RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Zwingli, Huldreich
(so far as this is reflected in his consciousness, in consequence of his own religious life) and in the real life in and with God, in which he has come to see that the essence of religion lies. He feels an interest in every doctrine in precisely the degree in which
it is the expression of such relations as
6. Rigid appear to be decisive for the life of Practicality faith that men actually experience.
and Exclu- Everything, on the contrary, which sion of | does not touch the immediate present, Speculation. or touches it only remotely, which does not have to do with the actual relation of God to man and of man to him, which belongs in the region of the merely transcendent, and, consequently, can not be the object of experience, he places, even in doctrine, far in the background. The being of God as such, God in his premundane self-existent being, does not disturb him; the trinitarian definitions of the church doctrine, with the ontological hypostatization of the Father, Son, and Spirit, he cites only in a formal way, and certainly betrays, while he does this, an undeniable tendency to Unitarianism (iii. 179, 1. 1, p. 208); the doctrine of creation, the angels, the miracles, the “ state of integrity,”’ the question as to the possibility of the Fall, and that as to the method in which the sinful tendency of our nature is transmitted, the intercession and the royal office of Christ, the beginning of the new life in conversion, the distinguishable elements of the life in the world to come, and the condition after the final judgment do not fix his attention. On the contrary, the decisive weight in the doctrine of God falls upon the active presence of God in his entire creation, upon the self-communication of God to man and mediately, through man, to the world, and, consequently, upon providence as the “present operation of God,” the absolute activity of God as the unity of his power, wisdom, and goodness; while in the doctrine of the provision of salvation and the realization of salvation this stress falls upon the impartation and the indwelling of the Spirit of God and the union with God produced thereby, and upon salvation conferred by faith as a present possession. Even the doctrine of the eternal decree of election (in antithesis to which nothing but the stubborn fact drives him to the affirmation of reprobation) is employed in the development of the concrete religious consciousness; it aims at the establishment of faith which is, to be sure, the product of the divine causality, although this faith does not in this world correspond to its ideal in any respect.
If we add to this that religion has for its central point not so much the atonement as liberation from evil, viz., redemption; that the significance of Christ is found less in his merit than in his example, to which we are bound; that the specific principle of redemption is found, not so much in Christ as in the freely ruling and guiding Holy Spirit; that faith appears to be, not so much the organ of receptivity, as itself a spontaneity, a God-filled motive force, and an “ effectual power and unwearing activity ” which exhibit their result in the fulfilment of the will of God; that the struggle for moral perfection, for a righteousness which is not merely imputed but real, and the active battle which this demands be-
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tween the flesh and spirit, controls the religious life, even in the development of doctrine, more, and disproportionately more, than the need 7. Centered of the forgiveness of sins and justificain Christian tion (which are already always assured Conscious- in God); that, side by side with the ness and gospel, the law also has its place as Experience revelation for the impartation of the reof Sancti- deeming grace of God to man; that fication. the deepest motive for repentance is recognized as consisting in the knowledge of the grace of God which the Gospel brings; and that, finally, the ethical standard of Christ is applied alike both to the individual person and to all the organizations which unite to form human society, we may venture to ask whether we may not apply to Zwingli, when we confine ourselves to the essential substance of his doctrine, what has elsewhere been maintained as universally true of the Reformed theology—that it is, in general, that presentation of evangelical truth which describes it from the standpoint of the Christian consciousness, and upon the high level and under the definite forms of the experience of sanctification (M. Schneckenburger, Vergleichende Darstellung des lutherischen und reformierten Lehrbegriffs, ed. E. Giider, p. xxxvi. sqq., Stuttgart, 1855).
BIBLIOGRAPHY: The definitive edition of Zwingli’s works has been appearing since 1904 under this title: Huldreich Zwinglis sémtliche Werke unter Mitwirkung des Zwingli- Vereins in Ziirich. Volume i. goes down to the First Zurich Disputation, 1523, and was published in Berlin by C. A. Schwetschke und Sohn. Volume ii. begins with Zwingli’s exposition and defense of the forty-nine articles he had drawn up for the first Zurich disputation, which was originally published July 14, 1523, and goes down to Zwingli’s ‘‘ Advice respecting the Mass and the use of Pictures in the Churches,’”’ and was published in 1908 in Leipsic by Verlag von M. Heinsius Nachfolger. The editors of both volumes were Emil Egli and Georg Finsler. Egli died Dec. 31, 1908. Walther Kéhler, his successor in Zurich University, was called in to take his place upon the edition. It was decided to begin the publication of the Zwingli correspondence as volume vii., so it appeared with this title-page: Huldreich Zwinglis simtliche Werke unter Mitwirkung des Zwingli-Vereins in Ziirich herausgegeben von Dr. Emil Eglit, Professor an der Universitdit in Ziirich, D. Dr. Georg Finsler, Religionslehrer am Gymnasium in Basel, und D. Dr. Walther Kéhler, Professor an der Universitét in Ziirich, Band vii., Leipsic, Verlag von M. Heinsius Nachfolger, 1911. Volume iii. was begun in 1911, and so was volume viii., the two are to run in parts alternately. But as it will be several years before this edition is finished the students of Zwingli will frequently have to fall back upon the old edition of Schuler and Schulthess (8 vols., with small supplement, Zurich, bey Friedrich Schulthess, 1828-61). In this edition the Latin works are separated from the German and the arrangement is frequently inconvenient, whereas in the definitive edition there is no such separation and the contents are in chronological order. Great attention has been paid in the new edition to editorial details in the way of special historical and bibliographical introductions, minute study of the text, especially the German text which is furnished with a glossary. Many new letters appear in the correspondence as the result of the labors of Egli, who ransacked every place likely to yield them. Both the Latin and the German treatises are annotated in a manner very superior to thatin the Schuler and Schulthess edition.
Georg Finsler, Zwingli-Bibliographie. Verzeichniss der gedruckten Schriften von und tuber Ulrich Zwingli, Zurich, Orell Fussli, 1897, gives an exhaustive list of Zwingli literature down to date, continued in Zwingliana, 1902, No. 1—in Zwingliana attention is paid to this literature. The biographies based on the sources and the resultants
Zwingli, Huldreich
of years of special studies and therefore not soon to be superseded are these: (1) Raget Christoffel: Huldreich Zwingli. Leben und ausgewdhite Schriften, Elberfeld, 1857, Eng. transl. by John Cochran, Zwingli; or, the Rise of the Reformation in Switzerland, Edinburgh, 1858 (an excellent translation; the selections given by Christoffel of Zwingli’s writings are, however, entirely omitted); (2) Johann Caspar Moerikofer, Ulrich Zwingli nach den urkundlichen Quellen, 2 parts, Leipsic, 1869; (3) Rudolf Staehelin, Huldreich Zwingli. Sein Leben und Wirken, nach den Quellen dargestelit, 2 vols., Basel, 1897 (generally accepted as the best). In English there are two works of high grade: (1) Samuel Macauley Jackson, Huldreich Zwingli, the Reformer of German Switzerland, New York, 1901 (with bibliographical introduction; 2d ed., revised 1903; like Staehelin Jackson draws directly from the correspondence as his chief source. He spent four years on the book and has enriched it with special contributions from John Martin Vincent on Switzerland before the Reformation and from Frank Hugh Foster on Zwingli’s theology). (2) Samuel Simpson, Life of Ulrich Zwingli, the Swiss Patriot and Reformer, New York, 1902 (more popular than Jackson’s book but scholarly and independent).
For the study of Zwingli’s theology at first hand there is nothing approaching M. Huldreich Zwingli’s sdimmtliche Schriften im Auszuge, 2 vols., Zurich, 1819. It is the work of Salomon Voegelin, and presents Zwingli’s teachings on all subjeets systematically arranged under appropriate heads, by quoting his exact language. The only edition accessible to Voegelin was that of 1581.