Merten Perboom, an Anabaptist, was baptized about Christmas of 1534 by Leenaert van Ysenbroeck in the Palmenhuys near Born, in the duchy of Jülich, now Dutch province of Limburg. Upon his arrest and trial at Maastricht, Limburg on 29 January 1535, he recanted and was beheaded at the Vrijthof square of Maastricht on 1 February 1535. His confession is remarkable for its information about early Anabaptism: Merten was baptized after Leenaert had read from a book (a New Testament?). Anabaptists did not believe in purgatory. They believed that if one party of a married couple had not been rebaptized they were living in adultery. For this reason Merten had forced his wife to be baptized against her will. He also gave some information about a plan of the Anabaptists to meet in Ysenbroeck and to march to Amsterdam. This shows that early Anabaptism in this region was largely infected with revolutionary ideas.

Bibliography

Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Harrisonburg, Virginia, and Waterloo, Ontario, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 3, p. 656. All rights reserved. For information on ordering the encyclopedia visit the Herald Press website.

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