Archive for the ‘Bullinger’ Category
An Update
I’ve been working on this for a good while now and it’s almost ready to send off to the publisher. And I’m excited about it. I’ll have it to them in a month or so. Then I can return to the Commentary and finish off Samuel and Kings and it will all be over with. Yay! (And in the meanwhile I’ll work on my assigned portions of the critical edition of Melanchthon’s Opera Omnia and a Festschrift and a volume of essays on the Reformation and other sorts of projects).
Bullinger: Dispensing the Truth
The belly being full, either no prayers at all, or else fat and unwieldy prayers, are made. — Heinrich Bullinger
Today With Calvin
On 21 February 1538, Calvin wrote Bullinger
“In general, we are looked on here as preachers rather than pastors. We cannot have a Church that will stand unless the discipline of the apostles be restored. There is much alteration which we earnestly desire, but which can be effected only by our applying ourselves to it with faith, diligence, and perseverance. Oh, that a pure and sincere agreement might at length be established among us! Would there be any obstacle in the way of the meeting of a synod, at which everyone might propose what he believed to be useful to the Churches?”
Adversus omnia catabaptistarum prava dogmata Heinrychi Bullingeri
It’s here for your enjoyment. Emidio Campi says of it (in a brilliant article forthcoming)
In May 1535—in the charged atmosphere of the Anabaptist kingdom of Münster in Westphalia and its catastrophic end—he wrote, at the request of the synod, an evaluation concerning the treatment of heretics, decisively defending the death penalty for obstinate Anabaptists.[1] The evaluation had considerable impact. Pressure on dissidents increased significantly. The morals court and synod were steadily occupied with problems caused by the Anabaptists.
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[1] Text in Urs Leu, “A Memorandum of Bullinger and the Clergy regarding the Punishment of the Anabaptists (May 1535),” MQR 78 (2004), 109-132.
Warhaffte Bekanntnuß der Dieneren der Kirchen zu Zürich
Heinrich Bullinger’s little book in answer to Luther’s ongoing insults, Warhaffte Bekanntnuß der Dieneren der Kirchen zu Zürich: was sy Gottes wort mit der heiligen allgemeinen Christenlichen Kirchen gloubind und leerind … : Mit zugethaner kurtzer Bekanntniß D. Martin Luthers vom hl. Sacrament, of 1544, begins
As Bullinger continues he lambasts Luther’s absurd notions and particularly his unbending self-centeredness. It’s a glorious work showing that Bullinger too had a temper and had reached his breaking point thanks to Luther’s decades long derision.
Heinrich Bullinger on Prophecy and the Prophetic Office (1523–1538)
A new book by Daniël Timmerman titled Heinrich Bullinger on Prophecy and the Prophetic Office (1523–1538) is to be released this month by Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht.
It has often been noted that the Protestant Reformation of the early sixteenth century witnessed a revived interest in the scriptural notions of prophets and prophecy. Drawing from both late medieval apocalyptic expectations of the immanent end of the world and from a humanist revival of biblical studies, the prophet appeared to many as a suitable role model for the Protestant preacher. A prominent proponent of this prophetic model was the Swiss theologian and church leader Heinrich Bullinger (1504–1575). This study by Daniël Timmerman presents the first in-depth investigation of Bullinger’s concept of prophecy and his understanding of the prophetic office. It also engages with the history of the Zurich institute for the study of the Scriptures, which has become widely known as the »Prophezei«.
I’ve read it in manuscript. It’s brilliant. You’ll want to read it.
