The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 2

III. Calvin Clear on Antichrist but Uncertain on Other Prophecies

JEAN (JOHN) CALVIN (1509-1564), eminent French Re former, and generally regarded second only to Luther in Reformation influence, was born at Noyon in northern France, and studied at Paris, Orleans, and Bourges. ¹⁴ He first went to the university to prepare himself for the priesthood, but on the request of his father he changed to jurisprudence. While Calvin was at the university, in 1527, his cousin Robert Olivetan induced him to read the Bible, pointing out the conflict between Scripture teachings and the doctrines of the church. Calvin was a serious thinker, and a brilliant student. Moreover, the influence of Wolmar, his instructor in Greek, a professor openly sympathizing with the cause of the Reformation, may have made a deep impression upon his soul, although Calvin himself speaks of his conversion as a sudden act without aid by any human agency. He publicly embraced Protestantism about 1532, beginning to proclaim his new-found faith. PFF2 433.3

Calvin suddenly found himself the leader of the evangelicals in France. In 1533 a friend of Calvin, Nicolas Cop, became rector of the Sorbonne, and incurred the anger of the faculty by his candid inaugural oration (which was probably prepared by Calvin), and had to flee. Thereupon Calvin left Paris quietly. In 1534 an overzealous Protestant brought on a climax in Paris by publishing an anti-Catholic placard, which caused a violent reaction. ¹⁵ Many Protestants were imprisoned, banished, or burned. Between 1533 and 1536 Calvin became a fugitive evangelist for a time, protected by Marguerite of Navarre. Later he went to Strassburg and Basel. PFF2 434.1

While he was in Basel the first edition of his Institution Christianas Religionis appeared in 1536 ¹⁶ and was dedicated to Francis I, king of France. Calvin was only twenty-six years of age when he wrote that remarkable work, which became doubt less the most outstanding systematic presentation of the Protestant faith. Calvin was not satisfied with this first edition, and worked ceaselessly to improve and enlarge his work, until in the eighth edition, which appeared in 1559, it had reached its final form and had grown to five times the size of the original tractate of 1536. In 1536 he also spent some months in Ferrara at the court of the Duchess Renate, and became a spiritual adviser to her until his death. Threatened by the Inquisition, he returned to Switzerland. PFF2 434.2

In the same year Calvin arrived at Geneva, where he was called to be a preacher and teacher of theology. As the apostles of old were circumcised and trained in the Jewish faith, so the Reformers had largely been born, baptized, confirmed, and educated in the Catholic Church. Calvin was no exception. Though prepared for the priesthood, he had never read mass or entered the higher orders, and no bishop had ordained him. He simply responded to the call as pastor and teacher, and was elected at Geneva in 1536 by the presbyters and the council, with the consent of the people. ¹⁷ PFF2 435.1

In 1537, with Farel, Calvin prepared a Confession of Faith. He also introduced stern disciplinary measures of which the city did not approve, and was banished from Geneva in 1538. A few years later the Geneva senate sent Calvin a written invitation to return, which he did in 1541, and sought to make Geneva a model for all Protestant communities. Calvin possessed the iron will, the frankness, and the thorough Bible knowledge necessary to become the second great leader of Protestantism. After a long struggle Geneva became the city of Protestant piety and the training center for missionaries of the evangel. PFF2 435.2

Calvin insisted on the removal of crosses and other papal emblems from church buildings. And he requested that only psalms and New Testament hymns be sung. He spent the rest of his life in Geneva, where he founded a school, or academy, for training pastors, which later became the university. Until the end of his life he presided over the Little Council, which ruled the city on the theocratic principle. In 1551 he had a controversy with Bolsec on predestination, and in 1553 the burning of Michael Servetus took place. No mercy was shown under the theocracy, since the doctrine of tolerance was not yet recognized. He preached on alternate days, lectured thrice a week, carried on a vast correspondence, and did voluminous writing—his works being published in some fifty volumes. ¹⁸ PFF2 435.3

1. UNSATISFACTORY IN EXPOSITION OF PROPHECIES

Though clear in his identification of the Papacy as Antichrist, Calvin was the least satisfactory of all the Protestant leaders regarding the prophecies in general. He still followed Augustine in many things-the stone of Daniel 2 as the churchly spiritual kingdom which will break up all earthly kingdoms, and the thousand years embracing the various historic troubles that had afflicted the church militant ¹⁹—but he was averse to giving any definite explanation to prophetic time periods. The time and times and half a time should not be considered as years but might stand for “any period whose termination is in the select counsel of God.” He made the Little Horn refer to Julius Caesar and the other Caesars, and the forty-two months an indefinite time. ²⁰ He made the 1290 days to mean anything except 1290, and he avoided writing on the Apocalypse. ²¹ PFF2 436.1

2. IDENTIFICATION OF ANTICHRIST GIVEN EMPEROR

In his letter sent to the emperor Charles V on the necessity of reforming the church, Calvin wrote: “The arrogance of antichrist of which Paul speaks is, that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.” ²² PFF2 436.2

After declaring that the pope’s laws have taken precedence over God’s laws, and alluding to his prohibition of meats and of marriage as a “doctrine of devils,” Calvin avers that the highest impiety is to set man in a higher rank than God. Then he adds, “If they deny the truth of my statement, I appeal to fact.” The closing portion of the letter reads: PFF2 436.3

“I deny that See to be Apostolical, wherein nought is seen but a shocking apostasy—I deny him to be the vicar of Christ, who, in furiously persecuting the gospel, demonstrates by his conduct that he is Antichrist—I deny him to be the successor of Peter, who is doing his utmost to demolish every edifice that Peter built—and I deny him to be the head of the Church, who by his tyranny lacerates and dismembers the Church, after dissevering her from Christ, her true and only Head.” ²³ PFF2 436.4

3. CITES PAUL AND DANIEL ON ANTICHRIST

Calvin’s identification of the Papacy as the prophesied Antichrist is explicit. In his classic Institutes there are at least four sharp applications. Here are two: PFF2 437.1

“Daniel and Paul had predicted that Antichrist would sit in the temple of God. The head of that cursed and abominable kingdom, in the Western Church, we affirm to be the Pope. When his seat is placed in the temple of God, it suggests, that his kingdom will be such, that he will not abolish the name of Christ or the Church. Hence it appears, that we by no means deny that churches may exist, even under his tyranny; but he has profaned them by sacrilegious impiety, afflicted them by cruel despotism, corrupted and almost terminated their existence by false and pernicious doctrines; like poisonous potions, in such churches, Christ lies half buried, the gospel is suppressed, piety exterminated, and the worship of God almost abolished; in a word, they are altogether in such a state of confusion, that they exhibit a picture of Babylon, rather than of the holy city of God.” ²⁴ PFF2 437.2

“But while the Spirit has expressly predicted, by the mouth of Paul, that there shall come an apostasy, which cannot take place without the pastors being the first to revolt from God, why do we wilfully shut our eyes to our own ruin?” ²⁵ PFF2 437.3

4. ANTICHRIST LURKS IN THE CHURCH UNDER A MASK

Explaining that he is only using Bible phraseology when he calls the Roman pontiff “Antichrist,” Calvin says: PFF2 437.4

“Some persons think us too severe and censorious when we call the Roman pontiff Antichrist. But those who are of this opinion do not consider that they bring the same charge of presumption against Paul himself, after whom we speak and whose language we adopt. And lest any one should object, that we improperly pervert to the Roman pontiff those words of Paul, which belong to a different subject, I shall briefly show that they are not capable of any other interpretation than that which applies them to the Papacy. Paul says that Antichrist ‘sitteth in the temple of God.’ In another place, also, the Holy Spirit, describing his image in the person of Antiochus, declares that his kingdom will consist in ‘speaking great words,’ or blasphemies, ‘against the Most High.’ Hence we conclude that it is rather a tyranny over the souls of men, than over their bodies, which is erected in opposition to the spiritual kingdom of Christ. And in the next place, that this tyranny is one which does not abolish the name of Christ or of his Church, but rather abuses the authority of Christ, and conceals itself under the character of the Church, as under a mask. Now, though all the heresies and schisms which have existed from the beginning belong to the kingdom of Antichrist, yet when Paul predicts an approaching apostasy, he signifies by this description that that seat of abomination shall then be erected when a universal defection shall have seized the church, notwithstanding many members dispersed in different places, persevere in the unity of the faith. But when he adds, that even in his days ‘the mystery of iniquity’ did ‘al ready work’ in secret, what it was afterwards to effect in a more public manner, he gives us to understand that this calamity was neither to be introduced by one man, nor to terminate with one man. Now, when he designates Antichrist by this character,—that he would rob God of His honor in order to assume it to himself,—this is the principal indication which we ought to follow in our inquiries after Antichrist, especially where such pride proceeds to a public desolation of the church. As it is evident therefore that the Roman pontiff has impudently transferred to himself some of the peculiar and exclusive prerogatives of God and Christ, it cannot be doubted that he is the captain and the leader of this impious and abominable kingdom.” ²⁶ PFF2 437.5

A similar statement appears in his work on the Thessalonian epistles, with pagan Rome as the impediment, or historical occasion of delay, and Chrysostomcited as supporting evidence. ²⁷ PFF2 438.1

5. COMMENTARY ON DANIEL EXCEPTION TO REFORMATION WRITERS

Calvin’s Commentaries on the Book of the Prophet Daniel, published in Latin at Geneva, soon after translated into English (1570), is the least satisfactory of all the Reformed expositions, and constitutes an exception. Though it clearly depicts the four world powers of Babylonia, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome, it is not clear on the feet and toes of Daniel 2, nor on the ten horns, and the Little Horn of Daniel 7. Of Daniel 2, Calvin does say, “Under one image the whole state of the world is here depicted for us.” Again, “The dream was presented to King Nebuchadnezzar, that he might understand all future events to the renovation of the world.” ²⁸ PFF2 438.2

But aside from recognizing the same four empires in Daniel 7, Calvin considers Rome only in its pagan phase, and confines the ten horns and the Little Horn to that era. ²⁹ Calvin is not too specific on the seventy weeks, and where he is specific he is not chronologically exact. He begins the period with the first decree of Cyrus. The seven weeks, or forty-nine years, extend from Cyrus to the sixth year of Darius. About 480 years elapsed from Darius, Calvin adds, to the death of Christ, who was cut off in the seventieth week. He implies that the crucifixion occurred in the midst of the seventieth week, when the sacrifice and offering end, but does not specifically date the cross. ³⁰ PFF2 438.3

In many ways Calvin was a Preterist, so far as the book of Daniel was concerned, decades before Alcazar, the Jesuit, popularized Preterism. Nor did Knox’s views seem to have induced Calvin to accept the year-day principle. He was, however, very clear and positive on the Papacy as Paul’s Man of Sin and the Antichrist of Scripture. PFF2 439.1