 Northwestern Germany in the early 16th century was dotted by a number of small ecclesiastical states, each run by a prince bishop. The state was run by aristocratic clerics who elected one of their own as bishop. Generally these bishops were secular lords who were not ordained. By bargaining over taxes the capital city of each of these states had usually rested for itself a degree of autonomy. The clergy, which constituted the ruling elite of the state, exempted themselves from taxation while imposing very heavy taxes on the rest of the populace. Generally the capital cities came to be run by their own power elite, an oligarchy of guilds, which used government power to cartelise their various professions and occupations. The largest of these ecclesiastical states in northwest Germany was the Bistropic of Münster, and its capital city of Münster, a town of some 10,000 people, was run by the town guilds. The Münster guilds were particularly exercised by the economic competition of the monks, who were not forced to obey guild restrictions and regulations. During the peasants war the capital cities of several of these states, including Münster, took the opportunity to rise in revolt, and the bishop of Münster was forced to make numerous concessions. With the crushing of the rebellion however, the bishop took back the concessions and re-established the old regime. By 1532 however, the guilds, supported by the people, were able to fight back and take over the town, soon forcing the bishop to recognise Münster officially as a Lutheran city. It was not destined to remain so for long however. From all over the northwest hordes of anabaptist enthusiasts flooded into Münster, seeking the onset of the new Jerusalem. From the northern Netherlands came hundreds of Melchiorites, followers of the itinerant visionary Melchior Hofmann. Hofmann, an uneducated Furies apprentice from Swabia in southern Germany, had for years wandered through Europe, preaching the imminence of the Second Coming, which he had concluded from his researches would occur in 1533, the 15th Centenary of the Death of Jesus. Melchiorism had flourished in the northern Netherlands, and many adepts now poured into Münster, rapidly converting the poorer classes of the town. Meanwhile, the anabaptist cause in Münster received a shot in the arm when the eloquent and popular young minister, Bernd Rothman, a highly educated son of a town blacksmith, converted to anabaptism. Originally a Catholic priest, Rothman had become a friend of Luther and the head of the Lutheran movement in Münster. Converted to anabaptism, Rothman lent his eloquent preaching to the cause of communism, as it had supposedly existed in the primitive Christian church, holding everything in common with no mine and thine, and giving to each according to his need. In response to Rothman's reputation, thousands flocked to Münster, hundreds of the poor, the ruthless, those hopelessly in debt, and people who, having run through the fortunes of their parents, were earning nothing by their own industry. People in general who were attracted by the idea of plundering and robbing the clergy and the richer burgers. The horrified burgers tried to drive out Rothman and the anabaptist preachers, but to no avail. In 1533, Melchior Rothman, sure that the second coming would happen any day, returned to Strasbourg where he had had great success calling himself the prophet Elias. He was promptly clapped in jail and remained there until his death a decade later. Rothman, for all the similarities with the others, was a peaceful man who counseled non-violence to his followers. After all, if Jesus were eminently due to return, why commit against unbelievers? Rothman's imprisonment, and of course the fact that 1533 came and went without a second coming, discredited Melchior, and so his Münster followers turned to far more violent, post-millennialist prophets, who believed that they would have to establish the kingdom by fire and sword. The new leader of the coercive anabaptists was a Dutch baker from Harlem, one Jan Mathis. Reviving the spirit of Thomas Münster, Mathis sent out missionaries or apostles from Harlem to re-baptise everyone they could, and to appoint bishops with the power to baptise. When the new apostles reached Münster in early 1534, they were greeted as we might expect with enormous enthusiasm. Caught up in the frenzy, even Rothman was re-baptised once again, followed by many ex-nuns and a large part of the population. Within a week, the apostles had re-baptised 1,400 people. Another apostle soon arrived, a young man of 25 who had been converted and baptised by Mathis only a couple of months earlier. This was Jan Bockelsen, who was soon to become known in song and story as Johan of Leiden. Though handsome and eloquent, Bockelsen was a troubled soul having been born the illegitimate son of the mayor of a Dutch village by a woman's serf from West Valia. Bockelsen began life as an apprentice tailor, married a rich widow and then went bankrupt when he set himself up as a self-employed merchant. In February 1534, Bockelsen won the support of the wealthy cloth merchant, Burnt Nipperdollink, the powerful leader of the Munster guilds and truly married Nipperdollink's daughter. On the 8th of February, son-in-law and father-in-law ran wildly through the streets together, calling upon everyone to repent. After much frenzy, mass writhing on the ground and the seeing of apocalyptic visions, the Anabaptist rose up and seized the town hall, winning legal recognition for their movement. In response to this successful uprising, many wealthy Lutherans left town and the Anabaptists, feeling exuberant, sent messages to surrounding areas, summoning everyone to come to Munster. The rest of the world they proclaimed would be destroyed in a month or two. Only Munster would be saved to become the new Jerusalem. Thousands poured in from as far away as Flanders and Frisia in the northern Netherlands. As a result, the Anabaptists soon won a majority on the town council and this success was followed three days later, on the 24th of February, by an orgy of looting of books, statues and paintings from the churches and throughout the town. Soon Jan Mathis himself arrived, a tall gaunt man with a long black beard. Mathis, aided by Bockelson, quickly became the virtual dictator of the town. The coercive Anabaptists had at last seized a city. The great communist experiment could now begin. The first mighty program of this rigid theocracy was of course to purge the new Jerusalem of the unclean and the ungodly, as a prelude to their ultimate extermination throughout the world. Mathis called therefore for the execution of all remaining Catholics and Lutherans, but Nipidolink's call ahead prevailed, since he warned Mathis that slaughtering all other Christians than themselves might cause the rest of the world to become edgy, and they might all come and crush the new Jerusalem in its cradle. It was therefore decided to do the next best thing, and on 27th of February the Catholics and Lutherans were driven out of the city in the midst of a horrendous snowstorm. In a deed prefiguring communist Cambodia, all non-Anabaptists including old people, invalids, babies and pregnant women were driven into the snowstorm and all were forced to leave behind all their money, property, food and clothing. The remaining Lutherans and Catholics were compulsorily rebaptised and all refusing this administration were put to death. The expulsion of all Lutherans and Catholics was enough for the bishop, who began a long military siege of the town the next day on 28th of February. With every person drafted for siege work, Jan Mathis launched his totalitarian communist social revolution. The first step was to confiscate the property of the expelled. All their worldly goods were placed in central depots and the poor were encouraged to take according to their needs, the needs to be interpreted by seven appointed deacons chosen by Mathis. When a blacksmith protested at these measures imposed by Dutch foreigners, Mathis arrested the courageous Smithy. Summoning the entire population of the town, Mathis personally stabbed, shot and killed the godless blacksmith as well as throwing into prison several eminent citizens who had protested against his treatment. The crowd was warned to profit by this public execution and they obediently sang a hymn in honour of the killing. A key part of the Anabaptist reign of terror in Munster was now unveiled. Unerringly just as in the case of the Cambodian communists four and a half centuries later, the new ruling elite realised that the abolition of private ownership of money would reduce the population to total slavish dependence on the men of power. And so Mathis, Rothman and others launched a propaganda campaign that it was un-Christian to own money privately, that all money should be held in common, which in practice meant that all money whatsoever must be handed over to Mathis and his ruling clique. Several Anabaptists who kept or hid their money were arrested and then terrorised into crawling to Mathis on their knees, begging forgiveness and beseeching him to intercede with God on their behalf. Mathis then graciously forgave the sinners. After two months of severe and unrelenting pressure, a combination of propaganda about the Christianity of abolishing private money and threats and terror against those who failed to surrender, the private ownership of money was effectively abolished in Munster. The government seized all the money and used it to buy or hire goods from the outside world. Wages were doled out in kind by the only remaining employer, the theocratic Anabaptist state. Food was confiscated from private homes and rationed according to the will of the government deacons. Also to accommodate the immigrants, all private homes were effectively communised, with everyone permitted to quarter themselves anywhere. It was now illegal to close, let alone lock doors. Communal dining halls were established where people ate together to readings from the Old Testament. This compulsory communism and reign of terror was carried out in the name of community and Christian love. All this communisation was considered the first giant steps towards total egalitarian communism, where as Rothman put it, all things were to be in common, there was to be no private property and nobody was to do any more work, but simply trust in God. The workless part, of course, somehow never arrived. A pamphlet sent in October 1534 to other Anabaptist communities hailed the new order of Christian love through terror. For not only have we put all our belongings into a common pool under the care of deacons and live from it according to our need, we praise God through Christ with one heart and mind, and are eager to help one another with every kind of service. And accordingly everything which has served the purposes of self-seeking and private property, such as buying and selling, working for money, taking interest and practising usury, or eating and drinking the sweat of the poor, and indeed everything which offends against love, all such things are abolished amongst us by the power of love and community. With high consistency the Anabaptists of Munster made no pretense about preserving intellectual freedom while communising all material property, for the Anabaptists boasted of their lack of education and claimed that it was the unlearned and the unwashed who would be the elect of the world. The Anabaptist mob took particular delight in burning all the books and manuscripts in the Cathedral Library, and finally in mid-March 1534 Mathis outlawed all books, except the Good Book, the Bible. To symbolise a total break with the sinful past, all privately and publicly owned books were thrown upon a great communal bonfire. All this ensured, of course, that the only theology or interpretation of the scriptures open to the Munsterites was that of Mathis and the other Anabaptist preachers. At the end of March however, Mathis' swollen hubris laid him low, convinced at Easter time that God had ordered him and a few of the faithful to lift the bishop's siege and liberate the town, Mathis and a few others rushed out of the gates at the besieging army and were literally hacked to pieces. In an age when the idea of full religious liberty was virtually unknown, one can imagine that any Anabaptists whom the more orthodox Christians might get hold of would not earn a very kindly reward. The death of Mathis left Munster in the hands of young Bockelson, and if Mathis had chastised the people of Munster with whips, Bockelson would chastise them with scorpions. Bockelson wasted little time in mourning his mentor. He preached to the faithful, God will give you another profit, it will be more powerful. How could this young enthusiast top his master? Early in May, Bockelson caught the attention of the town by running naked through the streets in a frenzy, falling into a silent three-day ecstasy. When he rose again, he announced to the entire populace a new dispensation that God had revealed to him. With God at his elbow, Bockelson abolished the old functioning town offices of council and burgamasters and installed a new ruling council of 12 elders, with himself, of course, as the eldest of the elders. The elders were now given total authority over the life and death, the property and the spirit of every inhabitant of Munster. A strict system of forced labor was imposed, with all artisans not drafted into the military, now public employees, working for the community for no monetary reward. This meant, of course, that the guilds were now abolished. The totalitarianism in Munster was now complete. Death was now the punishment for virtually every act, good or bad. Capital punishment was decreed for the high crimes of murder, theft, lying, avarice and quarrelling. Also death was decreed for every conceivable kind of insubordination, the young against their parents, wives against their husbands and, of course, anyone at all against the chosen representatives of God on earth, the totalitarian government of Munster. Burnt Nipperdolink was appointed high executioner to enforce the decrees. The only aspect of life previously left untouched was sex, and this now came under the hammer of Bockelson's total despotism. The only sexual relation permitted was marriage between two Anabaptists. Sex in any other form, including marriage with one of the godless, was a capital crime. But soon Bockelson went beyond this rather old fashioned credo and decided to establish compulsory polygamy in Munster. Since many of the ex-bellies had left their wives and daughters behind, Munster now had three times as many marriageable women as men, so that polygamy had become technologically feasible. Bockelson converted the other rather startled preachers by citing polygamy among the patriarchs of Israel, as well as by threatening dissenters with death. Compulsory polygamy was a bit too much for many of the Munsterites who launched a rebellion in protest. The rebellion, however, was quickly crushed and most of the rebels put to death. Execution was also the fate of any further dissenters, and so by August 1534 polygamy was coercively established in Munster. As one might expect, young Bockelson took an instant liking to the new regime, and before long he had a harem of 15 wives, including Dvarah, the beautiful young widow of Jan Mathis. The rest of the male population also began to take to the new decree as ducks to water. Many of the women did not take as kindly to the new dispensation, and so the elders passed a law ordering compulsory marriage for every woman under, and presumably also over, a certain age, which usually meant being a compulsory third or fourth wife. Moreover, since marriage among the godless was not only invalid, but also illegal, the wives of the expellees now became fair game, and were forced to marry good Anabaptists. Refusal to comply with the new law was punishable, of course, by death, and a number of women were actually executed as a result. Those old wives who resented the new wives coming into their household were also suppressed, and their quarrelling was made a capital crime. Many women were executed for quarrelling. But the long arm of the state could reach only just so far, and in their first internal setback, Bockelson and his men had to relent and permit divorce. Indeed, the ceremony of marriage was now outlawed totally, and divorce made very easy. As a result, Munster now fell under a regime of what amounted to compulsory free love. And so, within the space of only a few months, a rigid puritanism had been transmuted into a regime of compulsory promiscuity. Meanwhile, Bockelson proved to be an excellent organiser of a besieged city. Compulsory labour, military and civilian was strictly enforced. The bishops' army consisted of poorly and irregularly paid mercenaries, and Bockelson was able to induce many of them to desert by offering them regular pay. Pay for money, that is, in contrast to Bockelson's rigid internal moneyless communism. Drunken ex-murcenaries were, however, shot immediately. When the bishop fired pamphlets into the town, offering a general amnesty in return for surrender, Bockelson made reading such pamphlets a crime punishable by, of course, death. At the end of August 1534, the bishops' armies were in disarray, and the siege temporarily lifted. Jan Bockelson seized this opportunity to carry his egalitarian communist revolution one step further. He had himself named King and Messiah of the last days. Proclaiming himself King might have appeared tacky and perhaps even illegitimate. And so Bockelson had one Ducenture, a goldsmith from a nearby town and a self-proclaimed prophet, do the job for him. At the beginning of September, Ducenture announced to one and all a new revelation. Jan Bockelson was to be king of the whole world, the heir of King David, to keep that throne until God himself reclaimed his kingdom. Unsurprisingly, Bockelson confirmed that he himself had had the very same revelation. Ducenture then presented a sword of justice to Bockelson, anointed him and proclaimed him king of the world. Bockelson, of course, was momentarily modest. He prostrated himself and asked guidance from God. But he made sure to get that guidance swiftly. And it turned out, mirabile dictu, that Ducenture was right. Bockelson proclaimed to the crowd that God had now given him power over all nations of the earth. Anyone who might dare to resist the will of God shall without delay be put to death with the sword. And so, despite a few mumbled protests, Jan Bockelson was declared king of the world and messiah. And the Anabaptist preachers of Munster explained to their bemused flock that Bockelson was indeed the messiah as foretold in the Old Testament. Bockelson was rightfully the ruler of the entire world, both temporal and spiritual. It often happens with egalitarians that a whole, a special escape hatch from the drab uniformity of life, is created for themselves. And so it was with King Bockelson. It was, after all, important to emphasise in every way the importance of the messiah's advent. And so Bockelson wore the finest robes, metals and jewellery. He appointed courtiers and gentlemen at arms who also appeared in splendid finery. King Bockelson's chief wife, Divara, was proclaimed queen of the world and she too was dressed in great finery and had a suite of courtiers and followers. This luxurious court of some 200 people was housed in fine mansions requisitioned for the occasion. A throne draped with a cloth of gold was established in the public square and King Bockelson would hold court there, wearing a crown and carrying a scepter. A royal bodyguard protected the entire procession. All Bockelson's loyal aides were suitably rewarded with high status and finery. Nipah Dolink was the chief minister and Rothman royal orator. If communism is the perfect society, somebody must be able to enjoy its fruits and who better but the messiah and his courtiers. Though private property and money was now abolished, the confiscated gold and silver was now minted into ornamental coins for the glory of the new king. All horses were confiscated to build up the king's armed squadron. Also names in Munster were transformed. All the streets were renamed. Sundays and feast days were abolished and all newborn children were named personally by the king in accordance with a special pattern. In a starving slave society such as communist Munster, not all citizens could live in the luxury enjoyed by the king and his court. Indeed the new ruling class was now imposing a rigid class oligarchy seldom seen before. So that the king and his nobles might live in high luxury, rigorous austerity was imposed on everyone else in Munster. The subject population had already been robbed of their houses and much of their food, now all superfluous luxury among the masses was outlawed. Clothing and bedding were severely rationed and all surplus turned over to King Bockelson under pain of death. Every house was searched thoroughly and eighty-three wagon loads of surplus clothing collected. It is not surprising that the deluded masses of Munster began to grumble at being forced to live in abject poverty while the king and his courtiers lived in extreme luxury on the proceeds of their confiscated belongings. And so Bockelson had to beam them some propaganda to explain the new system. The explanation was this. It was all right for Bockelson to live in pomp and luxury because he was already completely dead to the world and the flesh. Since he was dead to the world in a deep sense his luxury didn't count. In the style of every guru who has ever lived in luxury among his credulous followers he explained that for him material objects had no value. How such logic can ever fool anyone passes understanding. More important Bockelson assured his subjects that he and his court were only the advanced guard of the new order. Soon they too would be living in the same millennial luxury. Under their new order the people of Munster would forge outward armed with God's will and conquer the entire world exterminating the unrighteous after which Jesus would return and they would all live in luxury and perfection. Equal communism with great luxury for all would then be achieved. Greater descent meant of course greater terror and King Bockelson's reign of love intensified its intimidation and slaughter. As soon as he proclaimed the monarchy the prophet Deuconshire announced a new divine revelation. All who persisted in disagreeing with or disobeying King Bockelson would be put to death and their very memory blotted out. They would be extirpated forever. Some of the main victims to be executed were women, women who were killed for denying their husband's their marital rights, for insulting a preacher or for daring to practice bigamy, polygamy of course being solely a male privilege. Despite his continual preaching about marching forth to conquer the world King Bockelson was not crazy enough to attempt that feat especially since the bishops army was again besieging the town. Instead he shrewdly used much of the expropriated gold and silver to send out apostles and pamphlets to surrounding areas of Europe attempting to rouse the masses for Anabaptist revolution. The propaganda had considerable effect and serious mass risings occurred throughout Holland and Northwestern Germany during January 1535. A thousand armed Anabaptists gathered under the leadership of someone who called himself Christ Son of God. And serious Anabaptist rebellions took place in West Frisia in the town of Minden and even in the great city of Amsterdam where the rebels managed to capture the town hall. All these risings were eventually suppressed with the considerable help of betrayal to the various authorities of the names of the rebels and of the location of the munition dumps. The princes of Northwestern Europe by this time had had enough and all the states of the Holy Roman Empire agreed to supply troops to crush the monstrous and hellish regime at Munster. For the first time in January 1535 Munster was totally and successfully blockaded and cut off from the outside world. The establishment then proceeded to starve the population of Munster into submission. Food shortages appeared immediately and the crisis was met with characteristic vigor. All remaining food was confiscated and all horses killed for the benefit of feeding the king, his royal court and his armed guards. At all times the king and his court ate and drank well while famine and devastation raged throughout the town of Munster and the masses ate literally everything even inedible that they could lay their hands on. King Bockelson kept his rule by beaming continual propaganda and promises to the starving masses. God would definitely save them by Easter or else he would have himself burned in the public square. When Easter came and went Bockelson craftily explained that he had meant only spiritual salvation. He promised that God would change cobblestones to bread and of course that did not come to pass either. Finally Bockelson, long fascinated with the theatre, ordered his starving subjects to engage in three days of dancing and athletics. Dramatic performances were held as well as a black mass. Starvation however was now becoming all-pervasive. The poor hapless people of Munster were now doomed totally. The bishop kept firing leaflets into the town promising a general amnesty if the people would only revolt and depose King Bockelson and his court and hand them over. To guard against such a threat Bockelson stepped up his reign of terror still further. In early May he divided the town into 12 sections and placed a duke over each one with an armed force of 24 men. The dukes were foreigners like himself as Dutch immigrants they were likely to be loyal to Bockelson. Each duke was strictly forbidden to leave his section and the dukes in turn prohibited any meetings whatsoever of even a few people. No one was allowed to leave town and any court plotting to leave helping anyone else to leave or criticising the king was instantly beheaded usually by King Bockelson himself. By mid June such deeds were occurring daily with the body often quartered and nailed up as a warning to the masses. Bockelson would undoubtedly have let the entire population starve to death rather than surrender but two escapades betrayed weak spots in the town's defence and on the night of the 24th of June 1535 the nightmare New Jerusalem at last came to a bloody end. The last several hundred Anabaptist fighters surrendered under an amnesty and were promptly massacred. And Queen Divara was beheaded. As for ex-King Bockelson he was led about on a chain and the following January along with Nipah Dolink was publicly tortured to death and their bodies suspended in cages from a church tower. The old establishment of Munster was duly restored and the city became Catholic once more. The stars were once again in their courses and the events of 1534-35 understandably led to an abiding distrust of mysticism and enthusiast movements throughout Protestant Europe.