The first rift
The first rift In January 1522 Zwingli had been preaching the gospel in Zurich for three years. He had a considerable following, but he was manifestly feeling that the services and routine of the seven churches went on much as before and that the work of evangelisation was laborious. He also now knew that effective action required the positive support of the Council, to which, as Canon and citizen, he now had easier access.
Ash Wednesday fell on 5 March in 1522, and shortly after that day an event occurred which involved Zwingli in the public assertion, and then defence, of one application of the Bible message which he had expounded and to which he had given intensive study. It came over a minor matter, one of the most adiaphorous of the adiaphora, the rule of fasting during Lent. It also happened in association with one of Zwingli's earliest supporters and admirers, the printer Christopher Froschauer, for it was in his house that trouble over this started. His press,1 operating in the shadow of the Dominican cloister, had been in existence for several years, and from it had come the usual books of piety and elementary instruction that characterised the early days of printing. He specialised in cheap, handy octavo volumes, and was quick to use illustrations provided on occasion by Holbein, Cranach, Graf or Diirer. Compared with Basle or Venice, the establishment was insignificant, yet without it much of Zwingli's work would have been impossible.
It was in the parlour of Froschauer's house that a small company 1 Froschauer was a Bavarian who was made a full citizen of Zurich in 1519. He had been preceded as a printer by Peter and Hans Hager and Hans Riiegger - the earliest indication of his press is in 1518. P. Leemann-van Elck, Zur Zurcher Druckgeschichte (Berne, 1934), 60.
F. J. Schiffmann, Der Dominikaner Albertus Albo Lapide und die Anfdnge des Buchdrucks in der Stadt Zurich (ZT 1899), 100-30. J. Staedtke, Christoph Froschauer•, der Begrunder des
Zurcher Buchwesens (Zurich, 1964). J. Staedtke, Anfdnge und erste Blutezeit des Zurcher
Buchdrucks (Zurich, 1965). P. Leemann-van Elck, Der Zurcher Drucker Christoph Froschauer
(Festschrift der Schweizer Bibliophilen Gesellschaft, 1931). P. Leemann-van Elck, Die
Offizin Froschauer, Zurichs beruhmte Druckerei im 16. Jfahrhundert. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Buchdruckerkunst anldsslich der Halbjahrtausendfeier ihrer Erfindung. MAGZ Bd. 33 H. 2
1939-1943 (Zurich, 1940). G. R. Potter, Zwingli and his publisher, The Library Chronicle
(Philadelphia, 1974) XL. 108-17.
The first rift met1 early in the Lenten season of 1522. There part of a simple evening meal consisted of some form of sausage. Zwingli was among those present but did not eat any of this although most of the rest of the company did so, but he also raised no objection. They all knew that they were offending against the law and custom of the church and that this law and custom would be, if necessary, upheld by the authority of the Zurich council, as in fact it was on 9 April.2 It would have been easy to have escaped any serious consequences. It could have been explained as an accident or a mistake; it could have been admitted as sinfully wrong and absolution sought and obtained; it might even have received retrospective dispensation from the bishop or his Official. This could have been granted on the grounds which were in fact rather feebly advanced as an afterthought, that the printers were engaged upon heavy manual labour, which indeed they were, and that special pressure of work on an edition of the Epistles of St Paul for the Frankfurt book fair called for nutritious food. Monks and friars, like those in the neighbouring cloister, were required by their Rule to abstain from butcher's meat altogether, but it had long since been accepted that the Rule could be modified for the sick in the Infirmary who needed special nourishment, and this had become a notorious loop-hole for evasion. There would be no difficulty, particularly if a little money passed as a token of regret and as a fee of recompense for drafting any necessary documents, about overlooking the whole matter. Instead, Zwingli not only condoned the action but made it a public issue in his sermon of 23 March, which was enlarged on 16 April into a short pamphlet, printed by the same Froschauer firm, on the right to choose freely what to eat (Von Erkiesen und
Freiheit der Speisen).3
By April 1522 Zwingli had sorted a good many things out for himself.
He had ceased to be primarily a humanist and a scholar; he had parted company with his revered master, Erasmus, because he was now making the 1 Egli, /, 72-6 (Nos. 233-5); Bullinger, Ref. I, 69-70; Farner, Zwingli HI, 237-52. Reports varied about the number of people present and participating: Leo Jud, Heinrich Aberli,
Bartlime Pur seem certain; Georg Binder, Hans Utinger, Hans Hottinger, Wolf Ininger,
Lorenz Hochriitiner, Hans Ochsenfuss are probables. Goeters, Vorgeschichte, 239-81.
2 Egli 1 77 (no. 237); Morikofer 1, 97. Froschauer was fined a small sum. Things were not improved by the news that there had been a minor riot in Basle caused by someone deliberately eating pork in Lent; Z vn, 509. Froschauer claimed that he had been unable to afford fish and that a vegetarian diet was inadequate.
3 Z 1, 74 (88)-i36. A formal complaint had been made to the Bishop of Constance about Zwingli's sermon. The complainants were thereupon fined by the council for taking the matter outside the jurisdiction of Zurich, and the defendants were allowed to justify their action.
This they did, but before the council had given a ruling the Bishop of Constance intervened to call the clergy of the city together to hear a communication requiring their obedience on this issue. Intervention by the council was therefore unavoidable in order to prevent episcopal dictation within the city walls. After some discussion, Zwingli was allowed to state his case, which he then developed into this treatise. Z vii, 515-16 n. 6. It is almost certain that he made use of Luther's Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen.
ZWINGLI reborn Christ ('Christusrenascens') into a guide for thought and action in a way that Erasmus could not, and he was cutting himself loose from Rome.
Already towards the end of 1520, he had formally declined to receive further instalments of his Papal pension.1 At Glarus and Einsiedeln, he had satisfied his conscience about accepting money from this quarter by using it for the purpose of buying books on the principle pecunia non olet.
At Zurich, however, he was adequately recompensed as Canon and preacher, so that this reasoning no longer applied. Further, Bible study and self-examination, intensified by illness, made him unable to accept papal claims; the pope in his view was shrinking to one bishop - albeit of Rome - among many, and a number of traditional episcopal prerogatives were being challenged.
From the pulpit his evangelical sermons continued to be heard, to the growing embarrassment of some of his fellow-Canons, Hofmann in particular, and there were even demands for his resignation or removal if he did not come more into line with the others. Instead, he was pushing things even further by his words about fasting. It was a deliberate and critical decision. He could assuredly have secured a well-paid sinecure in return for inaction, and he could have devoted his time and talents to the humanist studies in which he delighted. From Rome came, with calculated secrecy, some significant advances. As late as January 1523 there was a formal letter from Pope Adrian VI, itself an indication of approval, and the nuncio, Ennio Filonardi, hinted that a cardinal's hat might be the reward for compliance.2 So far he was, it is worth repeating, like Erasmus, outwardly an orthodox Catholic priest, saying mass, hearing confessions, taking part in all the ceremonial routine of the Great Minster. He had already learnt to hasten slowly.3
Like many others, he was dissatisfied about a number of particular issues such as indulgences and fasting, which he wanted clarifying in the light of scripture. In the justificatory tract Von Erkiesen und Freiheit der
Speisen {Of choice and freedom in the matter of food) he explained that he had never spoken against abstention from meat-eating during Lent or on Fridays:4 he had spoken of freedom in Christ, and this had been inter1 Farner, 11. 414 regards this as a decisive stage in the course of Zwinglian Reformation.
Wyss 17; Z 1. 396; Z 11, 314.
2 Z VIII, 13-14 and notes; Farner ill, 319. Myconius asserted that Zwingli was offered 'omnia certe praeter sedem papalem'. For a more sceptical view G. Miiller, Die romische Kurie und die Reformation, 1523-34 QFRG 38 (Giitersloh, 1969), 14 n. 29. A similar suggestion of a bishopric had reached Luther in 1518. J. Mackinnon, Luther and the Reformation (London,
1928) 11, 102; WA 4.1, 274 and 277 n. 28.
3 'by going slow*, he wrote to Jud in May 1522, 'we achieve our ends' -*faciendum enim interdum, quod minime velis, ut, quod maxime velis, aliquando sequatur*. Z vn, 520.
4 Together with the Ember days, Rogation days and the vigils of saints days. F. SchmidtClausing in Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, Bd. II (Tubingen, 1958), coll. 883, 884;
Z 1, 99 n. 2.
The first rift preted by some as implying that they need not abstain from meat since this was not required by the Bible. It was this opinion, rather than the action taken, that Zwingli sought to justify. The ceremonial laws of the Old Testament have been superseded by the Gospel, which is not one of works but of faith and love. The freedom brought to humanity by the New
Testament was something invaluable and inalienable. Food was a necessity of life more important than gold (as Midas discovered), and the principle that the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath, must be applied to fasting likewise. This must be optional, not obligatory.
In attempting to oblige all to fast at specified times, Canon Law and the spiritual authorities have acted ultra vires. Many local regulations such as abstention from milk, butter, cheese (as derived from beasts) or eggs, have been relatively recently * made, and dispensations or exemptions have been freely sold. If it had been sinful to take milk or eggs on fast-days, why had it taken the authorities fourteen centuries to discover the fact ? If it was not sinful, as it was not, then the requirement was made only for the money to be obtained by securing exemption.
Freedom, it is insisted, must be combined with love; those who fast must be respected and not interfered with; the motive, not the action, matters, and of the motive it may be impossible to judge. The Bible teaching, above all the example of St Peter (Acts 10. 10-16) and the divine permission to eat freely, together with St Paul's exposition to the Corinthians (I Cor. 6. 12-14), left Zwingli confident that his opinion was right.
Having demonstrated that fasting was a human rather than a divine command, and urging that it is, in any case, like working on saints' days
(but not on Sundays), a matter of indifference, having expressed his willingto be corrected from the Bible if wrong, insisting throughout on charity in judging others, the more so if they have yet to come to know God's word fully, he returns at the end to the freedom of the individual to choose in this particular instance. The bishops have exceeded their rightful powers and have fleeced their flocks rather than fed them.
The treatise itself, like many to follow, was hurried and at the same time reasonably cautious. He was well aware that feelings could easily be roused, and he was anxious to avoid tumult and disorder. The bishop directly concerned was the good-natured native of Zurich, Hugo of Hohenlandenberg,
Bishop of Constance,2 who soon made it clear that he was not prepared to go any of the way with the new demands. On 24 May 1522, the Zurich council was invited in a letter from the bishop to maintain a stand for peace and unity within the church. This letter, and a similar one to the 1 Z 1, 109-10 for details.
2 A. Willburger, Die Konstanzer Bischofe Hugo von Landenberg, Balthasar Merklin, Johann von
Lupfen (1496-1537) und die Glaubensspaltung (Miinster i.W., 1917).
PZI
ZWINGLI Chapter of the Great Minster,1 was in fact written by the bishop's Official,
Dr Johann Fabri (or Faber) of Leutkirch who had at first been attracted to Zwingli both as a humanist and as a preacher, but had recently visited
Rome and returned to act as advocate and pamphleteer on behalf of the papacy. The question of fasting during Lent raised, obviously, the whole general issue of ecclesiastical authority. To flout the bishop was to flout the Pope and thus the authority of the church, unless, as Zwingli vainly hoped, the bishop gave way.
Before the relatively minor matter of eating meat during Lent had been considered, a much more serious topic was raised by the Zurich evangelicals : the question of clerical celibacy.
The incompatibility of the priesthood with the married state had a very long history behind it.2 Although the ministers of the early church had included many married men, a preference for the single state early manifested itself. Monasticism helped this tendency, as did papal pronouncements. But married clergy, although officially disapproved and where possible disregarded, were common enough before the twelfth century
(Ailred of Rievaulx, like many other notable clerics, had a long clerical ancestry). After noo, however, the combination of high esteem for asceticism with the efforts of the Hildebrandine reformers and the necessity of preventing ecclesiastical benefices becoming hereditary, was decisive. Matrimony and the priesthood were made incompatible. It does not need any very extensive knowledge of medieval literature to make it clear that society then was 'permissive' enough. Chastity was sufficiently rare to be regarded as of itself almost a qualification for sanctity. Opportunities for sexual indulgence were notoriously numerous and taken for granted. University towns, the breeding grounds of future clerics, were overrun with loose women; in tiny Zurich itself everyone knew where to find a brothel. The fact that ZwingH's own admitted lapse did not prevent his selection for his notable position in Zurich speaks for itself, as does also, for example, a similar admitted act by Sir Thomas More.3
For all practical purposes much of northern Switzerland had a married clergy.4 Legally this was impossible; the priest and his concubine could
1 Z I, 190. The small council was prepared to support the bishop, but the great council ('the two hundred') insisted that Zwingli should be heard.
2 The literature is considerable - over a thousand treatises are reported. It was conveniently and unsympathetically summarised a century ago by H. C. Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church (Philadelphia, 1867; 3rd edition, 2 vols. Philadelphia and London,
1907). M. Thurian, Marriage and celibacy (London, 1959); W. Bertrams, Der Zolibdt des
Priesters2 (Wiirzburg, 1962) and an article, Celibat, by Leclerc in Dictionnaire d* archeologie chretienne et de liturgie (with bibliography) 11, coll. 2802-32 (Paris, 1910).
3 P. S. Allen, The Age of Erasmus (Oxford, 1914), 205.
4 Zeller-Werdmuller 1, 16 n. 1. 'Offene Concubinatsverhaltnisse der Geistlichen waren wahrend des ganzen Mittelalters die Regel, wie zahllose Urkunden beweisen.'
The first rift not be man and wife, for canon law had forbidden such matrimony for centuries. Yet in the dioceses of Constance and Chur the existence of such unions was almost officially recognised. The bishop's officers collected a kind of protection money from clergy with families, and in return for regular payments made no attempt to bring any action in the episcopal court. It was even encouraged by allowing the children of priests to inherit property by will as if they were legitimate. The income to the bishop was appreciable. In Zwingli's own diocese there were said to be 1,500 children of priests, for each of whom the bishop's Fiscal (agent) received four (later five) gulden.1 While there could not be any canonically recognised union in much of Switzerland, the status of the 'priest's whore' was a respectable one. It was, none the less, a manifestly unsatisfactory compromise. Luther came out explicitly in favour of clerical marriage in his Address to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation of June 1520, saying no more indeed than many had done before, but saying it with firmer emphasis.2 Such a message was obviously not acceptable to Rome, to the Bishop of Constance or to the Canons of the Great Minster, but Zwingli had already reached a similar conclusion. The difference was that what Luther proclaimed from the house tops was put forward in Zurich at first cautiously and hypothetically. Zwingli usually had a good sense of timing, and in this important matter he held his fire until it could be directed to the best effect. By 1520 he was convinced that clerical celibacy rested on no adequate biblical basis.
Some of his early marginalia indicate a certain preoccupation with the Gospel and Pauline teaching about matrimony, the latter very much reinforced by the writings of St Augustine. His own lapse was a constant burden and reproach to him, while he knew perfectly well how often many of his fellow priests found outlets in visits to the 'baths', while others, to everyone's knowledge, lived with their housekeepers and often raised families.
Some time early in 1522 Zwingli secretly married a lady of higher social rank than himself, Anna Reinhart, widow of Hans Meyer von Knonau.3
1 O. Vasella, Reform undReformation in der Schweiz (Miinster, 1958) 28; Z 1, 225. The fine was nominally as penance for 'Nicolaitism' (from Acts 6. 5, Rev. 2. 6-7, 15). Z 1, 225 n. 6;
R. Durrer, Die Schweizergarde im Rom (Lucerne, 1927), 317 n. 8.
2 J. Mackinnon, Luther and the Reformation 11, 240; WA 1, 6., 440-1; H. C. Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church3 (London, 1907), 41; L. von Muralt, Zurichs
Beitrag zur Weltgeschichte imZeitalter der Reformation ZT 1945 (Zurich, 1944), 61-85. H.
Denifle, Luther und Luthertum in der ersten Entwickelung quellenma'ssig dargestellt. 2 Bde.
(Mainz 1904-9. Also trans. J. Paquier, Luther et le lutheranisme> 4 tomes, Paris, 1910-13) especially the introduction.
3 Anna Reinhart was the daughter of the keeper of the inn zum Rossli in Zurich. Exactly
Zwingli's age, she had made a love-marriage with Hans Meyer von Knonau (died 1517) against the wish of the latter's father. There were three children of this marriage - Margaret, who in 1527 married Anton Wirz (killed at Kappel, 1531) and secondly Hans Escher vom
4-2
ZWINGLI This could not be kept hidden, and was one of the reasons that brought about a petition to the Bishop of Constance on 2 July 15221 signed by him and ten other priests. The other signatories were Balthasar Trachsel,2
Georg Staehelin,3 Werner Steiner,4 Simon Stumpf,5 Erasmus Schmid,6 Jodocus (Jost) Kilchmeyer,7 Huldrych Pfister,8 Kaspar Grossmann,9
Johann Schmid10 and Leo Jud. This serious appeal, which had the qualified support of Erasmus, was promptly rejected at Constance and was also sent, in modified and more popular form, in German, to the wider lay public of the Confederation.11 This was a deliberate bid for popular support enhanced by praise for his countrymen and an assurance that a married priesthood would not mean that church endowments would be used for the benefit of the families of the recipients.
This little printed pamphlet starts with a charmingly simple introduction to the Gospel message, the preaching of which was now said to be almost entirely neglected. Instead, the emphasis was on routine attendance at mass, insistence upon payment of tithes and oblations, the pushing of indulgences, the enhancement of the authority of the Pope, and the multiplication of saints and their shrines. To call preaching the Word heretical,
Luchs; Gerold, to whom Zwingli was to dedicate his treatise on Education, Quo pacto etc. in 1523 (below 217-18 and n. 2), and who likewise perished at Kappel; and Agatha, who married Hans Balthasar Keller. At 38, Anna agreed in the early part of 1522 to be Zwingli's wife, and their cohabitation was well known, e.g. to Glarean in Basle, Myconius in Lucerne and Berchtold Haller in Berne. It was not until 2 April 1524 that he 'went to church' - i.e. publicly recognised marriage with her. This was three months before the birth of their first child, and was followed by a lawsuit about Frau Reinhart's property. Staehelin 1, 224; Z iv,
407 n.; Wyss 33; Koehler, Zwingli 87; ZWA in, 197-221, 229-45; Durrer, Schweizergarde
3i7 n. 8.
I Z 1, 188 (i97)-2io. Supplicatio ad Hugonem episcopum Constantiensem, written in Latin for limited circulation.
2 Dean of the collegiate church of Arth, married in 1521.
3 From Schwyz, also known as Calybeus.
4 Of Zug, son of the Ammann, and widely travelled. He later settled in Zurich and helped
Bullinger.
5 A former monk from Franconia, and friend of Beatus Rhenanus, who had become incumbent of Hb'ngg on the resignation of his uncle Nicolaus Petri. There was opposition from the Abbot of Wettingen and a lawsuit.
6 Erasmus Schmid (Fabricius) c. 1492-1546 graduated M.A. at Freiburg in 1514, taught at Sion, was beneficed at Stein a. R., and from 1521 was canon of the Great Minster and a devoted adherent of Zwingli. He took part in the first Zurich disputation, was dismissed for his part in the Ittingen affair, became well known in Zurich for his scholarship, and died as minister at Reichenweier (Alsace). Z 1, 139; Z vn, 84 n. 1; ZSKG 50 (1936) 360-6.
7 Canon of Lucerne. He tried, but failed, to reform Rapperswil.
8 Or Pistoris, from Uster.
9 Megander.
10 Faber, one of the canons of the Great Minster.
II Z I, 210 (2i4)-248. Eine freundliche Bitte und Ermahnung an die Eidgenossen, 13 July 1522.
Its only obvious effect outside Zurich was to stiffen the opposition. Myconius, for example, who was known to be one of Zwingli's friends and disciples, was dismissed from his position as schoolmaster in Lucerne, and was with considerable difficulty provided for in Zurich.
There were to be many similar rather pathetic figures during the next ten years. Vasella,
Reform und Reformation, 63 n. 165 pertinently asks why the appeal was both to bishop and confederation.
The first rift Hussite or Lutheran, was utterly unfair. 'We truly have nothing in common with Luther or anyone else who might harm Christian peace and doctrine.'1
The personal preference for the single state shown by St Paul was no divine command; on the contrary, the 'bishops' of the early church were married men. A young priest, hearing confessions and in close contact with girls and young married women, could well be a 'dangerous animal'. Give him a wife, children and a home, and his passions will be cooled. This simple observation is followed rather incongruously by a haphazard appeal to early church history, including the Synod of Gangra (c. 345), the Council of Toledo (400) and references to St Hilary, St Augustine and Pope Nicholas I (858-67). The state of matrimony was a highly honourable one; it was monstrous that the children of priests should be despised and rejected, unable to learn a decent trade or become a gild member if boys, unacceptable as suitable wives if girls. The Swiss were born in one honourable Confederation; they suffered together and they fought together; could they not together defend Bible teaching against the misinterpretation of the Pope and the hierarchy ? The petitioners asked only for recognition, not for special privileges for wives, nor that benefices should descend from father to son. Clerical marriage should be openly avowed and recognised, and society would be the better for it. Preachers of the Gospel should be protected against Pope, bishops or their agents.
It was an eloquent and well-written appeal.2 Within Zurich itself, support was gathering. The nomination of Leo Jud as stipendiary priest at St Peter's on 1 June 1522 was one sign of the time. Another was the acceptance of Zwingli's claim to preach in his own way.3
Outside Zurich, opposition was mounting. To meet this, Zwingli published, on 23 August 1522, his first major statement of faith, Apologeticus
Archeteles4 intended for all his countrymen, 'who are not the same as Germans'.5 The very title is significant, an apology in the commonly used sense of defence, and this was to be 'once and for all'.6 It was written in Latin and completed exactly three months after the note from the Bishop of Constance to the Chapter of the Great Minster to which it was the 1 Z 1, 224. * Wir warlich nut gmeins habend weder mit dem Luter noch mit dheinem andren, das christenlicher ler und ruw iitzit schaden mog, ja gar dhein gemeinsamy.'
2 Erasmus himself wrote in favourable but guarded terms, and many letters refer to the minor sensation that it caused. Allen v, 46; Z 1, 192-3; Staehelin 1,229-31; Goeters, Vorgeschichte,
250.
3 Koehler Zwingli, 81; Egli /, 107 (no. 301); Z 1, 257.
* Z 1, 249 (256H84.
5 Z 1, 270: *et Helvetii inter Germanos non censeantur'.
6 * Archeteles' is one of the composite Greek-derived nouns which early sixteenth-century humanists, following Erasmus' example in Enchiridion militis or More's in Utopia, loved to invent: in this case 17 dpxrj 'beginning', ro reXos 'end'. Zwingli could seldom resist the temptation to advertise his knowledge of Greek.
ZWINGLI reply.1 As such, it was gratuitous. Zwingli had not been mentioned by name in the episcopal letter, and any reply to the Bishop should have come from the Chapter as a whole. Yet he knew quite well that his preaching had started the trouble and that his defence of meat-eating in Lent had been a challenge. He was also well aware that the bishop personally had not the scholarship needed for a learned discussion and that his real enemies in Constance were the suffragan bishop, Melchior Fattli(n), and the active
Official, John Fabri. Moreover, the matters raised by the bishop were of public concern, and his communication could not be regarded as private episcopal advice to the governing body of the collegiate church. Zwingli's task was to defend the preaching of the Gospel in Zurich and to demonstrate to his fellow-countrymen that no heresy was taught there.2 Every device - indignation, irony, logical argument, scriptural citation, history, law, even classical analogy - was used in this treatise. Indignation at the opening: there in Zurich they lived in the utmost quiet and repose, and the council had encouraged evangelical preaching as against the anecdotes and irrelevances of the Mendicants.3 The apology opens with a tribute to the new-won freedom to expound the Gospel, which they were determined not to lose or abandon. The true pastors, who may be simple people, must defend themselves against false prophets, ravening wolves, guided merely by human reason and tradition. In season and out of season, the Gospel must be heard against even those who enjoy high office, authority, power, wealth, honours and glory. Christ's teaching is for the spiritually minded, not for the learned exclusively - woe to those who call evil good, good evil,
1 The episcopal communication, grandly described as 'paraenesis' (Z i, 263-9), na<l been received on 24 May 1522. In it the bishop had warned the canons against the wolf already in the fold, an oblique reference to Luther whose excommunication by Leo X (Exsurge, Domine,
15 June 1520) had been confirmed on 3 January 1521 (Decet Romanum). The Diet of Worms
(8 May 1521) had added imperial condemnation of the new doctrines whose promulgation was forbidden in the Empire, including Zurich. The bishop emphasised that innovations and alterations in the traditional church services were to be avoided. Cf. [Sebastian Meyer]
Ernstliche Ermahnung Hugo von Landenbergs, Bischofs zu Konstanz, zu Frieden und christlicher
Einigkeity mit schoner Auslegung und Erkldrung, hg. v. K. Schottenloher. Bd. iv, Heft 5 of Flugschriften aus den erst en jfahren der Reformation hg. v. O. Clemen, 277-8 (Leipzig, 1911).
2 At the Lucerne meeting of the Diet (EA 4, ia, 194) 27 May 1522, complaints of presumptuous preaching causing division and error among Christians were plainly directed at Zurich.
3 This action by the council had the result of a challenge by the Franciscan friar, Francis
Lambert of Avignon, who also defended image veneration at a debate in Zurich on 21 July 1522 in the presence of Biirgermeister Marx Roist, two Company Masters, Hans Ochsner and Heinrich Walder, and the Town Clerk, Kaspar Frei. The three Regular Orders had been represented, as had the Canons of the Great Minster and the three stipendiary ministers,
Heinrich Engelhard from the Fraumiinster, Rudolf Roschli from St Peter's and Zwingli from the Great Minster. Zwingli's energetic claim to be the principal exponent for Zurich 'ich bin in diser statt Zurich bishof und pfarrer' was accepted, and in future Bible-preaching only, and not the teaching of Duns Scotus and Aquinas, was to be encouraged. Z1, 257-8 n. 3, 337; vii, 532; Wyss 17-18 and notes; Bullinger, Ref. 1, 77-8; Goeters, Vorgeschichte, 246.
The first rift light darkness, darkness light, bitter sweet and sweet bitter.1 Let the opponents cease to put their sanctions before the grace of God, selling dispensations that should be free, terrorising tender consciences, driving men to desperation, demanding chastity where Christ allowed freedom, and living in most unapostolic luxury.
The bishop would have it that the new errors were worse than the old ones, as if 'that countrified Zwingli'2 was worse than Sabellius who had taught tritheism, Arius who made Christ less than the Father, Manichaeus who claimed that there are two Gods - good and evil - and Marcion who believed that Christ was never fully human.' I shall not cease from aiming to restore the ancient unity of the Church, and I will prove that I am neither a leader of faction nor a heretic' It is the opinions of his critics which are breeding sedition, tumult, war, enmity and all that is evil.
He reminded his readers that for four years (1519-22), for the edification of his fellow countrymen, he had set forth the plain Gospel message: 'We planted, Matthew, Luke, Paul and Peter watered, and God gave wonderful increase.'3 In so far as his bishop was a true bishop, all had been done in agreement and harmony with him.
Basing his preaching exclusively on the Gospels, Zwingli called men to repentance and to generosity toward the poor. To the best of his ability, human, man-made doctrines had been rejected, false prophets denounced, traditions accepted only when in harmony with the divine word. Without any vainglorious belief that the spirit of God was upon him, he none the less believed that he was the instrument for the delivery of God's word.
After this vigorous defence he went on to reply to the bishop's insistence that the Gospel implied the existence of a united church behind it. Was the Bible not there at the time of Arius, or of Pope Liberius (352-66) himself an Arian, or Anastasius II (496-8), under all of whom the Christian church was manifestly divided ? Nor was it good enough for his opponents to shelter under the Augustinian aphorism' I would not believe the Gospel unless the church had approved it.'4 But where was the church when, only nine years after the Resurrection, Matthew wrote his narrative? The gospels were there before St Augustine wrote, independent of him and of the church. The church received the message at the hands of the four evangelists and no approval was needed.
He then passed to some familiar assertions. The rock, so much appealed to, could refer to Christ just as easily as to St Peter, and therefore it would seem to be impious sacrilege to call the Roman pontiff supreme and chief
1 Cf. Isaiah 5. 20.
2 'rusticus iste Zuinglius': Z 1, 283.
3 Z 1, 285.
4 Z1, 293. Strictly 'Ego vero euangelio non crederem, nisi me catholicae ecclesiae commoveret auctoritas.' (Contra Manichaei epistolam quam vocant fundamenti. Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum Latinorum (Vindobonae [Vienna] 1891) xxv, 197.) MPL, 42. c. 176.
ZWINGLI priest, universal bishop. Bishops waging war, dazzling men with the splendour of their equipage and furniture, collecting money on any and every pretext, were a sad sight. As for Fabri himself, he should cease to obstruct the rebirth of Christianity1 -he and his friends were like unto the pseudo-apostles who taught human satisfaction instead of the redeeming blood of Christ, seeking ever for honours and reward - pecuniam omnino habere oportet.
Even General Councils could err, for councils had disagreed with one another, one allowing clerical marriage and another forbidding it, whereas the scriptures could not be wrong, and from the scriptures not the letter that kills but the spirit that gives life (2 Corinthians 3. 6). From this basis of sola scriptura, Zwingli urged the elimination of a great deal of the sacerdotalism, antiquarianism and ritualism that had accreted to worship.
The Christian community (respublica Christiana) had been at its best in the earliest days when ceremonies hardly existed, as contrasted with the German and Swiss cities where pseudo-bishops must needs anoint the walls of the churches with water, salt and ashes, as if bells could not ring without the application of holy water or altars be used without being first rubbed with consecrated oil.
He then appealed to the anti-clericalism seldom far below the surface in the medieval city. He contrasted priests with laity, the learned ones with the illiterate, the key-holders with those with empty purses, the idle
Religious with the sweating workers, the debauched and adulterers with faithful husbands, the tax-exempt men of leisure with those who paid rates and taxes, the peacefully sleeping clergy not liable to watch and ward duties with those whose vigilance saved the city from danger while religion refused to allow the others to lift a finger in its defence. They thought they were always in the right, that they alone steered by the pole star, cynosura, that majority opinion was with them.
In one of the many parentheses, Zwingli showed a thoroughly sixteenth century distaste for democracy or majority rule. Everything of value had been the work of minorities - the early apostles had been but a handful among a mass of unbelievers, no philosopher of repute would be so crazy as to prefer the judgement of the ignorant many to that of the understanding few, nor could any such majority rule apply today. This is the more interesting because in later life and in different circumstances
Zwingli was to appeal to a majority vote in a community on a religious matter as decisive.2 He would also not accept compulsory conversion compelle intrare meant 'try hard to persuade them to come in', not 'bring them in by force'.3 But here again, when Zurich was to become an entirely
1 'renascenti Christianismo' Z 1, 301; 'herbescentem Christum' Z 1, 307. See above 75-6.
2 See below 348, 373.
3 z 1, 316; Luke 14. 23.
The first rift evangelical city, the inhabitants had no option but to conform or go away. It was wrong for the Abbot of St Gall to force his faith upon his tenants and subjects, for they must be free to choose; but Zurich state subjects were certainly not free to choose to follow the errors of the Anabaptists.
However much Apologeticus Archeteles may have been thought of as a ' once and for all' final statement, it was in fact nothing of the sort: it marked a stage, and a very transitional stage, in Zwingli's thought. Few things are more misleading in his case than to attribute a defined body of doctrine to him at a particular point in time and label it Zwinglian. Even more than with Luther and Calvin was it true that, standing firm indeed upon the basic principle of the infallibility and certainty of the Bible, his ideas grew and changed. Much that seemed simple in 1522 was recognised as needing explanation, modification, adjustment and even abandonment later. In this sense Zwingli may have been one of the most progressive and adaptable of the Reformers.
He insisted that neither individually, nor even in General Council assembled, could bishops be entrusted with the interpretation of the Bible.
Many bishops were scarcely literate; and scholarship, in any case, was not enough. The layman might know more than the priest; the divine truths were often revealed to the simple minded and hidden from the professional theologians,1 a conviction that was to cause difficulties long after Zwingli's time.
From inspiration he passed to prayer. The early sixteenth century saw in some respects the culmination of the medieval conviction of the need for, and the efficacy of, ceaseless supplication to heaven. In addition to being individual, prayer could also be corporate and vicarious, which was a reason for the endowment and support of many houses of religion and the employment of innumerable chantry priests. In this treatise, the value of prayer to the saints is, revealingly, not considered; but attention is directed to the need for a man personally to beseech for divine mercy and forgiveness. This came of grace and divine favour, by no means of right or certain due; and, while we must pray all the time, the goodness of God and not any merit acquired by words alone allowed us to hope for favour. The section ends with an appeal for humility.
Finally, Zwingli once again appealed to the fact that his teaching had been accepted in Zurich with enthusiasm. Order was now better maintained there than in any other Swiss city;2 dissension had largely ceased,
1 Z 1, 322:'. . . indoctissimi quique, modo pii sint, scripturam iuxta mentem dei quam simplicissime capiant'. The biblical truism was again to be qualified later when Zwingli's opponents appealed against his own teaching to their 'inner light', cf. Z I, 382.
2 Z 1, 325: 'in alio Helvetiorum pago'.
ZWINGLI peace and happiness were apparent. If the Bishop of Constance could but bring himself to abandon 'human traditions', dreams and worthless superstition, he could count on the enthusiastic friendship and support of Zwingli and his friends.
Apologeticus Architeles was certainly a good start if not an end. It was vigorous, challenging and clear. It asserted scriptural authority as plainly as ever Luther did. It showed the way to future doctrinal development; yet it was sufficiently cautious, open-minded and reasonable to provide a basis for further discussions could these but have been possible. No answer, of course, was vouchsafed, but the position had been stated in print for all to read, which many did with approval. It was, however, although relatively hastily composed, a scholarly and controversial statement, from a priest to his superior and suitably 'veiled in the obscurity of a learned language.'1 Two weeks after its publication, he was repeating and simplifying much of it in the vernacular for those who could not read
Latin. In this case, it was the nuns of Oetenbach, it being a safe assumption at the opening of the sixteenth century that a nun could not read or understand the Latin of the services she said and sang with monotonous regularity.2
The ladies at Oetenbach, the very site of which can now be traced only with great difficulty, were of the Dominican order,3 some sixty of them in a large building with considerable endowments. Some of the most respected city families were represented there,4 aloof, cut off, their spiritual needs catered for by the friars of their own Order of Preachers,
Zwingli's most active opponents. These needs included sermons which, coming from the Dominican friars, were entirely conventional and traditional and not, as the Biirgermeister and council required, based on ' the holy Gospels, St Paul and the prophets, casting aside Duns Scotus and Aquinas'.5 The friars refused io alter their style in favour of direct evangelical exposition such as Zwingli offered, and this caused comment and a demand that secular preachers should be allowed access to the nunnery pulpit.
Echoes of what was being said outside could not fail to reach the cloister, and one result of Zwinglian preaching was internal discord, so that the council had to intervene in December 1522 to require the ladies to live
1 It included a poem by Grebel (Z 1, 327) which marked almost the end of Grebel's friendship.
2 E. Power, Medieval English Nunneries (Cambridge, 1922) 246-55; A. Hamilton Thompson,
Visitations of Religious Houses in the Diocese of Lincoln, 11 (Horncastle, 1918) 1,49, 91; Visitations in the diocese of Lincoln 1517-1531 11 (Hereford, 1944), 90.
3 H. Zeller-Werdmiiller u. J. Bachtold,' Die Stiftung des Klosters Oetenbach und das Leben der seligen Schwestern daselbst,' in ZT (1889), 213-76.
4 E.g. Agatha Grebel, sister of Junker Jakob Grebel, was among those who left the convent in 1523. Egli 1,132 (no. 367). s z 1, 329,
The first rift peaceably together until the following spring. Each nun was to be free to choose her own confessor, and in March 1523 evangelical pressure was stepped up by the nomination by the council of Leo Jud as priest-incharge, the Dominicans being excluded from the pulpit.1 After this, a number of the younger Religious left to get married, and, in effect, the nunnery was dissolved.
It was for the edification of these religious ladies, while still together and possibly bewildered by pulpit instruction cutting across their uncertain residual convictions, that Zwingli wrote, in September 1522, a short introduction to Bible study: Von Klarheit und Gewissheit des Wortes Gottes2
(The clarity and certainty of the Bible). It was an exposition and assertion in the first place of the irresistible power of the Word and secondly of its essential lucidity. The Holy Spirit unfailingly reveals the meaning of the Bible to those who truly seek to know God's message as opposed to those who merely expect their opinions to be confirmed by the Bible text.3 It was likewise one of the many statements of his basic position that he was to write, and also, as almost always, it included a statement of the nature of God and of the essentials of the Christian faith. Immortality was assumed; therefore, all people desire salvation, which means an eternal life with God for the soul, which is so much more than the body with which it is fused in this earthly life.
God showed his omnipotence in the creation of the universe and mankind; when, after the Fall, death and daily toil became the common lot, God continued to reveal himself in the Old Testament prophets and in some of the great figures of the ancient world. God's promises were sure, Christ came to rule the world, showed the power of the word by miracles, and revealed God, timeless and eternal. The Incarnation, resurrection, the sending of the Holy Spirit, and a careful and orthodox account of the Trinity in Unity, are included. This leads on to a section on the certainty and strength of God's word. God's promises in the Bible will be fulfilled.
Zwingli then faces the obvious difficulty that, in fact, through the scriptures God speaks often in parables and apparent uncertainties. This is true on the surface, but by careful study, attention, faith and recognition of the limitations of the human intellect, full understanding is possible. This comes by God's grace; those who are spiritually healthy and well have the faith accorded to Noah, Abraham, Moses and the prophets; those who are sick try to twist God's word to suit their own inclinations and self-will.
1 Egli 1, 122, 123, 131-2 (Nos. 346, 348, 366). See below 143.
2 Z1, 328 (338)-384. It was translated into English by Sinonoys (see below, 391 n. 1). * A booke which is intituled De claritate verbi Dei', y* is to say of the playnelynesse or lyghtsomnes of gods word. That booke I have already traslated into English & is called a short pathway to come to thee ryghte understating of Gods word.' No example seems to have survived.
3 Z 1, 382.
ZWINGLI To the understanding enlightened by God his word is abundantly clear.
The 'schoolmaster' who must teach them is Christ-not the Doctors of the church, or the Fathers, or the Pope, or the classroom, or church councils. Human additions to God's word whether by bishops or others are unnecessary and must be rejected. God reveals himself through his
Spirit, in obedience to whom comes all knowledge and understanding.
In this way, too, will come proper understanding of the meaning of the Bible, hitherto little known and overlaid with traditional human interpretations which must be abandoned. The fact that majority opinion sometimes favoured some particular application of the scriptures was of little or no significance; Christ stood alone against the High Priest and his supporters; the apostles were a tiny group, with city people as well as country people against them; if there were ten disbelievers to one believer, this did not alter the fact that the latter was right.
Not only the majority might err, so too might (and did) the scholars.
Philosophy1 was not sufficient guide; theologica scholastic a was merely human light which paled before the light of God: learned men were as liable to mistakes as others were, the disciples had been taught by Jesus and not by the men of learning; God reveals the truth to those who pray, and faith will follow. Again and again this splendid confidence that others, like the preacher himself, can and must replace speculative deductions by divine certainty, comes to the fore. In matters on which the Bible thus considered spoke clearly there could be no question of submission to human authority; on all other matters the secular government must be obeyed.2
From this note of obedient humility to ascertained scriptural teaching in a sermon which, if delivered as printed, must have left the hearers bewildered by its variety and depth, Zwingli turned to a piece of revealing self-defence which is also in part autobiographical. It is a little curious that having written a treatise which rejected the concept of the nun as the virgin dedicated to God, he turns, in September 1522, to a lyrical defence of the perpetual virginity of the mother of Christ.3 His uncle John was still Abbot of the Monastery of Fischingen, a Benedictine house half way to St Gall, and at least one of his sisters had 'entered religion'.
It was to these relatives that Zwingli now vindicated himself, well 1 By a curious linguistic quirk, Zwingli uses exactly this word and spelling but with a narrower meaning than in English. Z 1, 378.
2 From this principle so early established, Zwingli never departed. In Zurich, the government based its laws and administration (to Zwingli's satisfaction) upon Holy Writ. Obedience to it, therefore, was entirely proper. Only in this sense was there a Zurich * theocracy5. R. C.
Walton, ZwingWs Theocracy (Toronto, 1967) 49, 218. L. von Muralt, Zum Problem der
Theokratie bei Zwingli, in Discordia Concors 11 (Basle, 1968) 387-90.
3 'Von der ewig reinen Magd Maria' Z 1, 385 (39i)~428.
The first rift knowing that his opponents were spreading stories of his greed, licence and heterodoxy. Specifically, among other things, it was widely alleged then and later that he had maintained that the Virgin Mary was a light woman, a trollop (ein andre trull).1
Having so warmly urged the exclusive authority of the scriptures, Zwingli had, without resource to 'tradition', to explain the texts in Matthew and Mark2 from which it could be deduced that Mary married
Joseph and that they had other children. This false opinion, Zwingli explained, had been put forward long since by Helvidius; there were other ways of interpreting the texts;3 without a nominal husband Mary might have been stoned to death; as it was, she was included in the well-born family of David. To deny that Mary remained inviolata before, during and after the birth of her son, was to doubt the omnipotence of God; a virgin birth was foretold by Isaiah, and it was right and profitable to repeat the angelic greeting-not prayer-'Hail Mary'.4 From Mary we can learn humility, unswerving constancy of faith in her son when all others had deserted him,5 simplicity, faith and hope. God esteemed Mary above all creatures, including the saints and the angels - it was her purity, innocence and invincible faith that mankind must follow. Prayer, however, must be from the heart and to God alone; God is not to be approached through any creature but through Christ alone. The Virgin was an example, not a mediator. To say ' Hail Mary' was praiseworthy, but no number of Aves, no amount of indulgences attached to them, no mechanical telling of the beads would of itself be of avail. Such good works had been put up for sale all too freely and easily, so much so that, with a collecting box or alms dish near the object of indulgence, men were freely enquiring the cost of sin. Heaven and hell were thus offered for money like horses, pigs and cattle.
About himself Zwingli told his family in sorrow and in self-exculpation that men were saying6 that he had fathered three children, had been found
1 Z I, 404-5, 488.
2 Matthew 1. 24; 13. 55-6; Mark 6. 3.
3 Z 1, 422 'brothers', for example, can mean 'friends'.
4 Z Ij 4° 7'
5 Z 1, 421. It is somewhat remarkable to find Zwingli referring to St Anselm's ninth homily
(MPL 158, c. 644-9), 'Stabat autem iuxta crucem Jesu mater eius' (John 19. 25 Vulg.), embroidering on the theme as 'foolish' (ndrrisch) because it assumed that the ladies at the cross were weeping and mourning. Zwingli was somewhat ambivalent on this subject.
Constantly as he insisted upon the certainty of the perpetual virginity of the mother of God he accepted neither her Immaculate Conception nor her Assumption. K. Federer, Zwingli und die Marienverehrung, ZSKG 45 (1951) 13-26.
6 This gossip was repeated in Chur by the wealthy Jakob Stapfer, formerly master of one of the Zurich companies. He had supported the sending of military assistance to Ulrich of Wiirttemberg in 1519. 'Jakob Stapfer, friiher Zunftmeister, hatte kurz vorher in Chur behauptet,
Zwingli sei Vater von drei Kindern, er treibe sich Nachts auf den Strassen umher, er beziehe nicht nur vom Papst sondern auch von Frankreich eine Pension, er habe in einer Predigt
ZWINGLI wandering in the streets at night and that he was in the pay both of the Pope and of the King of France. For such reports he cared little- 'the more my name is abused among men, the better it is with God'. Being human, he was sinful, but he had never taught what was untrue. He had long since renounced his papal pension and he had refused attractive benefices at Basle and Chur. He had demonstrated God's mercy and righteousness from the Bible, to be obtained by grace and faith, contrary to the teaching of those who have exalted good works, have set themselves up as judges of sin, assessing their magnitude and the punishment they involve, assessing this in terms of hard cash, which, when collected, they spend on fair ladies and elaborate dwelling-places. It was all this that he opposed, for Christ was the man of poverty and suffering in whom all are brothers. Those who would overcome the world must first learn to overcome themselves. It was a remarkable exculpation: of its effect on his family we shall never know.
While he was seeing this personal statement through the press, the Medici Pope, Leo X, whose political actions Zwingli had observed with increasing distaste for nine years, was replaced by the Dutch-born Adrian
VI. This admirable idealist was well aware of the successes and popularity of Luther; impressed also by the defeat of the French at Bicocca1 on 27 April 1522, he turned hopefully to the Imperial Diet summoned by the Council of Regency to meet at Nuremberg before the end of the year.2 It was only moderately well attended; the Emperor was represented by his brother the Archduke Ferdinand, the Pope sent Cardinal Francesco
Chieregati as his nuncio.3 This envoy had a private interview with Ferdinand on 28 September 1522, reports of which were soon spread abroad. The papal policy was now one of peace: if Francis I, Henry VIII and Charles V could be reconciled, there might be good hopes of a reform in Christendom, among the clergy especially, and peace could well mean that more money and men were available against the infidels.4 It was, however, the Pope insisted, also necessary to eliminate all that was opposed gesagt, "Ave Maria sei so viel as Gott gruss dich Gretlin usw.". Z I, 405 n. 2. Cf. Z vn, 576.
Such attacks went on all his life. In January 1528 he was accused of stealing 20 gulden.
Strickler, 1, 588-9 (Nos. 1885 a, b).
1 Zurich was not represented at Bicocca, where her contingent might well have altered the fortunes of the day. The other Swiss states remained true to the French alliance, but their men, who had not been paid, returned home as soon as the outcome of the battle was apparent.
2 O. R. Redlich, Der Reichstag von Nurnberg 1522-23 (Leipzig, 1887, reprinted Gottingen,
1963). The internal situation in Germany was relatively favourable. The danger from the knights had been ended by the deaths of Franz von Sickingen and Ulrich von Hutten. The latter, whom Zwingli always admired, ' the distinguished protector of religion and German freedom', died a bankrupt refugee at Ufenau in 1523. Z 1, 431, VIII, 128; see below 127-8.
3 L. Pastor, Geschichte der Pa'pste IV, 2 (Freiburg, 1907), 88-92; E.T. ix (London, 1923) 127-37.
4 Rhodes fell after a long siege on 21 December 1522, the Grand Master of the Order of St John, Villiers de TIsle-Adam, being obliged to retire to Malta.
The first rift to God and the love of one's neighbour, and this included the heretical teaching of Martin Luther and his adherents, among whom Zwingli was now generally counted.
Zwingli, constantly in touch with south German affairs, reacted rapidly and almost violently to the tidings. What was being prepared at Nuremberg could be to the advantage neither of the Gospel nor of German freedom. There was no serious hope that the Pope could eliminate the manifest abuses of the clergy, while the suppression of Luther and his doctrines would have serious political as well as religious repercussions.
These ideas Zwingli set out in a paper, written with great humility for the consideration of the German Diet.1 There is no evidence that it ever reached Nuremberg, where it certainly had no influence; perhaps what we have is only a draft of a more elaborate memorandum that was never written or presented. It contains a remarkable appreciation of Luther,
' undeniably devout and learned ',2 for if he is lost, who is safe ? The writer, however, was concerned with the cause of the Bible, since all who sincerely preach the Gospel are classed as Lutherans. He warns the Germans that an agreement between the Emperor and the King of France will result not in an army being sent against the Turks but in the suppression of Luther's adherents at home. If this were to happen, Rome would control more than the Germanic Kingdom, the whole of Christendom3 would be subject to it.
If Pope Adrian were really concerned about the welfare of the respublica Christiana, he would take steps to ensure the pure preaching of the reborn
Christ and the restoration of discipline rather than attempt merely to reduce the number of cardinals, an institution whose value could be challenged.
Further, Zwingli adds, there was a persistent rumour that Erasmus, the most pious and innocent of men, whose only weakness was his reasonableness and moderation, was to be declared a heretic, primarily because of his edition of the New Testament. This would be monstrous, but from the new Pope Zwingli had little hope. In this he was justified by the event, because before 1523 was out Adrian VI was dead and another Medici,
Clement VII, reigned disastrously in his stead.
Disappointed by the cold shoulder from Germany, Zwingli turned to his own Zurich, where the fruits of four years of persistent expositions of the New Testament text in the vernacular were becoming apparent.
Zurich was still to all outward appearance a Catholic city. The Christmas 1 'Suggestio deliberandi super propositione Hadriani pontificis Romani Neroberge facta.'
Z 1, 434-41.
2 Z 1, 440. 'Vir sine controversia pius et doctus.'
3 Z 1, 439. 'Obtinuit Roma non iam totius Germanie regnum, sed orbis Christiani monarchiam...'
ZWINGLI of 1522 was celebrated with the usual ritual; mass was said in all the churches, friars and secular priests moved in their customary processions, the Canons of the Great Minster functioned normally. In fact, however,
Zwingli had many adherents among clergy and influential laity alike. It was apparent that no remedy was to come from Constance or from Rome, that the rules about fasting were not to be relaxed, clergy were not to be allowed to marry, the monastic life continued to be esteemed as the best and the precepts of the Gospel were not to be enforced in such institutions. This was not good enough and the time was ripe for a show-down.
Without it there would be danger of civil commotion. The preacher in the church of the Augustinian friars across the river was preaching something very different, conservative, conventional, defensive and scholastic.
He had been wilfully interrupted1 by Leo Jud, stones had been thrown and disorder with difficulty averted. The advanced thinkers needed explicit public support, official encouragement and a clear mandate to continue. If the Bishop of Constance would not allow free exposition and discussion of the new way of approach, another method of expressing it must be found. This meant the panacea of the age, a public debate.
The issues were becoming clear. The rulers of Zurich were aware that they had among them a humanist, second only to Erasmus in Switzerland, a university graduate thoroughly versed in the outmoded scholastic philosophy of the age, a priest with much parochial experience, versed in politics, passionately patriotic. For at least six years he had been studying the Bible in its original Greek and Hebrew, applying to the text his own considerable linguistic and exegetical abilities. He, if any one, could refute publicly the charges that were being freely made that Zurich was the home of heretics, followers of the excommunicated Luther.
Indulgences, the celibacy of the clergy, the obligation to abstain from meat-eating at certain times, the validity of perpetual monastic vows, all these had recently been challenged in sermons and in writing. It was quite a formidable indictment, especially when added to it was a relatively new controversy, 'image-worship'.2 Representations of the Virgin and the saints were extremely common all over Europe. The poorest country church contained pictures painted on the walls or on canvas, stained glass with stories of the legends of saints, and statues of them in wood or stone, in great variety, sometimes of real artistic merit, sometimes crude suggestive representations. All these had multiplied in the fifteenth century. Such
' images' were constantly said to be ' the Bible of the poor', encouraging 1 Staehelin 1, 259; L. Weisz, Leo Jud, Ulrich Zwinglis Kampfgenosse 1482-1542 (Zurich, 1942),
39. An action which, when taken later by Anabaptists, was roundly condemned. C. Pestalozzi,
Leojudd (Elberfeld (i860), 17; Egli j , 136 (No. 373).
2 H. v. Campenhausen, Die Bilderfrage in der Reformation, ZKG 68 (1957), 96-128.
The first rift devotion and instructing the ignorant; but what these ignorant illiterate people made of them we cannot know, because they could hardly express their thoughts in speech, let alone in writing.
There was indeed a general conviction that the whole great company of the saints, depicted so strikingly as individuals, could, and did, plead before the Almighty on behalf of those on earth. In the hour of danger or anxiety, to call upon a saint might be to secure instant help or relief.
A man looking into his church, as he ought to do, on his way to work in the fields, would probably gaze upon a picture of a great giant St Christopher staggering under the weight of the little Christ whom he carried over the river. This was thought to act as a kind of insurance ticket, and for that day the man was safe from harm or accident. Popular thought, encouraged by anecdotes introduced into many a sermon, was permeated with expectation of the direct intervention in human affairs of the saints in heaven.
To distinguish between the concrete and the abstract was not always easy, especially for untrained minds familiar only with animate and inanimate objects. That the relics of the saints worked miracles was almost a matter of faith. It was almost equally easy to believe that the image, the representation, especially if it were of some antiquity, could do likewise.
To pray to the saint, in some sense to worship the saint, and so likewise his or her image, was an easy and natural transition. Every priest knew, or ought to have known, that worship was due to God alone (and possibly in less degree to the Virgin Mary), but that to all others, even St Peter himself, veneration, but not worship, was called for.l There were different words which could be paraded at the appropriate moment - latria and dulia, the one for God, the other for creatures.
In practice, however, the shrines of popular saints were crowded with those saying their prayers to them; Zwingli had seen a great deal of this when he was closely connected with the wonder-working shrine of the Virgin at Einsiedeln, and he preached, walked in procession and said his services every day in the Great Minister amidst a profusion of these representations.
'You shall not make a carved image for yourself, nor the likeness of anything in the heavens above, or on the earth below, or in the waters under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or worship them...' The word of God, re-emphasised in the New Testament, could hardly be clearer than that; the practice of many ordinary people was in contradiction to it, and official explanations might not be convincing. Much of the earlier
1 This was elaborated in the Anslegen und Griinde der Schlnssreden (Z n, 191) and more fully in Eine Antwort, Valentin Compar gegeben, Z iv, 84-128. 'HyperduhV was the special honour reserved for the Virgin Mary.
ZWINGLI satire of Erasmus (particularly in the Colloquies) which the young Zwingli had lapped up, had been directed against pilgrimages, relics and images.
By the end of 1523, but how long before it is impossible to be sure, study of the whole Bible and of the relationship of the new to the old law had convinced Zwingli that images and pictures of the holy men and women of the past were more than objects of common abuse. They were impious and so must be removed. They hindered the direct access of the individual soul to God; they were at best vain distractions, at worst they encouraged idolatry. Money offered at the shrine of an image would be much better given to the poor.
Elimination of images from the churches was a serious matter. The clergy were not likely to do this spontaneously, but neglect to take action meant that what were coming to be regarded as superstitious objects would remain. The temptation then would be for young enthusiasts to take matters into their own hands, and this some would do very willingly.
Destruction was easy and, in a measure, pleasurable. To make a bonfire of pictures and wooden superstitious objects, to smash glass and hew down stone monuments could be fun. Youth did not need much encouragement to vandalism; let the young wreckers loose and they would gleefully make a job of it if they knew there were no proceedings to follow.
Violence was very near the surface in sixteenth century society, where excitement was often lacking. A Christian government, indeed any government, could not tolerate disorderly conduct or damage to churches and their contents. If men had been mistakenly taught, if the divine word did condemn images, if iconoclasm was desirable, it should be carried out under supervision and by authority, not by indiscriminate smashing by youths who could all too easily become gangs of hooligans. If what the bishop ruled about fasting, indulgences, vows and clerical marriage was to be overruled by an appeal to a higher tribunal, that of the scriptures, so too must the matter of the images.
This was, in fact, soon to become one of the characteristic features of the Reformation in Switzerland. It could hardly be represented as an insignificant matter, and, added to the other points already in dispute, it would mark an open breach with Rome if hostile action were to be tolerated or encouraged by the civil authority. The mere presence or absence of the images might perhaps be regarded as a matter of taste or choice, although reformers from the days of St Bernard and the early Cistercians had complained of the danger of distracting attention in church from true personal worship, prayer and contemplation. It was also true that, provided the distinction between veneration and worship was clearly made and understood, the more obvious objections were met; where the true spirit of the
The first rift teaching of the church was operative there was no bowing down and worshipping.
Then, however, there could be little use for or need of physical representations. Many of these were crude, many unintelligible, many frankly undesirable. For unknown, dubious, or unworthy martyrs and confessors of long ago to have attributed to them miracles which far surpassed anything related of Christ and the apostles in the New Testament was both excessive and liable to rouse sceptical disbelief. Unless the memorials were removed, those who saw them might accept the most imaginative of legends and easily be distracted from Bible reading, prayer and worship.
Zwingli concluded that to pray to, or invoke, the saints was useless.
There was no biblical testimony in favour of this practice. It was not the custom of the primitive church and it was repugnant to reason, for God to be approached through a creature. With these thoughts abroad, the government of Zurich at the end of 1522 had much cause for anxiety. The opposition must be taken seriously. The bishop of the diocese, leading figures in the Great Minster and a majority of the delegates who attended
Diets of the Confederation seemed to regard them as Lutherans, heretics and outlaws. There were threats of violence to be considered as well.
Matters must be publicly brought to a head; Zwingli must state his opinions clearly in writing, and a decision must be reached about religious practices hitherto taken for granted, but definitely within the wide control of the government. The latter could not refuse to accept responsibility.
A particular case helped to bring matters to a head. It had long been accepted that jurisdiction over members of a state (Ort) lay with its government alone and external interference was not to be tolerated. Among those who were proposing to give practical attention to the new recommendations from the Great Minster pulpit was Hans Urban Wyss, who from 1520 had been minister of Fislisbach.1 He had all too faithfully echoed and paraphrased to his own congregation what he had heard and come to believe, and, in particular, had declared against intercessions to the Virgin
Mary. Fislisbach was just south of Baden, whither Zurich's authority did not extend exclusively. A Federal Diet met at Baden on 24-25 November
1522 and complaints about the new preaching were made to it.2 The minister was arrested, accused of heterodoxy and handed over to the Bishop of Constance, at whose orders he was strictly imprisoned in the 1 Wyss was a native of Eglisau and therefore a subject of Zurich and in August 1523 became an assistant preacher at Winterthur.
2 Not for the first time. The matter was raised again on 15 December, when the Diet resolved that preaching innovations - neuen lehre - should be prohibited. Zurich and Basle were asked to forbid the printing of'solicher niiwen buechlin'. EA, 4, ia, 247-50, 255, 348, 489.
ZWINGLI near-by Gottlieben Castle, where John Hus had been incarcerated before him. After over seven months of incarceration, torture and examination, he recanted and was allowed to return to his duties,1 but by then Zurich had taken a decisive step towards religious independence.
1 The case aroused remarkable interest all over northern Switzerland. Z I, 501 n. 9; Z VII, 623 n. 7; Z VIII, 34-7. Bullinger, Ref. 1, 80. The recantation was dictated by Fabri.