Note 25 — Chapter XXI

For full particulars concerning the change, see Rockwell, loc. cit., 216 ff. The latter says, p. 217: “Luther’s opinion obviously changed [before March 12, 1536].... Yet he expressed himself even in 1536 against the divorce [Henry the Eighth’s]; the prohibition [of marriage with a sister in-law] from which the Mosaic Law admitted exceptions, might be dispensed, whereas the prohibition of divorce could not be dispensed,” and, p. 220: “In the change of 1536 the influence of Osiander is unmistakable.... Cranmer, when at Ratisbon in 1532, had visited Osiander several times at Nuremberg, and finally won him over to the side of the King of England.” At the end Rockwell sums up as follows (p. 222): “The expedient of bigamy ... was approved by Luther, Melanchthon, Grynæus, Bucer and Capito, but repudiated by Œcolampadius and Zwingli. Hence we cannot be surprised that Luther, Melanchthon and Bucer should regard favourably the Hessian proposal of bigamy, whereas Zwingli’s successors at Zürich, viz. Bullinger and Gualther, opposed it more or less openly.”