‘Lately Gone into Germany’: Thomas Tillam and his Treatises on Marriage, Divorce and Polygamy

ABSTRACT

Thomas Tillam lived in the middle of the seventeenth century and stands out as one of the most intriguing figures among the religious dissenters of the time. Having had short-term success establishing Baptist churches at Hexham and Colchester, he encouraged 100–200 families to emigrate to Southern Germany and set up a Judaeo-Christian community. In 1660–1665 his publications entitled Temple of Lively Stones and The Unequal Yoke Unloosed, reveal his attitude to marriage and divorce. He seems to have moved from his declaration that ‘I know not any door of divorce (opened in the Gospel) except adultery’ to defending the divorce of ‘unacceptable wives’ and supporting polygamy by Old Testament precedents. The reason for this change of belief is considered in the light of rumours and accusations from contemporary commentators and the marital situation of his benefactor, Karl I Ludwig.

KEYWORDS:

• Thomas Tillam
• marriage
• divorce
• polygamy

Acknowledgements

I wish to gratefully acknowledge the encouragement and provision of primary source material by Professor Martin Rothkegel and the most helpful suggestions by Dr Stephen Copson. I wish to thank Dr Wanda Neary for proof-reading the text.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Stephen Kent, “Thomas Tillam and the Hexham Church Records”, Baptist Quarterly 52, no. 3 (2021): 98–111.

2 Edmund Warren, Jew's Sabbath Antiquated (London, 1659), preface (unpaginated).

3 ‘House of Commons Journal Volume 8: 28 May 1660’, in Journal of the House of Commons: Volume 8, 1660–1667 (London: His Majesty’s Stationary Office, 1802), 47–48. British History Online,, http://www.british-history.ac.uk/commons-jrnl/vol8/pp47-48, accessed June 8, 2022.

4 Thomas Tillam, The Temple of Lively Stones (London, 1660), 9.

5 Ibid., 180.

6 Ibid., 360–1.

7 The Agreement of Frederick Earl of Wiedt, Baron of Runkell and Isenburgh in Germany (London: Gilber[t]son, 1661). Exemplar: Library of Congress, AC901. M5, 127, no. 5 (digitalised by the Library of Congress Duplication Service).

8 The Solemn Covenant to renounce all powers and rulers contrary to Christ and his government, cast off their coin, and separate from all relations linked to anti-Christian religion. Document Ref.: SP 29/181 f.150 Folio Numbers: ff. 150 Date: Dec. 14 1666 Source Archive: The National Archives of the UK Gale Document Number: MC4327882840 (Gale, Cengage Learning, 2020).

9 Christopher Sanderson to Joseph Williamson, ? 14 March 1665-6, Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, of the reign of Charles II, 1666–1667, preserved in the State Paper Department of Her Majesty's Public Record Office. SP 29/181.

10 Anthony Fletcher, “The Protestant Idea of Marriage in Early Modern England,” in Religion, Culture and Society in Early Modern Britain. Essays in Honour of Patrick Collinson, ed. Peter Roberts (Cambridge, 1994), 161–81.

11 The Life and Death of that Old Disciple of Jesus Christ and Eminent Minister of the Gospel Mr. Hanserd Knollys Who Dyed In the Ninety third Year of his Age. Written with his own hand to the Year 1672 and continued in General in an Epistle by Mr. William Kiffin (London: Harris 1692), 25–27.

12 Taylor to Williamson, 5 Mar 1668, Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, of the reign of Charles II, 1668, preserved in the State Paper Department of Her Majesty's Public Record Office. SP 29/236.

13 Martin Rothkegel, The Unequall Yoke Unloosed. Thomas Tillam’s divorce tract (2021) 149 http://www.academia.edu/63063494. (accessed December 30, 2022).

14 Thomas Tillam, The Unequall Yoke Unloosed (1660) Universitätsbibliothek Kassel, Landesbibliothek und Murhardsche Bibliothek der Stadt Kassel, 4° Ms. theol. 49 https://orka.bibliothek.uni-kassel.de/viewer/image/1557493786034/2/#topDocAnchor, (accessed December 2022).

15 Ibid., 3.

16 Ibid., 4.

17 Ibid., 6.

18 Ibid., 7.

19 Ibid., 10.

20 Ibid., 12.

21 Ibid., 13.

22 Ibid., 15.

23 Ibid., 18.

24 Ibid., 21.

25 Rothkegel, The Unequall Yoke Unloosed, 149.

26 See A. A. Hodge, The Westminster Confession – A Commentary (Monergism Books, 2014).see Chapter 24, Of Marriage and Divorce

27 See Sara J. van den Berg and W. Scott Howard, The Divorce Tracts of Milton, Texts and Contexts (Dusquesne University Press, 2010).

28 See Austin Woolrych, “Squibb, Arthur”, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004).

29 George Eve, Arthur Squibb et al., A Faithful Testimony against The Teachers of Circumcision and the Legal Ceremonies; who are lately gone to Germany, National Library of Scotland, Shelfmark Crawford ET.s.1662/13 9.

30 JB, The Morality of the Seventh-day-Sabbath Disproved (London 1683), 15.

31 Rothkegel, The Unequall Yoke Unloosed 156 and see Stephen D. Snobelen, ‘Biddle, John’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004).

32 Joannis’ report first appeared in Johann Jacob Schudt, Judischer Merckwurdigkerten Vierdter Theil (Frankfurt a. M.: Andreae, 1718), 313–5.

33 See John Cowell The Snare Broken (London: E Brewster 1677), 59; Edward Stennett and William Henry Black, The Insnared Taken in the Works of His Hands (London: Printed for author 1679), 94.

34 W.N. to Hen. Muddiman, December 3 1664, State Papers Domestic 1660–1714, The National Archives Document, Ref.: SP 29/106/14, Sequence Number 0019,0020 (Gale, Centage Learning, 2020).

35 Quoted from Johann Friedrich Reiger, Ausgeloschte Chur-Pfalz-Simmerische Stammlinie, (Frankfurt a, M 1735), 273–9 by Cottrell-Boyce in Godly Judaizing and Godly Singularity in Thomas Tillam’s The Temple of Lively Stones (2019) fn 94. However, Tillam’s name does not appear in the primary source.

36 See Unequal and Morganatic Marriages in German Law (May 2004) https://www.heraldica.org/topics/royalty/g_morganat.htm. (accessed December 30, 2022)

37 Dirk Van der Cruysse, Madame sein ist ein ellendes Handwerck. Liselotte von der Pfalz. Eine deutsche Prinzessin am Hof des Sonnenkönigs (Munich, 1997), 34–35.

38 For the morganatic marriage of Philip of Hesse see Faulkner, John Alfred. “Luther and the Bigamous Marriage of Philip of Hesse.” The American Journal of Theology, 17, no. 2 (1913): 206–31.

39 Christopher Sanderson to Williamson, 14 December 1666, Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, of the reign of Charles II, 1666–1667, preserved in the State Paper Department of Her Majesty's Public Record Office. SP 29/181.

40 Edward Browne, An Account Of Several Travels Through a great part of Germany: In Four Journeys, (London: Tooke, 1677), 56.

41 Doris Ebert, “Englische Sabbatarier im Kloster Lobenfeld 1664–1669”, in Kraichgau: Beitrage zur Landschafts- und Heimatforschung Yearbook 11 (Heimatverein Krachgau, 1989), 94–103.

42 Personal communication from Professor M. Rothkegel.

43 News of Tillam’s death was reported in early August 1674 in a letter from Joseph Davis, a Seventh-day Baptist in London to Rhode Island USA reported in Baptists in Early North America, ed. Janet Thorngate (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2017), 33.