CHAPTER XXX

THE REFORMATION

(ii. BEYOND GERMANY)

MARTIN LUTHER was one of three outstanding reformers. HULDREICH ZWINGLI, 1484-1531, was another. He represented the reformed faith among the people of Switzerland, and, as became a pupil of the great Pico della Mirandola, he carried his love of humanism into the closest relationship with his religious teaching.

As early as 1516, "before he had heard of LUTHER, he began to preach the Gospel at Zurich, and to warn the people against relying upon human authority." He has recounted the story of his emancipation from the traditional theology in these words:

when seven or eight years ago I gave myself up to the study of the Bible I was completely under the power of the jarring philosophy and theology. But led by the Scriptures and the Word of God I was forced to the conclusion: you must leave them all alone and learn the meaning of the Word out of the Word itself.

His earliest reformation writing appears to be A Defence of Martin Luther by Christ our Lord, addressed to the City of Rome, 1520. This was an appendix to a Latin pamphlet which was entitled Advice of One who desires with his Whole Heart that Due Consideration be paid both to the Dignity of the Pope and to the Peaceful Development of the Christian Religion. The Defence, which is in ZWINGLI'S

handwriting, although not at all in his style, is a terrible arraignment of the bishop of Rome.

In justification of some members of his congregation who did not observe the Lenten fast of 1522, he published a sermon entitled Selection or Liberty respecting Foods; on Offence and Scandal; whether there is any Authority for forbidding Meat at Certain Times. After a discussion of several texts of the New Testament he reaches the conclusion:

I say that it is a good thing for a man to fast, if he fasts as fasts are taught by Christ. But show me on the authority of the Scriptures that one cannot fast with meat. . . .

These points have forced me to think that the church officers have not only no power to command such things, but if they command them, they sin greatly.

His first Reformation treatise of any length was the Archeteles, "the beginning and the end," 1522, in which he defended himself against various charges brought by the bishops against him. He resolved "by one blow to win his spiritual freedom," and therefore exposed in a thoroughly ruthless fashion the unscriptural nature of the episcopal claims and practices. During the same year he issued two sermons. The first was on the Perspicuity and Certainty or Infallibility of the Word of God; the second was entitled The Perpetual Virginity of Mary the Mother of Jesus Christ Our Saviour.

What ZWINGLI had done for the learned in his Latin treatise the Archeteles, he did for the people in The SixtySeven Articles. In this work he gave a summary of his teaching in German; later in the same year, 1523, he published an Exposition and Proof of the Conclusions or Articles. This clear but somewhat discursive defence "is full of per

sonal allusions," and "contains ZWINGLI's first printed assertion of his relation to LUTHER. . .

With the hope of preventing any abuses of the Reformation doctrine of liberty he published a practical tract on Divine and Human Righteousness, 1523, of which he says in the preface:

The Gospel of Christ is not hostile to rulers, nor does it occasion any disturbance to temporal affairs, rather it confirms the authority of rulers, instructs them in the right performance of their duties and how to be in harmony with the people, if they act in a Christian manner according to the divine precepts.

In a work on The Canon of the Mass, 1523, "he enunciates the doctrine, now so commonly associated with his name, that the Eucharist is not a mystery but a ministry, the atmosphere is not awe but love, the result is not infusion of grace but of enthusiasm; we remember Christ, and the thought of His presence stirs us to fresh exertion in His service."2 At the end of the same year he prepared for the Council of the city of Zurich A Short Christian Introduction, to be sent to the pastors and preachers under its authority. It treats of sin, of law, of the Gospel, of "the removal of the Law," of images, and of the mass. Of images he says:

If any one wishes to put historical representations on the outside of the Churches, that may be allowed, so long as they do not incite to their worship. But when one begins to bow before these images and to worship them, then they are not to be tolerated anywhere in the wide world; for that is the beginning of idolatry, nay, is idolatry itself.

1 Samuel Macauley Jackson, Huldreich Zwingli, 2d ed. (1900), p.

197.

2 Ibid., p. 201.

A small work entitled The Shepherd was published in 1524, and a lengthy defence entitled Antibolon. (Antibolon is a late Greek word meaning a formal reply.) It contained an attack upon a work written by JEROME EMSER during the previous year with the title Defence of the Canon of the Mass against Huldreich Zwingli.

The Swiss Reformer's best known work is his lengthy Commentary on the True and False Religion, 1525, which covers most of the subjects of practical theology, and gives the most comprehensive summary of his mature teaching. The much canvassed subject of Baptism next engaged his attention, and he devoted several tracts to the exposition of the views he held, and to the denunciation of the Catabaptists, i.e. the drowners. During 1530 he issued some expository works-A Clear Instruction concerning the Last Sup

The Providence of God, and, in 1531, the Exposition of the Christian Faith, was published posthumously. His general theological position appears in one of his later works, the Reckoning of the Faith of Ulric Zwingli, which is dated July 3, 1530, and was laid before the Emperor Charles at the Diet of Augsburg.

Briefly the Spirit breathes wherever He wishes. Thus the Truth spake. Therefore, the Spirit of grace is conveyed not by this mersion, not by this draught, not by this anointing; for if it were thus it would be known how, where, whence, and whither the Spirit is given.

For if the presence and efficacy of grace are bound to the sacraments, they work where these are conveyed; and where these are not applied all things languish.

The Anabaptist movement troubled both LUTHER and ZWINGLI. BALTHASAR HUBMAIER, 1480-1528, was first drawn to the Reformation by the writings of LUTHER; he afterwards became a follower of ZWINGLI; and finally, in

1525, an Anabaptist. He left a "really beautiful address, vigorous and acute in argument," entitled The Sum of the Truly Christian Life, 1525. MENNO SIMONS, 1492-1559, the founder of the Mennonite sect, also became an Anabaptist after his conversion from the Roman communion. His first piece of literary work was The Horrible and Gross Libel of John of Leyden, in which he protested against the use of physical force in the service of religion. Thirty-two other works followed this, the chief of them being The Foundation of the Christian Doctrine, 1539, in which he explained the main principles of his faith.

ZWINGLI'S successor at Zurich was HENRY BULLINGER, 1504-1575, whom the influence of PETER LOMBARD had led by way of the writings of AUGUSTINE and CHRYSOSTOM to a first-hand study of the Scriptures. He had made himself acquainted with the works of LUTHER, and in 1521, had lectured on the Loci Communes of MELANCTHON in the cloister school of Cappel. His writings are in the main controversial. He wrote against the Lutheran view of the Lord's Supper, and joined with CALVIN in 1549 in the conclusions of the Consensus Tigurinus on the same theme. He is best known to English readers by his Sermons, of which there are four volumes of translated selections. Among these a series of fifty, divided into groups of ten, was entitled The Decades; they were rendered into English during the reign of King Edward VI, and soon took their place as a manual for the training of the Anglican clergy.

LEO JUD or JUDAS, 1482-1542, succeeded ZWINGLI at Einsiedeln, and became known as an assiduous preacher of the reformed doctrines. He was one of the earliest translators of the Bible into German; in fact his version was printed at Zurich in 1529, before LUTHER'S rendering was completed.

In France, the father of the Reformation, and "the first scholar to preach Christ from the sources," was JACQUES