Melchior Hoffman

Melchior Hoffman (or Hofmann; byname: Pel(t)zer "furrier"; c. 1495 – c. 1543) was an Anabaptist prophet and a visionary leader in northern Germany and the Netherlands.

Hoffman was born at Schwäbisch Hall in southwest Germany before 1500. His biographers usually give his surname as Hofmann; in his printed works it sometimes appears as Hoffman, and in his manuscripts as Hoffmann.

He was without scholarly training, and first appeared as a furrier in Livonia. Attracted by Luther's teachings, he came forward as a lay preacher, combining business travels with a religious mission. He worked as a lay preacher in the cities of Wolmar (from 1523), Dorpat and Reval. In Dorpat he became involved in an iconoclastic revolt, and the magistrates obliged him to go to Wittenberg to obtain Luther's approval of his preaching. After his return to Dorpat he was involved in more controversy and forced to leave the city.

After the same thing happened in Reval, he decided to go to , Sweden, where he arrived in the autumn of 1526. Here too he was involved in religious disturbances and so left Sweden again.

After a short stay in Lübeck he made his way to Denmark, where he found favour with King Frederick I, and was appointed by royal ordinance to preach the Gospel at Kiel. He was probably the first printer in the city. He was extravagant in his denunciations, and developed a Zwinglian view of the Eucharist.

Luther himself was alarmed at this. At a colloquy of preachers in Flensburg on (April 8, 1529), Hoffman, John Campanus and others were put on their defence. Hoffman maintained (against the "magic" of the Lutheran interpretation) that the function of the Eucharist, like that of preaching, is nothing more than an appeal for spiritual union with Christ. Refusing to retract, he was banished.

...
Wikipedia