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Johan Eberlin Von Günzburg's Wolfaria The First Protestant Utopia1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Susan Groag Bell
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Extract

It is now almost a century since a German theologian first discussed the life and work of Johan Eberlin von Günzburg, the Swabian folkpreacher who doffed his Franciscan habit to follow Luther. In the ensuing period, the published writings of this minor Reformation character have been submitted to microscopic analysis, pertaining to his theological, sociological, political and philological style by a variety of German scholars. So far, however, there has been no assessment of Johan Eberlin's significance against the background of Christian Humanism as it applied to the German Renaissance. With two recent exceptions there has been almost no reference to this fascinating figure in the Reformation literature available in the English language. I intend here to remedy this injustice and to throw some light on a personality of considerable historical interest by reviewing the internal evidence of his most important work—that part of his Fünfzehn Bundsgenossen (Fifteen Confederates) which comprises his utopia.

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Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 36 , Issue 2 , June 1967 , pp. 122 - 139
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1967

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References

2. Riggenbach, B., Johan Eberlin von Günburg und sein Reformprogram (Tübingen, 1874).Google Scholar

3. Schottenloher, Karl, Bibliographie zur deutschen Geschichte im Zeitalter der Glaubenspaltung, 2nd edition, Hiersemann, Anton (Stuttgart, 1956), I, 205–206Google Scholar. Also Deuerlein, E., in Lebensbilder aus dem Bayerischen Schwaben, V (1956), 70–93Google Scholar. Good background material can also be found in Berger, Arnold E., Die Sturmtruppen der Reformation (Leipzig, 1931)Google Scholar; Andreas, Willi, Deutschland vor der Reformation (Stuttgart, 1932)Google Scholar; Peuckert, Will-Erich, Die Grosse Wende (Hamburg, 1945).Google Scholar

4. Cole, R. G.. “The Pamphlet and Social Forces,” The Lutheran Quarterly, XVII (1965), 195–105Google Scholar; and Hitchcock, W. R., The Background of the Knights' Revolt (Berkeley, 1958)Google Scholar.

The writer would challenge Professor Hitchcock's thesis, that Eberlin in his capacity as a member of the aristocracy furthered the Knights' Revolt. Professor Hitchcock reasoned that Eberlin was a knight, first, because of the aristocratic “von” of his distinguishing name “von Günzburg,” and second because Eberlin's constant references to and crude admiration of the nobility apparently signified his own membership of this group. Such reasons are not well founded. The use of the “von” in the Middle Ages simply denoted an adherence to a certain locality and was used in this manner all over Europe. In any case Eberlin often omitted “von Günzburg,” or used “von Klein-Kötz” (the small village of his birth) instead. At two of the Universities which he attended, Ingolstadt and Freiburg im Breisgau, he is inscribed as Johan Eberlin de Ketz Minori, he would hardly have done so had his noble title been “von Günzburg.”

As for Eberlin's references to the nobility, these are in keeping with his simple, lowly admiration of an upper class. They place him rather more certainly among the peasants than among the aristocrats. Naturally, he would expect the administrators of his utopian state of Wolfaria to be mainly aristocrats. What medieval mind would not¶ The interesting point is that Eberlin wanted half of them to be peasants.

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11. The entire translation is published in Blätter für das Bayerische Gymnasialwesen, XXIII (1887), 1–16.

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13. (I) “New Statutes which Psitacus has brought from the land of Wolfaria, concerning the reformation of the Spiritual Estate.”

(II) “Description of a new Order of the Secular Estate of Wolfaria as reported by Psitacus.”

Psitacus was the latinized nickname for Eberlin's cousin, Ulrich Sittich, who appears on other occasions in his pamphlets.

14. von Günzburg, Johan Eberlin, Ausgewählte Schriften, in Neudrucke deutscher Litteraturwerke des XVI und XVII Jahrhunderts, Band I., No. 139–141 (Halle, 1896), pp. 107–131Google Scholar. Numbers in parentheses. in the text, refer to the relevant page number of this edition of ‘Wolfaria’.

15. “Wan man annam diess reformatz So gschweigt man manche kloster-katz Die vornen läckt und binden kratzt.”

Now here's a scheme I have in mind For cloistered tom-cats 'tis designed All smiles in front, and claws behind.

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25. Merchant companies profiting from usury, deriving their name from the famous house of Fugger which was active in and around Augsburg, where Eberlin grew up.

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34. Ibid., 445 (zum achtzehnten).

35. Ibid., 457 ff. (zum fünfundzwanzigsten).

36. Ibid., 438 ff. (zum dreizehuten).

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39. Ibid., 559 ff.

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43. Eberlin, , Sämtliche Schriften, I, vi.Google Scholar

44. Ibid., III, xxvii.

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46. An English translation of Andrea's Christianopolis by Felix Emil Held was published by the University of Illinois, in 1914.Google Scholar

47. An English translation of Gott's Nova Solyma, by the Rev. Waiter Begley (who thought the author to be John Milton) was published by Charles Seribuer's Sons (New York, 1902) in two volumes.

48. Landmann, , Franziskanische Studien, XIII (1926), 345–346.Google Scholar

49. Eberlin, , Sämtliche Schriften, III, 283.Google Scholar