Martin Bucer

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(Also called BUTZER.)

One of the leaders in the South GermanReformation movement, b. 11 November, 1491, at Schlettstadt, Alsace; d. 28 February, 1551, atCambridge,England. He received his earlyeducation at the Latin School of his native place, where at the age of fifteen (1506) he also entered theOrder of St. Dominic. Later he was sent to theUniversity of Heidelberg to prosecute his studies, and matriculated, 31 January, 1517. He became an ardent admirer ofErasmus, and soon an enthusiastic disciple ofLuther. He heard the Saxonmonk at a public disputation, held atHeidelberg in 1518, on the occasion of a meeting of the Augustinian order, became personally acquainted with him, and was immediately won over to hisideas. Having openly adopted the newdoctrine he withdrew from theDominican order, in 1521, became courtchaplain of Frederick the Elector Palatine, and laboured assecular priest at Landstuhl, in the Palatinate (1522), and as a member of the household of Count Sickengen and at Weissenburg, Lower Alsace (1522-23). During his incumbency at Landstuhl he married Elizabeth Silbereisen, a formernun. When, in 1523, his position became untenable at Weissenburg, he proceeded to Strasburg. Here his activity was soon exercised over a large field; he became the chief reformer of the city and was connected with many important religio-political events of the period. Hisdoctrinal views on points controverted betweenLuther andZwingli at first harmonized completely with theideas of theSwiss Reformer. Subsequently he sought to mediate betweenLutherans andZwinglians. The highly questionable methods to which he resorted in the interest of peace drew upon him the denunciation of both parties. In spite of the efforts of Bucer, the Conference of Marburg (1529), at which the divergent views ofLuther andZwingli, especially thedoctrine regarding the Eucharist, were discussed, failed to bring about a reconciliation. At the Diet of Augsburg, in the following year, he drew up with Capito the "Confessio Tetrapolitana", or Confession of the Four Cities (Strasburg,Constance, Memmingen, and Lindau). Later on, moved by political considerations, he abandoned this for the Augsburg Confession. In 1536, he brought about the more nominal than real "Concordia ofWittenberg" among GermanProtestants. He gave his own, and obtainedLuther's andMelanchthon'sapprobation for the bigamy of the Landgrave Philip ofHesse, attended in 1540 the religious conference betweenCatholics andProtestants at Hagenau, Lower Alsace, and in 1541 the Diet ofRatisbon. The combined attempt of Bucer andMelanchthon to introduce theReformation into theArchdiocese of Cologne ended in failure (1542). Political troubles and the resistance of Bucer to the agreement arrived at byCatholics andProtestants in 1548, and known as the "Augsburg Interim", made his stay in Strasburg impossible. At the invitation of Archbishop Cranmer, he proceeded toEngland in 1549. After a short stay inLondon, during which he was received by King Edward VI (1547-53), he was called to Cambridge as Regius Professor of Divinity. His opinion was frequently asked by Cranmer on church matters, notably on the controversy regardingecclesiastical vestments. But his sojourn was to be of short duration, as he died in February, 1551. Under the reign ofQueen Mary (1553-58) his remains were exhumed and burned, and histomb was demolished (1556), but was reconstructed in 1560 by Queen Elizabeth (1558-1603).

Bucer was, afterLuther andMelanchthon, the most influential of GermanReformers. For a clear statement ofdoctrine he was ever ready to substitute vague formulas in the interest of unity, which even his able efforts could not establish among theReformers. He forms a connecting link between the German and theEnglishReformation. Of the thirteen children he had by his first marriage, only one, a weak-minded son, survived. Wibrandis Rosenblatt, the successive wife of severalReformers (Cellarius,Œcolampadius, Capito, and Bucer), whom he married after his first wife died from the plague in 1541, bore him three children, of whom a daughter survived. Only one of the ten folio volumes in which his works were to appear was published (Basle, 1577). It is known as "Tomus Anglicanus" because its contents were mostly written inEngland.

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