Hans Hut

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Hans Hut: Engraving from the 17th century

Hans Hut (also written Hutt , Huth , Huet ; * around 1490 in Haina ; † December 6, 1527 in Augsburg ) was a leading figure in the Anabaptist movement and one of the most successful Anabaptist missionaries of the Reformation . In the year and a quarter of his missionary activities, he brought Anabaptism to Franconia , Bavaria , Moravia , Austria and Silesia . Unlike the Zurich Anabaptists, who had received their original theological stamp from Zwingli , Hut was a student of the reformers Thomas Müntzer and Andreas Karlstadt . Today he is regarded as the founder of an independent movement within Anabaptism, which developed “on the basis of mysticism and apocalypticism ” and whose main areas of distribution were in Central Germany and Austria.

Life

Bibra: View of the village with St. Leo Church (built 1492–1503)

Information about Hut's origins and youth is scarce. His exact date of birth is also unknown. It is only relatively certain that he was born in the last decade of the late 15th century as the son of a Hans Hut resident in Haina and that he had at least one brother. Presumably in connection with his marriage to a woman of the same age but not known by name, Hans Hut moved to Bibra around 1515 , which is about 15 kilometers from Haina in a north-westerly direction. The marriage had six children about whom very little information is available. A contemporary profile of the Nuremberg city ​​council states about Hut's appearance and appearance :

“ The highest and most noble patron of the Anabaptists is Johannes Hut, an almost learned, skilful fellow, quite a man's length [tall] and a peasant person with light brown, clipped hair and a pale beard under his nose. His clothing is a kemling gray and sometimes a black riding skirt, a gray, wide hat and gray trousers. "

Hut was a bookbinder , but initially worked as a sexton at St. Leo Church in Bibra . From 1521 he earned his living as a traveling bookseller . On trips to Wittenberg and Nuremberg around 1522 he came into contact with the radical reformer Thomas Müntzer , possibly also with Andreas Bodenstein, known as Karlstadt . In September 1524 he lodged Müntzer after his escape from Mühlhausen and arranged for him to find a Nuremberg printer for his writing Expressed Exposure of False Faith . However, the council confiscated most of the 500 printed copies because of the call for overthrow they contained. Encouraged by Müntzer's criticism of infant baptism , Hut refused to have his newborn child baptized at the end of the same year. He and his family were therefore expelled from Bibra. He put his wife and children with Hans Denck in Nuremberg, he went to Müntzer's camp and on May 15, 1525, took part in the decisive peasants' war near Frankenhausen . Hut managed to escape the enemy troops by fleeing.

At Pentecost 1526 he was baptized in Augsburg by Hans Denck, who had previously received baptism from Balthasar Hubmaier . He expected the beginning of the kingdom of God in the form of a violent apocalyptic enforcement of the rule of Christ in 1528. Therefore, he developed extensive missionary activities because he had to seal the 144,000 before Pentecost 1528. He therefore understood the baptism he had donated as the sealing of the person to be baptized. That is why he marked him with a water cross on his forehead.

His missionary work extended from the Thuringian-Franconian border in the north to Tyrol and Moravia . Hans Hut was only a missionary for the Anabaptist movement for a year and a quarter. Traces of its effectiveness can be proven in Thuringia , Franconia , Swabia , Bavaria , Austria , Salzburg and Moravia. Larger cities in which he preached the Anabaptist teachings and gave baptism were Coburg , Augsburg, Erlangen , Nuremberg , Nikolsburg , Vienna , Steyr , Freistadt , Linz , Passau and Salzburg as well as many smaller towns that he passed through on his travels. On his missionary trips, he seems to have often visited former farmers war veterans.

His preaching was strongly influenced by Thomas Müntzer's mystical thoughts. The hat researcher Gottfried Seebaß therefore calls him “Müntzer's legacy”. In the Turkish threat he saw God's punishment for an unrepentant Christianity. Because of the apocalyptic function that he attested to the expanding Ottoman Empire , he spoke out against national defense in the event of an attack. This brought him into conflict with other leaders of the Anabaptists and led to a religious conversation with Balthasar Hubmaier in Nikolsburg , as a result of which he was arrested by the authorities but was able to flee.

In August 1527, Hans Hut was one of a number of leading Anabaptists who met in Augsburg for an Anabaptist Council ( Augsburg Synod of Martyrs ). There one wanted u. a. Compensate for differences in doctrinal opinions. When the Augsburg council found out about the meeting, they tried to get hold of the people who had gathered. Hut was arrested along with important Anabaptists from Augsburg. Because it was not possible to dissuade the detainees from their teachings, Hut and the others were sentenced to long terms in prison. Hans Hut died at the end of 1527 as a result of a fire in Augsburg prison, which he allegedly had laid himself in his cell. His body was burned at the place of execution and the ashes were scattered in the Wertach .

Christening succession

The so-called "baptismal book" by Hans Huts, written around 1527

The line of baptismal succession goes back to Hans Hut (Pentecost 1526) via Hans Denck (spring 1526), Balthasar Hubmaier (Easter 1525), Wilhelm Reublin (January 1525), Jörg Blaurock (January 1525) to Konrad Grebel (January 1525). The dates in brackets indicate the respective baptism date. Evidence of this can be found in the biography articles of the persons mentioned.

Works

  • The secret of baptism , baide des zaichens and essence, the beginning of a true, true Christian life , 1527, received as a manuscript
  • A Christian lesson on how divine scriptures should be compared and judged. From the power of the holy spirit and the celibate of the three-part christian faith sambt iren understanding , 1527

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Heinold Fast (Ed.): The left wing of the Reformation. Testimonies of faith of the Anabaptists, spiritualists, enthusiasts and anti-Trinitarians , Volume IV in the series: Classics of Protestantism (Ed. Christel Matthias Schröder), Bremen 1962, p. 78
  2. ↑ Gottfried Seebaß: Müntzer's legacy. Work, life and theology of Hans Hut , Gütersloh 2002 ( sources and research on the history of the Reformation ; Volume 73), p. 498
  3. ↑ Paul Wappler quotes in this context the statement of a contemporary of Hut's from February 1527. According to this, Hut was between 30 and 40 years old at that time; see Paul Wappler: The Anabaptist Movement in Thuringia from 1526 - 1584 , Jena 1913, p. 232
  4. ↑ Gottfried Seebaß: Müntzer's legacy. Work, life and theology of Hans Hut , Gütersloh 2002 ( sources and research on the history of the Reformation ; Volume 73), p. 167
  5. ↑ It is reported of a daughter of Hut that she was drowned as a martyr of the Anabaptist movement in the Regnitz at the end of January 1528 ; see Gottfried Seebaß: Müntzer's legacy. Work, life and theology of Hans Hut , Gütersloh 2002 ( sources and research on the history of the Reformation ; Volume 73), p. 169, note 16. - A son accompanied Hans Hut on the journey from Staffelstein to Augsburg (1527). In the history book of the Hutterite Brothers (p. 47), we learn from a son named Philipp, who could possibly be identical to the one already mentioned , that he belonged to a Hutterite community in Moravia. Another child of Hans Hut must have been born in the second half of 1524.
  6. ↑ Quoted from Hans Guderian: Die Anabaptist in Augsburg. Your story and your legacy , Pfaffenhofen 1984, p. 62
  7. ^ Community Grabfeld.de: Bibra ; accessed on September 8, 2017
  8. ^ Hans-Jürgen Goertz (Mennonite Lexicon, Vol. V): Article Hut, Hans ; accessed on February 9, 2014
  9. ↑ Rev 7.4  EU , 14.1 EU , 14.3 EU
  10. ↑ Wolfgang Schäufele: The missionary awareness and work of the Anabaptists - presented according to Upper German sources , Volume XXI in the series Contributions to the history and teaching of the Reformed Church (Ed. Paul Jacobs et al.), Neukirchen-Vluyn 1966, p. 143.
  11. ↑ Michael Klein: Historical thinking and class criticism from an apocalyptic perspective . Hamm 2004, p. 125, 126 ( PDF, 841 kB [accessed on March 5, 2013] dissertation at the Fernuni Hagen ).
  12. ↑ Both writings can be found in Lydia Müller: testimonies of beliefs from upper German baptismal people , Leipzig 1938
personal data
SURNAME Hat, Hans
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hutt, Hans; Huth, Hans; Huet, Hans
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Anabaptists in southern Germany and Austria
DATE OF BIRTH around 1490
PLACE OF BIRTH Haina , County of Henneberg , Holy Roman Empire
DATE OF DEATH December 6, 1527
Place of death Augsburg , Holy Roman Empire