Christian History Institute (CHI) provides church history resources and self-study material and publishes the quarterly Christian History Magazine. Our aim is to make Christian history enjoyable and applicable to the widest possible audience.
Execution of the Tailor-King
The bodies of Jan Bockelson, and two other leaders of the Anabaptist sect, were hung outside the church of St Lambert on 22 January 1536.
Today, the spire of the church of St Lambert in Münster still has three unusual adornments: cages. They were first hung on 22 January 1536 to hold the mutilated bodies of Jan Bockelson and two other leaders of the Anabaptist sect that had ruled the north-west German city for 16 months.
Anabaptism emerged in the first years of the Reformation, a separatist, communitarian faith. Its leaders were closely aligned with the peasant uprisings that took place across Germany in 1525. History was providential and they were on the right side of it; what need of a master when Christ’s millennium was at hand?