Norman Cohn's book 'The Pursuit of the Millennium' is a classic work for a reason: it is outstanding history and well written. Like most very good histories, it illuminates the past and has implications for the present as well.
Cohn's topic is 'Millenarianism' in the Middle Ages, or the recurring emergence of a collective of "faithful" under the leadership of a charismatic prophet (or prophets) who believe that the world will imminently be transformed into an earthly paradise inhabited by the "select" (i.e., themselves). This Edenic existence will last 1,000 years and then the Last Judgement will forever sort all mankind into the camps of Heaven and Hell. The basis of the millennial paradigm is rooted in the Book of Daniel (Ch. VII: Daniel's Dream) and the Book of Revelation (Ch. XX), as well as the enduring legend that there could be a return to what was wishfully assumed to be mankind's original egalitarian and plentiful existence.
Millenarianism flourished in the Middle Ages in response to anxious and disorienting social conditions, such as rapid population growth and widespread agricultural failures in the High Middle Ages and the Black Death of the Late Middle Ages. The most fervent followers were the marginalized poor whose place within the social structure and whose very survival was under threat. A prophet, who assumed the role of messiah, offered the poor a chance to be among the "select" or elite.
Cohn surveys a series of Millenarian outbreaks, from the poor's participation in the First Crusade (c. 1100), to the English Peasants' Revolt (1381), to the Hussite Rebellion, and it's offspring, the Taborites of Bohemia (c. 1425), to the German Peasants' War fostered by Thomas Müntzer (c.1525), and through the Anabaptist Revolt at Munster (c. 1530).
Modern corollaries of millenarianism are not difficult to conjure; one need only think of Nazi Germany and Hitler's "Thousand-Year Reich" for an obvious echo. Its' "select" - the Volk - largely supported a martial spirit and an intent on conquering "lebensraum" (not unlike the First Crusade). Of course the Nazis grasped power out of the disorienting economic and social conditions of the Weimar Republic. Perhaps no one made better use of these parallels between the Middle Ages' phenomenon and more recent history than Friedrich Reck did in his novella
A History of the Münster Anabaptists: Inner Emigration and the Third Reich: A Critical Edition of Friedrich Reck-Malleczewen's Bockelson: A Tale of Mass Insanity
(an edition which also includes background commentary and critical exposition).
Cohn concludes his book with reference to the present, where he claims the enduring underpinnings of millenarianism continue to exist in secular forms.
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Top reviews from other countries
Clademir Araldi
Livro muito atual, em nossos tempos tão obscuros!
Reviewed in Brazil on July 7, 2015Scott Claxton
The End of The World is Upon Us ...............
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 27, 2013
