Heinrich Bullinger:
A Reformed Reader’s Guide

Scripture, grace, and the church

1504 to 1575 · About 40 minutes

Jump to contents ↓

“After the productive period of the Zwinglian Reformation, which embraced fifteen years, from 1516 to 1531, followed the period of preservation and consolidation under difficult circumstances. It required a man of firm faith, courage, moderation, patience, and endurance. Such a man was providentially equipped in the person of Heinrich Bullinger, the pupil, friend, and successor of Zwingli, and second Antistes of Zürich.”¹

Philip SchaffHistory of the Christian Church, VIII, §54

Why should a Reformed Christian read Heinrich Bullinger?

Heinrich Bullinger helped shape the faith and worship of Reformed churches across Europe.² He wrote the Second Helvetic Confession, helped develop Reformed covenant theology, and worked with Calvin to bring Zürich and Geneva into agreement on the Lord’s Supper. His work helps explain convictions we still confess.

His sermons show why those convictions matter. In The Decades, he directs troubled consciences to Christ, traces one way of salvation through both Testaments, and explains why believers and their children belong within the covenant community. Reading him can deepen our understanding of grace, baptism, and the Lord’s Supper.

These selections let Bullinger make his own case. Alongside his pastoral counsel, we’ll encounter disagreements and harsh judgments that deserve honest scrutiny. Our aim is to understand his teaching, weigh it by Scripture, and learn from it.

✠ ✠ ✠

---

Bremgarten, Kappel, and Zürich

Bullinger was born in Bremgarten in 1504, and taught at Kappel before returning to serve his hometown. In 1531, after Zwingli’s death, Zürich called him to the Grossmünster. These three places frame a ministry that reached well beyond Switzerland.³

---

Anna, the household, and the letters

A minister’s hospitality also depended on the people who kept his house. Anna Adlischwyler married Bullinger in 1529. They had eleven children; their household also sheltered students and refugees. Anna’s surviving letter to their son joins prayer and good company with concerns about laundry and shoes.⁴

Their courtship was not an uncomplicated romance. Anna tried to withdraw from the engagement. Bullinger’s surviving reply says that she did not want to leave the convent. Her widowed mother strongly opposed the marriage, but Anna’s own letter is lost, so we cannot fully recover her reasons. Zürich’s marriage court, composed of pastors and civic officials, ruled the engagement binding. Anna died in the plague of 1564; Bullinger, also ill, survived.⁴

A European ministry by letter

About 12,000 letters survive from Bullinger’s correspondence: roughly 10,000 received and 2,000 written. That is a network, not a claim that he personally wrote all 12,000. The University of Zürich’s project identifies about a thousand correspondents, with letters predominantly in Latin and early modern German.⁵

Use Bullinger Digital to follow people, dates, and places.

---

Four reformers in his life

Zwingli: a friend’s work and a family’s needs

Bullinger’s care for Zwingli’s legacy reached into the home. Schaff records that he secured a pension for Zwingli’s widow and educated two of Zwingli’s children alongside his own.⁶

Calvin: agreement on the Lord’s Supper

Bullinger and Calvin reached agreement on the Lord’s Supper in the 1549 Consensus Tigurinus. Their friendship also endured a serious dispute over predestination. The next section examines their disagreement in their own words.⁷

Luther: an early teacher through his books

Bullinger was raised Roman Catholic; his father was the parish priest in Bremgarten. At the University of Cologne, where he studied from 1519 to 1522, he considered entering the Carthusian order. Reading the church fathers, Scripture, Luther, and Melanchthon’s Loci communes helped bring him to justification by faith and the Reformation by 1522.⁸

He was never ordained a Roman Catholic priest. In 1523 he began teaching at the Cistercian monastery of Kappel as a layman, without taking monastic vows. He met Zwingli that year and became his friend and fellow reformer. In 1529 he became the Reformed pastor of Bremgarten; in 1531 he succeeded Zwingli in Zürich.⁸

Bullinger learned from Luther and Melanchthon through their books, not as their student at Wittenberg. No personal meeting with either man has been established from the sources cited here. “Roman Catholic, then Lutheran, then Zwinglian” therefore suggests a neater succession of allegiances than his development warrants. Bullinger’s lasting allegiance was to the Swiss Reformation, where he became a theologian in his own right. Later, the Lord’s Supper divided him from Luther. In 1548, Bullinger welcomed Lutheran ministers driven from their cities, even some who had preached against Reformed doctrine. Their earlier hostility did not prevent him from offering hospitality.⁸

His example challenges us to care for fellow Christians even when they have criticized our beliefs.⁹

Melanchthon: books, letters, and a son’s education

Bullinger and Melanchthon later corresponded. In a surviving letter of June 22, 1544, Bullinger thanks Melanchthon for his assessment of his commentary on John. The Henry whom Bullinger later recommended to Melanchthon for theological training was his son, not Bullinger himself. Schaff reports that Melanchthon prized Bullinger’s work on justifying grace.¹⁰

Zwingli’s successor was also an independent theologian. Joe Mock’s study of Bullinger’s 1534 commentary on 1 Corinthians shows him drawing on Scripture and Ratramnus, not merely repeating Zwingli. Bullinger defended his predecessor’s reputation while developing his own account of spiritual feeding on Christ.¹¹

---

Did God ordain Adam’s fall?

Bullinger objected to language saying that God had ordained Adam’s fall. He feared that such language made God responsible for sin. These tensions came into sharper focus during the Bolsec controversy over predestination in 1551 and 1552. The question still matters: how can God govern all things while remaining holy, and how can sinners remain responsible?¹²

What was the Bolsec controversy?

Jérôme Bolsec, a physician and former Carmelite monk, publicly challenged Geneva’s teaching on predestination in October 1551. One central question was whether faith flows from God’s election or election depends on faith. Bolsec argued that people are elected because they believe; Calvin taught that God’s gracious election is the source of their faith. The dispute reached Geneva’s civil council, which consulted the churches of Zürich, Bern, and Basel. Bolsec was banished from Geneva on December 23, 1551.¹³

Bullinger’s reservations did not amount to accepting Bolsec’s position. Zürich’s pastors pointed Calvin back to their existing agreement on election in the Consensus Tigurinus. Yet they withheld the full endorsement he wanted, especially concerning reprobation, God’s passing over some rather than choosing them for salvation. This helps explain the hurt in Calvin’s letter below.¹⁴

What can we read from the dispute?

Calvin’s major work was On the Eternal Predestination of God (1552), available in Henry Cole’s public-domain English translation at Covenanter.org. The controversy prompted Calvin to complete his earlier answer to the Roman Catholic theologian Albert Pighius. Although Bolsec helped occasion the book, its argument chiefly answers Pighius rather than naming Bolsec throughout. The dedication is dated January 1, 1552.¹⁵

Bullinger also sent Calvin short Latin theses on the causes of human salvation and condemnation with his letter of November 27, 1551. E. A. de Boer identifies these in his study of the controversy, p. 65, note 47. For the personal cost of the disagreement, read Calvin’s January 1552 letter to Bullinger, letter CCXC in Bonnet’s collection.¹⁶

The name Genevan Consensus also appears in accounts of this dispute. Older histories commonly apply it to Calvin’s 1552 book; de Boer argues that it more properly identifies the Genevan ministers’ agreement expressed on December 18, 1551. It should not be mistaken for an agreement endorsed by all the Swiss Reformed churches.¹⁷

What Calvin actually said

Calvin’s position went beyond foreknowledge. The following wording comes from the final, 1559 edition of his Institutes of the Christian Religion, where the argument is readily accessible. It states the position at issue; it is not a quotation from the 1552 treatise.

“Nor ought it to seem absurd when I say, that God not only foresaw the fall of the first man, and in him the ruin of his posterity; but also at his own pleasure arranged it.”¹⁸

John CalvinInstitutes of the Christian Religion 3.23.7 (Beveridge)

Calvin immediately addresses human responsibility in the next section: “Man therefore falls, divine providence so ordaining, but he falls by his own fault.”¹⁸ God’s decree and Adam’s guilt belong together in his argument. Calvin does not treat God’s sovereignty as an excuse for human sin.

What troubled Bullinger

In his letter of December 1, 1551, Bullinger warned Calvin that his treatment was troubling other readers. Schaff translates this part of the letter:

“many are displeased with what you say in your Institutes about predestination”¹⁹

Heinrich BullingerLetter to Calvin, December 1, 1551; excerpt as translated by Philip Schaff

The objection went beyond tone. In his 1553 exchange with Bartholomew Traheron, Bullinger resisted saying that God had arranged Adam’s fall. He emphasized human sin and unbelief as the grounds of condemnation and urged restraint about God’s hidden purposes. His later Second Helvetic Confession, chapter VIII, likewise cautions against speculative questions about why God willed or permitted the fall. Yet it also affirms that God willingly permits, limits, and overrules evil.²⁰

Both denied that God is the author of sin

We should let both men speak. Commenting on James 1:13, Calvin explicitly rejects assigning the blame for sin to God:

“But there are two things to be noticed here: when Scripture ascribes blindness or hardness of heart to God, it does not assign to him the beginning of this blindness, nor does it make him the author of sin, so as to ascribe to him the blame: and on these two things only does James dwell.”²¹

John CalvinCommentaries on the Catholic Epistles, James 1:13 (John Owen translation)

Bullinger’s confession is equally explicit. Its rejection includes the following words:

“we condemn Florinus and Blastus (against whom also Irenæus wrote), and all those who make God the author of sin”²²

Heinrich BullingerSecond Helvetic Confession, chapter VIII, excerpt

The dispute concerned how to explain God’s decree without making him blameworthy for evil. Bullinger affirmed gracious election in Christ, and Calvin affirmed that sinners act willingly and bear the guilt of their sins. Their disagreement should neither be erased nor turned into a claim that Calvin confessed what both men rejected.

Calvin’s hurt and his offer of friendship

Calvin had hoped for stronger support from Zürich. In his January 1552 letter to Bullinger, he spoke plainly about his disappointment. These three excerpts show how deeply the response hurt him, and how he still offered his friendship:

“Inasmuch as we experienced—not without severe pain—considerably less support from you than we had anticipated, I prefer bringing my complaint candidly before you, rather than nourish my displeasure by keeping it to myself.

…

Altogether, I feel grieved beyond measure that there is not a better understanding between us.

…

Although you disappointed my expectations, I nevertheless gladly offer you our friendship.”²³

John CalvinLetter to Heinrich Bullinger, January 1552

For Reformed readers, Westminster Confession of Faith 3.1 and 5.4 hold God’s comprehensive decree together with his holiness and the creature’s responsibility. Our aim remains to weigh both men by Scripture. For the modern debate, see Dinesh D’Souza on Calvinism: Answered.

---

The gospel and grace

We don’t need to begin with a label. Begin with what Bullinger says Christ has done for sinners. These selections retain the historical English of H. I.’s translation as edited by Thomas Harding for the Parker Society. Line breaks and spacing are normalized; the wording is not modernized.

What is The Decades?

The Decades is Bullinger’s collection of fifty written sermons, arranged in five groups of ten. “Decade” here means ten sermons, not ten years. Published in stages from 1549 to 1551, the collection presents Christian teaching through sermons on Scripture, faith, salvation, the church, and the sacraments. It is a substantial theological work in sermon form, rather than a single treatise or a record of ten years of preaching.

Good news for the world

“Let us rather hold, that the holy gospel of Christ doth generally preach to the whole world the grace of God, the remission of sins, and life everlasting.”²⁴

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon I, p. 33

Faith is God’s gift

“This therefore is left unto us for a thing most certain and undoubtedly true, that true faith is the mere gift of God, which is by the Holy Ghost from heaven bestowed upon our minds, and is declared unto us in the word of truth by teachers sent of God, and is obtained by earnest prayers which cannot be tired.”²⁵

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, First Decade, Sermon IV, p. 87

“Moreover, this prayer, wherein we desire to have faith poured into us, is of the grace and gift of God, and not of our own righteousness, which before God is none at all.”²⁶

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, First Decade, Sermon IV, p. 87

Christ bears our punishment

“For look what pain, penalty, punishment, or correction was due to us, and the same was laid on the Lord himself: and for that cause was the Lord wounded, and received stripes; and with them he healed us.”²⁷

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, First Decade, Sermon VI, p. 109

“The death of Christ, therefore, is a full satisfaction for our sins.”²⁸

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, First Decade, Sermon VI, p. 109

Faith alone, with good works following

“for wheresoever faith is, there also it sheweth itself by good works; because the righteous cannot but work righteousness.”²⁹

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, First Decade, Sermon VI, p. 118

This is an excerpt from a longer sentence. Bullinger distinguishes the ground of our acceptance from the fruit of faith. Read the whole paragraph before making him choose between justification by faith and the necessity of a changed life.

“Wherefore these two, grace and merit or work, cannot stand together.”³⁰

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, First Decade, Sermon VI, p. 119

Compare Heidelberg Catechism 60 through 64 and Westminster Confession 11. Faith receives Christ; our works do not add to his merit.

---

One covenant, one Savior

Covenant theology is not an appendix to Bullinger’s defense of baptism. It helps him read the whole Bible. Israel and the church do not have different saviors or different ways of salvation.

“the old fathers are one and the same people that we are, living in the same church and communion, and saved not in any other but in Christ alone, the Son of God, in whom also we look for salvation.”³¹

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Third Decade, Sermon VIII, p. 283

Bullinger teaches that the Old and New Testaments reveal one covenant in substance. He traces the same doctrine, faith, Spirit, hope, and inheritance through both.

“In the very substance, truly, thou canst find no diversity: the difference which is betwixt them doth consist in the manner of administration, in a few accidents, and certain circumstances.”³²

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Third Decade, Sermon VIII, p. 293

Here “accidents” means nonessential features, not mishaps. Compare Westminster Confession 7.5 and 7.6. The continuity rests in Christ; differences of administration remain real.

Cornelis Venema’s study of The Old Faith explains why Bullinger could call the Reformation a recovery of the ancient faith. Scripture has final authority, but the church does not begin again with each reader. Venema also cautions against making Bullinger’s covenant theology a separate, anti-predestinarian Reformed tradition.³³

How he helped develop Reformed covenant theology

Bullinger was an early architect of Reformed covenant theology. His 1534 De testamento seu foedere Dei unico et aeterno gave sustained attention to God’s one, eternal covenant. The Old Faith (1537) and the later Decades carried that concern into the church’s teaching.³⁴

His contribution was to show how the covenant holds together the Bible’s history of salvation: one Savior, one gracious promise, faith and its obedience, and signs that belong to God’s people and their children. That makes the covenant important for preaching, the church, and baptism, not just a specialist topic.

He did not invent the biblical idea or hand later Reformed churches a finished Westminster system. Pierrick Hildebrand’s recent study also connects Bullinger’s covenant teaching with election and his account of humanity before the fall. We should avoid making “Bullinger’s covenant” and “Calvin’s predestination” competing explanations of the Reformed faith.³⁵

---

Christ and the sacraments

The Supper directs us to Christ’s completed sacrifice. Bullinger joins remembrance, thanksgiving, and communion with Christ. His language deserves more attention than the shorthand “mere symbol” allows.

One sufficient sacrifice

“For neither ought or can Christ be sacrificed again, who, being once offered, is sufficient to cleanse all the sins of all ages.”³⁶

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon IX, p. 432

A promise made visible

“For the Lord, by setting bread and wine before us in the holy banquet, would have his promise and communion testified unto us, and his gifts represented unto us, and made manifest to our senses; and would also gather us visibly into one body, and retain the memory of his death in the hearts of the faithful; and finally, put us in mind of our duty, chiefly of praise and thanksgiving.”³⁷

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon IX, p. 433

Receiving Christ by faith

“But it is eaten spiritually, by faith, not with the bodily mouth. For as chewing or eating maketh us partakers of the meat, so are we made partakers of the body and the blood of Christ through faith.”³⁸

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon IX, p. 462

Read these alongside Heidelberg Catechism 75 through 79 and Belgic Confession 35. The sign and the gift belong together without becoming the same thing.

---

Children of the covenant

Bullinger argues that God includes believers and their children in his covenant. Because baptism is the sign of that covenant, believers’ children should receive it too.

“For to whomsoever the Lord promiseth that he will be their God, and whomsoever he receiveth and acknowledgeth for his, those no man without an horrible offence may exclude from the number of the faithful.”³⁹

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon VIII, p. 383

“And God promiseth, that he will not only be the God of them that confess him, but of infants also; he promiseth to them his grace and remission of sins.”⁴⁰

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon VIII, p. 383

“In sacraments the thing signified and the sign are considered. The thing signified is the excellenter; from that infants are not debarred. Who, then, will deny them the sign?”⁴¹

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon VIII, p. 389

Compare Heidelberg Catechism 74 and Belgic Confession 34. Read his whole sermon, too: Bullinger distinguishes outward church membership from the inward reality of faith. Baptism is no excuse for unbelief.

---

A confession for the churches

The Second Helvetic Confession is the shortest route into Bullinger’s mature theology. Originally his own confession, it became a confession used by churches. Read it as a connected account of Scripture, Christ, salvation, worship, and pastoral life, not merely a collection of famous sentences.⁴²

Start with chapters I and II on Scripture and its interpretation; X on election; XV and XVI on justification, faith, and good works; XVII and XVIII on the church and ministry; and XIX through XXI on the sacraments. Then read the remaining chapters in order.

One familiar heading deserves care: “The Preaching of the Word of God Is the Word of God.” R. Scott Clark explains the textual history of this heading. Do not detach it from the confession’s insistence that ministers preach God’s Word.⁴³

Read the complete Second Helvetic Confession

How does it compare with the Belgic Confession?

Election and assurance. Both confessions teach that God chooses sinners in Christ by grace, without regard to their works. Belgic Confession article 16 briefly describes his mercy in saving some and his justice in leaving others in the ruin they brought upon themselves. Second Helvetic chapter X spends more time helping troubled believers: look to Christ and his gospel rather than search God’s hidden purposes. It also warns against rashly declaring someone rejected by God. The difference here is chiefly emphasis, not two opposing doctrines of salvation.⁴²

Government and religious coercion. Both the Second Helvetic Confession and the original Belgic Confession assigned civil rulers a role in suppressing false religion. In 1905, the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands removed the Belgic’s language about suppressing idolatry and false worship and destroying the kingdom of Antichrist. The Christian Reformed Church made the same deletion in 1938 and revised the article further in 1958. These churches judged the older wording inconsistent with Scripture’s teaching about church and state.⁴²

Why revise the Belgic rather than the Second Helvetic?

The Dutch churches’ Three Forms of Unity grew out of their own history: a confession of faith, a teaching catechism, and a response to doctrinal controversy. Bullinger’s Second Helvetic Confession was welcomed in Holland, but it did not become one of those adopted standards.

---

The Five Points of Calvinism in The Decades and the Second Helvetic Confession?

Can we establish all five? Not with equal confidence. Bullinger wrote before the Synod of Dort, and TULIP is a later summary. There’s substantial agreement here, but we should let his own arguments set the limits. Read these sermons alongside his later Second Helvetic Confession. The selections below show where his confession reinforces the teaching of The Decades and where questions remain.

T: Human inability, clearly taught

“There is therefore born together with all men a blindness of heart and mind, a doubting in the promises of God, and an unbelief and perverse judgment in all heavenly things.”⁴⁴

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon II, p. 100

This concerns our inability in spiritual things, not the loss of all ordinary reasoning or skill. On the preceding page Bullinger expressly acknowledges human abilities in earthly affairs. Compare Canons of Dort III/IV.3 and Westminster Confession 9.3.

The Second Helvetic Confession states the same inability plainly:

“Therefore man, not as yet regenerate, has no free-will to good, no strength to perform that which is good.”

Second Helvetic Confession, chapter IX

U: Election without foreseen merit, clearly taught

“God’s predestination is not stayed or stirred with any worthiness or unworthiness of ours; but of the mere grace and mercy of God the Father, it respecteth Christ alone.”⁴⁵

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon IV, p. 187 and 188

“For they are wrong, that think those that are to be saved to life are predestinate of God for the merit’s sake, or good works, which God did foresee in them.”⁴⁶

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon IV, p. 188

Election does not rest on foreseen good works. Bullinger directs troubled believers to Christ rather than speculation about the hidden decree. Compare Canons of Dort I.7 and I.9.

His confession likewise grounds election in Christ, without merit in us:

“Therefore, though not for any merit of ours, yet not without a means, but in Christ, and for Christ, did God choose us; and they who are now-ingrafted into Christ by faith, the same also were elected.”

Second Helvetic Confession, chapter X

L: Definite atonement, not established by these texts

Bullinger teaches substitutionary atonement and full satisfaction. Yet he also calls Christ “the only satisfaction of the world.” That wording occurs in his own argument, not merely in a Bible citation.⁴⁷

Neither the universal language nor the references to the faithful settle, by themselves, the precise saving intention addressed in Canons of Dort II.8. The passages establish a sufficient, substitutionary sacrifice; they do not establish an exclusive saving design for the elect with the same clarity. Calling this a demonstrated five-point system would go beyond the evidence.

The confession gives us further evidence. Chapter XV affirms Christ’s substitution and satisfaction:

“For Christ took upon himself and bare the sins of the world, and did satisfy the justice of God.”

Second Helvetic Confession, chapter XV

Chapter XI also describes Christ’s sufficiency for believers:

“and, to be short, he is the fullness and perfection, the salvation and most abundant sufficiency, of all the faithful.”

Second Helvetic Confession, chapter XI

These statements affirm Christ’s complete saving work and its benefits for believers. They do not, by themselves, settle whether his death was intended to secure salvation for the elect alone.

I: Grace renews the will, substantial support

“And in this regeneration of man the will also doth receive an heavenly virtue, to do the good which the understanding perceived by the Holy Ghost: so that it willeth, chooseth, and worketh the good that the Lord hath shewed it; and on the other side nilleth, hateth, and repelleth the evil that the Lord hath forbidden it.”⁴⁸

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon II, p. 101 and 102

“But now note this, that whatsoever they do which are regenerate by the Spirit of God, they do it freely, not by compulsion, nor against their wills.”⁴⁹

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon II, p. 102

“Furthermore, unless we be drawn of the heavenly Father, we cannot believe.”⁵⁰

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon IV, p. 190

This is more than unaided choice. God renews the will, and the renewed person acts willingly. Compare Canons of Dort III/IV.11, 12, and 16. These passages strongly support effectual grace, although they are not a full treatment of every later question about resistance and calling.

Chapter IX describes how the Spirit changes us:

“In regeneration the understanding is illuminated by the Holy Spirit, that it may understand both the mysteries and will of God. And the will itself is not only changed by the Spirit, but it is also endued with faculties, that, of its own accord, it may both will and do good (Rom. 8:4).”

Second Helvetic Confession, chapter IX

God changes the will so that we willingly do good. This supports the account of renewing grace in The Decades.

P: Certain salvation in Christ, strong support

“And because our salvation doth stay only upon him, it cannot but be most certain.”⁵¹

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon IV, p. 188

“Faith therefore is a most assured sign that thou art elected; and whiles thou art called to the communion of Christ, and art taught faith, the most loving God declareth towards thee his election and good-will.”⁵²

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon IV, p. 187

On page 189 Bullinger cites John 10 on Christ’s sheep never perishing. He then addresses anxious believers and warns against neglecting offered grace. This is strong evidence for the security of salvation in Christ, though these pages do not develop all the distinctions about temporary faith and serious falls found in Canons of Dort V. Read them as pastoral counsel, not as a slogan.

The confession also explains why remaining sin does not overthrow the Spirit’s work in believers:

“In the meanwhile, because the strength of the flesh and the relics of the old man are not of such great force that they can wholly quench the work of the Spirit, therefore the faithful are called free, yet so that they do acknowledge their infirmity, and glory no whit at all of their free-will.”

Second Helvetic Confession, chapter IX

Our remaining sin is real, but it cannot wholly extinguish the Spirit’s work. Our confidence rests in God’s grace.

Where Bullinger sends the anxious reader

“God therefore doth then draw thee, when he preacheth unto thee the gospel by his servants; when he toucheth thy heart; when he stirreth thee to prayer, whereby thou mayest call and cry for his grace and assistance, his enlightening and drawing.”⁵³

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fourth Decade, Sermon IV, p. 190

---

The difficult questions

Did he advise Calvin about Servetus?

Yes. Schaff records that Bullinger encouraged Calvin to regard the case as an opportunity to defend the truth, and Zürich joined the Swiss churches in condemning Servetus’s teaching and advising punishment. Schaff also states that the consulted churches did not expressly recommend the death penalty; they left the form of punishment to Geneva’s magistrates.⁵⁴

That distinction does not make Bullinger an opponent of the execution. Schaff reports his approval, and records that he urged Calvin to write the Defense of the Orthodox Faith against the Prodigious Errors of Michael Servetus, published in 1554. The book defended the doctrine of the Trinity against Servetus’s teachings and argued that civil authorities could lawfully punish heretics with death. In a March 26, 1554 letter, Bullinger worried that its brevity and obscurity would trouble sympathetic readers. He added:

“And, indeed, your style appears somewhat perplexed, especially in this work.”⁵⁵

Heinrich BullingerLetter to John Calvin, March 26, 1554, as quoted by Philip Schaff

By “perplexed,” Bullinger meant that Calvin’s writing was difficult to follow. He worried that even sympathetic readers would struggle to understand the arguments because Calvin treated this difficult subject too briefly. This criticism of the book’s clarity should not be mistaken for opposition to the execution.

Melanchthon approved the execution in a letter to Bullinger dated August 20, 1555. He praised Geneva’s decision and expressed surprise that anyone objected:

“I judge also that the Genevese Senate did perfectly right … And I wonder at those who disapprove of this severity.”⁵⁶

Philip MelanchthonLetter to Heinrich Bullinger, August 20, 1555, as quoted by Philip Schaff

This was a shared failure of leading reformers, not a reason to excuse it. We can reject Servetus’s denial of the Trinity without defending his execution.

The published Calvin correspondence supplies another witness. An editorial note to Calvin’s letter of February 23, 1554 quotes Bullinger urging the defense:

“Endeavour, my dear Calvin, to describe exactly and piously for all pious persons, Servetus, with the manner of his death, that all may turn away with loathing from the monster.”⁵⁷

Heinrich BullingerQuoted in the editorial note to Calvin’s letter, February 23, 1554

That evidence concerns the defense after the execution. It must not be turned into an invented instruction about the method of execution before the trial ended.

Did he write harshly against the Anabaptists?

He did. In The Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon VIII, Bullinger answers opponents who compare baptizing an infant to baptizing a log. The historical English translation gives this reply:

“Go, ye false knaves, go with your blasphemies to the place which you deserve!”⁵⁸

Heinrich BullingerThe Decades, Fifth Decade, Sermon VIII, p. 388

The surrounding argument defends children as objects of God’s promise. The invective remains harsh. This is the wording of H. I.’s English translation, not a fresh translation of Bullinger’s Latin. Nor should one polemical passage be treated as a fair description of every Anabaptist.

What coercion did Bullinger support?

Bullinger defended civil punishment for religious dissent. Historian Hans Ulrich Bächtold explains that he regarded Anabaptist resistance to the established church, oath-taking, and payment of tithes as a threat to the unity of church and society. He treated these refusals as forms of rebellion.⁵⁹

How did he regard Jews?

Bullinger criticized Luther’s late anti-Jewish writing. In his letter to Martin Bucer of December 8, 1543, he condemned its abusive language and objected to Luther’s claim that rabbis had corrupted the Hebrew Bible. He compared Luther’s hostility toward Hebrew commentators with that of Reuchlin’s old opponents. He also asked Bucer to involve Melanchthon in restraining Luther.⁶⁴

The same letter still commends useful Christian arguments in Luther’s writing against Jews. Bullinger’s protest should not be turned into an endorsement of Judaism or a declaration of modern religious equality. Bullinger objected to Luther’s abusive language about Jews and rejected his accusation that Jewish teachers had corrupted the Hebrew text of the Old Testament.

His teaching that Old Testament believers share our salvation in Christ is also a different question from how he treated living Jewish communities. This letter cannot establish his position on every civil restriction or expulsion. We should neither erase his protest nor make it prove more than it does.

---

Knox, England, and the limits of obedience

Bullinger’s correspondence reached churches facing persecution and political danger. In 1554 John Knox brought questions about rulers, idolatry, and resistance. Bullinger distinguished obedience to lawful government from obedience to commands against God. He also warned against deciding particular cases without knowing their circumstances.⁶⁵

Read the questions and answers at Banner of Truth. Notice the combination of resistance to idolatry and caution about acting too quickly.

---

Which edition should I use?

For free reading and quotation checking, use the Parker Society scans. For a physical set, consider the Reformation Heritage Books reprint. A modernized text can help with difficult English, but cite the edition you actually quote.

Reformation Heritage Books: edition and sample · Monergism: modernized PDF

The four free source volumes

• First and Second Decades (1849)
• Third Decade (1850)
• Fourth Decade (1851)
• Fifth Decade (1852)

In the citations, “First Decade, VI” means sermon six in the first group of ten. It does not mean volume one, chapter six of a modern systematic theology. “Nilleth” means does not will or rejects; “ministery” means ministry; “testament” may name the covenant. You may want to keep a short vocabulary list as you read.

---

A map of all fifty sermons

These brief descriptions are reading aids, not quotations of the historical titles. The five groups cover far more than the doctrines of grace. Open each decade to see its ten sermons and their page ranges. The list numbers are sermon numbers. Page numbers refer to the printed pages of the Parker Society edition linked below, not PDF page numbers. If you’re using the Reformation Heritage Books reprint, locate the selection by decade and sermon number.⁶⁶

First Decade: Faith and the Word

1. God’s Word and its revelation (pp. 36 to 57)
2. Hearing God’s Word and Scripture’s sufficiency (pp. 57 to 70)
3. Interpreting Scripture (pp. 70 to 81)
4. Faith: its nature and source (pp. 81 to 97)
5. One true faith (pp. 97 to 104)
6. Justification by faith (pp. 104 to 122)
7. The Creed: the Father, Christ’s incarnation and suffering (pp. 122 to 140)
8. The Creed: Christ’s resurrection and reign; the Holy Spirit (pp. 140 to 157)
9. The Creed: the church, forgiveness, and everlasting life (pp. 157 to 180)
10. Love of God and neighbor (pp. 180 to 192)

Open the first decade

Second Decade: God’s commands and our callings

1. Natural, divine, and human laws (pp. 193 to 209)
2. The first two commandments (pp. 209 to 237)
3. God’s name and lawful oaths (pp. 237 to 253)
4. The Sabbath and Christian assemblies (pp. 253 to 267)
5. Parents, children, and authority (pp. 267 to 298)
6. Murder and the magistrate (pp. 298 to 322)
7. The magistrate’s care of religion (pp. 323 to 344)
8. Judgment and punishment (pp. 345 to 369)
9. War and the duties of subjects (pp. 370 to 393)
10. Marriage and chastity (pp. 393 to 435)

Open the second decade

Third Decade: Life under God’s law

1. Property and theft (pp. 17 to 48)
2. Wealth, poverty, and restitution (pp. 48 to 64)
3. Suffering and Christian comfort (pp. 64 to 111)
4. False witness and coveting (pp. 111 to 124)
5. Ceremonial law and priesthood (pp. 125 to 167)
6. Sacrifices and sacred observances (pp. 167 to 217)
7. Judicial laws (pp. 217 to 236)
8. The law’s use and fulfillment; the two testaments (pp. 236 to 300)
9. Christian liberty and good works (pp. 300 to 357)
10. Sin and its consequences (pp. 358 to 432)

Open the third decade

Fourth Decade: The gospel and the triune God

1. The gospel (pp. 1 to 55)
2. Repentance, renewal, and the human will (pp. 55 to 114)
3. God and the Trinity (pp. 123 to 173)
4. Creation, providence, and predestination (pp. 173 to 194)
5. Worship and prayer (pp. 194 to 238)
6. Christ’s two natures (pp. 238 to 273)
7. Christ as King and Priest (pp. 273 to 297)
8. The Holy Spirit (pp. 297 to 326)
9. Angels and devils (pp. 327 to 365)
10. The soul, death, and the life to come (pp. 365 to 408)

Open the fourth decade

Fifth Decade: The church and its ministry

1. The church and its marks (pp. 3 to 48)
2. The church’s unity and communion (pp. 49 to 92)
3. Ministers and their offices (pp. 93 to 127)
4. The calling of ministers and the keys (pp. 128 to 163)
5. Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer (pp. 163 to 226)
6. Sacraments as signs (pp. 226 to 293)
7. The purpose and use of sacraments (pp. 293 to 351)
8. Baptism (pp. 351 to 401)
9. The Lord’s Supper (pp. 401 to 478)
10. Church ordinances, schools, care of the poor, marriage, and burial (pp. 478 to 526)

Open the fifth decade

---

Beyond the Decades

Bullinger’s sermons are the best starting point, but they are only part of his work. Follow the question that interests you, rather than trying to read everything at once. For a starting point in the sermons, see First Decade, Sermon VI, pp. 104 to 122, on justification; Third Decade, Sermon VIII, pp. 236 to 300, on the law and the two testaments; or Fifth Decade, Sermon IX, pp. 401 to 478, on the Lord’s Supper. The fifty-sermon map gives page ranges for the other topics.

The covenant and the antiquity of the faith

The 1534 treatise De testamento seu foedere Dei unico et aeterno concerns God’s one and eternal covenant. The Old Faith (1537) defends the continuity of evangelical faith with the Scriptures and the ancient church. The University of Zürich’s edition guide identifies these writings and their critical editions. Begin with Cornelis Venema’s open study of The Old Faith before pursuing specialist editions.

Did he write biblical commentaries?

Yes, extensively. Before Zürich, he lectured on Romans at Kappel in 1525 and Hebrews in 1526 and 1527. His printed works then included John’s three epistles and Hebrews (1532), Romans and Acts (1533), 1 Corinthians (1534), 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians (1535), and the Thessalonian and Pastoral Epistles with Philemon (1536). A collected commentary on the apostolic epistles followed in 1537.⁶⁷

These works let us hear Bullinger follow a biblical book rather than select passages for a doctrinal topic. Begin with Romans for salvation, Hebrews for the unity of the covenants, and 1 Corinthians for the church and the Supper. His preaching also extended to Old Testament books, including Daniel.

Revelation: comfort for a suffering church

Bullinger preached through Revelation at the Grossmünster from 1554 to 1556. His Hundred Sermons on the Apocalypse appeared in Latin in 1557 and English in 1561. He dedicated the work to Christian exiles and believers awaiting Christ’s return. This is Heinrich Bullinger, not the much later E. W. Bullinger.

Calvin did not write a commentary on Revelation. Bullinger’s sustained exposition gives us something different from Luther’s shorter treatments in his Bible prefaces of 1522 and 1530.⁶⁸

His approach was historicist: he connected Revelation’s visions with events across the history of the church, including the rise and corruption of the papacy. He placed the thousand years in the past, beginning around Constantine, rather than expecting a future earthly millennial kingdom. This resembles later amillennialism in rejecting such a future kingdom, but the label needs care. Bullinger’s dating of a literal thousand-year period differs from the usual modern amillennial reading. Applying our later categories too neatly would be anachronistic.⁶⁹

His purpose was pastoral. In Revelation 4, the throne declares God’s rule; the rainbow recalls his covenant and grace. Revelation 7 consoles suffering believers with the Lamb’s victory. Revelation 21 and 22 promise renewed creation, resurrection life, and freedom from suffering. He opposed relocating that final blessedness into an earthly millennial kingdom.⁷⁰

Read Jeffrey Jue’s introduction at Ligonier, then Brunner’s open scholarly study. Keep Bullinger’s historical identifications distinct from his lasting pastoral question: how does Christ’s promised victory sustain the church now?

The sacramental agreement with Calvin

The Consensus Tigurinus (1549) belongs beside Fifth Decade IX. It is an agreement between reformers and churches, not a work to attribute to Bullinger alone. Read its statements about signs, Christ’s benefits, and the Spirit’s work together.

Read the Consensus Tigurinus (Beveridge translation, with William Gross’s updated language and notes).

---

Articles, interviews, and research tools

The authors and institutions below deserve the credit for their work. Start with the introductions, then use the studies that answer your particular question.

Accessible introductions

• Philip Schaff: Heinrich Bullinger
  Christian Classics Ethereal Library. The substantial public-domain biography quoted in the introduction. Its nineteenth-century judgments need comparison with later scholarship.
• John R. Muether: Second Helvetic Confession (1566)
  Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Ordained Servant. A short confessional introduction and a good entry into Bullinger’s concern for pastoral ministry.
• Jeffrey K. Jue: Alpha and Omega
  Ligonier Ministries. Places Bullinger’s Revelation preaching in the setting of persecution and Christian hope.

For closer study

• Cornelis P. Venema: The Old Faith
  Mid-America Journal of Theology 15 (2004), pages 11 through 32. Open scholarly study of Scripture, covenant, antiquity, and the Reformation’s claim to catholicity.
• Joe Mock: What Sort of Nachfolger of Zwingli Was Bullinger?
  Westminster Theological Journal 82 (2020), pages 301 through 317. Especially useful for moving beyond the assumption that Bullinger merely repeated Zwingli on the Supper.
• Rebecca A. Giselbrecht: Myths and Reality about Heinrich Bullinger’s Wife Anna
  Zwingliana 38 (2011), pages 53 through 66. Archival source criticism of family stories and the work behind the household’s hospitality.
• R. Scott Clark: A Text-Critical Note on the Second Helvetic Confession
  The Heidelblog. A focused examination of the familiar heading about preaching and God’s Word.
• Heinrich Bullinger: On Obedience to Lawful Magistrates
  Banner of Truth. A primary-source excerpt of Bullinger’s answers to Knox, with the historical English translation and source identified.

Watch and listen

• W. Robert Godfrey: Who Are the Reformers? Heinrich Bullinger
  Westminster Seminary California, August 30, 2016. A dedicated video introduction; the seminary highlights covenant theology and the Lord’s Supper.
• The Swiss Reformation: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow
  Reformed Forum, Christ the Center 906, May 9, 2025. Camden Bucey interviews Kurt Vetterli and Florian Weicken. Start at 39:25 for Bullinger and 44:25 for the Second Helvetic Confession. The full episode supplies broader Swiss context.

These are listening recommendations, not sources for the verbatim quotations above. The Reformed Forum chapter times come from its published episode guide.

Primary research portals

• Bullinger Digital
  Search the correspondence and consult manuscript witnesses. Follow the edition information attached to an individual letter.
• Heinrich Bullinger Stiftung: the correspondence project
  University of Zürich. Explains the corpus, languages, editorial work, and the difference between letters received and letters written.
• University of Zürich: programmatic theological writings
  A guide to critical editions of foundational writings, including The Old Faith and the covenant treatise.

---

Books for the next stage

These choices serve different purposes. The links establish the editions; the brief descriptions are not claims to have reviewed every page of each book.

• Cornelis P. Venema, Heinrich Bullinger and the Doctrine of Predestination
  Baker Academic, 2002. The most directly relevant specialist follow-up to the five-point question. Read it alongside the sermons, especially when assessing claims about an “other Reformed tradition.”
• Bruce Gordon and Emidio Campi, eds., Architect of Reformation
  Baker Academic, 2004. A collection for widening the inquiry beyond one doctrinal controversy. The Folger catalog supplies edition information.
• W. P. Stephens, The Theology of Heinrich Bullinger
  Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2019; edited by Jim West and Joe Mock. A substantial theological study. The editors completed the unfinished Lord’s Supper chapter, a relevant distinction when citing it.

Donald K. McKim and Jim West’s Heinrich Bullinger: An Introduction to His Life and Theology (Cascade, 2022) is another accessible option. Read Justin Myers’s review in Themelios before choosing it; the review raises questions about the handling of Bullinger’s theology and comparisons with Calvin.

---

Questions worth keeping straight

Was he only Zwingli’s caretaker?

No. He preserved Zwingli’s legacy, but his biblical exposition, covenant theology, confession, and correspondence warrant study in their own right.

Was his Supper merely an empty memorial?

That label obscures his language about spiritual participation in Christ by faith. Read Fifth Decade IX and the Consensus Tigurinus before deciding what his account includes or excludes.

Can we call him a five-point Calvinist?

Only with qualifications so substantial that the label may conceal more than it explains. The Decades gives clear evidence on inability and unmerited election, strong support for renewing grace and security in Christ, and less decisive evidence for the precise later formulation of definite atonement.

Does defending infant baptism excuse his polemics?

No. We can assess his covenant argument while acknowledging his defense of civil punishment for religious dissent, including exclusion and, in some cases, death. Zürich’s authorities also imprisoned and banished Anabaptists. The account above distinguishes Bullinger’s advice from the magistrates’ actions.⁵⁹

---

Why Bullinger deserves another hour

Bullinger helped give the Reformed churches a theology they could preach, confess, and pass on. For more than forty years after Zwingli’s death, he served Zürich through sermons, correspondence, and care for the church. His work on God’s covenant, his agreement with Calvin on the Lord’s Supper, and the Second Helvetic Confession make him essential to understanding how the Reformed tradition took shape.

There are personal reasons to keep reading, too. His sermons address the sinner’s need for grace, the believer’s assurance in Christ, and the promises God attaches to baptism and the Lord’s Supper. These are questions we bring to worship, to our children, and to seasons of doubt. Bullinger’s failures deserve honest judgment. His teaching deserves the patient hearing we have begun here.

Start with one sermon. Read First Decade VI on justification, then turn to the agreement he reached with Calvin on the sacraments. Keep Scripture open beside him. Our aim is to understand his teaching, weigh it by Scripture, and learn from it. The reward is a fuller understanding of the faith we confess and fresh reasons to trust the Savior he preached.

✠ ✠ ✠

REFORMED DOGMATIKA

---

Footnotes

The quotations from The Decades use H. I.’s historical English translation, edited by Thomas Harding for the Parker Society. This Reader is a guide to the sources, not a critical edition of Bullinger’s complete works.