The Holy Terrors of Munster

[Athena]

I want to discuss some shocking human behavior in a series of post taken from history. I am sure we need a shared mythology, but religion is not the perfect mythology. As we know, throughout history humans have done some really awful things based on Christian mythology, and this one story.

 

The Holy Terrors of Munster In the long record of man's savagery to man, there is not more brutal episode than the drama of the Anabaptist revolution played out in the small city of Munster in northwest Germany in 1534-35. There, as the medieval world was dying and the modern age dawning, as an anciet social order disintegrated and a new proletariat was born, starving and desperate men conceived a utopian kingdom of eternal goodness and eternal peace- and ended by creating a forerunner of the modern totalitarian state.

 

Edmund Stillman "The Holy Terrors of Munster".

I am not sure Edmund Stillman association with the modern totalitarian state is not a prejudice that distorts the lesson we need to learn, but his account of what happened deserves our attention. I see a relationship between what happened in Munster and Occupy.

 

Anabaptist competed with Lutherans, and eventually became Mennonites and Amish. Something the later faiths might want to deny because they want to distance themselves from what happened at Munster. However, getting back to Occupy, this was not a religious movement, neither was the Russian revolution exactly a religious movement, because the Russian revolution banned religion. What is shared in common is the dying of an old order and beginning of a new order, also the gathering of rootless and discontent people, who want to believe if we lived communally, sharing everything equally, life would be better. These rootless and discontent people reacting against all forms of authority, and reducing their order to anarchy.

 

Quote: "But Munster would not remain Lutheran, and conservative, for long. When in 1532, the nearby Dutchy of Cleves expelled its Anabaptist, many of them migrated to Munster, carrying with them their doctrinal contagion. From then on the movement grew within the walls of the city. In 1533 new recruits, the first of many, arrived from the Netherlands, among them Jan Bockelson of Leyden, a young man of twenty-four who had been baptized into the movement only a few months before. "And so they came". records a chronicle, "the Dutch and the Frissians and the scoundrels from all parts who had never settled anywhere; they flocked to Munster and collected there." As did the same kind of people flock to the Occupy camps, completely changing the movement from an economic focus to a social focus, and orderly protest to mayhem.

 

As within the walls of Munster private property of all kinds was made communal property, and monogamony gave way to men having many wives and as conditions deteriorated to no sexual restraints but using sex to make up for all the unmet needs, including the need for food. Around the city were mercinaries sent to crush the rebellion, and they laid siege on Munster, preventing any supplies from getting in, leading to starvation.

 

Quote: "At last, in May (1535), when most of the inhabitants had tasted no bread for eight weeks," writes Cohn, "the kind agreed that those who wised should leave the town. Even then he cursed the fugitives, promising them that the reward for their infidelity would be everlasting damnation. Their earthly fate was indeed fearful enough. The able bodied men were at once put the sword; as for the women and old men and children, the Bishop feared- not unreasonably- that if they passed through his lines they would stir up trouble in the rear and accordingly refused to allow them past the blockhouses. These people therefore lingered of for five weeks in the no man's land before the town walls, begging the mercenaries to kill them, crawling about and eathing grass like animals and dying in such numbers that the ground was littered with corpses."

 

Within the city Anabaptist watched from the walls and jeered, acting out the belief so dear to medieval man that the greatest delight of the saved in Paradise was watching the sufferings of the damned in hell. Of course everyone within the city walls, were also starving and the seige ended in them all dying or being killed, and the leaders were hung in cages outside the city wall, where they remained until rather recently.

 

Occupy Eugene was surrounded by a fence, by city orders. Our story is not as dramatic, but when a man was killed in the camp, and the city counselors felt justified in closing the camp, a news photographer took a picture of the councelors, and they were smiling. I had mixed feelings as we did not get the promised social services, but I was also glad to distance myself from the mayham and human suffering.

[questionposter]

I don't get what your point is. First you were talking about that man is "savage", which can be explained by common ancestry to other violent animals such as chimps which have genetic mutations to cause compulsions of such behaviors, then you say like...sharing isn't good or something or maybe that the bible's advocation of sharing is wrong? Just look at ants, pretty much the most dominant insect species on the planet, and their members all work together.

There's a point in sharing where sharing past a certain value of resources costs too much for a host to efficiently have resources for themselves. However, this is only in a space with very limited resources. A simple mathematical model could probably show in a community that holistic sharing probably works. Another problem with this seems to be the image of "hive mind" or lack of free-will people would have, which doesn't need to happen. Most of what's wrong with communism is the human aspect such as with dictators rather than the actual mathematical aspect of a working model. But there might be some instances where it wouldn't work, but I think modern civilization can afford some sharing. In fact, without sharing we probably wouldn't even be able to globalize and have a modern civilization.

Edited April 15, 2012 by questionposter

[Athena]

Yeah a reply! When I read of Munster I was mesmerized by the story. I also saw the connection with my Occupy experience. However, in another forum no one responded to my post, and that is I why came back here. I really want to tear this thing apart, and examine it carefully. I swear, if we had a major earthquake that overwhelmed the police and fire department, like Katina overwhelm public services, we would be in a big trouble.

 

How is it civilized people can become dangerously uncivilized? What is it that makes us civilized in the first place?

 

Religious people speak of our dark side, and you mentioned our animal heritage. Personally, I am aware of it, but I don't understand it at all.

On my way to this forum, I saw a news article about bad tornado's and was drawn to it. I felt an excitement and pleasure in the idea that people would get torn up by a tornado, and before being too critical of me, I don't watch TV because I am normally sickened by shows of humans being cruel to each other. I wonder how this can be popular entertainment, and it is the most popular. How could the mercenaries around Munster, watch people die, and the people within the Munster walls, enjoy watching the suffering? What is this dark nature within us and how do we keep it repressed?

 

Oh and about the sharing- obviously mankind has succeeded because of sharing, but it also succeeds because it can control its sharing. The severe reaction to the people of Munster, was about maintaining control of sharing. Katina was about loosing control of sharing. We have a growing population that believes it does not have equal opportunity, and it does not owe those who do have, anything, not even respect of their lives or personal property. At what point should these people become proactive in doing something about be marginalize and pushed out of the mainstream of polite soceity?

 

I did an Occupy survey that questioned if participants had grown up with abuse. We know some parents are abusive. Poverty is abusive and leads to poor parenting. Is this a social problem we should address? Are we living with a time bomb, as were the people in the past.

Edited April 15, 2012 by Athena

[questionposter]

Yeah a reply! When I read of Munster I was mesmerized by the story. I also saw the connection with my Occupy experience. However, in another forum no one responded to my post, and that is I why came back here. I really want to tear this thing apart, and examine it carefully. I swear, if we had a major earthquake that overwhelmed the police and fire department, like Katina overwhelm public services, we would be in a big trouble.

 

How is it civilized people can become dangerously uncivilized? What is it that makes us civilized in the first place?

 

Religious people speak of our dark side, and you mentioned our animal heritage. Personally, I am aware of it, but I don't understand it at all.

On my way to this forum, I saw a news article about bad tornado's and was drawn to it. I felt an excitement and pleasure in the idea that people would get torn up by a tornado, and before being too critical of me, I don't watch TV because I am normally sickened by shows of humans being cruel to each other. I wonder how this can be popular entertainment, and it is the most popular. How could the mercenaries around Munster, watch people die, and the people within the Munster walls, enjoy watching the suffering? What is this dark nature within us and how do we keep it repressed?

 

Oh and about the sharing- obviously mankind has succeeded because of sharing, but it also succeeds because it can control its sharing. The severe reaction to the people of Munster, was about maintaining control of sharing. Katina was about loosing control of sharing. We have a growing population that believes it does not have equal opportunity, and it does not owe those who do have, anything, not even respect of their lives or personal property. At what point should these people become proactive in doing something about be marginalize and pushed out of the mainstream of polite soceity?

 

I did an Occupy survey that questioned if participants had grown up with abuse. We know some parents are abusive. Poverty is abusive and leads to poor parenting. Is this a social problem we should address? Are we living with a time bomb, as were the people in the past.

 

I'm still not quite sure what you want from this thread. What is your position on sharing? There's many subconscious actions that effect your perception and chemical feelings. Many of these mechanics were formed through the process of evolution. For instance, when you watch TV a lot, if your not very careful, your brain will take it as a mental environment and adapt to it. This is because your brain is not adapted to distinguish between reality and something that is not reality, evolution as only effected how those survive via reality, so your subconscious brain may mistake things for TV as the environment around it for which it must respond to.

Of course, it is a little more complex than that, because on one end, you have someone like Siddhartha, and on the other, you have someone like Hannibal Lector and millions of varieties in between. Both people are intelligent, but besides from growing up in different environments which when your brain is developing in its early stages it tries to adapt to and then solidify to in adulthood, you have the physical mechanisms themselves such as those that release certain amounts of certain chemicals and those that are responsible for neuro-function in various parts of the brain. While it is possible for both a kind and violent person to be intelligent or stupid, there mechanisms that are more adapted for doing things. I'm thinking people like Siddhartha have very open minds and don't really solidify on just any particular mental state, and then I'm thinking people like Lector have brains which do solidify or keep in the habit of mental states, but I guess people like him would already know that, so then it would also come down to consequence, whether they will do something or if the risk out weights the benefit which is a separate mechanism. Its very complex, and many of these "violent" adaptations are simply remnants of our ginetic ancestry, such as from primates. Its very complex, and many of these "violent" adaptations are simply remnants of our ginetic ancestry, such as from primates. But now, there isn't much of a logical use for those adaptations for civilization to survive, which is why people like Lector tend to get sent to prison, whereas 3,000 years ago he might be some war hero.

For some these mechanisms are easy to control because they do not occupy as much brain function or not as much of certain chemicals get released or not as much of a habit builds up, for others, not so much.

This is often how I explain racism too. Often times with racism, there may simply be an environment someone grew up in which was discriminatory to a certain race, and their subconscious saw that that was a pattern and built onto it and carried it through.

Edited April 17, 2012 by questionposter

[Athena]

I'm still not quite sure what you want from this thread. What is your position on sharing? There's many subconscious actions that effect your perception and chemical feelings. Many of these mechanics were formed through the process of evolution. For instance, when you watch TV a lot, if your not very careful, your brain will take it as a mental environment and adapt to it. This is because your brain is not adapted to distinguish between reality and something that is not reality, evolution as only effected how those survive via reality, so your subconscious brain may mistake things for TV as the environment around it for which it must respond to.

Of course, it is a little more complex than that, because on one end, you have someone like Siddhartha, and on the other, you have someone like Hannibal Lector and millions of varieties in between. Both people are intelligent, but besides from growing up in different environments which when your brain is developing in its early stages it tries to adapt to and then solidify to in adulthood, you have the physical mechanisms themselves such as those that release certain amounts of certain chemicals and those that are responsible for neuro-function in various parts of the brain. While it is possible for both a kind and violent person to be intelligent or stupid, there mechanisms that are more adapted for doing things. I'm thinking people like Siddhartha have very open minds and don't really solidify on just any particular mental state, and then I'm thinking people like Lector have brains which do solidify or keep in the habit of mental states, but I guess people like him would already know that, so then it would also come down to consequence, whether they will do something or if the risk out weights the benefit which is a separate mechanism. Its very complex, and many of these "violent" adaptations are simply remnants of our ginetic ancestry, such as from primates. Its very complex, and many of these "violent" adaptations are simply remnants of our ginetic ancestry, such as from primates. But now, there isn't much of a logical use for those adaptations for civilization to survive, which is why people like Lector tend to get sent to prison, whereas 3,000 years ago he might be some war hero.

For some these mechanisms are easy to control because they do not occupy as much brain function or not as much of certain chemicals get released or not as much of a habit builds up, for others, not so much.

This is often how I explain racism too. Often times with racism, there may simply be an environment someone grew up in which was discriminatory to a certain race, and their subconscious saw that that was a pattern and built onto it and carried it through.

 

Thank you. I think maybe this subject would work better in a history forum.

 

Every culture has a consciousness and subconscious. Periodically there are episodes of mass insanity. Witch hunts and wars are such periods, and some consider what happened at Munster to one of those moments of insanity too. But then plenty in the past might seem strange to us today. The Age of Chivalry mixed with Christian superstition lead to a lot of crazy stuff.

Edited April 20, 2012 by Athena