Calvin (Calvinus, Cauvin, Chauvin, Calvin Jean)

CALVIN (Calvinus, Cauvin, Chauvin, Calvin Jean). - The most important initiator of Protestantism in France, Switzerland and the Netherlands. Among the pseudonyms used by C., let us recall: Martianus Lucanius, Carolus Passelius, Charles d'Espeville.

I. THE MAN

1. Youth and apostasy

C. was born on July 10, 1509 at Noyon (Picardy) to Catholic parents, the second of 6 children. His father was an employee of the episcopal curia, his mother was the daughter of a wealthy innkeeper of Cambrai. Directed toward ecclesiastical studies, at only 12 years of age John already held a prebend (of N. S. de la Gésine), and, subsequently, having received the tonsure, also the chaplaincy of St-Martin de Martheville, which later passed to his younger brother. He did not, however, continue in the sacred Orders, but, with the support of the Montmor family, went to study in Paris. In 1524 he began the course of philosophy at the college of Montaigu, and then that of theology. In 1528, on his father's advice, he abandoned theology in order to devote himself to law, which was to have opened for him the path of the magistracy, and he went to Orléans to the school of Pierre de l'Etoile. Theodore Beza says that his companions called him "accusatif", that is, informer. He lived withdrawn, "sauvage et honteux", a lover of tranquility and study (Opp., XXXI, p. 22). In 1529 C. attended the University of Bourges, where he met the humanist Giovanni Wolmar, who made him resume theological studies, with the intention of winning him over to evangelism.

The times were in fact inflamed with religious novelties. In Paris, Giovanni had witnessed the first attempts of the Lutheran struggle against the Sorbonne, and had lived amid the ferment of reformist ideas, seeing the first trials as well as the first capital executions of the new heretics. A cousin of his, Pietro Roberto, called Olivetano, had given him heterodox writings to read, which made an impression on his soul, planting in it the first seeds of the religious crisis (Opp., IX, p. 51). The apostasy, slowly prepared, occurred in 1533, not without inner turmoil (ibid., V, pp. 358-416). The decisive step on the path of rebellion came with a discourse drafted by him at the request of Nicola Cop for the inauguration of the academic year in the church of the Maturins in Paris on Nov. 1, 1533, in which he affirmed the principle of justification in the Protestant sense and defended the heretics "as those who purely strove to insinuate the Gospel into the souls of the faithful." Forced to leave the city, he wandered through France at Angoulême, Nérac, Noyon, Poitiers, Orléans, until in 1534 he took refuge in Strasbourg, which had become the stronghold of the reformed, and in Basel in 1535. There he completed and brought to light the work Institutio Christianae Religionis, openly contrary to Catholic doctrine, and after a journey to Ferrara in Italy to the court of Ercole II, whose wife Renata of France was his supporter, he went to Geneva in Switzerland, where the reformer Farel convinced him to remain to help him settle the situation in favor of the heretics.

2. C. at Geneva (1536-38; 1541-64). - Precisely in that year (1536) the council of Geneva, which had made itself the promoter of the antipapal movement, had decreed the destruction in all the lands of Vaud of the altars, the tearing down of images and the suspension of every form of Catholic worship. Encouraged by these examples, Farel and C. proposed the Articoli de regimine Ecclesiae with analogous measures, which were accepted by the Two Hundred, who held the legislative power in the city. By other decrees worship was organized in a purely Protestant form, both as regards the Eucharistic Supper and the singing of the Psalms, preaching and the celebration of marriages. The elections favorable to the two reformers increased their power; but the "demonstration of the faith," which was a kind of creed extracted from the Institutio Christianae Religionis, which they sought to impose on the citizenry, met with strong opposition among many Genevans, who had accepted the reform only for political reasons of independence and not in order to place themselves under the yoke of preachers. Thus in the new elections of 1538 the opposing party gained the upper hand, and the new Council forbade the two leaders to preach. Having transgressed the order, they were expelled from the territory. C. took refuge in Bern, then in Basel, until, invited by Bucer, he went to Strasbourg. There he found other leaders of the reform, among them the two Sturm, Capito and many French refugees. The three years he spent in the Alsatian city (1538-41) were among the calmest of his life. C., salaried by the city itself, gave public lectures on Holy Scripture, spiritually guided the French community, and could attend to his favorite studies. He then published the second edition of his Institutio, a celebrated Reply to Sadoleto (1539), bishop of Carpentras, who had tried in vain to lead the Genevans back to the ancient faith, and the Commentarius in Epistolam ad Romanos (1540). In the autumn of 1540 he was united in marriage with Idelette de Buren, widow of an Anabaptist. In 1541 he took part in the colloquies of Haguenau, Worms and Regensburg, while at Geneva the situation had again turned in his favor, and the three Councils of the city officially addressed to him the invitation to return. C., a most skillful politician, had himself entreated, interposing delays that were to sharpen the desire for his coming, and opposing letters from certain magistrates of Strasbourg who demanded him back. Finally he consented to the pressing insistences, not without laying down conditions that made him practically the arbiter of the situation. On Sept. 16, 1541 he re-entered Geneva, obtaining the approval, with few modifications, of Les Ordonnances Ecclésiastiques de l'Église de Genève, with which he organized the entire domestic and social life of the citizens according to Calvinist doctrine (v. the text in Opp., X, p. 15 ff.) and which became the fundamental law of state for the Genevan republic. In 1543 all the laws and customs were reorganized and the civil Constitution completed. C. could be satisfied; he had imposed the ordinances he wanted, and was, in a certain sense, become the uncontested master of the city.

3. Government of C

The direct contact that C. had had at Strasbourg with the German reform had allowed him to note its blameworthy drawbacks. It had not improved morals, but had subjected the spiritual power to the civil one and had favored social disorders with its excessive spirit of insubordination and independence. The Genevan Church was therefore placed by him on foundations that would not repeat those errors. The State was to be subject to the Church, having no other reason for being than to make its subjects observe the divine law. Religion was the supreme arbiter of public life. With these criteria a government was constituted which, under a democratic appearance, was oligarchic. The actual government depended on a few. The class of preachers with its General Assembly (Congregation) was the true ruler of public life. The ordinances had begun by affirming that God had provided for the constitution of the primitive Church with the creation of pastors, doctors, elders and deacons; that was the "rectus ordo" which alone could be acceptable to him. Geneva too, then, would be governed in conformity with it.

The pastors, or ministers of the word, were the essential element of the community. They had the task of preaching the Gospel, administering the Sacraments, teaching, admonishing, reproving in public and in private, examining and instituting future pastors. C. personally trained the first ministers, gathering them every Friday for scriptural and theological expositions, and regulated preaching, establishing three parishes in which sermons were held three times a week and on Sunday. Subsequently there would be the practice of a daily sermon in every church of the city. Those of C. were treated with much care, were not long, so that the whole service, with the accompaniment of songs and prayers, lasted no more than an hour. The doctors had charge of the schools and of the education of the young. To the elders, twelve like the apostles, belonged the care of discipline. They were to be elected by the three councils from among men "of upright life, honest, without stain, above every suspicion and, above all, full of the fear of God" and chosen in such a way as to represent all the districts of the city. The deacons, then, were to visit the sick, assist the poor and be of help to the ministers.

The most characteristic organ of C.'s spiritual domination was the consistory, a kind of tribunal, made up of six ministers and the twelve elders, which met every week and kept watch over the morals of the citizens and their attendance at religious duties. In the graver cases it handed the guilty party over to the council for punishment. The civil authority had to execute its decisions, and everyone, including the magistrates, was subject to it. The consistory used spiritual weapons, such as admonition, and in extreme cases exclusion from communion.

No measure aroused as much hostility as this tribunal with its methods. The citizen found it harsh and contrary to civic traditions "to be summoned before a court of ministers almost all of them foreigners" and "to be forced to beg mercy from God and from justice," not to mention that the consistory by its very nature encouraged denunciation. Very many could not help comparing the despotic intransigence of the new yoke with the previous ecclesiastical government of the bishops, so much gentler, and it did not seem reasonable to them that this had been overthrown only to fall into a worse situation. Hundreds of people were in fact tried and condemned. Therefore, if the establishment of C. in Geneva in the first period (1542-46) saw the consolidation of his power, in the second (1546-54) he had to fight a violent opposition, which he managed to overcome only through his great firmness, tenacity and severity.

In these years C., struck in his dearest affections by the death of his wife after that of his only child still in swaddling clothes, became increasingly closed and gloomy. Physically he was tormented by migraines, stomach pains, exhaustion. But his activity knew no pause. Religiously he devoted himself completely to the reform, not only in Geneva, but intervening through his letters in the Protestant questions of all Switzerland, and also of France, Germany and Sweden, while he welcomed into his city the Huguenots persecuted by Henry II. Nor were there lacking doctrinal controversies among companions in heresy; thus in 1551 with Jerome Bolsec, who had publicly attacked his doctrines on predestination. C. succeeded in having the expulsion of the adversary decreed and in having his own doctrine officially consecrated. Nor did he cease composing literary works of a theological nature. Between 1546 and 1555 he published the Commentaries on the Old and New Testament.

The most salient fact of this period, however, was the reformer's struggle with Michael Servetus. This Spaniard, who already in 1530 had published a heretical work on the Most Holy Trinity, with which he had scandalized Catholics and Protestants, and who since 1545 had entered into epistolary relations with C., had challenged many of his theories with an unpleasant tone of superiority. C. then wrote to Farel that "if Servetus came to Geneva he would not permit him to leave it alive." Now precisely in 1553 this man, having had to flee from Vienna where he had been condemned to the stake, had stopped for a night in Geneva, perhaps yielding to the irresistible temptation to see his competitor up close. But, once recognized, he was immediately arrested. According to Genevan law the accuser had to go to prison with the accused until the tribunal was convinced of the guilt. Therefore C. presented his own accusation formulated in 40 articles, through one of his secretaries, who was however soon released. On 15 Aug. 1553 began the first of those interrogations that have remained famous, in which several times C. himself played the part of accuser. From the proceedings it became clear that if one relied only on theological opinions, the trial would have been excessively prolonged; then C. accused Servetus of doctrines subversive not only of religion, but of society, and the unfortunate man was condemned. The death sentence was juridically illegal, and according to Protestant principles of free examination, a contradiction; the ordinances of 1542 recognized in fact as sole penalties banishment. On the morning of the execution C. went to the prisoner, who vainly implored mercy, and in fact Servetus, led to the Town Hall Square, was burned alive. C. received many letters of congratulation, among them those of Melanchthon (Op. Melanchtonis, XV, p. 268), but also severe criticisms, especially from Sebastian Castellio, and he had to write in 1554 an apology for his act: Defensio orthodoxae fidei; but this did not prevent him from being accused from then on of a religious intolerance worse than that which he reproached in the ancient faith.

Politically, however, with this episode C. gained the upper hand over his adversaries, who had vainly requested a verdict of acquittal, and who saw the elections of 1555 favorable to the reformer. Then Perrin, leader of the opposing movement, sought to promote an insurrection, which did not succeed. His party, called the Perrinists or Libertines, was dispersed with the expulsion of very many members, of whom 60 were condemned to capital punishment, which fortunately they escaped with the exception of only two.

From then (1555) until 1564, the year of his death, C. had full power. The alliance with Bern, the struggle against the Duke of Savoy, the formation of a new bourgeoisie with the classes favorable to C. who had immigrated from France, the repression of contrary elements with the condemnations issued by the consistory, made Geneva the best-organized fortress of Protestantism in Europe.

4. The Genevan Academy (1559)

Among the works founded by C. the first true Protestant university of international character both in its teachers and its students, namely the Genevan Academy, deserves to be remembered, destined to radiate and perpetuate his work, of which Theodore Beza was the first rector (Leges Academ. Genev. Promulgatio, Geneva 1559).

Already in 1565 there had been talk of founding a University in Geneva, but the concession made by Charles IV had been revoked; Pope Martin V had given another charter of foundation in 1418; and thus a college had arisen, later replaced in 1536 by the "Collège de Rive" called the "Grande Eschole." C. enlarged it and made it become a true university. The first public lecturers of the new academy were Chevalier, Bérault and Tagaut, who gave it a note of classicism. Already in 1560 the first publication appeared, a Hebrew grammar by Chevalier, followed in the same year by a Latin version of Appian of Alexandria made by Bérault. As for Jean Tagaut, he composed a Latin poem Protrepicon ad Hieropolia in honor of the holy city (Geneva), in which the fugitive Protestants of Europe found asylum, dedicating it to the people and the senate. C. enjoyed those beginnings promising for his cause. In 1456 the students had already risen to 1500.

5. Last years and death (1559-64)

The last period of the reformer's life was characterized by physical and moral sufferings and by exhausting activity for the spread of Protestantism. Already in 1558 C. had had an attack of pleurisy and had begun to spit blood.

From 1560 other ailments had been added, such as kidney stones, gout and ulcers, so that at the beginning of 1563 he was almost continually confined to bed, without however neglecting to write and dictate, and also, when he was permitted, to preach. During this time he composed the Commentarius in quatuor libros Mosis, in formam harmonice Digestus (1563) and the commentaries on the books of Jeremiah, finally completing his exegeses with the commentary on Joshua. Having become tubercular, he no longer rose from his bed. On 2 April 1564, Easter day, he was carried to the temple to receive the supper for the last time, and on the 5th he made his will. He had not enriched himself in the government, and his estate was modest, amounting to only 200 crowns. The last recommendations made to the magistrates and to the pastors, divulged by the ministers who were his supporters, have a self-panegyrical character. The innovator would have assured them that he had taught the word of God without errors, and would have exhorted them to thank God for the dangers from which his action had freed them. He added the warning not to make changes and innovations, because all changes were dangerous and often harmful (ibid., XXI, p. 100), contradicting with these words his own conduct, which had been entirely one of innovation with respect to the preceding faith. To the magistrates he recommended the administration of justice with equity and moderation, thanking them for having so often put up with him. The phrasing is a strange compound of pious, humble and devout expressions, with a great and lofty conception of himself. In his last days he prayed much and asked God's forgiveness. On the evening of 27 May 1564 C. died: he was fifty-five years old. The following day he was buried at Plain Palais, without any tombstone, according to his wish, marking the place of burial (ibid., XXI, p. 106), so that even today his bones cannot be found. His death was not mourned. He himself, before dying, said in his message to the Church of Bern: «They feared me more than they loved me!». Beza, appointed by him as his successor, delivered the panegyric of him, saying that with his death «splendida lux nobis erepta est» (ibid., XXII, p. 168), and Colladon wrote that on that day «the greatest light of the world had been taken up into heaven» (ibid., XXII, p. 105). But the system of repressions employed and the «chagrin et difficile» character caused C. to be cursed by many. His enemies spread the rumor that the innovator's last moments had been under God's curse, that he had died in despair, and that a certain Harennius, having slipped into his room, had lifted the cloth that covered the corpse, revealing the signs of a shameful disease. Rumors that have all the characteristics of slanderous legend, but that indicate the mentality of the age and the animosity of not a few Genevans.

II. THE WRITINGS

Of the immense work carried on by C. as teacher, preacher and writer, there remain more than 2,200 sermons in manuscript, and about a hundred works, not only exegetical but doctrinal, polemical, apologetic, liturgical, homiletic and literary, to which must be added the letters, the opinions or responsa and even an epinicion to Christ.

The best old edition of C.'s Latin works is the one made at Amsterdam in 1671 in 9 vols.; but another in 7 vols., published at Geneva in 1617 and the following years, was already in circulation. A large part of these works was translated into French and English. Among these editions, the collection Oeuvres en français de J. Calvin, recueillies pour la première fois. Précédées de sa vie par Théod. de Bèze, et d'une notice bibliographique par P. L. Jacob, bibliophile (Paris 1842) is well known, as are the translations prepared by the "Calvin Translation Society," made by Henry Beveridge (Edinburgh 1845-51).

A good critical edition is found in the Corpus Reformatorum under the title Ioannis Calviis opera quae supersunt omnia (59 vols., Brunswick and Berlin 1863-1900), begun by J. W. Baum, E. Cunitz and E. Reuss, and completed by Lobstein and Erichson. The list of C.'s principal writings may be read in the Cyclopaedia Bibliographica of J. Darling (London 1854, coll. 554-56). The most recent French translation of the Institutio is the one published in 4 vols. by J. Pannier (Paris 1936).

III. THE DOCTRINE

The term "Calvinism" serves to designate the whole of the heterodox theological doctrine proper to the Reformed Churches that draw their inspiration from the school of C. This doctrine is centered on a particular interpretation of divine predestination, on a peculiar conception of moral and social life, and on a consequent form proper to worship and to the political system.

Chronologically Calvinism appears after Lutheranism and Zwinglianism, and dialectically it tends to surpass them, but without excluding their guiding principles, which it seeks to fuse into a super-unity, to which it gives a character of its own and original. Calvinism and Lutheranism come together and roughly identify with each other in the doctrine of free justification, of the imputation of the merits of Christ and in fiduciary faith, as in the denial of the actual transubstantiation, of the eucharistic sacrifice and of the seven Sacraments, reduced to only two, then differing in their particular interpretations, in which, especially with regard to the Sacraments, Calvinism draws its inspiration from the Zwinglian doctrine, though transcending it.

All three systems uphold the uniqueness of the Bible as the norm of faith. Holy Scripture, inspired by God, would be the only infallible criterion, the foundation and the norm of what one must believe and do. But while Lutheranism and Zwinglianism pass to the private interpretation of Scripture under the influence of the Spirit, C. is more rigid and does not admit free examination. The objectivity of Revelation, since God is the direct inspirer of the Bible, presupposes the truth already contained in it; this must be discovered beneath the letter (cf. Inst., ch. I, 20-21). Only the predestined come to understand its profound meaning, because it is suggested to them, through the Holy Spirit, by conscience. Nevertheless Calvinism connects once again with the other two conceptions, when it rejects the living Magisterium of the Church, the supremacy of the Pope, the value of Tradition and of the Councils, and when it denies to the Catholic Church the authority to interpret and judge the true meaning of Holy Scripture (Inst., ch. I, 21-35).

The heads of doctrine most particularly proper to Calvinism can be gathered from the work Institutio Christianae Religionis, published by C. at Basel in 1536, in which he fixed his own principles. These in the following years were not subjected to new developments, but rather to retouchings, deepenings and clarifications. C. always showed himself little inclined to correct or revise his own ideas, and from the very beginning of his apostasy he had his system already completed in almost all its particulars.

In fact the Institutio became the foundation of the religious belief of Geneva and thereafter of Calvinism, and was regarded by the Genevans almost as a second Bible. The consistory proclaimed its doctrine "holy," forbidding anyone to speak of it in a contrary sense. C. too said that it was more the work of God than his own. And really this work, in that part which it preserves of revealed truth, that is, of the ancient faith in the enunciation of certain points of the Catholic religion conjoined with errors, has aspects of profound spirituality and very high religiosity, which are precisely those that attract souls and minds, unfortunately then led astray into heretical conclusions by the additions, interpretations or denials of C. The subjects treated can be inferred from the twenty-one chapters of the work (in the present exposition reference is made to the 1553 edition edited by R. S. Oliva). In the first two chapters C. treats of the knowledge of God and the knowledge of man, the foundation of religion (ch. I-II). In the third and fourth, of the law and of vows (ch. III-IV). Then of Faith and of the Apostles' Creed (ch. V-VIII), of penance (ch. IX), of justification through faith and of the merit of good works (ch. X), of the similarities and differences between the Old and the New Testament (ch. XI), of Christian liberty (ch. XII), of human Traditions (ch. XIII), of the predestination and providence of God (ch. XIV), of prayer (ch. XV), of the Sacraments in general (ch. XVI), of Baptism and of the Supper (ch. XVII, XVIII), of the other five Sacraments which he calls false (ch. XIX), of civil administration (ch. XX), ending with the norms of a Christian life (ch. XXI). The same themes return more concisely in the Catechismus Ecclesiae Genevensis, that is, in the formula for instructing children, which the reformer inculcated in the ministers, even foreign ones, in order to reduce his adherents to the unity of the faith.

From these sources the hinges of Calvinist doctrine emerge clearly.

1. The absolute sovereignty of God, justification and predestination

All true wisdom, says C., consists in the knowledge of God and of ourselves. God can be known first of all from the spectacle of creation in its manifestations and from the providence that governs it. Secondly from Holy Scripture and finally from the interior testimony of the Holy Spirit. The knowledge of God thus derived must lead man to the fear and reverence of God and make him understand that in Him every good must be sought and that to Him all gratitude is due. It not only makes him know the love, patience and mercy of God toward men, but also the rigor of his vengeance against sinners, and therefore man must be induced to wish to serve God, and to honor him with the innocence of life and unfeigned obedience, and to rest in everything on his goodness (cf. Inst., ch. I, 1-7). His knowledge must lead him to humility, because human nature, created in the likeness and image of God in Adam, is through original sin totally vitiated and corrupted, so that original sin, which passes from father to son, is not only the deprivation of all goods, but is a contamination that has made human nature fertile in every kind of evil. Free will itself is spoiled, so that, practically, if one is not regenerated by God, men choose only among evil. In short the corruption is such that man is on his part totally incapable of any good and inclined to complete evil. To this weakness of the human will God brings aid with his Grace; and the willing of good comes from grace. God promotes in man obedience to the law, and there is nothing good in man. Salvation is the work of God alone in everything. God is the Absolute, intelligence and will incomprehensible, inaccessible, legislating, sovereign, omnipotent, on whom man has total dependence, because the world of the finite is from the beginning contained in the Infinite, which also contains its freedom. C. speaks with theological equivocation and has already made assertions contrary to the truth revealed and transmitted by the Catholic Church. In the logic of error C. proceeds. God "absolute autonomy" is the living God; he acts, rejects and accepts, damns and saves; and seeks his own glory, disposing of men with absolute freedom, in the twofold predestination to faith, to Grace and to beatitude, or to infidelity and damnation. Salvation comes from God and is had through faith, with the application of the redemption of Jesus Christ. Such faith is a complete trust in God, whereby the predestined one does not place his trust in the observance of the Law or in his own righteousness, because then no one can be held just, "but setting aside every thought of works," which he must nevertheless observe, he turns to embrace "only the mercy of God, and, turning his gaze away from himself, directs it to Christ alone" (Inst., ch. XII, 2).

The law indeed has as its office "to teach, stimulate and exhort to the good," which, however, in fact man never fully accomplishes, so that the real question is not "how we are just, but how, though being unjust and unworthy, we are reckoned just" (ibid.). The remedy is in Christ, in whom God has freely placed "every happiness for our misery, and every wealth for our poverty; in whom He opens to us His heavenly treasures, so that all our faith must look to Him, on Him must depend all our expectation, in Him must be fixed and rest all our hope" (Inst., ch. XV, 1). The sinner must pass from faith to repentance, which has two parts: "mortification and vivification" (ibid., ch. IX, 2): the first is "the sorrow and terror of the soul conceived from the knowledge of sin and from the sense of God's judgment." "When one is led to a true knowledge of sin, then he truly begins to hate and to execrate sin; he sincerely displeases himself; he confesses himself wretched and lost, and desires to be different. If with this he is touched by some feeling of God's judgment, then he lies struck and dismayed, he trembles humiliated and cast down, he is discouraged and despairs. This is the first part of repentance...; vivification is the consolation that is born of faith, that is, when man, prostrated by the consciousness of sin and struck by the fear of God, turning to the goodness of God, to the mercy, grace, salvation that is through Christ, raises himself, breathes, takes heart again and, as it were, returns to life from death" (ibid., ch. IX, 2). C., reporting this doctrine, completes and summarizes it in these words: "repentance is the true conversion of our life to God, originating from a sincere and serious fear of God, which consists in the mortification of our flesh and of the old man, and in the vivification of the Spirit" (ibid., ch. IX, 4); through it the predestined man lays aside evil actions, mortifies his passions, and tends toward true justice, while with trust in God's mercy, intimate and personal, he has the certainty that the promises of mercy made by the Lord are verified in him, and this assurance gives him peace. God reckons him just, imputing to him not his sins but the merits of Christ. Faith alone saves and not works (ibid., ch. X, 2). This faith does not originate from man, but is the work of the Spirit, and is a free gift given by God to His elect. The election to have this saving faith, which characterizes the elect, depends solely on God, who grants it independently of any foreknowledge of human merits (ibid., ch. XIV, 6); all salvation depends exclusively on God. He predetermines by absolute decree what He wills to be done with every man, so that for some eternal life is foreordained, for others eternal damnation: saved or lost, independently of anything other than the sovereign will of God. History will be nothing but the unfolding of a divine plan immutably foreordained, in which man will act to manifest the glory of God.

C. corrupts the sense of the Pauline texts (Eph. 1, 4; Col. 1, 12; I Tim. 1, 9; Rom. 9, 11, and others) in order to uphold his horrible sentence of predestination to damnation, and he will assail the doctrine of Ambrose, Origen, Jerome and of all Catholic tradition, which teaches otherwise (ibid., ch. XIV, 5-14).

This "antecedent" predestination of some to eternal damnation is one of the most characteristic points of Calvinian errors. He himself is aware of its jarring note, and nevertheless repeatedly affirms it: "alii ad salutem, alii ad damnationem praedestinantur" (ibid., ch. XIV, 1). And although he recalls that it is "a boldness and wickedness" to wish to penetrate into God's secrets, which are "a labyrinth, from which one will find no exit" (ibid.), he dares to affirm that this doctrine has been revealed by God through His Word (ibid.). He immediately perceives the difficulty arising in many minds: that then it is not worth the trouble to devote oneself to good works, because "if God by eternal and immutable decree has fixed either life or death... and if by one's own works one can do nothing to change one's lot," it is better to plunge into every desire and passion (ibid., ch. XIV, 22). C. calls those who reason thus "swine who with these impure blasphemies defile the doctrine of predestination" (ibid., ch. XIV, 22). But it is certain that the heretical manner in which he presents the sublime mystery of predestination, corrupting its entire content, leads logically to despair and to the most insane consequences.

C. moreover evidently cannot give a reason why God is merciful to His elect, except that it so pleases Him, and likewise regarding the reprobation of others, for which he finds no other explanation than the will of God who thus wills to illustrate "His glory in their damnation." He who has abusively formed this false concept of predestination is led to confess it a decretum horribile (Comm. Ep. ad Rom., IX, 14) and inexplicable. Yet he does not shrink from even more horrible explanations, saying that in order that the reprobate may plunge to their destiny, they are deprived by God of the opportunity to hear the sacred word, or are hardened through that very preaching, being made blind and deaf. But anything whatsoever must be held just because God wills it so. With this C. goes against the gentle doctrine revealed by God and taught by the Catholic Church that God wills the salvation of all men, even after original sin, having given His beloved Son for the salvation of all (cf. Io. 3, 16; II Cor. 5, 15; I Tim. 2, 1-6), and that one will reap what one has sown, so that he who sows in his flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, he who sows in the spirit will from the spirit reap eternal life (cf. Gal. 6, 8). No one is reprobated except he who, freely sinning, has rejected the means of salvation offered to him by divine Goodness, because contributing to salvation are not only the efficacy of Grace but the exercise of men's free cooperation. C., on the other hand, like heretics in general, abandoning the teaching of the Church to which alone Jesus Christ promised the infallible assistance of the Holy Spirit, forgets the definitions of the Councils, particularly those of Orange (a. 520) and of Valence (a. 855), and the doctrine of the Fathers, according to which "no one is predestined to evil" (Denz-U, 160, 200, 300, 316, 321 etc.) but just as "no one is saved against his will," so he who perishes "is damned by the merit of his own iniquity" (ibid., 200, 316, 318). The will of God indeed, though sovereign, is also holy, just and loving, "and cannot damn anyone without there being merit on his part" (St. Augustine, Cont. Iul., III, 35). The Council of Trent (1545-63) will take up the question again, specifying Catholic doctrine on justification and predestination, and condemning as heresies the errors of the innovators, and those of C. (Sess. VI, chs. 1-16; Denz-U, pp. 793-810 with the relevant canons, ibid., pp. 811-43).

The reaction to Calvinist doctrine, however, came not only from the Catholic side, but from the Protestants themselves, among whom was Jerome Bolsec; and later Arminius, who sought to vindicate human freedom and responsibility, teaching that the inherited tendency to evil had not suppressed free will, and that God comes to the aid of all with "prevenient Grace." The Arminians sought to draw closer to Catholic doctrine, while remaining in error, and in fact they fought Calvinist theories against predestination to such an extent that every sect which, following their example, does not follow C.'s theories on this point is today called Arminian. Other Arminians maintained that divine reprobation was brought about only in foresight of original sin (postlapsarian), while the Gomarists declared it absolute and antecedent to the foresight of any sin (antelapsarian). C. then compounded his theory with the doctrine of "Irresistible Grace" for the elect, which infallibly produces salutary acts by intrinsic virtue and to which one cannot resist, and with the certainty that the elect must have of their perseverance. He also taught that sins do not take away predestination.

2. The Sacraments

According to C., the Sacraments are purely external signs instituted by Jesus Christ to comfort the weakness of faith, and by which the faithful in turn testify before others to their piety toward God. In other words, they are symbols by which the Lord confirms the promises of his benevolence to the human conscience (Inst., ch. XVI, 1). They are not efficacious signs of Grace, as the papists instead teach, nor is there any difference between those of the old and the new Law (ibid., ch. XVI, 22). In proportion to the faith with which they are received, they preserve, foster and increase the knowledge of Christ, and cause one to possess and taste more of his riches (Inst., ch. XVI, 16). C. is very vague and departs greatly from Catholic theology, according to which the Sacraments really confer Grace on anyone who receives them duly (Council of Trent, Sess. VII). C. admits only two Sacraments: Baptism and the Supper. Baptism serves to strengthen and increase faith; it is a distinguishing mark of Christians, and is "a kind of diploma which assures that sins are blotted out in such a way as to be no longer remembered or imputed in the sight of God" (Inst., ch. XVII, 1). It is conferred only once, but its efficacy extends not only to the past, but to one's whole life. Indeed, the Baptism received is a testimony that the redemption of Christ has already been applied, and therefore, whenever one does not fall into sin, one must remember one's Baptism and thereby be confirmed in the faith, through which one is always certain and assured of the remission of sins: "Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved," says C., applying the words of Mark (16:16) in this sense and thereby denying any further sacrament of Penance or Confession (ibid., ch. XVII, 4).

As for the Baptism of the Baptist, it was the same ministry as that later entrusted to the Apostles, nor is there any difference between the two rites (ibid., ch. XVII, 7). Nor should the value of Baptism be considered from the hand of the one who administers it, but from the hand of God, from whom it has come (ibid., ch. XVII, 16). Circumcision differed from Baptism only as a ceremony, but had the same inner efficacy (ibid., ch. XVII, 22), and like it, Baptism must also be given to infants (ibid., ch. XVII, 23-51). The Supper, on the other hand, is "the spiritual banquet, in which Christ has called himself the life-giving bread, and with which he feeds souls for blessed immortality. The signs are the bread and the wine, which are sanctified into the body and blood of Christ, so that they may represent his invisible communion" (ibid., ch. XVIII, 1). C. denies transubstantiation (ibid., 6) and the real presence of Christ, but admits a spiritual and dynamic (virtual) presence; it is "as if Christ himself showed himself present and allowed himself to be touched by us" (ibid., ch. XVIII, 3). All the words spoken by Christ in the institution or in the promise of the Eucharist are interpreted by C. in a tropical and symbolic sense (ibid., ch. XVIII, 7 ff.). C. does not admit the Eucharistic Sacrifice, but declares the Supper useful, under both kinds, as a memorial of Christ, a symbol of him which comes to increase faith and the union of charity among the faithful, and because these in Communion receive "through faith" the virtue and the benefits of the Sacrifice of the Cross. So that it is fitting to receive Communion frequently and not only once a year (ibid., ch. XVIII, 41-43), and under both kinds (ibid., 45-49). C. then denies the other five Sacraments of Confirmation, Penance, Extreme Unction, Order and Matrimony, seeking polemically against the papists, whom he often mocks, to demonstrate that these are either of purely ecclesiastical origin or were instituted by Christ in a sense other than that attributed to them by the Church (ibid., ch. XIX).

In this part too, the mixture of errors and truths comes from the fact that C., like the other innovators, trusted too much in his own sense in the interpretation of the Sacred Texts, departing from and abandoning the traditional teaching of the Church.

Rightly, therefore, the famous Dominican Father Ambrose Catharinus, at the beginning of the third session of the Council of Trent (4 February 1546), in the oration he delivered, explicitly alluded to the necessity of union with the Pope, of looking to Peter, who according to the word of the Lord confirms his brethren (Concilium Tridentinum, ed. Goerresiana, Freiburg im Breisgau [abbreviation CT], IV, 585). The Council of Trent, therefore, in its action for the extirpation of heresies, which was one of the principal ends for which it was convoked (CT, IV, 548), did not fail to promulgate two preliminary decrees, De canonicis Scripturis and circa abusus ex Scripturis provenientes, which had in view the establishment of the truth denied by Calvin, namely that the rule, the norm, and the criterion for directing one's life, as it appeared from the Sacred Texts, was not Scripture alone, but the judgment of the Church through both Scripture and the apostolic traditions. For Jesus Christ, having established his Church, before ascending into heaven, told the Apostles to go into all the world to proclaim his Gospel (Mt 28:19) by means of preaching: "Go into all the world, preach the Gospel to every creature...". And indeed the Apostles went preaching everywhere with the assistance of the Lord, who confirmed their word with miracles... (Mk 16:15-20). So the first announcement of the Gospel was not made with writings, but with the word. And the Apostles, many of whom wrote nothing, and their successors, were jealous guardians of the truth and watched carefully lest errors infiltrate the teaching, as is evident from what the apostolic Fathers and apologists narrate of their prompt resistance wherever attempts appeared to introduce changes into the deposit of Sacred Revelation. Therefore Sacred Scripture was not the sole criterion of truth; Jesus promised his unfailing assistance and that of the Holy Spirit to the teaching Church, so that it, and not the private interpretation of individuals, should remain "the pillar and ground of the truth" (1 Tim 3:15), and in entrusting to St. Peter "the keys of the kingdom of heaven" and giving him the charge to feed his sheep and his lambs (Jn 21:15), he promised that upon him he would build his Church against which the gates of hell would not prevail (Mt 16:18), all promises that assure that the truth of the divine message would be preserved incorrupt, and without contamination of falsehood, in the "Church with its visible head." Therefore the Council, in order to curb the presumption of those who, trusting in their own sense, interpreted Sacred Scripture according to their own fancy, making it say even what was purely their own imagination, recalled this truth to mind, reaffirming that with regard to the sense and the true interpretation of Sacred Scripture "the only legitimate interpreter was the Church alone, as the one to whom Christ had entrusted the teaching and the incorrupt transmission of the truth" even to the consummation of the ages, and that consequently the private interpretation of Sacred Scripture that went against the unanimous sense of the Holy Fathers was reproved (CT, V, 91-92).

In the subsequent sessions, after long study congregations, the dogmatic decrees were approved which clearly defined the doctrine on the seven Sacraments instituted by Jesus Christ in the genuine sense handed down by apostolic tradition; namely, of Baptism and Confirmation (Sess. VII: CT, V, 994 ff.), of the Eucharist as sacrament (Sess. XIII, XXI) and as sacrifice (Sess. XXII: CT, VIII, 959-62); of Penance and Extreme Unction (Sess. XIV: Denz-U, 894-906, 907-10); of Orders (Sess. XXIII: CT, IX, 620-22), and of Matrimony (Sess. XXIV: CT, IX, 965-68). In their splendid enunciation and exact formulation they became the most objective and lucid condemnation of Calvinist sacramental doctrine.

3. Morals, Church and worship

Calvin rightly distinguishes between the morality of a simple philosopher and that of a Christian, and in conformity with Catholic teaching he inculcates the love of true justice. Man is not inclined to it by nature, but is repeatedly recalled to it by God in Scripture, because God is holy, and union with Him presupposes sanctification; since God cannot unite himself with one who lives in iniquity and uncleanness (Inst., ch. XXI, 1-2). Moreover, God the Father has presented Christ as the exemplar, according to which men must model themselves. They are called to be children of God, they have been purified in Baptism, and it would be the height of ingratitude and impropriety on their part if they did not strive for purity of life, all the more so since they are temples of God and called to eternal glory (ibid., ch. XXI, 3-4). Calvin coincides here with the traditional teaching of the Church and has most beautiful pages, especially where he demonstrates that in order to attain this end God has given his law of the ten Commandments, which directs man in virtue, and that according to this law man must work to give glory to God, remembering that he does not belong to himself, but is God's possession (ibid., ch. XXI, 6). The law of the Lord leads to subduing vices and passions, to exercising disinterested charity toward one's neighbor, loving him according to God and the precepts of the Apostle (1 Cor 13:4), and all the other virtues that Christ taught; which does not happen without mortification and self-denial (Inst., ch. XXI, 9-13). Self-denial must also lead to abandonment and total resignation to God, in all that He wishes to dispose concerning the life of each one, and to the patient acceptance of the crosses that the true disciples of Christ must bear, whose purposes are illustrated by Calvin with much wisdom (ibid. ch. XXI, 14-17). One must be ready to struggle in defense of justice, to endure for its sake even ignominy and calamity, always aiming at Christian patience and not at the earth, but at blessed eternity (ibid., ch. XXI, 27).

Nevertheless, even life here below, however full of miseries, is to be considered by the elect among God's blessings, and man must render thanks to the Lord for it. Earthly life is indeed filled with God's benefits which demonstrate his infinite goodness, and kindle in the soul the desire to taste God better in the hereafter (ibid., ch. XXI, 28-29). Therefore one must not fear death too much, all the more so since with the resurrection the predestined one will enjoy eternally. As for the use of earthly goods, the rule must be moderation, detaching the heart from them, and using them for good. Calvin also admits various vocations among men, to which each one must correspond, knowing that they have been established by God for the common good and for that of each individual, so that each one, in fulfilling his own task, not only pleases God but has peace (ibid., ch. XXI, 30-36). This body of doctrine is substantially common to every Christian confession. C. nevertheless adds here and there some erroneous assertions of his own; thus when he affirms that concupiscence is already in itself sin; that all actions, even those of the just, are stained by guilt, and that man, as long as he is not reborn through the work of the Holy Spirit, can do nothing but sin; that the Christian must scrupulously observe the law of God in order to render himself acceptable to Him, but without expecting from the good works performed any merit, since they possess none; that there is no difference between mortal and venial sins, all being equally a transgression of the will of God; that the law of the Old Testament continues to exist, abolished by Christ only in its ceremonial part. C. also makes erroneous comments on the tenor of the individual Commandments, as for example on the second, concerning the worship of sacred images, in which he misrepresents Catholic doctrine. Nor should we forget the fundamental error of irresistible Grace for the elect, which, not being available to others, cuts short the impulse toward good in those who think they are not numbered among them.

As for the society of the predestined, it constitutes the invisible Church and the communion of Saints. To it belong those who have faith understood in the Calvinist sense, and only they. This Church is one, holy and catholic (Catech. Eccl. Genev.: de Fide). There also exists a visible Church, composed of the individual local Churches in which the word of God is preached and the Sacraments are administered in conformity with it (Inst., ch. VIII, 8). Where the word of God is violated and the administration of the Sacraments is corrupted, the visible Church ceases to exist. C. combats the Roman Church and the Papacy. The Pope is neither a bishop, nor vicar of Christ, nor successor of Peter, nor head of the Church (ibid., ch. VIII, 129); he admits instead a hierarchy with Ministers of divine institution, but not in the Catholic sense, the ancient priesthood having been transferred to Christ alone (ibid., ch. XXIX); he also admits a universal priesthood of all the faithful, whose sacrifice is the praise of God (ibid., ch. VII, 5).

The individual churches are governed by Ministers or Pastors, assisted by doctors, elders and deacons (laymen); the Ministers are all equal among themselves (ibid., ch. IV, 9). In every temple the divine word must be preached and worship exercised, which consists above all in the Supper and in sacred song and in prayer. In the second edition of the Institutio, C. treats extensively of prayer, and shows the Catholic influence. The official ritual that organizes the liturgy in the Calvinist temples is entitled: Manual of Prayers and Ecclesiastical Songs, with the manner of administering the Sacraments and of consecrating Marriage according to the custom of the Ancient Church (Geneva 1542). C. was inspired in it by the models adopted by Luther and by Zwingli, and by the Strasbourg ordinance of 1539, which he had made use of during his stay in that city; nor did he omit certain forms of the Catholic liturgy such as the confession of sins of the «Confiteor» type before Communion, the recitation of the Creed or Symbol after the Sermon, and the final blessing.

The result was a cultic practice that the reformer sought to make ever more worthy. In its definitive form, the singing of the Psalms with magnificent chorales also entered into the office. C. had a sense of art and of music, and had understood the importance they have for touching human hearts and carrying them to God, when they are used appropriately.

As regards the Calvinist conception of the political system and of its relations with the Church, it rests on these principles: the State is necessary and of divine institution; its attribution is the temporal prosperity of the citizens in subordination to their spiritual good and therefore dependently on the Church. It must therefore cultivate and maintain the external worship of God, defend religion and the Constitution of the Church. It is the office of the magistrates to protect the sacred ministry and thus to remove every idolatry and false worship, to destroy the kingdom of the Antichrist and to promote that of Christ. The Calvinist State is the secular arm of the reformed Church. The two powers are conceived in Calvinian theocracy in the relations of «supreme power» of the Church and of «duty of dependence» of the State (Inst., ch. VIII, 170-71; ch. XX, 4-28). Such a conception favored the rise of National Churches or of Church-States as against the supranationality proper to Catholicism.

The Calvinist doctrines spread from Geneva with incredible rapidity. First of all in Switzerland, where the Catechismus Genevensis (1541), the Consensus Tigurinus (Zurich 1540) and the Consensus Genevensis (1552) were published and subscribed; in France, where they gave rise to the Huguenots, to the secession from the Church and to the wars of religion (Confessio Fidei Gallicana, 1559). In Scotland the Confessio Scotianus prior (1560) and posterior (1561) were subscribed; in the Netherlands the Confessio Belgica (1561); in the Palatinate the Catechisis Palatina seu Heidelbergensis (1563); and after the death of C. his Creed with its distinctive dogmas were adopted by a part of the Hungarians with the Confessio Czengerina (1570), by Poles with the Consensus Poloniae (1570-86), and were spread in Prussia with the Articles of Lambeth (1594) and in England with the Confessiones Marchicae (1613-45) and the Confessio monasteriensis and the Catechismus maior et minor Westmonasteriensis (1619-47).

The success of C. was due to a rare combination of circumstances depending in part on the man, and in part on the environment and the age. As an innovator, he, besides the qualities of a capable, strong-willed and energetic leader, knew how to dominate by the force of his system, more logical and more stringent than the Lutheran one; he then placed in the hands of the reformed a theology that more easily presented some sign of unity. Moreover he nourished a high and spiritual morality and was one of the most distinguished writers of the new French literature, with classical and literary qualities superior to the other reformers, gifts these appreciated in the centuries of humanism. His chair, moreover, was located in the center of Europe, at the crossing point and meeting place of all the movements of the time and of the most powerful nations, destined to give their imprint to history, and he had collaborators of different nationalities, whom he had succeeded in transforming into convinced and strenuous propagandists. The age, finally, was one of ignorance and religious bewilderment, of heated controversies, of political upheavals, quivering with anti-papal apostasy. It is no wonder that the sects detached from the unity of the Church of Rome polarized toward him. But like all movements and ideologies that separate themselves and are not founded on the chair of truth established by Christ in the Pope, pastor of pastors, Calvinism too, after its first successes, withered, giving rise to new disintegrations.

Today there is no sect known by the name of «Calvinist» alone. The two main groups that draw inspiration from Calvinist doctrines are called «Presbyterians» (v. PRESBITERIANI).

Sulla dottrina calviniana in generale: A. Munro, Calvinista in its Relations to Scripture and Reason, Glasgow 1856; E. Giran, Sébastien Castellion et la réforme calviniste, ivi 1914; A. Menzies, A Study of Calvin and other Papers, Londra 1918; H. Clavier, Études sur le Calvinisme, Parigi 1936; P. Chiminelli, Il Calvinismo, Milano 1948. Per l'iconografia di C. cf. E. Doumergue, Iconographie calvinienne, Losanna 1909.

On Calvinist doctrine in particular: on justification and predestination: L. Goumar, La doctrine du salut d'après les Commentaires de J. Calvin, Lausanne 1917; H. Bauke, Die Probleme der Theologie Calvins, Leipzig 1922; M. Bendiscioli, Il problema della giustificazione nel suo sviluppo storico, Brescia 1941. On the Sacraments and on morals: J. Beckmann, Vom Sakrament bei Calvin, Tübingen 1936; J. J. Majal, Étude comparée des deux morales luthérienne et réformée, Paris 1901; A. Hunter, Teaching of Calvin, Glasgow 1920. On Church and State: A. Roget, L'Église et l'État à Genève du vivant de Calvin, Geneva 1867; F. Cruc, L'action politique de Calvin hors de Genève, ibid. 1909; K. Frohlik, Die Reichsgesetze Calvins, Munich 1922; M. E. Chenevrière, La pensée politique de Calvin, Geneva 1937. - On worship: E. Stern, La théorie du Culte d'après Calvin, Strasbourg 1869; R. Will, Le Culte, ibid. 1925; R. Freschi, G. C., la vita, il pensiero, il riformatore, 2 vols., Milan 1934; M. Thurian, Joie du Ciel sur la terre. Introduction à la vie liturgique, Geneva 1946. - Summary articles: J. Dedica, Calvin et Calvinisme, in DSp, I, coll. 23-50; A. Baudrillart, Calvinisme, in DThC, II, coll. 1398-1422; A. Lanz, L'attività dogmatica del Concilio di Trento nel primo, secondo e terzo periodo della sua convocazione (1545-49; 1551-52; 1562-63), in Veneranda Compagnia di S. Paolo, quad. 2, Turin 1944, pp. 11-31; quad. 3, ibid. 1945, pp. 3-39. - For the bibliography, cf. Questioni di Storia moderna, edited by E. Rota, Milan 1948, pp. 175-77; Y. Congar, s. v. in Catholicisme, II (1949), coll. 405-24.

Arnaldo Lanz