THE PROVENANCE OF JOHN CALVIN'S EMPHASIS ON THE ...

espect to the sacraments, at least not as Calvin and Bucer, much less Melanchthon,
employed it. 873
Given that the trajectory of Bullinger's thought in the mid-1540s diverged from
Calvin's at that time, and that Bullinger's thought in the mid-1560s prospectively allows
for a view seemingly more compatible with that of Calvin, one cannot help but wonder
if the "influence" of how to speak of the Spirit with respect to the sacrament flowed
from Geneva to Zurich, rather than from Zurich to Geneva. 874 Again, even in his
correspondence with Calvin prior to the Consensio mutua, the accent of Bullinger's
expressions regarding the Holy Spirit is different than Calvin's, perhaps bearing out this
theory.
Calvin and Bullinger likely first met in Basel in 1536, 875 at the time that The
First Helvetic Confession was being formulated. Bullinger penned the majority of this
confession. Though Martin Bucer and Wolfgang Capito are largely responsible for its
articles on the sacraments, 876 Bullinger certainly would have been party to their
expression given his prominence in the Protestant church of the Swiss Confederation
and his ownership of the confession otherwise. As indicated below, these articles bear
not one mention of the Holy Spirit.
873 This is evident in Bullinger's 1534 commentary on 1 Corinthians as well, where the term does
not appear in his discussion of 1 Corinthians 11, given the heading De Eucharistia. See also Janse,
"Calvin's Eucharistic Theology," 49.
874 This is not to bespeak the significance of research that has demonstrated the extent to which
Bullinger was a formidable student of the church who developed his own view of the sacraments
independent of interaction with Zwingli. When he was appointed Zwingli's successor, however, as
Antistes of Zurich, he certainly felt compelled to uphold and defend Zwingli's view, at least for a time.
See, e.g., Rorem, Calvin and Bulllinger.
875 Büsser, Heinrich Bullinger, 118.
876 See below.
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