John Calvin : a sixteenth-century portrait /
Bouwsma, William J. 1923-2004.
John Calvin : a sixteenth-century portrait / [print] A Sixteenth Century Portrait William J. Bouwsma. - New York : Oxford University Press, (c)1988. - viii, 310 pages : portrait ; 3 cm
The Man and the Times -- The Labyrinth -- The Opening -- The Abyss -- A Program for the Times
"Calvinism has been widely credited--or blamed--for much that is thought to characterize the modern world: for capitalism and modern science, for secularization and democracy, for individualism and utilitarianism. But John Calvin the man has been largely ignored by historians; most of us, if we think of him at all, tend to view him as little more than the joyless tyrant of Geneva and the source of an abstract theology as forbidding as its author. This book, by an eminent historian whose career has been devoted to understanding the larger patterns of early modern European history, aims to make Calvin come alive by putting him back in his own time and understanding how he dealt with its problems. A Frenchman, an exile, and a humanist in the tradition of Erasmus, Calvin was unusually sensitive to the complexities and contradictions of later Renaissance culture. The Calvin who emerges from this eloquent study is a surprisingly human, more plausible, more ecumenical, and often sympathetic figure, whose achievement was both more and less than --
9780195043945 9780195059519
87012338
GB8841688 bnb
Calvin, Jean, 1509-1564.
Sixteenth century.
Seizième siècle - Biographies.
Reformed churches Calvin, Jean, 1509-1564 - Biographies
BX9418.B782.J646 1988 BX9418
John Calvin : a sixteenth-century portrait / [print] A Sixteenth Century Portrait William J. Bouwsma. - New York : Oxford University Press, (c)1988. - viii, 310 pages : portrait ; 3 cm
The Man and the Times -- The Labyrinth -- The Opening -- The Abyss -- A Program for the Times
"Calvinism has been widely credited--or blamed--for much that is thought to characterize the modern world: for capitalism and modern science, for secularization and democracy, for individualism and utilitarianism. But John Calvin the man has been largely ignored by historians; most of us, if we think of him at all, tend to view him as little more than the joyless tyrant of Geneva and the source of an abstract theology as forbidding as its author. This book, by an eminent historian whose career has been devoted to understanding the larger patterns of early modern European history, aims to make Calvin come alive by putting him back in his own time and understanding how he dealt with its problems. A Frenchman, an exile, and a humanist in the tradition of Erasmus, Calvin was unusually sensitive to the complexities and contradictions of later Renaissance culture. The Calvin who emerges from this eloquent study is a surprisingly human, more plausible, more ecumenical, and often sympathetic figure, whose achievement was both more and less than --
9780195043945 9780195059519
87012338
GB8841688 bnb
Calvin, Jean, 1509-1564.
Sixteenth century.
Seizième siècle - Biographies.
Reformed churches Calvin, Jean, 1509-1564 - Biographies
BX9418.B782.J646 1988 BX9418