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Chiliasm and the Hussite Revolution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Howard Kaminsky
Howard Kaminsky
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
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“… non estimemus fabulam illam quasi veram, quam quidam dicunt, quod instabit seculum bonum, in quo nullus erit malorum, et quod nihil paciantur, sed gaudio ineffabili sint prediti.” (From a Taborite commentary on Apocalypse, c. 1425.)

In the years following John Hus' martyrdom the movement he had led developed from a Prague University reform movement into a national reformation. Ideas that had formerly existed as topics for discussion among university intellectuals were established as actual religious practice among large groups of people, of all estates and with widely varying interests and viewpoints. As each such group entered the national movement it necessarily contributed its own viewpoint, with the result that every extension of the reform involved almost as many difficulties for the Hussites as for the Catholics. Of course there had always been differences among the university masters themselves, the inevitable conservative-radical dichotomy based ultimately on differences of spiritual temperament that exist within any group. But far more significant was the social polarization that took form as the concept of reform held by the upper estates was opposed by programs deriving from the point of view of artisans, peasants, and “the poor.”

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , March 1957 , pp. 43 - 71
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1957

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References

1. The following introduction is based on the author's “Hussite Radicalism and the Origins of Tabor. 1415–1418,” Medievalia et Humanistica, X (1956), 102ffGoogle Scholar, and on an unpublished study of the events of 1419. The general background and sequence of events of the period covered by the present paper can be studied in Heymann's, F.Žižka and the Hussite Revolution (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1955)—hereafter cited as “Heymann.”Google Scholar

2. The sectarian ideas amounted to the rejection of all doctrines and rites not stipulated as necessary by the New Testament. Rejected were, specifically, the cult of saints, holy images, the complexities and lavishness of massritual, the doctrine of Purgatory and the consequent works for the dead, the doctrinal and ecclesiastical authority of the Roman hierarchy, the holding of property or regular reception of income, in any form, by the clergy. The sacramental acts of sinful priests were regarded as invalid.

3. The mountain is not so named in the Bible but only in a tradition dating from the fourth century. Cf. the sermon on Matt, , xxviii, 16Google Scholar, preached by the Prague radical John Želivský on 21 April 1419 [ed. Molnár, A., Jan Želivský. Dochovaná kázání z roku 1419, I (Prague: Czechoslovakian Academy, 1953), 43].Google ScholarSylvius, Aeneas, Historia Bohemica (Helmstadt: J. Sustermann, 1699)Google Scholar, ch. xl, also cites the tradition as the source of Tabor's name. Cf. also Judges iv, 6ff.

4. Master Laurence of Březová, “Hussite Chronicle” (in Latin), ed. Goll, J., Fontes rerum Bohemicarum, V (Prague, 1893), 351f.Google Scholar (this work hereafter cited as “Laurence of Březoyá”). Laurence's chronicle is extremely reliable and is the basic narrative source for the period under discussion.

5. See Heymann, , p. 105ff.Google Scholar

6. Laurence of Březová, p. 357Google Scholar (an entry for January–February 1420).

7. On 10 February 1420 Sigismund named Plzeň, Písek, and Hradec Králové as centers of Wyclyfite resistance (Urkundliche Beiträge zur Geschichte des Hussitenkriegs, I, ed. Palacký, F. (Prague: Tempský, 1873), 15–17).Google Scholar The name of Klatovy, near Plzeň, is added in an anonymous news report (Ibid., p. 24). Cf. also the source presented by Bernt, A., “Ein deutsehes Hussiten-paternoster aus dem Stifte Hohenfurt,” Mitteilungen des Vereins für Geschichte der Deutschen in Böhmen, XXXIX (1901), 320Google Scholar, which names Žatec as a center of resistance. The chiliasts at one point urged people to flee to Žatec, Lonny, and Slaný (see note 9 below); these towns may therefore have maintained resistance during the whole period after the November truce.

8. P. 355f. The second paragraph obviously recapitulates and amplifies the first, and may therefore have been a later insertion. Laurence's dating is confirmed beyond reasonable doubt by the fact that the only exactly dated source for the early phase of the chiliast movement, an anti-chiliast letter, was written on 22 January [ed. Bartoš, F. M. “Z dějin chiliasmu r. 1420,” Do čtyř pražských artykulů (Prague, 1925), p. 97].Google Scholar

9. The idea that five cities would endure through the Day of Wrath was based on Isaiah, xix, 18.Google Scholar No chiliast text we know names five Bohemian cities, and we know indeed that at first the cities were not named: the resultant confusion in the minds of the faithful was noted in a rescript issued by the Prague masters Jakoubek of Stříbro and Christian of Prachatice, probably written sometime in January 1420 (ed. Goll, J., Quellen und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der Böhmischen Brüder, II (Prague: Otto, 1882), 52–53Google Scholar (hereafter cited as “Goll”). The naming of the cities, presumably all pro-chiliast, cannot have been in vogue after Plzeň's surrender to the royalists, on 20 March 1420. On the other hand, the omission of Písek, an important Taborite city, suggests that the list had only a secondary significance.

10. Ed. Nejedlý, Z., Dějiny husitského zpévu za válek husitských (Prague, 1913), p. 800f.Google Scholar (in Czech). Nejedlý, associates it with the early congregations, in the spring and summer of 1419 (p. 198), but only on the basis of content, and in my reconstruction of Taborite history the content fits early 1420 much better.

11. Ed. Palacký, F., Archiv český, VI (Prague, 1872), 43f. (in Czech).Google Scholar

12. Jakoubek, writing at about this time, noted that “unus spiritus prophetat, quod rex Babilonis id est rex Ungarie … destruet Babilonem id est Pragam” (Goll, , II, 58); later, however, the chiliasts preached “quod iam nunc in hoc anno ulcionis Pragensis civitas velut Babilon debet destrui et comburi per fideles”Google Scholar (Laurence of Březová, p. 455).Google Scholar Cf. also Master John Příbram's Život kněží táborských (“The Story of the Taborite Priests”), ed. Macek, J., Ktož jsú boží bojovníci (Prague: Melantrich, 1951), p. 263Google Scholar henceforth cited as “Život”). In his Czech commentary on the Apocalypse [ed. Šimek, F., Jakoubek ze Stříbra: Výklad na Zjevenie Sv. Jana, I (Prague, 1932), p. 528]Google Scholar, Jakoubek noted that the “blasphemous cry” was raised in Prague: “Flee quickly from Prague—only on the mountains is there salvation and liberation;” elsewhere he accused the Taborite Master John of Jičín of having written to the Praguers, especially to the women, urging them to leave the city (Goll, , II, 60). The biblical idea of fleeing Babylon and taking refuge on the mountains was not new to the Bohemian reformers of all parties, but it had previously been understood symbolically.Google Scholar

13. Taken respectively from the rescript of Jakoubek and Christian of Prachatice, Goll, , II, 51–53; a letter from Jakoubek to an unnamed non-chiliast priestGoogle Scholar, Goll, , II, 57–59;Google Scholar this letter again; a University rescript of February 17, 1420, ed. Bartoš, F. M., “Z dějin chiliasmu,” pp. 97–100.Google Scholar All in Latin.

14. Ed. Palacký, F., Archiv český, VI, 41–43 (in Czech);Google Scholar I have emphasized key points.

15. The quote seems to come from Jakoubek's letter, Goll, , II, 58.Google Scholar

16. Goll, , II, 60; the letter notes that the chiliasts had set a day between February 10 and 14 for the coming Day of Wrath. Master John Příbram compared the Taborite switch from pacifism to violence with the haphazard flight of grasshoppersGoogle Scholar (De ritibus missae, apud K. Höfler, Geschichtschreiber der husitischen Bewegung in Böhmen, II, Fontes rerum Austriacarum, I. Abt., Bd. VI (1865), 531Google Scholar —hereafter cited as “Höfler”).

17. Chelčický, Petr, O boji duchovním, ed. Krofta, K. (Prague: Otto, 1911), p. 27f.Google Scholar See Spinka, M., “Peter Cherčický, the Spiritual Father of the Unitas Fratrum,” Church History, XII (1943), 271–291;CrossRefGoogle Scholar Spinka regards it as almost certain that Chelčický was influenced by the Waldenses (p. 274).

18. See his O trojím lidu (“On the Triple Division of Society”), ed. Krofta, , op. cit., p. 155ff. and passim.Google Scholar

19. The evidence, some of which has already been noted, consists of the letters and rescripts addressed by the Prague masters to those who had asked their advice. The surviving letters were probably all written by Master Jakoubek; they include: (1) a letter to non-chiliast priests in general, January 22, 1420 (ed. Bartoš, F., “Z dějin chiliasmu,” p. 97);Google Scholar (2) a letter to an anonymous non-chiliast priest (Goll, , II, 57–59); (3) a letter to the chiliast Master John of JičínGoogle Scholar (Goll, , II, 59–60). Of the rescripts two survive. In one case two priests, a Nicholas and a Wenceslas, had disputed the points summarized in the text below and had agreed, “before a large number of people” to abide by the decision of the masters Jakoubek of Stříbro and Christian of Prachatice, which decision survivesGoogle Scholar (Goll, , II, 51–53). The other rescript, anonymous but dated February 17, 1420, is addressed to a “nobilis Domine, zelator legis Christi precipue” and answers the questions whether the faithful might congregate and whether the “secular estates” might fight for the Hussite cause (ed. Bartoš, “Z děejin chiliasmu,” pp. 97–100). On the assumption that the rescripts were addressed to Taborites, scholars have tried to identify Nicholas and Wenceslas and the noble lord; I believe the assumption to be flimsy and the identities of the recipients immovably lodged in obscurity (but cf.Google ScholarHeymann, , p. 89).Google Scholar The quotes that follow are drawn chiefly from the first rescript.

20. Goll, , II, 52–53.Google Scholar

21. The rescript of February 17, ed. Bartoš, op. cit., p. 99.Google Scholar

22. Of the four chiliast priests named as most prominent by Laurence of Březová, two, Koranda and Markolt, are known to have been in Plzeň (see p. 59 above).

23. Život, p. 266.Google Scholar Cf. also p. 275f.

24. Staří letopisové č6ští, (“Old Czech Annalists”), ed. Palacký, F., Scriptores rerum Bohemicarum, III (Prague, 1829), 29–30Google Scholar (henceforth cited as “OCA”).

25. The main body of the local Taborites captured Ústí on February 21, 1420 (see below), and had presumably been expelled some time before that date; a turbulent history of mutual expulsions by the various parties in Ústí is suggested by one source, OCA, p. 471f.Google Scholar, which is unfortunately telescoped and hence not clear. See Heymann, , p. 87.Google Scholar

26. For Písek radicalism in 1416 see Macek, J., Tábor v husitkém revolučním hnutí, I (Prague: Czechoslovakian Academy, 1952), 216.Google ScholarLaurence of Březová, p. 347Google Scholar, tells of the destruction of the Dominican monastery there by the Hussites on August 20, 1419. A special study of the “Beginnings of Taboritism in Písek” has been published by Macek, J. [“K počátkům táborství v Písku,” Jihočeský sborník historický, XX (1953), 113ff.]Google Scholar but is unavailable in this country; some at least of its main contributions are included in Macek's books on Tabor, which I have used and cited.

27. Jakoubek argued that salvation was not to be expected on the basis merely of a man's being in Plzeň or Písek rather than in Prague (Goll, , II, 58).Google Scholar

28. See note 7 above.

29. Život, p. 264fGoogle Scholar.

30. This difficult passage reads in the original, “.… a tomu zběhlému lidu k sobě na hory v městě Piesetským k´zali a ustavili. …”

31. Louda had taken minor orders, studied at the Prague University, and been a notary. In the Hussite revolution, however, he emerged as a political leader [see Macek, , Tábor v husitském revolučním hnutí, II (Prague: Czechoslovakian Academy, 1955), 78f].Google Scholar It has been argued that Louda was with Žižka in Plzeň. [F. M. Bartoš introduction to Staré letopisy české z Vratislavského rukopisu, ed. Šimek, F. (Prague, 1937), p. vii]Google Scholar, but the argument seems to me to be based on too many combinations to be cogent.

32. Although not attested for Piˇsek, this principle governed the administration of the common chests later set up at Tabor: Laurence of Březová, pp. 381, 438.Google Scholar

33. Macek, , Tábor …, II, 237.Google Scholar

34. Ibid., 145.

35. Goll, , II, 60.Google Scholar

36. See above note 16. According to Sylvius, Aeneas, op. cit.Google Scholar, the day had been fixed at Pentecost. I agree with Macek, , Tábor …, II, 54Google Scholar, that no great significance is to be attached to such particular dates, which were probably furnished by individual preachers ad hoc.

37. Laurence of Březová, p. 357f.;Google ScholarOCA, p. 33.Google Scholar

38. Chronicon veteris collegiati Pragensis, Höfler, I, FRA, I. Abt., II (1856), 79.Google Scholar

39. OCA, p. 34;Google Scholar cf. Macek, , Tábor …, II, 76, n. 130.Google Scholar

40. See Laurence of Březová, pp. 358, 370;Google ScholarChron. vet. colleg. Prag., loc. cit.

41. We know that in the course of 1420 the chests existed in Písek, Tabor, and Vodňany (Staré letopisy české, ed. Šimek, , p. 28).Google Scholar See also Laurence of Březová, pp. 381, 438.Google Scholar

42. Laurence of Březová, p. 362.Google Scholar

43. Macek, , Táabor …, II, 136ff.Google Scholar, offers by far the best reconstruction and analysis to date of Tabor's wars in south Bohemia and their relation to chiliasm.

44. Both Žižka and the future Taborite Bishop Nicholas of Pelhřimov, the two strongest forces leading Tabor towards order and national political action, chose Písek as their base. See Macek, , Tábor …, II, 238Google Scholar and passim. Macek assimilates the Písek-Tabor polarization to the split between the “bourgeois opposition” (a wholly inaccurate Marxist cliché, meaning in the present context anyone who was interested in property) and “the poor.”

45. Život, pp. 265–267.Google Scholar

46. A third surviving chiliast letter seems to show this penetration of adventism with the chiliast vision (ed. Bartoš, F. M., “Z dějin chiliasmu,” pp. 96–97):Google Scholar

… the sun will blaze, the clouds will disappear, the darknesses will vanish, blood will flow from wood, and He will reign who is not expected by those living on the earth. … Therefore let us be ready.…

And who is ready? Only he who remains in Christ and Christ in him. And he is in Christ who eats him. But to eat Christ's Body is livingly to believe in him. And to drink his Blood is to shed it with him for his Father. And he takes Christ's Body who disseminates his gifts, and he eats his Body who livingly listens to his Word. … And for this eating the just will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father, when he comes in clouds with his glory and great power, and sends as representatives his glorious angels to sweep out all scandals from his inheritance. And then evil will be abashed, lies will perish, injustice will disappear, every sin will vanish, and faith will flower, justice will grow, paradise will open to us, benevolence will be multiplied, and perfect love will be abundant.…

I write these things to you as to adults, able to eat of all foods, and not as to those living on milk. … I admonish you in the name of God to make this letter known to the whole community.

Bartoš dates this letter at the very beginning of the movement, in early January 1420, presumably because of its vagueness. But it is obviously advanced in comparison to the other two letters, and gives a picture of the future Age that none of the early adventist preaching seems to have given. If the letter did originate in January, then it would lead us to interpret even the early adventist preaching as inspired—perhaps at one or more removes—by somebody's clear picture of the millennium.

47. The text has been preserved by Laurence of Březová, pp. 417–424.Google Scholar Only one other Latin chiliast tractate is known to survive, and it is more diffuse and practical than this one (ed. Bartoš, “Z dějin chiliasmu,” pp. 102–111).Google Scholar

48. Laurence of Březová, p. 456;Google ScholarKrofta, K., “O některých spisech M. Jana z Příbrama,” Časopis českého Musea, LXXIII (1899), 213.Google Scholar

49. Laurence of Březová., p. 418.Google Scholar

50. Život, pp. 268, 269, 282.Google Scholar Like most important Taborite priests, Capek had a University background. He seems to have been associated with the reform movement even in Hus' time (Urkundliche Beiträge, II (1873), 521f.)Google Scholar, and he was later reminded by John Příbrara that he had held orthodox views on the eucharist in 1417 (Život, p. 303).Google Scholar He was a prolific song-writer, and one of the songs definitely his (“Ve jméno božie počněme,” c.1417, ed. Nejedlý, , op. cit., p. 805ff.)Google Scholar shows a spirit and body of thought very much like Jakoubek's—limiting the cult of saints, for example, but not demanding its abolition; etc. It is instructive to note how the chiliast fever could take possession of such a man.

51. Život, pp. 268–270.Google Scholar

52. These conditions appear in Aquinas' Summa theologica, II, ii, 40Google Scholar, and in Wyclif's De civili dominio, ed. Loserth, , II (London, 1900), p. 240ff.Google ScholarJastrebov, N., Etjudy o Petrě Chelčickom i jego vremeni (St. Petersburg, 1908), p. 92ff.Google Scholar, shows, with parallel citations, that the masters were following Wyclyf. On the general subject of Hussite attitudes to war, particularly in the tractates and discussions of early 1420, cf. Hoch, K., “Husité a válka.” Česká mysl, VIII (1907), 131ff.Google Scholar, and Jastrebov, , op. cit., p. 33ff.Google Scholar

53. Život, p. 267.Google Scholar

54. The list is of the greatest importance, since it preserves Taborite ideas not otherwise attested by the sources; its authenticity is proven by the following facts: (1) the articles seem to preserve the Taborite formulations of the original texts, (2) many of the articles are to be found in surviving Taborite sources, and these in no case contradict the articles of the list, (3) the Taborite leaders themselves accepted one version of the list as substantially true, although venomously formulated in some cases (Laurence of Březová, p. 462f.).Google Scholar The surviving texts may be grouped as follows:

I. 1. A Czech version, ed. Palacký, , Archiv český, III (1844), 218ff.Google Scholar, and ed., with corrections, by Macek, J., Ktož jsú boží bojovníci, pp. 57–66Google Scholar (I cite from Macek). The MS was part of the Třebon archives of the Rožmberk family, Tabor's neighbors and greatest enemies in South Bohemia.

2. A Latin version used by Laurence of Březová, pp. 403–405, 413–416Google Scholar, in a systematic discussion of Tabor inserted into the course of his chronicle ad August 1420.

II. A Latin version read by the Prague masters at a discussion with the Taborites, in Prague, December 10, 1420 (Laurence of Březová, pp. 453–462).Google Scholar

III. A Latin version given by John Příbram in his Contra errores Picardorum [cf. Bartoš', F. M. catalogue of Příbram's works, Literární činnost M. Jana Rokycany, M. Jana Příbrama, M. Petra Payna (Prague: Czech Academy, 1928), p. 64, No. 5].Google Scholar It has been published by (1) Döllinger, J., Beiträge zur Sektengeschichte des Mittelalters, II (Munich, 1890), 691–700Google Scholar, and (2) Prochazka, F., Miscellaneen der Bömische und Mährische Litteratur (Prague, 1784), 279–293.Google Scholar

IV. A Czech version, evidently based on II (via III) but very much reworked and adding important historical and circumstantial information, in Příbram's, JohnŽivot, p. 263ff.Google Scholar

Text III differs from II mainly in the arrangement of the articles; there are also some additions. I, 2 seems to be a reworking of I, 1 (or its equivalent). Thus there are basically two redactions known, I, 1 and II; of these II is obviously further away from the original Taborite sources, although possibly preserving a few elements of them not in I, 1. The purpose of I, 1 seems to have simply been to collect the articles; the purpose of II was to make clear their heretical meaning: the articles of II, as opposed to I, 1, are systematized, arranged in logical sequence, and stripped of circumstantial elements. See note 62 below.

All of the lists contain both chiliast and non-chiliast articles, the latter for the most part Waldensianist. This fact has led some scholars to regard the chiliast and Waldensianist complexes as related. Since the Waldensianist articles are attested as radical beliefs as early as 1415—and notably in the very south Bohemian area where chiliasm flourished and Tabor was founded—it has been supposed that chiliast ideas also were in vogue at that date. Thus, e.g., Heymann, , p. 59Google Scholar, in a discussion of pre-1419 radicalism, says that “they were chiliasts.” And J. Macek, who regards all the sectarian articles as part of the ideology of “the poor,” expressing the poor's social aspirations and attitudes to the feudal order, does not attempt to separate out the varying parts of this ideology (cf. e.g. Tábor … II, 89ff.).Google Scholar Against these loose treatments it must be insisted that the Waldensianist and chiliast complexes were distinct, even though co-existing in 1420 among the Taborites and, undoubtedly, in the minds of many individual Taborites. My arguments are as follows:

1. The datable sources show Waldensianist ideas among the provincial radicals as early as 1415 and up through 1418, but they do not speak of chiliasm before January 1420.

2. The Waldensianist and chiliast complexes, although alike in expressing the sectarian mind, stemmed from different orientations of that mind. See for example Chelčický's striking criticism of Martin Húska, p. 30 below. Or compare the following articles, both from the list in question:

[Waldensianist:]

Christians should not hold or believe anything that is not explicitly stated and written in the Bible.

[Chiliast:]

In that time [of Christ's Kingdom] … no one will teach anything to anyone, nor will there be any need of books or Bibles, for the Law of God will be written in the heart of everyone. …

Other equally striking contradictions could be given.

3. Laurence of Březová, who did not simply give the list but used it to compose a picture of Tabor in 1420, separated the two complexes.

My reconstruction, based on the above and other evidence, is this: The basic and original sectarian inspiration (there were other inspirations too) of Hussite radicalism and Taboritism was Waldensianism, the ideas and attitudes of which entered the Hussite movement in 1415, if not earlier, and, fused with the scholastic mind, formed the basis of Taborite religion throughout Tabor's separate history—i.e., until 1452. For a brief time, however, the Free Spirit complex of chiliasm (see below) surged to the fore and dominated the Taborite movement, politically and doctrinally, until the latter part of 1420, when representatives of the Waldensianist-scholastic fusion progressively liberated themselves and the Taborites from Free-Spirit ideas. The latter, losing their political scope, took on more and more narrowly sectarian forms, specifically Pikartism and Adamitism (see below), the adherents of which were driven out of Tabor and exterminated in the course of 1421. By the time the Prague masters read their list, on December 10, 1420, the chiliasts had been, so to speak, bypassed as influences on the development of the Taborite organism; although no Taborites disowned the chiliast or Pikart articles of the list at the meeting, no Taborite defense of them was ever offered, and their foremost exponent, Martin Húska (see below) was almost at once imprisoned by one of Tabor's allies.

55. Macek, , Ktoyž jsú bozí bojovníci, pp. 58–60.Google Scholar

56. Laurence of Březová, p. 455.Google Scholar

57. Ibid., p. 454; Macek, , Ktož jsú boží bojovníci, p. 58.Google Scholar It is important that these bloodthirsty doctrines also appear in a chiliast source, the Latin tractate published by Bartoš, , “Z dějin chiliasmu,” p. 111:Google Scholar “the just … will now rejoice, seeing vengeance and washing their hands in the blood of the sinners.”

58. Apud Nejedlý, op. cit., p. 183 n.40.Google Scholar

59. Laurence of Březová, p. 424.Google Scholar

60. Macek, J., Ktož jsú boží bojovníci, p. 60.Google Scholar Cf. Jakoubek of Stříbro, Výklad, ed. Šimek, , p. lxxxvii.Google Scholar The chiliasts thought that Christ had already come secretly.

61. Jakoubek, , Výklad ed. Šimek, , p. 527.Google Scholar

62. The chiliast tractate in Latin ed. Bartoš, “Z dějin chiliasmu,” p. 110f., explains that at least some of the sacraments, especially the eucharist, will remain, but in a new form, as memorials of Christ's victory rather than his passion. The author is not sure about the others because “even now certain ones are not kept”—an evident reference to the basic Waldensianism of the Taborite movement. The Czech redaction of the list of Taborite articles, Macek, , Ktož jsú boži bojovníci, p. 61Google Scholar, makes exactly the same point, but explains more precisely that the need for the old sacraments will not exist because there will be no sin in the New Age. But the Prague text, in Laurence of Březová, p. 460Google Scholar, says only that the Taborites believed the sacraments would not last until Christ's final coming. It is obvious that this text was formulated ad usum inquisitionis.

63. Macek, Ktož jsú boží bojovníci, p. 60.Google Scholar

64. Ibid., p. 61.

65. OCA, p. 478.Google ScholarMacek, , Tábor …, II, 62Google Scholar supposes that only work for the lords was to be stopped, but on p. 367 he interprets the source literally, evidently oblivious of his earlier improvement on it.

66. Macek, , Ktož jsú boží bojovníci, p. 59.Google Scholar

67. See Příbram's testimony, above, p. 55. Cf. Laurence of Březová, p. 423f.Google Scholar And cf. Pekař, J., Žižka a jeho doba, I (Prague: Vesmír, 1927), 181f.Google Scholar

68. This is the main weakness that I find in J. Macek's Marxist interpretation, Tábor …, II. Without in the least denying the correlation between the point of view of the medieval “poor” and chiliast ideology, I feel that the proper use of this insight is as a means of analysis and understanding, not as an a priori determination of essence. For the rest, much of Macek's brilliant work can be wholly accepted, but in reverse: for example, chiliasm was certainly not atheistic, as he says (p. 118), but Marxism may well be called chiliastic; thus the effort to interpret chiliasm as a kind of forerunner of Marxism can lead to valid judgments.

69. P. 413. Markold and Koranda were among the Plzeň Taborites; John of Jičín was probably active in south Bohemia, perhaps at Písek (cf. OCA, p. 471f.).Google Scholar Martin's pre-eminence is attested by Příbram, , Život, pp. 290, 294.Google Scholar

70. Apud Macek, , Tábor … II, 73.Google Scholar

71. P. 431.

72. Sylvius, Aeneas, Historia Bohemica, ch. xli.Google Scholar

73. Cf. Holinka, R., “Počátky táborského pikartství,” Bratislava, VI (1932), 191.Google Scholar

74. Laurence tells of the Czech disciples, p. 431;Google Scholar cf. p. 494 for the later strength of Pikartism in Prague.

75. Laurence of Březová, pp. 517–519Google Scholar (a letter from Žižka to Prague, describing Adamite practices). Cf. OCA, p. 476ff;Google ScholarSylvius, Aeneas, op. cit.Google Scholar

76. Příbram, J., Contra errores Picardorum, apudGoogle ScholarKrofta, K., “O některých spiseeh M. Jana Příbrama,” Časopis českého Musea, LXXIII (1899), 212.Google Scholar

77. The relationship of heresy in north France and Belgium to Hussite Bohemia has been brilliantly explored by Bartoš, F. M., “Picardi a Pikarti,” Čsopis českého Musea, CI (1927), 225–250.Google Scholar He concludes (pp. 227, 229) that the Picards of 1418 had come from Lille and Tournai, fleeing an inquisition of that year.

78. The record of the process is published in Fredericq, P., Corpus documentorum inquisitionis haereticae pravitatis Neerlandicae, I (Ghent: J. Vuylsteke, 1889) 269ff.Google Scholar

79. The comparison has been made by Holinka, R., Sektářstvi v Čechách před revolucí husitskou, Sborník Filosofické Fakulty University Komenského v Bratislavě, VI (1929), 169–170.Google Scholar He infers not a direct derivation (see note 77 above) but an absolute agreement in substance. I add only a few points to Holinka's work, and the numbering is mine:

[Homines intelligencie, Fredericq, pp. 272, 274, 276, 277:]Google Scholar

Item dicunt (1) tempus veteris legis fuisse tempus Patris et tempus novae legis tempus Filii, et pro nunc esse tempus Spiritus Sancti, quod dicunt esse tempus Heliae, (2) quo removebuntur [another version has “reconciliabuntur”] scripturae; (3) ut quae prius tamquam vera habebantur, jam refutentur, etiam et catholicae veritates quae consueverant praedicare de paupertate, continentia, obedientia. Quarum veritatum oppositum, ut asserunt, est predicatum hoc tempore Spiritus Sancti … [dicunt] (4) quod praedicationes et doctrinae antiquorum sanctorum et doctorum cessabunt et supervenient novae, et (5) quod scriptura clarius revelabitur quam hucusque notificata sit, et (6) quod spiritus sanctus clarius illuminabit intellectum humanum quam huiusque fecerit, (7) etiam in apostolis, quia non habuerunt nisi corticem, et (8) quod instabit tempus, quo revelanda erit illa lex spiritus sancti et libertatis spiritualis et (9) tunc praesens lex cessabit …

[Chiliast articles, Prague text, in Laurence of Březová:]

(1) quod iam nunc ecclesia militans longe ante adventum Christi novissimum … per alium adventum Christi, qui iam factus est, in regnum dei … reparabitur et reparatur …; [post] finem et terminum presentis temporis seu anni presentis … erit aliud seculum … [p. 456]. (2) Quod lex dei scripta in regno reparato ecclesie militantis cessabit et biblie scripte destruentur … [p. 458]. [For the variant of (2) above, “reconciliabuntur,” cf. Laurence of Březová, p. 413: a certain chiliast layman in Prague “novum per antiquum et e converso exponebat testamentum.”] (3) Quod iam … Christus in sua mititate, mansuetudine et miseracione adversariis legis Christi exhibenda non est imitandus et sequendus, sed solum in zelo, furore, crudelitate et iusta retribucione [p. 454]. [Cf. the more precise correspondence of the formulation in Příbram's Život, p. 276:Google Scholar the chiliasts preached that the Bible would be voided “in regard to suffering, coercion, and subjection to kings and lords.”] (4) Quod … doctrine sanctorum doctorum … ab ecclesia primitiva approbatorum … non sunt a fidelibus legende [p. 460f.]. (5) Lex Christi omnibus superscribetur in cordibus eorum … [p. 458]. (6) Quod … sol humane intelligencie non lucebit hominibus … sed omnes erunt docibiles dei [p. 457]. (7) Quod gloria huius regni reparati … erit maior quam fuit ecclesie primitive [p. 457]. (8) [Cf. the text cited ad (1).] (9) Quod lex gracie … cessabit [p. 458].

(It will be noted, by the way, that Brussels article 3 suggests a prior Waldensian orientation of the sect.)

80. I follow Holinka, , Sektářství, p. 171Google Scholar, in regarding the Brussels sect's fusion of Joachimite and Free-Spirit motifs as also the essential characteristic of chiliasm. (But cf. Heymann, , pp. 210ff., 258ff.:Google Scholar the chiliast element seems to be ignored.) On Joachim of Floris and the (Pseudo-) Joachimite tradition, see Grundmann, H., Studien über Joachim von Floris, Beiträge zur Kulturgeschichte des Mittelalters und der Renaissance, XXXII (Leipzig: Teubner, 1927).CrossRefGoogle Scholar For the Joachimitism of the Brussels sect, see p. 182 n.l. In characterizing Taborite chiliasm as basically the same as the Brussels heresy I am guided by Grundmann's formulation, p. 115: “… treffen wir hier den Knoten des Ganzens: dass eine solche Zeit als Weltzeit kommen wird, in der das wirklich sein wird, was dem katholischen Christentum stets transzendentes Ideal war, das ist das schlechthin Unkatholische der joachimschen Lehre, und von da aus geht alle Heterodoxie; nicht von irgendeiner Abweichung in der Dogmenlehre, nicht von einer Kritik der kirchlichen Stände, nicht von einer Ablehnung der Sakramentskirche.”

81. There were certain negative liberties: e.g., the leader of the sect walked naked through the streets one day. It is interesting that the Bohemian Adamites also practiced nudism.

82. So Sedlák, J., Taborské traktáty eucharistické (Brno, 1918)Google Scholar, introduction, and Holinka, , “Počátký táborského pikartství,” p. 195.Google Scholar There is indeed one explicit statement that ideas of the chiliast movement were derived from 14th century German heretics active around Jindřichův Hradec (Neuhaus) in south Bohemia: Staré letopisy české, ed. Šimek, , p. 29.Google Scholar This area was in fact a seat of popular Waldensianism [cf. Chaloupecký, V., “K dějinám Valdenských v Cechách před hnutím husitským,” Český časopis historický, XXXI (1925), 376].Google Scholar And various central European Waldensian groups at this time did actually cultivate millenarian expectations (see the text in Döllinger, , op. cit., II, 363f.).Google Scholar Even the occasional physical violence of some of these groups may help explain the passage from Waldensianism to chiliasm at Tabor: cf. Preger, W., “Ueber das Verhältnis der Taboriten zu den Waldensiern des 14. Jahrhunderts,” Abhandlungen der königliche Bayrische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Hist. Cl., XVIII (1889), 100f;Google Scholar and cf. Döllinger, , op. cit., II, 305.Google Scholar

83. Jakoubek, , Výklad, ed. Šimek, , p. 527.Google Scholar

84. Staré letopisy české, ed. Šimek, , p. 28.Google Scholar

85. Laurence of Březová, p. 416.Google Scholar

86. Život, p. 291.Google Scholar

87. The division of booty is attested by, e.g., Laurence of Březová, p. 381Google Scholar (“… unicuique, prout opus erat de spoliis inperciendo …”). Strict chiliast doctrine would demand the total destruction of all property, and this was often done after military victories. But there were innumerable petty raids that drew on local peasants, etc. for food and drink; the confessions tortured from those raiders captured by the Rožmberks are preserved in the Popravčí Kniba paˇnův z Ražmberka, ed. Mareš, F. (Prague, 1878).Google Scholar

88. Laurence of Březová's chronicle contains a note, p. 438Google Scholar, to the effect that although the chiliasts had preached in the summer that all seigneurial dues would cease, Tabor nevertheless collected the usual dues from “her” peasants on St. Gall's Day (October 14) 1420, the regular day of collection. Macek, J., Tábor … II, 295–298Google Scholar, argues that the villages later to be parts of Tabor's domains were demonstrably under rule of other lords through 1420 and in some cases later; therefore Tabor cannot have collected from them. But the argument seems to me mechanical: a Taborite force could easily have received collections from a village that also had to pay to another lord. We know that such cases did exist; a Taborite synod of 1422 decreed that exactions should be avoided “… ubi villani fideles veritati adhaerentes coguntur parti adversae censum solvere …” (Höfler, , II, 485)Google Scholar —the context makes it plain that this practice had gone on. Cf. also Příbram's testimony, Život, p. 266Google Scholar, that the peasants were paying five or six rents under Tabor.

89. Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini visited Tabor in 1451 and described the system in a letter to Cardinal Carvajal [ed. Wolkan, R., Fontes rerum Austriacarum, II. Abt., LXVIII (1918), 25].Google Scholar

90. Macek, , Tábor … I, 345ff.Google Scholar

91. Cf. Macek, , Tábor … II, 77Google Scholar (re the Taborite city of Vodňany). Tabor was a new settlement and had no monopolies to begin with.

92. Laurence of Březová, p. 438.Google Scholar

93. Of Free-Spirit ideas only Pikart eucharistic doctrine left its mark on later Taborite doctrine, which however did not deny a kind of Real Presence—in the form of an infusion of Grace as the worthy communicant took the sacrament.

94. His greatest work was the Chronicon causam sacerdotum Taboriensium continens, Höfler, II, 475–820Google Scholar, a majestic collection of tractates and other works, many of them Nicholas' own, arranged to document the Prague-Tabor disputations that lasted from 1420 to 1444.

95. See Heymann, , p. 105ff.Google Scholar

96. The draft was produced by discussions of all the Hussites in Prague on March 27, 1420, but the first three had already been proclaimed a month before by Prague and the Hussite barons. Thus the provincial radicals were in effect adhering to the Prague program and putting their own into the background. Very briefly, the Four Articles demanded: (1) free preaching of the Word of God, (2) utraquist communion, (3) the removal of civil ownership or dominion from the clergy, (4) the punishment of all public mortal sins. See Bartoš, F. M., “Vzník pražských artikulů,” Do čtyř pražských artykulů (Prague, 1925), pp. 70–73:Google Scholar even the last article may have preceded the May meetings.

97. See Heymann's, account, p. 192ff.Google Scholar What the Prague masters wanted primarily was to force the argument of chiliast ideas before the University community, the latter being the supreme Hussite arbiter of doctrine. Cf. Jakoubek's request that John of Jičín do just that, in January 1420, Goll, , II, 60.Google Scholar

98. Laurence of Březová., p. 474f.Google Scholar

99. Höfler, , II, 482ff;Google Scholar cf. Hoch, op. cit., p. 377Google Scholar, Jastrebov, , op. cit., p. 103ff.Google Scholar

100. Höfler, , II, 482ff.Google Scholar

101. Apud Macek, , Tábor … II, 354.Google Scholar