The Consistory And Social Discipline In Calvin S Geneva

Examines the most successful institution of social discipline in Reformation Europe: the Consistory of Geneva during the time of John Calvin

The Calvinist Reformation is characterized above all by a focus on church discipline enforced by church courts known as consistories. The Geneva consistory served as the model and mother institution throughout the Calvinist world. In this book, Robert M. Kingdon surveys the theoretical underpinnings of the Calvinist emphasis on discipline and how theory was put into practice by John Calvin in Reformation Geneva. Professor Kingdon looks in turn at how the Geneva consistory and the pastors and councilors who staffed it reformed religious practice, religious education and marriage practices. Finally, Robert M. Kingdon uses the emotion of hatred as a lens to examine how Calvin and his colleagues attempted to reform emotions. He delves into the way in which Calvin and his colleagues employed the consistory to attenuate interpersonal hatred, while employing propaganda to whip up interconfessional hatred.

In Calvin's Geneva, the changes associated with the Reformation were particularly abrupt and far-reaching, in large part owing to John Calvin himself. Adultery and Divorce in Calvin's Geneva makes two major contributions to our understanding of this time. The first is to the history of divorce. The second is in illustrating the operations of the Consistory of Geneva--an institution designed to control in all its variety the behavior of the entire population--which was established at Calvin's insistence in 1541. This mandate came shortly after the city officially adopted Protestantism in 1536, a time when divorce became legally possible for the first time in centuries. Robert Kingdon illustrates the changes that accompanied the earliest Calvinist divorces by examining in depth a few of the most dramatic cases and showing how divorce affected real individuals. He considers first, and in the most detail, divorce for adultery, the best-known grounds for divorce and the best documented. He also covers the only other generally accepted grounds for these early divorces--desertion. The second contribution of the book, to show the work of the Consistory of Geneva, is a first step toward a fuller study of the institution. Kingdon has supervised the first accurate and complete transcription of the twenty-one volumes of registers of the Consistory and has made the first extended use of these materials, as well as other documents that have never before been so fully utilized.

In Calvin's Company of Pastors, Scott Manetsch examines the pastoral theology and practical ministry activities of Geneva's reformed ministers from the time of Calvin's arrival in Geneva until the beginning of the seventeenth century. During these seven decades, more than 130 men were enrolled in Geneva's Venerable Company of Pastors (as it was called), including notable reformed leaders such as Pierre Viret, Theodore Beza, Simon Goulart, Lambert Daneau, and Jean Diodati. Aside from these better-known epigones, Geneva's pastors from this period remain hidden from view, cloaked in Calvin's long shadow, even though they played a strategic role in preserving and reshaping Calvin's pastoral legacy. Making extensive use of archival materials, published sermons, catechisms, prayer books, personal correspondence, and theological writings, Manetsch offers an engaging and vivid portrait of pastoral life in sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century Geneva, exploring the manner in which Geneva's ministers conceived of their pastoral office and performed their daily responsibilities of preaching, public worship, moral discipline, catechesis, administering the sacraments, and pastoral care. Manetsch demonstrates that Calvin and his colleagues were much more than ivory tower theologians or "quasi-agents of the state," concerned primarily with dispensing theological information to their congregations or enforcing magisterial authority. Rather, they saw themselves as spiritual shepherds of Christ's Church, and this self-understanding shaped to a significant degree their daily work as pastors and preachers.

This book comprises a series of essays on Calvin's work and on the thought and devotion applied to it. The author includes an account of John Calvin's early life and the important events of his struggle and triumphs in Geneva

The chapters in this volume were originally presented as papers at the 2009 colloquium of the Calvin Studies Society, held to mark the five-hundredth anniversary of John Calvin's birth. They offer a fresh evaluation of Calvin's ideas and achievements, and describe how others--from his contemporaries to the present--have responded to or built upon the Calvinist heritage. This book dispels popular misperceptions about Calvin and Calvinism, allowing readers to make a more accurate assessment of Calvin's importance as a theologian and historical figure. Contributions address areas in which Calvin's legacy has been most controversial or misunderstood, such as his attitude toward women, his advocacy of church discipline, and his understanding of predestination. These essays also give a nuanced picture of the impact of Calvinism by taking account of both the positive and negative reactions to it from the early modern period to the present. Part 1: Calvin: The Man and His Work Part 2: Appeal of and Responses to Calvinism Part 3: The Impact of Calvin's Ideas

A description of the course of the Protestant Reformation in the city of Geneva from the 16th to the 18th centuries.

This book chronicles the history of the Protestant Reformation in sixteenth century Geneva under the leadership of John Calvin and is the best modern study of the Genevan Reformation available. The narrative of this work is enhanced by twenty-seven tables of extensive statistical data and eleven prosopographical appendices drawn from the author's extensive studies in the Geneva archives. His work shows the challenges faced by Calvin and his associates as they sought to proclaim and enact their Christian faith in a Genevan society that was facing severe problems with the influx of refugees from all over Europe.