The Pursuit of the Millennium: Revolutionary Millenarians and Mystical Anarchists of the Middle Ages

Title Page Copyright Page Foreword Introduction Acknowledgements Chapter 1 - The Tradition of Apocalyptic Prophecy Jewish and early Christian apocalyptic The apocalyptic tradition in medieval Europe Chapter 2 - The Tradition of Religious Dissent The ideal of the apostolic life Some early messiahs Chapter 3 - The Messianism of the Disoriented Poor The impact of rapid social change The poor in the first crusades Chapter 4 - The Saints Against the Hosts of Antichrist Saviours in the Last Days The demonic hosts Phantasy, anxiety and social myth Chapter 5 - In the Backwash of the Crusades The Pseudo-Baldwin and the ‘Master of Hungary’ The last crusades of the poor Chapter 6 - The Emperor Frederick as Messiah Joachite prophecy and Frederick II The resurrection of Frederick Manifestos for a future Frederick Chapter 7 - An Elite of Self-immolating Redeemers The genesis of the flagellant movement Revolutionary flagellants The secret flagellants of Thuringia Chapter 8 - An Elite of Amoral Supermen (i) The heresy of the Free Spirit The Amaurians The sociology of the Free Spirit Chapter 9 - An Elite of Amoral Supermen (ii) The spread of the movement The way to self-deification The doctrine of mystical anarchism Chapter 10 - The Egalitarian State of Nature In the thought of Antiquity In patristic and medieval thought Chapter 11 - The Egalitarian Millennium (i) Marginalia to the English Peasants’ Revolt The Taborite Apocalypse Anarcho-communism in Bohemia Chapter 12 - The Egalitarian Millennium (ii) The Drummer of Niklashausen Thomas Müntzer Chapter 13 - The Egalitarian Millennium (iii) Anabaptism and social unrest Münster as the New Jerusalem The messianic reign of John of Leyden Conclusion Appendix: The Free Spirit in Cromwell’s England: the Ranters and their Literature Notes and Bibliography Notes Bibliography Index