John Calvin, "the theologian"

Abstract

It is not unfair to say that in the last two hundred years the name of John Calvin has been vilified more than that of any other theologian in Christian history, except perhaps for the apostle Paul. The church historian Will Durant infamously stated that Calvin “darkened the human soul with the most absurd and blasphemous conception of God in all the long and honoured history of nonsense”. In contrast, the purpose of this article is to elaborate on an admiring – though by no means hagiographic – tribute given to Calvin by one of his own contemporaries, Luther’s erudite associate Phillip Melanchthon. Melanchthon said of Calvin that he was “the theologian”, a title previously conferred upon the Cappadocian father Gregory Nazianzen. Not even the great Augustine had been honoured in this way, but in recognition of his specific contribution to the doctrine of God in the Trinitarian century, Gregory was. As was Calvin in the sixteenth century.