The Calvinist International
In his De Regno Christi (1550), Martin Bucer propagates a number of laws for the establishment of a Christian commonwealth. One is that there ought to be education for all young people. This was, in part, to prevent idleness, which was an evident concern to Bucer. But it was also the case that Bucer wanted to improve […]
In his De Regno Christi (1550), Martin Bucer advises King Edward VI of England to reestablish the Kingdom of Christ not just through edicts and decrees, but through persuasion. This is a good demonstration of magisterial reformers’ understanding of belief and faith, and the way that one comes to these. Outward conformity is not enough. One must […]
Martin Bucer admits that it is true, in some sense, that the church came before the scriptures. It is true that the church was established before the canon of the New Testament was closed. This does not mean, he insists, that the church had (or continues to have) the authority to make or change God’s word. […]
Amy Nelson Burnett points out that Zwinglians and Lutherans differed on the practice of offering private confession and absolution. Lutherans believed the practice to be a healthy replacement for mandatory auricular confession, while the Zwinglians considered it meaningless for one Christian to pronounce forgiveness over another. Martin Bucer initially supported the Zwinglians on this issue […]
In the 1520s and 30s Protestants were embroiled in polemics against Roman Catholic theologians. One of the many debated issues regards the nature of faith and the controversial Protestant claim that God justifies sinners by faith alone. As Martin Bucer points out in 1532 in his commentary on the Psalms (Sacrorum Psalmorum libri quinque) Catholic […]
We continue on with our series of Reformed exposition of Psalm 148:11, “Kings of the earth, and all people; princes, and all judges of the earth,” with Martin Bucer’s comments from his Sacrorum Psalmorum libri quinque Again, this may well be a “you heard it here first” kind of text. Bucer gives a slightly different Latin […]
Fred Sanders posted a short introduction to Martin Bucer here. Reading it reminded me that I once wrote a not-so short introduction to Martin Bucer, and you can read that over here. Over the past 6 years, my own views have developed (or should I say “organically matured”?) somewhat, and so my take on Bucer […]
Our friend and McGill student Eric Parker has an excellent post on the positive use of Psuedo-Dionysius by the Reformer Martin Bucer. Mr. Parker states: Bucer, following Ficino’s commentary, used Dionysius’s writings for the sake of the Reformation. The clearest example of this is in his Commentary on Romans where he discovers in Dionysius what […]
Despite the strong re-affirmation of sacramental grace in Reformed theology over the last few decades, there is a curious feature in the history of Reformed theology when it comes to the use of the expression “to confer grace.” Among the 16th- and 17th-century Reformed theologians, the sacraments are overwhelmingly affirmed as genuine instruments of the […]