Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T18:00:42.632Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

‘Do You Understand What You Are Reading?’ Calvin's Guidance for the Reading of Scripture

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

Randall C. Zachman
Randall C. Zachman
Affiliation:
Department of TheologyUniversity of Notre DameNotre Dame IN 46556USA
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

One hot day a eunuch of great authority under Candace, Queen of the Ethiopians, was riding home in his chariot. He had just been to the temple in Jerusalem, yet he was not content to have his faith nourished by the priestly exposition of Scripture alone, but was also studiously reading Scripture for himself, specifically the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah. He found enough clarity in the prophet to strengthen his faith; but then he came across a passage that seemed to block his access to the meaning of the prophet, for it spoke of one who in a contradictory way was humiliated beyond all others, and yet exalted above the earth. As he was puzzling over the meaning of this passage, a man appeared and asked him, ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ The eunuch could have dismissed this question with proud disdain. Instead, he responded with modesty and humility, ‘How can I, unless someone guide me?’ Philip answered the eunuch's most pressing question, ‘Of whom does the prophet speak?’ by pointing him to Jesus Christ. The eunuch responded to Philip's help in interpreting Scripture with such faith that he asked to be baptized then and there, and then returned home with much joy, for he now knew the one true God, and Jesus Christ whom he has sent.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 54 , Issue 1 , February 2001 , pp. 1 - 20
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 2001

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Comm Acts 8:31, Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia, edited by Baum, Wilhelm, Cunitz, Edward, and Reuss, Eduard (Brunswick: A. Schwetschke &Son (M. Bruhn), 1863–1900), Vol. 48, p. 192Google Scholar; henceforth CO48:192B; Calvin's New Testament Commentaries, edited by Torrance, David W. and Torrance, Thomas F. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1959–1972), Vol. 6, p. 247, henceforth CNTC 6:247.Google Scholar

2 Ioannis Calvinus caesaribus, regibus, principibus, gentibusque omnibus Christi imperio subditis salutem, CO 9:747–8; in Institutes, 1536 Edition, translated and annotated by Battles, Ford Lewis (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1986), p. 374.Google Scholar

3 Ibid.

4 Ibid., p. 375.

5 A tous amateurs de Iesus Christ, et de son S. Evangile, salut, CO 9:816; Calvin: Commentaries, edited and translated by Haroutunian, Joseph (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1958), p. 72.Google Scholar

6 Ibid.

7 Calvin therefore agrees in part with Roman critics of the principle of sola Saiptura, for with them he emphasizes the central importance of the interpretation of Scripture by the church. According to Calvin, the church fell into ruin when it lost godly interpreters of Scripture, and will only be restored when both Scripture and godly interpreters are again given to the church. Calvin differed from Rome, however, in his desire to make every Christian a godly interpreter of Scripture. Calvin's focus on the need to interpret Scripture also distinguishes him from the Gnesio-Lutheran understanding of sola Scriptura, at least as represented by Westphal. ‘We are perfectly agreed that we must acquiesce in the words of Christ: the only question is as to their genuine meaning. But when it is inquired into, our masters of the letter admit of no interpretation (nullam interpretationem). Away, then, with all this cunning, and leave us at liberty to ask what our Savior meant’. Ultima Admonitio ad Westphalum, CO 9:184A;Tracts and Treatises, translated by Beveridge, Henry (Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1849), Vol. II, p. 403.Google Scholar

8 ‘At this period Instilulio was the synonym of Calechismus.’ Watanabe, Nubuo, ‘Calvin's Second Catechism’, in Calvinus Sacrae Scripturae Professor, edited by Neuser, Wilhelm H. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1994), pp. 228–229. In 1557, Calvin described the 1536 edition as a breve enchiridion (CO 31:23).Google Scholar

9 Institutes, 1536 Edition, p. 1; Ioannis Calvini opera selecta, edited by Barth, Peter, Niesel, Wilhelm, and Scheuner, Dora (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1926–1952), Vol. III, p. 8, lines 6–8, 11–13Google Scholar; henceforth OS III.8.6–8, 11–13. See Ford Lewis Battles, ‘The First Edition of the Institutes (1536)‘, in Interpreting John Calvin, edited by Benedetto, Robert (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 1996), pp. 91–93.Google Scholar

10 de Greef, Wulfert, The Writings of John Calvin, translated by Bierma, Lyle D. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 1993), pp. 195–197.Google Scholar

11 Ganoczy, Alexandre, The Young Calvin, translated by Foxgrover, David and Provo, Wade (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1987), p. 108.Google Scholar

12 CO 10a:12–13; Calvin: Theological Treatises, translated by Reid, J. K. S. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1954), p. 54.Google Scholar

13 Ganoczy, op. cit., p. 111.

14 Latin Preface to the Reader, Institutio Chrislianae religionis, 1559, OS III.6; Calvin: Institutes of the Christian Religion, edited by McNeill, John T. and translated by Battles, Ford Lewis (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960), Vol. 1, p. 6Google Scholar; henceforth (1:6). Serene Jones notes the centrality of Scripture for the faithful in Calvin's view, but she has Calvin join the persuasive efforts of Scripture and the Holy Spirit with his own rhetoric. I would note in contrast that Calvin seeks in the Institutes to open access to the main themes of Scripture by the dialectical method of loci communes, which he derives in large part from the prior example of Philip Melanchthon, so that students know which themes to look for as they read Scripture. Such guidance is to my mind distinct from the effort to persuade. See Jones, Serene, Calvin and the Rhetoric of Piety (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), p. 27.Google Scholar

15 ‘[I]f we have gained a true understanding of this epistle, we have an open door to all the most profound treasures of Scripture’ (Argumenlum, Ioannis Calvini Commentarius in Epistolam Pauli ad Ramanos, edited by Parker, T. H. L. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1981), p. 5, lines 10–11; henceforth Romans 5.10–11; CNTC 8:5.Google Scholar

16 Comm. Romans 12:7, Romans 271.70–77; CNTC 8:269–70.

17 L‘Institution puerile de la doctrine chrestienne faicle par maniere de dialogue, OS II.152–6; see De Greef, Writings, p. 132.

18 ‘Calvin's Preface to Chrysostom's Homilies’, CO 9:833A; translated by Ian, W.Hazlett, P., in Humanism and Reform: The Church in Europe, England, and Scotland 1400–1643 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991),.pp. 141–142.Google Scholar

19 Ibid.

20 It is clear that there is not a watertight distinction between these audiences. In the Preface to the French translation of the Institutes of 1541, Calvin expresses the hope that ordinary Christians will profit from the guidance he offers in the Institutes;and in the Preface to the Chrysostom homilies, Calvin indicates that the homilies will be useful to pastors who lack a knowledge of classical languages. However, in both cases, it is clear that these are secondary audiences. Calvin's deletion of the French preface from the 1559/60 Institutes may well indicate that by this time he no longer had the ordinary Christian in mind even as a secondary audience for that work. See Muller, Richard A., ‘Calvin's “Argument du livre” (1541): An Erratum to the McNeil and Battles Institutes’, The Sixteenth Century Journal XXIX.1, 1998:37.Google Scholar

21 This aspect of the catechism and sermon is clearly manifested in the 1547 Ordonnances sur la police des eglises de la campagne. CO 10a:51–52; Calvin: Theological Treatises, p. 77.

22 The sermons on whole books of Scripture did not appear in print until 1561—see De Greef, p. 114.

23 Given the fact that this plan of instruction assumes the literacy of each and every Christian, something which was far from being the case in Calvin's day, one would also have to add the opening of the Geneva Academy in 1559 to the curriculum Calvin designed for the instruction of the unlearned. Calvin's vision of Christian education is very much indebted to the labors of Melanchthon and Sturm in this area.

24 Sermon on Ephesians 4:11, CO 51:556C; John Calvin's Sermons on Ephesians (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1973), p. 365.Google Scholar

25 ‘As things are disposed today, we always include under this title aids and instructions for maintaining the doctrine of God and defending the Church from injury by the fault of pastors and ministers.’ Les Ordannances ecdesiastiques, 1541, CO 10a:21–2; Calvin: Treatises, p. 62. These aids might include making available to ordinary Christians the instruction primarily designed for pastors, as may also be indicated by the translation of the Institutes and commentaries into French. ‘In addition, in many places where Calvin is clearly working from the 1539 Latin, the 1541 French text offers considerable argumentation and explanation, often intended to accommodate the text to an audience … less erudite than his Latin readers.’ Richard A. Muller, op. cit., p. 37.

26 Ibid.

27 ‘For Christ did not ordain pastors on the principle that they only teach the Church in a general way on the public platform, but that they also care for the individual sheep, bring back the wandering and scattered to the fold, bind up those broken and crippled, heal the sick, support the frail and weak (Ezek. 34:2–4); for general teaching will often have a cold reception, unless it is helped by advice given in private.‘ Comm. Acts 20:20, CO 48:462; CNTC 7:175.Jones quotes Calvin's statement that doctrine generally stated does not move us, but she does not attend to the way Calvin leaves the explicit application of doctrine to life first to the sermons of pastors, and then to their private advice. The Institutes are at the furthest remove from this concrete application in the whole of Calvin's program of study. Serene Jones, op. cit., p. 28.

28 ‘Pastors, to my mind, are those to whom is committed the charge of a particular flock. I have no objection to their receiving the name of doctors, if we realize that there is another kind of doctor, who superintends both the education of pastors and the instruction of the whole church. Sometimes he can be a pastor who is also a doctor, but the duties (facilitates) are different.’ Comm. Ephesians 4:11, CO 51:198A; CNTC 11:179.

29 Ibid.

30 Comm. Romans 12:7, Romans 271.75–6; CNTCB:270. Since Calvin produces the Institutes in his office as teacher, it would be the text most remote from Calvin's concern to exhort and persuade. Jones does not adequately consider the fact that Calvin thinks one can be a very fine teacher without being given great persuasive or exhortative skills, as was clearly the case with Philip Melanchthon, whom Calvin greatly admired as a teacher of the church, but who was not called to be a pastor.

31 ‘In that Church I have held the office (munere) first of Doctor (Doctoris), and then of pastor (pastoris). In my own right, I maintain that in undertaking these offices I had a legitimate vocation.’ Responsio ad Sadoleti Epistolam, CO 5:386B; A Reformation Debate, edited by Olin, John C. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1976), p. 50Google Scholar. See McNeill, John T., ‘John Calvin: Doctor Ecelesiae’, in The Heritage of John Calvin, edited by Bratt, John H. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1973), p. 10.Google Scholar

32 Jones notes four possible audiences for Calvin's writing in the Institutes: students, friends and followers in French parishes, humanists, and enemies. I agree completely that we need to take into account the audiences Calvin had in mind for his writings, but it seems to me that Jones misses the different audiences based on the different offices. The audience for the Institutes and commentaries is pastors and other learned teachers of the universal church, including the church in Switzerland, England, the Netherlands, Denmark, northern Germany, southern Germany, Italy, Poland, and Hungary, as well as France. The Institutes are written for the godly—the Latin polemical treatises are written for Calvin's enemies, such as Pighius, Westphal, and Heshussius. Members of French parishes would be the audience for the catechism, the sermons, and the French treatises, and only secondarily the Institutes and commentaries. Jones does not mention the primary beneficiaries of all of Calvin's labors, however, namely the unlearned who need to he guided by pastors so that they might read Scripture with profit. See Jones, op. cit., p. 53.

33 Inst., Preface to the Reader, 1559, OS III.6.1–4; (1:6).

34 Ibid., OS III.6.18–25; (1:6).

35 ‘Both of us felt that lucid brevity constituted the particular virtue of an interpreter. Since it is almost his only task to revel the mind of the writer whom he has undertaken to expound, he misses the mark, or at least strays outside his limits, by the extent to which he leads his readers away from the meaning of his author’ (John Calvin to Simon Grynaeus, Romans 1.3–12; CNTC 8:1). With regard to the importance of the context, Calvin says, ‘I am aware that a widely different meaning is given by some to the words of the prophet; but any one who takes a judicious view of the whole context will have little difficulty, I trust, in assenting to my interpretation’ (Comm. Isaiah 18:4, CO 36:324C; CTS 14:42).

36 Comm. Genesis 17:9, CO 23:239C; CTS 1:451. Bucer would be one who would gather all that is said in Scripture as a locus, and make it part of his commentary. Calvin delegates all such loci communes to the Institutes, so that be can follow the order of the context exclusively in the commentaries.

37 Calvin was quite explicit about the programmatic distinction between his commentaries and sermons. Commenting on Ephesians 4:5 on the unity of all in the Lord, Calvin says, ‘All these arguments for unity ought to be pondered more than they can be explained. I have been content to point out the apostle's meaning briefly, and leave the fuller treatment to sermons (concionibus).’ Comm. Ephesians 4:5, CO 51:191B; CNTC 11:173.

38 It is also likely that Calvin translated the Institutes into French, beginning with the 1539 edition, so that ordinary Christians would be guided in their reading of Scripture by that more extensive summary of the doctrine of piety and religion. All I am maintaining here is that the primary audience for the Institutes was future pastor's and teachers.

39 Comm. 2 Timothy 4:1, CO 52:184C; CNTC 10:332.

40 Comm. 1 Thessalonians 5:20, CO 52:176, CNTC 8:377.

41 Comm. Hebrews 5:14, Commentarius in Epistolam ad Hebraeous, edited by Parker, T. H. L. (Geneva: Droz, 1996), p. 86; CNTC 12:69.Google Scholar

42 Comm. 2 Timothy 4:1, CO 52:385; CNTC 10:332.

43 C. [W]hile 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. M. You deny then that it is enough for each to read privately at home; and affirm that all should meet together to hear the same doctrine? C. They must meet when they can, that is. when opportunity offers.’ Catechismus ecclesiae Genevensis, hoc est, formula erudiendi pueros in doclrina Chrissi, CO 6:110; Calvin: Theological Treatises, p. 130.

44 Comm. 2 Timothy 4:13, CO 52:392–3; CNTC 10:340–41; see also Calvin's sermon on the same passage.

45 Comm. 1 Corinthians 14:31, CO 49:530; CNTC 9:303. Calvin was clearly indebted to the instruction he received from other teachers of doctrine, especially Irenaeus, Augustine, Luther, Melanchthon, Bucer, Zwingli, and Bullinger. He was also indebted to the guidance in the interpretation of Scripture he received from others, especially Chrysostom, Ambrosiaster, Cyril, Oecolampadius, Melanchthon, Bucer, and Bullinger, along with Bude and Erasmus.

46 Comm. Daniel 7:15–16, CO 41:65A; CTS 25:48.

47 Comm. 1 Timothy 4:13, CO 52:302; CNTC 10:246–7.

48 ‘The degree nearest to the ministers and most closely conjoined to the government of the church is the lecturer in theology, of which it will be good to have one in Old Testament and one in New Testament.’ Draft Ecclesiological Ordinances, CO 10a:21; Calvin: Theological Treatises, pp. 62–3.

49 Ibid., CO 10a: 18; Calvin: Theological Treatise, p. 60.

50 De Greef, , Writings, p. 117.Google Scholar

51 Sermon on Ephesians 4:13, CO 51:572B; Sermons on Ephesians, p. 382.

52 Comm. Acts 18:26, CO 48:437–8; CNTC 7:144–5. See Douglass, Jane Dempsey, Women, Freedom, and Calvin (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1985)Google Scholar; and Thompson, John Lee, John Calvin and the Daughters of Sarah (Geneva: Droz, 1992).Google Scholar

53 Ioannis Calvinus caesaribus, CO 9:788; Institutes, 1536, p. 575

54 Comm. Acts 17:11, CO 48:401B; CNTC 7:101.

55 Brief Instruction for Arming All the Good and Faithful against the Errors of the Common Sect of the Anabaptists, CO 7:56; Treatises Against the Anabaptists and Against the Libertines, translated and edited by Farley, Benjamin W. (Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1982), p. 42.Google Scholar

56 Comm. Acts 17:11, CO 48:401B; CNTC 7:101.

57 Responsio ad Sadoletum, CO 5:408; A Reformation Debate, p. 82. The same observation is made by the member of the evangelical congregation before the judgment seat of God: ‘I, O Lord, as I had been educated from a boy, always professed the Christian faith. But at first I had no other reason for my faith than that which everywhere prevailed. Thy Word, which ought to have shown on all thy people like a lamp, was taken away, or at least suppressed as to us. And lest anyone should long for a greater light, an idea had been instilled into the minds of all, that the investigation of that hidden celestial philosophy was better delegated to a few, whom the others might consult as oracles—that the highest knowledge befitting plebian minds was to subdue themselves into obedience to the Church.’ CO 5:411; A Reformation Debate, p. 87.

58 Comm. Acts 17:11, CO 48:401–2; CNTC 7:102.

59 Preface to Chrysostom's Homilies, CO 9:833A; Hazlett, op. cit., p. 142.