IN THESE TRANSLATED SELECTIONS FROM THE Biblical Commentaries of Calvin, we have tried to produce a readable version of a representative part of his work in this field. The Commentaries were translated into English soon after they were published in the second half of the sixteenth century. (They were retranslated about the middle of the nineteenth century, by the Calvin Translation Society, Edinburgh, and have been reprinted in this second version.) They were also translated immediately into French and somewhat later into Dutch and German. Calvin's Commentaries profoundly influenced the churches of the Reformed tradition; and there can be little doubt that a renewed interest in them and study of them would not only contribute to a better understanding of Calvin, but would also have a profound influence on the mind and life of the church today. Our primary interest in preparing this volume has been to present Calvin as a Biblical commentator, with the hope that many will be induced to turn to the Commentaries themselves in search of the light Calvin throws upon the meaning of the Scriptures.
We concur in the judgment of many before us that Calvin was, for various reasons, a unique and extremely illuminating commentator. His education as a humanist, his extensive knowledge of the work of other interpreters of the Bible, his classical and patristic erudition, his insights as a Reformer and churchman, and his exegetical competence and grasp of the Biblical mind -- all these make him an endlessly fresh and eye-opening interpreter.
Calvin's Commentaries and sermons fill volumes 23-55 of his Works
(in Corpus Reformatorum[1]); and the
Commentaries by themselves fill forty-five volumes in English: thirty on the
Old Testament, fifteen on the New Testament (in the series of the Calvin
Translation Society).
The grandeur of this achievement becomes all the more evident when we remember
that these Commentaries were the work not of a detached scholar, but of a
Reformer whose days were filled largely with pastoral work both in the church
and in the state. His multiple activities and preoccupations in the latter
capacity, especially in the light of his delicate and sickly physical
condition, leave one amazed at the diligence and perseverance which made
Calvin's literary output (fifty-nine volumes in his Works) possible. One
must not forget the several versions of the Institutes, his numerous
tracts and thousands of letters. Calvin believed not only in the Word of God,
but also in human words as means of promoting the gospel and serving the
church.
The Commentary on Romans, the first, was published in 1540. The latest, Joshua
(1564) and Ezekiel, chs. 1-20 (1565), were published after Calvin's death. In
between came the great Commentaries on Genesis, the four last Books of Moses
(Harmony), the Psalms, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Lamentations, Ezekiel, and the
Minor Prophets (Calvin preached on the other books such as Deuteronomy, Job,
and Samuel, but he did not lecture on them). There were also the Commentaries
on all the books of the New Testament, except 2 John and I2 John and
Revelation. The Harmony of Exodus-Deuteronomy (four volumes in English) and the
Harmony of the Gospels (three volumes) deserve special mention as astonishing
works of organization, both of narrative and of topics. They are, in fact,
convincing evidence of Calvin's grasp of Scripture as a whole and in detail. It
is impossible to single out the greater Commentaries. Each is valuable for the
insights it gives into the Word of God contained in it. One has only to consult
Calvin on a few given passages of Scripture to recognize that he is indeed a
teacher without an equal. Calvin comments with the conviction that any passage
of Scripture he may examine contains a Word of God full of God's wisdom,
applicable to the
Most of the Old Testament Commentaries were delivered as lectures. Calvin spoke
slowly and quietly, so that his words could be recorded fairly accurately by
his students and more exactly by his secretaries. Afterward he went over what
had been taken down, corrected it, and allowed it to be published with proper
dedications to friends and persons of importance in England and elsewhere.
It is important to remember that these lectures were delivered at the Academy,
which provided education to the children of Geneva, and attracted students of
theology by the hundreds from France, England, Scotland, Holland, and
elsewhere. Some of the greatest Protestant theologians of the day were trained
in this Academy. But the majority of those who attended his lectures went to
their several countries to work, and often to suffer, for the establishment and
the progress of the Reformed faith. What these men needed was clear, sure, and
strong grasp of Scripture doctrine, available for the new churches or
gatherings of Protestants in their own lands, surrounded by hostile forces and
in constant peril. Calvin commented for the upbuilding of these people and the
churches they came from and went to.
He began his lectures always with the prayer, "May the Lord grant that we study
the heavenly mysteries of his wisdom, making true progress in religion to his
glory and our upbuilding." The closing prayer was longer, and in it Calvin laid
before the Lord the special needs of the faithful as the Scripture just studied
had revealed them.
The Scripture passage was read in the original language, then translated into
Latin.[2] Calvin's Latin translation is
apparently his own; in the classroom, it was made directly from the text. He
was of course as familiar with the Vulgate as most modern English translators
are with the Authorized Version, and like
What Hebrew text he used is apparently uncertain. Available, besides the
Brescia edition used by Luther, were the Soncino (1488), the Bomberg editions,
printed at Venice (1518-1526), and three editions of Münster, printed at
Basel (1534, 1536, 1546). None of them differed significantly from the Brescia
edition. The Complutensian Polyglot, finally published in 1521, was used by
Beza (according to Delitzsch) and presumably was available to Calvin.
Calvin's opponents have minimized his knowledge of Hebrew (
While translating the New Testament, Calvin has both the Vulgate and Erasmus
before him. But he does not hesitate to make his own rendition. This statement
could be substantiated from almost every other page of the New Testament
Commentaries. One or two examples will suffice. He translates
As to the New Testament text, Calvin clearly uses that of Erasmus. But
references to ancient and more recent "manuscripts" show that he was not
satisfied simply to follow even an authority like Erasmus.
Erasmus' influence on Calvin as critic and exegete was far-reaching. The
former's insistence upon the necessity of knowing the original languages of the
Bible[8]; his principle that the more obscure
passages of the Bible should be interpreted with the help of those which are
clear[9]; his plea for understanding the Bible
in its "natural, or historical and grammatical" sense, and spiritually, that
is, for moral edification[10]; his view of the
Bible as having been written under the direction of the Holy Spirit (
Calvin divides his text conveniently, so that he may be able to deal with a
story or topic as a whole. After explaining a given passage in general, he then
proceeds to discuss specific verses, phrases, and words, which he repeats
sometimes in Latin and sometimes in the original. As he proceeds, he uses Latin
renditions
As the occasion demands, Calvin goes into details in discussing a geographical
and historical point. He appeals to classic authorities; to Jewish, pagan,
Christian writers of antiquity, like Josephus, Pliny, and Jerome; and he quotes
the best authorities of his own day. But he is brief and to the point. He
weighs evidence, expresses an opinion, and moves on. It is seldom that he loses
himself in detail and turns aside from his main purpose (as he does on Gen.
15:2, where his discussion of
He paraphrases frequently, clarifying statements and ideas for the duller
students. One can imagine the quick dipping of quill pens in the ink whenever
the class heard "as if he were to say" (
Characteristically, his worst term of condemnation for any
With all this practical concern with the "progress" of his students and of the
churches, Calvin was a conscientious historical critic. His comments did not
degenerate into the undisciplined exhortation which often goes with "practical
preaching." He neither practiced nor encouraged irresponsibility toward "the
genuine sense" of Scripture. The students were to know what the author of a
given text meant by what he said, and any "spiritual" meaning other than one
derived from the author's intention was at once misleading and unedifying.
Calvin said bluntly of Ezek. 17:1-2, "The prophet's discourse cannot be
understood without a knowledge of the history [behind it]." Calvin's concern
with history will be dealt with later.[18]
Here we point it out as an essential part of his work as a lecturer,
contributive rather than irrelevant to the hearing of God's Word.
Calvin's refusal to be diverted from his main purpose is clear also in his use
of classical and early Christian literature. The list of classical references
is a long one. Cicero appears most often (sixteen times in the Pentateuch
Harmony alone); but there are quotations from all the better-known Latin
authors (Horace, Juvenal, Seneca, Terence, Cato, Quintilian, Virgil, Plautus,
Suetonius, Tacitus, Livy, Pliny), and from the Greek authors (Homer, Euripides,
Xenophon, Ovid, Aristophanes, Epicurus, Plutarch, and Aesop). He quotes Plato
and Aristotle with respect. He admires Plato's wisdom and piety, but objects to
the "angelology" of Platonism (2 Peter 1:4, Col. 2:18, etc.). He quotes
Aristotle on the distinction between anger and hatred (from "The Second Book on
Rhetoric"), and refers with approval to his saying that the tongue should be an
image of the understanding (Gal. 5:19, 1 Cor. 14:11). In the field of law, he
speaks of Portius' law, Flavian law, the laws of Sempronius, and Valerius' law
(Acts 16:35, 22:25, 1 Tim. 1:10). Herodotus,
The same holds for his use of ancient Christian literature. Hundreds of
references in the Commentaries, quotations, approving and disapproving
discussions make it obvious that Calvin had an extensive and masterly knowledge
of Augustine, Jerome, and Chrysostom. He obviously learned a great deal from
all three, and depended upon the latter two, as well as on Josephus, for his
knowledge of Biblical times and places. But his knowledge is not limited to
these giants. He makes apt reference, with frequent quotations, to Tertullian
and Cyprian; to Irenaeus and Origen; to Cyril of Jerusalem, Epiphanius, Basil,
Gregory Nazianzen, Hilary, Lactantius, and Ambrose of Milan; to Eusebius and
Socrates, the historians; to Pope Leo I, Gregory the Great, and Bernard of
Clairvaux. But again, the fathers are consulted for the help they may provide
for understanding Scripture; they do not interfere with his exposition of it.
Calvin was grateful to contemporary commentators like Melanchthon, Bucer,
Bullinger, and others (on Romans[19]). But the
use he makes of their works keeps a consistent pattern. No references are given
to exhibit his own learning. However, his comments show that he had read and
pondered over the works of his contemporaries. Ecolampadius,20 he
says, interprets rightly and prudently, but one needs leisure to read his work
(Dan. 9:25). He quotes approvingly and supports by his own argument Luther's
designation of Ps. 132:14 as "the bloody promise," but he disagrees with Luther
on Dan. 8:22-23; "Luther indulging his own thoughts too freely refers this to
the masks of Antichrist." He gives high praise to Bucer in the
Calvin declares (and truly) that he does not expend words refuting contrary
opinions unless he knows the faithful are troubled by them.[22] Most of his arguments therefore are with the "papists"
and the Anabaptists. There are uncomplimentary references to "the doctors of
the Sorbonne." Jewish commentators are usually treated as a group and dismissed
as blind to the relation between the Old Testament and Christ. He uses their
judgment frequently on details, especially the meaning or derivation of words.
Kimchi he mentions by name and calls him "the most correct interpreter among
the rabbis" (Ps. 112:5).index2
It is ironical that Calvin in spite of his frequent references to "the
blindness of the Jews" was himself attacked, especially by the theological
faculty of Wittenberg, as "a Judaizer." A pamphlet against his method of
interpreting Scripture, which was published in 1593, bore the horrendous title
"Calvin Judaizing, that is, the Jewish Glosses and Corruptions by which John
Calvin did not Fear to Corrupt the most Luminous Passages of Sacred Scriptures
and its witness to the Glorious Trinity, the Deity of Christ and of the Holy
Spirit, including the Predictions of the Prophets on the Coming of the Messiah,
His Birth, Passion, Resurrection, and Sitting at the Right Hand of God, in a
Detestable Fashion. A Refutation of the Corruptions is Added." The reason for
such attacks was of course Calvin's insistence on attending to the "genuine
sense" of Scripture.[23] He despised the
allegorical method of interpreting Scripture which had provided Christians with
their favorite means of twisting the Bible into a religious book of their own
liking. In insisting upon the original meaning of a text, he deprived the
orthodox, even among Protestants, of many of their traditional proof texts. He
even undermined the traditional doctrine of Biblical authority. But he taught
the Protestant ministry how to read their Bible, and to understand it as the
Word of God to the churches -- which is the utmost a commentator can do.
Calvin published his Commentaries to give his readers insight into the Word of
God and to point out its relevance to
Here we must not fail to point out that every salient point of Calvin's
theology is discussed, and is often more briefly and clearly and persuasively
presented, in the direct statements of the Commentaries than in the sustained
and usually technical arguments of the Institutes. We hope that our
selections on faith, providence, Jesus Christ, and so on, will help the reader
to correct many an impression he has received either by dipping into the
Institutes or by secondhand acquaintance with Calvin. We ourselves were
repeatedly and pleasantly surprised by what we found in these Commentaries: we
hope the reader will find the same instruction and pleasure.index1
In the main, the Old Testament Commentaries were delivered as lectures,
and the New Testament Commentaries were dictated at home. We owe an enormous
debt to Calvin's friends and secretaries who wrote down his lectures and
sermons, and took dictation at his home.[24]
Among these special mention must be made of Jean Budé, the son of the
great humanist Guillaume Budé, and his brother-in-law Charles de
Jonvillers, both of whom were refugees from France and lived on Calvin's
street. They worked tirelessly with him in the preparation of the Commentaries
on Jeremiah and Lamentations, on Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Twelve Minor
Prophets, which occupy seventeen volumes in English translation. They have left
us firsthand accounts of the way Calvin's Commentaries were composed and made
ready for publication.See Papacy
Budé wrote of the beginning of the work: "When some years ago that most
learned man, John Calvin, at the advice and request of friends, undertook to
explain the Psalms of David in the School, some of us his hearers began to take
notes in our own way, for our own private study, according to our own judgment,
and at will. But aroused by what we heard, we began to think how unjust it
would be to a great many people, and to the whole
And we have the following, from Charles Jonvillers, on the preparation of the
Commentary on Ezekiel:
"On February 13, 1563, Calvin began to expound Ezekiel in the Public School;
even though he was constantly afflicted by various serious diseases, and had
either to be carried to the lecture hall in a wooden chair, or arrive perforce
on a horse; for his frail body had become so worn out that there was hardly any
strength left in him. And yet, for a whole year after that February, the
virulence of his disease did not keep him from discharging his responsibilities
of preaching and lecturing.
"Finally, in February of the following year, when he had finished chapter
twenty (except for four verses), he was forced to stay at home and almost
continuously in bed. Still, even while his mind had to carry the burden of his
illness, he was constantly thinking, or dictating; and he often kept writing,
so that it is hardly credible how much he accomplished even when he could not
leave his house because of bad health. Among other things, he corrected
diligently the greater part of these lectures, as is evident from the copy with
his notations, which I have saved with care along with the rest."[26]
A passage from The Life of John Calvin, by Nicolas Colladon, a minister
and friend of Calvin, gives us a glimpse of the latter at work:
"About the month of September (1558), he was attacked by a prolonged and
dreadful fever; and while it lasted, he was forced, to his great regret, to
stop both reading and preaching. But he did not cease to work at home, in spite
of the remonstrances of those around him that he spare himself. At this very
Again, according to Colladon: "Calvin on his part did not in the least spare
himself. He worked much harder than his strength and health could bear. Every
other week he preached one sermon a day.[28]
Three times a week he lectured on theology. He was present at every meeting of
the consistory, and made all the remonstrances. Every Friday, at a discussion
on Scripture, which was called the congregation, what he added after the main
speaker was like a lesson in itself. He did not fail to visit the sick, to give
pastoral advice, and to do an endless number of things that went with the
ordinary exercises of his ministry. Aside from the usual activities, he was
greatly occupied with the faithful in France. He instructed, exhorted,
counseled, and comforted them in the midst of persecution, as well as
interceded for them, or had others do it when he thought there was a way."[29]
After describing Calvin's excellent memory, Colladon goes on to say: "It is not
that he had much time to prepare his lectures, for even though he would have
preferred to do so, he had no leisure for it. And for a truth, most of the time
he did not have one whole hour for preparation. . . . I will add still another
evidence for his [remarkable] memory: If, while he was dictating, someone came
in to speak to him and stayed a half hour, or even an hour, most often he would
remember
"He slept very little. Even though this meant he was less than energetic, it
did not keep him from being ready for work and the fulfillment of his duties.
On the days when he was not to preach, he would stay in bed and at five or six
o'clock would ask for a number of books, so that he might dictate with someone
writing down his work. If it was his week, he was always ready to go up into
the pulpit. When he returned home, he went to his bed and lay down on it with
his clothes still on, and taking some book, continued his labors. . . . So it
is that he dictated most of his books in the morning, working continually and
in a very happy state of mind."[30]
I. Calvin's "Literalism"
Calvin's exegetical method and procedure were the product of a century of
classical humanism, first in Italy, but later especially in Northern Europe.
Humanists, such as Lorenzo Valla[31]
(1407-1457), Guillaume Budé[32]
(1467-1540) and Erasmus[33] (1466-1536), had
in common a zeal for recovering
The so-called literalism of Calvin is directly related to the Renaissance
scholars' desire to get at the original and "genuine" meaning of a text.
Reformers, like Luther, Bucer, and Zwingli, as well as Calvin, who were all
indebted to Erasmus and the humanistic method, agreed that the natural
meaning of a statement was to be preferred to one arrived at by way of
allegorizing or supplying a meaning other than the literal. This method
was a commonplace among humanists, who applied it to Greek and Roman writings
earlier than to the Bible. Allegory was contrary to the humanistic canon of
interpretation; and "literalism," that is, the desire to get at an author's own
mind, was of its essence.
So we find Calvin bent upon establishing what a given author in fact said. He
criticized the church fathers, especially Augustine, Chrysostom, and Jerome,
for dealing too subtly with the texts, for allegorizing and speculation; even
though he obviously takes their understanding of the Bible more seriously than
he does that of the humanists.[34] He
complains repeatedly that even while Augustine's remarks on a given passage are
good, they are irrelevant to the purpose of its writer (on Rom. 8:28, John
1:16). Allegorizing was misunderstanding, and misunderstanding was the evil a
scholar had to avoid by all means.
Neither the humanists nor Calvin meant by the literal meaning necessarily an
unspiritual meaning. The natural interpretation of a passage for them was one
that did Justice to the intention of the author. When Calvin protested
against allegorizing, he was protesting not against finding a spiritual meaning
in a passage, but against finding one that was not there. The Word of God
written for the upbuilding of the church was of course
2. Calvin as Historian
As a disciplined humanist, Calvin recognized that the Biblical writers, for
example the prophets, wrote for their own times and situations. In this sense,
Calvin is a confirmed "historicist." When Isaiah, or Hosea, or Jeremiah, or a
psalmist speaks he speaks for the benefit of God's people or the church in his
own day. The Holy Spirit does indeed speak by them prophesying the Messiah, and
for the future church. Calvin can say that Isaiah foresaw the glory of Christ
(on John 12:45). But he habitually looks at the prophecies quoted in the New
Testament, not from the position of the prophet, but from that of the apostles
or Evangelists who "applied" them to their own situation. Even while he assumes
that the New Testament writers wrote as dictated and directed by the Holy
Spirit, as a commentator he is concerned with the way they dealt with the Old
Testament; and he speaks of their activity as applying [
To Calvin, the ultimate end of the Bible is the Kingdom of Christ, his reign
over the people of God, and their faithfulness and obedience to him. This end
was seen in the Old Testament dimly, or as he likes to say,
As a critic Calvin recognized in the Bible a natural working of the human mind
which is not always too clear or too apt. Commenting on 1 Peter 3:14, And be
not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled, he goes so far as to
accuse Peter of misconstruing Isaiah (ch. 8). But he excuses Peter on the
ground that he was only referring to the prophet for a purpose of his own, and
not explaining "every word used by the prophet." He says that when Paul quoted
Ps. 68:19, in Eph. 4:8, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity
captive, and gave gifts to men, he actually changed the wording of the
psalm, even though "he can hardly be said to have departed from the substance."
But he believes that Paul did not actually quote the psalm; he "used it as an
expression of his own, adapted to the matter on hand." Paul more than once gets
into difficulties by using "the Greek translators" (on Heb. 10:5, 38), and at
least once one cannot tell what prophet he is quoting from (on 1 Cor. 15:54).
When Stephen says in Acts 7:16 that the patriarchs were taken to Shechem and
buried in a sepulcher bought by Abraham, he clearly contradicts Gen. 50:13,
Josh. 24:32. Calvin refers to Jerome's statement that the pilgrim Paula saw the
tombs of the twelve patriarchs in Shechem. But he is not convinced. He says
that perhaps Moses was using "synecdoche," that is, Joseph stands for the
patriarchs; or that perhaps Luke was following an old tradition. He ends the
discussion with,
3. The Reliability and Inspiration of the Bible
Calvin studied the Bible as a book composed by human beings, according to the
interests of the authors, and he followed the practices familiar to critics of
literature. In this his humanism is obvious. But he also was a humanist of the
bent of Lefèvre d'Étaples,36 Erasmus, or Bucer, when
he put his method to a theological use. Calvin was not interested in the Bible
as a merely human product. His critical study was inspired by a profound and
powerful desire to get back, through texts and versions, to "the oracles of
God." If some humanists went back to the classical authors for new wisdom on
man, Calvin, with the other Reformers, went back to the Bible for the wisdom of
God.
It is important to remember that the Bible was to him above all the Word of God
spoken for the edification of the church. This explains his willingness to
admit many unsolved problems of detail, even while he insists that the writers
of the Bible were the mouthpieces of God. He sees that the Evangelists
differ one from another in many a detail (on Matt. 22:2), but he insists that
they agree on the main points of a story or parable. Where there is a question
of numbers, as of women and angels at the resurrection, he points to the
writers' unconcern for exact information in such matters and draws the reader's
attention to the gospel or law. In fact, he sets aside a discrepancy of a
thousand, between an account of Moses (Num. 25:90) and that of Paul, by
remarking that the Biblical writers cared no more than the ancient Romans for
numerical minutiae (on 1 Cor. 10:8). Paul was concerned to warn the church at
Corinth against idolatry. What mattered was the reliability of
The humanists believed in the wisdom of the classics, feeding their minds on
the sayings (of which they made collections) of the ancient philosophers; but
they did so not for mere factual accuracy, but for the edification of their
age. There is a suggestive analogy between the humanist attitude toward the
classics and Calvin's toward the Bible. The Word of God spoken by the Spirit
was the word of salvation and every blessing that goes with it. One had to
believe in it and receive it with gratitude. It was worthy of the most diligent
investigation. So one did one's best to understand the Bible, and to discover
its consistency as the Word of God. A man had to attend to the chief business
on hand. What we have in the Bible is the wisdom of God, a "Christian
philosophy," a way of life that will enable us to live and die well in a world
where the devil rages and perils are always at hand. Indeed the humanistic
method required that one deal with questions of time, place, and authorship
raised by the texts; but one also had to be prepared to leave them unsettled,
and go on to the main point, to what was said of God's glory and man's duty.[37]
Calvin knew that there were variant versions of the Bible, but he did not know
-- nobody knew -- in his time, that there were various traditions behind the
Biblical literature. Today we recognize that "contradictions" in the Bible are
due to "date, authorship, and composition." But our way was not open to Calvin.
Both assuming the inerrancy of the Spirit and knowing the ways of the human
mind, Calvin did his best to harmonize contradictory statements. But even where
he failed, he was satisfied that the intention of the Spirit in dictating "the
oracles of God" was fulfilled; that the Word of God for the guidance of the
church had been properly received and set down for the benefit of God's
people.
Calvin indeed insisted that the Spirit "dictated" the oracles of God. But such
dictation did not so much establish the authority of the Bible as give us the
Word of God for the upbuilding of the church and the benefit of the Christian
in particular situations. Since the Holy Spirit spoke by the prophets, God
himself spoke; so, when men read the Bible, they attend to their God. But what
is their business but to listen to him and to hear him for obedience? So it is
that the Christians read the whole of the Bible as the Word of God: not to
believe
Calvin's doctrine of the authority of Scripture is discussed at length by
theologians and church historians. Unfortunately, too many of them rely on
sections of the Institutes, and fail to test the conclusions they draw
by the content of the Commentaries themselves.[38]
Calvin, of course, accepts the whole Bible as the Word of God and he uses terms
like "dictation" and "amanuensis of the Holy Spirit." In his Commentaries he
shifts back and forth between God and the prophet as the speaker in the same
way in which the prophets alternate the first and third person in their
oracles. But those who see in such phrases a doctrine of inerrant Scripture and
exact verbal inspiration forget that Calvin himself had a good deal of
experience in dictating to secretaries and to students, and then correcting the
results. God, the Holy Spirit, is of course inerrant, and the Word of God given
by the Spirit was formulated to serve best the needs of God's church. But the
human instruments, being men, were certainly not perfect. And they did remain
men. Isaiah remained a great poet and Ezekiel indulged in wearisome
repetitions. Calvin made no assumption of a succession of miracles to eliminate
every slip.[39]
Calvin trusted the fidelity of those to whom God had entrusted his Word more
than he trusted the care of the Jewish rabbis who supplied the vowel points.
More fundamentally, he trusted the providence of God to provide his chosen in
all ages with needful instruction. He himself seldom emends (but see
Calvin uses the doctrine of inspiration against the Church of Rome.[40] The Bible is the Word of God as over against
the word of man as found in the papacy. His contention is that the Spirit spoke
by the prophets and not by the pope or the Roman Church. The fathers could be
wrong and often were; the councils could be wrong and often were; the tradition
and the canon law could be and often were wrong. Over against all these, the
Bible could not be and was not wrong. So when the fathers, the councils, or the
tradition in general oppose the Bible, the Bible is right, and all the rest are
wrong.
But the things at issue between Rome and the Reformers were not the incarnation
of our Lord, or his resurrection, or any miracle or prophecy. They were not the
number of Israelites who came out of Egypt or the genealogies of Matthew and
Luke. They did not even have to do with "the date, authorship, or composition"
of the books of the Bible. All such questions, which have agitated men from
"the age of reason" to our own day, were not the points at issue. Therefore,
the question of verbal infallibility and plenary inspiration, with the relevant
questions having to do with "science and religion" or "faith and reason," were
not at issue. The issue was a proper exposition of the Christian faith: the
grace of God, sin, justification, the ministry, and the sacraments; in short,
the gospel. The heart of the Bible to Calvin as to Luther is Christ -- the
anticipation of Christ and the witness to Christ, Christ's own work and his
relation to the people of God.[41] This is
where the inspiration of the writers is crucial. Witness to Christ is the
reason for inspiration, as it is also the reason for the work of the Spirit in
the church. The Spirit spoke by the prophets about Christ! And as he spoke
about Christ and all that is relevant to our salvation by him, he spoke with
absolute authority. The Church of Rome had corrupted the gospel. The gospel in
its purity was to be found in Scripture. This purity of the gospel was the work
of the Spirit, who had dictated the gospel, as found throughout the Bible, to
the writers.
At a later time, inspiration meant infallibility with regard to miracles,
predictions, and sundry accounts of matters of fact.
4. Knowledge of God
The language of the Spirit is the language of human beings, and even while it
is dictated, spoken, it is dictated or spoken not in an alien tongue with an
alien logic but in the familiar tongue of man with its common logic. However,
the speech of the Spirit is a heavenly discourse, concerning God and his
benefits, spoken not to satisfy our curiosity as to his "essence," but that we
may know his power.[42] The language of the
Bible is intended not to disclose God as he is in himself, but as he is toward
us. He is toward us, not as an informant first but as a Savior, with his power.
To know God in fact is to know above all his power; and we know his power in
the faithfulness, peace, joy, the spiritual gifts, we receive from him. God's
power and Word go together. According to Calvin, God's power is spiritual and
the Spirit of God, who is witness to God's power above all, speaks a spiritual
language which is accommodated to our understanding by the use of our common
language.
There is a knowledge that gives a man power over the thing known; the knowledge
of the Christian man is the opposite of this. By the knowledge of God the
Christian subjects himself to God's power. The latter knowledge differs from
"the speculative," which Calvin considered incongruous with the Christian's
relation to God. We know God, not to use him, but to worship and obey him.
Therefore we know, not God's essence (as we know the essence of an object), but
his grace and will by and for worship and obedience. This knowledge is one
adapted to our role as creatures, and one sufficient for this role; not more
and not less than we need to believe in God and obey him. It is knowledge first
and last of God's love exercised toward us; a knowledge carrying with it a
certainty all its own by the same
There is of course a singular congruity between the sign and the thing
signified: as between the resurrection and the victory of God over sin and
death; or between the ascension and the return of the Son to the right hand of
the Father. But prior to the congruity we discern, there is the congruity of
God's own doing, as established by the Holy Spirit. If we recognize the signs
as signs, it is because the Spirit gives us light as an aspect of God's
redemptive work. When we put Calvin's doctrine of inspiration in its proper
context, and remember the unique way in which Biblical language is to him a
signification of God's love and power as present in the church, we realize that
Calvin used the Bible neither as an authoritarian nor as an anti-authoritarian,
neither as a Hodge nor as a Sabatier; the Bible was to him the vehicle of God's
power first, and secondly of our knowledge of Him.
5. Knowledge of Man
Calvin's belief that the Bible is God's Word, and his discipline as a humanist,
are not sufficient for explaining his greatness as a commentator. What indeed
is it that keeps a reader of these volumes of Commentaries interested, as he
proceeds chapter after chapter, verse after verse? The variety in the treatment
of the texts of course does a great deal to prevent boredom. But the positive
interest of the reader is maintained by Calvin's constant concern with the
light that the texts throw upon the life of man in its many aspects and its
tantalizing depth. The Institutes begin with the proposition that the
knowledge of God and the knowledge of man are inseparable one from the other,
and that they together constitute the only true and solid wisdom (
The Bible contains a definite perspective upon human life. Calvin appropriates
it, and uses it freely and variously for an understanding of man. Calvin's
interpretation of this perspective may well appear to some readers as
"pessimistic." In the light of God's wisdom, men seem to be given to folly
which produces in turn the miseries writ large in their history. The failings
of patriarch, king, and apostle, not to mention those of God's people in
general, are set down impressively in the Bible, and Calvin does not fail to
point them out. He points out the infidelities, rebellions, cowardices, and
malefactions of men which have brought contempt for God and misery upon
themselves. History is tragic; but it is neither hopeless nor futile. Universal
though evil is, men act as responsible beings, under the mercy as well as the
judgment of God who is wise and knows what he is doing. Calvin entertains
neither Stoic fatalism nor humanistic "faith in man." He repudiates both
fatalism and "free will" because he sees history as the drama of God's
sovereign dealings with sinners, for their salvation and the fulfillment of
God's purpose. Thus history is suffused, as Jonathan Edwards would say, "with a
divine and supernatural light"; in it the Spirit speaks with the might of the
living God toward faith and a godly life. So, the miseries of men are seen in
the context of God's mercy and faithfulness, even his judgment and wrath
cooperating with his Fatherly benevolence, toward the predestined purpose of
his self-disclosure to men as illumined by Jesus Christ who is God manifested
in the flesh.
In Calvin's mind there was a profound and prevailing continuity between
Christ and the church: between the experience
Calvin appropriated the sufferings of God's people depicted in the Bible for
the evangelicals in Europe and for himself. It is hardly possible, as we read
his comments on Noah, David, Job, Jeremiah, or on the disciples of Jesus, to
escape the truth that they all are vivified by their profound appropriateness
to his condition.[47] Calvin turns again and
again to the inescapable and bewildering fact that in this world the disciples
of Christ have suffered far more grievously than the wicked who have abused and
oppressed them. So it had been in the past; so it was in his own day; so it was
in his own person. He suffered physically as well as mentally all his days. He
lived under cares and contentions which gradually killed him at the age of
fifty-six. The image of Calvin as a stern and insensitive puritan overlord does
not bear examination. He not only felt the afflictions of his fellow
evangelicals, but also commented upon them constantly both as an interpreter of
the Bible and also as a "theologian." It is quite possible and even necessary
to see Calvin's
I. The Providence of God[48]
The suffering of the righteous confronts us directly with the providence of
God; and the doctrine of providence was constantly on Calvin's mind and to it
he made a peculiar contribution. It was traditional in medieval theology to
write on "providence and free will." The providence of God, although welcome as
providing for man's necessities, was a stumbling block in so far as it made
man's own freedom doubtful. So the main interest of the philosophical
theologians was to reconcile God's providence with man's freedom and
responsibility. Now, all this is changed by Calvin. He finishes his comments on
Acts 20:32 with the characteristic and blunt statement: "Since Scripture
teaches that we have sufficient help in God's power, let us be mindful that
only they are strong in the Lord who renounce their free will and lean upon him
who alone, as Paul confesses rightly, is able to build up." When people
suffered dungeon and exile, yea, were at the brink of death in the hands of
irresistible foes, it was irrelevant and futile to reconcile providence with
the free will of man. These victims of oppression were not free against the
combined power of church and state. The only proper question under the
circumstances was, "What did God intend by their suffering?" What these people
needed to know was that God was "at the helm" and that neither torture nor
death came upon them without the providence of God
When Calvin took up the other matter of providence in relation to human
wickedness, he insisted upon man's sin (as in the case of Judas), and upon the
subtle tyranny of Satan over human beings (Matt. 26:14). But once again he
insisted upon the proposition that no evil is perpetrated apart from God's
providence and his use of it for his glory and the good of his people. Even as
a sinner, a man could receive hope and courage from the faith that his own
wickedness was under God's providence and would further, in spite of himself,
God's glory.
We are not concerned here with justifying Calvin against his detractors. The
point is that his doctrine of providence grew out of his preoccupation with the
sufferings of "the elect," and can be stated and understood properly in that
context. "Since Scripture teaches!" In a way, it is quite unwarranted to claim
that Scripture in toto denies man's freedom in so far as he is a
responsible being. Calvin himself does not deny, in fact he insists upon, the
doctrine of man's responsibility (on Matt. 11:21). But he is far from wrong in
the insight that Scripture is a celebration of God's peculiar sovereignty as
God and Father, and was written above all by men who set themselves to instill
courage and hope among God's troubled people, declaring God's control over the
affairs of men and the hope of the fulfillment of his purpose through all the
vicissitudes of human existence. In any case, Calvin's doctrine of providence,
with all the thought he spent upon it, means that whether we are good or evil,
whether we live or die, we are God's.
The subject of providence requires a discussion of miracles. To Calvin, the
miracles of the Bible were in a class by themselves. They were the work of God
the Father, in praise of Christ and for the sake of the church; and the
knowledge of them was the work of the Spirit. They were to Calvin the means
with which God revealed himself to his people. They were strictly "signs" in
the sense of the Gospel of John. God worked them not to inflame man's taste for
miracles in general, but as vehicles of his grace suitable for human
apprehension. What made a miracle a sign was the Word of God. A miracle without
the Word was to Calvin a prodigy which even the Pharaoh's magicians could
perform (Ex. 7:12). It proved, not God's grace, but his judgment which blinded
the people and made
Calvin was aware that men are always gaping for miracles (on John 11:18). The
more they feel their weakness before the powers of nature, the more they look
for a supernatural power that will enable them to overcome the evils caused by
nature and the climax of these evils in death. The miraclemongers care, not
about the Kingdom of God, but about their convenience and their belly (on John
6:26). They have no taste for the cross, and therefore they debase the power of
Christ with their "hope of gain." Calvin knew all this as a permanent
temptation in the church. He insisted, therefore, repeatedly and strongly that
miracle and doctrine go together (on Matt. 24:23, Mark 16:20), and refused to
identify God's power with the working of miracles (on 1 Thess. 1:4), holding
that the Word of God is superior to miracles (on John 4:48, 20:31). Christians
languished and died in prisons without any miracle to enable them to escape.
These people lived, not by miracles, but by the Word of God, by their
faithfulness to Christ. What they had available was not the hope of physical
escape, but the greater miracle of faithfulness and joy. Therefore, Calvin
received the Biblical miracles as signs of God's power; but he knew the same
power by the preaching of the gospel, by the miracle of weak men made strong,
both as to those who preach and as to those who hear (on Mark 16:20).
2. Predestination
Calvin's doctrine of predestination is a complex matter, and is above all
directed against the Roman Church, in support of "justification by faith."[49] But here it is necessary to keep in mind the
persecution of the Protestants in his day. As in Scripture, so in Calvin's mind
it was no small comfort that the sufferings of the church were predestined
according to the will and the purpose of God.[50] Predestination meant to Calvin, as to Paul, that the
sufferings of the Christians were no accident in the history of mankind. The
unfolding of history was the realization of God's purpose which went back to
the beginning. The doctrine of predestination for Calvin was bound up with the
Calvin's doctrine of predestination was inspired by the need of the Protestant
churches for a knowledge of the continuity between the gospel they believed and
for which they suffered, and the promises of God made from the beginning
and through the ages. Like the early church, like evangelist and apostle, the
Reformer took great pains to establish the antiquity of the gospel he preached.
A church under persecution was plagued with profound doubts. Excommunicated
ex-Romanists, subject to enemy power, deprived of home and goods, in exile and
at death's door, these poor people who lived in anxiety and despair, subject to
miseries from which even the dregs and criminals of society were exempt, had
nothing to sustain them except the promises of God. They were invited by Calvin
to turn their eyes to Abraham and Moses and Noah and David, to the great
deliverance of God, to the mysterious workings of his "secret purpose," to the
manifestations of his wisdom and power, rooted in his eternal purpose and his
predestined end -- all established in Jesus Christ crucified, risen, ascended,
and at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. If one abstracts the doctrine
of predestination before the ages from the promises of God made
by creation and fulfilled through the ages since, one does violence to Calvin's
mind on this matter (see especially on 2 Tim. 1:9-10, Titus 1:2).
This introduction is not the place for a full exposition of such a complex and
profound doctrine as predestination. We are interested only in indicating that
Calvin's version of this doctrine cannot be understood properly except in
relation to the suffering church. For instance, it is common to think of
predestination as deterministic (on Rom. 9:17). Determinism means that one fact
arises from one or more others by way of a natural necessity and that one can
discover how one situation determines another. But one does not study the
condition of the Christians in this world and arrive at an understanding of
predestination.
3. Faith and Reason
Calvin refused to "explain" to himself or to others the workings of God's
purpose in the fearful destiny of the believers in the world. On the other
hand, the triumph of Christ, his ascension and sitting at God's right hand,
were the immovable signs of God's sovereignty and thus the certainty of the
fulfillment of God's predestined purpose. Predestination therefore meant to
Calvin hope in a world where "determinism" could have produced only despair.
This hope Calvin received from Scripture, and he was determined to let
Scripture rule his mind and keep it within the bounds of sanity.
But the Word and promise of God made no sense to the carnal mind. The Word of
God was both a stumbling block and a foolishness, and the flesh recoiled from
it. There was no way of verifying it while believers were tortured and murdered
all around him. There was no way of justifying the ways of God in His world
except by faith.
Faith which is the proper work of the Spirit must rely upon and draw its
strength from the promise of God in Christ and Scripture. It has no mandate to
supersede the Word of God. And this is so because faith is to believe in God's
love and care for his people in the midst of their humiliations and sufferings.
But this love and care we know, not by our cogitations upon "the facts of
life," but by adhering to God's word in the Bible. "Reason," which confronts us
with the injustices and cruelties of this world, cannot attain to a certain
knowledge of God's beneficence. The usual rational arguments for God's justice
and mercy, based upon the observed workings of God's providence, even though
Calvin himself used them, gave him no "certain
But faith did not solve the problem raised by reason to reason's satisfaction.
The Spirit did not open to him the "secret counsel" of God, because in fact
Scripture itself confronted him with this secret counsel, rather than removed
its secrecy. Faith, therefore, could not, any more than reason, penetrate to a
knowledge of God as he is in himself. Faith was a gift of God whose main
function was to create in man a certain knowledge of God's goodness toward us.
The miracle of faith was the miracle of joy in the midst of suffering. The
knowledge of God given by the Word and the Spirit was a knowledge which
occurred and became established with the joy of partaking in the cross of
Christ. If the Christians not only bore their cross, but also rejoiced in
bearing it, it was by the doing of God's own Spirit who regenerated them, made
them new creatures. The doctrine of the Spirit comes to life in Calvin's
theology, because he recognized that the comfort and joy of Christians at their
cross is the work of the living God who "spoke by the prophets."
Faith is the knowledge of God's goodness toward his suffering people, and not a
vague and general sense of the divine. Calvin did not deny that the carnal mind
has a confused and idolatrous awareness of God. But he knew that a natural
knowledge of God, without his self-revelation in Christ crucified and risen, by
the inward working of his Spirit, is no match whatsoever against the
machinations of the devil and the cruelty of men. He knew that human
cogitation, without God's illumination and power, is helpless before the
monstrous evils which proclaim the power of Satan and his reign of darkness and
death. Calvin knew this, and felt it adequately. He knew the misery of this
body of death, and he knew also that a mind conjoined with this body must
inevitably be overwhelmed by a life that is in fact a shadow of death (on 2
Cor. 4:11-12). Sufferings of this life act as portents of death, and before
death, says Calvin, "all the powers of men succumb with terror" (on 2 Cor.
1:8). Calvin was deeply impressed, doubtless in himself as in others, with the
elemental desire to live and the shrinking of the flesh from its destruction
(on 2 Cor. 5:1, Gal. 2:20, 2 Tim. 4:7). He knew how brave men are away from
danger, and how they turn into trembling leaves when they meet it (on John
18:17). This was no academic matter with him. He knew it as a common
4. Jesus Christ
The Commentaries contain numerous and weighty statements that we know God in
Christ. Commenting on 1 Peter 3:21, Calvin says, "Hence all cogitation on God
apart from Christ is an immense abyss which immediately swallows up our whole
mind." In another place, speaking of the knowledge of God among the Athenians,
he says that "the Lord allowed the men of Athens to fall into extreme madness"
(on Acts 17:16). Abyss, labyrinth, madness: such were words which came to
Calvin's mind when he considered man's knowledge of God apart from Christ. For
those who have taken up their cross for the gospel's sake, there is no
knowledge of God's goodness except in the knowledge of the crucified and risen
Christ.
In the context of the Christian life, Christ's mediatorship was to Calvin a
continuing experience as well as a historical event. That God had revealed
himself as Father in a man who was tempted and suffered, who exercised his
Sonship by the death of the cross, was at the center of the gospel to
multitudes of Christians who suffered and were tempted under their cross.
Calvin's Christ was nothing if he was not the Comforter of the church, the
source of the Christian's courage and hope, and his power of endurance.
This explains two of the characteristic emphases of Calvin: the humanity and
the Kingship of Christ, perhaps his Kingship and humanity, as two focuses of
his mediatorship. No one after Paul in the history of the church, so far as we
know, made so much of the ascension of Christ and his sitting at the right hand
of the Father, as did Calvin. There is nothing more joyful for a Christian than
to know that Christ crucified is at God's right hand as the King and comfort of
his people, reigning over the church, interceding with the Father for his
people, protecting and watching over them in their tribulations. Hence in
Calvin's thought the death, resurrection, ascension of Christ, issue in his
sitting at God's right hand as the climax of his own mission; from it they
derive their whole glory as elements of the gospel. The sitting at the right
hand is also the source of all the benefits that Christians receive from God
the Father. It is not too much to say that if one takes away Christ at God's
right
Calvin was as little concerned with the divine "essence" of Christ as he was
with the essence of God in general. It is the divine power and grace of Christ
that he finds of decisive importance for the church. He of course never denied,
he emphatically affirmed, the union of divine and human natures in Christ. By
the standard of the Church fathers, he was orthodox enough. But the words
"essence" or "nature" belonged to contexts of thought that were not his own. He
had no stomach for the kind of metaphysical reflection that is required by the
mind's desire to penetrate to God's or Christ's essence. The main point of
Calvin's insistence on the deity of Christ was that he was the agent of our
salvation. Commenting on Col. 1:15, he insists that Christ is "the image of the
invisible God," not only by virtue of his essence, but also as one in whom God
makes himself known to us. We know nothing about Christ's divine nature apart
from what he has done and continues to do for us. And he has done and continues
to do his work as a human being and our brother. Our brother is our King, and
our King is our brother. This situation is stated properly in terms, not of
essence, but of God's saving work; provided we bear in mind with Calvin that
the one and the same saving work was at once the Father's and the Son's by the
Spirit.
Calvin's eloquent comments on the events of Christ's life and death as recorded
in the Gospels are clearly intended to show the Christians that they are
suffering after their King and participating in his life. Here the deity of
Christ in no wise vitiates his authentically human experience of temptation and
"Passion." Calvin pays his tribute to orthodoxy by reminding himself that the
Son of God put on humanity and shared our life freely and voluntarily. He even
shows a predilection for the notion that he was "God clothed in human flesh"
(on Luke 19:41), or "manifested in the flesh" (on John 1:1, 1 Tim. 3:16).
It is quite evident that the orthodox understanding of the two natures of
Christ, as involving a divine and a human essence and even a divine and a human
consciousness, was, to say the least, awkward in relation to Calvin's concern
with Christ's role as mediator -- especially with Christ as the head of a
church engaged in mortal combat with evil. It is hardly too much to say that
Christ's divinity meant to Calvin above all that he, with the Father, was the
source of the Christian life and its blessings (on 2 Thess. 2:16). He insisted
that the Biblical statements concerning Christ's relation to God are, as it
were, not metaphysical but soteriological or "operational." They refer to his
work, to what he is to us and for us. God himself we know by his saving work;
and as this saving work is done by Christ, we know him as God.[52]
5. The Christian Life and the Last Things
About the Christian life we need not say much in this place. We have cited
Calvin extensively on this subject in our selections. Here we shall consider
his so-called otherworldliness.
Calvin's emphasis on self-denial can be understood and interpreted rightly only
if we keep in mind that there is in fact no victory over the power of death
without a denial of the self which works by sin and despair. A man has to know
the death of Christ by his own death, and know the resurrection of Christ by
the miracle of the victory over death within him; and such
Calvin knew no antidote to defeat and ruin except to raise our minds to heaven.
To him, a Christian walked on earth, but his life was hid in heaven. He spoke
with obvious passion against attachment to this world, and exhorted Christians
to renounce it in favor of heaven. In a sense, nothing is so essential to his
theology as the opposition between heaven and earth, and the insistence that
Christians, with their minds and hearts, leave the earth and go up to heaven.
But Calvin wanted Christians to lift their minds to heaven because Christ is
there, and it is from there that he reigns over the church in the world. He
says explicitly that heaven, where God is, and Christ is, is "above all the
heavens." It is not the heaven we see and in which the stars shine (on Heb.
9:24). Calvin is not concerned with it except as the abode of God and Christ,
and the origin of our salvation; so that, to turn the mind to heaven means to
turn it to Christ at God's right hand: to turn to him for strength against
tribulation and for victory over evil. We must turn to "heaven" for victory on
earth.
On the other hand, to turn away from the earth is to Calvin to mortify the
sinful flesh which shrinks before warfare with evil and the suffering it
entails. To renounce the world is to renounce Satan and all his evil works. It
is hard to be faithful to the gospel while the flesh rebels against the
privations and oppressions which it would avoid at the expense of treachery to
Christ and his gospel. In short, Calvin's insistence upon self-denial and world
renunciation must be understood in the context of the Christian warfare and in
the light of the sheer necessity of dying to sin if one is to live to Christ.
It has nothing to do with ascetic contempt for the created world, or with an
otherworldliness which seeks a heaven because it despairs of this world in
general. Calvin had only love and respect for the world as God's creation for
the use and enjoyment of man.[53]
Calvin turns the attention of the Christian not only upward
But the new life in Christ is itself by a resurrection from the dead (on John
5:21). When Paul says that the Spirit of God "shall also quicken your mortal
bodies," according to Calvin he means "everything left in us that is subject to
death. . . . From this we gather that here he speaks not of the last
resurrection which shall be in a moment, but of the continuous working of the
Spirit, by which he gradually destroys the remnants of the flesh and restores a
heavenly life in us" (on Rom. 8:11). In his comments on Acts 2:19, he
identifies the great day of the Lord not with the last things, but with
"the whole Kingdom of Christ" and the trials of the church. He does not
postpone the destruction of death prophesied by Paul to the end, but speaks of
it as having already occurred, as already realized in the deliverance of the
Christians from the power of death (on 1 Cor. 15:26). The Day of Judgment is
even now anticipated in the present dread and terror deep in the lives of the
ungodly, and in the present joy and exultation of the believers (on Rom. 2:5).
The coming of Christ itself is anticipated when Christians obey God and "vie
one with another in imitating him" (on Heb. 10:7); when Christians, in the
extremity of their sufferings, call upon him, and he comes to them with power
and help (on Matt. 19:23); when he consummates his present reign with a
complete revelation of his authority in all the earth (on Matt. 25:31). Calvin
speaks of the last things as a full manifestation of what is now hidden or
obscure.
He even, as we say, demythologizes the prophecy "Heaven and earth shall pass
away," by calling upon Christians to raise their faith "above heaven and
earth," to Christ in God's heaven (on Matt. 24:35). He calls upon them so to
meditate upon the last things as to receive patience and perseverance in their
trials (on 1 John 3:2). Their life is to be a waiting, without any clairvoyance
as to time and seasons. They are to live every day as though it were their last
(as it might well have been under
Introductory Selections from Calvin
I. Autobiographical SketchI
IF THOSE WHO READ THIS COMMENTARY, WHICH HAS cost me much labor, derive
some benefit from it, I should like to have them know how greatly I have been
helped [in writing it] through those relatively mild conflicts by which the
Lord has trained me. My own experience not only aided me in applying to our
present situation the teaching I gathered [from the Psalms], but also opened
the way to an intimate understanding of the mind of those who wrote them. It
gave me no little help in understanding the complaints of David, the greatest
of the psalmists, about the evils which the church suffered at the hands of
those who were supposed to be its members, for I myself had had the same or
similar experiences with enemies within the church. I differ so much from David
since I lack the many virtues which distinguished him, and I labor so much
under the corresponding faults, that I am ashamed to compare myself to him. But
although as I read the records of his faith, endurance, ardor, zeal, and
sincerity, the difference between us often made me groan, yet I found especial
help for myself when I saw in the Psalter as in a mirror both the requirements
of my calling and how ceaselessly [David] fulfilled them. . . .
It goes without saying that my own position is far below David's. And yet, as
he was elevated from the sheepfolds to the highest position of authority, so
God took me also from obscure and small beginnings and honored me with the
office of herald and minister of the gospel. My father intended me as a young
boy for theology. But when he saw that the science of law made those who
cultivate it wealthy, he was led to change his mind by the hope of material
gain for me. So it happened that I was
First, when I was too firmly addicted to the papal superstitions to be drawn
easily out of such a deep mire, by a sudden conversion He brought my mind
(already more rigid than suited my age) to submission [to him]. I was so
inspired by a taste of true religion and I burned with such a desire to carry
my study further, that although I did not drop other subjects, I had no zeal
for them. In less than a year, all who were looking for a purer doctrine began
to come to learn from me, although I was a novice and a beginner.
Then I, who was by nature a man of the country and a lover of shade and
leisure, wished to find for myself a quiet hiding place -- a wish which has
never yet been granted me; for every retreat I found became a public lecture
room. When the one thing I craved was obscurity and leisure, God fastened upon
me so many cords of various kinds that he never allowed me to remain quiet, and
in spite of my reluctance dragged me into the limelight.
I left my own country and departed for Germany to enjoy there, unknown, in some
corner, the quiet long denied me. But lo, while I was hidden unknown at Basel,
a great fire of hatred [for France] had been kindled in Germany by the exile of
many godly men from France. To quench this fire, wicked and lying rumors were
spread, cruelly calling the exiles Anabaptists and seditious men, men who
threatened to upset, not only religion, but the whole political order with
their perverse madness. I saw that this was a trick of those in [the French]
court, not only to cover up with false slanders the shedding of the innocent
blood of holy martyrs, but also to enable the persecutors to continue with the
pitiless slaughter. Therefore I felt that I must make a strong statement
against such charges; for I could not be silent without treachery. This was why
I published the Institutes -- to defend against unjust slander my
brothers whose death was precious in the Lord's sight. A second reason was my
desire to rouse the sympathy and concern of people outside, since the same
punishment threatened many other poor people. And this volume was not a thick
and laborious work like the present edition; it appeared as a brief
Enchiridion. It had no other purpose than to bear witness to the faith
of those whom I saw criminally libeled by wicked and false courtiers.
I desired no fame for myself from it; I planned to depart shortly, and no one
knew that I was the writer [of the book]. For I had kept my authorship secret
and intended to continue to do so. But Wilhaim Farel[54] forced me to stay in Geneva not so much by advice or
urging as by command, which had the power of God's hand laid violently upon me
from heaven. Since the wars had closed the direct road to Strasbourg, I had
meant to pass through Geneva quickly and had determined not to be delayed there
more than one night.
A short time before, by the work of the same good man [Farel], and of Peter
Viret,55 the papacy had been banished from the city; but things were
still unsettled and the place was divided into evil and harmful factions. One
man, who has since shamefully gone back to the papists, took immediate action
to make me known. Then Farel, who was working with incredible zeal to promote
the gospel, bent all his efforts to keep me in the city. And when he realized
that I was determined to study in privacy in some obscure place, and saw that
he gained nothing by entreaty, he descended to cursing, and said that God would
surely curse my peace if I held back from giving help at a time of such great
need. Terrified by his words, and conscious of my own timidity and cowardice, I
gave up my journey and attempted to apply whatever gift I had in defense of my
faith.
Scarcely four months had passed before we were attacked on the one side by the
Anabaptists and on the other by a certain rascally apostate who, relying upon
the secret aid of certain important people, was able to give us much trouble.
Meanwhile, internal dissensions, coming one upon another, caused us dreadful
torments.
I confess that I am by nature timid, mild, and cowardly, and yet I was forced
from the very beginning to meet these violent storms. Although I did not yield
to them, yet since I was not very brave, I was more pleased than was fitting
when I was banished and forcibly expelled from the city.
Then loosed from my vocation and free [to follow my own desire], I decided to
live quietly as a private individual. But that most distinguished minister of
Christ, Martin Bucer,56 dragged me back again to a new post with the
same curse which Farel had used against me. Terrified by the example of Jonah
which he had set before me, I continued the work of teaching. And although I
always consistently avoided public notice, somehow I was dragged to the
imperial assemblies.[57] There, whether I
wished it or not, I had to speak before large audiences. Afterwards the Lord
had pity on the City of Geneva and quieted the deadly conflicts there. After he
had by his wondrous power frustrated both the criminal conspiracies and the
bloody attempts at force, I was compelled, against my own will, to take again
my former position.[58] The safety of that
church was far too important in my mind for me to refuse to meet even death for
its sake. But my timidity kept suggesting to me excuses of every color for
refusing to put my shoulder again under so heavy a burden. However, the demand
of duty and faith at length conquered, and I went back to the flock from which
I had been driven away. With how much grief, with how many tears, and in how
great anxiety I went, God is my best witness. Many faithful men also understood
my reluctance and would have wished to see me released from this pain if they
had not been constrained by the same fear which influenced me.
It would make too long a story to tell of the conflicts of all sorts in which I
was active and of the trials by which I was tested. I will merely repeat
briefly what I said before, so as not to offend fastidious readers with
unnecessary words. Since
In all these five years certain men have had too great an influence, and a part
of the common people who were corrupted by their alluring propaganda have been
seeking unrestrained license. We therefore had both to oversee discipline and
to fight without intermission. For the ruin of the church was a matter of no
account to profane men and despisers of heavenly doctrine who desired and
obtained power to gain every indulgence they dared. Some were driven mad by
famine and hunger, and certain others by insatiable ambition or shameful greed
for profit; and they all were ready to ruin themselves and us by mixing
everything up rather than to [allow us to] maintain order. They were at it a
long time, and I think made use of every tool forged in Satan's workshop. The
only possible way to end their wicked plots was to destroy the men themselves
by a shameful death -- a spectacle which grieved me very much. For although
they deserved any possible punishment, I would rather have had them live safe
and unharmed. And they could have done so, if they had not been wholly
impervious to wise counsel.
This five-year trial, hard and burdensome enough to me, was made still worse
torture by the ill will of those who never ceased to attack me and my ministry
with vile slanders. Many were so blinded by their desire to abuse me that their
effrontery became shamefully outspoken. Others were saved by their own craft
from conviction and ignominious exposure. But when anyone repeats an offense of
which he has been accused a hundred times and acquitted, the indignity of it
all is hard to bear.
Because I assert that the world is governed by the hidden providence of God,
insolent men rise up and say that I make God the author of sin -- a futile and
baseless slander which would come to nothing of itself if it did not find eager
listeners. Envy or spite or ingratitude or wickedness so rules men that
When one suffers trials at the hands of professed enemies, one can bear them.
But when people who hide under the name of brothers, those who not only eat the
sacred bread but also serve it to others, and who boast loudly that they are
heralds of the gospel -- when these carry on such wicked warfare, how
detestable it is! It is of this kind of thing that David most rightly
complains, when he says, The man of my peace and he who ate bread with me
has lifted his heel against me (Ps. 41:10); and also, My companion and
associate who used to go with me to the temple of God, with whom I took sweet
counsel, he like an enemy has handed me over to the wicked (Ps. 55:14).
Some men have spread frivolous rumors about my treasures; others about my
enormous power. Others have talked about my sumptuous table. Does a man live in
the lap of luxury when he is content with meager food and plain clothing; when
he requires no more frugality from the poorest folk than he himself practices?
As for my authority, I wish I could hand it over to them! They measure my power
by the amount of my labor, by the weight of work that wears me down. How much
money I have, my death will show -- if there are any whom I cannot convince
while I am alive. But I admit that I am not "poor," because I desire nothing
beyond my actual needs.
These inventions, although they have no basis in fact, are believed among many
people because the majority think that the only way to cover up their shame is
to mix black with white. They think the best guarantee of impunity and license
would be the end of the authority of the servants of Christ. In addition there
are the mockers at feasts of whom David complains in Ps. 35:16: not only
the plate lickers but those who hunt the favor of the powerful with false
denunciations. I have become used to swallowing insults for so long that I am
almost insensitive; yet as their insolence increased I could not help feeling
some bitter pricks.
And as though it were not enough for me to suffer the inhumanity of neighbors,
a throng of evil-driven men from the frozen sea [Germany] stirred up (
But this also was David's experience. He deserved well of his people, yet he
was hated by many, as he laments in Ps. 69:4: They hate me without a cause.
. . . I returned what I did not rob.59 When I was assailed by
the undeserved hatred of those whose duty it was to help me, I received no
small comfort from knowing of the glorious example [set by David].
Now these experiences were a very great help to my understanding of the Psalms,
since, as I read, I was going through well-known territory. And I hope my
readers will realize that when I discuss David's thoughts more intimately than
those of others, I am speaking not as a remote spectator but as one who knows
all about these things from his own experience.
I have striven faithfully to make the value of this treasury [of the Psalms]
available to all the faithful. And even though I have not accomplished what I
had desired, I deserve some thanks for my attempt. All I ask is that each
reader judge my labor justly and honestly by its fruits and the profit he finds
in it. Certainly, as I said, when a man reads my book, he will see that I did
not seek to give pleasure unless I also gave help.
I have kept throughout to a simple method of teaching; and to avoid all
ostentation, I have refrained for the most part from the refutation of others,
which readily provides much opportunity for plausible showing off. I have not
mentioned opinions opposed to mine except where there was danger that my
silence would leave my readers doubtful or perplexed. I realized, of course,
that many would have been more attracted and tickled if I had included a varied
mass of ostentatious and glittering material. But nothing meant more to me than
to consider the upbuilding of the church.
May God who gave me this purpose also guarantee its success.
II. Preface to Olivétan's New Testament
But the wretched man, wanting to be somebody in himself, began incontinently to
forget and misunderstand the source of his good; and by an act of outrageous
ingratitude, he set out to exalt himself in pride against his Maker and the
Author of all that is excellent in him. For this reason, he went down in ruin
and lost all the dignity and superiority of the state in which he was first
created; he was despoiled and divested of all his glory and deprived of all the
gifts which were his; and this, to confound him in his pride and to constrain
him to understand what he was unwilling to do voluntarily: that he was by
himself nothing but vanity, and would never have been anything else except with
the help of the Lord of power.
Therefore, seeing that God's image and likeness was thus defaced, and man was
without the graces which God in his
Still, the Lord of mercy, who not only loves but is himself love and kindness,
being ready in his infinite goodness to love him who deserved no love, did not
altogether destroy men, or overwhelm them in the abyss of their iniquity. But
on the contrary, he sustained and supported them gently and patiently, giving
them time and opportunity to return to him and to apply themselves again to
that obedience from which they had turned aside. And even though he disguised
himself and kept silent, as though he wished to hide himself from them, leaving
them to go after their desires and the yearnings of their lusts, without law,
without order, without any correction of his Word, he nevertheless has given
them notice enough [of his presence] to move them to seek, feel, and find him,
and to know him and honor him as is his due.
For he has raised everywhere, in all places and in all things, his ensigns and
emblems, under blazons so clear and intelligible that no one can pretend
ignorance in not knowing such a sovereign Lord, who has so amply exalted his
magnificence; who has, in all parts of the world, in heaven and on earth,
written and as it were engraved the glory of his power, goodness, wisdom, and
eternity. Saint Paul has therefore said quite rightly that the Lord has never
left himself without a witness; even among those to whom he has not sent any
knowledge of his Word. It is evident that all creatures, from those in the
firmament to those which are in the center of the earth, are able to act as
witnesses and messengers of his glory to all men; to draw them to seek God, and
after having found him, to meditate
Meanwhile, in order to reveal his infinite goodness and kindness more fully
among men, he was not content to teach all men as we have just described; but
he made his voice to be heard especially by a certain people, whom he elected,
by his good will and free grace, from among all the nations of the earth. These
were the children of Israel, to whom he showed himself clearly by his Word, and
declared to them by his marvelous works what he intended them to know. For, he
drew them away from subjection to Pharaoh the king of Egypt, under whom they
were held down and oppressed, to deliver them and set them at liberty. He
accompanied them night and day in their flight, as one more fugitive in their
midst. He fed them in the desert. He made them to possess the Promised Land. He
gave victories and triumphs to their hands. And as though he were nothing to
the other nations, he willed expressly to be called the God of Israel, and to
have Israel called his people, on condition that they would recognize no other
Lord and receive none else as their God. And this alliance (covenant) was
confirmed and handed down by authentic instruments of testament and testimony
given by himself.
Nevertheless, these people, all of whom shared in the experience of their
cursed race, showed themselves to be true heirs of the wickedness of their
father Adam. They were unmoved by all these remonstrances [of God], and did not
listen to the teaching by which God admonished them. The creatures that had the
glory and magnificence of God stamped upon them were of no help to the
Gentiles, and failed to make them glorify him to whom they testified. And the
Law and the Prophets did not have the authority to lead the Jews in the right
way. All have been blind to the light, deaf to admonitions, and hardened
against the commandments.
It is true enough that the Gentiles, astonished and convinced by so many goods
and benefits which they saw with their own
As for the Jews, even though they received and accepted the messages and
commandments which their Lord sent them by his servants, they have nonetheless
intemperately falsified the faith before him, turned carelessly away from him,
violated and despised his law, hated it, and resisted walking in its ways. They
have become strangers to the house of God and run as dissolute men after other
gods, worshiping idols after the manner of the Gentiles, contrary to the will
of God.
Wherefore, if God were to approach his people, whether Jew or Gentile, a new
covenant was needed: one which would be certain, sure, and inviolable. And to
establish and confirm it, it was necessary to have a Mediator, who would
intercede and come between the two parties, to make concord between them; for
without this, man would have had always to live under the ire and indignation
of God, and would have had no means of relief from the curse, misery, and
confusion into which he was snared and had fallen. And it was our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ, the true and only eternal Son of God, who had to be sent
and given to mankind by the Father, to restore a world otherwise wasted,
destroyed, and desolate.
Also from the very beginning, the world was not without the hope of recovering
the loss suffered in Adam. For even Adam, in spite of his incontinency after
his ruin, was given the promise that the seed of the woman would crush the head
of the serpent; which is to say that Jesus Christ born of a virgin would strike
down and destroy the power of Satan.
After that, this promise was renewed more fully to Abraham, when God told him
that all the nations of the earth would be blessed in his seed. This meant that
from his seed would come Jesus Christ according to the flesh, by whose blessing
all men of every land would be sanctified. And the same promise was
In the first place, it is foretold for us in Isaiah, how he was to be born of a
virgin, saying: Behold, a virgin shall conceive and shall bear a son, and you
shall call his name Immanuel (Isa. 7:14). The time is described for us in
Moses, when good Jacob says, The scepter shall not be taken from the line of
Judah, nor the government from his hand, until the coming of the One who is to
be sent; and the same is the expectation of the nations (Gen. 49:10). And this
was verified when Jesus Christ came into the world; for the Romans, after
having divested the Jews of all government and rule, had, thirty-seven years
before [the coming of Christ] ordained Herod king over them, whose father was
Antipater the Edomite and his mother an Arabian; he was therefore a foreigner.
It had happened sometimes before that the Jews had been without a king; but
they had never before been left as they were now without counselors, rulers,
and lawgivers. Another numbering [of the time of Christ's birth] is given in
Daniel, by the reckoning of the seventy weeks (Dan. 9:24). The place of his
birth was given us clearly by Micah, who said, And thou Bethlehem Ephrata, thou
are the least among the thousands of Judah; but from thee shall come for me the
One who shall reign over Israel; and his coming shall be for all the days of
eternity (Micah 5:2). As for the afflictions he was to bear for our deliverance
and the death he was to suffer for our redemption, Isaiah and Zechariah have
spoken of those matters fully and with certainty. The glory of his resurrection
and the nature of his Kingdom, and the grace of the salvation he was to bring
to his people -- these things were fully treated by Isaiah, Jeremiah, and
Zechariah.
Such promises, declared and testified to by these holy men who were filled with
the Spirit of God, have been the comfort and consolation of the children and
elect of God, who have nourished, supported, and sustained their hope in these
promises, waiting upon the will of the Lord to show forth what he had promised.
Many kings and prophets among them have desired greatly to see its
accomplishment, never ceasing all the while to understand, in their hearts and
spirits by faith, the
Similarly, many times and in various seasons, God sent his people kings,
princes, and captains, to deliver them from the power of their enemies, to
govern them in peace, to recover their losses, to give them flourishing reigns,
and by great prowess to make them renowned among all the other peoples. He did
all this to give them a foretaste of the great miracles they were to receive
from this great Messiah, who was to be endowed with all the power and might of
the Kingdom of God.
But when the fullness of time had come and the period foreordained by God was
ended, this great Messiah, so promised and so awaited, came; he was perfect,
and accomplished all that was necessary to redeem us and save us. He was given
not only to the Israelites, but to all men, of every people and every land, to
the end that by him human nature might be reconciled to God. This is what is
stated plainly in the next book (the New Testament), and set forth there
openly. This book we have translated as faithfully as we were able according to
the truth and the style of the Greek language, to enable all Christians, men
and women, who know the French language, to understand and acknowledge the law
they ought to obey and the faith they ought to follow.[61]
It is to declare this thing (reconciliation), that the Lord Jesus, who is
its foundation and substance, has ordained his apostles, whom he has charged
and commanded to publish his grace to the whole world. And the apostles, in
order to discharge their duty properly and plainly, not only have taken pains
and shown diligence in fulfilling their embassy by the preaching of the word by
mouth, but they have also followed the example of Moses and the prophets, and
have left an eternal remembrance of their doctrine by reducing it to writing;
in which they have first told the story
And this book is called the New Testament in relation to the Old, which,
in so far as it had to be succeeded by and related to the New, and was shaky
and imperfect in itself, was abolished and abrogated. It is the new and the
eternal, which will never grow old and fail, because Jesus Christ is its
Mediator. He has ratified and confirmed it by his death, by which he has
accomplished full and complete remission of all sins (prevarications) which
remained under the first testament.
Scripture is also called gospel, that is, new and joyful news, because in it is
declared that Christ, the sole true and eternal Son of the living God, was made
man, to make us children of God his Father, by adoption. Thus he is our only
Savior, to whom we owe our redemption, peace, righteousness, sanctification,
salvation, and life; who died for our sins and rose again for our
justification; who ascended to heaven for our entry there and took possession
of it for us and [it is] our home; to be always our helper before his Father;
as our advocate and perpetually doing sacrifice for us, he sits at the Father's
right hand as King, made Lord and Master over all, so that he may restore all
that is in heaven and on earth; an act which all the angels, patriarchs,
prophets, apostles did not know how to do and were unable to do, because they
had not been ordained to that end by God.
As the Messiah had been promised so often in the Old Testament by the many
testimonies of the prophets, so also Jesus Christ was by sure and certain
testimonies declared to be the One, and none other, who was to come and was to
be waited for. For the Lord God has made us so completely certain in this
matter, by his Word and his Spirit, by his angels, prophets, apostles, and even
by all his creatures, that nobody is in a position to contradict it without
resisting and rebelling against God's power. In the first place, the eternal
God has testified to us by his voice itself (which is without doubt irrevocable
truth), saying, Behold my well beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear him
(Matt. 9:7). And as Saint John says, the Holy Spirit himself is our great
witness in our hearts (1 John 5:1). The angel Gabriel, sent to the Virgin Mary,
said to her: Behold, you shall conceive in your womb, and shall bear a Son, and
shall call his name Jesus; for he shall be great and shall be
All these witnesses come together into a unity so well, and they are of one
accord among themselves so fully, that it is easy to recognize in such
agreement most certain truth. For there could not be such harmony in lies.
Besides, it is not only the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, the angels, the
prophets and apostles that bear witness to Jesus Christ; his own wonderful
works show forth his most excellent power. The sick, the lame, the blind, the
deaf, the mute, the paralytic, lepers, lunatics, demoniacs, and even the dead
raised by him have carried the emblems of his power. By his power, he has given
life; in his name, the works he has had given him to do were sufficient
witnesses to him (John 10:25). Besides, even the wicked and the enemies of his
glory were constrained by the very force of truth to confess him and to
acknowledge something [of his glory]: for instance, Caiaphas, Pilate, and his
wife. I do not care to bring up the witness of the devils and unclean spirits,
seeing that Jesus Christ rejected them.
In short, all the elements and all the creatures have given Jesus Christ the
glory. At his command, the winds ceased, the
Furthermore, we are called to this inheritance without respect for persons;
male or female, little or great, servant or lord, master or disciple, cleric or
lay, Hebrew or Greek, French or Latin -- no one is rejected, who with a sure
confidence receives him who was sent for him, embraces what is presented to
him, and in short acknowledges Jesus Christ for what he is and as he is given
by the Father.
In the meantime, all we who bear the name of Christians, male or female, shall
we permit ourselves to dishonor, to conceal, and to corrupt this Testament,
which is so rightly ours, without which we could not pretend any right to the
Kingdom of God, without which we should be ignorant of the great blessings and
promises which Jesus Christ has given us, of the glory and beatitude he has
prepared for us? We do not know what God has commanded or forbidden us; we
cannot tell good from evil, light from darkness, the commandments of God from
the ordinances (constitutions) of men. Without the gospel everything is useless
and vain; without the gospel we are not Christians; without the gospel all
riches is poverty, all wisdom, folly before God; strength is weakness, and all
the justice of man is under the condemnation of God. But by the knowledge of
the gospel we are made children of God, brothers of Jesus Christ, fellow
townsmen with the saints, citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven, heirs of God with
Jesus Christ, by whom the poor are made rich, the weak strong, the fools wise,
the sinners justified, the desolate comforted, the doubting sure, and slaves
free. The gospel is the Word of life and truth. It is the power of God for the
salvation of all those who believe; and the key to the knowledge of God, which
opens the door of the Kingdom of Heaven to the faithful by releasing them from
sins, and closes it to the unbelievers, binding them in their sins. Blessed are
all
O Christians, men and women, hear this and learn. For surely the ignorant man
shall perish in his ignorance, and the blind who follows another blind man will
fall into the ditch with him. There is but one way to life and salvation, and
that is faith and certainty in the promises of God which cannot be had without
the gospel; for by hearing it and knowing it living faith is provided, together
with sure hope, and perfect love for God and a lively love toward our neighbor.
Where then is your hope, if you contemn and scorn to hear, see, read, and
retain this holy gospel? Those who have their affections fixed upon this world
chase with every means whatever they think will bring them happiness, without
sparing labor, body, life, or reputation. And all this is done in the service
of this wretched body, which has a life so vain, miserable, and uncertain. When
it is a question of life immortal and incorruptible, of beatitude eternal and
immeasurable, of all the treasures of Paradise, shall we not endeavor to pursue
them? Those who give themselves to the mechanical arts, however low and mean
these may be, expend pain and labor to learn and know them; and those who
aspire to a reputation of greatest excellence torment their minds day and
night, to understand something of the human sciences, which are nothing but
wind and smoke. Should we not then much more be employed and diligent in the
study of this divine wisdom, which passes beyond the whole world and penetrates
as far as the mysteries of God, which it has pleased him to make known by his
holy Word!
What then shall estrange and alienate us from this holy gospel? Shall injuries,
curses, disgrace, and want of worldly honor? But, we know well that Jesus
Christ has traveled the same road which we have to follow, if we would be his
disciples; that we must not refuse to be despised, mocked, humiliated, and
rejected before men. For it is thus that we shall be honored, prized,
glorified, and exalted in God's judgment. Will there be banishments,
proscriptions, privation from goods and riches? But we know that if we shall be
banished from one country, the whole earth is the Lord's, and if we be thrown
out of the earth itself, nonetheless we shall not be outside of his Kingdom.
[We know] that when we are despoiled and impoverished, we have a Father who is
rich enough to nourish us; even that Jesus Christ was made poor, so that we
might follow him in his poverty.
In short, if we have Jesus Christ with us, we shall come upon nothing so
accursed that he will not turn it into a blessing; nothing so execrable that it
shall not be made holy; nothing so evil that it shall not turn into our good.
Let us not lose our comfort when we see all earthly powers and forces against
us; for the promise cannot fail, that the Lord on high will hold in mockery all
the assemblings and efforts of men who would conspire against him. Let us not
be desolate, as though all hope were lost, when we see true servants of God die
and perish before our eyes. For it was said truly by Tertullian, and so it has
been approved and shall be until the consummation of the age, that the blood of
the martyrs is the seed of the church.
And we have a still greater and a more sure consolation, when we turn our eyes
away from this whole world and set aside all that we can see before us, to wait
with patience for the great judgment of God, by which in one moment all the
machinations of men against him shall be struck down, brought to nought, and
overturned. This shall be when the Kingdom of God, which we now see in hope,
shall become manifest; when Jesus Christ shall appear in majesty with his
angels. It shall then be that the good and the evil shall be present before the
judgment seat of this great King. Those who have remained firm in this
testament, who have followed and kept the will of this good Father, shall be at
his right hand as his true children, and shall be blessed with the fulfillment
of their faith, which shall be eternal salvation. And since they were not
ashamed to own and confess Jesus Christ, when he was despised and condemned
before men, they shall also share in his glory, and shall be crowned with him
in eternity. But the perverse, rebellious, and condemned, who have despised and
rejected this holy gospel, and similarly those who for the sake of holding on
to their honor, riches, and high estate have been unwilling to be humbled and
made low with Jesus Christ; who for fear of men have cast aside the fear of God
and like bastard [sons] disobeyed this Father -- these shall be on the left
hand; they shall be executed and cast out; for the reward of their
unfaithfulness, they shall receive eternal death.
Therefore, when you hear that the gospel presents you Jesus Christ in whom all
the promises and gifts of God have been
It follows that every good thing we could think or desire is to be found in
this same Jesus Christ alone. For, he was sold, to buy us back; captive, to
deliver us; condemned, to absolve us; he was made a curse for our blessing, sin
offering for our righteousness; marred that we may be made fair; he died for
Our life; so that by him fury is made gentle, wrath appeased, darkness turned
into light, fear reassured, despisal despised, debt canceled, labor lightened,
sadness made merry, misfortune made fortunate, difficulty easy, disorder
ordered, division united, ignominy ennobled, rebellion subjected, intimidation
intimidated, ambush uncovered, assaults assailed, force forced back, combat
combated, war warred against, vengeance avenged, torment tormented, damnation
damned, the abyss sunk into the abyss, hell transfixed, death dead, mortality
made immortal. In short, mercy has swallowed up all misery, and goodness all
misfortune. For all these things which were to be the weapons of the devil in
his battle against us, and the sting of death to pierce us, are turned for us
into exercises which we
This[62] is what we should in short seek in
the whole of Scripture: truly to know Jesus Christ, and the infinite riches
that are comprised in him and are offered to us by him from God the Father. If
one were to sift thoroughly the Law and the Prophets, he would not find a
single word which would not draw and bring us to him. And for a fact, since all
the treasures of wisdom and understanding are hidden in him, there is not the
least question of having, or turning toward, another goal; not unless we would
deliberately turn aside from the light of truth, to lose ourselves in the
darkness of lies. Therefore, rightly does Saint Paul say in another passage
that he would know nothing except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And such
knowledge although mean and contemptible to the mind of the flesh is
nevertheless sufficient to occupy us all our lives. And we shall not waste our
time if we employ all our study and apply all our understanding to profit from
it. What more would we ask for, as spiritual doctrine for our souls, than to
know God, to be converted (
Here, I say once again, is enclosed all the wisdom which men can understand,
and ought to learn in this life; which no angel,
And you kings, princes, and Christian lords, who are ordained of God to punish
the wicked and to uphold the good in peace according to the Word of God -- to
you it belongs to have this sacred doctrine, so useful and needful, published,
taught, and understood in all your lands, realms, and lordly domains, to the
end that God may be magnified by you, and his gospel exalted; because by right
it is his due that all kings and kingdoms obey him in all humility and serve
his glory. Remember that sovereign Empire, above all kingdoms, principalities,
and lordships, was given by the Father to the Lord Jesus; and he is to be
feared, held in awe, and honored by everyone, great or little. Remember[63] what was foretold by the prophets: that all
the kings of the earth would render him homage as their superior, and would
adore him as their Savior and their God; let this come true in you. And
remember that it is no dishonor for you to be subject to such a great Lord, as
though in this way your own majesty and high place would be reduced and become
as nothing; for it is the greatest honor you may lawfully desire, to be known
and regarded as the officials and lieutenants of God. It is unthinkable that
Jesus Christ, in whom God wills to be glorified and exalted, should not have
dominion over you; and in fact it is reasonable enough that you should be the
ones to give him this preeminence, provided your own power is founded in him
alone. Otherwise what an ingratitude it would be that you should want to shut
out him who has established you in the power you possess, and maintains and
keeps you in it! What is more, you ought to know that there is no better
foundation, nor one firmer, for keeping your domains in true prosperity, than
to have him as Chief and Master, and to govern your peoples under his hand; and
that without him they [your domains] can be neither permanent nor endure for
long, but shall be accursed of God and shall consequently fall down in
confusion and ruin. Since God has thus given you the sword in hand for
governing your subjects in his name and by his authority; since he has done you
the honor of giving you his name and
This is what the Lord requires of you through his prophet, when he calls you
the guardians of his church. For this tutelage and protection is not a matter
of enlarging the riches, privileges, and honors of the clergy, which makes them
high and haughty, living in pomp and in all dissoluteness, contrary to their
proper estate; much less is it a matter of maintaining the clergy in their
pride and inordinate displays; it is rather a matter of seeing to it that the
entire teaching of the gospel is kept in its purity and truth; that the Holy
Scriptures are faithfully preached, read, and perused; that God is honored
according to the rule given us in them, and the church is well governed; that
all which is contrary to the honor of God, or to the good government of the
church, be corrected and repressed; so that the Kingdom of Jesus Christ may
flourish by the power of his Word.
O you who call yourselves bishops and pastors of the poor people, see to it
that the sheep of Jesus Christ are not deprived of their proper pasture; and
that it is not prohibited and forbidden to any Christian freely and in his own
language to read, handle, and hear this holy gospel, seeing that such is the
will of God, and Jesus Christ commands it; for it is for this cause that he has
sent his apostles and servants throughout the whole world; giving them the
power to speak in all tongues, so that they may in every language preach to
every creature; and he has made them debtors to the Greeks and the barbarians,
to the wise and the simple, in order that none might be excluded from their
teaching. Surely, if you are truly their vicars, successors, and imitators, it
is your office to do the same, watching over the flock and seeking every
possible means to have everyone instructed
It is the will of the Lord of lights by his Holy Spirit, by means of this holy
and saving gospel, to teach the ignorant, to strengthen the feeble, to illumine
the blind, and to make his truth to reign among all peoples and nations, to the
end that the whole world may know but one God and one Savior, Jesus Christ; one
faith, and one gospel. So be it.
III. Epistle to Simon Grynaeus on the Commentary on Romans
John Calvin, to Simon Grynaeus,64 a most illustrious man.
I remember that three years ago we had a friendly talk about the best way of
expounding Scripture. The method which you liked best, I myself approved most
of all others. We both felt that the chief virtue of an interpreter consists in
clarity combined with brevity. And indeed, since about the only business he has
is to lay open the mind of the writer he has set out to explain, the more he
leads the reader away from it, the more he deviates from his own purpose and is
sure to wander out of bounds.
We expressed the desire that, from among all those are today engaged in aiding
[the cause of] theology with this kind of work, someone would come forward who
would strive for simplicity and would write so as not to discourage his readers
too much with long-winded expositions. At the same time, however, I know that
not everybody agrees with us in this matter; and that those who do not accept
[our views], have good arguments on their side. Still, I cannot budge from my
love of brevity. Of course, since it happens that there is a variety of
disposition among men, and different people find pleasure in different things,
let everyone, in this case also, enjoy his own judgment, provided that he does
not try to make it a law for everybody else. Let us not, on our part, repudiate
or condemn the labor of those who are more wordy and expansive in their
expositions of the Sacred Books. But let them in return do
I simply could not resist trying my hand at something along this line, which
might be of benefit to the church of God. I am not sure that I have succeeded
in doing what we thought was desirable; nor did I hope as much when I began.
But I did make the effort to discipline my style, so that one could see I was
aiming at the ideal we set down. How far I have succeeded, it is not for me to
decide; I leave it to you and others like you to judge.
I can indeed see that many people will be offended by my undertaking and
condemn me because of all things I have dared to try [my ability] on this
epistle of Paul. Since men of excellent learning have already labored at
expounding it, it is unbelievable that any room is left for others to produce
something better. And I must say that even though I hoped my labor would
produce some good results, I was at the beginning deterred by this very
consideration. I was afraid that, if I set my hand to this task after so many
excellent workmen, I would incur the reputation of temerity.
There are commentaries on this epistle by many ancient and many modern writers.
Indeed they could not have labored at a better task; because when anyone
understands this epistle, the way is open before him to an understanding of the
whole of Scripture. I do not need to say anything about the ancient
[interpreters] whose piety, erudition, saintliness, and age invest them with
such authority that we should not condemn anything we have received from them.
As to those who are living, nothing will be gained by mentioning all of them by
name. I will speak my mind about those who have labored zealously and done
outstanding work [in the field]. Philip Melanchthon,65 by his
singular learning and industry, and the power of his competence in every kind
of intellectual discipline has shed much light on this epistle; more than all
who came before him. But he evidently set himself to examine closely only those
matters which were worthy of his own attention; he stopped with these, and
deliberately passed by a great deal which cannot but trouble the ordinary mind.
Then comes Bullinger,66 who also received
To this end, I hoped that when I wrote in my own way, no [charge of] odious
rivalry would be pressed against me, as I was at first afraid it would be.
Philip succeeded in what he set out to do: to clarify to the utmost what is
essential. He had no intention of preventing others from doing what must not be
neglected; and he did omit much because he was occupied with the things that
come first. Bucer is too prolix to keep the interest of busy people; his
[thoughts] are so high that the lowly and those whose attention is not the best
are in no position to understand him. Whenever he deals with any subject, his
unbelievably forceful and fecund mind brings up so many things that he does not
know how to take his hand off the paper (
And yet, I wondered for some time whether I would do better to make some
gleanings from these other men, so as to be able to put together something to
help those of mediocre mentality; or whether I should compose a complete
commentary,
As to its usefulness, I shall say nothing. However, men of good will who read
it have acknowledged having benefited from it more than I dare modestly promise
in so many words.
It is only right that I should be excused when I at times disagree with others
and differ from them. [I know that] we must have such reverence for the Word of
God that we do not, so far as it is possible, set it against itself with our
contradictory interpretations. I dare not think how much damage is done to its
majesty, especially when we do not treat it with great discernment and
sobriety. And, if to contaminate anything dedicated to God involves a great
crime, anyone who handles the most sacred thing in the world with unclean or
incompetent hands ought not to be endured.
Therefore, it is sacrilegious audacity rashly to turn Scripture this way and
that (as we please), and to fool with it as though it were a game; many people
have been doing this very thing long enough.
But we ought always to remind ourselves that even those who have not been
wanting in zeal for piety, and have handled the mysteries of God with
conscience and sobriety, have not always agreed among themselves. God has in no
instance honored his servants with such blessing as to endow them with full and
perfect knowledge of every subject; and doubtless his reason for this has been
to keep them humble and desirous to keep in communication with their brothers.
It is of course highly desirable that we should constantly agree in our
understanding of Scripture passages. But there is no hope for such a thing in
this life. Therefore, we must do our best neither to be pushed by a desire for
novelty, nor to deprecate others through envy; neither to be aroused by hatred,
nor to be goaded by ambition; rather, we should do only what is necessary, our
aim being
But because it is not proper that I state or establish the value of my own
work, I am happy to leave criticism to you. Since everybody defers to your
judgment in many things, I also, who have been intimate with you and know very
well the kind of man you are, owe you deference in everything. Familiarity has
a way of diminishing respect, but as men of learning know very well, in your
case, it greatly increases esteem. Farewell.
Chapter . The Bible; I. The Bible
[1]Opera, in Corpus
Reformatorum, ed. by G. Baum, E. Cunitz, E. Reuss, vol. 59, pp. 451-482,
contains a list of Calvin's publications during his lifetime.
[2]There was often a desire to include the
Hebrew in the publication, but to keep the cost of the volumes as reasonable as
possible, this was not always done. But see the Amsterdam edition of 1667.
[3]For strong objections to the Vulgate, see
Tracts (Edinburgh edition), vol. 3, pp. 76 f., or Opera, vol. 7,
pp. 411 f.
[4]King, John. Preface to Genesis, Edinburgh
ed., pp. xv-xvi.
[5]Footnote of an article by Tholuck in the
English volume on Joshua, Edinburgh ed., p. 348.
[6]See pp. 157, 310, 365, 396.
[7]See note 32.
[8]Opera Omnia, 10 vols., ed. by J.
Clericus, Leyden, 1703-1706, vol. 5, pp. 77-78.
[9]Ibid., p. 131.
[10]Ibid., vol. 3, pp. 1026, 1029,
1034.
[11]Ibid, vol. 6, p. 13, on Matt.
2:7.
[12]Berger, Samuel, La Bible au
seizième siècle, Paris, 1879, p. 78.
[13]Ibid.
[14]See. p. 322.
[15]See pp. 353. f.
[16]On Ezek. 16:12.
[17]See p. 80.
[18]See "Calvin as Historian," pp. 29-31.
[19]See Epistle to Simon Grynaeus, below.
201482-1531. He was born in Weinsberg in the Palatinate. He went to
Bologna to study law but ended studying theology in Heidelberg. In 1515 he
became cathedral preacher in Basel, and after a period in Germany, in 1522 he
returned to Basel, after which his name was associated with that of Zwingli and
with the Protestant Reformation. He was well versed in "the new learning" and
was respected both as exegete and as theologian.
[21]See p. 54 (and cf. p. 75).
[22]See Autobiographical Sketch, p. 57.
[23]Pp. 28f., 107f., 140f., 353, 366f. But see
also on Deut. 13:1, John 11:58.
[24]Doumergue, Emile, Jean Calvin, vol.
3, pp. 592 f.
[25]Opera, vol. 42, pp. 191-192.
[26]Ibid., vol. 40, proleg. See
Edinburgh edition of Ezekiel, p. xlvii.
[27]Ibid., vol. 21, pp. 87-88.
[28]According to Doumergue, Calvin "often
preached twice a day; he gave lectures; he spoke before the congregation every
week. He spoke before the consistory every week. He spoke before the council.
How often a week?" (Jean Calvin, 6, p. 73). See also F. W. Kampschulte,
Johann Calvin, 2, p. 375. But this writer is dependent to a large extent
upon Colladon, whom we have been quoting.
[29]Opera, vol. 21, p. 66.
[30]Ibid., pp. 108-110.
[31]Lorenzo Valla was a learned, boisterous,
and fearless scholar. He is famous for his exposure of "the Donation of
Constantine," which was supposed to have established the supremacy of Rome in
the church and over Italy and Western Europe. He was an accomplished Latinist,
a rigorous textual and historical critic, and a general nuisance for the
tradition. But he escaped the inquisition because of powerful friends including
two popes (Nicholas V and Calixtus III).
[32]Calvin called Budé "a matchless
ornament and crown of literature, by whose contribution today our France lays
claim to the palm of erudition" (O. Breen, John Calvin: A Study on
French Humanism, p. 114). He refers to Budé often (I Cor. 4:13, II Cor.
1:13, Phil. 2:9, John 2:5, 6:7, etc.) as an authority on the languages and
civilization of Greece and Rome. De asse at partibus eius of Budé
was held in highest esteem as a source book on the subject. He was critical of
the church and defended the primacy of Scripture and the cross for salvation,
but he refused to join "the Lutherans." His family later found their way to
Geneva. (See Josef Bohatec, Budé and Calvin, Graz, 1950, for a
classic discussion.)
[33]Erasmus requires no special discussion
here. His relation to the Reformation has inspired a literature that is copious
and readily available. See Preserved Smith, Erasmus, 1923; Albert Hyma,
The Youth of Erasmus, Ann Arbor, 1931; Margaret M. Phillips, Erasmus
and the Northern Renaissance, London, 1949; Louis Bouyer, Autour
d'Erasme, Paris, 1955.
[34]See pp. 107 f., 307 (cf. 327), 311, 334,
370.
[35]See p. 91.
36Lefèvre d'Ètaples (1450-1536) visited Italy (in
1492, 1500) and brought to France new zeal for classical learning. In 1512 he
published a commentary on Paul's epistles, and pleaded for the study of
Scripture as "the unique means of approaching Him who works all things in all"
(A. L Herminjard, Correspondence des Reformateurs, col. I, p. 6). In
1517 he was denounced by the Sorbonne for denying that Mary Magdalene, Mary the
sister of Lazarus, and "the sinful woman" were the same. After 1520 he became
the center of a lively reform movement including the Bishop of Meaux and the
king's sister, Marguerite d'Angoulême. In 1523 he translated Gospels into
French, and continued translating the Bible until 1530. He died a fugitive at
Nérac in 1536.
[37]See the Preface to the Commentary on
Hebrews.
[38]Cf. Davies, Rupert E., The Problem of
Authority in the Continental Reformers, London, 1946. Exceptions are Emil
Kraeling, The Old Testament Since the Reformation, Harpers, 1955, and
the section in The Interpreter's Bible, vol. 1, pp. 124-126, by John T.
McNeill. See also Henri Clavier, Étude sur le Calvinism, Paris,
1936, especially pp. 103 f. Dr. Edward A. Dowey maintains that Calvin assumes
the traditional views of the inerrancy of the Bible even while he comments upon
it as the work of human beings (The Knowledge of God in Calvin's
Theology, 1952, pp. 90 f.). This position, which seems correct, has been
debated, and it does not alter our thesis that the ground of the authority of
the Bible for Calvin was not inerrancy, but God who speaks by it. For a fine
discussion of the subject, see "The Reformer's Use of the Bible," by Paul L.
Lehmann, in Theology Today, October, 1946. See also Kemper Fullerton,
Prophecy and Authority, ch. 7.
[39]But see on Jer. 36:4-6, 28, and Dowey,
op. cit., pp. 90 f.
[40]Institutes, Bk. I, ch 7.
[41]See pp. 61 f., 93f., 101, 104 f., et al.
[42]See below, pp. 141, 176.
[43]See pp. 59-63, 270 ff., 356, 366 ff.
[44]The first sentence of the
Institutes.
[45]See pp. 127, 131, 279, 313, 341, 389.
[46]See Letters of John Calvin, ed. by
Jules Bonnet, 4 vols. It has an excellent index.
[47]See especially the Autobiographical
Sketch, pp. 51, 55-57.
[48]For the following sections, the reader is
referred to the chapter corresponding to the following topics.
[49]See pp. 197f., the Institutes, Bk.
III, chs. 21-24. The position of these chapters in the Institutes is
itself revealing.
[50]See especially on Rom. 8:28-30, pp. 306
f.
[51]City of God, Bk. XII, pars. 9 f.,
Bk. XXII, pars. 12 f.
[52]Niesel, Wilhelm, The Theology of
Calvin, The Westminster Press, 1956, tr. by Harold Knight.
[53]See pp. 124, 347, 349 f., 355, 356.
[54]Guillaume Farel (1489-1565), was like
Calvin, a Frenchman. He was one of the circle of Reformers who gathered around
Bishop Briconnet at Meaux near Paris. When, after much struggle in which Farel
was active, the Reformed faith was established in Geneva in 1535, he was the
leader of the church and induced Calvin to work with him. He was ousted with
Calvin in 1538, and returned with him in 1541, but he left in 1542, and in 1544
settled in Neuchatel. He remained Calvin's close friend, and died a year after
Calvin in 1565 in Metz.
55Pierre Viret (1511-1571), Swiss-born Reformer, helped Farel in
Geneva and stayed in the city when Farel and Calvin were expelled (1538-1541).
Thereafter he worked in Lausanne, his birthplace, and also lectured on the New
Testament in Bern, until he was ousted in 1559 and returned to Geneva. After a
checkered career in France and much controversy with French Catholics, he died
at Orthez (south of Bordeaux) in 1571. He was an extensive and respected writer
as well as an effective preacher. Unfortunately he has not been studied fully
or properly.
56Martin Bucer (1491-1551) was the Protestant Reformer in
Strasbourg, where Calvin stayed for three years (1538-1541) when he was forced
out of Geneva. A man zealous for Christian unity, he had considerable influence
upon Calvin, especially during this early period in the latter's activity. He
commented extensively upon the Bible, and did his best-known work on the
Gospels. His commentary on Romans was published in Strasbourg in 1536, shortly
before Calvin began to work on his own. See Henri Strohl, Bucer: humaniste
chrétien.
[57]At Worms in 1540 and at Regensburg in
1541, where the Catholics and the Protestants entered into futile discussions
on reunion.
[58]See John T. McNeill, The History and
Character of Calvinism, 1954, ch. II.
59Calvin's wording.
[60]This preface to Pierre Robert
Olivétan's translation of the New Testament, which has had a lasting
influence upon the French versions of the Bible, was written in 1534, about a
year after Calvin's conversion. We have translated it and put it here in the
beginning of this volume because it is his first statement of faith as a
Protestant and an eloquent defense of it. Erasmus wrote a similar preface to
his New Testament, and so did Lèfevre d'Étaples. For the latter,
see Herminjard, op. cit., vol. 1, pp. 132 ff. (No. 69). See also Nos. 1,
49, 79, 202 in the same work. We regret that space did not permit us to include
at least his "Epistle of Exhortation" (No. 69) in this selection. For Erasmus'
preface see Opera Omnia, 1704, vol. 5, pp. 137 f. This was translated
into English in 1529, 1540. Again we regret leaving this preface out! The title
at the head of Calvin's preface appeared at the beginning of Bibles and New
Testaments printed in Geneva and elsewhere after 1543. The present text, from
the Opera, C. R. 9, pp. 791 f., contains additions Calvin made after
1534.
[61]Instead of this passage, the treatise of
1543 and all the editions of the Bible that reproduce it contain the paragraph
which follows in the text.
[62]This paragraph is not in the 1535 preface.
It appears for the first time in the treatise of 1543 (C. R. 9, 815).
[63]See previous note for this passage and the
next paragraph.
64Simon Grynaeus (1493-1541), Swabian scholar, professor of Latin
and Greek in Heidelberg, left for Basel in 1529 to succeed Erasmus. He lectured
on Greek and later on the New Testament. He took part in the preparation of the
First Helvetic Confession and attended the Conference of Worms in 1540. As the
above dedication and other letters make clear, Calvin had a great admiration
for this linguist, exegete, and theologian.
651497-1560. German Reformer and friend of Martin Luther. His
annotations on Romans were published in 1529 and his commentary in 1532.
66Heinrich Bullinger (1504-1575), a Swiss Reformer, was the
successor of Zwingli in Zurich. His commentary on Romans and the other epistles
of the New Testament was published in 1537.
[67]See note 3, p. 54.
I. THE QUALITY OF THE COMMENTATOR
II. THE PREPARATION OF THE COMMENTARIES
III. CALVIN AS RENAISSANCE HUMANIST
IV. INTERPRETER FOR THE SUFFERING CHURCH
Introductory Selections from Calvin
THE TEXT
I. AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH FROM THE DEDICATION OF THE COMMENTARY ON THE PSALMS
II. PREFACE TO OLIVÉTAN'S NEW TESTAMENT
Epistle to the Faithful Showing that Christ Is the End of the
Law[60]
To all those who love Christ and his gospel, Greetings.
God the Creator, the most perfect and excellent Maker of all things, who had
already shown himself more than admirable in their creation, made man as his
masterpiece, to surpass all other creatures. Man is endowed with a singular
excellence, for God formed him in his own image and likeness, in which we see a
bright refulgence of God's glory. Furthermore, man would have been able to
continue in the state in which he was formed, if he had been willing to bow
down in humility before the majesty of God, magnifying him with deeds of grace;
not to seek his glory in himself, but knowing that all good things come from
above, always to turn his mind on high and to glorify the one and only God to
whom belongs the praise.
III. EPISTLE TO SIMON GRYNAEUS ON THE COMMENTARY ON ROMANS
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