Petr Chelčický

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Petr Cheltschitz
Petr Chelčický with scholars from the University of Prague
Petr Chelčický near Vodňany (1918, from the Slavic epic by Alfons Mucha )

Petr Chelčický (German Peter von Cheltschitz ), also Peter von Záhorka, (* probably around 1390 in Chelčice near Vodňany ; † around 1460 in Chelčice) was a Czech lay theologian , reformer and writer. He is considered the spiritual father of the Unity of the Bohemian Brethren ( Jednota bratrská / Unitas Fratrum ).

Life

The biography of Chelčický is in many ways in the dark, since he was threatened by the Inquisition in Bohemia as an uncomfortable thinker . It was almost forgotten for many centuries. He was born between 1380 and 1390 as the son of a South Bohemian country nobleman or a free farmer and is now regarded as identical to Peter von Záhorka. The Záhorkas of Záhořice had their seat on the fortress Záhoří (German Zahorschitz), which was located on the site of today's Záhorčí court in the Strakonice dominion ( Strakonice ) in southern Bohemia .

The preacher and theologian was a layperson and a supporter of the important Bohemian reformer Jan Hus . Since he lived in Prague around 1410, it is likely that he knew Hus personally. After his death in fire in 1415 at the stake in Constance , Chelčický stayed again in Prague around 1420, where the first difficult substantive and theological dispute with the successor of Jan Hus as preacher at the Bethlehem Chapel in Prague, the Hussite Jakobellus von Mies , took place . The Hussites named after Jan Hus' were split into two parties after his death, the pragmatic Utraquists and the radical Taborites . Years of violent struggle between both groups and the crusader armies of the Catholics raged in Bohemia during the Hussite Wars . The clashes claimed many lives in Bohemia and neighboring countries.

Chelčický, who has been living on his estate in South Bohemia since 1420, developed a radically pacifist vision of Christianity in various treatises and treatises in the old Czech language, influenced by John Wyclif (1330–1384) , which, however, he carried out in his writings in a contentious and vivid manner. He compared the emperor and the pope with two mighty whales that had torn the apostle Peter's fishing net. He rejected all exercise of power and violence in the church, as well as its possession. He justified this view with the Constantinian donation recognized as a forgery . He strived for a return to early Christianity , postulated the equality of all Christians, called for voluntary poverty, rejected monasticism, spoke out against conscription and rejected the oath. He criticized the corporate social order of the time of manorial rule and inheritance . Chelčický died between 1452 and 1460.

Publications (selection)

  • O boji duchovním (On spiritual struggle); 1421
  • O církvi svaté (From the holy church); 1421
  • O trojiem lidu (About three kinds of people)
  • Postilla , created 1434–41 (German excerpts: Vom Frieden Gottes, Leipzig 1920; Vom Gute Willen, Leipzig 1921)
  • Sieť viery (The Net of Faith), written 1440–43, first printed in 1521 by Pavel Severin in Prague. A German translation by Carl Vogl was published in 1970 by Georg Olms Verlag, Hildesheim. A text-critical edition in today's Czech was edited by Jaroslav Boubín, Historický ústav Praha 2012, ISBN 978-80-7286-196-5 .
  • Menší spisy , Prague 1891 (from this German sermon on the basis of human laws, Prague 1936)
  • Traktáty , Prague 1940 (German: We fools for Christ's sake, Prague 1929)
  • Replika proti Rokycanovi ( Eng . The poison of the holy church. A polemic about the power of the church in the time of the Bohemian Reformation . The replica from Chelčický to Bishop Rokycana , Berlin 1993)

Aftermath

Chelčický is one of the most important Czech reformers, who anticipated some of the points of view of Martin Luther's teaching and was influenced by the thoughts of John Wyclif . His polemical and dogmatic writings are among the most important achievements of old Czech literature. Germans from Eastern Bohemia were also among his followers. He is considered the spiritual father of the Bohemian-Moravian Brethren, which took up important thoughts from Chelčický. Chelčický itself did not found a new church or denomination.

Chelčický was only rediscovered in the 19th century. Leo Tolstoy in particular felt drawn to his ideas and felt him to be a forerunner of his own pacifist conception of an early Christianity, and he was praised in his book The Kingdom of Heaven within you . He attributed the similarities in thinking to alleged common traits as Slavs .

In his hometown Chelčice there is a memorial and a memorial hall for the theologian.

literature

  • Peter von Zahorka . Works and literature in: Life pictures for the history of the Bohemian countries , Volume 1, 1974
  • Heribert Sturm : Biographical lexicon on the history of the Bohemian countries , published on behalf of the Collegium Carolinum , Volume I, R. Oldenbourg Verlag Munich Vienna 1979, page 191, ISBN 3 486 49491 0
  • Ferdinand Seibt : Bohemica. Problems and literature since 1945 , 1970, 103 f.
  • Karl Bosl : Handbook of the history of the Bohemian countries , Volume 1, Stuttgart 1967
  • Lexicon of Theology and Church , Volume 2, 1958 (register 1967), Herder Verlag Freiburg im Breisgau
  • Sebastian Kalicha / Gustav Wagner: Peter Chelčický and the web of faith. On the heretic tradition of nonviolent anarchism . In: Sebastian Kalicha (ed.): Christian anarchism. Facets of a libertarian current . Verlag Graswurzelrevolution, Heidelberg 2013, pp. 173–189. ISBN 978-3-939045-21-2

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Guide through the Peter Chelčicky museum in Chelčice , accessed on May 9, 2019 (English)

Web links

Commons : Petr Chelčický  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Chelčický, Petr
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Peter von Chelčitz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czech lay theologian and reformer
DATE OF BIRTH uncertain: around 1390
DATE OF DEATH around 1460