“Law, Authority, and Liberty in Early Calvinism” by John Witte Jr. (Ch. 2)

This review, written by Ian Moes, is one of our series of reviews of chapters of David W. Hall & Marvin Padgett, Calvin and Culture: Exploring a Worldview (P&R, 2010). We welcome your engagement and responses.

In this chapter, John Witte Jr., Director of the Center for the Study of the Law and Religion and Professor of Law at Emory University Law School, illustrates how Calvin influenced the legal arena both during his life and after. He focuses on Calvin’s main legal teachings and the unique models of law and liberty, authority and discipline, and church and state that Calvinists later developed from Calvin’s writings.

Witte highlights that central to Calvin’s teaching is a basic separation between church and state, but not a division between religion and politics. The church, Calvin argues, is responsible for governing itself without state interference. The state is responsible for making and enforcing laws that encompass the biblical principles of love for God and neighbour, but not for embracing biblical laws per se.

Witte explains how this worked practically for Calvin, who described three uses for the “moral law,” i.e., the moral commandments engraved on the conscience and summarized in the Decalogue:

1. Theological – to condemn all persons in their consciences and compel them to seek God’s liberating grace;
2. Civil – to restrain the sinfulness of nonbelievers; and
3. Educational – to teach believers the means and measures of sanctification.

From these three uses, Calvin argued that it was the church’s responsibility to teach the “spiritual norms” that are distinctly Christian, and the state’s responsibility to enforce the “civil norms” that are common to all persons.

In this regard, Calvin argued that the church was its own distinct legal entity and held “doctrinal power” to determine its own confessions, “legislative power” to ensure orderly administration, and “jurisdictional power” to enforce its own laws and church discipline. Only if the church’s spiritual jurisdiction failed should the state be called upon to enforce civil and criminal sanctions. In doing so, Witte notes that Calvin struck a unique balance between “law and liberty, structure and spirit, order and innovation, dogma and adiaphora.”

In reading Witte’s overview of Calvin’s contributions to the legal arena, one can see how Calvin’s teachings are still evident today in both internal church relations and church-state relations. For example, Canadian courts are notably reluctant to interfere with internal church matters. This is something Calvin would applaud as it recognizes the church’s “jurisdictional power.” Additionally, Canadian courts have historically refrained from passing judgment on the validity of doctrinal beliefs, but have instead focused on whether a particular belief is sincerely held in determining whether it merits protection. Again, this is something Calvin would applaud as it recognizes the church’s “doctrinal power.”

The challenge arises, however, that we are living in an increasingly pluralistic society. There is an increasing sentiment, both judicially and socially, that the freedom to hold religious beliefs is broader than the right to practice them publicly. The courts are increasingly called upon to “balance” religious rights with other rights and to adjudicate on whether there are legal limits on religious freedoms that are “justified in a free and democratic society.” In this way, religious beliefs are increasingly marginalized to be practiced within the four walls of the church building.

In this context, do Calvin’s teachings provide any guidance? I think they do. While Witte notes that Calvin assumed each local community would have a single faith wherein both the church and the state would cooperate in the governance of a godly polity, Calvin’s primary emphasis was that the state should not apply biblical laws per se, but the (biblical) principles of love, justice and equity. We should be encouraged to continue Calvin’s urging on the state to reflect these principles in its law making and adjudication.

Ian Moes earned his LL.B. from the University of Alberta Law School and is a lawyer in Vancouver, BC, where he practices in civil, constitutional, and church law matters. He is a member of Langley Canadian Reformed Church and a director of the Geneva Society for Reformational Worldview Studies.

“1929 and All That, or What Does Calvinism Say to Historians Searching for Meaning?” by Darryl Hart (Ch. 1)

This review, written by George Alkema, is one of our series of reviews of chapters of David W. Hall & Marvin Padgett, Calvin and Culture: Exploring a Worldview (P&R, 2010). We welcome your engagement and responses.

That Calvin was drawn to Clio, the muse of history, was betrayed by a matched pair of intellectual Freudian slips tucked away in his commentaries: History, he taught, is “the teacher of life” and even the “mistress of life.” Editors Hall and Padgett note these descriptions in the book’s introduction, but Darryl G. Hart, visiting professor of church history at Westminster Seminary in California and historical contributor to the volume Calvin and Culture, will have none of it. Calvinist historians, he contends, are not equipped by their faith to understand the final meaning of historical developments. He in fact implies that their Christian viewpoint may be an impediment to understanding the significance of historical events. Reformed scholars, says Hart, need “epistemological humility,” by which he means a distinct reticence in interpreting history. (Hart’s reference to 1929 highlights two influential events of that year, the stock market crash and the reorganization of Princeton seminary, which would lead to the establishment of Westminster Seminary.)

Professor Hart rests his thesis on Calvin’s concept of divine providence, by which a good God rules sovereignly over all that occurs in history and in the lives of his children. Nevertheless, in spite of our belief in divine direction and control, events appear to us mortals, says Calvin, as “fortuitous.” That “chance” quality of events is enormously significant. As Calvin points out, Moses wrote that the secret things belong to God (Deuteronomy 29:29) and not to us. We do know that all things will work to the consummation of the divine plan, but we can’t penetrate the manner of its working out. For his use of the doctrine of providence and its implications, Calvin was dependent on Augustine, who was well-respected for his philosophy of history as set out in The City of God. Not a bad ally to have, especially when intellectual frustration is implied.

Christian scholars, then, Hart teaches, don’t possess a key to understanding the significance of specific events, and can’t know how these contribute to the advancement of God’s kingdom. They are at times tempted, however, to be over-confident, because Scripture reveals the aim of history, the middle of history, and history’s end. Hart provides examples of recent and contemporary Christian (and Calvinist) historians who have practiced their craft in a manner that for him crosses the line into stating too much and making claims that are really unsustainable. Ronald Wells, for instance, wrote some nasty prose about the humanism of the Enlightenment and its implications for the subsequent history of the west. [See Ronald Wells, History Through the Eyes of Faith (Harper, 1989) and Ronald Wells, ed., History and the Christian Historian (Eerdmans, 1998).] He in fact declared that the Enlightenment led mankind down a blind alley of “moral and spiritual blackness.” Hart terms this sort of pronouncement “moral judgment,” and as such inadmissible. Indulging in it, he believes, can derail the historian’s purpose and blind her to the “variety, complexity, and mystery of the past” (p. 4). It violates the interpretive humility and the intellectual modesty that, in his view, Calvin’s doctrine of providence imposes on the historian.

Thus Hart has put Calvin into the traces of a decidedly minimalist cart. Calvinist historians must accept the limits of their competence and refrain from kicking against the goads. One may well question, however, whether this is really the emphasis we need. After all, are we known for extravagant claims and wild-eyed enthusiasms? Hardly, I would say. What is needed, rather, is a spirit of encouragement, so that as Christian historians we work with robust analysis and discernment, and with a keen understanding of the significance that historical ideas, events, and movements naturally contain. Our task is to establish connections between our faith and historical events. Let’s take as an example (more or less arbitrarily chosen) the Battle of the Boyne of 1690. This battle saw the defeat of James II and of absolutism in England: The victorious William III was willing to sign the Bill of Rights which de facto initiated limited monarchy and provided for the growth of parliamentary institutions. Are we not obligated to notice God’s providential guidance in such events?

The calling of Christian historians requires them also to defend the faith from the vicious and often faddish calumnies of secular historians bent on defaming Christianity with false representations of past events. For this and for their interpretative tasks they have the necessary tools, for Scripture affords us wisdom in the estimation of humankind and its deeds. History, “the mistress of life,” is a great teacher when her story is told with the discernment that biblical insight can provide. A pity that Daryl G. Hart does not see this.

George Alkema is head of the History Department of Guido de Brès Christian High School in Hamilton, ON. He holds an M.A. in Ancient and European History from McMaster University (1975).

Reviews of Calvin and Culture

Back in September, we posted a book notice about Calvin and Culture, a new volume that is relevant to nearly every Reformed academic. We found a number of people willing to write brief reviews of many of the chapters, and today we begin rolling these reviews out, leaving some time after each one as an opportunity for discussion. Some of our contributors submitted their summaries and critiques some time ago, and others have provided their evaluations with very short notice upon our invitation, and we heartily thank all of our reviewers.

We plan to post the reviews following the sequence of the chapters. As will become clear in the brief summaries and reflections offered by our contributors, few historical figures have matched Calvin’s impact in terms of breadth and longevity. We expect you will agree that the legacy of Calvin in the academic disciplines is strong and worthy of our continued examination, participation, and advancement.

As you can see from the chapters listed at our book notice, several fields of academic study were not included, such as sociology, psychology, linguistics/language, theology. Certainly much has already been written on Calvin’s theology, but if you have any ideas on Calvin’s impact in these other areas, your contribution would be very welcome!

We hope you, our readers, will value and interact with each of these reviews. Part of the calling of the Reformed academic is to be aware of issues in other disciplines instead of being only narrowly focussed on his or her own particular area of teaching and research, and cross-fertilization of ideas is rewardingly fruitful and helps avoid reductionism.