If Calvinism is tranformational, why was Calvin so otherworldly?
Let the aim of believers in judging the mortal life, then, be that while they understand it to be of itself nothing but misery, they may with greater eagerness and dispatch betake themselves wholly to meditate upon that eternal life to come. When it comes to a comparison with the life to come, the present life can not only be safely neglected but, compared to the former, must be utterly despised and loathed. For, if heaven is our homeland, what else is the earth but our place of exile? If departure from the world is entry into life, what else is the world but a sepulcher? And what else is it for us to remain in life but to be immersed in death. If to be freed from the body is to be released from perfect freedom, what else is the body but a prison? . . . Therefore, if the earthly life be compared with the heavenly, it is doubtless to be at once despised and trampled underfoot. Of course it is never to be hated except in so far as it holds us subject to sin; although not even hatred of that condition may ever properly be turned against life itself. In any case, it is still fitting for us to be so affected either by weariness or hatred of it that, desiring its end, we may also be prepared to abide in it at the Lord’s pleasure, so that our weariness may be far from all murmuring and impatience. For it is like a sentry post at which the Lord has posted us, which we must hold until he recalls us. (Institutes, III.ix.4)
Old Life 
Yup. I recently went through “The Institutes.” Hard to see how anyone
can come up with a transformational mindset after what Calvin wrote there.
The latest argument I have heard from a “Vision Forum” type is that
Calvin was just a mixed up guy on these issues because he was a graduate
of a secular law school. Jeepers. Actually, this was a double-pronged
attack since I graduated from a secular law school as well.
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I recently toured Alcatraz Island, the former federal penitentary whose famously grim conditions broke many of the most hardened inmates. Now the place has posters with quotes from the former inmates describing the hated conditions of that awful place. Their descriptions of Alcatraz, however, are not as grim as Calvin’s about life in this age. Life was hard for Calvin, not least of all because of his poor health. I think we have to take this as a bit of hyperbole to make a point, or else it was written on a bad day.
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If Calvinism is tranformational, why was Calvin so otherworldly?
Then someone should’ve reminded Calvin to keep his otherworldliness off the streets:
“…To do this [keep the ordained ordinance of excommunication intact by taking “good care not fall into any impropriety”], we have deliberately required of you to be pleased to ordain and elect certain persons of good life and witness from among the faithful…who should be dispersed and distributed in all the quarters of the city, having oversight of the life and government of each of them; and if they see any vice worthy of note to find fault with in any person, that they communicate about it with some of the ministers, to admonish whoever it is that is at fault and to exhort him in brotherly fashion to amendment” (Calvin: Theological Treatises, “Articles concerning the organization of the church and of worship at Geneva proposed by the ministers at the council, Jan. 16, 1537,” p. 52).
This-worldly gestapo tactics in the name of Christ! I love me some 2K, but I don’t see much consistency from our forebears…
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Chris, so you’re saying Calvin thought Geneva was the kingdom of heaven?
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Ha. No, hardly. But maybe he had an inkling to make it more closely resemble it.
Perhaps he was having a hefty battle with gout when he wrote the quote you offered. Or perhaps Idelette was particularly sweet to him on the day when he wrote the quote I offered.
At any rate, he was, it seems, prone to moodiness. All I’m saying is that Calvin, and all of the magisterial reformers for that matter, seemed decently inconsistent on this point, precisely because they were men of their time. This business of spying on your neighbor is pretty deplorable, don’t you think?
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No, Knox did. *rimshot*
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Chris,
I suppose one way to explain the perceived inconsistency is to pyscholgize Calvin. But with all the counter-intuitive language from Jesus about hating parents and in-laws that get between us and him and laying down life in order to gain it, it sure seems like Calvin was drawing the same stark temporal/eternal distinction his Lord was. Which, by the way, is absolutely essential for that 2K you love so much.
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Chris, spying on neighbors is what elders are called to do.
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Is that pretext for creating a Christian surveillance industry?
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Where is the “inconsistency?” Elder oversight over the flock within the church (the visible kingdom of God) is pretty other-worldly and has no corollary in this world. The board of directors of Toyota Motors doesn’t pay visits to employees’ homes to check on the well being of their employees or even the gas pedals of their cars.
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Come on, people. This isn’t about an individualistic American’s disdain for all forms of authority, not least ecclesial. Of course it’s an elder’s business what goes on in a person’s life under his care.
The inconsistency comes unwittingly. The very things Calvin took for granted as a man of his time (like even preparing articles about the church’s life and worship for the city council’s passage, which, incidentally, thoroughly embody a principle of theocratic governance) conflate the kingdoms. Future Christians will no doubt think the same of us when they look at all the junk we’ve baptized in our culture (especially our jingoism and therapeutic consumption habits).
All this aside, please don’t defend what amounts to spying on others about “vices” that are more often than not relative to the culture in which one lives (such a system as it’s described in the above articles could only breed distrust). Of course, I’m not talking about stuff “that does not occur even among pagans” (1 Cor 5:1). Imagine if you lived under this mandate in London in the late 1640s under Cromwell: what if one of your vices was harboring suspicions that regicide is godless? Or a small southern town in the late 50s: what if one of your vices was pushing for desegregation? Or Kansas after 1881: what if one of your vices was to take a nip from the flask? You get the picture.
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