A young carpenter and his wife leave their home in upstate New York to join a religious commune led by an eccentric prophet. Matthias, as he is called, quickly rises to power within the group, using his charisma and his claim to have received direct revelations from God to gain control over the other members. Matthias’s rule is marked by increasingly bizarre and tyrannical behavior, and as his grip on the group tightens, the members begin to turn on him. In the end, Matthias’s kingdom comes crashing down, and he is tried and convicted of murder. “The Kingdom of Matthias” is a fascinating true story of sex, violence, and religious fanaticism in 19th-century America.