In Search of the Historic Calvin…

With July 10, 2009 being the 500th anniversary of the great Genevan reformer John Calvin, there are many conferences planned as well as new books being written in Calvin’s honor. And so, in keeping with the flow, I have decided to attend one conference (Desiring God National Conference in September, 2009) as well as read as much as possible by or about the Genevan reformer in hopes of learning more about Calvin’s life and his work. I think, by doing this, the conference will be more meaningful to me, too.

Along those lines, I recently read a work by William J. Bouwsma titled John Calvin: A Sixteenth Century Portrait (Oxford University Press, 1988. For those looking for a compelling biography of Calvin’s life, look elsewhere, for Bouwsma’s work is surely not it. The work is thorough regarding Calvin’s thought, however, as Bouwsma attempts to discover and interpret the historic Calvin (as opposed to the Calvin of tradition) through literally hundreds of quotes taken from Calvin’s sermons and writings. The strength of this book for me was in chapters 1, 13 and 14, covering Calvin’s life, his view of church government and his understanding of the church. These chapters were interesting and compelling.

The assessment given fell short of it’s goal, however, because Calvin’s writings are not John Calvin, and  to miss this point is to misunderstand the man, despite the amount of knowledge one may have of his times and his writings. At the end of the day, one would have to be present with Calvin to truly assess the man. I got the impression that Bouwsma would interpret Calvin’s commitment to and use/understanding of Scripture through what we know of his life and background. In other words, because he had such and such a background, he came up with the view of scripture that he had, right or wrong. It seems this is backwards. Rather, to understand Calvin it must be acknowledged that first, his conscience was captive to scripture as the living Word of God and second, scripture was molding him, and not visa versa; and so this grand attempt, complete as it is, is limited by the fact that the man lived 300 years ago, and our knowledge of him must be drawn, not from him, but from hard texts which he wrote.

I do recommend this book, but only for those who desire to wade through Bouwsma’s detailed analysis of Calvin’s life, based on hundreds of quotes. The book is not for the casual reader. It is written in such a way, and is sufficiently thorough, so as to make one think deeply about the man John Calvin, comparing Bouwsma’s conclusions to those from one’s own studies. It is a remarkable work in it’s detail; and as the late M. Howard Rienstra, former director of the H.H. Meet Center for Calvin Studies said, ‘future students of Calvin will be hard pressed either to ignore or refute Bouwsma’s theses’. Hopefully, some will try.