Huldrych Zwingli
“The shepherd”
Intro: What do we celebrate on October 31st?
Reformation Sunday 2008
What happened Oct. 31st 1517
Why celebrate this day? it was philosopher and poet, Georges Santayana, who said ” those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it.”.
The State of the Roman Catholic Church
Dark Ages – Middle ages; “The scandalous lives of the popes whose names fill the last paragraph of the history of the Middle Ages would have excluded them from decent modern circles and exposed them to sentence as criminals. They were perjurers, adulterers. Avarice, self-indulgence ruled their life. They had no mercy. The charges of murder and vicious disease were laid to their door. They were willing to set the states of Italy one over against the other and to allow them to lacerate each other to extend their own territory or to secure power and titles for their own children and nephews. Luther was not far out of the way when, in his Appeal to the German Nobility, he declared “Roman avarice is the greatest of robbers that ever walked the earth. All goes into the Roman sack, which has no bottom, and all in the name of God.” In all history, it would be difficult to discover a more glaring inconsistency between profession and practice than is furnished by the careers of the last popes of the Middle Ages.”
—History of the Christian Church, The (Schaff)

Pope Leo X 1513-1521
A most Catholic historian, Janssen (III. 77), says: “The court of Leo X., with its extravagant expenditure in card-playing, theatres and all manner of worldly amusements, was still more flagrantly opposed to the position of chief overseer of the Church than the courts of the German ecclesiastical princes, notably Albrecht of Mainz. The iniquity of Rome exceeded that of the ecclesiastical princes of Germany.” And was not the chief idea, which some of the aspirants after the highest office in Christendom had in mind, well embodied in the words with which Leo followed his election, “Let us enjoy the papacy”? If the lives of these latter popes were unworthy, their treatment of the spiritual prerogatives was sacrilegious. Rome encouraged the Crusades but sent no Crusaders. In Rome everything was for sale. The forgiveness of sins itself was offered for money.—History of the Christian Church, The (Schaff)
The state of the Church in Switzerland;
OVER the Churches of Switzerland, as over those of the rest of Europe, the Pope had established a tyranny. He built this usurpation on such make-believes as the “holy chair,” the “Vicar of Jesus Christ,” and the “infallibility” thence deduced. He regulated all things according to his pleasure. He forbade the people to read the Scriptures. He every day made new ordinances, to the destruction of the laws of God; and all priests, bishops not excepted, he bound to obey him by an oath of peculiar stringency. (W.A. Wiley)
The Church was as genial and corrupt in Switzerland as in Italy (Rome). She gave Patronage and considerable freedom to the humanists who gathered around Froban and Erasmus at Basel. It was part of the moral tolerance of the age that most Swiss priests enjoyed the services of concubines. One Swiss Bishop charged His clergy four guilders for every child born to them, and in one year 1,522 guilders from this source. He complained that many priests gambled, frequented taverns, got drunk – apparently without paying an Episcopal fee. (Will Durant)
The State of the Church in Zurich;
1506 a young 22 year old Priest paid 100 guilders for an appointment to a pastorate in Glarus. He zealously performed his duties their and continued his studies. He was a humanist, in the classical sense. After the school of Erasmus. Therefore, he taught himself Greek to read the New Testament in the original. He read Homer, Pindar, Democritus, Plutarch, Cicero, Caesar, Livy, Seneca, Pliny the younger, Tacitus and wrote commentary on the skeptical humorist Lucian. He considered Erasmus to be “the greatest philosopher and theologian” corresponding and visiting with him. As you can see heavy humanist influence. Which was true, particularly in the case of Erasmus, with the three great reformers. There was a passion for original source that was the true spawning of the reformation.
This young priest did not let his sacerdotal vows exclude him from the pleasures of the flesh. He had affairs with some generous women and continued to indulge himself until his marriage (1514). His congregation didn’t seem to mind, and the pope paid him an annual pension for his support against pro-French party in Glarus. There he was chaplain of the Swiss mercenaries doing his best to keep them faithful to the papal cause. After the loss of many men in battle, he began to strongly oppose the use of Swiss men for papal cause. (Durant)

Who was this young man? Huldreich Zwingli

The Need for reformation
POST TENEBRAS LUX: AFTER DARKNESS LIGHT
This period of the reformation some have said was the greatest outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon Christ’s church since Pentecost. I would have to agree.
Reformation Under Luther in Germany Oct. 31st 1517 95 thesis
About the same time a tremendous shift began to take place in Zwingli’s life. His experience certainly more gradual than Luther’s. and the Reformation under Zwingli had distinct emphasis. These two did not know of each other or correspond until reformation was underway in both areas Germany and Switzerland.
The Roaring 20’s because of the light of the word of God.
1517 Zwingli called for a thoroughly Biblical theology – a call to simple Christianity taught in the New Testament

What would that mean for his teaching and preaching and relationship to Rome.
1. No biblical warrant for the pope
2. He attacked the abuses in the sale of indulgences
3. He persuaded the Benedictine monks in Zurich to remove, from their lucrative shrine of the Virgin, an inscription that promised pilgrims “full remission of sins in guilt and punishment alike”
1519 His reforming influence grew in Zurich and he was called to the position of “People’s Priest” at the Great Minster in Zurich.
“The day after He arrived at Minster Zwingli announced that he would begin a new course of sermons. A continual course of sermons on the Gospel according to Matthew, basing his sermons directly on the text.” (McGrath)
This began in Zurich a consistent practice of expository preaching. This was totally out of the ordinary since the common practice of the priests was to deliver homilies and provided liturgy.
1522 The clarity and certainty of the word of God
“For Zwingli, scripture was a living and liberating text through which God spoke to His people and enabled them to break free from bondage to false ideas and practices. In particular he held that Christ’s sermon on the mount set out a vision for the moral life that was binding on all Christians” (McGrath)
He brought both Old Testament Principles and New Testament principles to bare on the morality of the believer.
Luther vs. Zwingli Lords supper
Views on Baptism infant baptism
Radical reformers: internal challenge Felix Manz Rebaptizer Anabaptist
1531 External Challenge; 5 Catholic cantons in Switzerland declared war on Zurich. No other Protestant Canton helped. They faced their opponent alone. Zwingli the chaplain of the Zurich army served in the battle of Kappel. The result was an ambush against the Zurich army and many were left dead on the battle field including Huldreich Zwingli. His will to Fight – he was a real man
The Church did not fair well in Zurich immediately after Zwingli’s death. However his successor Heinrich Bullinger strengthened it greatly.