Zwingli’s Preaching
Zwingli’s Preaching
“For God's sake, do not put yourself at odds with the Word of God. For truly it will persist as surely as the Rhine follows its course. One can perhaps dam it up for a while, but it is impossible to stop it.” – attributed to Ulrich Zwingli
About a month after his graduation, Zwingli, with the aid of Uncle Bartholomew, was ordained as a priest, with the power vested in him by the Bishop of Constance. Anxious to serve as a messenger of the Lord, he delivered his first sermon to a small, but receptive congregation in Rapperswil, about 80 miles east of Basel. He then returned to Wildhaus, and on September 29, the feast day of the Archangel Michael, he headed his first-ever Mass.
Zwingli was most certainly honored to host a Mass in his hometown, but the restless and ambitious young preacher was itching for a larger platform. Bearing this in mind, as soon as the first frost of winter coated the sweeping swathes of spruce trees outside of the Zwingli home, the preacher made the trek south to Glarus and filled one of the vacant posts within the city's parish. In some accounts, the people of Glarus actively sought out the preacher after hearing stories about his polished eloquence and the powerful messages embedded in his unique sermons. Whatever the case, Zwingli served as the resident parish priest of Glarus for the next decade.
Interestingly, there was no particular event that steered Zwingli on his eventual path, such as spectral apparitions, inexplicable miracles, or overnight revelations. Instead, the nonconformist's eyes were gradually peeled open to the deficiencies of the Catholic clerics and the distorted gospel they taught throughout the course of his own extracurricular studies. It was a steady, concerted effort that author D. Aubine described as “slow, but progressive.”
An excerpt from one of Zwingli’s journals explain what he was thinking at the time: “The Scriptures come from God, not from man, and even that God who enlightens will give thee to understand that the speech comes from God. The word of God...cannot fail; it is bright, it teaches itself, it discloses itself, it illumines the soul with all salvation and grace, comforts it in God, humbles it, so that it loses and even forfeits itself, and embraces God…[when] I began to give myself wholly up to the Holy Scripture, philosophy and theology would always keep suggesting quarrels to me. At last I came to this, that I thought, ‘Though must let all that lie, and learn the meaning of God purely out of His own simple word.' Then I began to ask God for His light, and the Scriptures began to be much easier to me.”
The congregation Zwingli had inherited was among the most important parishes within the Old Swiss Confederacy, for it was comprised of close to 33.3% of the canton. Still, his inexperience, the size of his flock, and the unfamiliar environment did little to dissuade him from launching his mission to reeducate and preserve the sanctity of Scripture at full-throttle. If anything, the challenge itself further galvanized him into action, and it was with this infectious gusto that he delivered his speeches, which allowed him to connect to his parishioners almost instantly. Myconius wrote that Zwingli “became a priest and devoted himself to the principal studies of divinity, for he perceived that one ought to know many things to whom had been committed the office of teaching the [lambs] of Christ.”
Unfortunately, his promising tenure in Glarus was blemished by an incident that demonstrated the Church's state of disarray. When Zurich native Henri Goldli, one of Pope Julius II's equerries, was made aware of the vacancy in Glarus, he submitted to the parish his papal-approved résumé. Fortunately for Zwingli, the iron-willed parishioners were unintimidated by Goldli's endorser and reiterated their preference for the Wildhaus-born preacher. Eventually, Goldli admitted defeat and grudgingly stepped aside, but not before demanding a fee of 100 guilders (roughly $1,450 today) for his troubles. Zwingli was scandalized by the nerve of the venal cleric – one favored by the pope, no less – but he bit the bullet and coughed up the cash. He could forgive, but he would never forget.
Pope Julius II
It was also in Glarus that Zwingli became enmeshed in the turbulent world of politics for the first time. In various cities across the confederacy, Glarus included, soldiers were being recruited as mercenaries to fight for foreign armies. The practice was not new, as it had been going on as early as the 13th century, when tensions between the Swiss and the Austrian Hapsburgs began to escalate. By the 16th century, an estimated 12% of the Swiss population were employed as mercenaries.
All the while, but the tensions between the confederacy and neighboring states had not waned, so the demand for mercenaries remained high. On top of the unremitting friction between the Swiss and the Hapsburgs, the confederacy was entangled in conflicts with the French and the Papal States. The preacher publicly aligned himself with the Holy See of Rome, a powerful ally of the confederacy, and as a token of his gratitude, Pope Julius II appointed Zwingli a military chaplain in the autumn of 1512, for which he received a hefty yearly pension.
In the years that followed, Zwingli was dispatched to the battlegrounds in Italy time and again, most notably during the Battle of Novara in 1513 and the Battle of Marigano in 1515. At the Battle of Marigano, which pitted the previously triumphant, but fatigued Swiss against the newly crowned French King Francis I, the two sides fought for about 28 hours. Some historians have attributed the victory of the French to the diversity of Francis’s soldiers, which included lances and cannons wielded by German, Venetian, and Swiss soldiers-for-hire. Anywhere between 8,000-14,000 of the 22,200 Swiss pikemen were wiped out by cannonballs, and 3,000-8,000 French soldiers and foreign mercenaries died in the crossfire. Throughout these campaigns, Zwingli dispensed soothing Biblical verses and last rites to soldiers both injured and on the brink of death, as per his job description, but he was absolutely appalled by the immorality and savagery unfolding before his eyes.
Although the mercenary system ensured a steady stream of cash and wealth for the territory, the practice itself was far from perfect. Jost Auf der Mar, author of Söldner for Europa (Mercenaries for Europe), shined a light on the “dirty business” in an interview with Swiss Info, explaining, “Swiss mercenaries were in the service of foreign powers for 500 years...There were a host of possible motives, including hunger, to leave the country, but a spirit of adventure and greed for looting were by far the most important. A mercenary was able to earn cash, which was rather rare in those days. There were so many men enlisting that there was a periodic shortage of farmhands as a result.”
Der Mar also cited the warlords' often questionable methods of recruitment. Former military officials, as well as innkeepers and other businessmen, were commonly employed as canvassers for mercenary employers. Der Mar noted, “It was not uncommon to use rather dubious methods to stock up the Swiss regiments. Young men were invited for a drink by the innkeeper, who literally tricked them into [signing] contracts.”
The humiliating defeat of the Swiss soldiers at the Battle of Marignano stirred up a new wave of discord within the confederacy. The citizens of Glarus, for example, abandoned their loyalties to the pope, aligning themselves instead with the French. As Zwingli remained faithful to Pope Julius II, he thought it wisest to install a vicar in his place and relocate to Einsiedeln in the Schwyz canton, a popular pilgrimage destination that housed a miracle-performing statue of the Blessed Mother. He left for Einsiedeln in early 1516.
The change of scenery did little to take Zwingli's mind off the horrors he witnessed on the battlefields. By this stage, the preacher had become categorically repulsed by the mercenary service, and as such he started a campaign to retire the broken system. Apart from the aforementioned issues highlighted by Der Mar, Zwingli railed against the destructiveness of the “Swiss-on-Swiss violence” and the pointless, pitiful deaths of the young men who died not for their beliefs, but defending the political motives of their employers. He also called attention to the physical, emotional, and psychological trauma the surviving soldiers suffered. Some experienced complete personality changes, with previously devout, mild-mannered soldiers starting to pick fights, drown themselves in booze, and engage in other forms of debauchery. Others slipped into bouts of severe depression, neglecting their families, farms, and responsibilities, and openly disobeying authorities.
Zwingli expressed his opposition to the mercenary system in The Labyrinth, an allegorical take on the practice steeped in satire that was published towards the end of 1516. In this poem, the Minotaur, a vicious and cannibalistic half-bull, half-man hybrid, is hidden within the labyrinth, emerging only to feast upon the seven boys and seven girls doomed to the labyrinth every nine years. Zwingli later explained, “This Minotaur represents the sins, the vices, the irreligion, [and] the foreign service of the Swiss, devouring the sons of the nation...Men are now wandering in a labyrinth, but, as they have no clue, they cannot regain the light, nor find the way out of it. Nowhere do we find an imitation of Christ. A little glory leads us to risk our lives, torment our neighbor, and rush into disputes, war and battle. One might imagine that the furies had broken loose from the abyss of hell...”
Zwingli himself is also said to be depicted in the poem as the hero, Theseus. Jean Heri Merle d'Aubigne, author of A History of the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century, expands on the significance of Theseus and other symbolism peppered throughout the poem: “A bold man, Theseus, [is determined] to rescue his country, but numerous obstacles arrest him: first, a one-eyed lion, this is Spain and Aragon; then, a crowded eagle...[or] the Empire; then a cock, raising its crest and seeming to challenge to the fight...[which] is France. The hero surmounts all these obstacles, reaches the monster, slays him, and saves the country.”
Zwingli may have fancied himself precisely that, but he was only human and therefore not without fault. Not long after his arrival in Einsiedeln, he found himself mired in a local scandal, accused of seducing the daughter of an unidentified local official. Zwingli later admitted that this was not his first sexual scandal, nor would it be the last. He admitted, “Some three years ago, I firmly vowed not to touch any woman. “I succeeded poorly in this, however. In Glarus, I kept my resolution about six months, and in Einsiedeln, about a year...That girl was a 'virgin' during the day and a 'woman' at night. She was such a 'day' virgin, however, that everyone in Einsiedeln knew exactly her role... She had affairs with many men, and finally with me. Or, let me say it better: she seduced me with more than flattering words...”
The preacher's refusal to take full responsibility for his sexual transgressions became a common theme in his confessions. While engaging in sexual affairs and even keeping a concubine were normal practices for preachers at the time, Zwingli was remorseful, leading him to either shift the blame or downplay his offenses. He always claimed he “never defiled a virgin, nun, or married woman.”
Zwingli may have struggled to maintain his chastity, but his congregation at Einsiedeln fell under his spell all the same. Parishioners were captivated by his enthusiasm and his growing audacity in pointing out the problems within the Church. German-born theologian and future Protestant reformer Casper Hedio, who attended one of Zwingli's sermons after his graduation in early November 1519, sang the preacher's praises in one of his letters. Hedio wrote, “How beautiful, how learned, solemn, piercing, and evangelical was the address [that Zwingli delivered]. Its force reminds me of the ancient doctors!”
Between the years of 1516 and 1518, Zwingli conscientiously fulfilled his duties as pastor, but he detached himself from politics completely and devoted his leisure time to scrutinizing and analyzing the Bible instead, using as reference a comprehensive library filled with over 300 classical, academic, and theological texts. His colleagues commended him for his dedication, and they saluted him as one of the foremost experts on Scripture.
Zwingli, however, was dissatisfied with his own grasp on the subjects, which he considered specious at best, for he recognized that he had only studied the Scripture in its Latin form. To remedy this, he educated himself in the languages of Hebrew and Greek, the original languages of the Old Testament and New Testament, respectively, and this decision is now considered by some the opening gambit of the Swiss Reformation. Zwingli discussed this decision in a letter to his old friend, Vadian, telling him, “I gave my labor to the Greek language, so that I might be able to draw the doctrines of Christ from the fountain of truth. I am resolved that no one shall turn me from it, except God. I do it not for glory, but for the love of sacred learning.”
At the same time, Zwingli worked to improve upon his public speaking skills, and to preserve his objectivity and open-mindedness by re-examining and re-evaluating the works of various classical authors. He dusted off the poems of Pindar, Hesiod, Homer, and Valerius Maximus, and he memorized extracts from Cicero's philosophical and political texts. All the while, he continued to flesh out a detailed list of the Church's failings and abuses.
There was, above all, one poem by Erasmus that left an indelible imprint on his mind. Zwingli later recounted the experience in a journal entry: “I shall not withhold from you, dear brethren in Christ Jesus, how it was I arrived at the firm conviction that we need no other mediator than Christ, and that none but Christ alone can mediate between God and man. Eight or nine years ago, I read a poem of Erasmus of Rotterdam on the Lord Jesus, wherein Jesus complains that men do not seek all good from Him, who is the source of all good, the Savior, Refuge, and Treasure of the soul. Whereupon I reflected, 'If that is so, why then do we seek help from any creature?'”
Zwingli was fortunate enough to meet the illustrious Dutch scholar himself sometime between August 1514 and May of 1516. Erasmus, like many who came into contact with Zwingli, was dazzled by the charismatic chaplain. Erasmus wrote to Zwingli weeks later, “I congratulate the Swiss nation on the efforts you are making on your studies and morals, both alike excellent, to polish and ennoble it.” Needless to say, his admiration for the preacher was very much requited, as Zwingli clung on to his every word. Erasmus once told him, “There is but one thing, that we have to seek for in the Holy Scriptures, and that is Christ.”
Zwingli's response to Erasmus was similarly cloying: “I could not have slept a wink had I not had some conversation with you. There is nothing in which I glory so much as in my having seen Erasmus.” He would cherish the present Erasmus bestowed upon him before his departure – a leather-bound copy of St. John's Gospel – for the rest of his days. He displayed the book on the altar below the crucifix in his bedroom and planted a kiss on it every evening before bed, “in order that [he] may never forget Erasmus from [his] prayers.”
Their correspondence continued for years, but it eventually petered out in the mid-1520s as Erasmus grew uncomfortable with Zwingli's increasingly radical views.
Erasmus