Andrzej Tomasz Towiański (; January 1, 1799 – May 13, 1878) was a Polish–Lithuanian philosopher and messianic religious leader.
Life
Towiański was born in , a village near Vilnius, which after the partitions of Poland belonged to the Russian Empire. He was the charismatic leader of the Towiańskiite sect, known also as (the Circle of God's Cause). In 1839 he experienced a vision in which the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mary urged him to act as a messenger of the Apocalypse. The Poles, the French—particularly Napoleon—and Jews were to play leading roles. Among those influenced by his thinking were the Polish Romantic poets Adam Mickiewicz, Juliusz Słowacki, and Seweryn Goszczyński.
His extraordinary influence on Mickiewicz, a leader of the Polish emigre community, was divisive, and some members of the community accused him of being a Russian agent.
He died in Zurich.
See also History of philosophy in Poland (Messianist period) List of Poles
Footnotes
External links
Dr Pavel Zahradník: Odkud přišli starší bratři?. Te Deum. 3/2009