Inspirés From the time of the
Edict of Nantes in 1598 until 1685,
France had permitted
Calvinist Protestants, known as
Huguenots, to practice their religion and exercise the full rights of citizens while still maintaining
Roman Catholicism as the
state religion. However, in 1685, King
Louis XIV of France issued the
Edict of Fontainebleau which ordered that Huguenot church buildings and schools be closed, and sought to
suppress the religion. The ('Inspired') were Huguenots in Southern France who
radicalized following their suppression and begun an itinerant ministry preaching the
end time was at hand with claims of prophetic inspiration. They spent the remainder of the 17th century traveling throughout the
Netherlands and
England as
refugees, before many of them settled in the
Pietist center of Halle.
Pott brothers The influenced three brothers surnamed Pott who lived in Halle until they were
exiled and went to
Hanau and
Wetteravia east of
Frankfurt in 1714. The Pott brothers were several of many
Pietists who had come to the area to take advantage of the religious tolerance of the counts of
Isenburg-Eisenberg. There, they gave what many understood as divinely-inspired
ecstatic speeches in a
trance-like state. They sometimes experienced uncontrollable jolting motions of their entire bodies while they were preaching, which was understood as verification that they were seized by a divine spirit. Their message was a call to repentance and awakening.
Early Inspirationalist movement Many were drawn to the Potts, and the group that gathered around them emerged as a distinct group in the late autumn of 1714. This group is known as the Inspirationalists. Soon, others began preaching in a similar style and experienced similar convulsions. Among these other early leaders were
Eberhard Ludwig Gruber,
Johann Friedrich Rock, and
Ursula Meyer of Thun. Everywhere the and Inspirationalists went, communities gathered around them. However, political freedom was very limited in this era, and the Inspirationalists were routinely banished and were unable to find a place in Europe they could permanently settle. Their religious practices, including
avoidance of military service and
refusal to take an oath, kept them in conflict with German authorities. Many of these communities were short-lived, and all the leaders continued to travel and were frequently banished by political rulers. Major centers of the Inspirationalists were successively at
Himbach near
Hanau until 1740, the
castle of Gelnhausen until 1753,
Lieblos, and then
Herrnhaag until the 1820s. The second generation of leaders in the 18th century were Wilhelm Ludwig Kampf and Paul Giesebert Nagel. Gruber stayed for a time with the community of
Brethren in Schwarzenau. However, the Inspirationalists found Brethren to be legalistic, sectarian, and sterile in contrast to their own
charismatic and prophetic missionary zeal. Ursula Meyer twice prophesied that Brethren leader
Alexander Mack was to meet an early death so that he would not continue to burden his co-religionists. She similarly disapproved of
Anabaptist Andreas Boni. The groups ended up competing, and poor relations likely spurred the Brethren to leave Schwarzenau for the Netherlands in 1720.
Decline and renewal Their religion continued to grow until Gruber and Rock's deaths, but subsequently declined until a reawakening sparked by Michael Krausert, who preached for a revival and had much support.
Migration to North America In the 1840s, renewed religious restrictions and requirements from political rulers prompted the Inspirationalists to migrate as a group to North America. Their first settlements were near
Buffalo on both sides of the
Niagara River. Sites included
West Seneca and the
Town of Elma. == Worship ==