Thomas Totney
Encyclopedia
TheaurauJohn Tany was an English
preacher and religious visionary.
, Lincolnshire
, the third, but eldest surviving, son of John Totney and Anne, née Snelle. His father, although a poor farmer and never of the parish elite, was a respectable member of the local community. Nothing is known of Thomas’s education, yet it seems likely that by the age of seven he would have learned to read and by the age of nine, if his family could still cope without him, he would have learned to write.
to a fishmonger but was not taught their trade, instead receiving instruction in his master’s adopted profession of goldsmith
. On receiving his freedom, he married a daughter of Richard Kett, a prosperous Norfolk
landowner, whose great-uncle had been executed as leader of the 1549 East Anglian rebellion
. Rather than serving as a journeyman, Totney quickly established himself as a householder – a costly progression suggesting he received a charitable loan or financial assistance from family and friends. He set up in St. Katherine Creechurch, a location favoured by small retailers for its inexpensive rents, his shop marked by an unknown sign near Aldgate
. To ensure that Totney’s business activities fell within their orbit, he was translated to the Goldsmiths Company in January 1634. However, along with the majority of ‘remote’ goldsmiths, he resisted a Company initiative (which had gained royal approval) to vacate his dwelling and relocate in Cheapside
, the hub of the goldsmiths’ trade.
, Cambridgeshire to manage the family farm. In the summer of 1640, probably while serving as one of the parish’s petty constables, he played an important part in resisting the collection of ship money. By his own account he was imprisoned in London and his horse distrained on the county sheriff’s authority. A series of payments in 1642 show his support for those opposed to Charles I
. Moreover, he claims to have witnessed one of Captain Oliver Cromwell
’s orations delivered at Huntingdon
to newly mustered volunteers. Totney later possessed a great saddle, musket, pair of pistols and sword, suggesting he served as a harquebusier. By December 1644, he had returned to Little Shelford where he resumed his duties as a local tax official, as well as taking up sequestered land and providing quarter for Parliamentarian soldiers and their horses. Following the outbreak of a second Civil War, Totney uprooted. He rented out his lands to a local villager and moved with his family to St. Clement Danes, Westminster
. In June 1648, his second wife died and was buried in the parish.
, appears on several of his works. Furthermore, he declared himself ‘a Jew of the Tribe of Reuben
’ and took the titles High Priest and Recorder to the thirteen Tribes of the Jews. Tany justified his claims by inventing a fantastic genealogy that traced his descent from Aaron, brother of Moses
, through the tribe of Judah
and by way of the ten tribes of Israel
, the Tartars and the Welsh
. He also circumcised himself.
Thereafter, believing he had been given the gift of tongues with which to preach the everlasting gospel of God’s light and love to all nations, he went forth armed with sword and word. Crying vengeance in the streets of London, he declared woe and destruction upon the city, prophesying that the ‘Earth shall burn as an Oven’ and all the proud, the wicked and the ‘ungodly shall be as stubble to this flame’. Drawing on the potent image of Christ as goldsmith, purging dross and corruption in a furnace, Tany forged his prophetic identity – the messenger foretold by Malachi
. He claimed his authority rested with the one who sent him, God:
mission to restore the Jews to their own land. In the manner of the children of Israel before him, he began living in a tent, perhaps modelled upon the tabernacle
, which he decorated with a symbol representing the tribe of Judah. He preached in the parks and fields around London and gathered a handful of followers. His message was strong, denouncing the clergy as ‘diabolical dumb dogs, Tythe-mongers’, who fleece rather than succour the people. Gospel injunctions also made him demand justice:
Tany’s first publication was a broadside entitled I Proclaime From the Lord of Hosts The returne of the Jewes From their Captivity (25 April 1650). It is likely that Captain Robert Norwood, a wealthy London merchant, paid for its printing.
at the same time as William Everard
, one-time leader of the Diggers. There was bedlam. It was reported that the rector, John Pordage
, fell into a trance while preaching and bellowing like a bull, ran to his house. There he found his wife upstairs, clothed all in white from head to toe, holding a white rod in her hand. Moreover, an adolescent was said to have fallen into a very strange fit, foaming at the mouth for two hours. He dictated verses concerning the destruction of London and demanded to go there to meet a goldsmith.
Tany next published two tracts: Whereas TheaurauJohn Taiiiiijour My servant (15 November 1650) and THE NATIONS RIGHT in Magna Charta (28 December 1650). Both demonstrated his earnest desire for social reformation, the latter exhorting the common soldiers to dissolve Parliament and call fresh elections. His next offering, Aurora in Tranlagorum in Salem Gloria, seems to have been written on three consecutive days in late December 1650. It was printed by a Baptist who had previously printed a ‘very dangerous’ book. The publisher was Thomas Totney’s brother-in-law. It was sold by Giles Calvert
from his shop at ‘The Black-spread-Eagle’ at the west end of St. Paul's Cathedral. In January 1651, Tany wrote the first of the epistles that eventually comprised THEOUS ORI APOKOLIPIKAL (1651) and Second Part OF HIS Theous-Ori APOKOLIPIKAL (1653).
On 25 March, Tany preached at Eltham, Kent
and then again on 13 April at Norwood’s house in St. Mary Aldermary. In May, Norwood was excommunicated from his gathered church. The following month an indictment was prepared jointly against Norwood and Tany. The indicters seem to have understood Tany as some type of Ranter
, as one of ungodly conduct who allegorized the Bible and internalized hell; as an antiscripturian universalist who repudiated gospel ordinances and averred that men might live as they wished; as one who glorified sin and maintained that the soul is God. Yet, as Norwood recognized, only two of the charges fell within the scope of the Blasphemy Act of August 1650 – the allegations that Tany and Norwood affirmed:
As their own accounts of the trial’s proceedings make clear, the defendants adamantly maintained that their words had been misrepresented, altered and taken out of context. Even so, on 13 August 1651, they were convicted jointly of blasphemy by a jury of twelve men at the London sessions of the peace held in the Old Bailey
. They were each sentenced to six months imprisonment in Newgate gaol without bail or mainprize. Conditions for those that could not afford the services of the gaoler were apparently intolerable.
claimed that the same morning God revealed to him that he had been chosen as the Lord’s ‘last messenger’. Reeve and his cousin Lodowick Muggleton, a freeman of the Merchant Taylors’ Company, announced themselves to be ‘the two Witnesses of the Spirit’ foretold in the Revelation of Saint John
. In addition, they denounced Tany as a ‘counterfeit high Priest’ and pretended prophet, marking him as a Ranter, the spawn of Cain. A few days later, the judges of the Upper Bench made their judgement: Lord Chief Justice Rolle washed his hands of the business. On 16 February 1652, Tany and Norwood, having served their sentence, were each released on £100 bail pending good behaviour for one year. Thomas Totney’s former master and another man later described as a goldsmith, provided sureties. In Easter term Norwood initiated a new legal appeal. After several hearings the judges deferred proceedings until the following law term. On 28 June 1652, they reversed the guilty judgement against Norwood and Tany, resolving that their opinions had been made to rigidly conform to the strictures of the Blasphemy Act. For, whereas the Act made it unlawful to maintain that ‘there is neither Heaven nor Hell, neither Salvation nor Damnation’, the defendants who affirmed that:
In March 1654 a list of some thirty ‘Grand Blasphemers and Blasphemies’ was submitted to the Committee for Religion, which included:
, Reme, Rome
, Naples
, Sissiliah and Jerusalem, as well as reaffirming an earlier claim to the crown of England. He did this by repeating Pontius Pilate
’s reply to the chief priests of the Jews after Pilate had written ‘JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS’ as the title to be put on Christ’s cross:
into which he cast his great saddle, sword, musket, pistols, books and bible. He crossed the River Thames
in a rowing boat and made his way to Parliament, ascending the stairs into the lobby outside the door. Unable to deliver a petition he departed, returning after about an hour oddly attired with a long, rusty sword by his side. Pacing up and down the lobby he suddenly threw of his cloak and began slashing wildly, but was disarmed before anyone was hurt. He was brought to the bar of the House and questioned by the Speaker. He refused to remove his hat, was evidently mistaken for a Quaker and committed to the Gatehouse prison
. Having been examined by the Committee for regulating printing, he wrote to the Speaker requesting liberty to have an audience with Cromwell. He then attached a great lock and long chain to his leg as a symbol of ‘the people of Englands Captivity’. Legal proceedings were transferred to the Court of Upper Bench, but on 10 February 1655 he was bailed upon habeas corpus
.
Two days later a fire broke out in Fleet Street
. In the following months, London was engulfed by several more unexplained fires which were interpreted as a sign of the impending destruction of the world. Eventually an arsonist was apprehended who may have been in the pay of William Finch, one of Tany’s disciples.
successfully and at an unknown date arrived in the United Provinces
, perhaps to gather the Jews of Amsterdam
. Some three years later, now calling himself Ram Johoram, he was reported lost, drowned after taking passage in a ship from Brielle bound for London. He was survived by his eldest daughter and probably also a second daughter and second son.
and gnosticism, hermeticism and Christian Cabbala. His sources were varied, although they seem to have included almanacs, popular prophecies, and legal treatises, as well as The Testament of the Twelve Patriarches, the Sonnes of Jacob (1647), Jacob Boehme's A Description of the Three Principles of the Divine Essence (English translation, 1648) and Mercurius Teutonicus (1649), Theologica Germanica, or, Mysticall Divinitie (1648), Paracelsus of the Nature of Things (1650), Henry Cornelius Agrippa's Three Books of Occult Philosophy (1650), and Menasseh ben Israel
's The Hope of Israel (1650). Tany had a few loyal followers but he failed to found a sect.
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
preacher and religious visionary.
Early activities
Totney was born at South HykehamAubourn Haddington and South Hykeham
Aubourn Haddington and South Hykeham is a civil parish in the North Kesteven district of Lincolnshire, England. According to the 2001 census it had a population of 885....
, Lincolnshire
Lincolnshire
Lincolnshire is a county in the east of England. It borders Norfolk to the south east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south west, Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire to the west, South Yorkshire to the north west, and the East Riding of Yorkshire to the north. It also borders...
, the third, but eldest surviving, son of John Totney and Anne, née Snelle. His father, although a poor farmer and never of the parish elite, was a respectable member of the local community. Nothing is known of Thomas’s education, yet it seems likely that by the age of seven he would have learned to read and by the age of nine, if his family could still cope without him, he would have learned to write.
Goldsmithery
In April 1626, Totney was bound as an apprentice in LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
to a fishmonger but was not taught their trade, instead receiving instruction in his master’s adopted profession of goldsmith
Goldsmith
A goldsmith is a metalworker who specializes in working with gold and other precious metals. Since ancient times the techniques of a goldsmith have evolved very little in order to produce items of jewelry of quality standards. In modern times actual goldsmiths are rare...
. On receiving his freedom, he married a daughter of Richard Kett, a prosperous Norfolk
Norfolk
Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...
landowner, whose great-uncle had been executed as leader of the 1549 East Anglian rebellion
Kett's Rebellion
Kett's Rebellion was a revolt in Norfolk, England during the reign of Edward VI. The rebellion was in response to the enclosure of land. It began in July 1549 but was eventually crushed by forces loyal to the English crown....
. Rather than serving as a journeyman, Totney quickly established himself as a householder – a costly progression suggesting he received a charitable loan or financial assistance from family and friends. He set up in St. Katherine Creechurch, a location favoured by small retailers for its inexpensive rents, his shop marked by an unknown sign near Aldgate
Aldgate
Aldgate was the eastern most gateway through London Wall leading from the City of London to Whitechapel and the east end of London. Aldgate gives its name to a ward of the City...
. To ensure that Totney’s business activities fell within their orbit, he was translated to the Goldsmiths Company in January 1634. However, along with the majority of ‘remote’ goldsmiths, he resisted a Company initiative (which had gained royal approval) to vacate his dwelling and relocate in Cheapside
Cheapside
Cheapside is a street in the City of London that links Newgate Street with the junction of Queen Victoria Street and Mansion House Street. To the east is Mansion House, the Bank of England, and the major road junction above Bank tube station. To the west is St. Paul's Cathedral, St...
, the hub of the goldsmiths’ trade.
Early political and religious involvement
Totney remained in St. Katherine Creechurch for another six years. There he heard the fiery sermons of Stephen Denison on the immutability of God’s decrees of predestination. It was a doctrine that troubled Totney until his epiphany. When his first son was born in December 1634, Totney refused to have him baptized and was presented before an ecclesiastical court as a result. Following his wife’s death, he remarried by licence during Lent, probably on Friday, 25 March 1636. This was the first day of the New Year in the old calendar and his actions hint at a type of confrontational godliness and perhaps also zealous Sabbatarianism. Upon his father’s death in 1638, he went to Little ShelfordLittle Shelford
Little Shelford is a village located to the south of Cambridge, in the county of Cambridgeshire, in eastern England. The River Granta lies between it and the larger village of Great Shelford, and both are served by Shelford railway station, which is on the line from Cambridge to London Liverpool...
, Cambridgeshire to manage the family farm. In the summer of 1640, probably while serving as one of the parish’s petty constables, he played an important part in resisting the collection of ship money. By his own account he was imprisoned in London and his horse distrained on the county sheriff’s authority. A series of payments in 1642 show his support for those opposed to Charles I
Charles I of England
Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...
. Moreover, he claims to have witnessed one of Captain Oliver Cromwell
Oliver Cromwell
Oliver Cromwell was an English military and political leader who overthrew the English monarchy and temporarily turned England into a republican Commonwealth, and served as Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland....
’s orations delivered at Huntingdon
Huntingdon
Huntingdon is a market town in Cambridgeshire, England. The town was chartered by King John in 1205. It is the traditional county town of Huntingdonshire, and is currently the seat of the Huntingdonshire district council. It is known as the birthplace in 1599 of Oliver Cromwell.-History:Huntingdon...
to newly mustered volunteers. Totney later possessed a great saddle, musket, pair of pistols and sword, suggesting he served as a harquebusier. By December 1644, he had returned to Little Shelford where he resumed his duties as a local tax official, as well as taking up sequestered land and providing quarter for Parliamentarian soldiers and their horses. Following the outbreak of a second Civil War, Totney uprooted. He rented out his lands to a local villager and moved with his family to St. Clement Danes, Westminster
Westminster
Westminster is an area of central London, within the City of Westminster, England. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, southwest of the City of London and southwest of Charing Cross...
. In June 1648, his second wife died and was buried in the parish.
New identity
After his revelation, Thomas Totney assumed the prophetic name TheaurauJohn Tany. 'TheaurauJohn' he understood to mean ‘God his declarer of the morning, the peaceful tidings of good things’. While his former surname may have been vocalized as Tawtney, his new last name was usually pronounced Tawney. Because he had a speech impediment he may have dropped the consonant. In addition, he appropriated the coat of arms azure, three bars argent surmounted by the crest a hind’s head erased, gules, ducally gorged, or. This device, borne by Sir John de Tany of Essex during the reign of Edward IEdward I of England
Edward I , also known as Edward Longshanks and the Hammer of the Scots, was King of England from 1272 to 1307. The first son of Henry III, Edward was involved early in the political intrigues of his father's reign, which included an outright rebellion by the English barons...
, appears on several of his works. Furthermore, he declared himself ‘a Jew of the Tribe of Reuben
Tribe of Reuben
According to the Hebrew Bible, the Tribe of Reuben was one of the Tribes of Israel.From after the conquest of the land by Joshua until the formation of the first Kingdom of Israel in c. 1050 BC, the Tribe of Reuben was a part of a loose confederation of Israelite tribes. No central government...
’ and took the titles High Priest and Recorder to the thirteen Tribes of the Jews. Tany justified his claims by inventing a fantastic genealogy that traced his descent from Aaron, brother of Moses
Aaron
In the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an, Aaron : Ααρών ), who is often called "'Aaron the Priest"' and once Aaron the Levite , was the older brother of Moses, and a prophet of God. He represented the priestly functions of his tribe, becoming the first High Priest of the Israelites...
, through the tribe of Judah
Tribe of Judah
According to the Hebrew Bible, the Tribe of Judah was one of the Tribes of Israel.Following the completion of the conquest of Canaan by the Israelite tribes after about 1200 BCE, Joshua allocated the land among the twelve tribes....
and by way of the ten tribes of Israel
Ten Lost Tribes
The Ten Lost Tribes of Israel refers to those tribes of ancient Israel that formed the Kingdom of Israel and which disappeared from Biblical and all other historical accounts after the kingdom was destroyed in about 720 BC by ancient Assyria...
, the Tartars and the Welsh
Welsh people
The Welsh people are an ethnic group and nation associated with Wales and the Welsh language.John Davies argues that the origin of the "Welsh nation" can be traced to the late 4th and early 5th centuries, following the Roman departure from Britain, although Brythonic Celtic languages seem to have...
. He also circumcised himself.
Thereafter, believing he had been given the gift of tongues with which to preach the everlasting gospel of God’s light and love to all nations, he went forth armed with sword and word. Crying vengeance in the streets of London, he declared woe and destruction upon the city, prophesying that the ‘Earth shall burn as an Oven’ and all the proud, the wicked and the ‘ungodly shall be as stubble to this flame’. Drawing on the potent image of Christ as goldsmith, purging dross and corruption in a furnace, Tany forged his prophetic identity – the messenger foretold by Malachi
Malachi
Malachi, Malachias or Mal'achi was a Jewish prophet in the Hebrew Bible. He had two brothers, Nathaniel and Josiah. Malachi was the writer of the Book of Malachi, the last book of the Neviim section in the Jewish Tanakh...
. He claimed his authority rested with the one who sent him, God:
but who may abide the day of his appearing? for he is like fullers sope, a refiners fire.
Jewish millenarianism
Insisting that the restitution of the Jews was at hand and that he had been sent forth to gather them and proclaim ‘Israels return’, Tany set about enacting a millenarianMillenarianism
Millenarianism is the belief by a religious, social, or political group or movement in a coming major transformation of society, after which all things will be changed, based on a one-thousand-year cycle. The term is more generically used to refer to any belief centered around 1000 year intervals...
mission to restore the Jews to their own land. In the manner of the children of Israel before him, he began living in a tent, perhaps modelled upon the tabernacle
Tabernacle
The Tabernacle , according to the Hebrew Torah/Old Testament, was the portable dwelling place for the divine presence from the time of the Exodus from Egypt through the conquering of the land of Canaan. Built to specifications revealed by God to Moses at Mount Sinai, it accompanied the Israelites...
, which he decorated with a symbol representing the tribe of Judah. He preached in the parks and fields around London and gathered a handful of followers. His message was strong, denouncing the clergy as ‘diabolical dumb dogs, Tythe-mongers’, who fleece rather than succour the people. Gospel injunctions also made him demand justice:
feed the hungry, clothe the naked, oppress none, set free them bounden, if this be not, all your Religion is a lye, a vanity, a cheat, deceived and deceiving.
Tany’s first publication was a broadside entitled I Proclaime From the Lord of Hosts The returne of the Jewes From their Captivity (25 April 1650). It is likely that Captain Robert Norwood, a wealthy London merchant, paid for its printing.
Apocalyptic writings and preaching
In early September 1650, Tany was at Bradfield, BerkshireBradfield, Berkshire
Bradfield is a small village and civil parish in Berkshire, England. The parish also includes the now rather larger village of Bradfield Southend, and the hamlet of Tutts Clump....
at the same time as William Everard
William Everard (Digger)
William Everard was an early leader of the Diggers.-Biography:William Everard was apprenticed on 14 August 1616 to Robert Miller of the Merchant Taylors' Company, London. He was the son of William Everad, a yeoman of Reading and had been baptized on 9 May 1602 in the parish of St Giles, Reading,...
, one-time leader of the Diggers. There was bedlam. It was reported that the rector, John Pordage
John Pordage
John Pordage was an Anglican priest, astrologer, alchemist and Christian mystic. He founded the 17th century English Behmenist group which would later become known as the Philadelphian Society when it was led by his disciple and successor, Jane Leade.-Behmenists:John Pordage was the eldest son of...
, fell into a trance while preaching and bellowing like a bull, ran to his house. There he found his wife upstairs, clothed all in white from head to toe, holding a white rod in her hand. Moreover, an adolescent was said to have fallen into a very strange fit, foaming at the mouth for two hours. He dictated verses concerning the destruction of London and demanded to go there to meet a goldsmith.
Tany next published two tracts: Whereas TheaurauJohn Taiiiiijour My servant (15 November 1650) and THE NATIONS RIGHT in Magna Charta (28 December 1650). Both demonstrated his earnest desire for social reformation, the latter exhorting the common soldiers to dissolve Parliament and call fresh elections. His next offering, Aurora in Tranlagorum in Salem Gloria, seems to have been written on three consecutive days in late December 1650. It was printed by a Baptist who had previously printed a ‘very dangerous’ book. The publisher was Thomas Totney’s brother-in-law. It was sold by Giles Calvert
Giles Calvert
Giles Calvert was a prominent printer during the English Revolution, developing a catalogue which included such notable preachers as John Saltmarsh....
from his shop at ‘The Black-spread-Eagle’ at the west end of St. Paul's Cathedral. In January 1651, Tany wrote the first of the epistles that eventually comprised THEOUS ORI APOKOLIPIKAL (1651) and Second Part OF HIS Theous-Ori APOKOLIPIKAL (1653).
Excommunication and imprisonment
On 6 March 1651, Tany was apparently brought before the Westminster Assembly of Divines, responding to their questions with thirty-seven of his own queries. Nonetheless, they accounted him mad. Perhaps shortly thereafter he forsook his trade.On 25 March, Tany preached at Eltham, Kent
Eltham, London
-Parks and open spaces:There is a large variety of open green space in Eltham, in the form of parkland, fields and woodland.*Avery Hill Park is large, open parkland, situated to the east of Eltham. It is most notable for its Winter Garden, a hothouse containing tropical trees and plants from around...
and then again on 13 April at Norwood’s house in St. Mary Aldermary. In May, Norwood was excommunicated from his gathered church. The following month an indictment was prepared jointly against Norwood and Tany. The indicters seem to have understood Tany as some type of Ranter
Ranter
The Ranters were an alleged sect in the time of the English Commonwealth who were regarded as heretical by the established Church of that period...
, as one of ungodly conduct who allegorized the Bible and internalized hell; as an antiscripturian universalist who repudiated gospel ordinances and averred that men might live as they wished; as one who glorified sin and maintained that the soul is God. Yet, as Norwood recognized, only two of the charges fell within the scope of the Blasphemy Act of August 1650 – the allegations that Tany and Norwood affirmed:
the Soul is of the essence of God
There is neither hell nor damnation.
As their own accounts of the trial’s proceedings make clear, the defendants adamantly maintained that their words had been misrepresented, altered and taken out of context. Even so, on 13 August 1651, they were convicted jointly of blasphemy by a jury of twelve men at the London sessions of the peace held in the Old Bailey
Old Bailey
The Central Criminal Court in England and Wales, commonly known as the Old Bailey from the street in which it stands, is a court building in central London, one of a number of buildings housing the Crown Court...
. They were each sentenced to six months imprisonment in Newgate gaol without bail or mainprize. Conditions for those that could not afford the services of the gaoler were apparently intolerable.
Appeals
On 27 October 1651, legal proceedings were initiated in the Court of Upper Bench appealing the verdict. After several sessions the case was deferred until the next law term. More hearings followed. On 4 February 1652, Tany appeared before the Court. A London tailor named John ReeveJohn Reeve
John Reeve was an English plebeian prophet who believed the voice of God had instructed him to found a Third Commission in preparation for the last days of earth. This commission was third in succession to the Mosaic Law and the gospel of Christ Jesus.He and his followers came to be known as...
claimed that the same morning God revealed to him that he had been chosen as the Lord’s ‘last messenger’. Reeve and his cousin Lodowick Muggleton, a freeman of the Merchant Taylors’ Company, announced themselves to be ‘the two Witnesses of the Spirit’ foretold in the Revelation of Saint John
Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament. The title came into usage from the first word of the book in Koine Greek: apokalupsis, meaning "unveiling" or "revelation"...
. In addition, they denounced Tany as a ‘counterfeit high Priest’ and pretended prophet, marking him as a Ranter, the spawn of Cain. A few days later, the judges of the Upper Bench made their judgement: Lord Chief Justice Rolle washed his hands of the business. On 16 February 1652, Tany and Norwood, having served their sentence, were each released on £100 bail pending good behaviour for one year. Thomas Totney’s former master and another man later described as a goldsmith, provided sureties. In Easter term Norwood initiated a new legal appeal. After several hearings the judges deferred proceedings until the following law term. On 28 June 1652, they reversed the guilty judgement against Norwood and Tany, resolving that their opinions had been made to rigidly conform to the strictures of the Blasphemy Act. For, whereas the Act made it unlawful to maintain that ‘there is neither Heaven nor Hell, neither Salvation nor Damnation’, the defendants who affirmed that:
there is ‘no Hell nor Damnation’, are not within the Statute, for tho by Implication if there be no Hell there is no Heaven, yet the court is not to Expand these words by Implication but according to the Letters of the Stat[ute].
Resumption of activities and second name change
Within a month of his release, Tany published a pamphlet he had written in Newgate entitled High Priest to the IEVVES, HIS Disputive challenge to the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge and the whole Hirach. of Roms Clargical Priests (March 1652). Echoing Paul’s epistle to the Romans, Tany proclaimed the return of ‘Israels Seed’ from captivity. About 1 January 1653, it appears from his own account that Tany underwent another purificatory ritual. He refrained from speaking for thirty-four days, isolating himself for twenty-one of them. On the fourteenth day he transcribed an edict to ‘all the Jewes the whole earth over’, which was to be engraved in brass and sent to the synagogue in Amsterdam. He signed this proclamation with his new name and titles, Theauroam Tannijahhh, King of the seven Nations, and Captain General under my Master Jehovah, and High-Priest and Leader of the Peoples unto HIERUSALEM. Together with some other material, it was issued by an unknown publisher under the title HIGH NEWS FOR HIERUSALEM (no date). It exasperated one reader, who complained ‘truly I skill not the man, nor his spirit; in his writing he offends against all rules of Grammar, Geography, Genealogy, History, Chronology, Theology & c, so far as I understand them’.In March 1654 a list of some thirty ‘Grand Blasphemers and Blasphemies’ was submitted to the Committee for Religion, which included:
XIX. A Goldsmith that did live in the Strand, and after in the City, and then at Eltham; who called his name Theaurau John Tany, the High Priest, & c. Published in Print, That all Religion is a lie, a deceit, and a cheat.
Claims of divine power
Writing from ‘the Tent of Judah’ on the ‘Tenth DAY NISAN’ (probably 16 April 1654), Tany addressed a millenarian epistle ‘Unto his Brethren the QUAKERS scornfully so called, who ARE the Children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; who ARE circumcised in Heart’. He saluted them as descendants of the Jewish race, an elect remnant who spoke a pure language and trembled at the word of God. On 8 May 1654, he issued an edict to all ‘earthen men and women’ announcing that he would shortly proclaim the Law and Gospel from his tent standing in the bounds of the Middle Park at Eltham, Kent. On 8 June 1654, he read out a speech in which he laid claim to the crowns of FranceFrance
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, Reme, Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, Naples
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...
, Sissiliah and Jerusalem, as well as reaffirming an earlier claim to the crown of England. He did this by repeating Pontius Pilate
Pontius Pilate
Pontius Pilatus , known in the English-speaking world as Pontius Pilate , was the fifth Prefect of the Roman province of Judaea, from AD 26–36. He is best known as the judge at Jesus' trial and the man who authorized the crucifixion of Jesus...
’s reply to the chief priests of the Jews after Pilate had written ‘JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS’ as the title to be put on Christ’s cross:
What I have written, I have written.
Assault on Parliament
On the morning of Saturday, 30 December 1654, in the week that Cromwell was offered the crown, Tany solemnly made a large fire at LambethLambeth
Lambeth is a district of south London, England, and part of the London Borough of Lambeth. It is situated southeast of Charing Cross.-Toponymy:...
into which he cast his great saddle, sword, musket, pistols, books and bible. He crossed the River Thames
River Thames
The River Thames flows through southern England. It is the longest river entirely in England and the second longest in the United Kingdom. While it is best known because its lower reaches flow through central London, the river flows alongside several other towns and cities, including Oxford,...
in a rowing boat and made his way to Parliament, ascending the stairs into the lobby outside the door. Unable to deliver a petition he departed, returning after about an hour oddly attired with a long, rusty sword by his side. Pacing up and down the lobby he suddenly threw of his cloak and began slashing wildly, but was disarmed before anyone was hurt. He was brought to the bar of the House and questioned by the Speaker. He refused to remove his hat, was evidently mistaken for a Quaker and committed to the Gatehouse prison
Gatehouse Prison
Gatehouse Prison was a prison in Westminster, built in 1370 as the gatehouse of Westminster Abbey and first used as a prison by the Abbot, a powerful churchman who held considerable power over the precincts and sanctuary...
. Having been examined by the Committee for regulating printing, he wrote to the Speaker requesting liberty to have an audience with Cromwell. He then attached a great lock and long chain to his leg as a symbol of ‘the people of Englands Captivity’. Legal proceedings were transferred to the Court of Upper Bench, but on 10 February 1655 he was bailed upon habeas corpus
Habeas corpus
is a writ, or legal action, through which a prisoner can be released from unlawful detention. The remedy can be sought by the prisoner or by another person coming to his aid. Habeas corpus originated in the English legal system, but it is now available in many nations...
.
Two days later a fire broke out in Fleet Street
Fleet Street
Fleet Street is a street in central London, United Kingdom, named after the River Fleet, a stream that now flows underground. It was the home of the British press until the 1980s...
. In the following months, London was engulfed by several more unexplained fires which were interpreted as a sign of the impending destruction of the world. Eventually an arsonist was apprehended who may have been in the pay of William Finch, one of Tany’s disciples.
Final years
In September 1655, after weeks of heavy rain and widespread floods, Tany ‘in one of his old whimsies’ pitched his tent in the large tract of open ground between Lambeth Marsh and Southwark known as St. George's Fields. A satirical newsbook writer thought him ‘a madman’, fitter ‘for Bedlam then a Tent’. Sometime after 16 June 1656, Tany set sail. He crossed the English ChannelEnglish Channel
The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...
successfully and at an unknown date arrived in the United Provinces
Dutch Republic
The Dutch Republic — officially known as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands , the Republic of the United Netherlands, or the Republic of the Seven United Provinces — was a republic in Europe existing from 1581 to 1795, preceding the Batavian Republic and ultimately...
, perhaps to gather the Jews of Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
. Some three years later, now calling himself Ram Johoram, he was reported lost, drowned after taking passage in a ship from Brielle bound for London. He was survived by his eldest daughter and probably also a second daughter and second son.
Evaluation
Tany's writings embrace currents of magic and mysticism, alchemy and astrology, numerology and angelology, NeoplatonismNeoplatonism
Neoplatonism , is the modern term for a school of religious and mystical philosophy that took shape in the 3rd century AD, based on the teachings of Plato and earlier Platonists, with its earliest contributor believed to be Plotinus, and his teacher Ammonius Saccas...
and gnosticism, hermeticism and Christian Cabbala. His sources were varied, although they seem to have included almanacs, popular prophecies, and legal treatises, as well as The Testament of the Twelve Patriarches, the Sonnes of Jacob (1647), Jacob Boehme's A Description of the Three Principles of the Divine Essence (English translation, 1648) and Mercurius Teutonicus (1649), Theologica Germanica, or, Mysticall Divinitie (1648), Paracelsus of the Nature of Things (1650), Henry Cornelius Agrippa's Three Books of Occult Philosophy (1650), and Menasseh ben Israel
Menasseh Ben Israel
Manoel Dias Soeiro , better known by his Hebrew name Menasseh Ben Israel , was a Portuguese rabbi, kabbalist, scholar, writer, diplomat, printer and publisher, founder of the first Hebrew printing press in Amsterdam in...
's The Hope of Israel (1650). Tany had a few loyal followers but he failed to found a sect.