Political The Impact of Luther and Calvin
Political Context for the Reformation
Charles Vs attempted to impose his Catholicism on all the German States.
Charles subordinated German revenue and resources to his primary interests in Spain and Burgandy.
The Hapsburgs were repeatedly at war with the Valois dynasty in France between 1521 and 1555.
1532: Peace of Nuremberg allows Protestants to practice within their own territories.
Martin Luther Timeline
1517: Luthers 95 Theses
1519: Charles V Holy Roman Emperor (1519-1556)
1520: Open Letter to Christian Nobility
1520: Excommunication of Luther
1523: Luthers Temporal Authority
1525: Against the Murderous Thieving Hordes of Peasants
THEOLOGICAL ISSUES FOR LUTHER
Justification by the Gift of Faith Alone
Rejection of good works as a means to salvation
predestination and the limitation on free will imposed by sin
condemnation of indulgences
Primacy of Scriptural Authority
Rejection of Catholic Hierarchy in favor of the Church of all believers
Background Aristotelian Political Theory
(a product of reason alone, one of the practical sciences)
1. Personal freedom is required for the pursuit of the good life.
2. "Justice" requires the opportunity to fulfill human potentials.
3. The state should function to provide the conditions necessary for the good life of its citizens.
4. When tyrants abuse power they must be replaced.
5. Aristotelians stressed appeal to history and pagan philosophers.
The Relationship of Church to State: Two Kingdoms
Curtis, p. 238: We must divide all the children of Adam into two classes; the first belong to the kingdom
of God, the second to the kingdom of the world.
240: For this reason God has ordained the two governments; the spiritual, which by the Holy Spirit under
Christ makes Christians and pious people, and the secular, which restrains the unchristian and wicked so
that they must needs keep the peace outwardly, even against their will.
245*: But the kingdom of the world is a kingdom of wrath and severity. In it there is only punishment,
repression, judgment, and condemnation, for the repressing of the wicked and the protection of the good.
nothing else than the servant of Gods wrath upon the wicked,
Spiritual Freedom is not Political Freedom
Spiritual freedom is relief from the guilt of sin, but does not entail immunity from laws instituted for nonChristians.
Curtis, pp. 238-243 If anyone attempted to rule the world by the Gospel, and put aside all secular law and
the secular sword, on the plea that all are baptized and Christian, and that according to the Gospel, there is
to be among them neither law nor sword, pray, what would happen? He would loose the bands and
chains of the wild and savage beasts, and let them tear and mangle every one, Just so would the wicked
under the name of Christian abuse this freedom of the Gospel, carry on their knavery, and say that they
were Christians subject neither to law nor sword.
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Justice is Obedience to Secular Authority
Social inequality is part of Gods plan
Curtis, 245: The words of Scripture that speak of mercy apply to the kingdom of God and to Christians,
not to the kingdom of the world, for it is a Christians duty not only to be merciful, but to endure every kind
of suffering - robbery, arson, murder, devil and hell. It goes without saying that he is to smite, slay and
recompense no one. But the kingdom of the world is nothing else than the servant of Gods wrath upon the
wicked, and is a real precursor of hell and everlasting death. It should not be merciful, but strict, severe and
wrathful in the fulfillment of its work and duty.
Luthers Reaction to Peasant Uprisings
Curtis, 246: Now he who would confuse these two kingdoms - as our false fanatics do - would put wrath
into Gods kingdom and mercy into the worlds kingdom; and that is the same as putting the devil in
heaven and God in hell. Both of these things these sympathizers with the peasants would like to do. First
they wanted to go to work with the sword, fight for the Gospel as Christian brethren, and kill other
people, when it was these others duty to be merciful and patient. Now that the kingdom of the world has
overcome them, they want to have mercy in it; that is to say, they would endure no worldly kingdom, but
would not grant Gods kingdom to anyone. Can you imagine anything more perverse? Not so, dear friends!
If one has deserved wrath in the the kingdom of the world, let him submit, and either take his punishment,
or humbly sue for pardon.
The Duty of the Christian Prince
Curtis 246: He who would be a Christian prince certainly must lay aside the intention to rule and to use
force. For cursed and condemned is every kind of life lived and sought for selfish profit and good; cursed
are all works not done in love.
Curtis 247: A prince must proceed with fear; he must depend neither upon dead books nor upon living
heads, but cling solely to God, pray without ceasing to him, and ask for a right understanding, above all
books and masters, wisely to rule his subjects.
Review of 16th Century Political Issues for Luther
The Relationship of Church to State: the Two Kingdoms
Spiritual Freedom is not Political Freedom
Justice is passive obedience to secular authority regardless of social inequity; it does not include a right
to resist tyrants
The Duty of the Christian Prince is to cling solely to God
Political Effects of the Lutheran Reformation
Encouragement of Absolute Monarchy
Removal of Catholic opposition to secular power among German principalities
passive civil obedience as a foundation for the divine right of kings
John Calvin (1509-1564)
1509: born in Noyon, France
1528: of Master Arts in Paris followed by study of law
1535: exile in Protestant Basel, Switzerland
1536: Institutes of Christian Religion (1st ed)
1560: Institutes of Christian Religion (last ed)
1536: Geneva, Strasbourg, Geneva (1541)
Calvinist or Reformed Theology
Disagreed with Luther and affirmed only the spiritual presence of Christ in communion
General agreement with Luther about predestination
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More opposed to ceremony than Luther
Church and State
Curtis 253: Man is under two kinds of government - one spiritual, by which the conscience is formed to
piety and the service of God; the other political, by which man is instructed in the duties of humanity and
civility, which are to be observed in an intercourse with mankind.
Christian Liberty and Political Obligation
Curtis 254: This distinction [between the two governments] will prevent what the Gospel inculcates
concerning spiritual liberty from being misapplied to political regulations, as though Christians were less
subject to the external government of human laws because their consciences have been set at liberty before
God, as though their freedom of spirit necessarily exempted them from all carnal servitude.
Christian Liberty
Curtis 250: Christian liberty includes dismissing all thought of our own works, in reference to
justification, we must embrace the Divine mercy alone, and turning our eyes from ourselves, fix them
solely on Christ.
Curtis 250: Secondly, Christians are liberated from the yoke of the law [and] yield a voluntary
obedience to the will of God.
Curtis 251: The third part of Christian liberty teaches us that we are bound by no obligation before God
respecting external things, which in themselves are indifferent, but that we may indifferently sometimes use
and at other times omit them.
Curtis 251: Christian liberty is in all its branches a spiritual thing.
The Duty of Civil Obedience
Curtis 259: The first duty of subjects toward their magistrates is to entertain the most honorable
sentiments of their function, which they know to be a jurisdiction delegated to them from God, and on that
account to esteem and reverence them as Gods ministers
Curtis 259: subjects ought to be induced to submit to princes and governors, not merely from a dread of
their power, as persons are accustomed to yield to an armed enemy, who they know will immediately take
vengeance upon them if they resist; but because the obedience which is rendered to princes and magistrates
is rendered to God.
Tyranny as Punishment
Curtis 260: those who rule in an unjust and tyrannical manner are raised up by him [God] to punish the
inequity of the people
The Duty To Correct Tyranny?
Curtis 261-262: For though the correction of tyrannical domination is the vengeance of God, we are not,
therefore, to conclude that it is committed to us who have received no other command than to obey and
suffer.This observation I always apply to private persons. For if there be, in the present day, any
magistrates appointed for the protection of the people and the moderation of the power of kings, such as
perhaps is now possessed by the three estates in every kingdom when they are assembled; I am so far from
prohibiting them, in the discharge of their duty, to oppose the violence or cruelty of kings that I affirm that
if they connive at kings in their oppression of their people, such forbearance involves the most nefarious
perfidy because they fraudulently betray the liberty of the people, of which they know that they have been
appointed protectors by the ordination of God.
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The Prince as Minister of God
Curtis 249: This consideration constitutes true royalty: to acknowledge yourself in the government of your
kingdom to be the minister of God. For where the glory of God is not made the end of the government, it is
not a legitimate sovereignty, but a usurpation.
Curtis 257: civil magistracy is a calling not only holy and legitimate, but far the most sacred and
honorable in human life. If magistrates remember that they are the viceregents of God, it behooves them
to watch with all care, earnestness, and diligence, that in their administration they may exhibit to men an
image, as it were, of the providence, care, goodness, benevolence, and justice of God. And they must
constantly bear this in mind that if in all cases he be cursed that doeth the work of the Lord deceitfully, a
far heavier curse awaits those who act fraudulently in a righteous calling.
The Prince as Minister of God
Curtis: 258: no government can be happily constituted unless its first object be the promotion of piety,
and that all laws are preposterous which neglect the claims of God and merely provide for the interests of
men. Therefore, as religion holds the first place among all the philosophers, and as this has always been
regarded by the universal consent of all nations, Christian princes and magistrates ought to be ashamed of
their indolence if they do not make it the object of their most serious care.
Summary of Calvins Political Views
Church and State
Christian Liberty and Political Obligation
The Duty of Civil Obedience
Tyranny as Punishment
The Duty To Correct Tyranny?
only for those so politically appointed
The Prince as Minister of God
Subsequent Calvinists
distinction between Calvin and later Calvinists over active resistance to tyranny
theocracy in Geneva
Calvinists advocate resistance in Scotland and France.
The Council of Trent
Met intermittently between 1545-1563
reformed indulgences and obligations of the clergy
made Aquinas the central theologian of Catholicism
the Latin translation of the Bible, the Vulgate, is authoritative
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