Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on contributors
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 Martin Bucer and the Old Church
- 2 The relation between church and civil community in Bucer's reforming work
- 3 Bucer's influence on Calvin: church and community
- 4 The church in Bucer's commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians
- 5 Church, communion and community in Bucer's commentary on the Gospel of John
- 6 Eucharistic communion: impulses and directions in Martin Bucer's thought
- 7 Martin Bucer and the ministry of the church
- 8 Infant baptism and the Christian community in Bucer
- 9 Bucer's ecclesiology in the colloquies with the Catholics, 1540–41
- 10 The Strasbourg Kirchenpfleger and parish discipline: theory and practice
- 11 Ecclesiological motifs behind the creation of the ‘Christlichen Gemeinschaften’
- 12 Martin Bucer in England
- 13 Martin Bucer and the Englishing of the Psalms: pseudonymity in the service of early English Protestant piety
- Bibliography
- Biblical index
- Index of Bucer's works
- Index of modern authors
- General index
5 - Church, communion and community in Bucer's commentary on the Gospel of John
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 September 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on contributors
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 Martin Bucer and the Old Church
- 2 The relation between church and civil community in Bucer's reforming work
- 3 Bucer's influence on Calvin: church and community
- 4 The church in Bucer's commentaries on the Epistle to the Ephesians
- 5 Church, communion and community in Bucer's commentary on the Gospel of John
- 6 Eucharistic communion: impulses and directions in Martin Bucer's thought
- 7 Martin Bucer and the ministry of the church
- 8 Infant baptism and the Christian community in Bucer
- 9 Bucer's ecclesiology in the colloquies with the Catholics, 1540–41
- 10 The Strasbourg Kirchenpfleger and parish discipline: theory and practice
- 11 Ecclesiological motifs behind the creation of the ‘Christlichen Gemeinschaften’
- 12 Martin Bucer in England
- 13 Martin Bucer and the Englishing of the Psalms: pseudonymity in the service of early English Protestant piety
- Bibliography
- Biblical index
- Index of Bucer's works
- Index of modern authors
- General index
Summary
In his work on Bucer's concept of the church, published in 1984, Gottfried Hammann underlined the importance of the Reformer's biblical commentaries which, he claimed, allow us to grasp the nature of the church as Bucer understood it from his reading of the Old and the New Testament. According to Hammann, Bucer's concept of the church is first sketched out in his commentaries and merely elaborated upon in his other works.
Unfortunately, Hammann does not investigate any of the biblical commentaries in detail and so does not tell us how the Reformer's basic theology of the church is developed in them. This curious-seeming lacuna in Hammann's work will not appear curious at all to those familiar with the sheer length and lack of structure of the commentaries and with Bucer's notoriously complex and unattractive Latin style. This, added to the fact that so far only one of Bucer's commentaries, that on the Gospel of John, has been made available in a modern critical edition, will explain why students of Bucer's thought have been reluctant to tackle them or, in the case of the Synoptic commentary, have fallen back upon August Lang's classic but partial study of 1900.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Martin BucerReforming Church and Community, pp. 61 - 71Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1994