Wednesday, May 31, 2017

450th Anniversary of the Translation of Guido de Brès

Guido de Brès (1522 – May 31, 1567) was a French-speaking Walloon minister of the gospel, who studied under both John Calvin and Theodore Beza. Raised a Roman Catholic, he was converted to Christ before the age of 20. He would spend most of the rest of his life on the run for his faith. Most famous for his authorship of the Belgic Confession (1561), one of the Three Forms of Unity of the Reformed Churches (he also wrote another confession as well). It is an eloquent and profoundly spiritual milestone in the history of Reformed confessions and creeds, and it is the only Reformation creed written by a martyr. He also wrote Le Baston del la Foy (The Staff of Faith, Able to Shut the Mouths of Faith’s Enemies) (1562) and La Racine, Source et Fondement des Anabaptistes (The Root, the Origins, and the Foundation of the Anabaptists or Rebaptizers of Our Time) (1565), responses to both Roman Catholic and Anabaptists, the two greatest threats to the Reformed Faith at that time. Arrested in 1565, he was tried by the Spanish Inquisition, and ultimately hanged at Valenciennes, France on the last day of May, 1567, 450 years ago today. Before he was executed, he wrote a letter to his wife expressing his faith in Christ and encouraging her in the same, a letter which stands in the annals of church history’s most inspirational writings.



(The Countess de Reux Visiting De Bray and Le Grange in Prison
Illustration from James Wylie's History of Protestantism)

1 comment:

  1. I find this very interesting, as I am a Huguenot historian myself. Jean de Lery was another Genevan student who had a lot of adventures with the Huguenots (also in New World Brazil).
    Thanks for posting this!
    http://blog.hellandfamily.com/DanielInTheWritersDen/
    https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCxmd52VgBzDnOgt7ofqffw

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