Ludwig Hätzer

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Ludwig Hätzer (also Hetzer; * before 1500 in Bischofszell in the canton of Thurgau ; † February 4, 1529 in Constance ) was a journalist and Bible translator with radical reformation inclinations.

Life

Ludwig Hätzer: Engraving from the 17th century
Worms Prophets 1528: Translation by Hätzer and Denck

Ludwig Hätzer was born in Bischofszell before 1500 and attended the collegiate school there . He then studied at the artist faculty in Freiburg im Breisgau and Basel (1517–1518) without completing his studies with an academic degree . From 1520 to 1523, as a chaplain, he was the owner of the measurement pillars of Wädenswil on Lake Zurich .

In the summer of 1523 he moved to Zurich and joined the Reformation movement around Ulrich Zwingli . At the end of 1523 he published a pamphlet against the worship of images ( How to keep up with all idols and images ). Similar to Bodenstein's writing Von der Abbung der Bilder (1522), the script was strictly biblical . In the same year, he published the minutes of the second Zurich disputation. During this disputation he was already close to the radical wing around the later Anabaptists .

After a short stay in Augsburg , where he also worked as a journalist, he returned to Zurich in 1525 and joined the Anabaptist movement that had developed around Grebel and Manz . He rejected infant baptism but did not baptize himself into believers . Together with Castelberger , Reublin and Brötli , he was expelled from Zurich as a foreign Baptist on January 21, 1525. Hätzer moved back to Augsburg via Konstanz, but was also expelled from the city there at the endeavor of Urbanus Rhegius . Once again he returned to Zurich, where he reconciled with Zwingli and distanced himself from the demand for baptism of faith. In the spring of 1526, however, the final break with Zurich took place.

He was initially accepted by Capito in Strasbourg . Here he got to know the spiritualistic direction of Anabaptism with Hans Denck . Together with him he began to translate the Old Testament prophets into German ( Wormser Propheten 1527). In the summer of 1527 he met during the Martyrs' Synod with Hans Hut , but the city was able to leave before the arrests.

Hätzer then moved through various cities in southern Germany and carried out adult baptisms in Regensburg , among other places . He spent the winter of 1527/28 in Augsburg, where he married the maid Appolonia. When the persecution of the Anabaptists began in Augsburg in the spring of 1528, he returned to Bischofszell to devote himself to literary work in peace. This calm did not last long.

In November 1528 he was arrested in Constance at the instigation of the city of Augsburg. He was accused of bigamy with his wife and their previous employer in Augsburg. Under the pretext of fornication , the hater, disreputable as a heretic , was executed with the sword on February 4, 1529 after a lengthy trial. City councilor Thomas Blarer , the brother of the Konstanz reformer Ambrosius Blarer , described the end of Ludwig Hätzer in a letter that was printed in Strasbourg at the end of 1529.

Hätzer's relationship to Anabaptism was diverse. Initially he was close to the biblical direction of the Swiss brothers and in between felt connected to the apocalyptic direction around Hans Hut. After the acquaintance with Denck, he turned strongly to spiritualism and mysticism , which was also expressed in his adaptation of Theologia deutsch (1528). He is also one of the first German-speaking anti - Trinitarians of the Reformation. A manuscript against the church doctrine of the Trinity , however, remained unprinted.
In addition to his theological publications, some of his hymns have been preserved.

Works (selection)

  • A judgment of god our ee gemahels how one should keep oneself with all idols and figurines according to the holy scriptures drawn . Zurich 1523. Digitized
  • Acta or history, as it happened on the conversation [...] in the Christian place of Zurich [...]. Concerning the idols and the mess . Zurich 1523.
  • Samuel Marochitanus: A proof that the Messiah had come, that the Jews are still waiting on the cause of the future (translation and preface). Augsburg 1524.
  • From the evangelical mines and from the Christians Red aus hailiger written . Augsburg 1525.
  • All prophets Germanized in the Hebrew language (translation together with Hans Denck). Worms from 1528.
  • Theologia, German. Newly corrected and improved with great diligence. Several main speeches to study one of the disciples of Christ (processing). Worms 1528.

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Hätzer, Ludwig
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hetzer, Ludwig
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Publicist, translator and Baptist
DATE OF BIRTH around 1500
PLACE OF BIRTH Bischofszell , Thurgau
DATE OF DEATH February 4, 1529
Place of death Constancy