Some Observations Concerning
the Educational Philosophy of John Calvin
An attempt to synthesize the thinking of John Calvin in matters pertaining to a philosophy of education is justified on at least four grounds.
First, Reformed Christians, particularly as they are concerned for the articulation of a consistent world and life view, acknowledge the impetus given to all areas of Christian endeavor by the systematic genius of the Geneva reformer with respect to the development of a comprehensive doctrinal expression. The Institutes alone, as valuable now as in Calvin’s day, represent a statement so cogent as to shed light on our every task as Christians in the world. How that theological capacity was employed in the guidance of Calvin’s work of education in Geneva can be instructive for us today as well.
Second, it is clear that a great deal of Calvin’s energy was devoted to the development of educational institutions. Since he, the prince of reformers, was so evidently concerned over this area, we also must be who would continue this tradition today. Yet if we would emulate his labors in this area, we must begin at the beginning, with his thinking on the matter, his philosophy of education.
Third, it is further generally acknowledged that it was in the area of education that Calvin enjoyed one of his most enduring of successes.1 His influence in this area spread beyond his own adopted city and even the rest of Switzerland and his native France to England, Scotland, the American colonies, and elsewhere.2 The factors in Calvin’s
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thinking which contributed to his widespread and durable success should be of interest to his spiritual descendants today.
Finally, though many have undertaken to write in a summary manner on Calvin’s educational work, and others on certain aspects of his approach to the work of education,3 no comprehensive attempt has been made (to this student’s knowledge) to organize his thinking on education according to the perspective of a modern educator. This brief study certainly cannot claim to satisfy that need; rather, our hope is to point in the direction of discerning certain aspects of Calvin’s philosophy of education with a view to stimulating further research on the subject among scholars and to broadening the educational foundations of Reformed practitioners in all areas of Christian education.
One problem immediately facing us is that Calvin was certainly no philosopher of education, nor was such a formal discipline recognized among the scholarship of his day. Although there was a growing body of literature and a developing interest in the subject in the sixteenth century,4 still it would take another hundred years or so for Comenius actually to break this ground, and even that effort was yet centuries ahead of its time. Calvin, by contrast, was primarily a pastor, and it was thus that he perceived himself. All the great and abiding contributions of the Geneva reformer were accomplished or initiated during his tenure in the pulpit at St. Peter’s.
Yet Calvin was a thorough workman, both in dependence upon the Scriptures and in careful forethought of the requirements and possible consequences of any undertaking. Thus we might reasonably expect that the development of so comprehensive and effective an educational program as was sustained in Calvin’s Geneva must have occupied his mind for no little space of time and that some systematic approach, though never reduced to writing, must have guided his efforts. In seeking to reconstruct some aspects of that overall theory, we shall consider, first, the purpose and nature of education for Calvin. Next we will examine his view of the role of the Church in education and some specifics concerning the educational program which was developed for
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Geneva. Finally, we will look into some elements of Calvin’s view of learning itself and how, according to his perspective, learning could best be achieved. Especially in this last section shall we attempt to shine the searchlight of contemporary educational theory on selections from the Calvin corpus.
It is appropriate that we begin our discussion with a consideration of Calvin’s view of the purpose and nature of education. Again, we have from Calvin himself no precise formal statement along these lines to guide our research; however, it is clear from his writings that Calvin was acutely aware of the importance of the teaching ministry for the accomplishment of his work in Geneva. For example, in his letter to the reader introducing the 1559 edition of the Institutes this consciousness is clearly manifest. Here Calvin describes his calling to Geneva in educational terms, the nature of his own work being to “discharge the office of teacher in the Church.”5
Teaching was for Calvin the means of constantly setting forth the unadulterated truth of God’s Word, which alone would result in the education of the church. This represented a marked contrast to Romish sacramentalism in that it maintained that the church was blessed of God not in the accomplishment of ecclesiastically prescribed works of righteousness, but in hearing, understanding, and obeying the saving message of Christ from the Scriptures. The whole of Calvin’s theological undertaking seems to have been conceived in this manner. He confesses to having written the Institutes “chiefly for the sake of my countrymen, the French, multitudes of whom I perceived to be hungering and thirsting after Christ.”6 Likewise, Calvin saw every facet of his labors as having been intended to “advance (God’s) kingdom, and promote the public good.”7 This would include his work in education, which, together with his writing, preaching, and other endeavors, was designed to set forth the truth of God in the face of the lies and deceptions current in his age.8 Thus he hoped to be able
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to sanctify the name of God and create a response of reverent fear and worship among the people.9
Calvin confessed to having three specific purposes in mind for the course of his ministry in all its expressions: “how the glory of God is to be maintained on the earth inviolate, how the truth of God is to preserve its dignity, how the kingdom of Christ is to continue among us compact and secure.”10 His concern was that his work be ever guided by the light of Scripture applied to the present context and its challenges and intended to bring about that which most authentically expressed the Kingdom presence of Christ. This commitment, we can assume, would include his work in education. God, according to Calvin, could be expected to advance the cause of his glory among the Genevans in direct proportion to the degree of faithful declaration and exposition of his truth which was sponsored in the churches there. The saints would be edified and blessed only insofar as they were faithful in the hearing of that truth and diligent in understanding and obeying it. Whatever forms of instruction may have been designed for Calvin’s ministry, they must needs have been faithful to the purposes of God’s glory and the edification of his people; never conceived as ends in themselves; never allowed for the mere sake of perpetuating some received mode of instruction to obscure those purposes; and always scrutinized in their every phase by God’s truth and measured in their effectiveness by the degree to which they were able to advance the Kingdom of Christ and to promote the well-being of the people of God.
Thus, Calvin saw education as a means to the glorification of God and the edification of the church through the exposition of God’s truth in such a way that the people of God might learn to worship and serve him as they ought.
Yet who was to be responsible for the accomplishment of this purpose and for creating the necessary vehicles of instruction? And how was that program of instruction to be most faithfully and effectively arranged?
In answering these questions Calvin could have taken one of several routes. He might have chosen the expedient approach of his German
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and Swiss contemporaries and sought to enjoin the government in the form of the Genevan councils to create and maintain the necessary educational institutions. Or, he might have done as certain later Protestants and turned the entire responsibility over to the family heads of the city.
Instead, Calvin remained consistent with his overall purpose and looked to the Scriptures for guidance in determining who should be the responsible agent for the education of Geneva’s citizens and how the system of instruction should be organized.11 He found that the edification of the people of God in Geneva should be accomplished in no “other way than by the education of the Church.”12 Both the magistrate and the home were to have their roles in the work of education, but it was to be primarily through the church that this task would be organized and accomplished.13
Some rather cursory remarks are perhaps in order here concerning Calvin’s view of the Scriptures and what place they were to have in the process of instruction. Calvin held that “the only due method of teaching in the Church is according to the prescription and rule of his word.”14 It is through the Scriptures that we learn to “worship (God) with perfect integrity of heart and unfeigned obedience, and also to depend entirely on his goodness.”15 The Scriptures are absolutely indispensable to the development of Christian faith and conduct. This is so not only for the life of the individual believer but for all corporate expressions of Christian endeavor as well. Thus, as Calvin would have his own life regularly scrutinized by the Word of God and reformed according to its teachings, so also must this have been the case with his approach to the organization and practice of his ministry. As the introduction to the Ecclesiastical Ordinances states so clearly, “it has seemed to us advisable that the spiritual government of the kind which our Lord demonstrated and instituted by His Word should be set out in good order so that it may be established and observed among us.”16
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For Calvin it was more important to answer the question, How faithfully does our system of government and ministry conform to the criteria of Scripture? than to settle for rationale of convenience or expediency alone as the final norms. Thus, through his study of Scripture, Calvin came to see that the church was that body specially created by God to be the loving bosom of his people. He observes,
it is of the highest moment that we should specially recognize this care toward ourselves…. God having chosen the Church for his abode, there cannot be a doubt, that in governing it, he gives singular manifestations of his paternal care.17
It is the church
into whose bosom God is pleased to collect his children, not only that by her aid and ministry they may be nourished so long as they are babes and children, but may also be guided by her maternal care until they grow up to manhood, and, finally, attain to the perfection of faith.18
Thus it was the pastors of Geneva, organized as a company, the elected spiritual leadership of Geneva, who developed and gave oversight to the work of Christian education. Calvin assumes involvement on the part of parents in the education of children19 and, prior to 1541 at least, specified it on the part of the government;20 but the primary and greatest responsibility for the execution of this task was lodged in the church as represented in its pastors and officers.
The instructional responsibilities were to be divided between pastors and teachers.21 Calvin was concerned to maintain a distinction between these offices.22 Both ministers and teachers were to be called to their tasks by God and the church23 and were to be adequately provided
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for in their temporal needs by the people they were to serve.24 The function of the pastor was
feeding the sheep of Jesus Christ on the one hand with instruction, admonition, consolation, exhortation, deprecation; and on the other resisting all false doctrines and deceptions of the devil, without mixing with the pure doctrines of the Scriptures their dreams or their foolish imaginings.25
Pastors were to be seen as “messengers and ambassadors of God”26 and were to be esteemed and heeded accordingly, not as tyrants over the church but as wise and concerned shepherds seeking the well-being of God’s flock.
The office of the teacher or doctor was different from that of pastor. Here the primary responsibility was “the instruction of the faithful in true doctrine.”27 Teachers were to function both in the churches of Geneva and in the college as well. In the former they would give primary attention to the teaching of theology from both the Old and New Testaments.28 There also younger men were to be employed in the teaching of the catechism to children.29 The teachers in the college would instruct the students in “language and humanities” with a view to preparing at least some of them for the work either of ministry or civil government.30
The distinction between the offices of pastor and teacher was an important one for Calvin, centering on the matters of the sacraments and discipline:
teachers preside not over discipline, or the administration of the sacraments, or admonitions, or exhortations, but the interpretation of Scripture only, in order that pure and sound doctrine may be maintained among believers.31
These were not to be regarded as equal offices. Pastors were to be fully engaged in teaching, yet Calvin notes that the responsibilities of the teacher, though distinct from those of the pastor, are all “embraced in the pastoral office.”32
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In the course of time the Genevan church was able to establish and maintain not only a thriving ministry of education among the churches of the city but also a model school system for gymnasium and university students alike. As it is not our purpose to examine in detail the elements of that system but only the educational theory undergirding it, we can only give the most cursory of overviews here. The reader is referred to more detailed analyses for a deeper look into this matter.33 As we have noted, the form of education in Calvin’s Geneva took two primary expressions, that conducted in the churches and that carried out in the system of schools. In the churches instruction was primarily through preaching and the catechism. Preaching was provided as many as three times on Sundays and on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday during the week. Attendance, as we shall see, was considered to be vitally important.
The catechism was taught in special classes on Sundays at noon. Although it was mainly intended for children, some adults apparently attended as well. Teaching was by the doctors under the oversight of the pastors and was designed to result in the catechist’s personal and public expression of faith in Christ.
Three different schools were established. Of the school for girls not much is known, save that it was maintained separate from that of the boys. The boys’ school was intended as something of a preparatory school for the university. Here the boys studied languages, the classics, and philosophy, courses deemed most necessary for their later studies. At the university they studied theology, the sciences, and mathematics. After Calvin’s death medicine and law were added to the curriculum. The primary purpose of the university was eminently practical, to prepare young men for the ministry or for service in the government.
The scope of this program of education, together with its diversity and durability, show the practicality and strength of Calvin’s overall educational philosophy. Through these institutions the church, by means of its elected leadership, was able to see to the instruction of the people of Christ. The process involved both the home and the civil government, but it centered primarily on the leadership and oversight of the pastors and teachers.
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To this point we have been following a rather well-worn path. It is, however, when we turn to consider aspects of Calvin’s theory of learning that we strike out in something of a new direction.
The nature of learning and how best to achieve it are matters of much discussion among educators today, both within and beyond the pale of Christian faith. The discussion has given rise to erudite tomes and sophisticated technologies designed to advance the cause of one or another theory of learning. The matter was not nearly so complex for Calvin.
Calvin viewed man as inherently a learning creature.34 For one thing, he could not help but learn about God, since God has deposited in the minds of men a “seed of religion” and continually manifests himself to men “in the whole structure of the created universe”35 and, beyond that, in the Scriptures. Man is, therefore, bound to learn about God as a simple matter of existence, from the “most illiterate peasant” to the most accomplished student of liberal studies.36 Yet not all learn about God in an equal manner. Some deny the knowledge of God. Those, on the other hand, who apply themselves unto the knowledge of God are gripped in their hearts and minds (affect and cognition) and show the fruit of their learning in reformed lives (psychomotor).37 Such learning, however, is not the product of mere intellectual activity, be it ever so willful or diligent; rather, it is an inward work of the Holy Spirit in the hearts and minds of those who desire to know God:
the testimony of the Spirit is superior to reason, for as God alone can properly bear witness to his own words, so these words will not obtain full credit in the hearts of men, until they are sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit. The same Spirit, therefore, who spoke by the mouth of the prophets, must penetrate our hearts, in order to convince us that they faithfully deliver the message with which they were divinely intrusted.38
True learning is, therefore, consumately a work of the Holy Spirit. But what is it so to learn about God from his Spirit that one may be said truly to have come to “know” him?
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By the knowledge of God, I understand that by which we not only conceive that there is some God, but also apprehend what it is for our interest, and conducive to his glory, what, in short, it is befitting to know concerning him. For, properly speaking, we cannot say that God is known where there is no religion or piety.39
Thus, to “know God” involves both the acquisition of certain factual data about him and clearly understanding how that information is to be applied in our individual lives so as to nurture a true religious experience. Learning, that is, has both content and application. Moreover, learning which leads to the knowledge of God must concentrate on a twofold focus, involving our experience of him as Creator and as Redeemer.40 With respect to the former,
we must be so persuaded not only that as he once formed the world, so he now 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 judgment, 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.41
That is, the knowledge of God as Creator leads men to look toward him, depend upon him, and orient their entire lives toward him. He is related to as the focal point for every aspect of human life and interest, being the very source from which it all derives and by which it is all sustained. To know God as Creator, in short, is to acquiesce in his sovereignty for the whole of our lives.
The knowledge of God as Redeemer is experienced through faith in Christ42 and induces men to a true worship of God and confidence in the hope of everlasting life.43 Overall, therefore, it may be said that an individual has truly learned when he has come, through faith in Jesus Christ, to reverence and fear God, to anticipate and work for his blessings in every aspect of his life, and to thank and glorify him for the benefits thus received.44 And, as we have noted, this involves a
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surrendering and renewing of the mind, heart, and will, so that a complete transformation occurs in the learner. It was this quality of learning, involving the total man, which Calvin sought to effect in his students and his flock.
The knowledge of God thus entered into immediately has the effect of turning a man’s attention unto himself.45 As he learns to see himself as a being before God his Creator and Redeemer, the learner also begins to perceive what it is proper for him to consider with respect to himself:
in considering the knowledge which man ought to have of himself, it seems quite proper to divide it thus, first, to consider the end for which he was created, and the qualities—by no means contemptible qualities—with which he was endued, thus urging him to meditate on divine worship and the future life; and, secondly, to consider his faculties, or rather want of faculties—a want which, when perceived, will annihilate all his confidence, and cover him with confusion. The tendency of the former view is to teach him what his duty is, of the latter, to make him aware of how far he is able to perform it.46
This, then, is the other side of the coin in the overall learning process. As he increasingly concentrates upon his life as the image-bearer of God, the learner comes to strive after clear intellect, self-control over his emotions, “all his senses duly regulated,” and a walk of gratitude before his sovereign Lord.47 By the right use of his intellect he learns “to distinguish between objects, according as they seem deserving of being approved or disapproved.”48 By the proper exercise of his will he learns “to choose and follow what the intellect declares to be good, to reject and shun what it declares to be bad.”49 They cannot be said to be truly learning whose contemplation of God and themselves does not produce these evidences of a lively faith:
if the knowledge of God, in so far as it fails to produce this effect, is fleeting and vain, it is clear that all those who do not direct the whole thoughts and actions of their lives to this end fail to fulfill the law of their being.50
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Thus, in matters both of the knowledge of God and of man, Calvin sought a quality of learning which involved a radical reorienting of an individual’s entire lifestyle, one which drew him into a deeper and more personally comprehensive dependence upon God. Ultimately this was a work which only the Holy Spirit could accomplish,51 yet Calvin acknowledged that both the learners and teachers had significant roles and duties to fulfill in this learning process.
In order to achieve the quality of learning which Calvin sought to bring about, the learners would have to engage themselves in the fulfillment of three primary rseponsibilities. First among these was faithful and active attendance at public assemblies for instruction:
Pride, or fastidiousness, or emulation, induces many to persuade themselves that they can profit sufficiently by reading and meditating in private, and thus to despise public meetings and deem preaching superfluous. But since as much as in them lies they loose or burst the sacred bond of unity, none of them escapes the just punishment of this impious divorce, but become fascinated with pestiferous errors, and the foulest delusions. Wherefore, in order that the pure simplicity of the faith may flourish among us, let us not decline to use this exercise of piety, which God by his institution of it has shown to be necessary.52
Genevans were to enter with seriousness of heart and mind into worship and instruction, and this, presumably, throughout the entire course of their lives. This corresponds well with Calvin’s high view of the teaching ministry as the primary means unto the reformation of the church: “As we receive the true ministers of the Word of God as messengers and ambassadors of God, it is necessary to listen to them as to him himself, as we hold their ministry to be a commission from God necessary in the church.”53
This commitment to active participation was to be impressed upon the learners from the very youngest age. They would learn this through their participation in Sunday catechism,54 wherein understanding the nature and importance of true learning was made an integral part of what would eventually become their public profession of faith in Christ.55 Consider the following prescribed response for catechists:
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C: If we lay hold on it with complete heartfelt conviction as nothing less than truth come down from heaven; if we show ourselves docile to it; if we subdue our wills and minds to his obedience; if we love it heartily; if having it once engraved on our hearts and its roots fixed there, so that it bring forth fruit in our lives; if finally we be formed to its rule—then it will turn to our salvation, as intended.56
Calvin was emphatic about the citizenry’s need for the learning which could only come about through involvement in public instruction:
the Church can only be edified by external preaching, and there is no other bond by which saints can be kept together than by uniting with one consent to observe the order which God has appointed in his Church for learning and making progress.57
As a corollary he warned that “all who reject the spiritual food of the soul divinely offered to them by the hands of the Church, deserve to perish of hunger and famine.”58
Second, as diligent as they were to be concerning their attendance at public meetings of instruction, learners were to be equally diligent over their personal study of the Scriptures. This, too, was to be a part of their earliest training in Christian doctrine. Masters were bound to ask of their catechists,
M: But are we not to apply diligence and strive with all zeal to advance in (Scripture) by reading, hearing, and meditating?
C: Certainly, while everyone ought to exercise himself in daily reading, at the same time also all are to attend with special regularity the gatherings where the doctrine of salvation is expounded in the company of the faithful.59
Every citizen was to apply himself unto becoming “a disciple of Scripture.”60 Yet, since this discipline, if carried out in solitude, could lead to all manner of false interpretations and heresy, it was to be consistently balanced by participation in public instruction, as we have already shown.61
Finally, it was every learner’s responsibility to exercise vigilance over his own life, so that the learning which he gained in public and private might come to full fruition in obedience: “For not only does faith,
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full and perfect faith, but all correct knowledge of God, originate in obedience.”62
On the teacher’s part we can only speculate as to what formal responsibilities may have been required of those who taught the Scriptures and Christian doctrine in Calvin’s Geneva. Certainly diligence of preparation and fidelity to the Word of God go without saying. But, if we judge from Calvin’s example alone, some circumspection with respect to two other areas may have been at least a part of their normal discipline.
The first of these has to do with the methods of instruction. Certainly Calvin offers nothing by way of analysis, description, or theory concerning the various teaching methods which an instructor might use at any given time. Yet his familiarity with and use of a certain variety of such methods—including the lecture, catechesis, simple reading, perhaps private tutoring,63 as well as private meditation64—suggest that he and the other pastors and teachers in Geneva appreciated the suitability of particular teaching methods for particular audiences, contexts, and purposes. The lecture, for example, seems to have been largely reserved for sermons and the instruction of adults, while catechesis was primarily employed for the teaching of children, although adults may have been present for such sessions as well.65
At any rate, that at least some thinking went into the matter of teaching methods is plain. Learning of the sort desired in Geneva could be more effectively achieved when certain teaching methods were appropriately employed.
A second area has to do with learning objectives. Again, we are clearly reading backward from our own perspective at this point. Even among contemporary educators discussions of the validity of types of taxonomies of learning objectives have not engendered a consensus of approval. Concerning Calvin’s philosophy of education nothing concrete can be concluded as to whether or not particular courses of study or individual instructional sessions were constructed around specific learning objectives. It is doubtless too much to believe that such was the case to any high degree of consciousness among the teachers and pastors of Geneva.
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Yet certain “goals” for learning were clearly in mind at certain times. For example, with respect to the catechism, the goal for each learner is clearly stated: “When a child has been sufficiently instructed to pass on from the Catechism, he shall solemnly recite the sum of what is contained in it and he shall do this as a profession of his Christianity in the presence of the Church.”66 Here three learning goals have been clearly articulated: (1) The child is to make an oral presentation; (2) That presentation is to consist of an accurate summation of the contents of the Catechism; (3) That presentation is to include a profession of the child’s personal faith before the congregation. The first of these might be seen to be a behavioral or psychomotor goal, the second a cognitive, and the third an affective, to use contemporary educational terminology. It is not too much to expect that at least some such “learning objectives” must have been discussed with respect to those learners preparing, for example, for the ministry67 or civil government, as well as for the instruction accompanying church discipline on behalf of any whose learning, and therefore, Christian experience, may have been sometimes wanting. Calvin himself seems, at least with respect to his writing, to appreciate the value of having in mind particular desired results among the audience for whom his labors were intended.68
Perhaps Monter, better than anyone else, has accurately summarized the influence and impact of Calvin as theologian, pastor, and educator in Geneva:
This preacher, educator, and advisor had become an overpowering moral force within Geneva, and his influence was spilling over into many fields outside the ministry. When he died in 1564 Geneva lost the man who had given her the supplies of men, institutions, and ideas which would enable her to survive as a Protestant enclave in Catholic lands, as a tiny city state surrounded by princely absolution, and as a model for all Reformed communities and churches of his century.69
We have sought to bring together in this study the rudiments of Calvin’s educational theory as it was brought to bear upon the overall task of reforming the churches in Geneva and beyond. There is much
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more to be gained from reflecting on this; yet there is certainly much more work to be done before the full fruit of Calvin’s thinking on the subject of education will be yielded to our maximum benefit. We who cherish the heritage and theology of the Geneva reformer are well-advised to give his thinking in this critical area more careful and comprehensive consideration, in order that the strength of his philosophy of education may be allowed to make its contribution in our day.
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1 Cf. Gordon J. Spykman, “Sphere-Sovereignty in Calvin and the Calvinist Tradition,” in Exploring the Heritage of John Calvin (ed. D. E. Holwerda; Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1976) 206.
2 Cf. J. D. Douglas, “Calvin’s Contribution to Scotland,” W. Stanford Reid, “Calvin’s Influence in Canada,” and Alexander Barkley, “The Impact of Calvinism on Australasia,” in John Calvin: His Influence in the Western World (ed. W. S. Reid; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1982) 226–27, 233, 318, 328.
3 Cf. Arnold DeGraaf, The Educational Ministry of the Church (Nutley, N. J.: The Craig Press, 1968); Peter Y. De Jong, “Calvin’s Contribution to Christian Education,” Calvin Theological Journal, 2 (1967) 162ff; W. Stanford Reid, “Calvin and the Founding of the Academy of Geneva,” WTJ 18 (1955–56) 1–33.
4 Cf. Gerald Strauss, Luther’s House of Learning (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University, 1978) 48ff.
5 John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1953) 1.25.
6 Ibid., 3.
7 Ibid., 24.
8 Ibid., 3, 4.
9 Ibid., 19.
10 Ibid., 5.
11 Ibid., 1.9.2.
12 Ibid., 4.1.5.
13 Cf. D. Nauta, “Calvijn en zijn Academie in 1559,” Vier redevoeringen over Calvin (Kampen: Kok, 1959) 18–21, quoted in Spykman, “Sphere-Sovereignty,” 206–7.
14 Institutes, 4.8.8.
15 Ibid., 1.10.2.
16 Ecclesiastical Ordinances, 1541 in Philip E. Hughes, The Register of the Company of Pastors of Geneva in the Time of Calvin (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1966) 35.
17 Institutes, 1.17.6.
18 Ibid., 4.1.1.
19 “Articles Concerning the Organization of the Church and of Worship at Geneva, 1537” in Calvin: Theological Treatises (ed. J. K. S. Reid; LCC; Philadelphia: Westminster, 1954) 54.
20 Ibid., 49.
21 Institutes, 4.1.1-4.
22 John Calvin, Commentaries (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1979), on Eph 4:11.
23 Institutes, 4.3.10.
24 Commentaries, on Gal 6:6.
25 “The Geneva Confession” in Theological Treatises, 32.
26 Ecciesiastical Ordinances, 40.
27 Ibid., 40, 41.
28 Ibid.
29 Ibid.
30 Ibid.
31 Institutes, 4.3.4.
32 Ibid.
33 Cf. E. William Monter, Calvin’s Geneva (Huntington, New York: Robert E. Krieger, 1975); T. H. L. Parker, John Calvin: A Biography (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1975); and Reid, “Calvin and the Founding of the Academy of Geneva.”
34 Institutes, 2.2.12.
35 Ibid., 1.5.1.
36 Ibid., 1.5.2.
37 Ibid., 1.5.9.
38 Ibid., 1.7.4.
39 Ibid., 1.2.1.
40 Ibid.
41 Ibid.
42 Ibid.
43 Ibid., 1.5.10.
44 Ibid., 1.2.1.
45 Ibid., 1.1.1.
46 Ibid., 2.1.3.
47 Ibid., 1.15.3.
48 Ibid., 1.15.7.
49 Ibid.
50 Ibid., 1.3.3.
51 John Calvin, Commentaries on the Catholic Epistles, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1959) 200.
52 Institutes, 4.1.5.
53 “The Geneva Confession,” 32.
54 Ecclesiastical Ordinances, 47.
55 Ibid.
56 “Catechism of the Church of Geneva,” in Theological Treatises, 130.
57 Institutes, 4.1.5.
58 Ibid.
59 “Catechism of the Church of Geneva,” 130.
60 Institutes, 1.4.2.
61 Ibid., 4.1.5.
62 Ibid.
63 Ecclesiastical Ordinances, 41.
64 “Catechism of the Church of Geneva,” 130.
65 Monter, Calvin’s Geneva, 100-1.
66 Ecclesiastical Ordinances, 47.
67 Monter, Calvin’s Geneva, 134-35.
68 Institutes, 1.21.25.
69 Monter, Calvin’s Geneva, 119-20.