The Dreadful History and Judgement of God on Thomas Müntzer

In this brilliant work of historical excavation, Andrew Drummond charts the life and work of Thomas Müntzer, the man Martin Luther proclaimed a Ravening Wolf and a False Prophet. Despite his short life—he died on the executioner’s block in 1525 at thirty-five—Müntzer sought to fundamentally upend German society.

Omnia sunt communia, all things are to be held in common, proclaimed Thomas Müntzer at the head of the massed ranks of a peasant army in the year 1525. Ranged against him: the might of the princes of the German Nation. But how did Müntzer, the son of a coin-maker from central Germany, rise in just a few short years to become one of the most feared revolutionaries in early modern Europe, striking terror into the hearts of the religious and political establishment?

Far from the bloodthirsty devil of legend, Drummond shows us Müntzer as a man, one of considerable learning and principle, deeply sympathetic to the misery of the peasantry and the poor. Seeking to save Müntzer from the condescension of history, Drummond guides us through the religious and political disputes of the Reformation, placing his life and thought in the context of those turbulent years. In doing so, we get a portrait of an often contradictory, but always radical figure, one who continues to inspire movements of the poor across the globe.