Blue Cord

I have been tagged in the Zwingli Meme by Chris Brady at Targuman. The entire purpose of this meme is to annoy Jim West, who has threatened to remove anyone who participates in the meme from his blogroll. I was removed from Jim’s blogroll about a year ago for sins unknown, so I risk little by participating. Besides, Jim’s blogroll is down to single digits at this point, so I am not sure how big of a threat that is.

The rules of this meme are simple:

1. Post something rude about Zwingli. (Outrageous slander especially welcome.)
2. Tag someone who is not Jim West.

Personally, I was under the impression that zwingli was a type of pasta.¹ The meme seems to suggest that he was a theologian, so I looked him up. I tried most standard theological reference books, but he doesn’t seem to have been important enough to have been included in any of those works. I loaned someone my copy of Irrelevant Theologians of the 16th Century last week, so I had no choice but to head to Wikipedia.

I learned from Wikipedia that Zwingli was actually a stand-up comedian known primarily for doing a passable impersonation of Martin Luther. Although his impersonation gained him a good deal of popularity in Reformation circles, he stopped doing it after the Diet of Worms over fear of how it might hurt his standing with the Catholic church. This effectively ended his show business career, although his twin brother Elmer Fudd — a well-known actor — was able to get him cameo appearances in films from time to time. Years later, Zwingli was able to meet his hero Martin Luther while Zwingli was working as a bus boy at the Marburg Colloquy.²

I hereby tag Jim Getz.

1. They used to serve a baked zwingli casserole at seminary that was to die for! [back]
2. Zwingli’s role in the colloquy has been greatly exaggerated in subsequent accounts. [back]