CHAPTER III.
THE REFORMATION IN ZURICH. 1519-1526.
§ 10. Zwiiigli called to Zurich.
The fame of Zwingli as a preacher and patriot secured him a call to the position of chief pastor of the Great Minster (Grossmiinster), the principal church in Zurich, which was to become the Wittenberg of Switzerland. Many of the Zurichers had heard him preach on their pilgrimages to Einsiedeln. His enemies objected to his love of music and pleasure, and charged him with impurity, adding slander to truth. His friend Myconius, the teacher of the school connected with the church, exerted all his influence in his favor. He was elected by seventeen votes out of twenty-four, Dec. 10, 1518.
He arrived in Zurich on the 27th of the month, and received a hearty welcome. He promised to fulfil his duties faithfully, and to begin with the continuous exposition of the Gospel of Matthew, so as to bring the whole life of Christ before the mind of the people. This was a departure from the custom of following the prescribed Gospel and Epistle lessons, but justified by the example of the ancient Fathers, as Chrysostom and Augustin, who preached on whole books. The Reformed Churches reasserted the freedom of selecting texts ; while Luther retained the Catholic system of pericopes.
Zurich, the most flourishing city in German Switzerland,
beautifully situated in an amphitheatre of fertile hills, on
the lake of the same name and the banks of the Limmat,
dates its existence from the middle of the ninth century,
§ 10. ZWINGLI CALLED TO ZURICH.
when King Louis the German founded there the abbey of Frauenmiinster (853). The spot was known in old Roman times as a custom station QTuricum'). It became a free imperial city of considerable commerce between Germany and Italy, and was often visited by kings and emperors. The Great Minster was built in the twelfth century, and passed into the Reformed communion, like the minsters of Basle, Berne, and Lausanne, which are the finest churches in Switzerland.
In the year 1315 Zurich ^joined the Swiss confederacy by an eternal covenant with Lucerne, Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden. This led to a conflict with Austria, which ended favorably for the confederacy.! ^
In the beginning of the sixteenth century Zurich numbered seven thousand inhabitants. It was the centre of the international relations of Switzerland, and the residence of the embassadors of foreign powers which rivalled with each other in securing the support of Swiss soldiers. This fact brought wealth and luxury, and fostered party spirit and the
1 On the early history of Zurich, see Bluntschli, Geschichte der Eepuhlik Zurich, 2cl ed. 1856; G. v. Wyss, Zurich am Ansgange des ISten Jahrh., 1876; Dierauer, Geschichte der Schweiz. Eidgenossenschaft, vol. I. (1887), 171-217.
The Gheat Minster in Zurich in the Year 1519. (After the copperplate of Hegi.)
40 THE SWISS REFORMATION.
lust of gain and power among the citizens. BuUinger says, "Before the preaching of the gospel [the Reformation], Zurich was in Switzerland what Corinth was in Greece." ^
§ 11. Zivinfjlis Public Labors and Private Studies.
Zwingli began his duties in Zurich on his thirty-sixth birthday (Jan. 1, 1519) by a sermon on the genealogy of Christ, and announced that on the next day (which was a Sunday) he would begin a series of expository discourses on the first Gospel. From Matthew he proceeded to the Acts, the Pauline and Catholic Epistles ; so that in four years he completed the homiletical exposition of the whole New Testament except the Apocalypse (which he did not regard as an apostolic book). In the services during the week he preached on the Psalms. He prepared himself carefully from the original text. He probably used for his first course Chrysostom's famous Homilies on Matthew. With the Greek he was already familiar since his sojourn in Glarus. The Hebrew he learned from a pupil of Reuchlin who had come to Zurich. His copy of Reuchlin's Rudimenta Hebraica is marked with many notes from his hand.^
His sermons, as far as published, are characterized, as Hagenbach says, "by spiritual sobriety and manly solidity." They are plain, practical, and impressive, and more ethical than doctrinal.
He made it his chief object " to preach Christ from the fountain," and "to insert the pure Christ into the hearts."^ He would preach nothing but what he could prove from the Scriptures, as the only rule of Christian faith and practice.
1 Morikofer (I. 430 sqq.) gives a disgusting example of the rudeness and licentiousness of the Zurichers of that time.
2 He wrote to Myconius in 1522: " Statui proximis diebus in manus resumere liteias Hebraicas ; nam futuro Decembri . . . Psalmos prcelegam." Opera, VII. 145.
8 Christum ex fontibus pradicare, piirum Christum animis inserere. Corap. his letter to Myconius (1520), Opera, VII. 142 sqq.