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Zwingli's followers spread his Reformation doctrines through northern Switzerland and into Germany, where they came into contact and conflict with Lutheranism. With Luther, Zwingli believed in justification by faith, the supremacy of Scripture, and predestination of the elect, but the two quarreled bitterly over the meaning of the Eucharist. Luther believed in the real presence of Christ in the bread and wine of Communion; Zwingli argued that the Lord's Supper was only a memorial to the Saviour's redeeming sacrifice. In 1529, friends brought the two men together for a confrontation at Marburg. It did little good. "Your arguments are weak," thundered Luther. "Abandon them and give glory to God." Answered Zwingli: "We too ask you to give glory to God and abandon your begging of the question." Later, Luther declared that Zwingli was in league with the devil.
Fighting Prophet. As Zurich's spiritual dictator, Zwingli matured into a shrewd, power-conscious diplomat who tried to forge an international alliance against the Catholic Swiss cantons. When their armies attacked the Zurich forces in 1531, he buckled on sword and armor to serve as a fighting chaplain at the battle of Kappel. There, mortally wounded, he was captured and killed by the Catholics. His body was quartered by a hangman, smeared with dung and burned.
More a polemicist than a systematic theologian, Zwingli wrote an earthy, lucid prose that is rarely read today except by scholars. But his influence is nonetheless wide. He helped create the Reformed Church doctrine ultimately perfected by John Calvin, who imitated Zwingli in attempting to set up a theocratic city of God at Geneva. "Zwingli was no stained-glass-window saint," writes Pastor Rilliet, but he made "the unremitted search for God the ruling motive of his life."