Conclusion - Vermigli’s ‘Stromatic’ Theology

The description of the religious and political ferment in Italy helps to enlighten Vermigli's early career, while R. Gerald Hobb's account of the 'upper Rhine school' probes the Bucer-Vermigli relationship further. In reconstructing Vermigli's career as Reformer, there is a distinct challenge in recovering the state of his theology prior to his leaving Italy. Peter Martyr Vermigli was a biblical exegete whose fame rests rather on his polemical writings, especially in the sacramentarian controversy. Vermigli's commentary on Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics stands as the exemplary Reformed work of properly philosophical commentary. Here Vermigli shows that his doctrine of justification allowed 'a more positive judgment of Aristotle's ethics than that of Luther' (Baschera). Vermigli's role in the development of philosophy and theology should be reckoned in terms of his remarkable ability to combine such polarities as humanist and scholastic logic, Platonic-Augustinian and Aristotelian-Thomistic method, Reformed hermeneutics and medieval rabbinic commentary. Keywords: Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics ; Peter Martyr Vermigli's 'stromatic' theology; sacramentarian controversy