Itt-Ott, 1992 (25. évfolyam, 1/119-3/121. szám)

1992 / 1. (119.) szám

Catholic Voivode, wishing to end the confusing situation of the religious controversies, ordered Dávid’s arrest by the city council of Kolozsvár. Dávid mounted the pulpit nevertheless, in defiance of the ruler’s decree forbidding him to preach. In this, his last appearance in the pulpit, he upheld his principles, among them the concept of non adoramus, which was the most radical, stressing that Christ was not to be worshiped.

Fianlly the Voivode called together the synod at Alba Julia, where the majority of the participants repudiated Dávid’s theological innovations. The discussions lasted three days, after which the crown prosecutor read to Dávid the accusation and the sentence:

You, Francis Dávid, following your own advice and without the agreement of the Church, have committed blasphemy by denying God. Against the laws of the land, you nave proclaimed innovations. His Majesty therefore punishes you in exemplary fashion and according to what you deserve; so as to discourage others from similar innovations, you are to be held in prison until further notice (Magyar történelmi emlékek 1860, 3:22-29).

After the show-trial everybody went home except Francis Dávid, who was locked up in Déva castle, and there, after an illness that lasted several months, he died, in November, 1579.

Dávid left behind a religious and spiritual legacy which, because of its contradictions, continued to occupy the pages of church history for centuries. Great men generally influence posterity rather than their own generation. Dávid faced his destiny with the knowledge that with his revision he completed the spiritual revolution of the sixteenth century and its Reformation. According to the view of a more balanced church history, Dávid did not work toward the coming of the Enlightenment, but rather backwards in the direction of Old Testament Judaism.

On the occasion of the 400th anniversary of Dávid’s death, which was celebrated in Hungary in 1979, the historian of the radical Reformation, G.H. Williams of Harvard University, eulogized Dávid’s religious ideas before the experts that had gathered there from around the world: “Dávid was not really an innovator but the restorationist of Jewish Christianity... (Williams 1982, 321).”

For those who still treasure the Judeo-Christian tradition, the above formula can have an appeasing effect and point to the end of bitter contradictions.

After Dávid’s trial had ended, a great uncertainty overtook the Unitarians. Dávid’s conviction sent fear into those of the Transylvania non adoramus camp. According to Lech Szczucki, a modern Polish church historian, many fled and took refuge among like-minded, as in Poland, while others, turcophile collaborators, fled to Turkish territory (Szczucki 1980, 49). □

Notes

!The name Unitarian instead of Arinarian appeared first in 1568 and was used to distinguish the Antitrinitarian sect. It was only in 1600 that this word

was entered into official documents in an act asking for religious freedom. The National Diet has demanded from King Rudolph that religious freedom be assured and that four established denominations be allowed to live in complete freedom. These are the Roman Catholic, the Calvinist, the Lutheran, and the Unitarian confessions.’ (Magyar emlékek IV, Budapest, 1860, 551). In British ecclesiastical literature, the word Unitarian was first used in 1687 in a dispute between the Quaker William Penn and Henry Hedworth, who was a disciple of Socinus. Hedworth had learned the word in Holland from a Hungarian student.

2Not long before, Dávid had taken Stancaro to task for proclaiming the exclusivity of the human mind in matters of faith, saying, “Do not follow the philosophers who encourage turning away from God and who lead us to paganism.”

3Melanchthon also maintained that the “Mosaic Law against idolatry and blasphemy was binding on Christian states and was applicable to heresies as well. Melanchthon, Philip. In corpus reformatorum. Vol. VIII, 520.

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nr-OTT 25. évf. (1992), 1.(119.) szám 29