Martin Bucer

Life

Bucer was born in 1491 in Schlettstadt in Alsace (present-day Sélestat, France), into a family of coopers. At fifteen he became a Dominican friar, and in 1516 he was ordained a priest in Mainz. While later studying in Heidelberg, he met Martin Luther in 1518 and embraced his ideas.

After being released from his monastic vows, he married Elisabeth Silbereisen, a former nun, in 1522, and he was subsequently excommunicated. In 1523 he arrived in Strasbourg as a refugee, and for about twenty-five years he worked chiefly in that city, becoming the leader of its Reformation. When the political situation changed under Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, he was forced to leave Strasbourg. He went to England, where from December 1549 he served as Regius Professor of Divinity (a chair filled by royal appointment) at the University of Cambridge. He died in Cambridge on February 28, 1551, and was buried with great ceremony in the university church. In 1557, however, commissioners of Queen Mary I had his body exhumed and burned and his tomb destroyed; he was later rehabilitated by order of Queen Elizabeth I.

Ministry and Achievements

• Efforts at reconciliation: Strasbourg lay between Switzerland and southern Germany, which were influenced by Huldrych Zwingli, and central and northern Germany, which were influenced by Luther. Bucer sought to mediate the dispute between Luther and Zwingli over the Lord's Supper but did not succeed (see Eucharistic controversy), and his attempts to reach an agreement between Protestants and Roman Catholics also failed. He also welcomed persecuted Anabaptists into Strasbourg.
• Relationship with Calvin: In 1538 he welcomed John Calvin, who had been expelled from Geneva, to Strasbourg. He is regarded as something of a mentor to Calvin, influencing his pastoral ministry and thought.
• Pastoral care and discipline: He sought to renew both individuals and society through conversion, piety, and church discipline (the governance of the church), and he wrote a treatise on pastoral ministry, Concerning the True Care of Souls.
• The English Reformation: He wrote the Censura, a critique of the 1549 Book of Common Prayer, and some of its proposals are known to have been incorporated into the 1552 edition. He presented to Edward VI De Regno Christi (On the Kingdom of Christ), which set out a blueprint for reform in England, and at Cambridge he lectured on Ephesians.

Influence on the Korean Church

No record confirms that Bucer directly influenced the Korean church. However, in light of the view that he contributed to the formation of Calvinism through Calvin, Korea's Reformed churches, including the Presbyterian churches, may be said to share some of their theological roots with him. In addition, the Book of Common Prayer tradition that he helped revise is connected to the Anglican liturgical tradition to which the Anglican Church of Korea belongs.

Assessment

The Encyclopaedia Britannica presents Bucer as a liturgist and a mediator who worked tirelessly for reconciliation among the divided Reformation camps. Nevertheless, most of his attempts at mediation bore no fruit. In England, too, he is thought not to have fully realized his aims amid controversies over such issues as the Lord's Supper and clerical vestments. Some have observed that he has been less remembered than Luther and Calvin, yet because of his enduring influence on Calvin and on the English Reformation, he is counted among the important reformers of the sixteenth century.