Country bumpkins or God's chosen?
For every one will maltreat the Sacred Writings at his own sweet will. Country bumpkins!—Zwingli quoting his opponents
By Jim West
[My opponents] confront me presently with the Gordian knot:
“If it is not [declared to be] unlawful for any persons to make some definite proclamation in regard to the truth of Scripture, there will arise countless errors. For every one will maltreat the Sacred Writings at his own sweet will. Country bumpkins!”
Do ye not see that the spirit of God is everywhere like unto itself and ever the same? The more unskilled a man is in human devices and at the same time devoted to the divine, the more clearly that spirit informs him, as is shown by the Apostles and by the foolish things of this world which God hath chosen. And as it is a spirit of unity and harmony and peace, not of strife and dissension, it will inspire even the most ignorant, sobeit that they are pious, in such manner that they will understand the Scriptures in the plainest way according to God’s purpose. – Huldrych Zwingli
Zwingli’s opponents, the Catholics, were right to suggest that just as soon as everyone had a copy of the Bible and could read it, they would twist it to their own meaning and purpose. I recall hearing a middle aged man discussing the book of ‘Job’ (he constantly pronounced it like the word job as in employment) and suggesting that the Satan character in the book was but Jesus in another guise… Examples of misinterpretation can easily be multiplied if one merely turns on the radio or the tv or reads most journalists in the newspapers.
Relief of Zwingli preaching at the pulpit, by Otto Münch (1935); photograph by Rebecca Kennison - Own work, CC BY 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1669257
But Zwingli was right as well that even the persons lacking exegetical skill could understand and declare the plainest truths of Scripture so long as they were guided by the Spirit and were pious in their attempts to explain the text. Indeed, while leading a Bible study on 1 Peter at a Church in Phoenix a young high school student had a brilliant observation about a verse in that book which struck all of us in attendance as a flash of inspired insight.
Later in his career, Zwingli emphasized even more the importance of being led by the Spirit. Not every interpreter, after all, really is.
Jim West, Ming Hua Theological College
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