).9 Emphasising the
connection between optimistic apocalypticism and devotional literature, Felgenhauer
thereafter retreated to a spiritual Christianity, a hybrid of Reformed, spiritualist and
Lutheran doctrines focussed on practical Christianity. He largely abandoned histori-
6
Landes, Heaven on Earth, 15.
7
Hall, Apocalypse: From Antiquity to the Empire of Modernity, 9–17.
8
See above at pp. 150–155.
9
See in greater detail Penman, ‘A Prophet Confronts his Failures.’
cist apocalypticism in favour of a contemplative eschatology. In Torgau, Paul Nagel

too equivocated the initial failure of his hopes by subtly revising his expectations.
Nagel stoically faced his calumniators and opponents who revelled in his failed
prediction that a Golden Age of the spirit would dawn in 1624. In his Prognosticon
Astrologicon Auffs Jahr 1625, authored late in that same year, Nagel insisted that his
predictions would still be fulfilled. ‘Do you believe,’ Nagel there complained, ‘that
nothing shall come of my prophecy if it is not fulfilled in 1624? […] Spare me your
barbs and insults, for as I write, the year 1624 has not yet come to an end: and who
knows what today or tomorrow might bring?’10 Later in the same pamphlet, Nagel
intimated that the predictions which did not see fruition in 1624 would surely do so
in years subsequent; ‘because what is not fulfilled in 1624 shall occur in 1625.
Should there still be something wanting that shall be fulfilled in 1626 and so on until
1627 or 1628, etc.’11 This was a scenario that Nagel had already defended in a
Prognosticon for the year 1622 and pseudonymously in his Trigonus Igneus (1623),
in which work he predicted that the aftermath of the great conjunction of Jupiter and
Saturn may not be fully realized until as late as 1630.12 As we have already seen,
Nagel ultimately died at the end of 1624, all of his prophecies unfulfilled.
Other prophets attempted to soften the blow of disappointment in the middle
years of the 1620s by rallying expectations for further dates without giving up their
own convictions. An example is provided in the anonymously-authored Leo–Saucius
Redivivus (1625), a work prophesying the restitution of Friedrich V to the Bohemian
throne. The first half of this fascinating 24 page quarto pamphlet is dedicated to
articulating several prophecies about the delivery of the Bohemian kingdom from
Habsburg hegemony, in which the author argues that 1627 would witness the descent
of the New Jerusalem to earth, and the first steps toward the creation of a single
religion throughout the world.13 The second half of the work, however, concerned
the vexing question of whether the year 1624 should have brought with it the New
Jerusalem and the Golden Age, as many others had prophesied. This section began
with reference to the ‘many good people’ who had bravely predicted such an even-
tuality, but the author argues that although these authors had rightly expected a
coming Golden Age, the prophets had failed on account of being ‘too bold in the
10
Nagel, Prognosticon Auffs Jahr 1625, sig. C2v: ‘[M]eint ihr dann/es werde aus der Weissagung
nichts werden/wenn sie im 1624. Jahre nicht zum ende lauffe? […] [W]er weiß/was heute oder
morgen kömpt/spotte unnd lästere nur nicht/denn das 1624. Jahr is noch nicht foruber/als ich die-
ses schreibt.’
11
Nagel, Prognosticon Auffs Jahr 1625, sig. C3r: ‘Denn was in 1624. jahre nicht gentzlich erfüllet
wird/das wird sich erwiesen im 1625. Jahre. Solte auch in diesem noch etwas dahinden bleiben/das
wird erfüllet werden 1626. unnd so fort biß 27. oder 28. &c.‘
12
Nagel cited in Sührig, ‘Die Entwicklung der nidersächsischen Kalender,’ 466; [Nagel], Trigonus
Igneus, passim; Nagel, Prognosticon Auffs Jahr 1625, sig. C2v.
13
Leo-Saucius Redivivus, Das ist: Zwar sehr verwundeter/aber doch wider ernewerter Löwe:
Darinn Nicht allein die Clage unnd der Fall/wie auch die Ernewerung des Löwens aus einer
Uhralten Figur genommen/tractiret; Sondern auch diese Frage ventiliret unnd gehandelt wird: Ob
das New Jerusalem oder die güldene Zeit/wie sie genennet wird/Anno 1624. hat kommen sollen
oder nicht? (No Place: No Printer, 1625), sig. B3r. Possibly this vision was influenced by the
‘Hussite Box’ prophecy, or the works of Felgenhauer.
specificity of their predictions’ (wegen ihrer sehr grossen Künheit in prædicendo

specialia).14 On the basis of several astrological and astronomical arguments, the
author of Leo-Saucius redivivus argued that a Golden Age and a ‘total peace’
(vollkommener Friede) would dawn in 1626.15 In other words, there was nothing
wrong with the expectation of a future felicity, the fault of earlier prophets had been
in their prophetic methodologies. Nevertheless, the predictions of our anonymous
author would also fail to come to fruition.
As far as defenders of Lutheran doctrine were concerned, there was perhaps less
gloating than one might expect when the many prophecies failed to come to fruition.
Georg Rost naturally assumed that the prophecies for 1623 and the years following
would come to naught.16 And while it was undoubtedly pleasurable—and perhaps
something of a relief—to see that time had demonstrated the rectitude of his own
expectations, there was little point harping on the disappointment of these prophe-
cies. In the first place, the disappointed predictions were not the only or even the
gravest of the errors contained in heretical chiliastic literature. In the second place,
there was still a large quantity of optimistic apocalyptic material available in print
and manuscript throughout the Empire, against which the populace had to be warned.
Still, as Fig. 1 (see p. xxiii) indicates, the failure of prophecies for the mid-1620s had
an undeniable impact on the production of optimistic apocalyptic literature. As
Hermann Rahtmann had suggested in 1621—in a sentence that contributed directly
to accusations that he secretly supported chiliastic heresy—time had proven the most
effective stop to expectations of a felicitous future; or at least their open expression.
Yet although every hope and anticipation for the period between 1623 and 1630
came to nought, the Lutheran engagement with ideas of a felicitous future, and the
problematic nature of chiliasm for the confession, did not stop at this date. Optimistic
apocalyptic literature was still sold by booksellers and possessed by scribal publish-
ers. Expectations continued to be discussed within conventicles and epistolary net-
works. Many authors and prophets were still active. Epistolary networks which
linked like-minded persons had been maintained, and indeed, with the dispersal of
central European populations across Europe as a result of the Thirty Years’ War,
new centres of contact and activity were created in places like Amsterdam and the
United Provinces.17
14
Leo-Saucius Redivivus, sig. B3v.
15
Leo-Saucius Redivivus, sig. B4r.
16
Georg Rost, Theologische Weissagung Von der zwiefachen KirchenReformation, der gegenwerti-
gen und zukünfftigen: In zwey unterschiedene Theil kürtzlich abgetheilet; Im ersten Theil wird
gehandelt von der vorstehenden Reformation, und von allerley anmuthigen und nützlichen Fragen/
Ob Christus Anno 1625. sichtbarlicher weise wird wieder kommen/wie Nagelius mit seinem
Anhang treumet? (Rostock: Hallervord, 1625).
17
A starting point for this research is E.G.E. van der Wall, De mystieke Chiliast Petrus Serrarius
(1600–1669) en zijn Wereld. PhD dissertation, University of Leiden, 1989. On the significance of
Amsterdam and the United Provinces as a new centre for German printing before 1650 see
Bruckner, A Bibliographical Catalogue; Bruckner, ‘Addenda zu Barockbibliographien: Johann
Jakob Fabricius,’ Wolfenbütteler Barock-Nachrichten XI/2 (1984): 84–87; Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘A
Heterodox Printing Enterprise of the Thirty Years’ War: The Amsterdam Office of Hans Fabel
(1616-after 1650),’ The Library, Seventh Series, 15/1 (2014): 3–44.
After 1630 optimistic apocalyptic expectations attached themselves to different

causes, and found new expressions. With a kind of prophetic thriftiness, for exam-
ple, some failed predictions were dusted-off and employed afresh. Thus some
prophets who had witnessed the failure of the original Lion of Midnight, Friedrich
V, to return to the Bohemian throne, looked triumphantly to a new savior of German
Protestantism, Gustavus Adolphus, as the Swedish army invaded the Empire and
entered the Thirty Years’ War in July 1630. Adolphus himself might have played on
his role as a prophetic messianic saviour in his propaganda, although there has been
considerable debate among scholars as to whether or not these prophecies influ-
enced Adolphus’s decision to enter the conflict.18
Events in the natural world were also reassessed. In 1631 some prophecies con-
cerning the comet of 1618 were reprinted under the name of the sixteenth-century
visionary Paul Grebner, who was identified on the title page of one such publication
as a pastor (Pfarrherr), perhaps an attempt by the publisher to bolster the credibility
of the prophecies to a Lutheran audience.19 The prophecies of the Sprottau tanner
and lay-prophet Christoph Kotter concerning Bohemia, which had been circulating
in manuscript since the early 1620s, were printed in 1632 in an expanded German
edition.20 Also printed was a collection of more than 120 prophecies, both from
ancient as well as more recent authorities, which appeared in at least five editions in
the same year.21 Still, there can be little doubt that the failure of earlier prophecies,
18
For a bibliography and analysis of such works, see Gilly, ‘Der ‘Löwe von Mitternacht’; Johan
Nordström, ‘Lejonet från Norden,’ in Nordstrom, De Yverbornes Ö. (Stockholm: Bonniers, 1934),
9–54; Helmut Zschoch, ‘Größe und Grenzen des “Löwen von Mitternacht.” Das Bild Gustav
Adolfs in der populären protestantischen Publizistik als Beispiel religiöser Situationswarnehmung
im Dreißigjährigen Krieg,’ Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 91 (1994): 25–50. On Swedish
propaganda during this period, see Silvia Serena Tschopp, Heilsgeschichtliche Deutungsmuster in
der Publizistik des Dreißigjährigen Krieges. Pro- und antischwedische Propaganda in Deutschland
1628 bis 1635 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang 1991).
19
Paul Grebner, Prognosticon oder Erklärung: Über den Anno 1618 erschienen Comet Stern, und
dessen Operation. (No Place: No Printer, 1631). As Gilly, ‘Las novas de 1572 y 1604 en los mani-
fiestos rosacruces,’ has pointed out, Grebner was not a pastor, but rather a schoolteacher.
20
Christoph Kotter, Zwey wunder Tractätlein/Deren das Erste begreiffet Englische Erscheinungen
und Reden Christoph Köttern/Weißgerbern zur Sprotta in der Schlesien/einem frommen/einfältigen
Mann/zum öfftern in unterschiedlichen Gesichten widerfahren. Sonderlichen Das sechste Gericht/
so in der Welt gehalten werden soll/den Succeß/Fortgang/und glückliche Verrichtungen deren vor
diesem gebundenen/jetzo auffgelöseten Löwen von Mitternacht und Mittag/ihre Sieg und
Uberwindung wider den König vom Abgrund/die Babylonische Hur/und falsch geistliches
Jerusalem/wie auch die merckliche Veränderungen der Regimenten in der Christenheit/wie das-
selbig zum theil erfüllet/zum theil in nechsten Tagen/zu künfftiger Erfüllung vor Augen stehet/
betreffend. (No Place: No Printer, 1632); Hubková, ‘Görlitz, Comenius, und der Prophet aus
Sprottau,’ 45–53.
21
Deß Mitternächtigen Post-Reuters Adeliches und Untadeliches dreyfaches Paszport: Darinnen
seine bißher unterschiedliche abgelegte Frewdenposten Mit mehr als hundert und zwantzig … fast
Weltkündigen Göttlichen Weissagungen unnd Wunder-Zeichen. (Magdeburg: No Printer, 1632);
Frewdenposten, mit mehr als 130 … Weissagungen und Wunderzeichen außführlich beglaubet und
bestärcket werden. (Erstlich gedruckt in der erlösten Magdeburg, [1632]).
especially those concerning a Golden Age to dawn following the great conjunction
of 1623, left many devotees of optimistic apocalyptic expectations feeling reluctant
to espouse them publically.
As Robin Bruce Barnes was perhaps the first to point out, the most prominent
change which took place within Lutheran confessional culture in reaction to the
failed prophecies was the replacement of specific expectations of radical spiritual or
worldly transformation with less revolutionary and more sustainable spiritual
expectations.22 This marked a transition from apocalyptic expectations rooted in
history and chronology to more diffuse eschatological and even soteriological antic-
ipations. Visions of harmony typically no longer waited for Christ or God to inter-
vene directly in human history. Instead, a more contemplative eschatology
emphasised that salvation and delivery from the pains of this world would occur in
the spirit and the heart of the true Christian.
To be sure, this transition is not merely attributable to the failure of optimistic
apocalyptic expectations. It was also encouraged by the devotional turn in
Lutheranism engendered by Johann Arndt, Philipp Nicolai, Stephen Praetorius and
other authors of Erbauungsliteratur. We have seen that the works of Hermann
Rahtmann and Paul Egard meshed optimistic expectations with ideas of an eternal,
indwelling Kingdom of God in the heart of the believer. In the hands of later
Lutheran critics this notion was elaborated into a spiritualist faith in opposition to
the Mauerkirchen, culminating in a radical rejection of worldly things. Thus, after
his death in November 1624, it was Jacob Böhme’s contemplative and theosophical
works that were prized foremost by his followers, and the distinctly optimistic-
apocalyptic turn which followed his 1621 vision of a coming general Reformation
and aureum seculum were largely forgotten. As Tünde Beatrix Karnitscher has
shown in her study of the life of Johann Theodor von Tschesch (1595–1649), this
spiritualist turn replaced convictions of an imminent delivery from the sorrows of
this world with expectations of individual renewal through Christian practices like
prayer, meditation, and penance. The renovation of society had been to some extent
supplanted by the renovation of self.23
Perhaps the best example of the recession of apocalypticism following the pro-
phetic disappointments of the 1620s is the career of Paul Felgenhauer, one of the
few new prophets to be active after 1630. Under the influence of Arndt and Böhme,
Felgenhauer substituted his prior apocalyptic and chronological expectations with a
wide-reaching theosophy with its own theological dimensions. In essence,
Felgenhauer elaborated a systematic understanding of the workings of the universe
and the place and role of divinity in relation to the human condition.24 Although
optimistic apocalyptic convictions remained present in his philosophy of history,
22
23
Tünde Beatrix Karnitscher, Der vergessene Spiritualist Johann Theodor von Tschesch.
Untersuchungen und Spurensicherung zu Leben und Werk eines religiösen Nonkonformisten
(Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015).
24
Concerning Felgenhauer’s mature apocalyptic expectations see Wolters, ‘Paul Felgenhauers
Leben und Wirken,’ Jahrbuch für niedersächsische Kirchengeschichte 55 (1957): 54–93.
the general retreat from prophecy, chronology, and specific prediction paved the
way for the establishment of an eschatology of religious practice.
Similar transitions are detectable in more orthodox spheres of Lutheran confes-
sional culture. After 1630, Lutheran clerics—like many prophets—began to retreat
from chronological conjectures and their associated expectations in favour of spiri-
tualised eschatological speculations. As Barnes has shown, the significance of the
Last Judgment, which since Luther had formed the backbone of confessional iden-
tity, was gradually deemphasized.25 In its place was sown an individualistic escha-
tology. An example is provided by the work of the Erfurt theologian and pedagogue
Johann Matthäus Meyfart (1590–1642). As Erich Trunz (1905–2001) has convinc-
ingly argued, Meyfart recognised that the Lutheran sponsorship of investigation into
the Last Days, especially chronological speculation, was partially responsible for
what he considered the corruption of the faith by heretical chiliastic ideas.26 The
polemic employed by guardians of orthodoxy to combat the error had only gener-
ated confusion, ‘and provided the opportunity for even greater errors to be con-
ceived’ among the populace.27 In reaction, Meyfart tried to tame, instead of castigate,
the apocalyptic imagination. He therefore adopted an Arndtian approach to the
expectation of the End, and emphasized the devotional lessons to be learnt from
contemplation of the Last Judgment.28 Here historicist apocalyptic gave way to a
more contemplative, spiritual and sustainable understanding of the eschaton, as well
as its potential devotional applications. As Hartmut Lehmann has shown, Meyfart
manipulated the logic of optimistic apocalyptic expectations and remodeled them to
serve Lutheran spirituality through eschatology, an approach not dissimilar to that
of Egard.29
But while orthodox Lutheranism experienced a contemplative turn that gradually
marginalised apocalyptic expectations from the mainstream of the faith, there
remained plenty of room for alternative visions of a felicitous future on earth that
remained firmly tied to history. Among the most infamous Lutheran critics of the
seventeenth century was the Württemberg lay prophet Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil.30
25
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 228–260.
26
On Meyfart see Hartmut Lehmann, ‘Die Deutung der Endzeitzeichen in Johann Matthäus
Meyfarts Buch vom Jüngsten Gericht,’ Pietismus und Neuzeit 14 (1988):13–24; Erich Trunz,
Johann Matthäus Meyfart, Theologe und Schriftsteller in der Zeit des Dreißigjährigen Krieges
(Munich: Beck, 1987); Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 255–257.
27
Johann Matthäus Meyfart, Christliche Erinnerungen (1635) as cited in Schleiff, Selbstkritik der
lutherischen Kirchen, 20.
28
29
Korn, Das Thema des Jüngsten Tages, passim and Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 249, 265 exam-
ine the fading of Lutheran apocalyptic expectations in the course of the seventeenth century.
30
On Gifftheil see Ernst Eylenstein, ‘Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil,’ 1–62; Friedrich Fritz, ‘Friedrich
Gifftheil,’ Blätter für württembergische Kirchengeschichte 44 (1940): 90–105; Theodor Wotschke,
‘Zwei Schwärmer am Niederrhein,’ Monatshefte für Rheinische Kirchengeschichte 27 (1933):
144–178; Horst Weigelt, ‘Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil und die Schwenckfelder in Schlesien. Ein
Beitrag zur Geschichte des mystischen Spiritualismus in 17. Jahrhundert,’ in Traditio-Krisis-
Renovatio aus Theologischer Sicht. Bernd Jaspert, ed. (Marburg: Elert 1976), 273–283. A new
A prophet who became aware of his mission and identity in the course of the Thirty
Years’ War, Gifftheil’s polarising effect on contemporaries matched the challenging
nature of his own expectations. Namely, although he drew on the philosophies of
Johann Arndt, ideas of the imitation of Christ, and the Theologia Deutsch, Gifftheil
believed that peace, whether it be spiritual or worldly, could only be achieved in the
Empire by means of the sword and active military action. As Friedrich Kolb has
revealed, Gifftheil was awoken to his prophetic mission in the early 1620s, after he
accused Lutheran authorities in Württemberg of driving his brother Abraham (d.
1624) to suicide over what he considered to be frivolous charges.31 From 1628
Gifftheil printed a series of pamphlets, many arranged as centos—that is to say,
extracts from scripture joined to form a continuous narrative—that emphasized the
need for penance, but also where necessary the destruction of worldly religious and
political institutions, as a means of initiating God’s kingdom on earth. The church,
Gifftheil contended, was an institution incapable of providing comfort to the masses
because it used the faithful themselves as articles of comfort, as ‘cushions and
furniture.’32 It had to be destroyed so that peace could reign, and the true Christian
should thus not hesitate to take up the sword in order to achieve this goal (cf. Luke
22:36). On at least two occasions Gifftheil attacked and threatened to kill pastors
during their sermons for ‘not teaching God’s word.’ The second of these potential
victims was Lucas Osiander d.J., whom we have met in his capacity as an opponent
of optimistic apocalypticism in the early 1620s.33 Gifftheil often spent his days
preaching in the streets, and observers remarked on his unusual appearance, evi-
dently calculated to reinforce his prophetic credentials. In 1633, when he appeared
in the vicinity of Darmstadt, he was described as ‘a very tall, very strong man with
a long, thick, brown-black beard, long hair, a grey cloak with black girdles, carrying
a staff in his hand.’34 The majority of Gifftheil’s time appears to have been occupied
by petitioning European rulers, in a variety of languages, to abandon militarism and
adopt a pacifistic route to the coming Zion.35 Gifftheil hoped that a peaceful Godly
study of Gifftheil, which takes advantage of the material concerning him which can be found in
numerous archives throughout Europe, remains a desideratum.
31
Friedrich Kolb, ‘Abraham und Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil,’ Blätter für württembergische
Kirchengeschichte N.F. 4 (1900): 75–82.
32
Cited in Friedrich Fritz, ‘Konventikel in Württemberg von der Reformationszeit bis zum Edikt
von 1743,’ Blätter für württembergische Kirchengeschichte 49 (1949): 99–154 at 135.
33
Tübingen, Universitätsarchiv, Cod. M.h. 541. Letter of Osiander, 25 July 1636 to Melchior
Nicolai (1578–1659) and Johann Ulrich Pregitzer (1577–1646). On Gifftheil’s confrontation of the
preacher Zacharias Klenner in Schweinhaus (Świny) in 1626, see Horst Weigelt, ‘Ludwig Friedrich
Gifftheil und die Schwenckfelder in Schlesien. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des mystischen
Spiritualismus in 17. Jahrhundert,’ in Traditio-Krisis-Renovatio aus Theologischer Sicht. Bernd
Jaspert, ed. (Marburg: Elwert, 1976), 273–283.
34
Wilhelm Müller, ‘Ein Prophet im Amte Lichtenberg,’ Hessische Chronik 5 (1916): 34–41 at 37:
‘Dieser Man[n] ist ein zimblich lange starke Person mit einem langen, breyten, schwartsbraunen
Bart, langen Haren, ein grau tüchen Kleyd mit schwarts Schnüren ausgemacht und tregt ein Stab
in Handen.’ On the significance of the appearance, behaviour and performance of lay prophets see
further Beyer, Lay Prophets in Lutheran Europe, 100–132.
35
A testament to this activity is a volume of more than six-hundred leaves preserved in Dresden,
Landeshauptstaatsarchiv Sachsen, Geheimer Rat 10,024 Loc. 10,026/26: ‘Das vermeintlichen
kingdom, a precursor of the New Jerusalem, would be created by a unified Christian

faith on earth before the Last Judgment. Shortly before his death in Amsterdam in
1661, Gifftheil was seen by at least one continental author as a progenitor of the
Fifth Monarchist movement in England.36
Gifftheil’s teachings, popularized in more than one hundred extant pamphlets,
broadsheets and other printed documents, were collected and passed around by
other Lutheran critics, who shared his ideas of the necessity of activism in the Last
Days. One of his admirers was the Austrian Johann Permeier.37 As the careful work
of Noémi Viskolcz and Richard van Dülmen (1937–2004) has established, Permeier
was the spiritus rector of an epistolary society called the Societas Regalis Christi.
Founded in 1636, it brought together numerous contacts in an epistolary network of
like-minded critics of contemporary religion in Europe. This group appears to have
been inspired, in large part, by the works of Johann Valentin Andreae. In addition to
collecting the writings of prophets like Neuheuser, Felgenhauer and Gifftheil, texts
by Pantel Trapp, Johann Bannier, Lorenz Grammendorf (ca. 1575–1649) were of
interest to the group. While Viskolcz emphasises that most participants self-
identified as Lutherans, their expectations were inspired by the meliorism of
Calvinist clerics such as Johann Piscator (1546–1625), and by the expectations of a
future literal Millennium expressed by Johann Heinrich Alsted and Joseph Mede
(1586–1639).38 Permeier himself declared that although the expectation of a literal
Millennium was extraneous to true Christian belief, he nevertheless thought that
meditation upon the promise of the coming kingdom of God could assist in deci-
phering the signs of the times.39 These expectations were accompanied by a melding
of devotional writing with apocalyptic expectations in the common strivings of the
group. As Viskolcz and Theodor Wotschke (1871–1939) have shown in detail, one
of the major goals of the Societas was the publication of an edition of Johann Arndt’s
Propheten David Schriften und Sachen’ which contains a medley of communications, letters and
tracts from Gifftheil between 1639 and 1655. Other accumulations of documents concerning
Gifftheil can be found in the same archive under Geheimer Rat 10024 Loc. 10027/6, which were
gathered for Gifftheil’s trial in Dresden in 1639, as well as in Braunschweig, Stadtarchiv, BIII
15:14 and Wesel, Archiv der evangelischen Kirchengemeinde, Gefach 59,4.
36
Johann Berkendahl, Neue Schwarmgeister-Brut/Oder/Historische Erzehlung Von den Quakern.
([Amsterdam?]: No Printer, 1661), 91–2.
37
On Permeier see Viskolcz, Reformációs Könyvek; Richard van Dülmen, ‘Prophetie und Politik.
Johann Permeier und die ‘Societas regalis Jesu Christi’ (1631–1643),’ Zeitschrift für bayerische
Landesgeschichte, 71 (1978): 417–73; Bálint Keserű, ‘In den Fußstapfen der Rosenkreuzer. Johann
Permeiers Tätigkeit und Vorhaben im Karpatenbecken,’ in Gilly and Niewöhner eds., Rosenkreuz
als europäisches Phänomen, 287–306; Theodor Wotschke, ‘Johann Permeier. Der Primarius der
christköniglichen Triumphgesellschaft,’ Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 56 (1937): 565–597.
38
Viskolcz, Reformációs Könyvek, 64–75, 100, 103, 109, 209, 213, 251.
39
Halle, Bibliothek der Franckeschen Stiftungen, B17a III2b, cited in Viskolcz, Reformációs
Könyvek, 96: ‘Die Opinion vom 1000. Jährigen Seculo ist für keinen zur Seeligkeit nöthigen
Glaubens articul consituirt oder obtrudiert: doch weil Sie den claren Zeugnußen in Gottes Wort
oder Heiligen Schrifft zum Grund/ist sie so fern nicht zuuerwerfen/die weil viel anderer ding daran
hoffen/vnd diser Zeit verwirrte Beschaffenheit desto gewißer dadurch kan geprüfet werden.’
Postilla, a project in which they ultimately succeeded, and which appeared in print
in a magnificent folio edition shortly after Permeier’s death.40
Another supporter of Gifftheil, and a figure similar in some ways to Permeier,
was the Anglo-Prussian intelligencer Samuel Hartlib (ca. 1600–1662). As the son of
a Silesian merchant and an English mother, Hartlib was raised in a Lutheran house-
hold in Elbing, Prussia (Elbląg).41 During his youth, Hartlib was exposed to many
of the intellectual tensions inherent in Lutheran confessional culture, including
strains of apocalypticism. In the early 1610s he attended the Lutheran Latin School
in Brieg (Brzeg), where he was a classmate of Abraham von Franckenberg (1593–
1652), later an influential author of Christian kabbalistic writings and a follower of
Jacob Böhme. He thereafter studied abroad at universities in Königsberg and
Cambridge. Hartlib briefly returned to Elbing before deciding to permanently emi-
grate on account of unrest in the region. Operating as an “intelligencer,” or provider
of information, in London after 1628, Hartlib frequently indicated his dedication to
initiating a ‘general reformation’ in collaboration with numerous contacts, notably
the Scots minister John Dury (ca. 1600–1680), who sought to create an ‘impartial
Christianity’ on the basis of theological fundamentals, and the Moravian pedagogue
Jan Amos Comenius, who strived to achieve Panorthosia (universal reform) and
unite all knowledge.42
While Hartlib’s reforming optimism has usually been linked to Baconian, Puritan
and Comenian pansophic backgrounds—to say nothing of Reformed meliorism
more generally—it is also worth emphasizing its Lutheran contexts.43 While in
England, Hartlib collected and read works of Felgenhauer and Gifftheil, the latter of
whom visited Hartlib’s home on several occasions. During the 1640s, Hartlib also
supported the Amsterdam-based publishing enterprise of Hans Fabel who between
1646 and 1650 operated a printing house dedicated to the production of spiritualist,
alchemical and optimistic apocalyptic literature by the likes of Böhme, Franckenberg,
Gifftheil, Tschesch, Felgenhauer, and others.44 Hartlib, too, corresponded with
Permeier in support of the latter’s efforts to evangelize Arndt’s Postilla in England.45
40
Viskolcz, Reformációs Könyvek, 269–322; Theodor Wotschke, ‘Die Frankfurter Folioausgabe
der Arndteschen Postille und der österreichische Protestantismus,’ Jahrbuch der Gesellschaft für
die Geschichte des Protestantismus in Österreich, 55 (1934): 65–8.
41
Theodor Wotschke, ‘Der Posener Kirchenpfleger Georg Hartlieb,’ Historische Monatsblätter für
die Provinz Posen 11/1 (1910): 1–5. The best biographical accounts of Hartlib remain G.H. Turnbull,
Samuel Hartlib: A Sketch of his Life and his Relations to J.A. Comenius (London: Oxford
University Press, 1920); and Turnbull, Hartlib, Dury and Comenius: Gleanings from Hartlib’s
Papers (London and Liverpool: University of Liverpool Press, 1947).
42
Pierre-Olivier Léchot, Un christianisme “sans partialité” Irénisme et méthode chez John Dury
(v.1600–1680). (Paris: Champion 2011).
43
Chloë Houston, The Renaissance Utopia: Dialogue, Travel and the Ideal Society (Farnham:
Ashgate, 2014), 119–127.
44
Penman, ‘Hans Fabel,’ 3–44.
45
See Hartlib’s letters to Permeier (3/13 February 1643 and 24 February 1643) in [Johann
Permeier], Abtruck Unterschiedlicher Sendschreiben und Extraect, dadurch inbegriffnen der
Augspurgerischen Confession zugethanen Königreichen, Chur- unnd Fürstenthumben, sampt
As is well known, during the 1620s and 1630s, Hartlib supported an actual utopian
project, called Antilia, based on a reforming agenda established and underwritten by
Lutherans.46 That Hartlib owed debts to the Lutheran apocalyptic tradition is per-
haps best demonstrated in his dedicatory epistle to Clavis Apocalyptica (1651)—a
work which Martin Mulsow has argued was written by Michael Gühler of Brieg
(1598–1655)—in which Hartlib reiterated his belief, in the mode of Johann Valentin
Andreae, that his projects for ‘Advancement of Universal Learning and the Publick
Good’ would occasion ‘the advancement of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ […] which
shall come out of Sion by a Gospel-Reformation of this Age and Common-wealth.’47
Indeed, Hartlib hoped that the book would inspire the ‘building up of the walls of
Jerusalem in the mindes of Believers’ in order that the Temple of Heaven could
‘com[e] down from the New Heaven upon the New Earth.’48 Although Mordechai
Feingold has challenged the extent to which we can accept this statement as evi-
dence of Hartlib’s convictions, its consonance with the rest of Hartlib’s work, and
with widely-held Lutheran expectations, is striking.49 Precisely as in the example of
Andreae, Rahtmann, or even Egard, the exterior apocalyptic change prophesied by
Gühler had to be, in Hartlib’s estimation, preceded by an interior spiritual reform.
One may thus remark how Hartlib’s ideas of a ‘general reformation,’ which grew
from melioristic Lutheran and Reformed sources could mesh with Puritan ideas of
‘perfection.’ Recently, Paul Slack has argued convincingly that the concept of
‘perfection’ was an English invention of the seventeenth century.50 Hartlib’s inter-
changable use of terms like ‘reformation’ and ‘perfection’ throughout his oeuvre to
designate his apocalyptic projects might be understood as an indication of his eclec-
tic influences.
andern Ständen, Stätten und deren Ministerien im Christnahmigen Europa, wie ins gemein die
geziemende Wegsbereitung zu allerseits weiterer Außbreitung der Ewig-Evangelischen Reichs
Warheit Gottes unnd seines Christi … also auch in specie die Mit-Propagirung seines zu Eingang
dieses seculi … in Teutschland erweckten hochwerthen Vorzeugens … Herrn Johann Arndts …
hinterlaßner … geistreichen Pietet-Schrifften, nach Christschuldiger Lieb unnd Gesuch der
Heyligen allgemeinen Christlichen Kirchen Wolfahrt … insinuirt und recommendiret worden; Auß
… Franckfurt am Mayn/In den Jahren Christi/1642. und 1643 (Frankfurt am Main: No Printer,
1643), 67–71. I thank Noémi Viskolcz for bringing this source to my attention.
46
Donald R. Dickson, The Tessera of Antilia. Utopian Brotherhoods and Secret Societies in the
Early Seventeenth Century. (Leiden: Brill 1998).
47
Samuel Hartlib, ‘[Dedicatory Epistle],’ in [Michael Gühler], Clavis Apocalyptica or a
Propheticall Key written by a German D. and now Translated out of High-Dutch. (London: No
Printer, 1650), sigs. ∗2v-∗3r.
48
Samuel Hartlib, ‘[Dedicatory Epistle],’ sigs. ∗3v-∗4r.
49
Feingold, ‘And Knowledge shall be Increased,’ 381–382 suggests Hartlib never ‘yearned for an
imminent millennium’ and contests the significance of his dedicatory epistle to Gühler’s book.
50
See Paul Slack, From Reformation to Improvement. Public Welfare in Early Modern England.
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998); Penman, ‘Between Utopia and New Jerusalem,’
470–491.
The cases of Hartlib, Felgenhauer, Gifftheil, Permeier and their numerous cor-
respondents demonstrate that optimistic apocalyptic hopes could never be entirely
eradicated from Lutheran confessional culture. Apocalypticism was too valuable
and too attractive a proposition to lay fallow in times of hardship, war, and unrest.
In addition to the Gifftheils of the world, throughout the middle decades of the sev-
enteenth century the occasional wild-eyed prophet continued to appear, tramping
into villages and towns and declaring the imminent dawn of a new Golden Age. In
response, Lutheran theologians continued to publish tracts which documented these
cases and condemned chiliastic heresy, albeit more moderately and occasionally
than in the 1620s.51
But if apocalypticism remained attractive to lay Lutherans, it also remained so
for some clerics. While, as far as I am aware, no further Lutheran clerics advocated
an optimistic eschatological view of history before the end of the Thirty Years’ War,
this would change in the 1650s and early 1660s. One of these clerics was Georg
Lorenz Seidenbecher (1623–1666), pastor in Unterneubrunn, Thuringia, who
appears to have been the first church member after 1630 to attract an accusation of
harboring chiliastic heresy.52 He was expelled from his position on 25 November
1661. Like Egard and Rahtmann, Seidenbecher was a staunch supporter of Arndt’s
doctrines, and was convinced of the inherent devotional benefits of meliorist apoca-
lyptic expectations. Influenced by the doctrines of the Dutch apocalypticist Petrus
Serrarius (ca. 1600–1669), in 1660 Seidenbecher printed a pseudonymous work,
Chiliasmus Sanctus, which was issued in Amsterdam.53 Numbering more than 500
pages in duodecimo, this tract was dedicated to an exhaustive explication of
Revelation 20. Seidenbecher believed that the Millennium prophesied therein would
be one in which the power of the Holy Spirit revealed the essence of truth to the
world. After reviewing the diversity of opinion concerning the commencement of
the Millennium proposed by authorities like Luther, Wolther, Affelmann, Cramer
and other Lutheran clerics, Seidenbecher insisted that these conflicting interpreta-
tions meant that the thousand years of peace prophesied in Revelation 20 could not
possibly have been fulfilled historically. As such, it was yet to come. In his final
tracts, Seidenbecher heaped praise upon the Rosicrucian manifestos and the frater-
nity’s plans for a general reformation. As Wallmann has pointed out, a major source
51
Nicolaus Baring, Trewhertzige Warnung an alle fromme Christen gegen den newen Propheten.
(Hannover: Glaser, 1646); Johann Heinrich Ursin, Richtiges Zeigerhändlein Oder Christliche/in
H. Schrifft und den fürnembsten newesten Außlegern wolgegründte Einleitung in das göttliche
Buch der heimlichen Offenbahrung S. Johannis: Darinnen sonderlich das erdichtete tausendjäh-
rige Friedensreich auff Erden/gründlich widerleget. (Frankfurt: Hermsdorff, 1654).
52
See Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 136–7; vol. 4, 1151–1176; Wallmann, ‘Reich
Gotes und Chiliasmus,’ 118–122. The best account of Seidenbecher is that provided by Zuber,
‘Spiritual Alchemy,’ 252–282.
53
[Georg Lorenz Seidenbecher] Waremundus Freyburger, Chiliasmus Sanctus, qui est Sabbatismus
populo Dei relictus. Das ist Schrifftmäßige Erörterung der Frage: Was von den Tausend Jahren in
der Offenbahrung Johannis Cap. 20 und von denen so genandten Chiliasten heutigs Tages zu
halten sey. (Amsterdam: No Printer, 1660). On Seidenbecher and Serrarius see Wall, ‘De mystieke
chiliast Petrus Serrarius,’ 257–8, 303–4, 310–14; Zuber, ‘Spiritual Alchemy,’ 309–311.
for Seidenbecher’s opinions were the writings of Calvinists, particularly Alsted and
Piscator.54 Once more, with Seidenbecher, the search for insights into the Last Days
had occasioned a Lutheran to unite eclectic apocalyptic sources.
Another cleric who anticipated a future felicity was Friedrich Breckling (1629–
1711).55 As Mike A. Zuber has shown, Breckling’s expectations owed a significant
debt to Seidenbecher.56 The son of a Lutheran pastor, Breckling received an exten-
sive education throughout the Holy Roman Empire. He later made the acquaintance
of many dissenting spiritualists, and occupied himself with alchemy and Hermetic
philosophy, as well as reading Tauler, Weigel, Arndt, Gifftheil, Böhme, and the
medieval mystics. In 1659 he served as an assistant pastor in Handewitt in Schleswig,
but was forced from his position shortly thereafter on account of the controversy
created by some of his anti-authoritarian remarks. He then became pastor in Zwolle
in the United Provinces. Dissatisfied with contemporary Lutheranism, Breckling
eventually came into contact with Gifftheil: an encounter which likely intensified
his optimistic apocalyptic convictions.57 When Lutheran authorities became unable
to accommodate his increasingly bizarre speculations, Breckling was ejected from
his pastorate.58 Thereafter he authored numerous tracts which argued for an Arndtian
reform of the faith, a vision influenced by Paul Nagel, Johann Permeier and other
‘witnesses of truth,’ both historical and contemporary.59
A friend and contemporary of Breckling was the Halberstadt pastor Heinrich
Ammersbach (d. 1691).60 In 1665, Ammersbach issued anonymously two pamphlets
concerning the ‘secrets of the last days,’ in which he advocated the idea of a forth-
coming felicitous future.61 The first of these, Geheimnuß der letzten Zeiten, engaged
54
55
Friedrich Breckling, Autobiographie. Ein frühneuzeitliches Ego-Dokument im Spannungsfeld
von Spiritualismus, radikalen Pietismus und Theosophie. Johann Anselm Steiger, ed. (Tübingen:
Niemeyer, 2005); Friedrich Breckling, ‘Catalogus testium veritatis post Lutherum continuatis huc
usque.’ [n.d., 1690s?] in Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 4, 1103–1104. Further Arnold,
Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 148–150. Guido Naschert and Brigitte Klosterberg, eds.
Friedrich Breckling (1629–1711): Prediger, Wahrheitszeuge und Vermittler des Pietismus im nie-
derländischen Exil. Eine Ausstellung zu seinem 300. Todestag. Bearbeitet von Mirjam-Juliane
Pohl. (Halle: Verlag der Franckeschen Stiftungen, 2011).
56
Zuber, ‘Spiritual Alchemy,’ 306–311.
57
Breckling, ‘Catalogus testium veritatis’, 1103.
58
Naschert, et al., Friedrich Breckling, 155–156 (Zeittafel).
59
Guido Naschert, ‘“Zur Rettung derer bißher unter dem Nahmen des Vnkrauts unschuldig verfol-
geten Kinder Gottes”: Friedrich Brecklings Rettungen von “Wahrheitszeugen” im Kontext von
Toleranzdiskurs und Ketzergeschichte,’ in Verteidigung als Angriff. Apologie und “Vindicatio” als
Möglichkeiten der Positionierung im gelehrten Diskurs. Michael Multhammer, ed. (Berlin: De
Gruyter, 2015), 95–120.
60
On Ammersbach see Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 4, 142–144; Wallmann, ‘Reich
Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 121–123.
61
[Heinrich Ammersbach], Geheimnuß der letzten Zeiten. Betreffend die Sprüche H. Schrifft Joel
3. Apoc. 20. Zach 14. und vieler anderen mehr … (No Place: No Printer, 1665); [Heinrich
Ammersbach], Betrachtung der gegenwärtigen unf künfftigen Zeiten… (No Place: No Printer,
1665).
extensively with the arguments in Egard’s Posaune, while the second largely con-
sisted of an apologia for the expectations of Seidenbecher and Breckling.62 Indeed,
Ammersbach also edited and published several of Breckling’s works.63 His other
inspirations included Aegidus Guttmann’s Offenbarung göttlicher Mayestat.64 Other
Lutheran churchmen accused of chiliastic heresy during the later seventeenth cen-
tury include Ludwig Brunnquell (d. 1680) in 1658 and again in 1671,65 Joachim
Betke (1601–1663) during the 1660s,66 and Jacob Taube of Isselburg near Cleve in
1668.67 In the 1670s, following the debate concerning the orthodoxy of the expecta-
tions of Johann Melchior Stenger (1638–1710), the Braunschweig cleric Johann
Schindler (1613–1682) argued that, while the heresy of chiliasmus crassus must
indeed be condemned as a grave theological error, chiliasmus subtilis was a teaching
containing nothing apparently contrary to Lutheran doctrine.68 Schindler himself
anticipated an imminent conversion of the Jews.69
This survey suggests that optimistic apocalyptic expectations once again occu-
pied Lutherans from the 1650s. In contrast to the expressions of the early century,
62
Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,‘121–123.
63
Breckling, ‘Catalogus testium veritatis,’ 1104.
64
Colberg, Platonisch-Hermetische Christenthum, vol. 1, 239–240.
65
Brecht, ‘Die deutschen Spiritualisten des 17. Jahrhunderts,’ 221; Breckling, ‘Catalogus testium
veritatis,’ 1092.
66
Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 127–128.
67
Jacob Taube, Confessio Christiana. Das ist: Christlich Glaubens-bekäntnüß eines Einfältigen
unparteyischen Christen und Lehrers Jacobi Tauben, von Isselburg im Hertzogthumb Cleve: Als
eine Apologie, entgegen gesetzt den unmenschlichen Lügen und Verleumbdungen der
Falschgenandten Lutherischen Prediger zu Amsterdam/zu Lübeck/im Lande Cleve/West-Frießland/
und ihrer Adhaerenten in anderen Secten/Ständen und Städten … Sampt einer Relation der wun-
derlichen Proceduren, so vorgemeldte Prediger mit ihren Consistorialibus, wieder mich getrieben
(No Place: No Printer, [1668]). See further Schleiff, Selbstkritik der lutherischen Kirchen, 126,
134, 143–144, 160; Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3, 145; Colberg, Das Platonisch-
Hermetische Christenthum, vol. 1, 246–7, 250.
68
Johann Schindler, Tractatus De Regno Chiliastico, Das ist: Von dem erdichteten tausendjähri-
gem Reich Christi auff dieser Erden: Was der alten und neuen Chiliasten Irrthumb sey/und wie
solche Opinion jemehr aus dem XX. Cap. der Offenbahrung S. Johannis könne widerlegt werden/
als daß jemand sich unterstehen dörffe/daheraus sie zu beweisen; Nebenst einem kurtzen Bericht
De futuro Ecclesiae Christianae statu, Was Gott uns in seinem heiligen Wort offenbahret hat/das
künfftig annoch mit der Christlichen Kirchen sich werde zutragen biß an den Jüngsten Tag
(Braunschweig: Zilliger, 1670); Johann Schindler, Geistliche Hall-Posaune/Wormit den Jüden das
grosse Erlaß-Jahr und Jubel-Fest angekündigt wird/Oder De illustri Judaeorum Conversione sub
finem mundi: Daß in den letzten Tagen … eine grosse … Bekehrung der Jüden obhanden/und mit
sonderbahrer Freude der Christenheit geschehen werde (Braunschweig: Zilliger, 1674). Udo
Sträter, ‘Philipp Jakob Spener und der Stengersche Streit,’ Pietismus und Neuzeit 18 (1992):
40–79; Johannes Wallmann, ‘Pietismus und Chiliasmus. Zur Kontroverse um Philipp Jakob
Speners ‘Hoffnung besserer Zeiten,’ in Theologie und Frömmigkeit im Zeitalter des Barock
(Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1995), 405–406.
69
Johann Schindler, Geistliche Hall-Posaune/Wormit den Jüden das grosse Erlaß-Jahr und Jubel-
Fest angekündigt wird/Oder De illustri Judaeorum Conversione sub finem mundi: Daß in den
letzten Tagen … eine grosse … Bekehrung der Jüden obhanden/und mit sonderbahrer Freude der
Christenheit geschehen werde (Braunschweig: Zilliger, 1674).
however, this time the vanguard of advocates consisted largely of clerics. This sense
of optimism would come to a head in the mid 1670s, when optimistic apocalyp-
tic expectations were voiced by a young theologian from Rappoltsweiler
(Ribeauvillé) named Philipp Jakob Spener.70 More than any of his forebears, Spener
succeeded in connecting the devotional benefits of a coming felicity with Lutheran
apocalyptic doctrine, through his expectations of ‘cooperative orthodox optimism’
and his teaching of a ‘hope for better times’ (Hoffnung besserer Zeiten). Spener’s
Pia desideria (1675) combined a programmatic critique of Lutheran doctrine with
a vision of the church existing in a ‘holier state than at present.’71 Heike Krauter-
Dierolf has argued convincingly that Spener not only anticipated widespread reform
of the church and a growth in practices of personal piety before the Last Judgment,
but also the conversion of the Jews.72 These hopes, he maintained, did not contradict
article seventeen of the Augsburg Confession, which in his opinion contained no
injunction against the expectation of a felicitous future.73 Whereas the Augsburg
Confession was only an occasional touchstone in the early seventeenth-century
debates on chiliastic heresy, by the 1670s, it had become one of the central foci for
argument.74 Needless to say, Spener’s ideas proved controversial. For he did not
simply criticize the practices of the church, but also sketched practical programs to
improve them. Among these Spener saw the collegia pietatis, the communal study
and discussion groups which comprised the backbone of the Pietist movement, as
the most likely loci for reform in anticipation of ‘better times.’75
While Pietism remained an embattled culture within Lutheranism, coexisting
uneasily with strict orthodox doctrines of the faith for several decades, the success
of Spener’s advocacy of the idea of a period of future felicity for the church may be
judged by the fact that, as the eighteenth century began, several clerics began to
produce much more precise definitions of chiliastic error that respected and incor-
porated Pietistic expectations.76 Among them was Christoph Starck (1684–1744)
who insisted that optimistic expectations must envision a literal thousand-year
70
The literature on Spener is extensive. See as a starting point the classic study by Johannes
Wallmann, Philipp Jakob Spener und die Anfänge des Pietismus. 2nd ed. (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr
(Siebeck), 1986). On Spener’s apocalyptic expectations see Krauter-Dierolf, Die Eschatologie
Philipp Jakob Speners; Krauter-Dierolf, ‘Die Hoffnung künftiger besserer Zeiten.’
71
Philipp Jakob Spener, Pia Desideria: Oder Hertzliches Verlangen/Nach Gottgefälliger Besserung
der wahren Evangelischen Kirchen: sampt einigen dahin einfältig abzweckenden Christlichen
Vorschlägen (Frankfurt: Zunner, 1676), 77.
72
Spener, Pia Desideria, 77: Krauter-Dierolf, Die Eschatologie Philipp Jakob Speners, 10–12,
35–39 etc.
73
Krauter-Dierolf, Die Eschatologie Philipp Jakob Speners, 90, 92, 94–95, 115–120 etc.
74
The changing status of the Augsburg Confession as an authority in the adjudication of dogmatic
arguments is traced by Johannes Wallmann, ‘Die Rolle der Bekenntnisschriften im älteren
Luthertum,’ in idem., Theologie und Frömmigkeit im Zeitalter des Barock, 46–60.
75
Baxter, ‘From Cooperative Orthodox Optimism to Passive Chiliasm: The Effects of the Evolution
in Spener’s Zukunftshoffnung on his Expectations, Ideas, Methods and Efforts in Church Renewal.’
Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Northwestern University, 1993, 188.
76
See the studies collected in Breul and Schnurr, Geschichtsbewusstsein und Zukunftserwartung.
Millennium in order to constitute a heresy. By the early eighteenth century, under

the influence of Starck and others, the Lutheran definition of chiliastic heresy—
which had expanded rapidly in the 1610s and the 1620s—had finally begun to
contract.77
Christopher Starck, Synopsis Bibliotecae Exegeticae in Novum Testamentum. 3 vols. Leipzig:

77
Breitkopf, 1746, vol. 3, 1844–5.

Chapter 8
Conclusions
When early modern Lutherans encountered optimistic apocalyptic expectations,

they understood them as an acceptable hope, or a damnable heresy. The historian
sees things differently. Optimistic apocalyptic expectations were present throughout
Lutheran confessional culture of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Expectations of a felicitous future—and arguments against them—were expressed
by clerics and lay persons. These expectations had circulated on the margins of the
faith since the second half of the sixteenth century, growing in prominence and vis-
ibility as the Lutheran quest for identifying and interpreting the signs of the Last
Times deepened. The roots of these expectations could be found in traditions of
scriptural interpretation, such as the Refreshment of the Saints, in Joachite proph-
ecy, and among the works of sixteenth-century religious reformers like Paracelsus,
Sebastian Franck, Guillaume Postel, and others. For some Lutherans, these expecta-
tions were considered a manifestation of the ancient heresy of the chiliasts, which
seemed to contravene the idea of an imminent Last Judgment. But for others the
idea of a felicitous future provided a hope, a comfort, and a solace that could not be
found elsewhere within the confessional culture.
The problem was that between 1570 and 1630 the criteria for what constituted
chiliastic heresy were in flux. As such, it was unclear precisely which apocalyptic
beliefs were acceptable, and which were not. The expectations of the ancient chiliasts
were of no concern within early-Reformation Lutheranism. The seventeenth article of
the Augsburg Confession (1530) did not mention the heresy, but condemned the
worldly expectations of contemporary sects like the Anabaptists and Judaising
Christians. Yet from the mid 1570s on, clerics like Jakob Andreae, Ägidius Hunnius
and Johann Wolther began to associate the apocalyptic expectations of contemporaries
with the vocabulary of the ancient heresy. After 1614, in which year Daniel Cramer
identified a ‘new and subtle chiliastic opinion’ that did not anticipate a literal
Millennium before the Last Judgment, the floodgates were thrown open. The subse-
quent works of Andreas Libavius, Johann Affelmann and Johann Gerhard created a
category of heresy that condemned an oxymoronic nov-antiqua expectation called
chiliasmus subtilis, which outlawed any expectation of a worldly period of future felic-

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2_8
190 8 Conclusions
ity, no matter how brief, and regardless of its inspiration. Yet contradictory definitions
soon flowed from the pens of others, such as Georg Rost in Lübz. By the early 1620s
the boundaries of the heresy had become so elastic that the word chiliasmus could be
wielded like a cudgel, and applied to virtually any belief perceived to be antithetical to
Lutheran authority. In the contemporaneous polemical contestation of the doctrines of
new prophets, Weigelians, Rosicrucians, Photinians, Stiefelians, and others, it was
sometimes reduced to a synonym for some or all of those other heresies.
The doctrinal elaboration of chiliasmus crassus and chiliasmus subtilis was
intended to quell what some defenders of the faith saw as excesses in apocalyptic
speculation. But the cacophony of voices and of definitions led to confusion rather
than clarity. If contradictory definitions existed, how was any member of Lutheran
confessional culture, lay or clerical, to know if their expectations were heretical? As
this study has demonstrated, they could not. By 1622 the theological faculty of the
University of Wittenberg, while adjudicating the accusations made against Hermann
Rahtmann, recommended that disputation over the question of chiliasm should be
brought to a halt: if doctrinalists disagreed on the specifics of the error, then there was
no way that a definitive statement could be made on the subject. While the Wittenberg
theologians identified the ‘simple folk’ as the primary beneficiaries of such a policy,
it is clear that confusion existed at every level of Lutheran confessional culture con-
cerning what constituted chiliastic heresy. And when the arbiters of heresy themselves
cannot decide on the constituent elements of the offence, every accusation is unjust.
As Robin Barnes indicated in his landmark study Prophecy and Gnosis, the
debates concerning chiliasm were manifestations of a broader contestation of
authority. Stephen O’Leary has furthermore shown that, along with time and evil,
authority represents the third major topos of apocalyptic rhetoric.1 Chiliastic heresy
could be linked by clerics in a tight nexus with other heresies not because it con-
formed with others in terms of its basic teachings, but rather because all posed a
perceived threat to social order and the authority of the Lutheran church. In the
words of John Hall, these ‘heresies’ were representative of a ‘cultural disjuncture’
that manifested itself as a contestation over the legitimacy of insight into the Last
Days.2 The claim of many new prophets to have been taught in a School of the Holy
Spirit contravened the doctrine of sola scriptura which defined the Lutheran faith.
The widespread condemnation of knowledge as incomplete, or in need of
Reformation before the Last Judgment voiced in many scenarios of future felicity
smacked of presumptuousness theological as well as epistemological. This
perception was deepened by the fact that many prophets sought to identify the pre-
cise date of the coming apocalyptic drama, which was knowledge reserved for God
alone (Revelation 16:15, Matthew 24:43, 1 Thessalonians 5:2, 1 Thessalonians 5:4,
2 Peter 3:10). The anti-clerical thread which ran through many of the expectations
of optimistic apocalypticists, sometimes expressed as polemic against the incomplete
wisdom of the Mauerkirchen, was accepted as a further affront by defenders of
Lutheran doctrine. But Lutheranism felt itself under threat not only from heretics.
Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis, 228–260, 240, 318 n. 29; O’Leary, Arguing the Apocalypse, 20–60.
1
Hall, Apocalypse: From Antiquity to the Empire of Modernity, 2, 4, passim.

2
8 Conclusions 191
Pressure was also felt from the rapid spread of Calvinism into once Lutheran terri-
tories, as well as the Catholic Counter-Reformation.
Ultimately, the pressing need for Lutherans to resolve the problem of chiliastic
heresy was cut short by time itself. After the disappointment of the numerous pre-
dictions for a great reformation or Golden Age to follow 1623, discourse on opti-
mistic apocalypticism rapidly diminished. Expectations were recast by orthodox
and critical parties alike. These reformulations tended to focus more on visions and
scenarios of a hope or felicity that were sustainable over the longer term—for exam-
ple visions of hope to be experienced in an interiorised kingdom of God in the heart
or the soul—and were not tied to historical reckonings. Such expectations were no
longer truly apocalyptic, but eschatological in character. This flight into a spiritual-
ised eschatology would prove only temporary, for the intellectual and theological
tensions expressed in the debates on chiliasm were never resolved, but merely chan-
neled elsewhere. In the final three decades of the seventeenth century, this lack of
resolution would come back to haunt the confession. Namely, in the wake of his
postulation of Hoffnung besserer Zeiten in the 1670s and the widespread and bitter
controversy it provoked, the Pietist Philipp Jakob Spener would argue, with some
justification, that most optimistic apocalyptic beliefs had never been authoritatively
condemned within Lutheran confessional culture, and that they therefore possessed
a rightful place in the expectations of the church its members.3
There remain numerous tasks for further research. The Lutheran engagement
with optimistic expectations points to a need to reconsider the periodisation of sev-
enteenth century apocalyptic thought. While the date 1618 and the Thirty Years’
War have been seen of crucial significance to the expression of optimistic expecta-
tions, this study has shown that, since at least the 1590s prophecies had circulated
that anticipated a Golden Age to occur between 1620 and 1630.4 The expression of
such ideas intensified in the 1610s. And while the comet of 1618 and the Bohemian
Revolt occasioned a spike in the printing and circulation of literature concerning
these expectations, the expectations themselves did not spring ex nihilo from the
conflict; nor did they essentially change or challenge the nature of felicitous expec-
tations anticipated by their postulators. These events rather intensified and deepened
the pre-existing prophetic culture which already saw the 1620s as significant.
The widespread failure of the many predictions for the mid-1620s, in
particular those focussed on 1623, is arguably far more significant than the
importance attached to 1618, for these disappointments assisted in the transformation
of apocalyptic and eschatological expectations in the seventeenth century; not only
within Lutheranism, but also in other Protestant confessions. Within Lutheran
culture, there was a perceptible turn to spiritualised and contemplative expectations
of a felicitous future; not only among apocalyptic prophets like Paul Felgenhauer,
but also its opponents, like Johann Matthäus Meyfart. Equally, however, within
reformed confessional culture there occurred a turn from a vague meliorism—which
3
Krauter-Dierolff, Die Eschatologie Philipp Jakob Speners,107–120.
4
Focussing on the Thirty Years’ War are Haase, Das Problem des Chiliasmus; Narbuntowicz,
‘Reformorthodoxe, spiritualistische, chiliastische und utopische Entwürfe’.
192 8 Conclusions
in some cases, as in the Reformation (1625) of the Frankenthal pastor Christoph

Adolph (also Adolphi, ca. 1570–1625 or 1627) was almost indistinguishable from
the hopes of some Lutheran critics—to a specific Millenarianism.5 As Howard
Hotson and Jeffrey Jue have shown in their respective studies of Johann Heinrich
Alsted and Joseph Mede and the birth of Calvinist Millenarianism in 1627, the
prophecies disappointed in the course of the 1620s informed and inspired their
creation of a literal millenarian tradition within Calvinism, which appealed
specifically to the Millennium of Revelation 20 as a scriptural justification for
expectations of a felicitous future.6 The disappointment of predictions for 1623 may
well have played a key role in the gradual transformation of the expectations of
other figures like Jan Amos Comenius.7 This suggests that the repercussions of
Lutheran apocalyptic expectations for the 1620s were not limited to Lutheran
confessional culture, but transformed Protestant culture more broadly. This impact
should be taken into consideration in future studies of seventeenth century
eschatology and apocalypticism.
One of the suggestions made in this argument which invites further testing is the
proposed connection between expressions of optimistic apocalyptic expectations
and the so-called Frömmigkeitswende within Lutheran confessional culture.
Following Johannes Wallmann, in the present work I have suggested that one of the
major appeals of optimistic apocalypticism was that it provided a sense of hope and
comfort that was perceived to be lacking in cultures of strictly-orthodox and scho-
lastic Lutheranism.8 This is suggested not only by the fact that a great deal of apoca-
lyptic literature promoted practical Christianity—particularly penance and
prayer—in the Last Days, but also because of the dovetailing of apocalyptic and
spiritualised eschatological expectations in both genres. This is most evident in
Philipp Nicolai’s Historia deß Reichs Christi (1598) and the works of Valentin
Weigel and his imitators, but can also be discerned in the works of Hermann
Rahtmann and Paul Egard. Rahtmann and Egard were both followers of Johann
Arndt, and Egard saw his controversial Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes
(1623) as an extension of Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum. Ultimately, several figures
that initially postulated radical scenarios of imminent worldly transformation—
such as Johann Valentin Andreae in the Rosicrucian manifestos, and Paul
Felgenhauer—retreated to doctrines of individual transformation in Christ after
their apocalyptic expectations had been disappointed. Future studies devoted to any
one of these figures and the relationship between their apocalyptic expectations and
5
Christoph Adolphi, Reformation. Das ist, Bericht, auff eine dieser Zeit schwebende hochwichtige
Frage: was von der allgemeinen Reformation der Kirchen … zu halten seye? ([Frankfurt]: No
Printer, 1624).
6
Hoston, Paradise Postponed; Jue, Heaven on Earth.
7
See the discussion in Pavel Heřmánek, Jan Amos Komenský a Kristina Poniatowská učenec a
vizionářka v době třicetileté války (Prague: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, 2015), 128–133.
8
Cf. Wallmann, ‘Zwischen Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus’; Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und
Chiliasmus in der Lutherischen Orthodoxie.’
8 Conclusions 193
their reception of the works of Arndt could provide valuable evidence necessary to
engage with these questions in greater detail.
Another task for further research is a comparison of the trajectory of optimistic
apocalyptic expectations examined in the study with other Lutheran territories, espe-
cially in northern Europe. As mentioned in the introduction, a variety of helpful
studies already exist concerning Scandinavian and Baltic countries.9 Figures like the
Swedish astrologer Sigfrid Aron Forsius (1560–1624) and the antiquary and
Rosicrucian respondent Johannes Bureus, provide ready-made avenues for pursuing
this research further.10 Ideally, such studies would consider not only the production
and circulation of these ideas in other European languages, but also the reception of
German-language works. In 1637, Johannes Rudbeck (1581–1646), Lutheran bishop
of Västerås in Sweden, warned that chiliastic doctrines, spread by the likes of Paul
Nagel, were finding a foothold in Sweden.11 We have seen that prophets like Philipp
Ziegler and Paul Felgenhauer found receptive audiences in the United Provinces and
throughout northern Europe. Their reception, as well as the reception of Lutheran
works concerning chiliastic heresy, could shed further light on interchanges and
exchanges between different language areas within Lutheran confessional culture.
There is also need for further research concerning the reception of Lutheran
optimistic expectations in other regions of Europe. In Bohemia the translator of
Johann Arndt’s works, Michal Longolius (fl. 1610–1630), also translated Paul
Nagel’s Complementum Astronomiae (1620) into Czech. The studies of Vladimír
Urbánek have drawn our attention to the optimistic expectations of the Bohemian
astronomer Simon Partlicius (1588–1640), which were partially fostered by
education in Görlitz and exposure to German-language apocalyptic literature.12 In
9
Sandblad, De eskatologiska föreställningarna i Sverige; Lindroth, Paracelsismen i Sverige;
Schoeps, Philosemitismus im Barock; Laasonen, ‘Chiliastische Strömungen aus dem Baltikum’;
Laasonen, ‘Die Anfänge des Chiliasmus im Norden’; Åkerman, Rose Cross Over the Baltic;
Shackelford, ‘The Rejection of Paracelsianism in Denmark’; Beyer, Lay Prophets in Lutheran
Europe.
10
On Forsius see Terhi Kiiskinen, Sigfrid Aronus Forsius: Astronomer and Philosopher of Nature.
(Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang Publishing, 2007); Martin Kjellgren, ‘Taming the Prophets:
Astrology, Orthodoxy and the Word of God in Early Modern Sweden,’ PhD dissertation, Lund
University, 2011. On Buraeus, see Håkan Håkansson, Vid tidens ände: om stormaktstidens
vidunderliga drömvärld och en profet vid dess yttersta rand (Gothenburg and Stockholm:
Makadam, 2014); Thomas Karlsson, ‘Götisk kabbala och runisk alkemi: Johannes Bureus och den
götiska esoterismen,’ PhD Dissertation, Stockholm University, 2010. See also the case of the
Danish-born Anna Walker (d. ca. 1621), whose optimistic prophecies were influenced by the works
of Jacopo Brocardo. See Jürgen Beyer and Leigh T.I. Penman, ‘The Petitions of a “Supposed
Prophetesse.” The Lübeck Letters of Anna Walker and their Significance for the Synod of Dordt.
A Linguistic and Textual Analysis,’ in Revisiting the Synod of Dordt (1618–1619). Aza Goudriaan
and Fred A. van Lieburg eds. (Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2011), 107–134 at 122–123.
11
Johannes Rudbeckius, Warningspredikan offver thet Evangelium som pliighar forkunnas pa then
andre sondagen i Adventet (Vasteras, 1637), sig. D4r-v.
12
Urbánek, Eschatologie, vědění a politika, 32–103; Vladimír Urbánek, ‘Proroctví, astrologie a
chronologie v dílech exultantu Paula Felgenhauera a Simeone Partlice,’ in Vira nebo vlast? Exil v
ceských dejinách raného novoveku. Michaela Hrubá, ed. (Ústi nad Labem: Albis international,
2001), 156–173; Urbánek, ‘The Comet of 1618,’ 335–347.
194 8 Conclusions
England, the London-based Robert Darre, perhaps a merchant, was custodian of

autograph works of Valentin Weigel, theological Paracelsica, and copies of tracts by
Guillaume Postel, which were communicated to him by post in 1601 from Christoph
Weichart, Weigel’s cantor, presumably for safekeeping.13 In the mid 1620s a variety
of prophecies, including the Horologium Hussianum, were circulating in London.14
German-language optimistic apocalyptic literature thus found its way into the hands
of readers in a variety of different places, a circumstance which suggests something
of the widespread reception of these ideas in contemporary Europe.
There remains a pressing need to examine apocalyptic expectations in Lutheran
confessional culture in the period between 1630, when the present study concludes,
and the rise of Pietism in the 1670s, when most other studies begin. The intermedi-
ate period has at present only been sketched by Johannes Wallmann, Martin Brecht,
and in the present work.15 A study of Lutheran apocalyptic thought in the seven-
teenth century as a whole would be an immensely valuable undertaking, as it would
now be possible to avoid synchronic misconceptions concerning heresies like
chiliasm, and assess the place of optimistic expectations in Lutheranism over the
longue durée. Figures like Paul Felgenhauer, Ludwig Friedrich Gifftheil, and fol-
lowers of the doctrines of Jacob Böhme could prove central to such an undertak-
ing.16 Similarly desirable is a comparative history of optimistic apocalyptic thought
across the entire spectrum of seventeenth century Protestantism. Although the tra-
jectory of the Calvinist experience differs substantially to that of Lutheranism, each
confession shared similar backgrounds, and both were informed by many of the
same sources.17 While considerable care would need to be taken when choosing the
terminology with which to designate and describe the expectations that subject to
analysis, it appears that an investigation of potential cross-influences between the
confessions would shed further light on the roles played by optimistic apocalyptic
ideas in sixteenth and seventeenth century European culture.
13
Kathrin Biegger, ‘Wie gelangten theologische Paracelsusschriften nach London?’ Nova Acta
Paracelsica N.F. 4 (1989): 24–37; Horst Pfefferl, ‘Christoph Weickhart als Paracelsist. Zu Leben
und Persönlichkeit eines Kantors Valentin Weigels,’ in Telle, ed. Analecta Paracelsica, 407–423.
14
Noah Millstone, ‘The Rector of Santon Downham and the Hieroglyphic Watch of Prague,’ in
Manuscript Miscellanies in Early Modern England. Joshua Eckhardt and Daniel Starza-Smith
(Farnham: Ashgate, 2014), 73–90.
15
Wallmann, ‘Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus’; Martin Brecht, ‘Die deutschen Spiritualisten des 17.
Jahrhunderts,’ in Der Pietismus vom Siebzehnten bis zum frühen achtzehnten Jahrhundert.
(Geschichte des Pietismus, Band 1). Martin Brecht, ed. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht
1993), 205–240. Viskolcz, Reformációs Könyvek, provides an excellent starting point for the
period from 1630 to ca. 1645.
16
Several excellent starting points are already available. See in particular Mike A. Zuber, ‘Spiritual
Alchemy from the Age of Jacob Boehme to Mary Anne Atwood’; Tünde Beatrix Karnitscher, Der
vergessene Spiritualist Johann Theodor von Tschesch. Untersuchungen und Spurensicherung zu
Leben und Werk eines religiösen Nonkonformisten. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015.
17
Hotson, Paradise Postponed.
8 Conclusions 195
The implications of such studies would not be purely historical. They, like the
present volume, can also more broadly contribute to ongoing debates about the
place of apocalypticism in western narratives of progress, secularization, and
modernity.18 John Gray’s recently-postulated argument that ‘if a simple definition of
western civilization could be formulated, it would have to be framed in terms of
millenarian thinking,’ invites further investigation.19 If one accepts Brad S. Gregory’s
recent argument in The Unintended Reformation (2012) that Protestant confessional
culture is responsible for shaping modern western secular culture, then there exists
a pressing need to reassess the contribution and relative importance of ideas that
were central to Protestant thought in the creation of modernity.20 Apocalypticism,
more especially its optimistic variant, is unquestionably one of these. The present
study, which has examined the contestation of acceptable apocalyptic expectations
within Lutheran confessional culture of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth
centuries, may be understood as a contribution to this ongoing negotiation.
18
The classic formulation of this argument is Ernest Lee Tuveson, Millennium and Utopia: A Study
in the Background of the Idea of Progress. 2nd ed. (Gloucester, Mass: Torch Books, 1964); Arthur
H. Williamson, Apocalypse Then: Prophecy and the Making of the Modern World (Westport,
Conn: Praeger, 2008); Hall, Apocalypse: From Antiquity to the Empire of Modernity. See also
Robert Wallace, ‘Progress, Secularization and Modernity: The Löwith – Blumenberg Debate,’ New
German Critique 22 (1981): 63–79; Kathleen Davis, Periodization and Sovereignty (Philadelphia:
University of Philadelphia Press, 2008).
19
John Gray, Black Mass: Apocalyptic Religion and the Death of Utopia (New York: Farrar, Strauss
and Giroux, 2007), 6.
20
Brad S. Gregory, The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society.
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012).
Appendix
Printed Works Concerning Optimistic Apocalyptic

Expectations, 1600–1630
This short-title list contains a register of 367 prints (including separate editions and
issues) of 300 unique works which concern optimistic apocalyptic expectations,
printed between 1600 and 1630. With the exception of a handful of publications
from Calvinist authors—included in order to stress the relative interest of these two
major Protestant confessions in optimistic apocalyptic expectations—all were writ-
ten by authors from Lutheran confessional culture. The catalogue includes tracts
promoting visions of future felicity, as well as works against chiliastic heresy. The
catalogue also contains references to tracts, pamphlets, broadsheets and other
printed works that are or appear to be no longer extant, but which are referred to in
contemporary or reliable secondary sources. In such cases, the full known title is
given, along with a footnote documenting the source of the reference. Rosicrucian
books, with a handful of important exceptions––such as editions of original mani-
festos and works mentioned in the present study––have not been included. Carlos
Gilly is currently completing an extensive and eagerly-anticipated Bibliographia
Rosicruciana, to appear in six volumes, which will document several hundred pub-
lications, both scribal and print, some of which contain optimistic apocalyptic
expectations.
This catalogue is not intended as a definitive indication of the quantity of printed
literature concerning the expectation of a future golden age written by Lutherans
and printed during the early seventeenth century. While I have included all books
that have come to my attention that address the subject, there are undoubtedly others
that have escaped my attention. It is equally possible that ‘ghost editions’ among the
works I have not seen have filtered through from occasionally vague contemporary
references. Despite this, this bibliography, which furnishes the data for Fig. 1 (p.
xxiii), provides an indication of the intensification of debates concerning optimistic

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2
198 Appendix
apocalypticism by Lutheran authors before 1630, which can be refined, corrected,

and expanded by future scholarship.
The criteria employed in selecting the printed works included in this list are
straightforward. All texts that devote attention to optimistic apocalyptic expecta-
tions, either in passing or as a major focus, were included. My approach therefore
differs substantially from the methodology recently employed by Volker Leppin,
who in his Antichrist und Jüngster Tag identified a corpus of literature on the basis
of the appearance of appropriate key words in the title. Translations are included in
the list, but only if they are witnesses to now-lost German or Latin publications. The
vast majority of these are discussed in the preceding analysis. The titles themselves
were identified and collected from research in European, American, and Australian
libraries, or discovered in online databases like Karlsruher virtueller Katalog and
Verzeichnis der im deutschen Sprachraum erschienenen Drucke des 17.
Jahrhunderts.1 Other works were identified through the consultation of bibliogra-
phies both in print and manuscript, as well as through references in primary sources.
Optimistic expectations were not only found in printed literature on religion, or
indeed in heresiological tracts. As the bibliography of titles indicates, they were also
discussed in texts devoted to astrology, mathematics, pedagogy, history, engineer-
ing, music, medicine, encyclopaedism, politics, mining, alchemy, and poetry, to
name but a few. The diversity of genres and subjects in which these references
appear is additional evidence that optimistic expectations were a quotidian part of
Lutheran apocalyptic expectations more generally; and at that in a variety of differ-
ent spheres of life.
Several of the titles have prompted issues with classification. A prime example is
Hermann Rahtmann’sJesu Christi deß Königs aller Könige und Herren aller Herren
Gnadenreich (1621), which was discussed in chapter five. This work was written
against chiliastic heresy, but its publication resulted in the author being accused of
advocating the heresy he denounced. The works of Christoph Besold are equally
problematic. In some of these he argued against chiliastic heresy, but nevertheless
promoted a suite of optimistic apocalyptic expectations, such as the conversion of
the Jews before the Last Judgment, that he did not consider to be heretical. There is
no good solution to these problems. I have therefore considered the character and
impact of these problematic works when classifying them. They demonstrate, at any
rate, the fact that optimistic apocalyptic expectations were a constant presence in
Lutheran confessional culture, and that the denunciation of these expectations as
heretical was never unproblematic.
Manuscript and scribal publications have been excluded from this catalogue for
many reasons, but most simply because these works are frequently difficult, if not
impossible, to accurately date. As such, although numerous manuscripts have been
consulted and discussed in the body of this study, unprinted tracts are not included
in this catalogue. If the extensive contemporary bibliographies of Paracelsian and
dissident works compiled by Morsius and Widemann2 provide any indication,
1
http://www.ubka.uni-karlsruhe.de/hylib/en/kvk.html; http://www.vd17.de
2
Morsius, Nuncius Olympicus; Kassel, Landesbibliothek, 2° Ms Chem. 7; Hannover, NLB, MS
IV, 341.
Appendix 199
h owever, the number of manuscript tracts containing optimistic apocalyptic expec-

tations substantially exceeds the printed editions. Morsius listed some 220 works in
his possession; Widemann listed well over 500. Only a fraction of these are extant
today.
Legend:
∗ Not extant
→ Calvinist Author
† Lutheran work against chiliastic heresy
1600
Sperber, Kabalisticæ Precationes
1601
†Ianinicola, Strena ... was von den newen Paracelsischen Propheten ... zu halten
1602
Neuheuser, Tau ‫ ת‬The est vox vitae signum veritatis
1603
1604
Neuheuser, Tractatus: De Nova Stella
Röslin, Speculum Et Harmonia mundi: Das ist, Welt Spiegell
→Piscator, Das ander Thäil des Newen Testaments
1605
Neuheuser, Declaratio, oder Erklärung
Barbarossa, Extremum iudicium
†Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung
†Wolther, Das zwölffte Capitel Danielis
1606
Neuheuser, Christus optimus aenigmaticus est
Neuheuser, De tribus fidei statibus mutabilibus
Neuheuser, Argumentum und General grundlicher Beweiß
∗Neuheuser, Tuba: Ein Tractat und nützliche Erklärung uber den Spruch Pauli/I
Corinth. 11. Es müssen Irrfal oder Secten kommen. Marburg bey
Hutwelcker/1606.3
1607
Nicolai, De Regno Christi4
[Pitiscus], Sebald Branden Propheceyung
†Röder, Biblia der H. Schrifft, neuw verteutschet von den Caluinisten
1608
[Figulus], Thesaurinella Olympica aurea tripartita
Neuheuser, Ænigmatum, sig. D4v; Draud, Bibliotheca, 247.

3
Blindow, ‘Der unbekannte Nicolai,’ 39.

4
200 Appendix
→∗Ohnvergreiffliche Betrachtung von den letsten Merckzeiten der Welt Ende.

‘Heidelberg’5
→Piscator, Apologia, Das ist/Verthädigung der newen Herbornischen Bibel
†Scultetus, Warnung für der Zäuberer und Sterngucker
1609 [3,0,1]
[Poyssel], Magischer Beweiß
Röslin, Historischer/Politischer und Astronomischer naturlicher Discurs
Weigel, Libellus de Vita Beata
→Brightman, Apocalypsis Apocalypseos
1610
Neuheuser, Argumentatio de sancto et summo imperio
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi6
1611
Neuheuser, Argumentatio de sancto et summo imperio (another issue)
Neuheuser, Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen
∗Neuheuser, Commentario uber die gantze Offenbarung S. Johannis.7
∗Neuheuser, Grössen Tractaten uber die Evang. Matthaei am 24 Cap.8
→Napier, Entdeckung aller Geheimnüssen in der Apocalypsi … S. Johannis
1612
∗Neuheuser, Vera tam illius sancti et summi imperii9
∗Neuheuser, Iudicium sive iudicii generalis secretum, maxime ad hodiernum sancti
et summi imperii statum inceptum spectans, et de eodem declaratio
necessaria10
∗ Neuheuser, ‘Discursus, oder Dieffsinnige betrachtung’ 11
Haslmayr, Antwort an die lobwürdige Brüderschafft der Theosophen von
RosenCreutz
Nagel, Explicatio oder Auszwicklung der himmlischen Kräffte
[Pitiscus], Vaticinium de imminente ecclesiastici et politici status (Latin trans.)
∗Ratke‚ ‘Unknown Work’12
Röslin, 1572. Prodromus. 1604. Dissertationum Chronologicarum
Röslin, Zu Ehrn der Keyserlichen Wahl
→Brightman, Apocalypsis Apocalypseos (another issue)
→Napier, Entdeckung aller Geheimnüssen in der Apocalypsi … S. Johannis
†Cramer and Reineccius, Theses De Regno Christi
5
Besold, De Hebraeorum, ad Christum salvatorem nostrum conversione, conjectanea, 2.
6
Wallmann, ‘Zwischen Reich Gottes und Chiliasmus,’ 195.
7
Neuheuser, Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen, sig. B2r.
8
Neuheuser, ‘Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen,’ 230.
9
Otherwise lost work printed in Goldast, Politica Imperialia, 750-751
10
Otherwise lost work printed in Goldast, Politica Imperialia, 751-752.
11
Otherwise lost work printed in Goldast, Politische ReichsHändel, 751-752.
12
Gideon Vogt, Wolfgang Ratichius, der Vorgänger des Amos Comenius. (Langensalza:
F.G.L. Gressler, 1894), 31; Gilly, ‘Campanella and the Rosicrucians,’ 280.
Appendix 201
1613
Hitfeld, Jegenbeweiß Das die Welt nicht noch 42 Jahr stehen könne
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologicum … auff das Jahr … 1614
Neotechnus, VI. Prognostica Von Verenderung vnd zufälligem Glück vnd Vnglück
Tilner, Chronologische Zeit Rechnung
Weigel, Güldene Griff
Weigel, Vom Ort der Welt
→Piscator, In Apocalypsin Johannis commentarius
→Piscator, Commentarii in omnes libros Novi Testamenti
1614
[Andreae], Fama Fraternitatis (2 issues)13
Besold, Signa Temporum
Neuheuser, ‘Argumentatio de Sancto et summo imperio’
Neuheuser, ‘Vera tam illius sancti et summi imperii’
Neuheuser, ‘Iudicium sive iudicii generalis secretum’
Neuheuser, ‘Discursus, oder Dieffsinnige betrachtung’
Neuheuser, ‘Höchstwichtiger und sehr nothwendiger Sachen’
Weigel, Vom Ort der Welt (another issue)
Weigel, Dialogus de Christianismo
†Cramer, De Regno Jesu Christi
1615
[Andreae], Confessio Fraternitatis14
[Andreae], Fama Fraternitatis (3 further issues, all reprinted with the Confessio)15
Besold, De periculis nostri seculi oratio
∗Eine Astronomische Weißagung von dem zukünfftigen hochwigstigter händeln
vnd verenderungen Vnsers Deutschen Landes von Ao 1610 biß vff 1623 wie es
gehen wirt, gezogen auß der tiefste Speculations rechnung der astronomischen
Kunst vnd von einem gelerhten Manne vor ettlichen Jahren zu sammen gezogen,
Itzo aber nach seinem Tode an Tagk gebracht. Gedruckt zu Hamburgh durch
Philippum von Aßaw etc. [1615].16
Neuheuser, Ein Ewiger Beweiß
Weigel, Gnothi Seauton (2 issues)
→Napier, Schöne und lang gewünschte Außlegung
1616
[Andreae], Fama and Confessio Fraternitatis (another issue)17
Bureaus, Ara Foedaris Therapici
Neuheuser, Ein Ewiger Beweiß (2 further issues)
Neuheuser, Vera quaedam temporis definitio
13
Gilly, Fama Fraternitatis, 41-44.
14
Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, 72-73.
15
16
A manuscript copy is in Dresden, SLUB, N118, 213r-224r.
17
202 Appendix
∗[Neuheuser], Ein Deutsch Argumentum sampt seinem Sylogismo oder gründlichen

bewerung, Erklert. Wen, durch was vor mittel, unnd von welchen Menschen
eigentlich die Türcken geschlagen, Also das jr gantzes Reich einmal Christlichen
… untergeben und bekehrt werden soll. In Officina Samueliana. (Broadsheet).18
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologicum … auf das Jahr 1617
Röslin, WeltSpiegel (another issue)
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Informatorium
Weigel, Güldene Griff (another issue)
Weigel, Vom Ort der Welt (another issue)
†Libavius and Michael, De Millenariorum Haereticorum Secta
†Libavius, Wolmeinendes Bedencken
†Rothe, Exequiae Mamphrasianae
†H.Ar.No:R., Fama Remissa
1617
[Andreae], Fama and Confessio Fraternitatis19
Neuheuser, Aenigmatum Christi Resolutio seu explicatio
Neuheuser, Aliud, verissimum Argumentum ex prophetia Jesaiae
∗Nagel, Prognosticon Cabalisticum, Danzig.20
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi21
Röslin, WeltSpiegel (another issue)
Weigel, Gebetbüchlein
Weigel, Güldene Griff (another issue)
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Kirchen Oder Hauspostill (2 issues)
1618
Bureaus, Ara Foedaris Therapici (another issue)
Neuheuser, Sacrosanctum et unitum Imperium
Neuheuser, Victoria christianorum verissimorum universalis (2 issues)
∗Neuheuser, Lan Eden22
[Haslmayr], Astronomia Olympi Novi
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Drey Theil einer gründlichen/und wol Probirten Anweisung
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Zweiter Theil deß Gnothi Seauton/Heisset Astrologia Theologizata
[Pseudo-]Weigel, De Bono Et Malo In Homine
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Libellus Disputatorius
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Principal und HauptTractat von der Gelassenheit
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Kirchen oder Hauspostill (another issue)
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Kurtzer Bericht Vom Wege und Weise alle Ding zuerkennen
18
Paul Hohenemser, Flugschriftensammlung “Discursus politici” des Johann Maximilian Zum
Jungen. (Frankfurt am Main: Voigt & Gleiber, 1930), 36; John Roger Paas, The German Political
Broadsheet, 1600-1700. 13 vols. (Wiesbaden: Harrasowitz, 1985-2005), vol. 2, 341 (PL-36).
19
20
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologo-Cabalisticum auff das jahr MDCXX, 14; Nagel, Astronomiae
Nagelianae Fundamentum verum, sig. A4v.
21
Blindow, ‘Der unbekannte Nicolai,’ 39.
22
Mentioned in Neuheuser, Consideratio et enarratio brevis de nova stella, 42.
Appendix 203
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Moise tabernaculum

[Pseudo-]Weigel, Dritter Theil Deß Gnōthi Seauton
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Philosophia Mystica
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Soli Deo Gloria
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Theologia Weigelii
Weigel, Dialogus de Christianismo (2 issues)
Weigel, Gnothi Seauton (another issue)
→Brightman, Apocalypsis Apocalypseos (another issue)
†Affelmann & Spalchaver, Illustrium quaestionum theologicarum heptas
†Cramer, Apocalypsis, Oder Offenbarung S. Johannis
†Gerhard, Disputationum Theologicarum
1619
Capistranus, Woldenckwürdige Weissagung (six issues)
Neuheuser, Consideratio et enarratio brevis
Neuheuser, Mysterium tabulae quinque vocalium
∗Neuheuser, Enarratio de scientia verae cabalae23
Grebner, Conjecturen oder Muhtmassungen
Guttmann, Offenbarung Göttlicher Majestät
Lautensack, Offenbahrung Jesu Christi
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologicum … auff das Jahr … M.D.C.XX.
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologicum … auff das Jahr … VenI Do MIne IesV ChrIste
sponsa tVa parata est (1619)
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologo-Cabalisticum auff das jahr MDCXX
Nagel, Stellae prodigiosae seu Cometae (2 issues)
Nagel, Stellae prodigiosae seu Cometae … Ander Theil
Nagel, Des newen Cometen und Wunder-Sterns
(another issue)
Schmidt, Prodromus Coniunctionis Magnae
Schmidt, Geistreiche prophetische Weissagungen
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Vnterschiedliche/Sehr notwendige Theologische Tractätlein
[Pseudo-]Weigel, Vom Alten und Newen Jerusalem
[Pseudo-]Weigel, De Bono et Malo (another issue)
Ziegler, Harmonia und Harpffe Davids
†Andreae, Mythologiae Christianae
†Cramer, Biblia Das ist Die gantze H. Schrifft
†Hunnius and Legdæo, Principia Theologiae Fanaticae
1620
Besold, De Hebraeorum, ad Christum salvatorem nostrum conversione,
conjectanea
[Cussovius], Clangor Buccinae Propheticae De Novißimis temporibus
Neuheuser, Das Regal auch Tav. T ‫ ת‬Siegfahnen, 21; Weller, Die falschen und fingierten
23
Druckorte, vol.1, 18.

204 Appendix
Neuheuser, Victoria christianorum verissimorum universalis (another issue)

Neuheuser, Das Regal auch Tav. T ‫ ת‬Siegfahnen
Neuheuser, Sacrosanctum et unitum Imperium
∗Neuheuser, Sacrvm sigilvm quodam gravissimum, apertum factum. Das ist, Ein
fürtreffentliches schweres Siegel in H. Schrift Weissagung klar und offenbar
gemacht, Durch Wilhelmum Eo Newhäusern. Gedruckt zu Friedwegen bey
Samuel Ehafften Im Jahr Christi 1620. 4to, 24pp.24
[Felgenhauer], Decisio Prophetica in belli Bohemici
Hartprecht, Tuba Temporis
Heyden, Vierdte Buch Eßdrae
[Kärcher], Wunder- und Figürlich Offenbahrung
[Kärcher], Prognosticon, Oder Weissagung auff diese jetzige Zeit (2 issues)
∗Nagel, Clavis Apocalyptica oder, Buch der Apocalyptischen Schlüssel25
Nagel, Prognosticon astrologicum … auffs Jahr …MDCXXI
Nagel, Prodromus astronomiae apocalypticae
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologo-Harmonicum (1620) (2 issues)
Nagel, Complementum Astronomiae
Nagel, Ander Theil Complementum Astronomiae26
Nagel, Cursus Quinquenalis mundi27
(another ed.)
Nicolai, De Regno Jesu Christi28
[Pitiscus et al], Vaticinium Trin-uni-sonum
Theophilus, Dias Mystica
Trübsal der gantzen Welt
→Mylius, Magische Abcontrafeyhung
†Arndt, Zwey Sendschreiben (2 issues)
†Basilius, Lixivium pro abluendo
†Cramer, Biblia
†[Kepler], Kanones Pueriles
†Merck, Trewhertzige Warnung fürm Weigelianismo
†Rost, Prognosticon Theologicon oder Theologische Weissagung
1621
Bartolus, Aquila Esdrea
Capistranus, Prognosticon Das ist: Wohldenckwürdige Weissagung und
Propheceyung
24
Jöcher, Allgemeines Gelehrten-Lexicon, vol. 5, 553; Weller, Die falschen und fingierten
Druckorte, vol. 1, 19; Hohenemser, Flugschriftensammlung “Discursus politici,” 62.
25
Referenced in Nagel, Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologicum ... auff das Jahr ... M.D.C.XX., sig. C2v;
Nagel, Philosophia novae astronomiae, sig. C4v, K1v-2r; Nagel, Raptus Astronomicus, sig. E3v.
26
This is another edition of Nagel, Complementum Astronomiae.
27
This is another edition of Nagel, Complementum Astronomiae.
28
See Blindow, ‘Der unbekannte Nicolai,’ 39.
Appendix 205
Capistranus, Prophezey/Vom Zustand des Römischen Reichs

Colloquium Rhodostauroticum
Neuheuser, Coronae Gemma Nobilissima
Neuheuser, Warhafftige und gründtliche Erklärung
Etliche fürneme Zeugnisse … daß Christi Reich auch weltlich seie
Gründtliche Offenbarung und eigentliche Abbildung (2 issues)
[Kärcher], Schrifftmessige Offenbahrung
[Kärcher], Wunder- und Figürlich Offenbahrung (2 issues)
[Kärcher], Prognosticon, Oder Weissagung auff diese jetzige Zeit (2 issues)
Liptitz, Mysteria Apocalyptica29
[Mynsicht], Aureum Seculum
∗Nagel, Trigonometriae Apocalypticae30
Nagel, Philosophia Novae Astronomiae nostrae particular insignis
Nagel, Deutzche Astrologische Practica oder Prognosticum
Rahtmann, Jesu Christi deß Königs aller Könige und Herren aller Herren
Gnadenreich
Theophilus, Liber Vitae aureus
Trübsal der gantzen Welt
→Mylius, Christliche Reformirte Theologia
→Piscator, Commentarii in omnes libros Novi Testamenti
†Arnold, AntiNagelius
†Clüver, Primum Diluculum Apocalypticum
†Crüger, Send-Brief an Herrn M. Paulum Nagelium
†[Groscurdt], Bacchationum Nagelianarum Prima
†Holzhalb, Kurtze, grundtliche Offenbarung
†Merck, Nothwendige Schutzschrift … gegen Ezechiel Meths … Beschwerung
†Osiander, Admonitio de quorundam, ad præsentia hæc periculosa tempora
apectantum vaticinorum
†Rossow, De Infallibilibus, Approperantis Judicii Extremi, Prodromis
†Schelhammer, Widerlegung Der vermeynten Postill Valentini Weigelii
†Wallenberger, Trias Quaestionum Controversarum
1622
Capistranus, Prognosticon Das ist: Wohldenckwürdige Weissagung
Felgenhauer, Flos Propheticus (in three books)
∗Felgenhauer, Christianus31
Felgenhauer, Apologeticus contra invectivas aeruginosas Rostii
Felgenhauer, Bon’ Avisa oder Newe Avisen (2 issues)
Felgenhauer, Complement Bon’ Avisorum
29
A text by Eustachius Poyssel, although with several Calvinist interpolations.
30
Referenced in Nagel, Philosophia novae astronomiae sig. K1r; Grießman, Getrewer Eckhart,
118.
31
Edition printed in Halle by Christoph Bißmarck. See Wolthers, ‘Felgenhauers Leben und
Wirken,’ 73. A manuscript copy is preserved in Hannover, Niedersächsische Staatsbibliothek, TA
444.
206 Appendix
Heylandt, Examen Chronologicum (2 issues)

[Kärcher], Löwen-Geschrey/Das ist: Kurtze Offenbahrung
∗Nagelius Orthodoxus. Oppositus Antinagelio M. Philippi Arnoldi Archisacerdotis
Tilsæ in Borussia Oder Warhafftiger Nagelius zuentgegengesetzet deme
WiederWertigen Nagelio. M. Philipp: Arnoldi Ertz Priesters zue Tilse in Preüssen.
Anno M DC XXI.32
Nagel, Wächterbuchlein vnd Letztes Stundgeschrey
Nagel, Astronomiae Nagelianae Fundamentum verum
∗Stiefel, Etzliche Christ- und Gottselige Tractätlein den außerwehlten kindern
Gottes/ und beruffenen rechtgläubigen Christen zu trost/und ans taglicht der welt
in druck gegeben. Danzig, [1622].33
Urbinensis, Hoch nötiges und zu dieser betrübten zeit allen bedrängeten Christen
tröstliches bedencken
Ziegler, AntiArnoldus et AntiNagelius
→Alsted, Theologia prophetica
†Arnold, AntiNagelius (another issue)
†Besold, De Hebraeorum … conjecta (another issue)
†Crüger, Rescriptum Auff M. Pauli Nagelii Buch
†Gerhard, Loci theologici
†Groscurdt, Angelus apocalypticus
†Hunnius, Christliche Betrachtung der Newen Paracelsischen und Weigelianischen
Theology
†Hunnius, Conclusiones Aureae
†Müller and Avian, Exetasis vel examen quaestionum duum famosarum hoc nostro
peversissimo tempore
†Rost, Heldenbuch vom Rosengarten
†Thumm, Impietas Wigeliana
†Thumm and Rentz, Apodeixis Theologica
† Vollenweider, Examen der newen Lehr eines/der sich nen[n]et Levi Christen
1623
Communicativ Sendschreiben
Egard, Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes
Erdmute Juliane von Gleichen, Verantwortungs Schreiben
Felgenhauer, Disexamen vel examen examinis
Felgenhauer, Alerm Posaun
32
Manuscript copy in Erfurt Bibliothek des evangelischen Ministeriums, MS 21, fol. 578r-674v.
Although attributed to Nagel in Gilly, Cimelia Rhodostaurotica, 173, Nagel himself wrote that the
text was written by ‘Zweÿen gelehrten Mennern in Preüßen’ (Leipzig UB, MS 0 356, fol. 52v.
Nagel to Arnold Kerner, 29 April 1622). This would appear to be confirmed by Grießmann,
Getrewer Eckhart, 54, 82, 100, 122, 164, who adds that the book was ‘turch zween Zeugen der
uberthewren Warheit also beschrieben/ und fürgestellet: Geben aus der Newstadt/ da das Urim
unnd Thumim auffgegangen.’ It is also mentioned in Arnold, Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie, vol. 3,
54.
33
See Weiß, Die Lebenswelten des Esajas Stiefel, 561 and the references therein cited.
Appendix 207
Heylandt, Enarratio Chronologo-Historica Apocalypseōs S. Johannis

[Nagel], Trigonus Igneus
∗Nagel, ‘Prognosticon Pauli Nagelii Lips. in Annum 1624’34
Neuheuser, De lapide fortissimo (2 issues)
Neuheuser, Mystica tempora patefacta (2 issues)
∗Neuheuser, Sanctissimi nominis35
Rathmann, Quaestiones undecim
Verdun, Apocalyptische Satzstück
†Besold, Discursus Politici
†Cramer, Arbor Haereticae
†Eberken, Wolgegründte Ablehnung/des ubel gegründten SchwarmBedenckens
†Faber, Verzeichniß Zwey hundert Ketzer und Ketzereyen
†Fröreisen and Ulricus, Anatomia Sive Exenteratio Draconis Fanatici
†Grießmann, Getrewer Eckhart
†Osiander, Consideratio Praesentium Horum, Periculis Plenissimorum Temporum
†Rost, Dreyfacher theologischer Spiegel
†Rost, Modestum immodesti Apologetici Felgenhaueriani Examen
†Rost, Apologie des Heldenbriefes
†Theobald, Widertauffischer Geist
†Thumm and Zeller, Impietas Photiniana succinctè delineata
1624
Felgenhauer, Christianus Simplex (2 issues)
Felgenhauer, Alerm Posaun (2 issues)
Gründtliche Offenbarung und eigentliche Abbildung (another issue)
[Gebhard], Historische Erklärung
[Mynsicht], Aureum Seculum (2 further issues)
Nagel, Philosophia Novae Astronomiae (another issue)
Nagel, Tabula aurea M. Pauli Nagelii Lips. Mathematici
Nagel, Prognosticon Astrologicon Auffs Jahr 1625
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi
Schola Spiritus Sancti
Stiefel, Apologia und RettungsSchrifft
Stiefel, Kürtzlicher Gründlicher Verlauff in heiligen Religion-Sachen (2 issues)
Stiefel, Verantwortung des Büchleins
→Arnoldi, Reformation
†Eichstädt, Vindiciae Astronomiae M. Paulo Nagelio Oppositae
†Rost, Antapochrisis ad Disexamen-Vexamen Felgenhauerianum
†[Scultetus], Iudicium De fundamentis
†[Scultetus], Bedencken und Urtheil Matthiae Ehingeri
†Strubius and Cussovius, Disputatio Theologica
34
A manuscript copy prepared by Gottfried Gloger von Schwanbach, a member of Jakob Böhme’s
networks is in Leipzig, UB Ms Rep 106 IV 4, fols. 32v-52r.
35
Mentioned in Neuheuser, Mystica tempora patefacta, E1v.
208 Appendix
†Tarnow, De Novo Evangelio

†Thumm, Hehl and Heiland, Brevis Consideratio Trium Quaestionum (2 issues)
†Weber, Pseudo-Christus Ocreatus
†Wolther, Gulden Arch
†Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung (another issue)
1625
Bannier, Lutherischer Spiegel
[Felgenhauer], Prodromus Evangelii Aeterni seu Chilias Sancta (2 issues)
[Felgenhauer], Flos Propheticus In quo adaperitur Testimonium de Veritate Iesu
Christi
[Felgenhauer], Tuba Visitationis
[Felgenhauer], Leo Septentrionalis
[Felgenhauer], Calendarium novum-propheticum jubilaeum
∗Felgenhauer, Christiani vinculum perfectionis … .36
[Gebhard], Examen Chronologicum (another issue)
[Gebhard], Verosimilia historico-prophetica
Leo-Saucius Redivivus
[Morsius], Magische Propheceyung
[Mynsicht], Aureum Seculum (another issue)
Nagel, Raptus Astronomicus
[Teting], Ein kurtze Sermon Vom REiche GOttes
†Brenna, Krempel-Marckt Der … Brüdern vom Rosen-Creutz
†Rost, Theologische Weissagung Von der zwiefachen KirchenReformation
1626
Neuheuser, Index Sacrosancti Et Uniti Imperii, Sive Sanctae Monarchiae
Neuheuser, Revivicatio Veritatis
Neuheuser, Phrases Sacrae Scripturae
∗ Neuheuser, Singularem revelationem de S. Romano Imperio.37
De warachtighe en Groote Prophetie van Postellion38
[Morsius], Nuncius Olympicus
[Morsius], Eine wunderbarliche Vision Eines Catholischen Einsiedlers
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi (2 further issues)
†Behm, Kurtzer Vortrab Des bald folgenden ausführlichen Tractats
† Censuren und Bedencken Von Theologischen Faculteten (2 issues)
†Germanus, Der siebenden Apocalyptischen Posaunen
†Kinlen and Uberschar, Discursus primus de attributis astronomiae Ineptiis
M. Pauli Nagelii oppositis
†Rost, Amica ac fraterna Admonitio Super Controversiis De Vero Dn. Joannis
Arndten
†[Scultetus], ‘Urtheil Matthiae Ehingers’
36
A manuscript copy exists, see Wolthers, ‘Paul Felgenhauers Leben und Wirken’, 73.
37
Strasbourg, Archives de Ville, 1 AST 77, fol. 93r.
38
A Dutch translation of a German text, the original appears not to be extant.
Appendix 209
†Wendolin, Contemplationum physicarum

1627
[Gebhard], Verosimilia historico-prophetica (another issue)
Nagel, Raptus Astronomicus
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi (another issue)
→Alsted, Diatribe De Mille Annis Apocalypticis
→Mede, Clavis apocalyptica
→Napier, Schöne und lang gewünschte Außlegung (another issue)
†Cramer, Biblische Außlegung
†Cramer, Classicum poenitentiae seu Liber Apologeticus
†Himmel, Enthusiasmus Seu Collegium Antienthusiasticum
1628
Bericht/was Sechzehen Astronomi … inn ihren … Practicken setzen (2 issues)
Felgenhauer, Aurora Sapientiae Morgenröthe der Weißheit
Nicolai, Historia deß Reichs Christi (2 further issues)
†Facius, Admonitoria ad verosimilia Historico-prophetica
†Depulsio Epistolica Weseneriana
†Gutke, Ein Discurs von etlichen Enthusiasten
1629
Felgenhauer, Aurora Sapientiae Morgenröthe der Weißheit (another issue)
[Gifftheil], Stimme Durch welche der Herr Zebaoth auß Zion also brüllet
Warhafftige Weissagung
†Behm, Anti-Rahtmannianum Collegium Publicum
†Wolther, Geistreiche und wolgegründte Außlegung (another issue)
†Wolther, Das zwölffte Capitel Danielis (another issue)
1630
Felgenhauer, Christianorum Christianus secundum sensum Christi
Felgenhauer, Der Vorhoff am Tempel des Herrn
[Grammendorf], Error triunus39
Postilion oder Englische Posaun der Heimsuchung
→Alsted, Diatribe De Mille Annis Apocalypticis (another issue)
Summary
Printed Works concerning Optimistic Expectations:

Lutheran Pro 259
Lutheran Contra 88
Calvinist 20
Total: 367
39
The attribution is adopted from Viskolcz, Reformációs Könyvek, 86-96.
210 Appendix
Unique Works concerning Optimistic Expectations:

Lutheran Pro 202
Lutheran Contra 83
Calvinist 15
Total 300
Unique Authors (estimated)

Lutheran Pro 53
Lutheran Contra 46
Calvinist 7
Total 106
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Index of Scriptural Passages
Amos Luke
9:10, 48 12:2, 63
Daniel 18:8, x, 160
7, 91 21:11, 28
7:25, 159 22:36, 179
11, 88 Matthew
11:4, 91 5, 63
12:1, 146 7:15-20, 115
12:4, 63, 163 7:21-23, 123
12:7, 84, 159 10:26, 63
12:11-13, 24:11-24, 115
3, 159 24:14, 122
Haggai 24-25, xi
1:2-8, 13 28:19, 93
Isaiah Acts
9:6, 148 2:1-13, 63
24:21-23, 16 3:21-3, 45
25:8, 16 1 Corinthians
Psalms 15:22, 16
90:2, 159 16:9, 162
96, 91 1 John
Zachariah 4, 141
14:1-21, 158 4:1, 115
Baruch 2 Peter
5:4, 16 2:1, 115
2 Esdras 3:8, 159
7:28, 52 3:10, 190
11-12, 57 Romans
13, 47 2, 95
Mark 4:18, 167
4:30-34, 63 1 Thessalonians
13:22, 115 4:17, 111
John 5:1-4, 124
5:29, 16 5:2, 108, 190
16:13, 88 5:21, 26, 162

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2
262 Index of Scriptural Passages
2 Thessalonians 14:9, 26
2, 95 16:15, 190
2:3, 91 17:3, 94
5:4, 195 20, xi, xiv, 4, 15, 16, 47, 49, 52, 54, 81, 92,
Revelation 94, 98, 100, 102–104, 111, 127, 141,
1:8, 88 157, 159–161, 169, 183, 192
9:3, 80 20:1-3, 102, 160, 162
10, 81 20:5, xiii, 4
11:1-2, 83 20:9, 160
11:3, 91, 97, 122, 161 21:2, 147
14, 159 22:13, 88
General Index
A Antinomianism, 64, 76, 110, 140, 146, 148,

Adam, 13, 24, 84 150, 151, 169
Adelung, Johann Christoph, xviii Antwerp, 107
Adolphi, Christoph (ca. 1570–1625 or 1627), Apocalypticism
192 and eschatology, xii, xx, xxi, 8, 30, 53,
Adso (ca. 910–992CE), 4 191, 192
Affelmann, Johann (1588–1624), 110, 111, optimistic expectations, xvii, 77
113, 164, 183, 189 pessimistic expectations, x, xi, xvii, xxi, 4,
Africa, 19 75, 102, 109, 160
Agrippa, Heinrich Cornelius (1486–1535), 17, relationship to devotional literature, xix,
25, 75, 81 28, 120, 121, 173
Alchemy, 75, 184, 198 Arabia, 19
Alsted, Johann Heinrich (1588–1638), xiv, 29, Aristotle (384–322 BCE), 28
30, 180, 184, 192 Arndt, Johann (1555–1621), xvii, 22, 24–27,
Altdorf, 137 31, 34, 39, 42, 64, 82, 120–122, 129,
Altenburg, 55 143, 146, 155, 156, 158, 160–162,
Alt-Seidenberg, 48 164–167, 169, 177, 179–181, 183, 184,
Ambach, Melchior (1490–1559), 5 192, 193
America, viii, 43 Arnoldi, Philipp (1582–1642), 44, 85
Ammersbach, Heinrich (d. 1691), 184 Arthur, mythological king, 33
Amsterdam, viii, 45, 175, 180, Astrological literature
181, 183 practica, 66, 75
Amulets, 87 Schreibkalender, 66
Anabaptists, 7, 100–102, 104–106, 189 Astrology, xx, 29, 75, 131, 198
apocalyptic expectations of, 103 Astronomy, 64, 74, 81, 83
Andreae, Jakob (1528–1590), 19, 103, 105, Augsburg, 43, 60
126, 189 Augsburg Confession (1530)
Andreae, Johann Valentin (1586–1654), xxi, article seventeen, xi, 100, 105, 110, 112,
18, 19, 65, 126, 180, 182, 192 119, 138, 186, 189
Anhalt-Dessau, principality of, 16 and chiliastic heresy, xiv, 4, 103, 112, 186
Annaberg, 38 role in disputes concerning heresy, xv
Ansbach, 87 as source of authority, 103
Antichrist, xi, 3, 6, 19, 45, 57, 71, 99, 122, Augustine (354–430CE), 130, 133
123, 158–160, 162 August of Anhalt-Plötzkau (1575–1653), 33,
Anticlericalism, 6, 22–24, 27, 37 60, 75

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1701-2
264 General Index
Aureum seculum, see Golden Age Book of nature, 81

Authority See also Scripture
contested by apocalyptic expectations, Books
xxiii, 190, 195 availablity, 5, 50, 57, 107
feature of anticlericalism, 6 genres, 64
as topos in apocalyptic thought, 190 print runs, 64
See also Publishing, censorship
Boot, Anselm de (1550–1632), 87
B Boreel, Adam (1604–1667), 45
Baconianism Brandenburg, 26
and ideas of progress, xxv Braunschweig, 38, 41, 87, 104, 155, 162, 173,
Balingen, 87 185
Ballenstedt, 24 Brecht, Martin, 194
Baltic, 87, 193 Breckling, Friedrich (1629–1711), 184
Bamberg, 31 Bremen, 13, 42
Banau, Cunrad, 66 Breslau, 47
Bannier, Johann (d. 1625), 26, 58, 180 Breymayer, Reinhard (1944–2017), 82
Barnes, Robin Bruce, vii, x, xii, xix–xxii, 2, 5, Brieg, 181, 182
28, 66, 120, 125, 177, 178, 190 Brightman, Thomas (1562–1607), 54, 57
Barth, 87 Brigitte, 15
Bartolus, Abraham (fl. 1608–1628), 57 Broadsheets, xxii, xxiv, 33, 34, 48, 57–58, 69,
Basel, 24, 44, 87, 88 88, 92, 180, 197
Bede (ca. 672–735CE), 4 Brocardo, Jacopo (d. 1594), 12, 13, 16, 18, 28,
Bern, 46 35, 45, 88, 92, 95, 106, 111, 130
Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153), 17 Bruckner, John, 64
Bernburg, 144 Brunnquell, Ludwig (d. 1680), 185
Berthold Pirstinger (1465–1543), 131 Brux, Adam (1572–1639), 20
Besold, Christoph (1577–1638), 19, 111, 198 Brzeg, see Brieg
Betke, Joachim (1601–1663), 185 Bubenheimer, Ulrich, xvi
Beutha, 57 Bureus, Johann (1568–1652), 70
Beuthen an der Oder, 62 Buškovice, see Puschwitz
Bible, 13, 33, 39, 44, 52, 55, 82, 102, 141, Bytom Odrzańsky, see Beuthen an der Oder
149, 156, 157
Biblical criticism
impact on apocalyptic expectations, 63 C
as source of doubt, 83 Calendar
See also Chronology in apocalypticism, 66
Bißmarck, Christoph (d. 1624), 41, gregorian reforms of, 85
67, 69 See also Time
Biedermann, Benedikt (ca. 1545–1621?), 23, Calvinism, xiv, xv, 125, 191, 192
24 Calvin, Jean (1509–1564), xxi, 91
Bilderstürz, 25 Cambridge, 181
See also Calvinism Cambridge, University of, 181
Birckner, Johann (1587–1658), 140 Cammin, 143
Blancke, Michael (d. 1637), 128, 129 Campanella, Tomasso (1568–1639),
Bock, Hieronymus (1498–1554), 87 111, 130
Boguslow XIII (1544–1606), 87 Carbone, Ludovico (1545–1597), 77
Bohemia, 33, 40, 41, 49, 57, 62, 87, 94, 98, Cardano, Gerolamo (1501–1576), 75, 130
110, 171, 173, 174, 176, 193 Carolath-Beuthen, Majorat of, 62
Bohemian Revolt (1618–1620), xxii, 30, 34, Castellio, Sebastian (1515–1563), 18
40, 78, 191 Catholicism, xv, 6, 13
Böhme, Jacob (1575–1624), xvi, xxi, 34, Celle, 25
48–52, 56, 59, 60, 62, 64, 65, 67, 77, Censorship
85, 138, 140, 145, 147, 155, 177, 181, effectiveness, 65
184, 194 postpublication, 115
General Index 265
prepublication, 65, 115 in social-psychological literature, 172

role in combatting heresy, 65 Collegia pietatis, 186
Cento, 179 Comenius, Jan Amos (1592–1670), 34,
Cerinthus (fl. ca. 100CE), 99, 107, 110, 112, 181, 192
118, 119, 130, 131 Comets
Charlemagne (742–814CE), 30 of 1576, 29
Charles I, king of England (1600–1649), 45 of 1577, 29
Chemnitz, 23 of 1585, 29
Chiliasm (heresy), xii, xiii, xvii, xx of 1596, 29
as antique heresy, 99, 104, 105 of 1607, 92
of Church Fathers, 99, 104, 109, 130 of 1618, 30
as ‘new-antique’ heresy, 100, 109, 110, Confessio Augustana, see Augsburg
126, 169, 189 Confession
not condemned in Augsburg Confessionalization thesis
Confession, 183 and historiography of heresy, xv
origins in Jewish expectations, 101 Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn, see Great
relationship to optimistic expectations, conjunction
xix, xxi Constance, 43
relationship to pessimistic expectations, x, Constantinople, 88
xi, xvii, xxi, 4–6, 33, 101, 160 Conventicles, 18, 42, 114, 175
See also Optimistic apocalypticism Corrodi, Heinrich (1762–1833), xviii
Chiliasmus Corvinus, Johann (1583–1646), 113, 129,
as coinage of seventeenth century, 100 132–137, 151
See also Chiliasm (heresy) Courland, 13
Chiliasmus crassus, xiii, xviii, 110, 112, 116, Cramer, Daniel (1568–1637), xiii, 106–109,
118, 119, 127, 185, 190 111–113, 116, 117, 121, 126, 141,
Chiliasmus subtilis, xiii, xviii, 100, 111, 112, 183, 189
118, 119, 127, 142, 166, 185, 189, 190 C.R.C., see Rosencreutz, Christian
Christian IV of Denmark (1577–1648), 154 Cribarius, Wolfgang, see Siebmacher,
Christology, ix, 146, 150 Wolfgang
Chronology Croll, Oswald (ca. 1563–1609), 87
biblical chronology, 4, 39, 51, 54, 83, 146, Crucigerus, Christianus, see Felgenhauer,
159 Paul
sacred chronology, 83 Crüger, Peter (1580–1639), 66
secular chronology, 12 Crypto-Calvinism, 23
Church Fathers Currency (coinage)
and chiliastic heresy, 109, 133 and inflation, 31
expectations of, 99, 110, 133 regulation of, 93
Church inspections/inspectors, 73 Cussovius, Joachim (fl. 1596–1632), 142, 144,
Clerics 146, 150
accused of chiliastic heresy, 132, 185 as author of ‘Tuba propheciae’
dismissed from pastorates, 184 (ca. 1620), 143
as opponents of new prophets, 116 Cyprian (ca. 200–258CE), 129
and optimistic apocalyptic expectations,
105, 126, 151
Climate D
impact on agriculture, 31 Dacheröden, Caspar von (1585–1633), 139
impact on prophecy, xx Dahlenwarsleben, 69
and Little Ice Age, 31 Dallwitz, 75
Clüver, Johann (1593–1633), 164–166 Danckwerth, Peter (fl. 1624), 165
Coburg, 108 Danzig, xxv, 66, 70, 113, 118, 127, 129,
Cockaigne, 119 131–134, 136, 139, 151
Cognitive dissonance Darmstadt, 179
role in reaction to failed prophecy, Darre, Robert (f. 1601), 194
172, 173 Denck, Hans (1495–1527), 6
266 General Index
Denmark, 156 Erfurt, viii, 51, 53, 55, 140, 142, 149, 150, 178
Devil, x, 57, 71, 74, 101, 102, 165 Erfurt, University of, 53
See also Antichrist Erxleben, 61
Devotional literature Eschatology
in historiography, 120–121 and doctrine of last things, xii
relationship to chiliasm, xix individualistic doctrines of, 126, 178
relationship to optimistic apocalyptic relationship to apocalypticism,
expectations, 28, 31 173, 191, 192
See also Frömmigkeitswende Evans, R.J.W., 114
Dobricius, Johann (1576–1654), 58 Evil
Docemius, Johann (d. 1638), 143 as historical problem, xiii
Dresden, 34 as topos of apocalyptic rhetoric, 190
Dülmen, Richard van (1937–2004), 180 Exner, Balthasar (1576–1624), 62
Dury, John (ca. 1600–1680), 181
F
E Fabel, Hans (1616–in or after 1651), 181
Ecclesia spiritualis, 6 Fabricius, Jacob Jr. (1589–1645), 45,
Eckhart (ca. 1260–1328), 7 164–166
Egard, Paul (ca. 1578–1655), xix, xxiv, xxv, Facius, Caspar (1573–1646), 55
61, 153–155, 160, 161, 163, 164, Failed prophecy
167, 169 and character of Protestant eschatology, xii
Ehafft, Samuel pseud., 70 and cognitive dissonance, 172, 173
Ehinger, Elias (1573–1653), 30 impact on apocalyptic expectations, 172,
Ehrenstein, Schloß, 139 176, 178, 180, 183, 185, 192–194
See also Ohrdruf reactions of prophets, 177
Einsiedel, Abraham von (1571–1642), 69, 76 Famine
Eisleben, 87 and climate, 31
Elbe (river), 73 and inflation, 32, 79, 167
Elbing, 181 Faulhaber, Johann (1580–1635), 124
Elbląg, see Elbing Fauth, Dieter, xvi
Elert, Werner (1885–1954), 126 Feingold, Mordechai, 182
Elias Artista, see Elijah Felgenhauer, Paul (1593–1661), xxiv, 34,
Elijah, 11 38–42, 48, 53, 56, 57, 64, 65, 67, 71,
Elver, Leonhard (d. 1649), 50 78, 116, 124, 127, 145, 158, 161, 166,
Endkaiser, see Last Emperor 173, 177, 180, 181, 183, 191–194
Engelbrecht, Hans (1599–1642), 41, 125, 155, appearance of, 41
162, 165, 169, 173 Ferdinand I (1503–1564), 8
England, 13, 180, 181, 193 Ferdinand II of Styria (1578–1637), 32
Enns (river), 85 Festinger, Leon (1919–1989), 171, 172
Ennsdorf, 85 Ficino, Marsilio (1433–1499), 17
Eo, Wilhelm, see Neuheuser, Wilhelm Eo Fifth Monarchy and Fifth Monarchists, 86
Epistolary networks Figulus, Benedict (1567–1619?), 43, 98
and circulation of manuscripts, 60 Fludd, Robert (1574–1637), 77
as medium for transmission of books, Formula of Concord (1577), 19, 23, 103
63, 71 Forsius, Sigfrid Aron (1560–1624), 193
and printing projects, 60 Franck, Sebastian (1499–1543), 6, 7, 13, 15,
role of letters in scribal publications, 62, 141, 189
xi, 59–63 Francke, Johann, 69
Erasmi, Johannes Franckenberg, Abraham von (1593–1652), 181
and antitrinitarianism, 107 Franckists, see Franck, Sebastian
Erbauungsliteratur, see Devotional literature Frankenthal, 192
Erdmute Juliane of Gleichen (1587–1633), Frankfurt am Main, 5, 96
139, 148, 150 Frankfurt an der Oder, 143
General Index 267
Frankfurt an der Oder, University of Goldammer, Kurt (1916–1997), 8

(Viadrina), 143 Goldast, Melchior (1578–1635), 96, 97
Frantzius, Wolfgang (1564–1628), 39 Golden age, x–xiii, xxiv, 9, 14–17, 21, 30, 33,
Freyburger, Waremundus, see Seidenbecher, 35, 37, 40, 45, 47–51, 54, 57, 59, 73,
Georg Lorenz 74, 79–82, 84, 105, 109, 119, 121, 123,
Friedrich, Daniel (d. bef. 1610), 90 131, 150, 162, 171, 174, 177, 183, 191,
Friedrich I, Holy Roman Emperor 197
(1122–1190), 32 Golden Horns of Gallehus, 156
Friedrich I of Württemberg (1557–1608), 19 Görlitz, viii, 48, 50, 64, 193
Friedrich III of Saxony (1463–1525), 5 Gottorf, 164–166
Friedrich V of the Palatinate and I of Bohemia Graman, Georg (†1654), 139
(1596–1632), 33, 40, 57, 94, 98, 173 Grammendorf, Lorenz (ca. 1575–1650), 180
Friedwegen (fictional imprint), 71 Gray, John, 195
Frömmigkeitswende Great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn
and Johann Arndt, 22, 120 in 1603, 20, 29, 75, 89, 105
See also Devotional literature in 1623, x, xii, xxii, 29, 30, 52, 74, 80, 153,
Fürstenau, Kaspar von (1572–1649), 49 162, 177
of 1603, 84
Grebner, Paul (fl. ca. 1550–1590?), 13, 15,
G 18, 176
Galatino, Pietro (1460–1540), 17 Green, Jonathan, xxiii, 60
Galen (2nd century CE), 87 Gregory, Brad S., 195
Gallehus, 156 Grießmann, Valentin (d. 1639), ix, 55,
Gartamar, Sigmund (fl. 1524), 41 114, 145
Gdańsk, see Danzig Grünpeck, Joseph (1473–1532), 15, 47, 95
Gebhard, Heinrich alias Wesener (1578–1653), Gühler, Michael (1598–1655)
53–56, 145 as author of Clavis Apocalyptica, 182
Gebhardt Johann von Alvensleben Gustavus Adolphus (1594–1632), king of
(1576–1631), 61 Sweden
Gelassenheit, 6, 7, 47, 70, 74 impact of prophecy on actions, 125, 176
Génette, Gerard, 70 and prophecy of Lion of Midnight, 176
Georgijévic, Bartholomaeus (ca. 1506– Guttmann, Aegidus, 17, 185
ca.1566), 95 Gymnasium Schönaichianum, 62
Gera, 53
Gerhard, Johann (1582–1637), xiii, 25, 55, 56,
111, 112, 118, 133, 135, 189 H
Germanus, Johannes pseud, 145 Haase, Roland, xxi
Gießen, 26, 45 Habrecht, Isaac (1589–1633), 46
Gifftheil, Abraham (d. 1624), 179 Habsburgs, 34, 35, 39, 47, 96, 174
Gifftheil, Ludwig Friedrich (1595–1661), 194 Haimo of Auxerre (d. ca. 878CE), 4
apocalyptic expectations of, 61, 184 Halberstadt, 184
appearance of, 179 Halle an der Saale, 23, 41, 69, 113
Gifftheil, Ludwig Friedrich (1595–1661), 61 Hall, John R., xii, 173
Gilly, Carlos, vii, 10, 19, 52, 60, 197 Hamburg, 44, 50, 61, 115, 121, 122, 143, 155
Gladovius, Heinrich (fl. 1624), 166 Hamelin, pied piper of, 32
Glass, Solomon (1593–1656), 148–150 Hanau, 46
Gleichen, 139 Handewitt, 184
Glogau, 14, 62 H.Ar.No:R., 202
Gloger von Schwanbach, Gottfried Hartlib, Samuel (ca. 1600–1662), 181, 182
(fl. 1621–1630), 59 Hartprecht, Nicolaus (ca. 1585–ca. 1637), 51,
Głogów, see Glogau 54, 57, 128, 137, 139–142, 145,
Gnadenreich 147–151, 159, 169, 173
in work of Paul Egard, 161 Haslmayr, Adam (1562–ca. 1630), 33, 60, 61,
See also Kingdom of God 76, 200
268 General Index
Heaven, 20, 28–30, 43, 50, 74–76, 83, 86, 115, Hunnius, Ägidius (1550–1603), 104, 189
123, 125, 130, 147, 157, 158, 163, Hunnius, Nicolaus (1585–1643), 5, 115
168, 182 Huser, Johann (ca. 1545–ca.1601), 14
Heavens, Book of, 28 Hus, Jan (ca. 1369–1415), 33, 40
See also Astronomy; Book of nature Husum, 155, 165
Hebrew Hutwelcker, Rudolf (d. 1621), 90
and Christian kabbalism, 88 Hvolbek, Russell, xvi
Hecklingen, 144 Hynitsch, Erasmus (d. 1611), 69
Heidelberg, 13, 87, 200
Heinrich II von Reuß-Gera (1572–1635), 53
Helmstedt, 24, 132, 134, 136, 144 I
Henuriades de Verdun, Jan, 56 I.C.C.H, see Cussovius, Joachim
Heresy Illnesses
categories of, xiii impact on expectations, 79
and confessional identity, xii, xxi as metaphor for heresy, 115
definition of, 100 Imprints (false), 70
problematic nature of, 175 Inflation, 79, 93
See also Chiliasm See also Currency
Herlicius, David (ca. 1557–1636), 66 Inspiration, divine sources of, 85
Hermes Trismegistus, 88, 94 Irenaeus (140–202CE), 99
Hess, Tobias (1586–1614), 18, 19, 33, 60 Isselburg, 185
Heyden, Marx von der (1593–after 1648),
70, 90
Heylandt, Gottlieb, see Gebhard, Heinrich J
Hezech, Joseph, see Joseph, Paul Jablonewka, see Lichtenhagen
Hildegard of Bingen, 15 Jena, xiii, 24, 53, 55, 56, 111,
Hinckelmann, Benedikt (1588–1659), 61 132, 134–137
Hinckelmann, Peter (1571–1622), 61 Jena, University of, 139
Historia, 1, 52, 121, 122, 124, 139, 156, 161, Jennis, Lucas (1590–1630), 10, 70
192, 200, 202, 207–209 Jerome (347–420CE), 3, 4
See also Revelatio Jerusalem
Hoe von Hoenegg, Matthias (1580–1645), Heavenly Jerusalem, 13, 17, 20
35, 127 New Jerusalem, 4, 34, 40, 41, 65, 71, 76,
Hoffnung besserer Zeiten, see Spener, Philipp 85–88, 90, 91, 147, 171, 174, 180
Jakob Jesuits, 11, 128
Hogel, Zacharias (1574–1635), 150 Jesus (ca. 4BCE–30CE)
Hohenebra, 139, 147 as founder of ‘magical school, 17
Hohenstaufen dynasty, 32 Jews, 111
Holy Roman Empire, ix, xv, 10, 44, 45, 57, 67, and chiliastic heresy, 198
79, 86, 93, 97, 125, 127, 129, 145, 163, conversion of, 19, 45, 89, 185, 186, 198
169, 171, 184 Joachim of Fiore (c.1135–1202), 3–5, 13, 15,
Holy Spirit, ix, xi, xxiii, xxv, 3, 4, 6, 7, 11, 13, 20, 62
15, 17, 35, 82, 110, 120, 126, 129, 132, Johannes Capistranus (1386–1456), 62
142, 144, 146, 149, 155, 157, 158, Johann Georg I (1585–1656), 34
167–169, 183, 190 John of Patmos, 104
Holy United Roman Empire, see Neuheuser, Joris, David (1501–1556), 12
Wilhelm Eo Joseph, Paul (fl. 1611–1622), 138
Hope Jubilee, see Reformation Jubilee
as element of devotional literature, 153 Judaisers, 101, 106, 189
as motivation for optimistic Judgment Day, x, 2, 4, 27, 39, 48, 89, 91, 95,
apocalypticism, xxiv, xxv, 32 102, 105, 111, 119, 121, 123, 157,
Horologium Hussianum (1621), 41, 62, 194 161, 168
Hotson, Howard, vii, xiii, 29, 192 Jue, Jeffrey, xiii, 192
Hünefeldt, Andreas (1581–1666), 132 Justin (100–165CE), 99, 107, 131
General Index 269
K Last Judgment
Kabbalah, 15, 19 imminence of, x, 75, 121, 157, 189
See also Christian Kabbalism Lautensack, Paul (1478–1558), 10, 13, 27, 51,
Kaliningrad, see Königsberg 133, 135
Kamień Pomorski, see Cammin Law
Kärcher, Johann (fl. 1616–1630), 46–48, 56, reform of, 96
67, 124, 173, 204 Lay prophets, see Prophets
Karlsbad, 87 Lebenstedt, 104
Karlstadt von Bodenstein, Andreas Legnica, see Liegnitz
(1486–1541), 6 Lehmann, Hartmut, vii, 22, 178
Kassel, 20 Leipzig, 25, 56, 59, 76
Kaufmann, Thomas, xv Lenke, Nils, 61
Kaym, Paul (1571/2–1635), 49, 51–53, 56, 69, Leo–Saucius Redivivus (1625), 174
140, 145 Leppin, Volker, xx, 198
Kellingshusen, 153 Lerner, Robert, 4
Kepler, Johannes (1571–1630), 54, 66, 70, 204 Levi Christ, see Schäffer, Adrian
Kerner, Arnold (ca. 1590–in or after 1627), 41, Leyser, Polycarp Jr. (1586–1633), 26
59, 76, 78 Leyser, Polycarp Sr. (1552–1610), 34
Kesler, Andreas (1595–1643), 116 Libavius, Andreas (1550–1616), 108–113,
Key of David, 14, 18, 82 116, 126, 189
See also Golden Measure Lichtenberger, Johannes (1440–1503), 62, 95
Khunrath, Conrad (ca. 1555–1613), 88 Lichtenhagen, 105, 123
Khunrath, Heinrich (ca. 1560–1605), 25 Liegnitz, 49, 51, 140, 145
Kingdom of God Liegnitz Gymnasium, 51
in apocalyptic expectations, 64 Light
in eschatology, 121 in apocalyptic expectations, 144
spiritual, 137 as prophetic metaphor, 158, 167
worldly, 101, 130 Linck, Paul, 14–18, 20–22, 28, 32, 35, 135
Kipper und Wipper, see Inflation Linz, 85
Klenner, Zacharias (fl. 1626), 179 Lion of Midnight prophecy, 33, 95
Knowledge Little Ice Age, see Climate
biblical sources of, 63 Liturgical calendar, 168
increase in Last Days, 2, 108 Loifling, 14
Knuber, Johann pseud., 70 London, viii, 45, 51, 181, 194
Kober, Tobias (1587–1625), 50 Longolius, Michal (fl. 1610–1630), 193
Koch, Ernst, 55 Lower Silesia, 51, 59, 62, 147
Kolb, Friedrich, 179 Lübz, 41, 71, 114, 156, 190
Königsberg, 44, 105, 132, 134, 181 Ludwig, Nicolaus (1550–1617), 51
Kotter, Christoph (1585–1646), 34, 41, 49, 59, Lüneburg, 13, 50, 156
62, 63, 176 Lusatia, xvi, 35, 48, 50, 77, 147
Kress, Berthold, 10 Lutheranism
Krusicke, Joachim (fl. 1601–1620), 70 Lutheran confessional culture, vii, xi–xiii,
xv–xix, xxi–xxv, 2, 11, 18, 22, 53, 60,
71, 99–101, 103, 105, 113, 119, 125,
L 128, 137, 142, 151, 153, 161, 169, 172,
Landes, Richard, 173 173, 177, 178, 181, 183, 189–195,
Langensalza, 64, 114 197, 198
Last Days Lutheran doctrine, xii, xvi–xviii, xxi, xxv,
imminence of, x, 4, 15, 48, 75, 121, 23, 98, 99, 113, 116, 120, 141, 142,
157, 189 150, 173, 175, 185, 186, 190
search for knowledge of, 17, 21, 63 Luther, Martin (1483–1546), x, xi, xiv, 5, 23,
See also Last Judgment 32–34, 40, 43, 44, 78, 91, 101, 104,
Last Emperor prophecies, 20 105, 124, 149, 150
270 General Index
M Modernity
Magdeburg, ix, 23, 61, 69, 71, 113, 114, 128 and apocalypticism, xxv, 24, 172, 195
Maier, Michael (1568–1622), 62 and progress, 195
Maimonides (1135–1204), 101, 138 and Reformation of 1517, 159
Mamitzsch, Andreas (d. 1652), 69 and secularization, 195
Manresa, 85 Mohammed (571–632CE), 88, 141
Mansfeld, 87 Montanus, Johannes (1531–1604), 87
Manuscripts Montbéliard, 95
circulation of, xxiii, 59 Morsius, Joachim (1593–1642), 50, 61, 169
collections, 59, 62 Album amicorum of, 61
collectors, 69 as manuscript collector, 155
scribal publication of, 59 Mulsow, Martin, 182
Marburg, 87, 90, 91 Murase, Amadeo, 8, 14
Martin, James Perry, 126 Mysticism, 6
Matthäus, Burghard (d. 1600), 51 Mystics
Matthias I (1557–1619), 44 as influence on optimistic apocalyptic
Mauerkirchen, 9, 35, 40, 63, 84, 99, 146, 147, expectations, 7
177, 190 medieval works of, 4, 184
See also Anticlericalism
Mede, Joseph (1586–1639), xiv, 180, 192
Meder, David (1545–1616), 112 N
Meder, Paul, 146 Nachenmoser, Adam (fl. 1588), 13, 20, 21, 28,
Meisner, Balthasar (1587–1626), 55 35
Meissen, 58, 147 Nagel, Maria, 79
Melanchthon, Philipp (1497–1560), 34, 44, Nagel, Paul (ca. 1575–1624), xxv, 7, 12, 21,
62, 91, 102, 103, 141 26, 37, 41, 44, 46, 47, 49, 50, 54, 57,
Menzel, Abraham (d. 1637), 62 59, 62, 65–69, 73–84, 98, 110, 116,
Merck, Andreas (1595–1640), 113, 115, 147 119, 124, 127, 140, 141, 143, 147, 160,
Merian, Matthäus (1593–1650), 43, 69 166, 174, 184, 193
Messianism Napier, John (1550–1617), 57, 106, 124
in teachings of Esajas Stiefel, 84, 146 Narbuntowicz, Herbert, xxi
Metallurgy, 75, 87, 88 Nativities (astrological), 78
Meth, Ezechiel (1588–1640), 110, 114, 140, See also Astrology
146, 148 Natural Law
Methianer, see Meth, Ezechiel; Stiefel, Esajas in apocalyptic scenarios, 92, 93
Meyfart, Johann Matthäus (1590–1642), See also Law
178, 191 Nebra, 112
Michelsen, Andreas (d. 1627), 156 Netherlands, see United Provinces
Millenarianism Networks
in Calvinism, 192 epistolary networks, 59, 60, 175
in modern sociology, xiii interpersonal, 59, 63, 64
Millennium of Revelation 20 See also School of the Holy Spirit
fulfilled historically, 15, 57, 81, 102, 104, Neuheuser, Wilhelm Eo (fl. 1583–1626), xxiv,
106, 121, 141, 159 xxv, 7, 12, 67, 70, 73, 86–89, 91–98,
as a future time, x, 49, 54, 57, 81, 107, 110, 111, 173, 180
102–106, 110, 145, 159, 160, 180, 192 Neustadt (fictional imprint), 70
as the present, 15, 92, 121, 169 See also Imprints
Mini-Millennium, 4, 7, 13, 16, 28, 35, 50, 122 New evangelists, 122, 166, 167
See also Refreshment of the Saints New Jerusalem, 34, 40, 41, 71, 147, 171, 174
Miracles, 38 See also Jerusalem
Miraculous events New prophets, ix, 13, 28, 38, 39, 44, 70, 71,
comets, 28 73, 95, 100, 104, 110, 116, 122, 124,
new stars, 28, 29 127, 158, 160, 166, 177, 190
prodigies, 28 New reformation, see Reformations
General Index 271
New world, see America Penance, 39, 79, 121, 130, 146, 168, 177,
Nicholas of Lyra (1270–1349), 123 179, 192
Nicolai, Melchior (1578–1659), 179 See also Practical Christianity
Nicolai, Philipp (1556–1608), 54, 77, Penot, Bernard Gilles (1519–1617), 25
121–124, 141, 156, 161, 162, 169, Perfection, 93, 109, 147, 182
177, 192 See also Reformation
Noah, x, 86, 124 Permeier, Johann (1597–ca. 1644)
Noah’s flood, 157 and Arndt’s Postilla, 181
Nortorf, Holstein, xix, 61, 151, 153–157, 164 and epistolary networks, 59, 60,
N.T.H., see Teting, Nicolaus 175, 180
Nuremberg, viii, 4, 10, 13, 18, 44, 87, 98, 113, Pessimistic apocalyptic expectations
137–139, 147 conservative influence of, xx
in Lutheran confessional culture, xxi, 75,
102, 109, 160
O Philosophers’ stone, 138
Ohrdruf, 139, 140, 148, 150 See also Alchemy
O’Leary, Stephen, 99, 190 Photinians/Photinianism, 146, 190
Optimistic apocalyptic expectations Pietism, xix, 173, 186, 194
condemned as chiliasm, 119 and chiliastic heresy, xviii, xix
place in Lutheran confessional culture, ix, and Hoffnung besserer Zeiten,
xii, xiii, xix–xxi, xxiii, xxv, 2, 60, 71, xviii, 186, 191
99, 137, 142, 151, 172, 189, 192, Piety
197, 198 and apocalyptic expectations, 84
See also Pessimistic apocalyptic practices of, 84
expectations Piscator, Johann (1546–1625), 180
Osiander, Andreas (1498–1552), 4, 5, 8, 10, 14 Piscator, Johann pseud., 71
Osiander, Lucas Jr. (1571–1638), 122, Plaustrarius, Johann, see Kärcher, Johann
167, 179 Plötzkau, 75, 79, 144
Oswald, Johann, 95 Podewils, Dionysius von (1590–1647), 166
Ottoman Empire Poetry
in apocalyptic prophecy, 141 occassional poetry, 14
Long War (1593–1606), 88 Pohlig, Matthias, xx
prophesied defeat of, 88 Political prophecy, 32
See also Prophecy
Posen, 138
P Posnán, see Posen
Pandora’s Box, 166 Postel, Guillaume (1510–1581), 11–13, 15–18,
Panorthosia, 181 20, 25, 28, 35, 40, 77, 92, 107, 130,
See also Comenius 189, 194
Pansophy/Pansophism, viii, 181 Poyssel, Eustachius, 14, 17, 21, 28, 34, 35, 39,
Papias (70–163CE), xiii, 99, 130, 133, 135 40, 47, 57, 77, 82, 107, 130
Paracelsians, ix, xvi, xxiv, 18, 20, 21, 23, 26, Practical Christianity
33, 45, 46, 48, 61, 75, 82, 94, 98, 115, meditation, 177
139, 142, 146, 150, 198 penance, 24, 39, 79, 121, 130, 146,
Paracelsus (1493–1541), xi, 7–11, 13–15, 17, 168, 177
18, 20, 21, 28, 54, 59, 61, 63, 73, 109, prayer, 24, 121, 130, 146, 177
111, 121, 163 Praetorius, Stephan (1536–1603), 121, 177
See also Paracelsians Prague, viii, 33, 34, 40, 41, 171
Pareus, David (1548–1622), 44 Prayer, 17, 24, 85, 121, 130, 141, 146, 161,
Paris, 11 168, 177, 192
Partlicius, Simon (1588–1640), 193 Pregitzer, Johann Ulrich (1577–1646), 179
Peace Pregnancy
as expectation of optimistic miraculous, 148, 149, 173
apocalypticists, 53 prophecies of, 148
Pedagogy, 44, 198 pseudocyesis, 148
272 General Index
Preus, Robert D. (1924–1995), 125 biblical, 9, 44, 47

Prince of peace, 148 as doctrine of Christian spiritualism, 157
Printing in teachings of new prophets, 9, 47
books, xxii, xxiii Reeves, Marjorie (1905–2003), 8
censorship, 65, 69, 115 Reformation Jubilee of 1617, 34
See also Publishing Reformations
Progress, narratives of Counter Reformation, 125
and apocalypticism, 195 general reformation, 19, 20, 45, 52, 109,
and modernity, 195 125, 177, 181–183
and secularization, 195 New Reformation, xi, 50, 125
Prophecy and prophecies reformatio mundi, xxi
for 1612, 18, 60, 76, 107 Reformation of 1517, 159
for 1613, 18, 76, 107 Second Reformation, 16
for 1623, 40, 95, 175 universal reformation, 14, 20, 71, 95
failed prophecy, 171–187 Refreshment of the Saints, 3, 4, 54, 124,
of Fifth Monarchy, 86 160, 189
of Last Emperor, 20, 32, 33 Rehefeldt, Johann (1590–1648), 50
of Lion of Midnight, 33, 57, 61, 95, Relinger, Johann Carl, 43
125, 176 Rendsburg, 154
as media phenomenon, xxiii Reuchlin, Johannes (1455–1522), 15, 18
medieval, xi, 2, 3, 5, 7, 20, 28, 50, 106 Reuß, 53, 55
Sibylline, 5, 32 Revelatio, 52
Prophets See also Historia
appearance of, 14 Rhambau, Johann (1563–1634), 64
as cause of contemporary troubles, 1, 3, Rhetoric
33, 69, 95, 105, 141, 150, 160 place in apocalyptic discourse,
and chiliastic heresy, 190 99, 167, 190
and conspiracy, 114 topoi, 99
Pseudocyesis, see Pregnancy Ribeauvillé, see Rappoltsweiler
Pseudonyms, 40, 46, 53, 55, 56, 79, 174, 183 Richter, Gregor (1560–1624), 50
Pseudo-Paracelsus, see Paracelsus Riecken, Henry W. (1917–2012), 171
Pseudo-Weigel, see Weigel, Valentin Rosencreutz, Christian, 19, 20
Publishing, 25, 69, 156, 157, 181 Rosicrucian Fraternity, 20, 21, 43, 54, 76, 107,
print publication, 59 109, 110, 112, 114, 140, 156
scribal publication, xi, xxii, xxiv, 10, Rosicrucian manifestos
59–64, 68, 71, 103, 198 Confessio Fraternitatis, 20, 47, 109
See also Books, manuscripts Fama Fraternitatis, 18, 21, 43, 47, 60, 76,
Purianer, see Meth, Ezechiel; Stiefel, Esajas 95, 107, 109
Pursell, Brennan, 33 Röslin, Helisäus (1544–1616), 1, 12, 57, 58,
Puschwitz, 38 61, 96
Pyrmont, 143 Rost, Georg (1582–1629), 41, 69, 71, 85, 114,
116, 119, 121, 145, 156, 166, 175, 190
Rostock, 61, 67, 110, 122, 124, 128, 153, 156,
R 164–166
Radical reformation, 6, 7 Rudbeck, Johannes (1581–1646), 193
Rahtmann, Hermann (1585–1628), xxv, 118, Rudolf II (1552–1612), 33
127–137, 139, 151, 153, 161, 162, 166,
169, 175, 177, 182, 183, 190, 192, 198
Rahtmannischer Streit, see Rahtmann, S
Hermann Savonarola, Girolamo (1452–1498), 13
Rappoltsweiler, 186 Saxony, 5, 34, 39, 57, 79
Ratke, Wolfgang (1571–1635), 44, 96, 140 as inspiration for political prophecy, 32
Ratzeburg, 128 and political papism, 34, 57
Rebirth protestant reactions to, 34, 35
General Index 273
Scandinavia, 45, 193 Spener, Philipp Jakob (1635–1705),

Schachter, Stanley (1922–1997), 171 xviii, 186, 191
Schäffer, Adrian (d. 1654), 147 Sperber, Julius (ca. 1540–ca. 1610), 16–18,
Schilling, Heinz, xv 21, 22, 27, 28, 35, 51, 73, 77, 80, 127
Schindler, Johann (1613–1682), 185 Speyer, 87, 93
Schlaraffenland, 119 Sprottau, 20, 62, 176
Schleiff, Arnold (1911–1945), xvi Starck, Christoph (1684–1744), 186
Schleswig, Duchy of, 31 Staricius, Johann (fl. 1580–after 1624), 61, 62
Schmidt, Erasmus (1570–1637), 38, 40, 54 Stary Zawidów, see Alt-Seidenberg
Schönaich, Georg Freiherr von Staupitz, Johann von (1420–1524), 6
(1557–1619), 62 Steinbrücken, 139
Schönaich, Johannes von (d. 1639), 62 Stenger, Johann Melchior (1638–1710), 185
School of the Holy Spirit, xxiii, 37–71, 80, 83 Stern, Heinrich (1592–1665), 156
Schoppe, Andreas (1538–1614), 104, 105, 141 Stern, Johann (1582–1656), 156
Schubart, Matthias (fl. 1620–1622), 58 Stettin, xiii, 67, 106, 109
Schwäbisch Gmünd, 87 Steyr, viii, 85–87
Schweinhaus, 179 Stiefel, Esajas (1561–1627), 46, 50, 64, 76,
Schwenckfelders, 26, 43, 90, 93 84, 114, 146–150
Schwenkfeld von Ossig, Caspar (ca. 1489– Stifel, Michael (1487–1567), 107, 148
1561), 6 Straßburg, 13, 24, 43, 70, 87, 89, 90, 98
See also Schwenckfelders Strasbourg, see Straßburg
Scriptura Malachim, 81 Striegau, 87
Scripture, see Bible Strzegom, 87
Secularization Studion, Simon (1543–ca.1605), 17–21, 35
and apocalypticism, 195 Styria, 33, 85
and progress, 195 Sudermann, Daniel (1550–ca.1631), 89, 90
Seculum spiritus sancti, see Golden age Supernova
Seehausen, 38 of 1572, x, 1
Seidenbecher, Georg Lorenz (1623–1666), of 1604, 30
183, 185 See also Astronomy
Selnecker, Nicolaus (1530–1592), 54 Sweden, 144, 193
Serrarius, Petrus (ca. 1600–1669), 183 Świny, see Schweinhaus
Sibyls, 5, 108 Switzerland, 43, 147
Siebmacher, Johann, 138 Szczecin, see Stettin
Siebmacher, Wolfgang (1572–1632), 128, 137 Szprotawa, see Sprottau
Siedlisko, see Carolath-Beuthen
Slack, Paul, 182
Social conditions T
influence of, xx, 4, 75 Talmud, 91
role in prompting apocalyptic expectations, Tarnow, Paul (1562–1633), 122, 156, 166, 167
xiii Taube, Jacob (fl.1668), 185
Social discipline, xv, xx Tauler, Johannes (ca. 1300–1361), 6, 15, 17,
Societas Regalis Christi, see Permeier, Johann 51, 184
Sola scriptura, 7, 190 Tertullian (160–220CE), xiii, 99, 129
Sondershausen, 139, 142, 143, 146, 148, 149 Teting, Nicolaus (c.1590–c.1642), 155, 163,
Sonnenschein, Paul, see Nagel, Paul 165, 169
Sorbonne, 11 Thalebra, 51, 139, 150
Soteriology Theobald, Zacharias (1584–1627), 113
and eschatology, xxv, 126 Theologia Deutsch, see Tauler, Johannes
in Lutheranism, xxv Theophilus, Christianus pseud.? (fl. 1620),
Spaignart, Christian Gilbertus de (d. 1635), 7, 58
65, 114, 115 Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648), x, xx, xxi,
Spalchaver, Daniel (d. 1651), 110 30, 32, 54, 74, 78, 115, 150, 175, 179,
Sparn, Walter, xx 183, 191
274 General Index
Tholuck, August (1799–1807), 64 Wallenberger, Valentin (1582–1639), 114

Thomas a Kempis (ca. 1380–1471), 25 Wallmann, Johannes, vii, xviii, xix, 103, 122,
Thumm, Theodor (1586–1630), 122 183, 192, 194
Tieffenau bei Wülknitz, 76 Walther, Balthasar (d. ca. 1631), 50, 61, 76,
Tilner, Jakob (fl. 1613), 58 77, 140
Time Wegweiser, Uldriacus pseud., 67
apocalyptic time, 98 Weiß, Ulman, 146
collective synchronic time, 173 Weichart, Christoph (fl. 1576–after 1604),
temporal hothouse, 173 23, 194
as topos of apocalyptic rhetoric, 190 Weigelianism, 190
Torgau, 41, 49, 73–77, 79, 84, 174 Weigelians, 94, 167, 113, 144, 146, 190
Trapp, Pantel (d. 1637), 26, 180 See also Weigel, Valentin
Trithemius, Johann (1462–1516), 15 Weigel, Valentin (1533–1588), xvi, 5, 7, 10,
True Christianity, 22, 27, 34, 53, 63, 71, 74, 12, 16, 22–28, 38, 59, 65, 67, 70, 73,
122, 155, 162, 163, 169 76, 80, 83, 85, 95, 107, 110, 111, 116,
place in optimistic apocalypticism, 25, 63 121, 135, 154, 157, 162, 166, 184, 192,
and practical Christianity, 25, 42, 49, 50, 194
123, 153, 165, 173, 192 Wels, Volkhard, 21
See also Arndt, Johann Wenigentennstedt, 149
Trunz, Erich (1905–2001), 178 Werdenhagen, Johann Angelius (1581–1652),
Tschesch, Johann Theodor von (1595–1649), 25, 61, 155, 165, 169
177, 181 Werner, Johannes (1468–1522), 44
Tübingen, viii, xvi, 17–19, 64, 66, 103, 111, Wernigerode, 141
114, 115, 122, 144 Wesener, Heinrich, see Gebhard, Heinrich
Turks Wetterau, 87
prayers against (Turkgebete), 85 White Mountain, battle of, 34
prophesied defeat of, 123, 142 Widemann, Carl (1568–1638), 60, 61,
See also Ottoman Empire 156, 198
Wild, Eberhard (1588–ca. 1635), xvi, 64, 66,
67, 114, 144
U Winter, Johann (fl. 1624), 166
United Provinces, 13, 42, 45, 175, 184, 193 Wittenberg, 23, 24, 38, 56, 65, 74, 78, 93, 114,
Unterneubrunn, 183 119, 124, 132, 134–136, 160, 190
Upper Lusatia, 48, 59 Wittenberg, University of, 53, 104, 115,
Urbinensis, Valesius Minymus, 58 118, 190
Wolther, Johann (fl. 1605–1623), 105, 123,
124, 141, 183, 189
V World week
Västerås, 193 as element of apocalyptic expectations, 91
Venice, 13 as periodisation, 91
Visions role in chronological reckonings, 92
as audient experience, 86 Wotschke, Theodor (1871–1939), 180
role in apocalypticism, xxv, 9, 17, 50, 86, Wrocław, see Breslau
171, 177 Württemberg, 1, 17, 19, 33, 178, 179
Viskolcz, Noémi, 180 Würzburg, 42
Vives, Juan Luis (1493–1540), 133, 135
Vogt, Johann (d. 1626), 156
Z
Zeitz, 14
W Zeller, Winfried, 22, 120
Wählitz, ix, 114 Zerbst, 60
Waldeck, 144 Zgorzelec, see Görlitz
General Index 275
Ziegler, Philipp (fl. ca. 1580–ca. 1626), 21, 37, Zürich, 46

39, 42–46, 56, 61, 71, 92, 144, 145, Zwinger, Theodor (1533–1588), 25
173, 193 Zwingli, Huldrych (1484–1531), xxi, 89, 91,
Zittau, viii, 58 93, 95, 97
Zschopau, xvi, 23 Zwinglianism, 7, 90
Zuber, Mike A., 184 Zwolle, 184

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Leigh

Hope and Heresy

ISBN 978-94-024-1699-2 ISBN 978-94-024-1701-2 (eBook)

© Springer Nature B.V. 2019

standing of the revelation of world history as standing before a final confrontation

quasi-millenarian and semi-millenarian strains of expectation—are essential for

as ‘opponents without’ (äußere Gegner). Instead, they were recognized as ‘strang-

Untersuchungen (Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1952); Pentti Laasonen, ‘Chiliastische Strömungen

ments on chiliasm authored by Lutheran theologians during the period, Wallmann

alization, as well as calling attention to the pluralities of experience possible in early

Fig. 1 Printed works concerning optimistic Apocalypticism, 1600–1630

comparatively late voicing of opposition to the growing expression of these ideas by

Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2012), 1.

s­ upported and underwritten by the circulation of scribal publications. As the bibli-

1 The Three Mirrors �������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 1

4 Optimism Outlawed������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 99

Index of Scriptural Passages ������������������������������������������������������������������������ 261

Fig. 1 Printed works concerning optimistic Apocalypticism,

In 1579 Helisäus Röslin (1544–1616), son of a Lutheran pastor in Württemberg,

© Springer Nature B.V. 2019 1

churches). Each volume would therefore be dedicated to explicating the providen-

The Mirror of Belief – Kirchen Spiegel

After undertaking a thorough study of biblical chronology, Jerome concluded that it

status of these expectations ‘the traditional medieval conception of a short triumph

The Eschatology of Paracelsus and His Followers

Optimistic apocalyptic expectations circulated in sixteenth century Lutheranism in

that would become enormously influential among Lutherans. As Amadeo Murase

that the physician circulated in manuscript. According to Carlos Gilly, Paracelsus

explications of Revelation alongside a pseudo-Weigelian commentary.55 It is diffi-

then a private tutor, experienced an epiphany as he walked through the streets of

lated several influential prophecies in manuscript, such as his Blutfahnen, which

Linck’s reliance on ‘kabbalistic’ methods—whatever these may have been—reflects

Linck’s apocalypticism was echoed in the works of one of his contemporaries,

and Grebner. In a letter to Tobias Hess (1586–1614) in Tübingen, Studion com-

The Rosicrucian Brotherhood

Studion, and corresponded with him concerning apocalyptic prophecy.108 In his

Devotional Authors in search of Certainty

The search for an apocalyptic certainty is mirrored in another contemporary devel-

likely written in collaboration with Biedermann, made clear.133 Weigel stressed a

Paracelsus’ natural philosophical works.147 Arndt was aware of the controversial

Colloquium Rhodo-Stauroticum (1621), Arndt’s Wahres Christenthum was recom-

The Mirror of Nature – Natur Spiegel

deliberately circulating devalued coins.181 At the end of 1621, Emperor Ferdinand II

The Mirror of Worldly Affairs – Welt Spiegel

Political prophecy has long been a mainstay of European eschatological traditions.

(1580–1645), staunchly defended Saxony’s allegiance to the Habsburgs during the

Between 1600 and 1630 Lutheran confessional culture experienced a dramatic

© Springer Nature B.V. 2019 37

one).3 Many of these individuals were condemned by their theological opponents as

The prophetic trajectory of the German-Bohemian Paul Felgenhauer mirrors that of

Wittenberg’s castle church. Following a recommendation by the university provost

decided to abandon his prophecies of a worldly godly kingdom altogether.26 After

Gelassenheit––and the coming rebirth from an Adamic state that would soon to be

As mentioned above, one of Böhme’s correspondents who also cleaved to optimistic

another several years, as a manuscript work of 1627 attests.91 However, shortly

Heinrich Gebhard alias Wesener

prompted him to investigate eschatological doctrines, nor any evidence of existen-

of theologians at Jena and Leipzig. The reports of 1628 ultimately condemned

Some Minor Prophets

s upported and underwritten by the circulation of scribal publications. As the bibli-

1 The Three Mirrors �� 1

4 Optimism Outlawed�� 99

Index of Scriptural Passages �� 261

The Mirror of Belief – Kirchen Spiegel

The Eschatology of Paracelsus and His Followers

The Rosicrucian Brotherhood

Devotional Authors in search of Certainty

The Mirror of Nature – Natur Spiegel

The Mirror of Worldly Affairs – Welt Spiegel

Heinrich Gebhard alias Wesener

Some Minor Prophets

Scribal Publication and Manuscript Collectors

The Reach of Printed Books

The Prophet of Torgau

The Universal Instrument

The Role of Hope

A Prophet Between Utopia and New Jerusalem

The Seven Laws of the Holy United Roman Empire

The Reception of Neuheuser’s Works

The Doctrinal Position

The Creation of a Heresy

The Changing Status of Lutheran Devotional Literature

In addition to the circulation of conflicting definitions, another unexpected by-

The Rahtmann Dispute

The Opinions of the Theological Faculties

The Pastor of Nuremberg

J oachim Cussovius and the Reception of Hartprecht’s Tuba

The Messianic Turn

Posaune der Göttlichen Gnade und Liechtes (1623)

chronology, the key element in Egard’s interpretation of the crucial verses of