Philipps, Dirk

Philipps, Dirk one of the most eminent co-laborers of Simon Menno (q.v.), was born in 1504 at Lenwarden, the capital of Friesland, of Romish parentage. He was carefully and piously reared, and had unusual educational facilities in his time. When the Anabaptists came to Friesland, Philipps, who was then a devoted Romanist, soon became interested in the new doctrines; and after his brother Ubbo, a common mechanic, had embraced the modern teachings and become a preacher, Dirk also found pleasure in them; forsook the Church of Rome, and was rebaptized. As a preacher of the new doctrines he was stationed at Appingadam (Groningen), and contented himself in that position until the Anabaptists advocated the extreme socialistic views. About the year 1534 or 1535 these two brothers came out boldly against the Munster ideas of the Anabaptists, and thus prepared the way for the revolution which Menno shortly after effected. After 1536 the brothers Philipps disappear, and are but little heard of. At the conference of the different Anabaptists held at Buckholt, in Westphalia, they do not seem to have been present. In 1543 we find them at Emden. After that we only meet Dirk now and then, but always in closest intimacy with Menno. Ubbo finally separated from both Dirk and Menno, and took a conciliatory position between the Protestants and Romanists. But Dirk remained true to Menno, and ever after is warmly commended by the great Dutch Reformer and founder of the Quakers of Holland. After the death of Simon Menno, Dirk was more or less involved, and that unhappily, in the controversies which agitated the Dutch Anabaptists. In 1568 he was at Dantzic, but was so much sought after at home that the sixty-four-years- old man consented to return to Emden. He died there in 1568 or 1570. His many pamphleteering publications have been collected in his Enchiridion, or "Hand-book," among which there is an Apology or Defence of the Anabaptists; a treatise on Christian Marriage, etc. It is the universal testimony of Protestants and Romanists that Dirk Philipps was a very learned man, well versed in the classical languages, and a pulpit orator of the very highest order.

See Gent, Anfang u. Fortgang der Streitigkeiten unter den Taujgesinnten; Blaup. Ten Cate, Gesch. der Taufyesinnten. SEE MENNONITES, and the literature thereto appended. (J.H.W.)