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

Indeed, it was this growth that Calvin encountered in Geneva in 1536. Farel first
arrived in Geneva in 1532, but did not arrive to stay until 1535. In May 1536 the
General Council of Geneva formally adopted the reformation, though the practice of
Roman Catholic worship had been suspended already six months earlier. In its stead,
Genevan churches likely exercised the form for Sunday worship Farel prepared already
in 1533, his Maniere et Fasson printed in Neuchâtel during his first tenure there. 1136
Farel's is the first liturgy in vernacular French, and is itself an adaptation of the liturgy
of Bern of 1529. 1137 A new edition of Farel's liturgy appeared in 1538, in Geneva, under
the title Ordre et maniere. According to Bürki, some additions to the liturgy (and this
would include service material for occasions other than the celebration of the Lord's
Supper as well) are thought to bear Calvin's influence. 1138 Given interest in Calvin's
liturgy of the 1540s, both the 1533 and 1538 editions of Farel's form for the celebration
of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper are of interest in the forthcoming discussion.
Farel's 1533 edition of a form for the Lord's Supper most likely best
approximates that which Calvin encountered and employed upon his arrival in Geneva
in 1536. 1139 The form begins with an exhortation, heavy on sin but buoyed by the
1135 Jacobs, "Die Abendmahlslehre Wilhelm Farels," 164-65. See also discussion above at
footntotes 850 and 956.
1136 For another account of Farel's liturgy, particularly in its socio-historical context, see
Christopher Elwood, The Body Broken: The Calvinist Doctrine of the Eucharist and the Symbolization of
Power in Sixteenth-Century France (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 32-48. See also Andre
Emile Kaltenrieder, "The Lituriges of Guillaume Farel: Their Meaning and Relevance" (PhD dissertation,
Rhodes University, 1980); the Lord's Supper is taken up in Chapter 5, 94-113.
1137 Bürki, 17. Kapitel: "La Sainte Cène selon L'Ordre de Guillaume Farel," Coena Domini I,
339. "Mais elle rappelle également les liturgies d'autres villes que Farel avait visitées."
1138 Bürki, "La Sainte Cène . . . Farel," Coena Domini I, 340.
1139 Bürki, "La Sainte Cène . . . Farel," Coena Domini I, 340.
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