CRIPTO-CALVINISTS (PHILIPPISTS). - This is the name given to the followers of Filippo Melantone (1497-1560). Although closely united with Lutero, he nevertheless did not agree with him in all his doctrines, and after the death of his master, moved by the desire to reconcile Lutherans and Calvinists, he showed himself favourable to certain Calvinist doctrines. Against him and his followers, called c.-c. or f., arose the strict or pure Lutherans, led by Flacio Illirico, Amsdorf, etc., who established themselves firmly at the University of Jena; the c.-c. had as their leaders, besides Melantone, Major, Minius, and others, and their centre was the University of Wittenberga.
The controversy was especially fierce on the part of the strict Lutherans, who defended Lutero’s more daring doctrines, such as the ubiquity of Christ’s body, consubstantiation, etc. The Formula Concordiae (v. CONFESSIONI DI FEDE PROTESTANTI) of 1576 brought a kind of truce, but peace was again disturbed in Sassonia during the rule of the elector Cristiano I (1586-91) and his chancellor Nicola Krell (1550?-1601), who re-established crypto-Calvinism there; however, the guardian of the young elector Cristiano II (1591-1611) took care to eradicate even its last remnants and to introduce extreme Lutheranism once more.
BBL.: J. A. Dorner, History of Protestant Theology, particularly in Germany, 2 vols., Edimburgo 1871; Ph. Schaff-J. Herzog, Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, 4 vols., Nuova York 1891; Ph. Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, 3 vols., ivi 1877; G. Wilson, Philip Melanchton, Londra 1897. Camillo Crivelli