Marbach, Johann

MARBACH, mdr'bda, JOHANN: German Reform er; b. at Lindau, Bavaria, Apr.14,1521; d. at Strasburg Mar. 17, 1581. He began his studies at Strasburg in 1536,and three years later went to Wittenberg, where he lived in the same house with Luther and took his doctor's degree in 1543. After holding temporary positions at Jells and Isny, in 1545 he accepted a call to Strasburg, which was to be the field of his lifelong labor. Here, from 1545 to 1558, he was pastor of the Church of St. Nicholas; canon at St. Thomas' from 1546; professor from 1549, and from 1552 president of the Church Convocation. In 1551 he was an envoy from Strasburg to the Council of Trent. Until Butzer's departure for England (1549) Marbach was on the most cordial terms with the recognized head of the Strasburg Church, and remained a regular correspondent until Butzer's death (1551). By degrees, however, Marbach developed a tendency toward a more exclusive Lutheranism than that represented by the Strasburg Reformers. In the violent opposition to the Swiss, Calvinistic, and Unionistic elements in Strasburg, Marbach was leader. The result of this conflict was the "Lutheranizing" of Strasburg, as evidenced in the Strasburg Kirchenordnung of 1598, principally Marbach's work.

During his sojourn at Strasburg (1538-41), Calvin had founded and served a congregation of French refugees, which to the younger generation of Strasburg theologians appeared more and more like a foreign body in the local church. From 1553 complaints began to be urged against the pastor of the French congregation, Gamier, because he did not hold the doctrine of the Strasburg church on the Lord's Supper. He was obliged to leave Strasburg in 1555. In the same year, Peter Martyr, a teacher at the High School, betook himself to Zurich to escape making stricter declarations on the same subject. The last prominent advocate of a Unionistio-Calvinistic theology at Strasburg was Jerome Zanchi (1516-90), a teacher in the High School, and member of the French congregation. When in 1560 Marbach reprinted at Strasburg the treatise of the ardent Lutheran Tilemann Hesshusen, De prtesentia corporis Christi in ccena Domini with the author's vehement preface against the Elector Palatine Fredbrick III. and the Palatine theologians in Strasburg, open strife broke out between Zanchi and Marbach. The main points of contention were the doctrines of the Eucharist, of Ubiquity (q.v.), just then coming into prominence, and of the perseverance of the elect and predestination. This controversy gave occasion for a thorough discussion of predestination between the Lutheran and the Reformed theologians. Marbach advocated his own standpoint in his three principal writings: Christlicher and wahrhaftiger Unterricht von den Worten der Einsetzung des heiligen Abendmahla (1565); Chrisgicher Unterricd and waWaj'~e Pr weisung, dass Jesus Christus durch die persbnliche Vereinzgung der gottlichen and menachlichen Naturen in alle gottliche Herrlichkeit erhaben and versetzt sei (1567); Antwort and griindliche Widerlegung der vermeinten Trostschrift Tossani, in der er den ZwirtgliSchen Sakramentaschwarm aufs neue die Bahn bringt (1579).

Amid all these conflicts Marbach's course was determined not by vainglory nor personal malevolence, but by a sincere love of purity in doctrine and of ecclesiastical discipline and order, as he conceived them. His standpoint in the question as to creed subscription was always that in accepting the "Wittenberg Concord" (1536) Strasburg acceded to the

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Lutheran Confession; and he understood this con fession just as the later Lutheran theologians gen erally understood it. The sole canon which he applied in theological controversies was pure Luther anism. From this doctrinal position he combated not only the Calvinists but the Schwenkfeldians and Anabaptists, who were still active at Strasburg; while, on the same platform, he accomplished the introduction of the Lutheran catechism at Strasburg (1554), and strove for the use of uniform hymn books and a common liturgy, though not with im mediate success. He instituted private confession in the Church of St. Nicholas, and kept up there the rite of confirmation when it began to fall into disuse in other Strasburg churches. In the interest of a "uniform doctrine and confession," Marbach also took an active part in bringing about the acceptance of the Formula of Concord (q.v.), as is shown by his correspondence from 1567 with Jacob Andre& and Martin Chemnitz. Moreover, he pre vailed with the Strasburg theologians to sign the Zerbst Formula (1.571), while the official acceptance of the Formula of Concord was opposed by the town council. In the Palatinate he assisted Elector Ludwig, in 1576, to restore Lutheranism after the death of Frederick III. He was likewise eminently active (1564-78) in Zweibrileken (see Wolfgang, Count Palatine). This lean, stirring, industrious little man was by no means lacking in sincere piety, which did not exclude personal irritability, petty intrigues, and doubtful methods in the heat of conflict. Against the Jesuits and the superstitions favored by them he published a vigorous treatise, Von Mirakeln and Wunderzeichen (1571).

Paul Grünberg.

Bibliography: Sources are Marbach's own writings; Die Strassburger Kirchenordnung of 1598; the Christlirhe Leichpredigt, Strasburg, 1612; G. Obrecht, Patriotische Gedenkrede, ib. 1659; J. Fecht, Hist. eccl. saculi xui., supplernentum, Durlach, 1683. Consult: W. T. It6hrich, Geschichte der Reformation im Blame, vol. iii., Strasburg, 1832; various essays in W. Horning, Beiträge zur Airehengeschichte des Elsasses, ib. 1881-93; W. Horning, Dr. Johann Marbach, Beiträge zu dessen Lebembild, ib. 1887; idem, Handbuch der Geschichte,der evangeliech4uthertschen Kirche in Strasabwv, ib. 1963; F. Hubert, Die Strassburger liturgischen Ordnungen im Zeitaiter der Reformation, G6t_ tingen, 1900; J. M. Ran, Quellen zur Geschichte des kirchlichen Unterrote . . . 1630-IB00, i. 1, pp. 141-154, Gütersloh, 1904; T. Gerold, Geschichte der Kirche St. Niklaus in Stras.burg, Strasburg, 1904.