HIST 102 #7 - Calvinism in Switzerland & France

Hello, welcome back to Western Civilization 102. Our lecture series. Our topic today is Calvinism. So, we continue to discuss the Reformation time period around the 16th century in Europe. Dr. Robison, of course, enlightened us on the English Reformation and how that was, of course, different. We have already discussed important Reformation figures such as Martin Luther and Ulrich Zwingli, and Dr. Price, in a previous lecture, also discussed the Anabaptist part of the radical revolution. They believed in adult baptism, and they were definitely persecuted throughout history by both Protestants and Catholics.

So today, we're going to go a little bit further into the Protestant Reformation and discuss another key figure by the name of John Calvin. Now, Dr. Price will, of course, discuss the background of Calvin. He was from France but has a very important role in the Reformation as far as Switzerland is concerned. He will move to Switzerland, and he will actually reorganize a city, Geneva. Sure, we all know Geneva. He reorganized it, reorganizes it based on his, um, his beliefs. So he makes people actually practice and work them out. So it's very interesting to see how he reorganizes the city of Geneva along the lines of his religion. Not a very fun city to be in, by the way, but we'll find out about that from Dr. Price in his upcoming lecture.

Dr. Price also discusses the differences. Just because we have a Protestant Reformation does not mean that everyone simply agrees with one doctrine. You know, the Catholic Church has a list of their doctrines, but when you have these, these reformers coming about, questioning different doctrines of the, of the church, they're all going to come up with their own versions and their own doctrines. So Dr. Price will discuss in his upcoming lecture the differences between Calvin and Luther. Because Calvin did read Luther's works, he just comes to a few different conclusions. Um, now, you know, one, of course, being that Luther felt that music and paintings and art and stained glass, that's all wonderful, loved it. He was actually, I want to say he was a composer, he wrote music, Luther did. Martin Luther. Calvin, no, no. Four bare walls and a sermon for Calvin. He did not want all of the extra accompaniment, the music and the singing and, and stuff of that nature. He didn't feel it was necessary at all. So he was a bit more puritanical in nature, of course, and, and his, his, uh, religious beliefs will come down and influence the Puritans as well.

Also, Calvin and Luther, just a few things that Dr. Price will mention that they didn't totally agree on the Sabbath. They both felt you should, you had to go to church, but after that, Luther was like, do what you want to do. And Calvin, of course, was, do nothing. You do not do anything resembling any kind of, of worldly behavior on the Sabbath, according to Calvin. In fact, when he reorganized this town in Geneva, you will be punished if you're caught doing stuff like that. You can't play cards, no gambling, no dances, no dancing at all. And also, um, you know, Calvin did not agree with Luther when it came to just the basic structure of the church and, and the, the robes and, and how the, the priest, I guess you could say, um, were dressed. He didn't want anything, Calvin did not want anything to resemble the Catholic Church, basically. And Luther didn't so much mind that at all.

So Dr. Price also goes on and he discusses, um, Calvin's very famous book, The Institutes of the Christian Religion. Uh, very famous and most used book, according to Dr. Price, in the Reformation. So he'll discuss and let you know a little bit about that as well. And also, a very big topic and, and what we think of when most people think of when we think of John Calvin is his doctrine of predestination and his belief that God predestined you to either heaven or hell, and you really don't have a choice in it. And your behavior on Earth will not pre-de-, will not help you get into one of the other. So that's kind of a very pessimistic outlook and way of doing things. And Calvin actually said that not many would be among, he calls the elect or the saved. Uh, Dr. Price, very interestingly, will go through some of the arguments and the questions against this doctrine of predestination. For example, uh, some would say the Bible calls upon people to repent and seek salvation. Well, if you're seeking salvation, then what does it matter if, if predestination is right? Because you're already predestined. You can't seek salvation if you're already damned, or if you're already going, you're among the elect. And so Dr. Price gives some of the arguments, um, for and against this about how Calvin, uh, argued for his doctrine of predestination, gives examples, um, and Dr. Price's upcoming lecture also some questions that will be answered here in Dr. Price's lecture on Calvinism.

Um, well, some of us are going to be saved and some damned, and it has already been decided. What are our odds of being saved? He will answer that question for you, according to Calvin, not very good, as we'll find out. And then, of course, Dr. Price answers this question, according to what Calvin would say. I mean, this is based on what Calvin is defending here. He's defending his doctrine. If predestination exists, and our chances of going to hell are a lot higher than our chances of going to heaven, why live a decent life at all? Why do any good works? Why live a Christian life? Does it matter? Okay, well, Calvin has an answer for that one as well, which you'll find out in just a few minutes. And Dr. Price also discusses the different levels in, in the Calvinist church, um, and again, he goes into a lot of depth on putting all of this religious doctrine and religious practice into an actual town. This was not a very nice town to be in. They closed all the taverns. You were very regulated. Major government regulation. We are not talking here in Geneva, Switzerland, under Calvin. We are not talking about a separation of church and state. Definitely not here as well.

And then, of course, Dr. Price will talk about how, uh, this, this is all happening in the 16th century, how Calvinism becomes so very important to other groups of people throughout Europe. For example, um, in Scotland, the Presbyterians. In Holland, the Dutch Reformed Church. In France, they're called the Huguenots. These are all Protestants, but they were all influenced by this man named John Calvin. So let's find out the answers to these questions. Today, we're going to talk about another of the Protestant movements, and this one is called Calvinism. It's named after its founder, John Calvin, and it is the foundation, in many ways, as we're going to see, of all, all future Protestant movements, and especially of the Presbyterian church and the so-called Reformed churches of Europe that begin as a result of Calvin's ideas and Calvin's thought.

Um, John Calvin is the founder of the movement, and I'm sure all of you at this point know that Martin Luther began the Protestant Reformation. And I hope you remember that despite, uh, his famous books on the subject of the Reformation, Luther was never really a very systematic thinker. He never sat down and really thought through the logical consequences of the ideas that he wrote about. Uh, the person who did that for Protestantism is John Calvin. Calvin was a lawyer by training. He had a, a legal mind that would allow him to tenaciously deal with the various ideas and doctrines of the Protestant church in ways that Luther couldn't. Now, Calvin, um, would provide a systematic explanation for the, the thought and ideas of the Protestant movement, and he would also provide a systematic outline of what a Protestant church should be. In other words, if you wanted to establish a Protestant church anywhere in the world where there wasn't one, then say, Eastern Europe or the New World or Asia, then Calvin's books would provide the theology and church organization that you needed in order to form these new movements.

Now, although Calvin always acknowledged his enormous theological debt to Luther, his religious teachings differed from those of Luther in several important essentials, several important ways. And I thought it might be a good idea, before we actually look at Calvin himself, to talk a little bit about those differences. First off, Luther's attitude about proper Christian conduct in the world was much more passive than Calvin's. For Luther, a good Christian should merely endure the trials of life, have faith in God's mercy, and that was all you really needed in order to achieve salvation and in order to be a good Christian. Calvin argued that every Christian should labor throughout his or her life for the glory of God. Every Protestant should work actively to bring others into the faith, to bring others into an understanding of God's word and of God's glory. So that's the first difference. Luther and Lutherans were more passive in their faith. Calvinists were expected to be more evangelical.

The second difference is Calvin's theology. Calvin's religion is considerably more legalistic and more like an Old Testament faith than Luther's. This can be illustrated in the attitude of the two men toward the Sabbath. Uh, for Luther, the conception of Sunday, the Sabbath, was similar to that which prevails among Christians today. It's a day of rest. You should go to church services, and then during the remainder of the day, although you were refrain from work, you should enjoy the pleasures of, of social activities and, and you should enjoy the pleasures of, of having some time off. Calvin argued that the Sabbath should be a day of rest. There should be, it should be a day of prayer and meditation. It should literally be a day devoted to worship and devoted to thinking about your faith. That, that social activities shouldn't get in the way of devoting that particular day, the Sabbath, Sunday in the case of Christians, to God. So that's the second big difference.

The third difference is that these two men differ extensively on matters of church government, matters of church government. Uh, Luther broke with the Catholic notion that, that, um, there should be a, a, a, a hierarchy, a clerical hierarchy, but he nevertheless believed that some kind of organization, church organization, was necessary, and that the prince should enforce the rules of the church. Essentially, that there should be no difference in differentiation between church and state, and the prince should be the boss of both. Uh, Calvin argued for the elimination of all traces of hierarchy. He recommended that individual congregations elect their own ministers, and for Calvin, church government should be assemblies of ministers and elders who met and made policy for their particular congregation, and that an assembly of elders should essentially run the state. What we might say is, Luther believed that there shouldn't be any separation of church and state, but the prince should be the boss. Calvin believed that there should not be any separation of church and state, and the church should be the boss. The church elders should be the boss.

Now, another important difference between the two was the way that church services looked. Luther retained a great many features of the old Catholic worship, such as altars and vestments for the priests, special clothing for the clergy. He, Calvin rejected anything that smacked of, of Roman Catholic worship, anything that smacked of Roman Catholic worship. He insisted on prohibiting all rituals, all vestments, all instrumental music, all images and stained glass windows. Calvinist services became what one historian called, "four bare walls and a sermon." So there are some, some basic differences in how the church structure should work between the two, and we're going to talk, and as we go along, about some differences in theology as well. But first, a little bit about Calvin himself.

John Calvin, as I mentioned before, I, I think was not of Luther's generation. John Calvin was of the generation that came before, that came after Luther. He was born in 1509, which means that he was a boy of eight when Luther tacked his 95 Theses on the church door. He was also, Calvin was also not a German. He was French, and his father was an official, not a clergyman, but an, an official in the legal section of the Roman Catholic Church of France. Uh, his dad wanted Calvin himself to become a lawyer and join the legal section of the church in France, in other words, follow in Dad's footsteps. So, as a young man, Calvin was sent off to the University of Paris to learn theology and law in order to follow in his dad's footsteps. At the University of Paris, Calvin was introduced to the writings of Martin Luther, and according to Calvin himself, he experienced an emotional and intellectual conversion while he was at the University from Roman Catholicism over to Lutheran Protestantism. He said, in his later works, "God, by a sudden conversion, subdued and brought my mind to a teachable frame, and from thence he became a Lutheran."

Now, um, not a good idea at the University of Paris. It was a church school, a Roman Catholic Church school. The, the heresy was brutally stamped out wherever it happened to appear at the University. And so, very, and, and poor John made the mistake of telling his friends about his conversion experience and would find out very quickly that he had made a really bad move. In fact, his friends told him, "It's a good time, John, to get out of town." He was forced to leave the university, and he escaped from France to Switzerland, where he would spend essentially the rest of his life.

Now, in 1536, not long after he settled in Switzerland, at the ripe old age of 26 years old, Calvin published the first edition of his book entitled, Institutes of the Christian Religion. Institutes of a Christian Religion is the most famous and most widely used book of the Protestant Reformation. The Institutes contains a systematic exploration of the doctrines of Calvinist Christianity, the doctrines of Protestantism, in essence. I should say that it was his first edition that he published in 1536. He would publish nine editions of this book between 1536 and 1559, and each edition would be twice as long as the previous work. So the Institutes grew and grew over John Calvin's lifetime.

Well, the central idea of Calvinism and of the Institutes is the majesty and sovereignty of God. Calvin argued that God is truly all those omni-, things that we are told God is. He is truly omnipotent, that is all-powerful. He is truly omniscient, he knows everything. And he is truly omnipresent, which means that God is present at all times, in all places, at once, omnipresent. Now, you might say that this is certainly nothing new. That, that the Roman Catholic Church teaches that, that Martin Luther taught that the omniscience and omnipotence and omnipresence of God. If you have taken catechism, you've heard all that stuff before. But the difference here between Calvin and Luther, the difference between Calvin and the Roman Catholic Church, is Calvin went on from these basic ideas to explain the logical consequences of each of these ideas.

Well, let's go to the biggest question right away. If you think back to the Luther, the, the Luther lecture, you'll remember the, the first and biggest question for all Christians is, how can I achieve salvation? How can I be saved? Uh, ever the good Protestant, Calvin said that humans are saved by faith, which is a free gift from God, just as Luther had. But Calvin sees this as the middle of an argument, not the end of an argument, as Luther did. Like Zwingli, Calvin went on to say, if God is all-powerful, then he chooses who will be saved and who will be damned, who will go to heaven and who will go to hell. Now, God is also not limited by time. So Calvin wrote that God has already decided this for every person who will ever live before the, before the world was created, before there even is a world, that, that before he creates the world, he essentially makes two lists: a long list of all the folks who will be damned, and a very short list of all those who will be saved. And there's nothing you can do about which list you're on. In other words, he's, God's already decided. This is the doctrine of predestination. We talked about it a little bit with, uh, with Zwingli, and I said when I got to Calvin, I'd spend more time on it, and here we are, and here I am.

Now, you might say, this isn't what the Bible says. The Bible calls on people to repent and accept Christ and seek salvation. And Luther, I'm sorry, Calvin would answer, being French, "Oh, contraire!" The Bible, he says, clearly indicates, clearly illustrates predestination. For instance, the Hebrews in the Old Testament were God's chosen people. Well, why were they chosen? Does the Bible say they're the most powerful people on Earth at the time? No. Does the Bible say that their deeds were better, more moral, more righteous than other people on the planet at the time? No. Uh, are they the most numerous? Are they the largest number of people in the world at the time? No. Uh, are they the most sin-free? Maybe it has to do with sin? And of course, again, no, not at all. We have no idea why God chose the children of Israel, the Israelites, to be his people. He just did it. There's nothing the Hebrews could do not to be chosen, and there's nothing the Hebrews could be, could do to be chosen. It was all God's will. They were predestined to be the children of God. Well, Calvin has all kinds of other examples. Why is David God's favorite and not Saul in the Old Testament, the books of Samuel? Well, um, we know David was a sinner. In fact, we know of a number of places where he, he committed some pretty nasty sins. He fell in love with a girl, a woman named Bathsheba, who was married. So he managed to get Bathsheba's husband killed so he can have an affair with her. That's pretty darn sinful. Uh, so in many cases, Saul was the better man, but God chose David, uh, why? Because he did, it was the will of God, and we can never know why. And Calvin argues that there are plenty, plenty more examples too.

Now, you might argue, uh, one can give human beings choices that will lead to their salvation because God doesn't necessarily know in advance what people will do. Calvin's reply is that that's a silly argument. He says that, quote, "There is no difference between knowledge and will. Why does God know it? Because he wills it." And, uh, in fact, Calvin argued that God willed the fall of Adam. It could never have happened otherwise. Well, here's an argument that might work. If God wills all, then if we commit sins, well, that must be God's fault, right? And we can't help it. It's all God's will. It's all predestined. And Calvin says, "No, no, no, no, no. Sinning is our fault. We have nobody else to blame but ourselves when we sin." And we should contemplate the cause of our sin rather than, and the nature of humanity, rather than to blame God for our failings and shortcomings.

Well, if all of us are going to, if some of us are going to be saved and some of us are going to be damned, and it's already been decided, what are our odds of being saved? What are the chances that we, as individuals, will achieve salvation? According to Calvin, not very high. In fact, he said that very, very few people would be saved, and those he called the elect, those who were elected by God for salvation. Uh, for years, Calvin also said that there was no way that anybody could know whether they were saved or whether they were damned. It's just, you know, predestination. You can't second guess God. You can't know. Well, throughout his life, righteous Calvinists would ask him, would badger him, "How do I know? How do I know if I'm among the saved? How do I know if I'm among the elect?" Seems like a pretty important question. How can I tell? And for years and years, Calvin said, "No, you can't. Don't bother me. Go away. Move on." Uh, finally, I suspect because under enormous pressure from his followers, he finally responded to this question, and he said, "Okay, there's three ways. Three ways." Now, if you're a good attorney when you come up with a, or a good history professor, whatever, you're listing things, you always want at least three. And I suspect he said, "There's three ways" before it even occurred to him that maybe there's not really three ways, as we're going to see.

First off, how do you know how you've done in predestination, what Calvin also sometimes called God's terrible decree? Calvin said there's a three-way test to determine whether you might be among the elect, you might be bound for glory. Number one, he said, you should have a heartfelt profession of faith, nothing fake, a heartfelt profession of faith. In other words, you should be able to say, "God has touched me personally in such a way that I know he has plans for me." A heartfelt profession of faith. The second thing is, you should lead a decent and godly life. You should lead a decent and godly life. He said this is an indication that God knew what you would be like, and you have sort of earned salvation, even though the decision's already made. You should lead a decent and godly life. And finally, the last one, he said, you should regularly take communion. Now, remember, communion isn't an act of faith. It is works. You are doing something in order to achieve communion. And this simply doesn't follow from the notion of salvation by faith alone. And I suspect what happens is, he said, "There's one, there's two, and there's three," and he really wasn't sure what three should be. And this was the answer that he gave because it simply doesn't work with the notion of, of salvation by faith and not by works. Anyway, that's what he said. He said, "If you do these three things, then you will have a chance. If you don't, then you have no chance at all."

Now, you might say to yourself, if predestination exists, and our chances of going to hell are a whole bunch higher than our chances of going to heaven, why on earth should we bother to live a decent life? Why do anything good? Why live a Christian life at all? And as I said, Calvin supplied answers for everything, and this question is no exception. Calvin wrote that it was worthy of us to live a decent life, if even if we are not among the elect, because in living a decent, godly, Christian life, we are thanking God for the life on this Earth that he has given us, even if we don't get an afterlife, even if we don't go to heaven when we die. Calvin argued that predestination should stimulate people's people to do God's work, uh, because a righteous life is at least a hint of predestination, a hint of election. And besides, while the elect will perform God's will by the gift of God's grace, he said, the damned should honor God by conforming as far as possible to a Christian way of life.

Well, you might say this is interesting, but I should point out that Calvin went far beyond that. He not only said what the doctrines of the Protestant church should be, but he also, in his best lawyerly way, wrote a book on how to do it. This book is called The Ecclesiastical Ordinances, and it is essentially a handbook on how to create a Christian church, and through it, a Christian society anywhere and everywhere in the world. Like I said earlier, the Institutes and the Ecclesiastical Ordinances, Calvin's book on theology and Calvin's book on social organization, would allow a person to establish a Protestant community anywhere in the world.

Well, in the Ecclesiastical Ordinances, Calvin called for the creation of a church, and individual church, and each church, he said, should have four church offices: pastors, teachers, elders, and deacons. Pastors, teachers, elders, and deacons. So let's go through each one. The pastor, number one. It is his job to preach the word of God, to offer baptism and communion, the only two sacraments recognized by Protestants, baptism and communion, and generally conduct the business of the church. Pastors would meet regularly and discuss theology and church problems. When a minister retired or died, the, um, the congregation would have the task of hiring a new pastor by common consent. In other words, each church was essentially independent, sort of like Baptist churches are today. Each church was essentially independent, and each church would choose its, the congregation would choose its pastor.

Well, number two is teachers. The, as you might guess, the first job of a teacher is to teach children, and as Calvin said, others who wish to profit from instruction. Uh, they were required to have bachelor's degrees in theology, and they, they have the same rules as other teachers in terms of, of what they should teach. There was, uh, there's no notion of, of separation of church and state in Calvin's writings. So one of the jobs that teachers have, the primary goal of a teacher is to instruct students in theology, instruct them in how to lead a decent life, and prepare them to live in a Christian community.

Well, the elders. Each church would have 12 elders, and they were essentially the morals police. It was the job of the elders to be nosy, to look into everybody's business, to decide who was behaving and who wasn't behaving. And the elders had the job of prosecuting individuals who did not behave in a Christian and godly and righteous Calvinist manner.

Number four are the deacons. Deacons are easy to explain. These are the folks who were chosen to help the poor and the widows, the orphans, the needy within the community. The deacons essentially provide the, the social welfare network to help the less fortunate members of a Calvinist community.

Now, Calvin did more than simply write a book about how a church and a community should be organized. He also established a Calvinist state in the city of Geneva in Switzerland, which after 1541 would become a model of what a Protestant community should be like. Without a doubt, the most important organization in the city of Geneva was something called the Consistory, which is a body of men consisting of the pastors, five at first, and the elders, 12 elders chosen from the various churches in Geneva. The Consistory met every Thursday, and, and while although he was not always the president of the Consistory, Calvin was one of the pastors, so he was always on the Consistory, and of course, he was always the most influential member. The Consistory acted as a morals court because Calvinists believe in an Old Testament idea that the misbehavior of one person can bring God's wrath down on the entire community. The Consistory often investigated the most intimate personal habits of members of the congregations in, in Geneva. The Consistory members, members of the Consistory might visit any household at any time without any warning to check on the habits of its members. Members of the Consistory might visit businesses and other institutions to make sure that the, uh, the people who were at these businesses were living a righteous life, we're being godly, as it were, we're not violating the religious laws of the city of Geneva.

Now, theoretically, the Consistory could not impose capital punishment. The, theoretically, the job of the Consistory was to teach those who had gone astray how they should behave, what was right behavior. But because the members of the Consistory were either pastors or members of the elders of the various churches, these were very influential, very powerful men in Geneva. And so, if a person violated the law in such a way that Consistory members believed that they should be punished, they should be executed or exiled or imprisoned, then the Consistory could turn these offenders over to the authorities, the, the police authorities of Geneva, where they would be tried and executed. Um, when that happened, that, when trials happened with the, the police authorities, the punishments could be pretty, pretty severe. In one four-year period, the city council executed 58 people, or 58 people for crimes brought by the Consistory, and exiled 76 people. The city council either executed or put in jail, we're not sure what which, a person who named his dog Calvin.

Well, what other sort of thing did the Consistory punish besides people who made fun of it? It kept records from its founding in 1542, so we have a pretty good idea about what it was up to. First off, the Consistory punished anything that hinted at Catholicism. Calvin was rabidly angry at Roman Catholicism. Calvin believed, like Luther, that the Roman Catholic Church was corrupt, but Calvin also believed that it was evil, that in essence, the Roman Catholic Church had become a corruption of Christianity over the years and should be stamped out. Uh, the Consistory punished a barber, for instance, with a fine because a pastor had come into his barber shop. This fellow didn't know any difference. He had given him a clergyman's haircut, the little, that's called a tonsure, where you, you take the hair out of the middle of the head like Roman Catholic clergymen had. And when the, when the pastor found out that he had received this haircut, he had brought this barber before the Consistory, Consistory for punishment. Um, a goldsmith who made a chalice, a Roman Catholic chalice for the mass for a neighboring town, was fined and jailed for a short time. Another man was, was imprisoned for a short time because he said in a public drinking house that he believed the Pope was probably a good man.

The Consistory also punished anyone that it believed engaged in what it called superstition or witchcraft. Uh, for instance, one woman was whipped for trying to cure her sick husband by putting a spider in a walnut shell and hanging it around his neck. At the time, that was considered to be a cure, or at least an aid for people with arthritis. Um, she was, she was corporally punished, she was whipped and given some jail time. Uh, the Consistory also went out of its way to deal with what it considered lewd behavior. Indecent dancing, not all dancing, but indecent dancing was outlawed. So I guess the Lambada was right out in Geneva. Card playing, gambling with cards, was outlawed. Dresses with low necklines were outlawed. Public drunkenness drew very stiff penalties. Uh, Geneva had been famous for years for prostitution, and apparently the Consistory tried in the 1550s to get rid of Geneva's prostitution problems. As, as late as 1558, the Consistory suggested to the city council, which of course agreed because it was made up of more or less the same people, that, um, that prostitutes should be punished by making them walk through the streets wearing a red hat with a trumpeter following along behind them, calling attention to them. Calvin himself thought this was a pretty pathetic punishment, but the council didn't want to go any further. The truth of the matter was, prostitution was very popular among the people of Geneva. It, it was one of the draws that brought people to the city. It was sort of like in Amsterdam today, it was a tourist draw. So the people of Geneva really didn't want to end prostitution in the city. And if a member of the Consistory pushed too hard, they might find that their congregation fired them. If a pastor preached out against the sins of prostitution to the point where folks thought it might hurt business, then he might find himself without a job. After all, a congregation that can hire a pastor can also fire a pastor. It's true of the elders as well. If an elder was too outspoken on subjects that members of his congregation didn't like, then an elder might find that when the next election came up, he lost his job. So the con-, the congregations of these Calvinist churches have a certain degree of power over their leadership, over their elders, over their pastors. The Consistory, by the way, the Consistory was never able to get rid of prostitution in the city, and those ladies of the evening who wore the big red hats and walked through the streets with a trumpeter behind them simply considered it good advertising.

Now, the Consistory also closed taverns in the early 1550s. They decided that taverns were places, very popular places in Geneva, mostly wine houses. The Consistory decided that these chat-, these taverns were places of, of corruption and depravity. So they, what they tried to do was turn them into coffee houses. Coffee was just becoming a popular beverage in Europe in the mid-1500s. So all the taverns were forced to stop selling wine and start selling coffee, and religious tracts and books were placed all over the tavern, so you could go in and drink coffee and read religious tracts and discuss, discuss religion with your buddies. This didn't go on very well. The people of Geneva were not one little bit amused by all this, and in fact, within a year or so, all the taverns were reopened again as wine houses. The coffee house idea simply didn't work.

Now, this should be some kind of indication to you that Calvin was by no means all-powerful in Geneva. At various times during his life, people opposed what they considered the harsh rule of the Consistory, and indeed the harsh rule of John Calvin. They opposed going further than they were comfortable going in terms of changing, transforming Geneva society, and the religious government was simply forced to back down. In spite of that, though, Calvin remained the major force in Geneva until his death in 1564. So for nearly 15 years, Calvin ran Geneva, and it became a model Protestant, Calvinist Protestant state.

Now, in the middle of the 16th century, Calvin's Geneva was a shining example, a shining example to many Protestants. Calvin's disciple, a Scotsman named John Knox, who would found the Presbyterianism, the Calvinist movement, Presbyterianism, which would become the state church in Scotland, John Knox said that Geneva was, quote, "the most perfect school of Christ that ever was on Earth since the days of the Apostles." Many foreigners flocked to Geneva for refuge, for instruction, to learn what this new Protestantism was all about. They often returned to their home country, um, Calvinists to the core, to spread Calvinism to their home country. Since Calvin himself thought of Geneva as a staging point for bringing Calvinism to the world, he encouraged people to go abroad, to go to other countries as missionaries to promote his brand of Protestantism. So from the middle of the 16th century, Geneva became the center of a concerted and militant effort to spread the new faith, the Calvinist faith. Soon, Calvinists became the majority in Scotland, where they were known as the Presbyterians. Soon, Calvinists became a substantial group in Holland, where they are known as the Dutch Reformed Church, the Dutch Reformed Church. A substantial minority of Calvinists developed in France, where they were called the Huguenots, and we will talk about them a little ways down the road, and the, the consequences of Calvinism in France and in, in John Calvin's home country.

Many English Protestants fled to Geneva and other Calvinist places on the continent to escape the, the, the, uh, Inquisition, to escape the persecution of Queen Mary Tudor, Bloody Mary, as she's known in England. And when they return home after Elizabeth I comes to the throne, these English Calvinists will return home, and they will look at the Church of England, re-Protestantized under Elizabeth, and what they will see there is much too Catholic for their liking. Many of them will say that the English church, the Church of England, is simply a Roman Catholic church with a prayer book. And so Calvinists in England, and late in the reign of Elizabeth and afterwards, as we're going to see in this course, we'll begin to talk about purifying the Church of England, purifying meaning removing the Catholic influences from the English church. And because they talk about purifying the Church of England, the folks who like the English church will start calling them an insulting term, what it becomes an insulting term, "those damn Puritans who want to change everything." So the English Calvinists become known as the Puritans, and we'll talk a good bit about them, not only in this course but in American history as well.

Um, Calvinist beliefs fanned out throughout Europe. Calvinist churches were founded all over Europe. The results of this militant missionary effort were twofold. First, the Catholic Church itself would begin a period of reform in reaction to, a certain extent, to the threat of Calvin, Calvinist Protestantism, and this reform is sometimes called the Catholic Reformation, sometimes called the Counter-Reformation. Secondly, Europe would be plunged into a period of religious warfare that would last for over two centuries, and we will talk about some of those wars down the road.

Now, one last thing about John Calvin that, that's, that's, that's worth talking about. Um, I, well, first time I taught high school social studies, I used the textbook. I taught a European history course, and I used the textbook, and one of the lines that I'll always remember from that textbook is it is a line that said, "In Geneva under Calvin, Geneva was not a happy place." I thought that was a nice summation, but it's not entirely true. Calvin himself, uh, was not opposed to drinking in moderation, to dance if it was not lewd or licentious, to the enjoyment of life. In fact, Calvin even believed that prosperity and happiness in this life were an indication of election to the next life. Calvin himself wrote, quote, "We are nowhere in the Bible forbidden to laugh, or to be satisfied with good food, or to buy new possessions to add to those already enjoyed by ourselves and our ancestors, nor," says Calvin, "are we forbidden to be delighted with music, or to drink wine." So we can probably say that it wasn't all fear and dread in Geneva. That Calvinism is not truly what one American editorial writer said, that, that, that, that Puritans, uh, were deathly afraid that somebody somewhere was having fun. Calvinism was not all fear and dread.

So, what can we say? Well, the most important thing we can probably take out of this lecture is that John Calvin finished the logical work started by Luther. He expanded Luther's ideas and arguments to, to show Christians the consequences of those ideas and arguments, and he wrote two manuals that Protestants could use on how to set up a church and how to think. And people would set up churches and expand Calvinist doctrines and Calvinist ideas all over the world. Ah, very interesting. Um, so it was very, uh, fun to discover how Calvin defended his religion using, of course, his logic and the Bible. Of course, it was neat to see the answers to those questions that I asked in the beginning of the lecture. Now, we will continue with our topic of the Reformation for our next lecture, and we will discuss the Catholic, yes, the Catholic Church also has a Reformation for itself. They're trying to, um, stop the momentum of the Protestant Reformation, so they're trying to reform some of their own practices. And so we'll find out from Dr. Robinson about the Catholic Reformation. Until next time.