Writings about the prophetic Christian movement known as the New Prophecy and subsequently as Montanism (among other things) have never been thick on the ground. In recent decades, however, there has been more than that steady trickle on the subject which appeared in times past. William Tabbernee's Fake prophecy and polluted sacraments is a valuable companion volume to his 1997 Montanist inscriptions and testimonia: epigraphic sources illustrating the history of Montanism, given that it looks systematically at the evidence for ecclesiastical and then imperial reactions to Montanism. Fake prophecy covers four centuries, from Montanism's inception in Phrygia (which Tabbernee dates at c. 165 ce or perhaps a little earlier) to the events of 550 ce. Then, in the reign of Justinian i and under persecution by John bishop of Ephesus, the great reliquary of the Montanists at Pepouza was broken into. The bones of the founding prophets, Montanus, Priscilla and Maximilla were burned. Montanist literature was destroyed.

Those familiar with modern scholarly literature about Montanism and who know the importance of differentiating Montanist and anti-Montanist sources chronologically and geographically will not be surprised by Tabbernee's Fake prophecy. His view of Montanism owes nothing to the lurid tabloid style which even today one finds in some observations about the movement. Conflating the most colourful claims about the movement from all periods and places Montanism emerges as the offspring of a demented, castrated semi-pagan and a couple of wild women who, beset by hubris and apocalyptic zeal, challenged rightful church authority with claims of superior revelation by the Paraclete and by devious means gained a following which was bent suicidally on martyrdom. Tabbernee, by contrast, argues that Montanists did not in fact believe or do a lot of what figured in accusations. In any case Montanism (like Gnosticism) was no single, simple phenomenon but a diverse prophetic movement. While some of its accusers surely distorted the truth, some of the charges made against it may have been applicable only to a particular subgroup or region.

Tabbernee's important contribution is in the classification and analysis of what was said against Montanism over the four hundred years, leading to summary conclusions with each major section of the study. Montanus may well have been a priest of Apollo in the past, Tabbernee observes, but there was no incontrovertible evidence that Montanists derived their beliefs and practices directly from Phrygian religions or that they were chiliasts. Rigorist they were in response to society and personal discipline but he challenges the notion that Montanists' desire for martyrdom exceeded that of other Christians and led to voluntary deaths (Tertullian's view is not taken as representative of Montanist teaching). Montanism had sought to win the Churches to the (ethical) revelation that the Paraclete offered through its prophets. Its followers had practised glossolalia and it was ‘an innovative movement prepared to introduce new ministerial structures appropriate to the (for them) contemporary situation’, such as having women in the ranks of the clergy and new offices in the Church (p. 423). Such conclusions and many more in the book are not necessarily novel; Tabbernee's annotations acknowledge the many ways in which his findings match those of others and are at odds with some. They emerge, though, from a process of analysis of the many claims, counter-claims and legislation and from Tabbernee having considered the texts, authors and characters concerned in relation to the evolution of ecclesiastical and imperial response.

In dealing with the known opponents of Montanism Fake prophecy rests on the premise that opposition (and Montanist reaction to it) may be categorised chronologically in three periods: 165–99 ce; 200–324 ce; 324–550 ce. This is surely correct, give or take some possible debate about the date at which the first phase came to an end. Opposition came from Church and State but not equally across the range of time. Consequently the eleven chapters of Fake prophecy span a book which is in three parts.

Part i concerns ecclesiastical opposition (and Montanist response) pre-324 ce, part ii deals with state opposition in the same period and finally part iii examines Church and State opposition (and Montanist reaction) 324–550 ce. There were similiarities across the three periods where writings and legislation were concerned, as also where Montanist practice and accusations against the movement were concerned. There were also differences of emphasis and of degree. The word ‘heresy’ (‘hairesis’) when used of Montanus and the women in its earliest phase is properly understood in terms of factionalism/sectarianism, Tabbernee maintains (and this reviewer agrees) and not in terms of its later meaning. As for accusations of pseudo (or fake) prophecy and of the introduction of novel practices, they featured throughout, but post-Constantine they were ‘often inaccurate or exaggerated’ (p. 86). Phase i had featured almost exclusively the opposition of ‘catholic’ clergy to a phenomenon with which they had direct contact, by phase iii, however (post 324 ce and probably earlier) there was a more ‘academic’ response to an ever-present fear about ‘heresy’. Consequently in phase iii we should not assume a correlation between the presence of an opponent of Montanism in a given area and where Montanists may actually have been.

Character by character Montanism's opponents appear in this work, from Zoticus of Otrous and the Eusebian Anonymous through Origen, Hippolytus, Epiphanius' ‘Anti-Phrygian’ to Augustine and Sozomen. Accusations are itemised and analysed – from the Montanists' payment of salaries through cabbage-eating to blood-letting and infanticide. I wished more had been said about the third-century prophetess in Cappadocia (Cyprian, ep. lxxv) but Tabbernee's study is thorough and shows familiarity with a large amount of literature (I know of only a few small items to which he has not referred and I have discovered some new ones through this book). It is supported with a bibliography, 25 pages, of the passages, inscriptions etc. cited, and finally a general index (which is what the header on p. 485 should read).