Münzer, Thomas

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Münzer, Thomas (c.1490–1525). German radical Reformer. He was born in Saxony and was educated at Leipzig and Frankfurt. He was ordained and spent four years (1516–20) as an itinerant priest. At the Leipzig Disputation (1519) he met Luther and created a good impression, but later developed revolutionary views, asserting as authority for his radical message a form of Spirit-inspired direct revelation. He was in repeated conflict, and after the defeat of the peasants in the Peasant's Revolt, he was captured and executed: according to Luther, it was ‘a just and terrible judgement of God’.

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