Calvin's Mixed Legacy


With John Calvin's 500th birthday with us, there is much debate as to his legacy. I'm not a Calvinist, though I value aspects of his theology. As a Protestant I'm an heir of his work, even if at times it means that those who have influenced and formed me resisted his work. Arminians, of which group I likely am a part, are Reformed folk, they simply objected to the way the Reformation theology was being understood and developed. I don't like everything that Luther wrote or Zwingli or even Menno. Every movement has its dark side.

John Calvin was a product of his time, and his followers have taken his thought in any number of directions, many of which he probably would reject. But he likely gave a foundation to each of these trajectories.

I read today Paula Cooey's gracious post about Calvin and his legacy. Even as she rejects his involvement in the Servetus execution and his atonement theology, she finds much that is valuable as well. She notes that there are both right wing and left wing interpretations -- Capitalist and Marxist versions. Consider the very title of her reflections at Religion Dispatches: "John Calvin at 500: From Theocrats to Marxists, Calvin’s Vision of Joy and Cruelty Left Complex Legacy."


Cooey writes:

The legacy Calvin left is ambiguous at best. The dominant strain that runs through consists of an accentuated Augustinian proclivity to the transform world, a stewardship characterized by leaving the place better than one found it. “Better” is subject to interpretation and debate, of course. Many of his followers, somewhat more scholastic and ever more into policing human life and less into rejoicing, were and are a tough and all-too-often nasty lot, to say the least. In fact, Calvin, with others (that fiery redhead John Knox who smashed the stained glass windows of St. Andrew’s Cathedral in Edinburgh, to name the most notable among them) gave birth to the various denominations that make up the Reformed Protestant Church: Presbyterians, the United Church of Christ, Disciples of Christ, and others all share the name Calvinist. In this country, these Calvinists range in their political and social world-transforming behaviors from avid theocrats, still capable of spewing a vituperative anti-Catholic polemic, to equally avid radical supporters of gay and lesbian marriage.


One note here -- while there are likely Calvinist Disciples, the Disciple founders made it very clear that they were breaking from Calvin. That said, it is important that we consider the legacy that Calvin has left, acknowledging both the positives and the negatives. I think it worth recognizing that whatever the proclivities of the founding fathers, the American nation has roots in the Calvinist vision. Even as Calvin sought to establish a Christian commonwealth in Geneva, so did the Puritans first in England, and then in America. We hail the Pilgrims, but they were separatist Calvinists of the most rigid kind.

I will post more about Calvin through the week, as I do think his is a legacy we must grapple with.

Comments

Popular Posts