John Calvin ' Theologian of the Bible

JOHN H. LEITH

Professor of Historical Theology Union Theological Seminary in Virginia

Calvin's theology can properly be described primarily as commentary upon Scripture as a whole and secondarily as commentary upon the way the church had read Scripture in its theology and creeds.

O H N CALVIN'S first title in Geneva was "Reader in Holy Scripture." 1 Very soon after he arrived in Geneva, he joined Farei in insisting that the inhabitants subscribe to a creed which began with this affirmation: First we affirm that we desire to follow Scripture alone as rule of faith and religion, without mixing with it any other thing which might be devised by the opinion of men apart from the Word of God, and without wishing to accept for our spiritual government any other doctrine than what is conveyed to us by the same Word without addition or diminution, according to the command of our Lord.2 In his last message to the pastors of Geneva he declared : As concerns my doctrine: I have taught faithfully, and God has given me grace to write. I have done it with the utmost fidelity, and have not to my knowledge
i. Corpus Reformatorum: Joannis Calvini Opera Quae Supersunt Omnia, Guilielmus Baum, Eduardus Gunitz and Eduardus Reuss, eds. (Brunsvigae: C. A. Schwetschke et Filium, 18631897), Vol. 5, col. 233. References to this work are hereafter cited by GR, followed by vol. and col. nos. Translations are usually from the Edinburgh, Calvin Translation Society and Library of Christian Classics (hereafter LGG) editions of Calvin's works. 2. CR IX, 693; LCC, XXII, 26.

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corrupted or twisted a single passage of the Scriptures; and when I could have drawn out a far-fetched meaning, if I had studied subtility, I have put that [temptation] under foot and have always studied simplicity. I have written nothing through hatred against any one, but have always set before me faithfully what I have thought to be for the glory of God.3 In his will, he identified himself as " I , John Calvin, Minister of the Word of God in the church of Geneva. 554 John Calvin quite clearly intended to be a theologian of the Bible. Calvin's intention to formulate his theology according to the Reformation principle of sola scriptum, to listen to the Bible without adding to it or taking away from it, was grounded in his own Christian experience. Luther had struggled with a guilty conscience, and his experience of the divine forgiveness forever afterwards shaped his theology. Calvin is more reticent concerning his own Christian experience, but there is significant indication that hearing the voice of the living God in the Scripture was basic to it. In the autobiographical material in the preface to the Psalms commentary, the "superstitions of popery55 stands in contrast to the "purer doctrine 55 that was a consequence of his conversion. Likewise, when Calvin defended the Reformation in his "Reply to Sadolet,55 obedience to the Word of God is a primary mark of the Reformation, though he refers to justification by faith as the keenest subject of controversy between them. In the defense which Calvin projects for the Protestant before the tribunal of heaven, he declares, " I heard from thy mouth that there was no other light of truth which could direct our souls into the way of life, than that which was kindled by thy Word.55 5 Obedience to the Word is also a fundamental theme in Calvin's justification of those who had been instructed by Protestant preachers. I n his treatise on the "Necessity of Reforming the Church, 55 Calvin writes, . . . the Reformers have done no small service to the Church in stirring up the world as from the deep darkness of ignorance to read the Scriptures, in labouring diligently to make them better understood, and in happily throwing light on certain points of doctrine of the highest practical importance. In sermons little else used to be heard than old wives' fables and fictions equally frivolous. . . . Therefore
3. CR IX, 893; ET see Williston Walker's John Calvin: The Organizer of Reformed protestantism (New York, Schocken Books, 1969), pp. 437f. 4. CR XX, 299. 5. CR V, 408; LCC, p. 247.

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let there be an examination of our whole doctrine, of our form of administering the sacraments, and our method of governing the Church; and in none of these three things will it be found that we have made any change in the old form, without attempting to restore it to the exact standard of the Word of God.6 Calvin's emphasis on the Word of God in the passages in which he defends the Reform are likely to be in part at least autobiographical. His teaching on the testimony of the Holy Spirit points even more emphatically to his own experience of the Word of God in Scripture. No argument, however persuasive, can give the Scriptures authority. "The only true faith is that which the Spirit of God seals in our hearts. 55 "Let this point therefore stand : that those whom the Holy Spirit has inwardly taught truly rest upon Scripture, and that Scripture indeed is self-authenticated; . . .55 (I, vii, 5). 7 Calvin contended that all theology is superficial that does not issue from the struggles of conscience.8 For Calvin this agony of conscience must have been rooted in struggles that grew out of a corrupt Christianity that was purged by the Word of God. Calvin's theological method was the fruit of his Christian experience. I The Interaction of Theology, Commentary, and Sermon

One of the most striking characteristics of Calvin's work as theologian is his synthesis of the work of the exegete, the systematic theologian, and the preacher. This synthesis was rooted in Calvin's conviction that all theology stands under the Word of God and also in his insistence that theology is a practical science. In a perceptive article on "The Modernity of Calvin's Theological Method, 55 Gilbert Rist has written that Calvinist theology is located between the biblical text and preaching. It is necessary to recognize that with Calvin theological effort is not the final consideration; it gives way to what precedes it and what follows it; it is only the discourse which permits preaching to take root in Holy Scripture; it is only a key, an opening, an entrance to the profitable reading of both the Old and New Testaments. Theology is a service for all men and not a purpose in itself, intelligible
6. CR VI, 473; LCC, pp. i86f. 7. References to the Institutes of the Christian Religion are from LCC, Vols. X X and X X I , John T. McNeill, ed., trans, by Ford Lewis Battles. Hereafter references to the Institutes are enclosed in parentheses in the text by bk. no., Gh. no., and sec. no. 8. CR V, 405 ; LCC X X I I , 243.

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only to clerics. Doctrine is contained in the Holy Scripture, not in dogmatics, and this is why theology is only able to echo the biblical text, to reflect it constantly without being able to add anything to it. In a sense, Calvinist theology reduces itself (almost!) to a hermeneutic; this is a strength and at the same time a weakness. It is nevertheless a fundamental option which it is proper to point out at the beginning since it conditions the foundation, the form, and the method of the work of the reformer.9 The interaction of theology, sermon, and commentary was carefully thought out and programmatically developed. In the preface to the 539 edition of the Institutes, Calvin stated that his object was to prepare students for the sacred volume.10 The Institutes had the modest purpose of being a manual for the reading of Scripture in contrast to the grandiose design of summas. As such, the Institutes are intentionally related to the reading and study of the Scriptures and the commentaries. This purpose persisted through all the editions of the Institutes. The 1559 preface declares again, " . . . it has been my purpose in this labor to prepare and instruct candidates in sacred theology for the reading of the divine Word,. . . . " In the preface to the French edition of 1560, which was meant for a more popular audience, he expressed the hope that the Institutes will be a "key to open a way for all children of God into a good and right understanding of Holy Scripture Although Holy Scripture contains a perfect doctrine, to which one can add nothing,..." most readers, Calvin knew, would need some guidance. Calvin's Institutes were not designed for the theological elite but for the Christian as a reader of Scripture. The Institutes also have a specific relation to the commentaries. The preface to the 1539 edition states that they are to pave the way for the commentaries. Calvin expressly offers the commentary on Romans, which was written in 1539, as an example of his plan. In writing the commentaries, Calvin would presuppose the Institutes and specifically refer the reader to them for fuller treatment of specific topics. It is significant that development of the Institutes parallels the writing of the commentaries. In the years between the Romans commentary in 1539 and Calvin's death in 1564, Calvin commented on every book in the New Testament except Second and Third John and Revelation. He
9. "Modernit de la Mthode thologique de Calvin," RThPh, 1:20 (1968). 10. The prefaces are printed in ET, LCC edition of the Institutes.

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also published commentaries on the Book of Genesis and a harmony of the rest of the Pentateuch, Joshua, Psalms, Isaiah, Ezekiel 1-20, Daniel, Jeremiah, Lamentations, and all the Minor Prophets. In addition Calvin preached frequently, which enabled him to comment on many books on which he did not produce commentaries including Job, Judges, First Kings, and Second Samuel. The only books not commented on in the Institutes are Esther, Nahum, Second John and Third John. u It is wrong therefore to think that the Institutes developed simply as a result of theological controversies or the demands for theological coherence and completeness. The section on predestination, for example, was greatly enlarged as a result of Calvin's study of the Gospel of John. The focus of both Institutes and commentaries was the sermon. Calvin preached more than two thousand sermons in Geneva. No man, not even a genius, can be expected to say something new in so many sermons. Consequently there is much repetition from sermon to sermon, and also from the commentaries and even the Institutes to the sermons. The sermons are more popular in style than the commentaries and in them Calvin is more in conversation with his culture; but no hearer or reader can doubt that the writer of the Institutes and commentaries was also the preacher. Nowhere else in Christian history have the tasks of theology, biblical study, and preaching been integrated on so competent a level as in John Calvin's work in Geneva. Possibly nowhere else were theology and exegesis so focused on the sermon and the life of the congregation. This integration was possible because of Calvin's understanding of theology. Theology was for Calvin a practical, not a theoretical, task. Its end was the formation of human life and society in conformity to the will of God rather than the vision of God. For this reason he wrote his theology for the people of God, not for academics or the theologically elite and for this reason he rejected speculation and sophistry. He could put this whole matter with biting clarity in his question to Sadolet: Do you remember what kind of time it was when the Reformers appeared, and what kind of doctrine candidates for the ministry learned in the schools? You yourself know that it was mere sophistry, and so twisted, involved, tortuous and puzzling, that scholastic theology might well be described as a species of secret magic. The denser the darkness in which any one shrouded a subject, and the
11. Cf. Index I, Biblical References, LCC XXI, 1553 ff.

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more he puzzled himself and others with nagging riddles, the greater his fame for acumen and learning.12 Calvin's rejection of speculation and sophistry was so radical that it finally undercut legitimate theological concerns, but it also made theology the major concern of the "people." Theology has the task of clarifying the biblical message. Calvin knew that Scripture texts could not be simply repeated. In justifying the terminology of trinitarian theology, he wrote, If they call a foreign word one that cannot be shown to stand written syllable by syllable in Scripture, they are indeed imposing upon us an unjust law which condemns all interpretation not patched together out of the fabric of Scripture. . . . we ought to seek from Scripture a sure rule for both thinking and speaking, to which both the thoughts of our minds and the words of our mouths should be conformed. But what prevents us from explaining in clearer words those matters in Scripture which perplex and hinder our understanding, yet which conscientiously and faithfully serve the truth of Scripture itself, and are made use of sparingly and modestly and on due occasion? (I, xiii, 3). Calvin's theology can properly be described primarily as commentary upon Scripture as a whole and secondarily as commentary upon the way the church had read Scripture in its theology and creeds. Theology clarifies and focuses the message of Scripture. Explaining Scripture in "clearer words" meant, in practice, explaining it in conversation with humanist culture. Calvin was a participant in the humanist culture of his day, and every paragraph of theology that he wrote reflects this fact. His theology was worked out in dialogue with the thought forms of his age, even though he wrote no programmatic essays proposing to do this. H e did give expression to the theological basis for a theology alive to its culture in his affirmation of the universal activity of the Logos. Men who have even "tasted the liberal arts penetrate with their aid far more deeply into the secrets of the divine wisdom" (I,v,2). Wencelius in L'Esthtique de Calvin has demonstrated how Calvin used poetry in his theological task. Calvin as a theologian was very much in conversation with the humanist culture and as such he posed the question of faith sharply for his humanist friends, who refused his Protestant and Christian commitments.
12. CR V, 396-97 ; LCC XXII, 233.

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Theology, however, has the task not simply of clarifying Scripture but also of ordering the message of Scripture. This problem, apparently, was a major concern for Calvin. In the preface to the 1559 edition of the Institutes he declared that he had never been satisfied until then with the arrangement of his theology. He takes satisfaction in the conviction that " . . . I have so embraced the sum of religion in all its parts, and have arranged it in such an order, that if anyone rightly grasps it, it will not be difficult for him to determine what he ought especially to seek in Scripture, and to what end he ought to relate its contents." 13 In this sense Calvin was a systematic theologian, providing in the Institutes the "system" that was mirrored in his commentaries. The question can properly be raised whether the integration of theology and biblical study is a proper goal for the theologian today. The answer may be both yes and no. The demands of biblical study and of theology today are so great that no man, however much a genius, can master them as did Calvin in his time. Indeed, Karl Rahner, one of the ablest of modern theologians, suggests that the day may be past when any one man can know enough to write a systematic theology and that the best option will be a theological encyclopedia which permits specialized competence in a more general statement of the faith. The explosion of knowledge not only in the theological disciplines but in culture in general precludes in practice the integration of the theological tasks in the work of any one person. Yet Calvin still remains a proper goal in that the theologian, if he is a theologian of Bible, must utilize the work of biblical and cultural specialists. Furthermore the parish minister, in dependence on specialized scholarship, must remain a generalist who performs the theological task in preaching and churchmanship very much as Calvin did. It must not be overlooked that Calvin, more than any other major Reformer, was a parish minister and churchman, as well as a theologian and exegete, and in this he is still our model. II Calvin as Interpreter (a) The natural sense. Calvin was by intention an interpreter of the Bible from the beginning of his Reformed experience. In 1534 he wrote
13. LCC XX, 4.

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the admirable preface to Olevitan's translation of the Bible into French. In the preface to the commentary on Romans, written in 1539, he refers to his conversation with Simon Grynaeus three years earlier on the best method of expounding the Scriptures. The very fact that Calvin so quickly submitted his commentary on Romans for publication, when so many of the leaders of the Reformation had already published commentaries on Romans, points to Calvin's determination to work in this field, as well as to his confidence in the worth of his exposition. The background for Calvin's exegesis lies in French humanism. He had received the best training his day provided. He had learned from the circle of Jacques Lefvre to appreciate a "humble Christian style." "What the humanists . . . . admired in the piety of the Fathers . . . . was its simplicity and clarity [which avoided] emphasizing difficulties, nodi, openly opposing authorities sic et non, probing quaestiones in disputations, and finally reconciling them by a subtle dialectic. . . ." 14 Calvin's training as a humanist uniquely equipped him for the task of Bible exposition. He was influenced by the writings of Erasmus and Valla, as well as Lefvre. When the Council of Trent made the Vulgate the definitive test, he exclaimed, "What! are they not ashamed to make the Vulgate version of the New Testament authoritative, while the writings of Valla, Faber and Erasmus, which are in everybody's hands, demonstrate with the finger, even to children, that it is vitiated in innumerable places?"15 Battles has noted that in Calvin's treatise on Seneca's De Clementia the young humanist lavished great care upon the meaning of words and phrases in his text.16 Calvin mastered Latin under such teachers as Cordier. He eagerly studied Greek under Wolmar and Dans. While his knowledge of Hebrew has been debated, it is likely that he studied Hebrew with such competent teachers as Vatable in Paris, Capito in Strasbourg and Sebastien Mnster in Basel. Calvin's primary interest was not the mastery of languages, but there is no reason to doubt his fundamental competence.17
14. Eugene F. Rice, Jr., "The Humanist Idea of Christian Antiquity: Lefvre d'taples and His Circle," in Werner L. Gundersheimer, ed., French Humanism, 14.J0-1600 (Harper Torchbooks; New York, Harper & Row, Publishers, 1969), p. 169. 15. CR VII, 416; Calvin's Tracts, III, 74. 16. Ford Lewis Battles and Andre Malan Hugo, Calvin's Commentary on Seneca's De Clementia (Leiden, E. J. Brill, 1969), p. 85. 17. Wilhelm Vischer, "Calvin, Exgte de L'Ancien Testament" in La Revue Rforme, 69:8 ff. (1967).

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From the beginning two basic principles guided Calvin's work as an interpreter. The first was simplicity and brevity. He enunciated this principle with the writing of his first commentary, and he never deviated from it. Indeed, simplicity and brevity were characteristic of Calvin's total life style. The second principle was the fundamental importance of the "natural sense55 of a passage. Calvin reacted with all the passion of a trained humanist against ". . . the licentious system [that changed] into a variety of curious shapes the sacred Word of God. They [Origen and others] concluded that the literal sense is too mean and poor, and that, under the outer bark of the letter, there lurk deeper mysteries, which cannot be extracted but by beating out allegories. . . .5518 In the context of his age Calvin took seriously the historical character of the Bible. He engages in textual criticism.19 He notes that Moses does not write as a philosopher or scientist but in the language and thought forms of the people.20 In commenting on Matthew 27:9, he notes that the writer uses the name Jeremiah where he should have put the name Zechariah. Calvin admits that he does not know how this came about and adds, "I do not trouble myself to inquire.55 21 In his comments on Mark 1:2 Calvin finds no objection to changing the words of Malachi to make the meaning clearer.22 On Matthew 27:51 he observes that Luke inverts the order: ". . . the evangelists as we have seen are not careful to mark every hour with exactness.55 23 There is a similar statement on Luke 24:12.24 He finds occasion to criticize the style of Ezekiel in commenting on Ezekiel i2:4-6. 25 Scholars differ as to whether Calvin believed in verbal inerrancy. The evidence seems to point to a more liberal understanding than verbal inerrancy connotes today, though Calvin did certainly insist that the words of Scripture are the very words of God. The question can probably never be answered, for Calvin never faced the question in the way in which any man who has encountered critical historical studies must ask it. The fol18. CR L, 336-37. Gal. 4:22. 19. C R L V , 159. Heb. 11:21. 20. CR X X I I I , 22. Gen. 1:16. 21. CR XLV, 749. Matt. 27:9. 22. CR XLV, 108. Mark 1:2. 2 3 . C R X L V , 782. Matt. 27:51. 24. CR XLV, 800. Luke 24:12. 25. CR XL, 256. Ezek. 12:4-6.

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lowing facts seem to be clear. First, Calvin was not a fundamentalist.26 He is too much the humanist in his study of Scripture. Secondly, while in the context of his time Calvin studied Scripture with philological, literary, and historical care, he could not possibly have imagined the problems that critical-historical study would raise in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. For this reason it is futile to find answers in Calvin's writings to new questions raised by modem historical consciousness. Thirdly, Calvin accepted the Scriptures as from "the very mouth of God.55 He never evades the theological force of any biblical phrase by labeling it the word of man. (b) The unity and diversity of Scripture. The unity of the Bible is a fundamental theological axiom with Calvin. Believing that God was the author of Scripture, he could only believe that any differences in Scripture were due to God5s accommodation to the needs of men in different ages (II, ii, 13). "He [God] is the Author of the Scriptures: he cannot vary and differ from himself. Hence, he must ever remain just as once he revealed himself there55 (I, ix, 2). Calvin was as aware as any man of his time of the apparent discrepancies in the Scripture, but he was surely as skillful as any man in the history of exegesis in handling these discrepancies. Along with all the Reformers he insisted that Scripture must be interpreted by Scripture so that obscure passages are interpreted by the clearer passages. This principle alone solved many problems. Calvin was also aware of the discrepancies between the different traditions in Old Testament history and in the Gospels, but these problems could also be accounted for by "harmonizing55 the Gospels or the Pentateuch. Even the controversy between James and Paul did not defeat Calvin, though it did strain his theological acumen. In the preface to the commentary on James, Calvin writes, "But this diversity should not make us to approve of one, and to condemn the other. Besides, among the evangelists themselves there is so much difference in setting forth the power of Christ, that the other three, compared with John, have hardly sparks of that full brightness which appears so conspicuous in him, and yet we commend them all alike.5527 On James 2:21 he comments: "When, therefore, the Sophists
26. Cf. Werner Krusche, Das Wirken des Heiligen Geistes nach Calvin (Gttingen, Vandenhoech & Ruprecht, 1957), pp. 161 ff. 27. CR LV, 381.

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set u p James against Paul, they go astray through the ambiguous meaning of a term. 5 5 2 8 T h e most serious problem Calvin faced with his bias toward the unity of Scripture was the Law-Gospel cleavage, which Luther had empha sized, and the difference between the Old and New Testament, which the Anabaptists would not let Calvin forget. Calvin refuses to set the law in opposition to the gospel. Only when the law is regarded as the way to merit God 5 s favor is it a terror and in opposition to the gospel. In commenting on Matthew 5 : 2 1 , Calvin insists, We must not imagine Christ to be a new legislator, who adds anything to the eternal righteousness of his Father. We must listen to him as a faithful expounder that we may know what is the nature of the law, what is its object, and what is its extent.29 The gospel cancels the rigor of the law but not the content of the law. Indeed, Christ is the soul of the law and apart from him it is dead (II, vii, 2). The God who spoke in the law is also the God who speaks in the gospel.30 . . . under the law Christ was always set before the holy fathers as the end to which they should direct their faith (II, vi, 2). T h e relationship between the Old and New Testaments merited two chapters in the Institutes. Characteristically, Calvin begins with the unity of the Testaments. " . . . all men adopted by God into the com pany of his people since the beginning of the world were covenanted to him by the same law and by the bond of the same doctrine as obtains among us. I t is very important to make this point 5 5 ( I I , , 1 ) . T h e two covenants ". . . are actually one and same. Yet they differ in mode of 55 dispensation ( I I , x, 2 ) . More specifically, the unity of the covenants is three-fold. First, in the Old as well as in the New Testament believers were adopted into the hope of immortality. Secondly, in both Testa ments believers are supported not by their own merits but solely by the mercy of God. Thirdly, believers in the Old Testament knew Christ as mediator, through whom they were joined to God and were to share in his promises ( I I , x, 2 ) . T h e third point received primary emphasis in Calvin's specific treat ment of the unity of the Testaments. Calvin never set limits to the Word. I take it for granted that there is such life energy in God's Word that it quickens the souls of all to whom God grants participation in it. . . . When I say they
28. GR LV, 406. James 2 : 2 1 . 2 9 . C R X L V , 175. M a t t . 5 : 2 i . 30. CR LV, 8.

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[Old Testament believers] embraced the Word to be united more closely to God, I do not mean that general mode of communication which is diffused through heaven and earth and all the creatures of the world. For although it quickens all thingseach according to the measure of its natureit still does not free them from the exigency of corruption. Rather, I mean that special mode which both illumines the souls of the pious into the knowledge of God and, in a sense, joins them to him. Adam, Abel, Noah, Abraham, and the other patriarchs cleaved to God by such illumination of the Word (II, x, 7).

Calvin did not doubt that Christ was manifested throughout the Old Testament, but his manifestation was obscure, shadowy, and by images. Consequently, Calvin likewise emphasized the increasing brightness of the revelation. "The Lord held to this orderly plan in administering the covenant of his mercy: as the day of full revelation approached with the passing of time, the more he increased each day the brightness of its manifestation55 (II, x, 20). It began with a feeble spark in the promise to Adam, but it broke forth increasingly until in the Christ, the Sun of Righteousness, the whole earth was illumined. If Calvin did not hesitate to emphasize the manifestation of Christ in the Old Testament, he likewise underscored the importance of the full manifestation in the incarnation and in the New Testament. In the New Testament earthly blessings are minimized and invisible spiritual reality emphasized; reality replaces the figures; spiritual doctrine or gospel replaces law or literalism; love takes the place of fear; and the universal call of the gospel supersedes the particularism of Israel. Calvin "freely admits the differences,55 but he immediately adds "in such a way as not to detract from its established unity.55 All the differences "pertain to the manner of dispensation rather than to the substance,.. .55 (II, xi, 1 ). The only real difference between the Testaments is the degree of clarity in the revelation of Christ. Calvin's emphasis on the unity of the Old and New Testaments is of fundamental significance for his theology. In fact, Calvin was accused by his contemporaries and by some scholars ever since of being under the domination of the Old Testament,31 a criticism that is not wholly just but not so easily disposed of as Barthian interpreters have seemed to think.32
31. E.g., James Mackinnon, Calvin and the Reformation (New York, Longmans, Green and Co., 1936), and E. Choisy, La Thocratie Genve au temps de Calvin (Genve, J. G. Flick, 1897). 32. E.g., W. Niesei, The Theology of Calvin, trans, by Harold Knight (London, Lutterworth Press, 1956), pp. 104 ff.

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The more important point is the significance of this emphasis for his theological method. Can a Christian theology develop with so emphatic a doctrine of the unity of the Bible? (c) The analogy of faith. In the dedicatory letter to Francis I, Calvin noted that Paul "wished all prophecy to be made to accord with the analogy of faith [Rom. 12:6], " 33 Calvin never to my knowledge defined the analogy of faith, but others have defined it as the Apostles' Creed and the generally agreed points of divinity. In any case, Calvin recognized that Scripture must be organized and interpreted in accordance with some understanding of its central meaning. Calvin's failure to define more specifically the analogy of faith ultimately prevented him from dealing adequately with the unity of the Bible in his theology as he had emphasized it. Calvin did write that we are to search for Christ in Scripture. "This is what we should in short seek in the whole of Scripture : truly to know Jesus Christ, and the infinite riches that are comprised in him and are offered to us by him from God the Father." 34 Yet, it is very difficult to square this intention with many of his sermons on Deuteronomy: Certainly Christ is not a canon within Scripture for Calvin, as he was for Luther. In the actual working out of his theology Calvin's initial commitment to write commentaries on the Pauline letters, a task he had completed by 1550, is of the greatest significance. His first commentary was on the Book of Romans and in it he found a basic clue to his understanding of Scripture as a whole. Calvin did not, any more than any other interpreter, attach equal importance to every passage of Scripture. The compilation of the biblical references in the Library of Christian Classics edition of the Institutes reveals a wide disparity in the number of references to Scripture passages: Romans, 582; Psalms, 576; Matthew, 528; John, 461 ; Luke, 130; Mark, 61; Genesis, 249; Deuteronomy, 155; First Corinthians, 423; First Thessalonians, 33; Revelation, 26. There are almost twenty five hundred references to the Old Testament but more than four thousand to the New Testament. It is obvious that Calvin had criteria by which he placed more importance on some passages than others. The role of the Apostles' Creed, not only in the overall organization
33. LCC, XX, 12. 34. Pref. to Fr. trans, of N.T.; CR IX, 815; LCC, XXIII, 70.

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of the Institutes but also in the development of themes within the /nstitutes, likewise points to Calvin's actual use of an analogy of faith. The Institutes are replete with references to the church's theologians.35 Calvin knew how the church had read and understood Scripture in the past, and this knowledge was a more significant guide to his reading than he ever admitted. Heinrich Bullinger in a very remarkable sermon, "Of the Sense and Right Exposition of Scripture," specifically identifies five principles of interpretation: (i) The exposition of the Scriptures must agree fitly and proportionally with our faith; (2) The exposition must not be repugnant to the love of God and neighbor; (3) The exposition of Scripture must consider the context of the passage; (4) Scripture must be expounded by Scripture; (5) Scripture must be expounded by a heart that loves God.36 Calvin does not so specifically develop either the analogy of faith or the analogy of love, even though he does in practice make use of an analogy of faith. Calvin was perhaps too sure that the content of Scripture is clear to the believing student of Scripture and too little aware of the extent to which faith commitments determined his own interpretation. Calvin's failure to develop either an analogy of faith or an analogy of love led to serious difficulties in his theology. On the one hand Calvin could write that we are to find Christ in the Scripture. On the other, he could use Scripture to justify infant damnation and brutality that cancelled all human sentiments.37 The inconsistencies in Calvin's theology arise not simply out of Calvin's method of developing a particular doctrine as fully as possible without relating it to other doctrines, but also out of his method as a theologian of the Bible. (d) The canon. Calvin has very little to say about the canon though the Castellio affair is enough to indicate that it was a sensitive theological point. Other theological issues were more current, and Calvin could finish his career without ever being forced to face the problems that the canon raises for theological methodology. In the end the theologian of the Bible must deal with these problems. Scholars are divided in their assessment of Calvin's views of the canon.
35. Cf. Author and Source Index, LCC edition of Institutes. 36. The Decades of Henry Bullinger, Thomas Harding, ed. (Cambridge, University Press, 1849), pp. 70 ff.

37. CR VIII, 476; xxix, 143; xxiv, 363; VIII, 309. 342

John CalvinTheologian of the Bible Interpretation

Calvin was clearly aware that the canonical authority of some books had been widely debated in the early church, but he nowhere makes clear what the precise basis of canonical inclusion or exclusion was. After acknowledging that questions had been raised about the canonical authority of Second Peter and that the style was not that of Peter, he affirms that it everywhere shows . . . the power and the grace of an apostolic spirit. [He then concludes,] If it be received as canonical, we must allow Peter to be the author, since it has his name inscribed, and he also testifies that he had lived with Christ : and it would have been a fiction unworthy of a minister of Christ, to have personated another individual. So then I conclude, that if the Epistle be deemed worthy of credit, it must have proceeded from Peter; not that he himself wrote it, but that some one of his disciples set forth in writing, by his command, those things which the necessity of the times required.38 Calvin also knows that Jude's place in the canon has been questioned, but because it contains nothing "inconsistent with the purity of apostolic doctrine 55 and was received as canonical by good authorities, he is willing to admit it. 39 As for James, Calvin uses very much the same arguments. T h e author is more "sparing in proclaiming the grace of Christ55 than becomes an apostle, but it contains nothing unworthy of an apostle of Christ; and so Calvin receives it.40 After reviewing the evidence, Benjamin B. Warfield concluded that the settlement of questions concerning canon and text depended on scientific investigation. " T h e movement of his thought was therefore along this course : first, the ascertainment, on scientific ground, of the body of books handed down from the Apostles as the rule of faith and practice; secondly, the vindication, on the same class of grounds, of the integrity of their transmission; thirdly, the accrediting of them as divine on the testimony of the Spirit.5541 Other scholars hold that the primary fact in determining the canonicity of a particular book is the testimony of the Holy Spirit. 42 No conclusive res38. CR LV, 441. 39. CR LV, 4851. 40. CR LV, 381. 41. Calvin and Augustine, Samuel G. Craig, ed. (Philadelphia, The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1956), pp. 101 f. 42. Warfield argued his case against J. Pannier and Kstlin (cf. Warfield, ibid., pp. 103 ff.), but more recently the position has been defended by John P. Newport in an unpublished Edinburgh thesis (1953) entitled "An Investigation of the Factors Influencing John Calvin's Use of the Linguistic and Historical Principles of Biblical Exegesis."

343

olution on the argument is possible because the difference is partly the result of definition of terms and partly the ambiguity of Calvin's own thought. It is sufficient for our purposes that Calvin had a very clear and definite commitment to the canon as it had been defined. The canon had important theological implications for Calvin's theology. First of all, it meant that the Old Testament is to be read in the light of the New and that the New is to be interpreted in continuity with the Old. Secondly, it meant that literary and historical canons of interpretation are subordinate to the canon, that through the Scriptures God speaks uniquely and decisively to man, in judgment as well as fulfillment of any other intimation he may have of the divine presence. The Bible is not a book among books, not a classic competing with classics in the market place of religious ideas, but the place where the church has found that the living God speaks. No theologian ever took the canon more seriously than did John Calvin. Calvin, however, never subjected the canon to critical examination as a theologian. He never faced squarely the fact that the canon, however much it may have been the church's acknowledgment of the authority that Scriptures actually exercised, was still a fallible ecclesiastical decision that could easily become a legalism. Furthermore, as has been indicated in the discussion of the analogy of faith, Calvin never developed a method for adequate discrimination between the lights and shadows of canonical material. In sum, Calvin was by intention a theologian of the Bible. He brought to this task the achievements of humanist scholarship that make his expositions a landmark in the history of interpretation. In his emphasis upon the canon and the unity of Scripture he brought to the task of exposition a profound awareness, nowhere exceeded in Christendom, that the Bible is not a book among books, but the place where God speaks to man about matters of life and death. Finally, he brought to the task of exposition a clear understanding of the purpose of theology and of exposition and of their role in the sermon as the proclamation of the gospel to the people, not to the theologically elite. Calvin's intention is still our model, and for this reason we must learn from his failures, particularly his failure to develop an analogy of faith and love. 344

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