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Luther’s conflict with Andreas Karlstadt, and the destruction and misery of the Peasant’s
War led by Thomas Müntzer (1489-1525). Luther’s teaching, according to Cochlaeus,
must be false because it results only in discord, disagreement, and violence. Karlstadt and
Müntzer both met bad ends because they attempted to “turn Luther’s words into deeds”—
although Cochlaeus notes with satisfaction that Müntzer recanted before his execution. 493
For Cochlaeus, the Apostles lived in harmony and unity, whereas Luther and his
followers war amongst each other and against their neighbours. The wretched deeds
(“infoelicia gesta”) of the deformed priests Karlstadt and Müntzer (“sacerdotum
difformia”) stand in stark contrast to the lives of the Apostles—the reader can see only
too clearly (“certius clariusque intelligat”) which is to be preferred. 494
This passage
paints a picture of Protestants as a violent, ungodly and warmongering group, and
contrasts them with the supposed harmonious community presided over by the Roman
pope in the other passages assembled in Cochlaeus’ compilation, the peaceful Apostles
(as in the Constitutions) or the well-disciplined and God-fearing hierarchy from
Dionysius’ Ecclesiastical Hierarchy.
The two figures discussed in this section, Clichtove and Cochlaeus, share a
common horror of disorder, and considered a powerful ecclesiastical institution to be an
effective bulwark against it. Furthermore, both authors turn to Dionysius when they argue
iat Mainz in 1549. The editors of the English translation describe “Cochlaeus’s unabashed antagonism for
the Reformation-“ noting “his virulent attacks on Luther, his ideals, and his fellow reformers.” Cochlaeus
1479-1552. Elizabeth Vandiver, Ralph Keen and Thomas D. Frazel, Two Contemporary Accounts of
Martin Luther, trans. Elizabeth Vandiver, Ralph Keen and Thomas D. Frazel (Manchester, New York:
Manchester University Press, 2002), 1.
493 One of Müntzer’s associates (the curiously named Fistulator) was captured and executed “without
confession or contrition, as though he were a beast” because he refused to recant. “However, Müntzer
ended his life in a far better fashion than did Fistulator...But Müntzer is said to have been led into great
penitence, and with the highest devotion both to have recanted his errors and to have accepted the
venerable sacrament under one form, after having made his confession according to the Catholic rite,
before he fell by the blow of the sword.” Vandiver, 161.
494 Cochlaeus, 2v.
180