ABSTRACT
Winstanley belongs to a long line of Christian radicals who have emphasized the ability of all people to understand the ways of God, and stressed the priority of the Spirit over the intellect and inspiration over memory and learning. This paper considers Winstanley alongside the eighteenth-century visionary William Blake and members of basic Christian communities in present day Latin America, noting how in approaching Scripture each is concerned to develop a new prophetic language to allow it to speak to and interpret their own situation, not to unlock its “meaning” with the tools of learning and scholarship. In particular each will want their new language to provide a critique of oppression, though that in itself will not be enough and must be accompanied by action.
