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Ranters
The Ranters were one of a number of dissenting groups that emerged around the time of the English Commonwealth (1649–1660). They were largely common people and the movement was widespread throughout England, though they were not organised and had no leader. History The chaos of the Second English Civil War, the execution of King Charles I and the animosity between the Presbyterians and Independents during the era of the Commonwealth gave rise to countless sectarian groups that were attempting to make sense of their society and place within that society. The Ranters were one such group. They were regarded as heretical by the established Church and seem to have been regarded by the government as a threat to social order. The quote "...the bishops, Charles and the Lords have had their turn, overturn, so your turn shall be next...", published in a Ranter pamphlet, no doubt caused some concern in the halls of power. The Ranters denied the authority of churches, of scripture, of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ranters
The Ranters were one of a number of dissenting groups that emerged around the time of the English Commonwealth (1649–1660). They were largely common people and the movement was widespread throughout England, though they were not organised and had no leader. History The chaos of the Second English Civil War, the execution of King Charles I and the animosity between the Presbyterians and Independents during the era of the Commonwealth gave rise to countless sectarian groups that were attempting to make sense of their society and place within that society. The Ranters were one such group. They were regarded as heretical by the established Church and seem to have been regarded by the government as a threat to social order. The quote "...the bishops, Charles and the Lords have had their turn, overturn, so your turn shall be next...", published in a Ranter pamphlet, no doubt caused some concern in the halls of power. The Ranters denied the authority of churches, of scripture, of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
English Dissenters
English Dissenters or English Separatists were Protestant Christians who separated from the Church of England in the 17th and 18th centuries. A dissenter (from the Latin ''dissentire'', "to disagree") is one who disagrees in opinion, belief and other matters. English Dissenters opposed state interference in religious matters, and founded their own churches, educational establishments and communities. Some emigrated to the New World, especially to the Thirteen Colonies and Canada. Brownists founded the Plymouth colony. English dissenters played a pivotal role in the spiritual development of the United States and greatly diversified the religious landscape. They originally agitated for a wide-reaching Protestant Reformation of the established Church of England, and they flourished briefly during the Protectorate under Oliver Cromwell. King James VI of Scotland, I of England and Ireland, had said "no bishop, no king", emphasising the role of the clergy in justifying royal legi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Laurence Clarkson
Laurence Clarkson (1615–1667), sometimes called Claxton, born in Preston, Lancashire, was an English theologian and accused heretic. He was the most outspoken and notorious of the loose collection of radical Protestants known as the Ranters. According to Charles William Sutton, writing in the ''Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900'', "the name is written Clarkson in his earlier tracts and Claxton in the later ones. It was no doubt originally Clarkson. In that form the name is still common about Preston, where it is pronounced 'Clackson'". Clarkson's ideas are set out in a 1650 tract sponsored by the wealthy Leveller military man, William Rainborowe, called ''A Single Eye''. Clarkson opposed the idea of sin, considering it to be "invented by the ruling class to keep the poor in order." He felt that only the intention of an act, and nothing at all about its content, mattered to God, so that no specific morality could be prescribed on religious bases. He considered the dang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diggers
The Diggers were a group of religious and political dissidents in England, associated with agrarian socialism. Gerrard Winstanley and William Everard, amongst many others, were known as True Levellers in 1649, in reference to their split from the Levellers, and later became known as ''Diggers'' because of their attempts to farm on common land. Their original name came from their belief in economic equality based upon a specific passage in the Acts of the Apostles. The Diggers tried (by "levelling" land) to reform the existing social order with an agrarian lifestyle based on their ideas for the creation of small, egalitarian rural communities. They were one of a number of nonconformist dissenting groups that emerged around this time. The Diggers were driven from one colony after another by the authorities. Theory In 1649 Gerrard Winstanley and 14 others published a pamphlet in which they called themselves the "True Levellers" to distinguish their ideas from those of the Level ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Everard (Digger)
William Everard (bap. 1602, d. in or after 1651) was an early leader of the Diggers. Biography William Everard was apprenticed on 14 August 1616 to Robert Miller of the Merchant Taylors' Company, London. He was the son of William Everad, a yeoman of Reading and had been baptized on 9 May 1602 in the parish of St Giles, Reading, as William Evered. This Everad took the Protestation Oath in the parish of St Lawrence, Reading on 20 February 1642. Less than a year later a William Everard was serving as a Parliamentary scout for Sir Samuel Luke in the Berkshire and Oxfordshire area. Hessayon speculates that he may have been captured by the Royalists as there is no record of him until May 1647 when an ensign by the name of William Everard signed a petition voicing the grievances of the army under the command of Sir Thomas Fairfax. He was cashiered out of the army in late 1647 or early 1648 for plotting to kill Charles I. In 1648 he was briefly imprisoned in Kingston, Surrey, for causing ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abiezer Coppe
Abiezer Coppe (1619 – 1672) was one of the English Ranters and a writer of prophetic religious pamphlets. Biography He was born in Warwick on May 20, 1619, and was a pupil of Thomas Dugard at The King's School, Warwick. From there he went to All Souls College, Oxford and also Merton College, Oxford. One of Coppe's major works is the '' Fiery Flying Roll'' of 1649, a (highly heretical) tirade against inequality and hypocrisy which vividly evokes the charged and visionary atmosphere that swept over England during the civil war and interregnum. While Coppe's views were unpopular with Royalists, they were equally disliked by Parliamentarians, and shortly after the ''Fiery Flying Roll'' was published he was imprisoned at Newgate Prison and the book burned. Coppe was later released and celebrated by publishing ''Coppe's return to the ways of righteousness'', in which he retracted his previous heresies, while adding a few more. Like Lodowick Muggleton and the Diggers' leader Ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joseph Salmon (writer)
Joseph Salmon ( fl. 1647–1656) was a significant English religious and political writer of the middle of the seventeenth century. Life He served in the New Model Army, leaving it in 1649. ''A Rout, A Rout'' contained criticism of the Parliamentary leadership. He was arrested in 1650, and imprisoned in Coventry, with a six-month sentence; and cashiered from the Army. After 1650 he was for a time a minister in Kent. He left Kent and went abroad in the middle of 1655. He later emigrated to Barbados. A Ranter? He was known to the Quaker George Fox, from 1648/9, who identified him as one of the Ranters. Who exactly the Ranters were is now a topic of scholarly debate, and it is suggested Fox may have supplied that name later; Christopher Hill considers Salmon to have belonged to the ‘mystical and quietist wing’ of the Ranters. Salmon's last known work is ''Heights in Depths'', from 1651, an apparent if partial recantation, written to fulfil a promise he had made to secure rel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jacob Bauthumley
Jacob Bauthumley or Bottomley (1613–1692) was an English radical religious writer, usually identified as a central figure among the Ranters. He served as part of the New Model Army, leaving in March 1650. After the Restoration of 1660, he took up a job as a librarian in Leicester, where he produced a book of extracts from John Foxe, published in 1676. Biography Bauthumley is known principally for ''The Light and Dark Sides of God'' (1650). This work was regarded as blasphemous for its pantheistic tendencies, including the following: After the Blasphemy Act of August 1650, he was arrested, convicted, and burned through the tongue. Bauthumley had served in the Parliamentarian Army; Norman Cohn states that he was in the Army while writing the pamphlet, and took part in Ranter and Quaker meetings in Leicestershire in the mid-1650s. Christopher Hill says that he left the Army in March 1650. His family had earlier suffered ostracism, for permitting sermons by Jeremiah Bu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Bunyan
John Bunyan (; baptised 30 November 162831 August 1688) was an English writer and Puritan preacher best remembered as the author of the Christian allegory ''The Pilgrim's Progress,'' which also became an influential literary model. In addition to ''The Pilgrim's Progress'', Bunyan wrote nearly sixty titles, many of them expanded sermons. Bunyan came from the village of Elstow, near Bedford. He had some schooling and at the age of sixteen joined the Parliamentary Army during the first stage of the English Civil War. After three years in the army he returned to Elstow and took up the trade of tinker, which he had learned from his father. He became interested in religion after his marriage, attending first the parish church and then joining the Bedford Meeting, a nonconformist group in Bedford, and becoming a preacher. After the restoration of the monarch, when the freedom of nonconformists was curtailed, Bunyan was arrested and spent the next twelve years in prison as he refuse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christian Anarchism
Christian anarchism is a Christian movement in political theology that claims anarchism is inherent in Christianity and the Gospels. It is grounded in the belief that there is only one source of authority to which Christians are ultimately answerable—the authority of God as embodied in the teachings of Jesus. It therefore rejects the idea that human governments have ultimate authority over human societies. Christian anarchists denounce the state, believing it is violent, deceitful and, when glorified, idolatrous. Christian anarchists hold that the "Reign of God" is the proper expression of the relationship between God and humanity. Under the "Reign of God", human relationships would be characterized by divided authority, servant leadership, and universal compassion—not by the hierarchical, authoritarian structures that are normally attributed to religious social order. Most Christian anarchists are pacifists who reject war and the use of violence. More than any other Bibl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
17th-century Denominations In England
Many religious denominations emerged during the early-to-mid-17th century in England. Many of these were influenced by the radical changes brought on by the English Civil War, subsequent Execution of Charles I and the advent of the Commonwealth of England. This event led to a widespread discussion about how society should be structured. *Fifth Monarchists * Grindletonians * Muggletonians *Ranters *Quakers *Seekers See also * Anglicanism *Anglo-Catholicism *Brownists *Diggers *The Caroline Divines * Congregational church * English Baptists * English Dissenters *English Independents *English Presbyterianism *Gangraena *Levellers *Puritans The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant. ... Further reading * * English Civil War History of Christianity in England Denominations ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seekers
The Seekers, or Legatine-Arians as they were sometimes known, were an English dissenting group that emerged around the 1620s, probably inspired by the preaching of three brothers – Walter, Thomas, and Bartholomew Legate. Seekers considered all organised churches of their day corrupt and preferred to wait for God's revelation. Many of them subsequently joined the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). Origins Long before the English Civil War there already existed what the English Marxist historian, Christopher Hill, calls a "lower-class heretical culture" in England. The cornerstones of this culture were anti-clericalism and a strong emphasis on Biblical study, but specific doctrines had "an uncanny persistence": Millenarianism, mortalism, anti-Trinitarianism, Hermeticism and a rejection of Predestination. Such ideas became "commonplace to seventeenth-century Baptists, Seekers, early Quakers and other radical groupings which took part in the free-for-all discussions of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
