Posted on 02/19/2007 9:16:36 AM PST by AlbionGirl
From the first-hand accounts, Oxford's Gillian Lewis notes, "The city of Geneva possessed a significance which was symbolic and mythical. Her friends saw her as the mirror and model of true piety, a haven of refuge, a roosting-place for fledglings, a stronghold to train and despatch abroad soldiers of the Gospel and ministers of the Word." And yet, there were enemies as well, enemies who saw Geneva as "Satan's sanctuary, a source of heresy, atheism, and libertinage and a centre for the active dissemination of sedition." 1
Just as soon as Geneva embraced the Reformation officially and severed its loyalties to the bishop and Duke of Savoy, the city was flooded with refugees from all over Europe. Over night Geneva became, after Wittenberg, Zurich, and Strasbourg, a capitol of the Protestant faith. Foreign visitors expressed amazement as they observed both the theological and practical attractions of the city.
Nevertheless, the impressions we received from our high school teachers, more than likely, had little in common with those reported by first-hand witnesses, friend or foe. Images abound of a tyrant in a black academic gown, organizing a sixteenth-century equivalent of the secret police to insure that no one, at any time or any place, was enjoying himself. The amazing thing about this is not the image itself, but the fact that it has survived in the public imagination even though it has been refuted by the consensus of the world's leading Renaissance and Reformation historians for over half a century. The foundation for this public myth is the assertion that Geneva was a theocracy and Calvin was its pope.
(Excerpt) Read more at the-highway.com ...
Ping.
Ping to read later
I've been trying really hard to find some sizeable excerpts online from his response to Bishop/Cardinal Sadoleto, but to no great avail. Sadoleto addresses a letter to Geneva, inviting it's citizens to come back into the Roman fold. Calvin is absent from Geneva at this point so the Genevans appeal to him to respond to the Bishop or Cardinal or whatever he was. Sadoleto argues that the Genevan citizens are more assured of pressing a better case before God in terms of their salvation if they explain to God that they believed what they believed because they had 1500 years of belief behind them. They could press upon God that this attachement to no innovation was done with obedience, etc., and that God would more likely look favorably upon their rationale based on all of this. The thing that is most striking is the tacit understanding that they'd be assured of salvation regardless of possible error if the error had a pedigree. It's a great piece of history and correspondence on the part of both men, but it particularly highlights Calvin's strength and his absolute prostration before the Providence of God. Relative to the salvation issue that I just referenced, here's a piece from his correspondence with Sadoleto that I could find:
It is not very sound theology to confine a man’s thoughts so much to himself, and not to set before him, as the prime motive of his existence, zeal to illustrate the glory of God. For we are born first of all for God, and not for ourselves…. This zeal ought to exceed all thought and care for our own good and advantage, and since natural equity also teaches that God does not receive what is his own, unless he is preferred to all things, it certainly is the part of a Christian man to ascend higher than merely to seek and secure the salvation of his own soul. I am persuaded, therefore, that there is no man imbued with true piety, who will not consider as insipid that long and laboured exhortation to zeal for the heavenly life, a zeal which keeps a man entirely devoted to himself, and does not, even by one expression, arouse him to sanctify the name of God (Calvin’s Tracts and Treatises, trans. Henry Beveridge, 7 vols., reprint ed. [Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983], 1:33-34).
I think I have both letters (translated) in a single book. Let me see if I can find it!
Alex, re your tagline. Thomas Hardy remarks in Tess of the d'Ubervilles (sp?) that each year we pass the anniversary of our death without knowing it or being stirred by it.
Well, according to Calvinism, the man was a totally depraved sinner, who may or may not have died as one of the elect.
Of course.
In fact, Cauvin told the Catholic Canonist and Astronomer, Copernicus, (you know that whole Heliocentric thingy which Copernicus taught))..The world also is stabilized, that it cannot be moved."
An excellent thought as we approach Ash Wednesday and its grim reminder "remember, you are dust...."
Yes, lightman, I agree.
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