Category Archives: Calvin’s Institutes

January 11, 2015 · 4:14 pm

Week 2 of 50 in the Institutes: Usurpers Anonymous

The concept in the film The Bourne Identity comes to mind when considering parts of the first three chapters of the Institutes.  Like Jason Bourne, all humanity has a natural instinct or awareness of an identity that goes beyond what immediately meets the eye (in this material world), but it is suppressed in many ways, often seeping out in various forms of idolatry (1.3.1):

That there exists in the human minds and indeed by natural instinct, some sense of Deity, we hold to be beyond dispute, since God himself, to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of his Godhead, the memory of which he constantly renews and occasionally enlarges, that all to a man being aware that there is a God, and that he is their Maker, may be condemned by their own conscience when they neither worship him nor consecrate their lives to his service. Certainly, if there is any quarter where it may be supposed that God is unknown, the most likely for such an instance to exist is among the dullest tribes farthest removed from civilisation. But, as a heathen tells us, there is no nation so barbarous, no race so brutish, as not to be imbued with the conviction that there is a God. Even those who, in other respects, seem to differ least from the lower animals, constantly retain some sense of religion; so thoroughly has this common conviction possessed the mind, so firmly is it stamped on the breasts of all men. Since, then, there never has been, from the very first, any quarter of the globe, any city, any household even, without religion, this amounts to a tacit confession, that a sense of Deity is inscribed on every heart. Nay, even idolatry is ample evidence of this fact. For we know how reluctant man is to lower himself, in order to set other creatures above him. Therefore, when he chooses to worship wood and stone rather than be thought to have no God, it is evident how very strong this impression of a Deity must be; since it is more difficult to obliterate it from the mind of man, than to break down the feelings of his nature – these certainly being broken down, when, in opposition to his natural haughtiness, he spontaneously humbles himself before the meanest object as an act of reverence to God.

Whenever God isn’t acknowledged, man acts as a usurper of his glory, because, as Calvin points out in 1.2.1, all human skill, intellect, and power (indeed, life itself) are gifts from God:

My meaning is: we must be persuaded not only that as he once formed the world, so he sustains it by his boundless power, governs it by his wisdom, preserves it by his goodness, in particular, rules the human race with justice and judgement, bears with them in mercy, shields them by his protection; but also that not a particle of light, or wisdom, or justice, or power, or rectitude, or genuine truth, will anywhere be found, which does not flow from him, and of which he is not the cause; in this way we must learn to expect and ask all things from him, and thankfully ascribe to him whatever we receive.

And so, working backwards, we can appreciate the wisdom in the opening of the Institutes where Calvin declares the absolute necessity of two kinds of knowledge: knowledge of self and knowledge of God.  Any individual or society which lacks a knowledge of God will remain oblivious to its true identity, and perpetual usurpers of God’s glory, claiming for self what belongs to God alone.  In the end, the very definition of what it means to be human is lost.

Links to Reformation 21 blogs through the Institutes for the upcoming week’s reading assignments:

Jan. 12 – 1.1.1 thru 1.2.1

Jan. 13 – 1.2.2. – 1.3.3

Jan. 14 – 1.4.1 – 1.5.1

Jan. 15 – 1.5.2 – 1.5.5

Jan. 16 – 1.5.6- 1.5.11

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January 4, 2015 · 3:12 pm

Week 1 of 50 in the Institutes: Much Maligned, Was He!

Since I will be referencing the Reformation 21 blogs from 2009 throughout this fifty week excursion through the Institutes, I feel no compulsion to give an overview or a lot of background, or even to make any profound observations, as if I had any to share, since the scholars and gentlemen over at the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals have already done that for every daily assignment (follow the links at the bottom of this entry).  For the first time since the formation of our group, I feel as if I’m along for the ride, and free to share as much, or as little, as comes to mind.

I take great delight in the little tidbits encountered whenever dealing directly with primary sources, and right at the outset we encounter a morsel which I never discovered from any secondary source.  In Calvin’s opening remarks to his readers, first affixed to the Institutes in 1559, we find the following comment (from Beveridge’s translation, bold added):

And truly it would fare ill with me if, not contented with the approbation of God alone, I were unable to despise the foolish and perverse censures of ignorant as well as the malicious and unjust censures of ungodly men. For although, by the blessing of God, my most ardent desire has been to advance his kingdoms and promote the public good,—although I feel perfectly conscious, and take God and his angels to witness, that ever since I began to discharge the office of teacher in the Church, my only object has been to do good to the Church, by maintaining the pure doctrine of godliness, yet I believe there never was a man more assailed, stung, and torn by calumny [as well by the declared enemies of the truth of God, as by many worthless persons who have crept into his Church—as well by monks who have brought forth their frocks from their cloisters to spread infection wherever they come, as by other miscreants not better than they.]

To whatever degree Calvin found himself to be much maligned in his own day, it has certainly been multiplied more than a hundredfold over the past five hundred years!  It seems many times people make up things to say against Calvin, without any basis whatsoever.  Many years ago I had the sad experience of hearing a pastor say, from the pulpit, that Calvin didn’t believe in the eternal punishment of unbelievers in hell.  (Obviously he never read the Institutes, 3.25.12, for example).

I appreciate the snippets Jeremy Walker included in An Outline of the Life of John Calvin which show some of the derision Calvin faced in his own day.  Far from having the universal acclaim and esteem of his contemporaries, Calvin found his name used derisively for many of the mutts running through the streets of Geneva, and worse:

The opposition was private and public, political and personal: children referred to him as ‘Cain’ rather than ‘Calvin’; a good number of Geneva’s dogs answered to his name; he was publicly abused whenever he went out, and called the second-ranked devil in hell.

Walker’s citation of Calvin’s reflections in April 1564, a month before his death, is especially telling with regard to the opposition he faced throughout his ministry:

When I first came to this church, I found almost nothing in it. There was preaching and that was all. They would look out for idols it is true, and they burned them. But there was no reformation. Everything was in disorder . . . I have lived here amid continual bickering. I have been from derision saluted of an evening before my door with forty or fifty shots of an arquebuse [musket]. . . . They set the dogs at my heels, crying, Here! here! and these snapped at my gown and legs. . . . though I am nothing, yet know I well that I have prevented three thousand tumults that would have broken out in Geneva. But take courage and fortify yourselves, for God will make use of this church and will maintain it, and assures you that he will protect it.

Along with the Institutes this year, I plan on reading John Calvin: A Pilgrim’s Life by Selderhuis to gain additional insights on Calvin’s life and times.  I look forward to getting to know Calvin the man, as well as his theology, better in 2015.

Links to Reformation 21 blogs through the Institutes:

Jan 5:  To the Reader

Jan 6:  Prefatory 1-2

Jan 7:  Prefatory 3-4

Jan 8:  Prefatory 5-6

Jan 9:  Prefatory 7-8

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December 28, 2014 · 4:13 pm

Countdown to Calvin: One Week to Go!

Our Dead Theologians Society small group is now just a week away from a fifty week excursion through Calvin’s Institutes, beginning January 5th.

The collective decision to take up this next selection is an event of no small significance for our reading group:

  • It is the 20th selection since the group was formed on March 30, 2009.
  • It is only the second non-Puritan work (the first was our previous read, Octavius Winslow’s Personal Declension & Revival of Religion in the Soul), and hence the earliest selection.
  • The charter members of the group have read a total of 4461 pages, an average of 2.2 pages per day, excluding breaks. Reading the Institutes in 2015 will require that pace to double to 4.4 pages per day for 344 days (94% of the year).
  • The highest number of books finished in a year so far is four, both in 2013 and 2014, and the Institutes will tie that number, if we consider it as four books in one.
  • The highest number of pages assigned for completion in a year was 893 in 2011. Reading the Institutes in 2015 in the McNeill-Battles 2 volume edition will exceed that record by 69%, with 1512 pages to cover.

Following the reading schedule developed by Dr. James C. Goodloe IV, we will spend roughly a third (35%) of our time in books 1 and 2, a third (31%) in book 3, and a third (34%) in book 4 as follows:

Book Start Date End Date # Days % Time Start Page End Page # Pages % Pages
1 1/5 2/26 52 15.1% 3 237 235 15.5%
2 2/27 5/6 68 19.8% 241 534 294 19.4%
3 5/7 8/25 110 32.0% 537 1008 472 31.2%
4 8/26 12/18 114 33.1% 1011 1521 511 33.8%
344 100.0% 1512 100.0%
Daily Avg: 4.4

Mortimer Adler and Charles Van Doren included the Institutes in their recommended reading list as one of those books that is typically over people’s heads (How to Read a Book, Appendix A: A Recommended Reading List). The Institutes of the Christian Religion is considered to be among the top 1% of books in the Western tradition that will significantly reward the reader for the efforts made to read them. And lest anyone become puffed up with the notion of this undertaking, please realize that some people make it a habit to read the Institutes every year, in addition to their annual reading through the Bible.

So rest now, but prepare to TAKE UP AND READ on January 5th!

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December 21, 2014 · 3:53 pm

Countdown to Calvin: Two Weeks to Go!

Our Dead Theologians Society is now just two weeks away from a fifty week excursion through Calvin’s Institutes, beginning January 5th.  Reading through the Institutes in 2015 will require an average of 5-7 pages per day of the McNeill-Battles (MB) translation, five days each week.  I’ve tried the schedule on for size, and already cruised through the first week.

Anyone with the two volume MB translation will want to take the opportunity to read the 43 page introduction (pp. xxix-lxxi) to gain further background than the materials recommended in the previous blog, since the first reading assignment for January 5th begins with Calvin’s preface to the reader (p. 3 of MB).

I discovered one delightful tidbit in the MB introduction on p. xxxvi, where it was noted that Calvin thought in Latin from his boyhood as a matter of habit.  The age at which Calvin took up this habit wasn’t specified, but the fact that he did so indicates how precocious he was in his studies.  This little tidbit also is essential in appreciating the role of the Latin and French editions of the Institutes.  Calvin wrote the Institutes in Latin, and the last four Latin editions (1539, 1543, 1550, 1559) were translated into French for wider dissemination, within a year or two after the Latin edition was published. Hence the Latin editions are definitive.

So unless you are a Latin scholar, the issue becomes which English translation to use.  The 1559, final edition of the Institutes has been translated into English four times: Thomas Norton (1561); John Allen (1813); Henry Beveridge (1845); and Ford Lewis Battles (1960).  J. I. Packer gives the following assessment of all four:

No English translation fully matches Calvin’s Latin; that of the Elizabethan, Thomas Norton, perhaps gets closest; Beveridge gives us Calvin’s feistiness but not always his precision; Battles gives us the precision but not always the punchiness, and fleetness of foot; Allen is smooth and clear, but low-key.  

Years ago I bought the McNeill-Battles translation (two volume set) from the Westminster Theological Seminary bookstore, because that is the edition used in the seminary’s coursework.  I figured if it was good enough for Westminster, it is good enough for me. And I must say, when I have pulled down Beveridge’s translation for sharing sections with others, I have usually been a little disappointed in his translation by comparison.  But I don’t mean to disparage Beveridge’s translation or scholarship.  Perhaps it is what you get used to.  I like how one person responded to the Beveridge vs Battles debate on PuritanBoard back in 2009, which a fellow DTS member shared with me:

Wow! Talk about inside baseball! Comparing Beveridge and Battles vis a vis who was the better Calvin scholar is a little like asking whether Micky Mantle or Roger Maris was a better Yankee.

I will probably acquire a copy of Beveridge’s translation within the next few months for further study anyway, and most of the passages I share from the Institutes will be his rendering, since it is available online.

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December 15, 2014 · 9:07 pm

Countdown to Calvin: Three Weeks to Go!

Our Dead Theologians Society will embark on it most ambitious expedition yet when we take up Calvin’s Institutes in 2015, beginning January 5th. Using the reading schedule prepared by Dr. James C. Goodloe IV, available online here, the pace will require reading an average of 5-7 pages per day of the Battles/McNeill edition of the Institutes, five days a week for 50 weeks (no sweat, just 10-15 minutes per day, 5 days a week).

Any cost-conscious enthusiast eager to join this expedition may obtain Beveridge’s translation (1845) for around $20 from the WTS Bookstore. If you want the more recent, two-volume Battles translation edited by John T. McNeill (1960), it will cost you a little more. If you don’t want to spend anything, Beveridge’s translation is accessible online for free.

As background on the life of Calvin, Jeremy Walker’s An Outline of the Life of John Calvin is handy. And J. I. Packer wrote an excellent preface, as always, to A Theological Guide to Calvin’s Institutes: Essays and Analysis. Ligon Duncan gave 10 good reasons to read through the Institutes in 2009 (the 500th anniversary of Calvin’s birth), so we are only six years behind, but the days of the week fall out exactly the same.  So Dr. Goodloe’s reading schedule will serve us well in 2015!

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