Customer Reviews

The Anabaptist Story

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Epstep's The Anabaptist Story is a standard text in introducing Anabaptist History, despite its datedness this is still a job I think the book does very well. After a brief (and outdated) introductory comment on the sources of Anabaptism roughly two-thirds of the book is focused on a history of the various variants of sixteenth century Anabaptism, although with an emphasis on individual personalities particularly those of Menno Simmons and Balthasar Hubmaier. There are now the resources available to gain more in depth biographies of most of these early leaders; nonetheless Epstep's brief summary is very useful and could be read individually apart from the wider narrative. The final third of the book examines key aspects of Anabaptist theology although with a strong emphasis on the early Mennonites, this is probably the least helpful part of the book. I would make two criticisms of the book.

I) Given his early demarcation of Anabaptists from inspirationists Epstep could have done a lot more to examine this difference.
II) Although the breadth of Epstep's study across the regional variations of Anabaptism is good the event that was most important in early perceptions of Anabaptism , namely the Theocracy of Munster is only ever really given passing reference. I find it difficult that that an event that was a defining point in the definition of the primary Anabaptist vision is not covered in any substantial treatment.

Overall this is a good book. However, I think that there are now better ones available. Event though it deals with a broader subject matter I think Meic Pearce's The Great Restoration is a better starting point. For an overview of different Anabaptist approaches to theological topics I would recommend Thomas Finger's A Contemporary Anabaptist Theology.