# A Study of Peter Chelčický's Life and a Translation from Czech of Part I of His Net of Faith (1947)/Part 1/Chapter 4

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CHAPTER IV
PETER CHELC̄ICKY̍ AND THE HUSSITE REFORMATION – THE PARTING OF THE WAYS
—Hans Denck.
The story of Chelc̄icky̍'s growth to independence is a chapter in which we are still missing several links. At the present day, the available and known material enables us the reconstruction of his gradual estrangement from the Hussite Reformation in approximately the following sequence:
I. THE ESTRANGEMENT FROM THE TABORITES
In another place we spoke of the year 1419 which was so decisive in Chelc̄icky̍'s life. This is the year in which there occurred the initial rift with the Taborites because of his insistence on total non-violence. You will remember that he then asked the masters of the Prague University the question whether it is permissible for Christians to take ​part in war. He was not satisfied with their conservative answer, and became disappointed especially in Master Jakoubek of Str̄i̍bro, then head of the University, who had formerly maintained a pacifist position.
The issue of non-violence was still a matter of public discussion in A.D.1421 in which year Chelc̄icky̍ wrote his pacifist contribution O boji duchovni̍m (About the Spiritual Warfare), and a little later, O ci̍rkvi svate̍ (About the Holy Church). These writings were addressed to the Taborites and were considerably read by them as well as by the growing circle of his followers. "They are the first books which we have preserved of the new nascent community." In his book About the Spiritual Warfare, written as an exposition of Ephesians 6: 10–20, where in the Christian is exhorted to "put on the whole armour of God," for his "warfare is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, . . . against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places," Chelc̄icky̍ shows how long he identified himself with the teachings and endeavors of the "Taborite Brethren" until the day when, incited by excessive chiliastic notions, they began an extermination war against all "unfaithful ones." By doing ​this they vitiated precisely those principles he cherished most, and he began to doubt the ethical justification of their position. Here, for the first time as far as we know, Chelc̄icky̍ expounds the fundamental pacifist thesis that a Christian must abstain from physical war and violence, since his main duty is the "spiritual warfare" against the evils of this world, violence being one of those evils.
II. THE ESTRANGEMENT FROM THE UTRAQUISTS
For a while, Chelc̄icky̍ is in good relations with the ​Utraquist Church and its controversial archbishop, John Rokycana. Many letters were exchanged between these two men. In another place we spoke of Rokycana's mediation between Chelc̄icky̍ and a group of young reformists." But Rokycana gradually became more and more what we might call a "high-church" man, with Romanist leanings. This in the end alienated him from Chelc̄icky̍ who wrote a sharp polemical Replika proti Rokycanovi, (A Reply to Rokycana).
PETER CHELC̄ICKY̍ AND HIS LIFE
01 pp. 30ff.
02 It is worth noticing that, at the Synod of St.Wenceslas' Day, A.D.1418, the principle of just war and limited violence was upheld and that, even after the reversal of the position in 1419, a Hussite priest Jan Z̄elivsky̍, was defending Chelc̄icky̍'s absolutist position. Cf. F. Bartos̄ "K poc̄a̍tkūm Petra Chelc̄icke̍ho," (The Beginnings of Peter Chelc̄icky̍), C̄asopis c̄eske̍ho musea, Prague, vol.II, p.154.
03 Spinka, "Peter Chelc̄icky̍, the Spiritual Father of the Unitas Fratrum," Church History, vol.XII, no.4 (December 1943), p.276.
04 Bartos̄, op. cit., p.155.
05 Holinka, ed., Trakta̍ty Petra Chelc̄icke̍ho, Prague: Melantrich, 1940, p.27.
06 Cf. p.22 et seq.
07 He went there together with Brother Lucas, a theologian later connected with the Unity.
08 Bartoš, op.cit., p.156.
09 i.e. the 4 essences of the Divine Body of the eucharist (corpus Christi figurative, naturaliter, personaliter, actualiter).
10 Bartos̄, op. cit., p. 156.
11 a Taborite theologian, priest of Z̄atec, friend of Payne.
12 Bartos̄ op. cit., p. 157.
13 Probably his De non adorando, Ad magnificationem.
15 Concerning the dating, cf. Bartos̄, op. cit., pp.149–160; Goll, "Petr Chelc̄icky̍ a jeho spisy," (P.C. and His Works), C̄asopis C̄eske̍ho musea, 1881, p.12–13, same author, Quellen und Untersuchungen, II, p.65; Yastrebov, Etjudy, 1908, p.185–195.
16 Reply Against Nicholas Bishop of Ta̍bor.
17 From the Reply, quoted by Bartos̄, op. cit., p. 152f.
18 ibid., p. 153, cf. Palacky̍, op. cit., p.234.
19 His official title was "Omnium heresum et precipue Viclefistice et Picardice heresis sollicitus persecutor," Bartos̄, op. cit., p.150.
20 Palacky̍, op. cit., p.227; Cardinal Aeneas Silvius, later Pope Pius II, called Nicholas "a man full of evil days."
21 p.42f.
22 Written A.D.1434.
23 Especially O sedmer̄e sva̍tosti̍, (About the Seven Sacraments).