Thursday, April 4, 2013

DID ZWINGLI REALLY COMMEND LUTHER?!



At about the time of the coronation of Charles V which took place on 22 October 1520 there appeared an anonymous pamphlet entitled “Advice of one who 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.” This pamphlet has an appendix: “A defence of Martin Luther by Christ our Lord addressed to the city of Rome.”

Samuel Macauley Jackson writes of this: “Although at first sight it seems highly improbably that Zwingli had anything to do with the pamphlet, as it is not at all in hi style, yet all doubt vanishes before the fact that the draft of it in Zwingli’s handwriting is to be seen today in the Zurich cantonal archives. It treats Luther in a kindly, condescending way, and advises that an impartial commission go through his books and examine him orally, and then pass final judgment on him” (Huldreich Zwingli: The Reformer of German Switzerland 1484-1531, p155).