‘The True Church’ in Reformation Theology

P. D. L. Avis

doi:10.1017/S0036930600026168

‘The True Church’ in Reformation Theology

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 February 2009

P. D. L. Avis

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P. D. L. Avis: Affiliation:
2 North Road South Molton Devon EX36 3AZ

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Two questions dominate much of Reformation theology: ‘How can I find a gracious God?’ and ‘Where can I find the true church?’ For Luther, the answer to both questions was given very simply in the gospel of justification. In speaking of a gracious God the gospel brought the church into being. The gospel alone, when believed, constituted the church. Other Reformers attempted to develop a more comprehensive and coherent doctrine of the marks of a true church. In this article I attempt to trace the evolution of the doctrine of the notae ecclesiae to the point where it had become so unwieldly that Hooker and Field abandoned it, and, replacing an intensive ecclesiology by an extensive one, set reformed ecclesiology on a new footing.

Type: Research Article
Information: Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 30 , Issue 4 , August 1977 , pp. 319 - 345

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0036930600026168 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1977

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^{page 319 note 1} Full bibliographies on Reformation ecclesiology are to be found in Léonard, E. G., A History of Protestantism: I i. The Reformation, Eng. Trans. Edinburgh and London 1965Google Scholar. General words dealing with the notae ecclesiae: Gassmann, Benno, Ecclesia Reformata, die Kirche in den reformierten Bekenntnisschriften, Freiburg 1968Google Scholar; Strohl, Henri, La Pensée de la Réforme, Neuchâtel 1951Google Scholar; Torrance, T. F., Kingdom and Church, Edinburgh 1956Google Scholar.

^{page 319 note 2} Rupp, E. G., The Righteousness of God, London 1953, 310.Google Scholar

^{page 320 note 1} Elert, Werner, The Structure of Lutheranism, Eng. Trans. St Louis 1962, i. pp. 255, 258.Google Scholar

^{page 321 note 1} But cf. Pelikan, J., Obedient Rebels: Catholic Substance and Protestant Principle in Luther's Reformation, London 1964, p. 14.Google Scholar

^{page 322 note 1} Althaus, P., The Theology of Martin Luther, Eng. Trans. Philadelphia 1966, p. 290.Google Scholar

^{page 322 note 2} Additional works on Luther's ecclesiology: Rupp, , ‘Luther and the Doctrine of the Church’, Scottish Journal of Theology, ix (1956)Google Scholar; Pelikan, , Spirit Versus Structure: Luther and the Institutions of the Church, London 1968Google Scholar; Schlink, E., The Theology of the Lutheran Confessions, Eng. Trans. Philadelphia 1961Google Scholar; Headley, J., Luther's View of Church History, Yale 1963Google Scholar.

^{page 322 note 3} Luther's Works, St Louis and Philadelphia 1955– (hereinafter cited as LW), xli, pp. 148–164.Google Scholar

^{page 323 note 1} ibid., pp. 194ff.

^{page 323 note 2} ibid., pp. 198f, 205.

^{page 323 note 3} Strohl, p. 178.

^{page 323 note 4} ibid., p. 174.

^{page 323 note 5} Watson, , Let God be God, London 1947, p. 170.Google Scholar

^{page 323 note 6} WA, ii, p. 208 (1519).

^{page 324 note 1} LW, xxxix, p. 305.

^{page 324 note 2} WA, vii, pp. 721f (Ubi vero Euangelium non esse videris (sicut in Synagoga Papistarum et Thomistarum videmus), ibi non dubites Ecclesiam non esse … Euangelium enim prae pane et Baptismo unicum, certissimum et nobilissimum Ecclesiae symbolum est … tota vita et substantia Ecclesiae est in verbo dei… Non de Euangelio scripto sed vocali loquor.)

^{page 324 note 3} See Pelikan, , Spirit Versus Structure, pp. 32ff.Google Scholar

^{page 325 note 1} LW, xl, pp. 9, 11.

^{page 325 note 2} ibid., p. 21.

^{page 325 note 3} ibid., p. 37. Cf. WA, lvi, p. 165; iv, p. 189; vi, pp. 560f; viii, p. 419.

^{page 325 note 4} WA, xliii, p. 596, cited Rupp, , The Righteousness of God, p. 321.Google Scholar

^{page 326 note 1} Léonard, p. 88.

^{page 326 note 2} Althaus, p. 292.

^{page 326 note 3} Schaff, , The Creeds of the Evangelical Protestant Churches, London 1877, pp. 11f.Google Scholar

^{page 326 note 4} Schlink, E., ‘The Marks of the Church According to the Augsburg Confession’, The Coming Christ and the Coming Church, Edinburgh and London 1967, p. 119.Google Scholar

^{page 327 note 1} CR, xxiii, p. 37.

^{page 327 note 2} Stupperich, R., Melanchthon, London 1966, p. 146Google Scholar. See CR V, 578–643, 3114 f; see also Meyer, Carl S., ‘Melanchthon, Theologian of Ecumenism’, J. E. H. xvii (1966)Google Scholar: Ministry, discipline and schools appear as marks in 1545 (202).

^{page 327 note 3} Strohl, p. 205.

^{page 327 note 4} On Calvin's ecclesiology: Ganoczy, Alexandre, Ecclesia Ministrans: dienende Kirche und kirchlicher Dienst bei Calvin, Freiburg, Basel, Wien, 1968Google Scholar; idem, Le Jeune Calvin: Genèse et Evolution de sa Vocation Réformatrice, Wiesbaden 1966Google Scholar; Milner, B. C., Calvin's Doctrine of the Church, Leiden 1970Google Scholar; Clavier, Henri, Études sur le Calvinisme, Paris 1936Google Scholar; Wendel, F., Calvin, the Origins and Development of his Religious Thought, Eng. Trans. (Fontana) 1965Google Scholar; Doumergue, E., Jean Calvin: Les hommes et less choses de son temps, v, Lausanne 1917Google Scholar; Niesel, W., The Theology of Calvin, Eng. Trans. Philadelphia and London 1956.Google Scholar

^{page 328 note 1} Tracts and Treatises, trans. Beveridge, , ed. Torrance, T. F., Grand Rapids 1958, i, pp. 38f.Google Scholar

^{page 328 note 2} Inst. IV.i.9ff.

^{page 328 note 3} Ganoczy, , Ecclesia Ministrans, pp. 146f.Google Scholar

^{page 328 note 4} Wendel, pp. 297, 300ff; cf. Niesel, p. 195.

^{page 328 note 5} op. cit., pp. 213f.

^{page 329 note 1} Cochrane, , ed., Reformed Confessions of the Sixteenth Century, London 1966, pp. 124f.Google Scholar

^{page 329 note 2} Wallace, R. S., Calvin's Doctrine of the Christian Life, Edinburgh and London 1959, p. 207Google Scholar; Ganoczy, , Le Jeune Calvin, pp. 334f.Google Scholar

^{page 329 note 3} Strohl, pp. 211ff.

^{page 329 note 4} Calvin's Commentaries, eds, D. W., and Torrance, T. F., Edinburgh 1959–, on Timothy etc, p. 232.Google Scholar

^{page 330 note 1} Doumergue, p. 30.

^{page 330 note 2} ibid., p. 44.

^{page 330 note 3} op. cit., pp. 102f.

^{page 331 note 1} ibid., p. 35.

^{page 331 note 2} op. cit., iii, p. 266.

^{page 332 note 1} Clavier, p. 46.

^{page 332 note 2} LW, xli, p. 211 (WA, li, p. 507: Es ist ein hoch, tieff, verborgen ding die Kirche, das sie niemand kennen noch sehen mag. Sondern allein an der Tauffe, Sacrament und Wort fassen und gleuben mus.).

^{page 332 note 3} Küng, , The Church, Eng. Trans. London 1967, pp. 265, 267.Google Scholar

^{page 333 note 1} LW, xli, pp. 2O7ff.

^{page 333 note 2} Headley, pp. 198ff.

^{page 333 note 3} LW, xxvi, pp. 25f.

^{page 334 note 1} Comm. on Galatians etc, p. 10.

^{page 334 note 2} Comm. on I Corinthians, pp. 17f.

^{page 334 note 3} Léonard, p. 331.

^{page 335 note 1} Ganoczy, , Le Jeune Calvin, p. 325.Google Scholar

^{page 335 note 2} Inst. IV, ii, 12 (Beveridge's trans.); cf. the French Confession of 1559: Rome occupies an anomalous position ‘parce qu'il reste encore quelque petite trace de 1'Eglise en la papauté,’ so that Roman baptism is valid. (Schaff, p. 376) This attitude of making reasonable concessions from a heavily fortified position survives into later Reformed ecclesiology. Wollebius argues (1626) that a church is not to be forsaken ‘provided there is no retreat from the pivot of salvation, namely the two tables of the law (sic) and faith in Christ.’ And Polanus, unlike other Reformed dogmaticians, recognised that Rome was a true church, while denying it to be a. pure one. (Heppe, , Reformed Dogmatics, Eng. Trans. London 1950, pp. 671, 668.)Google Scholar

^{page 335 note 3} Zwingli and Bullinger (Library of Christian Classics, xxiv) London 1953, pp. 308f.Google Scholar

^{page 335 note 4} ibid., p. 301. In one place he adds confession of faith, ibid., p. 299.

^{page 336 note 1} Zwingli and Bullinger (Library of Christian Classics, xxiv) London 1953, P. 303.Google Scholar

^{page 336 note 2} ibid., p. 304.

^{page 336 note 3} Wright, D., ed., Commonplaces of Martin Bucer, Appleford 1972, p. 31.Google Scholar

^{page 336 note 4} Strohl, pp. 194, 199.

^{page 337 note 1} Bucer, op. cit., pp. 2O5f. (1550–1).

^{page 337 note 2} Cited Léonard, pp. 18gf. (my italics).

^{page 337 note 3} McLelland, J. C., The Visible Words of God: a Study in the Theology of Peter Martyr, Edinburgh and London 1957, pp. 123ff.Google Scholar

^{page 337 note 4} Works, ed. Laing, , Edinburgh 1846, iv. pp. 266f.Google Scholar

^{page 337 note 5} ibid., ii. p. 110.

^{page 337 note 6} Schaff, pp. 462f.

^{page 338 note 1} Frere, and Douglas, , eds, Puritan Manifestos, 1954 edn, p. 9.Google Scholar

^{page 338 note 2} Carlson, , ed., The Writings of Henry Barrow 1587–1590, London 1962, pp. 294, 317.Google Scholar

^{page 338 note 3} Powicke, F. J., Henry Barrow and the Exiled Church of Amsterdam, London 1900, p. 104.Google Scholar

^{page 338 note 4} Carlson, , ed, The Writings of John Greenwood and Henry Barrow 1591–1593, London 1970, p. 121.Google Scholar

^{page 338 note 5} The Writings of Henry Barrow, p. 318.

^{page 339 note 1} Carlson, , ed., The Writings of John Greenwood 1587–1590 etc., London 1969, p. 98.Google Scholar

^{page 339 note 2} The Writings of Henry Barrow, p. 318.

^{page 339 note 3} On the Anglican ecclesiology of this period see Woodhouse, H. F., The Doctrine of the Church in Anglican Theology 1547–1603, London 1954Google Scholar. On the church visible and invisible, see pp. 45ff. He points out that Hooker uses the term ‘mystical’ as preferable to ‘invisible’ but as meaning substantially the same, p. 49.

^{page 340 note 1} Parker Society, Cambridge 1840- (cited as PS), ii Cran. p. 13.

^{page 340 note 2} PS, ii Hooper, p. 87, cf. p. 43. Cf. i Brad. p. 504; ii Brad. p. 202; ii Fulke, pp. 33f i Whit. p. 185.

^{page 340 note 3} PS, Ridley, p. 123.

^{page 340 note 4} PS, Lits. of Ed. VI p. 513(561).

^{page 340 note 5} PS, Nowell, pp. 174f(56).

^{page 340 note 6} PS, i Brad. p. 551.

^{page 341 note 1} PS, iii Jewel, pp. 152f; cf. ii Cran. p. 25.

^{page 341 note 2} PS. iii Tyn. pp. 44f; cf. ii Cov. pp. 412f.

^{page 341 note 3} ‘Not Papists, but our fathers’, Whitgift, cited in Hooker, Works, ed. Keble, Oxford 1845, i. p. 64.

^{page 341 note 4} ibid., iii. p. 501.

^{page 341 note 5} ibid., i. p. 61n.

^{page 342 note 1} ibid., iii. p. 505.

^{page 342 note 2} ibid., p. 489.

^{page 342 note 3} ibid., p. 499.

^{page 342 note 4} Sisson, C. J., The Judicious Marriage of Mr Hooker, Cambridge 1940, p. 8.Google Scholar

^{page 342 note 5} op. cit., iii. p. 543.

^{page 342 note 6} ibid., i. p. 339.

^{page 343 note 1} ibid., p. 342.

^{page 343 note 2} ibid.

^{page 343 note 3} ibid., p. 347.

^{page 344 note 1} Field, , Of the Church, Edinburgh 1847, i. pp. 25f.Google Scholar

^{page 344 note 2} ibid., pp. 65, 68.

^{page 344 note 3} ibid., pp. 35f.

^{page 344 note 4} ibid., iv. p. 527.

^{page 345 note 1} ibid., i. pp. 174, 359f.

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