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

In advance of this disputation, Farel prepared ten statements for debate,
published as a placard in parallel columns in Latin and French. 948 The third of these
statements is of particular interest. It reads, in Piaget's rendering of the original text:
3. Hanc vero ecclesiam Dei esse scriptura sancta predicat, quotquot se [solo]
Christi sanguine redemptos credunt, eiusque solius verbo inconcusse credunt et
nituntur, qui nobis corporali presentia subductus, spiritus sui virtute omnia
impleat, sustineat, regat ac vivificet.
3. La saincte scripture appelle eglise de Dieu tous ceux qui croient qu'ilz sont
racheptez du seul sang de Jesuchrist, et qui constamment sans vaciller croient et
du tout se fondent et s'appuient en la parolle de celluy seul, lequel estant retire
de nous par sa presence corporelle remplist par la vertu de son sainct Esprit,
soubstient, gouverne et vivifie toutes choses. 949
Farel's statement has three theological foci—ecclesiology, Christology, and
pneumatology—delivered in cumulative fashion. Regarding the interests of this study,
the pneumatological claim is striking: Christ accomplishes much spiritus sui virtute, or
par la vertu de son sainct Esprit.
In the course of the disputation, this statement is the entrée to extended
discourse about the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. 950 In the ten statements themselves,
the topic of the sacraments is not broached until statement four, 951 but in the course of
948 Piaget, Les Actes de la Dispute de Lausanne, 1536, 4.
949 Piaget, Les Actes de la Dispute de Lausanne, 1536, 5. Trans. Dennison,"The Lausanne
Articles (1536)," Reformed Confessions, 340-41. Dennison's rendering of Latin text reads: "Truly, holy
Scripture proclaims this Church of God to consist of as many as believe they are redeemed by the blood
of Christ alone, and firmly believe and lean upon Him by His word alone, who taken away from us in
bodily presence, fills, sustains, rules, and makes all things alive by the power of His Spirit."
950 In Piaget's edition of the account of the Lausanne Disputation, debate over the third statement
is presented on 98 pages of continuous text. Reference to the Lord's Supper first appears on the fourth of
these pages, and then on every page following. These pages comprise the challenges of the Protestant
delegation, Farel, Viret, Caroli, and Calvin, and the Roman Catholic delegation, Blancherose, Berilly,
Mimard, and Tandy, alike. (Piaget, Les Actes de la Dispute de Lausanne, 1536, 147-244).
951 Piaget, Les Actes de la Dispute de Lausanne 1536, 5.
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