An international celebration of the 500^th anniversary of John Calvin’s birth (and the 450^th anniversary of the final edition of his magisterial Institutes of the Christian Religion) will soon commence (see www.calvin500.org). For those who have heard little or primarily negative things about the Genevan Reformer, an obvious question might be “why?” A brief review of ten areas of culture that were irrevocably changed by the influence of Calvin and his band of brothers and sisters is in order. Love him or hate him, he was a change agent. We think for the better.

1. Education: The Academy⤒🔗

Calvin broke with medieval pedagogy that limited education primarily to an aristocratic elite. His Academy, founded in 1559, was a pilot in broad-based education for the city. Although Genevans had sought for two centuries to establish a university, only after Calvin’s settlement did a college finally succeed.¹By the time of Calvin’s arrival, city officials yearned for a premier educational institution, but, in 1536, most Genevans thought this was a target too ambitious. Regardless of the unsuccessful starts in education that had occurred between Geneva’s adoption of the Reformation in 1536 and Calvin’s return from his Strasbourg exile in 1541, it is clear that success in establishing a lasting university did not occur until Calvin set his hand to the educational plow after Geneva became settled in its Protestant identity in the 1550s. Calvin’s Academy, which was adjacent to St. Pierre Cathedral, featured two levels of curricula: one for the public education of Geneva’s youth (the college or schola privata) and the other a seminary to train ministers (schola publica).²One should hardly discount the impact that came from the public education of young people, especially in a day when education was normally reserved only for aristocratic scions or for members of Catholic societies. Begun in 1558,³with Calvin and Theodore Beza chairing the theological faculty, the Academy building was dedicated on June 5, 1559, with 600 people in attendance in St. Pierre Cathedral. Calvin collected money for the school, and many expatriates donated to help its formation. The public school, which had seven grades, enrolled 280 students during its inaugural year, and the Academy’s seminary expanded to 162 students in just three years. By Calvin’s death in 1564, there were 1,200 students in the college and 300 in the seminary. Both schools, as historians have observed, were tuition-free and “forerunners of modern public education.”⁴Few European institutions ever saw such rapid growth.

To accommodate the flood of students, the Academy planned to add — in what would become characteristic of the Calvinistic view of Christian influence in all areas of life departments of law and medicine. Beza requested prayer for the new medical department as early as 1567, by which time the law school was established. Following the St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre (1572), Francis Hotman — and several other leading consti­tutional scholars — taught at the Genevan law school. The presence of two legal giants, Hotman (from 1573–1578) and Denis Godefroy, gave Calvin’s Academy one of the earliest Swiss legal faculties. The medical school, attempted shortly after Calvin’s death, was not successfully established until the 1700s.⁵Calvin’s Academy became the standard bearer for education in all major fields.

Historically, education, as much as any other single factor, has fostered cultural and political advancement. One of Calvin’s most enduring contributions to society — a contribution that also secured the longevity of many of the Calvinistic reforms — was the establishment of this Academy in Geneva. Through his Academy, Calvin also succeeded where others had failed. Worth noting, none of the other major Protestant Reformers are credited with founding a university that would last for centuries, even becoming a sought-after property by some surprising suitors — like Thomas Jefferson.⁶

2. Care for the Poor: The Bourse←⤒🔗

Most people don’t associate Calvin with sympathy for the poor or indigent. However, a cursory review of his care for orphans, the needy, and displaced refugees in a period of crisis not only shows otherwise, but it also provides enduring principles for societal aid for the truly needy.

Calvin thought that the church’s compassion could best be expressed through its ordained deacons, the epitome of private charity. The challenge for Calvin was to derive practical protocols that would care for the poor, using the diaconal mechanisms that God had already provided through the church’s ministry of mercy.

Jeannine Olson’s able historical volume, Calvin and Social Welfare: Deacons and the Bourse Francaise, is an eye-opening study of Calvin’s impact on Reformation culture, focusing particularly on the enduring effect of his thought on social welfare through the church’s diaconate. In her treatise, she notes that, contrary to some modern caricatures, the Reformers worked diligently to shelter refugees and minister to the poor. The Bourse Francaise became a pillar of societal welfare in Geneva;⁷in fact, this mercy ministry may have had nearly as much influence in Calvin’s Europe as his theology did in other areas.

The activities of the Bourse were numerous. Its diaconal agents were involved in housing orphans, the elderly, or those who were incapacitated. They sheltered the sick and dealt with those involved in immoralities. This ecclesiastical institution was a precursor to voluntary societies in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in the West. Calvin was so interested in seeing the diaconate flourish that he left part of his family inheritance in his will for the Boys School and poor strangers.⁸

Its initial design was to appease the suffering of French residents who, while fleeing sectarian persecution in France, settled in Geneva. It has been estimated that in that single decade alone (1551-1560) some 60,000 refugees passed through Geneva, a number capable of producing significant social stress.

The deacons cared for a large range of needs, not wholly dissimi­lar to the strata of welfare needs in our own society. They provided interim subsidy and job-training as necessary; on occasion, they even provided the necessary tools or supplies so that an able-bodied person could engage in an honest vocation. Within a generation of this welfare work, Calvin’s diaconate discovered the need to com­municate to recipients the goal that they were to return to work as soon as possible. They also cared for cases of abandonment; supported the terminally ill who, in turn, left their children to be supported; and also included a ministry to widows who often had dependent children and a variety of needs.

Naturally there were theological peculiarities, and these theological distinctives led to certain practical commitments. Modern leaders might be better off to see what they can learn from the past; in summary, we find the following as principles of Calvin’s influential welfare reform:

1. It was only for the truly disadvantaged.
2. Moral prerequisites accompanied assistance.
3. Private or religious charity, not state largesse, was the vehicle for aid.
4. Ordained officers managed and brought accountability.
5. Theological underpinnings were normal.
6. Productive work ethic was sought.
7. Assistance was temporary.
8. History is valuable.

One of Calvin’s fellow Reformers, Martin Bucer, went so far as to say of the diaconate that “without it there can be no true communion of saints.”⁹In a sermon on 1 Timothy 3:8-10, Calvin himself associated the early church’s compassion as the measure of our Christianity: “If we want to be considered Christians and want it to be believed that there is some church among us, this organization must be demonstrated and maintained.” Calvin even on one occasion rhetorically asserted, “Do we want to show that there is reformation among us? We must begin at this point, that is, there must be pastors who bear purely the doctrine of salvation, and then deacons who have the care of the poor.”

3. Ethics and Interpretation of the Moral Law: The Decalogue←⤒🔗

Calvin’s interpretation of the Ten Commandments as ethical pillars was widely influential for generations of character development. In his discussion, he argued that this moral law was necessary; even though man was created in God’s image, natural law alone could only assist in pointing toward the right directions. Although acknowledging conscience as a “monitor,” still Calvin knew that depravity affected such conscience, and people were “immured in the darkness of error.” Thus, mankind was not left to natural law alone, lest it be given over to arrogance, ambition, and a blind self love. The Law, then, was as gracious as it was necessary. Such a fundamentally positive view of God’s Law would become a distinctive ethical contribution of Calvinism.

The Law also shows people how unworthy they are and leads them to distrust human ability. Calvin frequently used phrases like “utter powerlessness” and “utter inability” to make the point that people are dependent on God’s revelation if they are to do well. The Law is a “perfect rule of righteousness,” even though our natural minds are not inclined toward obedience.

Calvin noted that the Law is full of ramifications, and that it should not be limited to narrow applications. There is always, he wrote, “more in the requirements and prohibitions of the law than is expressed (literally) in words.” Each commandment also required its opposite. If one was not to steal, then he also should protect his and others’ property. If one was not to lie, then he was to tell the truth, and if one was not to commit adultery, then he should support marital fidel­ity. Calvin believed that we must reason from the positive command to its opposite in this way: “If this pleases God, it’s opposite displeases; if that displeases, its opposite pleases; if God commands this, he forbids the opposite; if he forbids that, he commands the opposite.” This wide application of the moral law created the basis of an ethical theory that spread throughout the West in time, and it also exhibited a sophistication that was not always present in some theologies.

Calvin believed that the Law had many practical functions — it convinced like a mirror; it restrained like a bridle; and it illumined or aroused us to obedience. However, another chief design of God’s Law was to guide and remind believers of God’s norms.

Calvin’s commentary on sexuality (when discussing the seventh commandment) spans less than a thousand words in the Institutes but is ever so profound. His discussion of “thou shalt not steal” was rich with texture, calling for a person not only to avoid theft but also to “exert himself honestly to preserve his own” estate (II.8.45). These and other commentaries formed the Protestant work ethic. Similarly, when he spoke of the internal scope of the commandment prohibiting false testimony, he noted that it was “absurd to suppose that God hates the disease of evil-speaking in the tongue, and yet disapproves not of its malignity in the mind” (II.8.48). While those expositions may be brief, they are excellent and so worthy of consulting that most Protestant confessions did just that thereafter.

Some of the codifications in various Puritan contexts would follow Calvin’s train on the need and proper use for the Law.

Calvinists, then, were not legalists but admirers of the perfections and wisdom of God’s Law, which they trusted more than themselves. Calvin’s followers regarded their own native abilities with such low esteem and God’s revealed Law in such high esteem that they became the creators and supporters of constitutionalism and law as positive institutions. Moreover, charity was the aim of law, and purity of conscience was to result.

4. Freedom of the Church: The Company of Pastors←⤒🔗

Calvin labored extensively to permit the church to be the church — and culture was impacted by a robust, vibrant church. In less than two years after Calvin’s arrival, he was exiled from Geneva. The struggle was an important one, involving whether the church and her ministers could follow their own conscience and authority or whether the church would be hindered by state or other hierarchical interference.

Calvin and William Farel (pastoring the Genevan churches of St. Pierre and St. Gervais, respectively) declined to offer communion to the feuding citizenry in 1538, lest they heap judgment on themselves. In return, the City Council exiled them for insubordination on April 18, 1538. In 1541, however, Calvin was implored to return to Geneva.

When he returned, rather than seeking more control for himself over church or civic matters, he sought to regularize a republican form of church government. One of Calvin‘s demands before returning to Geneva in September of 1541 was that a collegial governing body of pastors and church elders from the area be established. When it came time to replace inef­fective centralized structures, rather than opting for an institu­tion that strengthened his own hand, this visionary Reformer lobbied for decentralized authority lodging it with many officers. He also insisted that the church be free from political interference — separation of jurisdictions, not a yearning for theocratic oppressiveness, helped to solidify the integrity of the church, too — and his 1541 Ecclesiastical Ordinances specifically required such a separation.

Calvin’s and Farel’s first priority upon their re-engagement in Geneva was the establishment of the protocols in Calvin’s Ecclesiastical Ordinances, a procedural manual which prescribed how the city churches would supervise the morals and teaching of its own pastors without hindrance from any other authorities. The priority that Calvin assigned to this work shows how important it was for him that the church be free to carry out its own affairs, unimpeded by the state. The sovereignty of the ministerial council (Consistory) to monitor the faith and practice of the church was codified in these 1541 Ordinances. They were later revised in 1561, just prior to Calvin’s death, and provided enduring procedures for a free church. Obvi­ously, this arrangement marked a departure from the traditional yoking of political and ecclesiastical influence under Roman Catholic auspices.

In nations or regions where the civil government has ever or often sought to influence the church to change its views, this Calvinistic signature is greatly appreciated. A church free from external, hierarchical, or civil control was a radical and lasting contribution that Calvin made to the modern world. When the church is effective at promoting her God-given virtues, she is a powerful influence for society’s good.

5. Collegial Governing: The Senate←⤒🔗

Calvin also argued long and hard that government should not and could not do everything; it had to be limited in its task and scope. If it was not, it would run aground as in the time of the Hebrew prophet Samuel.

Calvin’s sermon on 1 Samuel 8 addresses one of the most widely expounded passages about political thought in Scripture. His 1561 exposition discusses the dangers of monarchy, the need for proper limitation of government, and the place of divine sov­ereignty over human governments. It is an example of Calvinism at its best, carefully balancing individual liberty and proper government.

Calvin began his sermon on 1 Samuel 8 by asserting that the people of Israel were, even at the last minute prior to electing a king, still free to change their minds; such freedom rendered the kingship optional. Then Samuel warned them “that the king who will reign over them will take their sons for his own purposes and will cause much plundering and robbery.” Calvin preached that “there are limits prescribed by God to their power, within which they ought to be satisfied: namely, to work for the common good and to govern and direct the people in truest fairness and justice; not to be puffed up with their own importance, but to remember that they also are subjects of God.”

Calvin’s calls to submit to the governor were not without limit. God established magistrates properly “for the use of the people and the benefit of the republic.” Accordingly, kings also had charters to satisfy: “They are not to undertake war rashly, nor ambitiously to increase their wealth; nor are they to govern their subjects on the basis of personal opinion or lust for whatever they want.” Kings had authority only insofar as they met the conditions of God’s covenant.

The republican-type plan suggested by Jethro (Exodus 18) appears as an innovation that did not originate in the mind of man, thought Calvin. Other commentators, ranging from Aquinas and Machiavelli to Althusius and Ponet, viewed Jethro’s advice as a pristine example of federalism or republicanism. Commenting on a similar passage in Deuteronomy 1:14-16, Calvin stated:

“Hence it more plainly appears that those who were to preside in judgment were not appointed only by the will of Moses, but elected by the votes of the people. And this is the most desirable kind of liberty, that we should not be compelled to obey every person who may be tyrannically put over our heads; but which allows of election, so that no one should rule except he be approved by us. And this is further confirmed in the next verse, wherein Moses recounts that he awaited the consent of the people, and that nothing was attempted which did not please them all.”

Thus, Calvin viewed Exodus 18 as a representative republican form. Geneva’s smallest Council of Twenty-Five was also known as the Senate.

This Genevan beacon, whose sermonic ideas later reached the shores of America, enumerated the ways kings abuse their power from the Samuel narrative. He distinguished a tyrant from a legitimate prince in these words: “a tyrant rules only by his own will and lust, whereas legitimate magistrates rule by counsel and by reason so as to determine how to bring about the greatest public welfare and benefit.” Calvin decried the oppres­sive custom of magistrates “taking part in the plundering to enrich themselves off the poor.”

The character of Calvinism is exhibited in this (and other) sermons that advocated limited government. Calvin was cor­rect that individual responsibility was a good speed bump to a government taking over more than it should. He altered the trajectory of governance, no less.

6. Decentralized Politics: The Republic←⤒🔗

One of the procedural safeguards of the 1543 civic reform — and a hallmark of Calvinistic governing ethos — was that the various branches of local government (councils) could no longer act unilaterally; henceforth, at least two councils were required to approve measures before ratification. This early mechanism, which prevented consolidation of all governmental power into a single council, predated Montesquieu’s separation of pow­ers doctrine by two centuries, a Calvinistic contribution that is not always recognized. The driving rationale for this dispersed authority was a simple but scriptural idea: even the best of lead­ers could think blindly and selfishly, so they needed a format for mutual correction and accountability. This kind of thinking, already incorporated into Geneva’s ecclesiastical sphere (imbed­ded in the 1541 Ecclesiastical Ordinances) and essentially derived from biblical sources, anticipated many later instances of political federalism. The structure of Genevan presbyterianism began to influence Genevan civil politics; in turn, that also furthered the separation of powers and provided protection from oligarchy. The result was a far more open and stable society than previ­ously, and Calvin’s orientation toward the practical is obvious in these areas.

The process of Genevan elections itself was a mirror of Calvinism view of human nature and the role of the state. In one of the earliest organized democratic traditions, Calvin’s fellow citizens elected four new syndics (commissioners) from a slate of eight for an annual term. Various levels of councils were then elected by the citizens.

This Calvin-shaped polity, which appeared to be either liberal or daringly democratic for its day, provided checks and balances, separation of powers, election by the residents, and other elements of the federal structure that would later be copied as one of Geneva’s finest exports. Additional features of federalism, including an early appellate system, were developed by the late 1540s. Not only was Calvin’s Geneva religious, but she also sought the assent of the governed to a degree not previously seen, leading the world to new and stable forms of republicanism. At the very least, one should acknowledge the rather striking correlation, both in time and in place, between the spread of Calvinist Protestantism and the rise of democracy.

In keeping with the teachings of Calvin, elected governors perceived themselves as having a duty to God, one that compelled them to serve the public good and avoid pursuing personal benefit. This notion of selfless political duty owed much of its staying power to Calvin, and it soon became an integral feature of Genevan public culture. Municipal officials were not full-time salaried employees in the time of Calvin, and the combination of checks and balances between the various councils required government to be streamlined and simple. Political offices in Geneva, in contrast with medieval and some modern customs, were not profitable for office holders. Service in such offices was even avoided by some, requiring the threat of a fine if a citizen refused to serve after election.

Geneva became the chief laboratory for the implementation of many of Calvin’s republican ideas. As such, her local political model yields hints about the character of Calvinism, complete with its tendency to limit government. Features such as limited terms, balance of powers, citizen nullification, interpositional magistracies, and accountability were at the heart of New World governments — which further amplified Calvinism to other generations and locales.

Many ideas that began with Calvin’s reformation in Geneva and later became part of the fabric of America were cultivated and crossbred in the seventeenth-century. Customs now taken for granted, like freedom of speech, assembly, and dissent, were extended as Calvin’s Dutch, British, and Scottish disciples refined these ideas.

7. Parity Among all Professions: The Doctrine of Vocation←⤒🔗

Another of the culture-shaping aspects of Cal­vin’s thought was his emphasis on the sacred­ness of ordinary vocations. Before Calvin and the Protestant Reformation, the doctrine of vocation or calling was thought to be only or exclusively for the clergy. However, his view of work as inherently dignified by our Creator elevated all disciplines and lawful vocations to the status of holy calling. One could, after Calvin, feel called to medicine, law, or education much as a clergyman felt called to serve the church.

Calvin’s call for hard work did not necessarily equate success or prosperity with divine blessing. His views, though, did have a persistent tendency of ennobling various areas of human calling and labor. Business, commerce, and industry were all elevated by Calvin’s principles, and those who adhered to these became leaders of modern enterprise. Max Weber and others are correct to identify that Calvinism dignified work and callings of many kinds.

Prior to his time, many workers felt little sense of calling unless entering the priesthood. Due primarily to the priestly emphasis of the Roman Catholic Church, “calling” or vocation was largely restricted to ecclesiastical callings prior to the Reformation. Calvin taught that any area of work — farming, teaching, governing, business — could be a valid and sacred calling from God. This was a radical change in worldview, which would ultimately alter many economies, cultures, and human lives.

The formation of the Genevan Academy under Calvin called for general education (not only in religious studies), and it provided for studies in law, medicine, history, and education. Calvin and other Reformers helped retire the sacred/secular distinction. He realized that a person could serve God in any area of labor and glorify him. Calvin counseled with many leaders, entrepreneurs, printers, and merchants in his time, and he did not revile any lawful calling. The character of Calvinism ennobles all good work. Despite its faith in the afterlife, Calvinism called its adherents to be leaders in all fields.

His commentary on the fourth commandment in Exodus 20 underscores the dignity of work also. Just as God commanded people to rest on the seventh day, so the Lord expected them to work on the rest of the days. Work was vital for all people made in God’s image, and for Calvin, thus, all callings were important. Calvin’s doctrine of work was further underscored — not to mention widely popularized — by his explanation that the fourth commandment that mandated rest on one day out of seven equally called for work during the other six.

Whether we eat or drink, Calvin agreed with Paul in the New Testament, we should do all to the glory of God. That is why the great post-Reformation composer Johan Sebastian Bach signed each of his original scores with the initials “SDG.” Those letters stood for the Latin phrase Sola Dei Gloria (“to God alone be the glory”). That organist knew the character of Calvinism and applied it to his craft. Some of the finest Christians in history have also applied the Lordship of Christ to their own vocations and served as leaders in their fields for the glory of God.

8. Economics and Profit: The Invisible Hand←⤒🔗

Of interest to historians both sympathetic and unsympathetic to Calvin, whatever Calvin was doing during this time transformed Geneva into a visible and bustling forum for economic development. With a growing intellectual ferment, evidenced by the founding of Calvin’s Academy and the presence of modern financial institutions (e.g., a Medici bank), Geneva became an ideal center for perfecting and exporting reform.¹⁰

Wherever Calvinism spread, so did a love for free markets and capitalism. If one valid measurement of leadership is its impact on its immediate environment, one might well compare Geneva before and after Calvin. The socio-economic difference between before and after Calvin may be noted by comparing three key occupational segments. Prior to Calvin’s immigration (1536), Geneva had 50 merchants, three printers, and few, if any, nobles. By the late 1550s, Geneva was home to 180 merchants, 113 printers and publishers, and at least 70 aristocratic refugees who claimed nobility.¹¹

However, it is certainly erroneous to think, like Max Weber in his The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905), that Calvinists equated material success with a sign of being the elect. To rebut that idea, one may simply consult Calvin’s teaching on the eighth commandment. On that commandment which forbade stealing, Calvin interpreted that the holding and protecting of personal property was by implication perfectly normal. In fact that commandment, properly understood, called for avoidance of greed for what others have, and it required every person to “exert himself honestly in preserving his own (property).” He warned believers not to squander what God providentially gave and also to care for his neighbor’s well being. He also saw this commandment as calling for contentment with “our own lot, we study to acquire nothing but honest and lawful gain; if we long not to grow rich by injustice, nor to plunder our neighbor of his goods ... if we hasten not to heap up wealth cruelly wrung from the blood of others; if we do not ... with excessive eagerness scrape together whatever may glut our avarice or meet our prodigality. On the other hand, let it be our constant aim faithfully to lend our counsel and aid to all so as to assist them in retaining their property.”

A prayer by Calvin makes Weber’s oft-repeated confusion fall to the ground more rapidly. The commonly mistaken caricature of Calvin as a crass capitalist should be contrasted with the prayer he suggested before beginning work, which is included in the 1562 Genevan Catechism. In that prayer, he led the people in asking God to bless their labor, noting that if God failed to bless it, “nothing goes well or can prosper.” He prayed for the Holy Spirit to aid workers in this calling “without any fraud or deception, and so that we shall have regard more to follow their ordinances than to satisfy our appetite to make ourselves rich.” Along with this, Calvin prayed that workers would also care for the indigent and that the prosperous would not become conceited. He prayed that God would diminish prosperity if he knew the people needed a dose of poverty to return them to their senses. Far from callousness toward the less fortunate, Calvin prayed that workers would “not fall into mistrust,” would “wait patiently” on God to provide, and would “rest with entire assurance in thy pure goodness.”¹²

He also asserted that any endeavor that ceased to have charity as its aim was diseased at its very root. Elsewhere, Calvin warned that luxury could incite great problems and produce “great carelessness as to virtue.” Moreover, he warned against “eagerly contend(ing) for riches and honors, trusting in our own dexterity and assiduity, or leaning on the favor of men, or confiding in any empty imagination of fortune; but should always have respect to the Lord.” Lest Calvin be misunderstood, he also called for a “curb to be laid on us” to restrain “a too eager desire of becoming rich, or an ambitious striving after honor.” The prosperity ethic that followed his time in Geneva is one of the wide-ranging effects of his thought and practice. Be he also advocated reliance on God — not wealth!

9. Music in the Vernacular: The Psalter←⤒🔗

One of Calvin’s early initiatives was to translate music designed for use in public worship into the language of the day. Realizing that what people sing in a holy context has enduring impact on how they act, Calvin wanted worship — in all its aspects — to be intelligible. Shortly after his settling in Geneva, he urged a talented musician, Clement Marot, to translate the psalms into mid-sixteenth-cen­tury French. Calvin wanted participants in worship, not only the clergy, to be able to understand and reiterate the truths of Scripture — this time in poetic structure. His democratizing of holy song and other elements of worship made parishioners participants in divine liturgy; simultaneously, it boosted the endeavor of artists.

Hymns and songs powerfully lodged distinct ideas in the popular mind, especially when aided by reading the Bible in the common language and sermons that were understood by the masses. The singing of these Psalms afforded these Protestants the occasion to confess their beliefs, and some anti-Protestants even went so far as to view the singing of Psalms as an inherently subversive act!¹³

Marot never completed his translation and arrangement of the Psalms, but Calvin’s disciple Theodore Beza was as committed, if not more so, to this project, which would both alter the nature of Protestant worship as well as further engrain Scriptural teachings into the Puritan mind. Beza even sponsored a hymn-writing contest shortly after Calvin’s death in his attempt to match the poetry of the Psalter with singable tunes.

Perhaps the largest single printing venture of the sixteenth century, Beza’s French translation of the Psalms into metrical form, went to press in Geneva’s old town.¹⁴This Psalter, which became the international songbook of expansionistic Calvinism,[¹⁵went through numerous editions (27,400 copies were printed in 1562 alone). Stanford Reid notes that to a greater degree than “all the fine theological reasoning, both the catechism and the Psalter entered into the very warp and weft of the humblest members’ lives. For this the credit must largely go to the first pastor of Geneva.”

Other importers of Calvinism to the West, besides the various Psalters, were the Geneva Bible and Bezels New Testament Annotations, which inspired readers ranging from Shakespeare (in his plays composed during the 1590s, Shakespeare quoted from the Geneva Bible)¹⁶to American colonists with “scores of marginal notes on covenant, vocation ... deposition of kings, the supremacy of God’s Word (over human tradition), and the duty of orderly resistance to tyranny.”¹⁷Beza and Marot’s hymnbook of metrical Psalms, which became surprisingly popular, paved the way for acceptance of other ideas championed by the enormously influential Beza.¹⁸Accordingly, art was elevated and became useful for cultural progress.

When Puritan settlers colonized North America, one of the consistent bestsellers of the day was the Bay Psalter, a thinly disguised revision of Calvin’s Psalter. Calvin’s disciples knew that the faith that sings powerful truths will also pass those truths on to future generations, and worship music set in the vernacular was a strong step in that direction.

10. The Power of Publishing Ideas: The Genevan Presses←⤒🔗

If Martin Luther seized on the potential of the printing press, Calvin and his followers elevated the use of the press to an art form. With the rise of the Gutenberg press, Reformers seized the new media with a vengeance to multiply their thought and action plans. Perhaps no first generation Reformer seized the moment like John Calvin. Expressing his thoughts with clarity and regularity was part of his life.

The ability to defend the views of Calvin rapidly in print mag­nified the lasting impact of his thought.¹⁹The number of books published in Geneva rose from three volumes in 1536 to 28 in 1554 and to 48 by 1561. The number of volumes printed in Geneva the five years prior to his death was a stunning average of 38 volumes per year (a ten-fold increase in 25 years). The average dropped to 20 per year after his death.²⁰By 1563, there were at least 34 presses, many manned by immigrants.²¹Shortly after Calvin’s death, one contemporary wrote: “The printed works flooding into the country could not be stopped by legal prohibition. The more edicts issued by the courts, the more the booklets and papers increased.”²²

Geneva also developed an extensive and efficient literary distribu­tion system. A childhood friend of Calvin, Laurent de Normandie (who later became mayor of Noyon), developed a network of distributors who took Genevan Calvinist publications into France and other parts of Europe. Many of the books were designed to be small for quick hiding, if need be, within clothing.²³Thousands of contraband books were spread throughout Europe during Calvin’s time, and several distributors of literature became Protestant martyrs. ²⁴

So successful was Calvin’s city at spreading the message that all books printed in Geneva were banned in France beginning in 1551. Calvin’s Institutes (along with at least nine of his other writings) had been officially banned in France since 1542, but that could not halt the circulation of his books. As a result, Geneva was identified as a subversive center because of its publishing; and the 1551 Edict of Chateaubriand forbade, among other things, importing or circulating Genevan books.²⁵Distributing such works for sale could incur secular punishment. However, many books still filtered across porous European borders. Some shrewd printers, unwilling to be thwarted by state censorship, cleverly responded by employing typeset fonts that were commonly used by French printers and published under fictitious addresses.²⁶This new medium and its energized distribution  pipeline allowed Calvin’s message to transcend Geneva’s geographical limitations.

Calvin‘s thought spread throughout Europe and sailed over the Atlantic with various colonists, cropping up frequently in sermons and pamphlets in various colonies. If English sermons in the seventeenth century were still referencing Calvin’s Institutes as a robust source for opposing governmental abuse, American colonial sermons conveyed his sentiments even more. “Probably no other theological work,” wrote Dartmouth historian Herbert Foster, “was so widely read and so influential from the Reformation to the American Revolution ... In England (it) was considered ‘the best and perfectest system of divinity’ by both Anglican and Puritan until (Archbishop William) Laud’s supremacy in the 1630s.” Oxford undergraduates were required to read Calvin’s Institutes and his Catechism in 1578.[1²⁷“Most colonial libraries seem to contain some work by Calvin,” and “scarcely a colonial list of books from New Hampshire to South Carolina appears to lack books written by Calvinists.”²⁸Even the Scottish philosopher David Hume, a fan of neither Knox nor Calvin, admitted: “the republican ideas of the origin of power from the people were at that time (about 1607) esteemed as Puritan novelties.”[1]²⁹Calvin’s ideas, then, took on a life of their own and became the actions emulated by many others, due in no small measure to the printing press and Calvin’s wise employment of the latest technology. A strong case can be made that the most determinative religion at the time was Calvinism or one of its offshoots. Long after his 1564 death, Calvin would live on and continue to mentor many through his writings, which are still widely available today.

Epilogue←⤒🔗

The Calvinist view of liberty, wherever it spread, gave citizens confidence and protections. Within a century, the American colonies would exhibit these Calvinistic distinctives. Not incidentally, one of the first colonial law-code was named “The Massachusetts Body of Liberties.” So close were law and liberty that Calvin’s disciples customarily associated law codes with tables of liberties. The reason was that a proper understanding of liberty is essential for any successful venture, whether it is business, civic, or religious. Calvin had seen an oppression of liberties — both in Paris as Protestants were persecuted and in the eyes of the many Roman Catholic refugees who arrived so regularly at Geneva’s walls — and he formed his view of liberties based on God’s Word and also in a fashion that avoided misuses of it.

Few thinkers with a lineage as ancient as Calvin have as much future promise. Calvin set forth both the positive necessity for well-ordered government as well as the limitations of its scope. His Reformed theology compelled government to be limited to the role of servant of the people; his political insights helped restrain the Leviathan. Today, when individuals frequently act as if centralized government agencies can provide lasting solutions to a wide range of social and individual problems, Calvinistic realism is one of the few substantial intellectual traditions that cogently warn against the twin dangers of utopianism and the threat of expansive governmental power.

Of all the theologies, Calvinism has made the most significant contribution to democracy. One summary of political Calvinism reduced Calvin’s ideas to five points that may be of continuing validity. Herbert Foster noted the following as hallmarks of Calvin’s political legacy,³⁰and these permeate the cultural contributions noted above:

1. The absolute sovereignty of God entailed that universal human rights (or Beza’s “fundamental law”) should be protected and must not be surrendered to the whim of tyranny.
2. These fundamental laws, which were always compatible with God’s Law, are the basis of whatever public liberties we enjoy.
3. Mutual covenants, as taught by Beza, Hotman, and the Vindiciae, between rulers and God and between rulers and subjects were binding and necessary.
4. As Ponet, Knox, and Goodman taught, the sovereignty of the people flows logically from the mutual obligations of the covenants above.
5. The representatives of the people, not the people themselves, are the first line of defense against tyranny.³¹

At least an elementary grasp of Calvin is essential to any well-informed self-understanding of Western democracy — indeed, for modernity itself. Unfortunately, many remain unaware of the signal contribution that the leadership of Calvin has made to open societies. We may even credit the Calvin’s Reformation with aiding the spread of participatory democracy. Even if this heritage no longer holds a place of honor in our textbooks or in our public tradition, we owe our Calvinistic forefathers a large debt of gratitude for their efforts to establish limited government and personal liberty grounded in virtue. A single man with heart aflame changed the world.

American Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia once estimated the paramount political accomplishment of the as law established by elected representatives instead of by the king or his experts. His candidate for the fin-de-millénaire award in late 1999 was “the principle that laws should be made not by a ruler, or his ministers, or his appointed judges, but by representatives of the people. This principle of democratic self-government was virtually unheard of in the feudal world that existed at the beginning of the millennium ... So thoroughly has this principle swept the board that even many countries that in fact do not observe it pretend to do so, going through the motions of sham, unopposed elections.”³²“We Americans,” continued Scalia, “have become so used to democracy that it seems to us the natural order of things. Of course it is not. During almost all of recorded human history, the overwhelming majority of mankind has been governed by rulers determined by heredity, or selected by a powerful aris­tocracy, or imposed through sheer force of arms. Kings and emperors have been always with us; presidents (or their equivalent) have been very rare.” However, it should be noted from the highlights above that Justice Scalia is describing the kind of republicanism pioneered by Calvin and his disciples — a repub­lic grounded in the eternal truth of morally-ordered liberty.

Even during the twentieth century, intellectuals certainly remained aware of Calvin. In fact, in the words of contemporary theologian Douglas Kelly, Calvin’s legacy continues and is “perhaps the stronger and deeper for the very fact that its roots are largely unperceived.” Large segments of political thought have often embraced such forward-looking Calvinistic concepts as respecting fixed limits on governing power and permitting people the rights to resist oppression with little awareness of their genesis.³³Calvin’s original formulation of these ideas was eventually “amplified, systematized, and widely diffused in Western civilization ... Thus modified, it would prevail across half of the world for nearly half a millennium.”³⁴

Calvin should certainly be acknowledged for his overall contribution to the legacy of freedom and openness in democratic societies. It is undeniable that he had a large influence on the American founding fathers, who had absorbed much more Calvinism, particularly in their views of the nature of man and the need for limited government, than some realize.

John Calvin was much more than a theologian, and his influence extended far beyond churches.³⁵When measured by this new millennium, he and his disciples will probably make more lasting contributions than Karl Marx, Napoleon Bonaparte, Albert Einstein, Bill Gates, or Henry Ford. Calvin inspired the cultural changes that gave rise to the political philosophy of the American founders, a truly extraordinary event in world history. Founding fathers such as George Washington, James Madison, Samuel and John Adams, Patrick Henry, and Thomas Jefferson³⁶stood on the shoulders of some of history’s greatest philosophers, not the least of whom was a pastor from Geneva hundreds of years ago. That he is still commemorated 500 years after his birth as a culture-shaping leader indicates the robust character of his thought and a sturdy legacy for generations to come.