What's in a Name?

George Whitfield:

I embrace the calvinistical scheme, not because Calvin, but Jesus Christ, I think,  has taught it to me. (Letter dated September 24, 1742)

Charles Spurgeon:

Did you say that such-and-such a thing is believed by you because you found it in Calvin's Institutes? I am a Calvinist, and a lover of that grand man's memory and doctrine; but I believe nothing merely because Calvin taught it, but because I have found his teaching in the Word of God. (Sermon number 2584 Metropolitan Tabernacle 44:517)

And I have my own private opinion that there is no such a thing as preaching Christ and him crucified, unless you preach what now-a-days is called Calvinism. I have my own ideas, and those I always state boldly. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism; Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else. I do not believe we can preach the gospel, if we do not preach justification by faith, without works; nor unless we preach the sovereignty of God in his dispensation of grace; nor unless we exalt the electing, unchangeable, eternal, immutable, conquering, love of Jehovah; nor do I think we can preach the gospel, unless we base it upon the peculiar redemption which Christ made for his elect and chosen people; nor can I comprehend a gospel which lets saints fall away after they are called, and suffers the children of God to be burned in the fires of damnation after having believed. Such a gospel I abhor. The gospel of the Bible is not such a gospel as that. We preach Christ and him crucified in a different fashion, and to all gainsayers we reply, "We have not so learned Christ." (Sermon number 98 New Park Street Pulpit 1:100)

It is no novelty, then, that I am-preaching; no new doctrine. I love to proclaim these strong old doctrines, which are called by nickname Calvinism, but which are surely and verily the revealed truth of God as it is in Christ Jesus. By this truth I make a pilgrimage into the past, and as I go, I see father after father, confessor after confessor, martyr after martyr, standing up to shake hands with me. Were I a Pelagian, or a believer in the doctrine of free-will, I should have to walk for centuries all alone. Here and there a heretic of no very honorable character might rise up and call me brother. But taking these things to be the standard of my faith, I see the land of the ancients peopled with my brethren-I behold multitudes who confess the same as I do, and acknowledge that this is the religion of God?s own church. (Sermon on Election 1:551) 

Again, I must say, I am not defending certain brethren who have exaggerated Calvinism. I speak of Calvinism proper, not that which has run to seed, and outgrown its beauty and verdure. I speak of it as I find it in Calvin?s Institutes, and especially in his Expositions. I have read them carefully. I take not my views of Calvinism from common repute but from his books. Nor do I, in thus speaking, even vindicate Calvinism as if I cared for the name, but I mean that glorious system which teaches that salvation is of grace from first to last.  (Sermon number 385 Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit 7:554) 

The old truth that Calvin preached, that Augustine preached, that Paul preached, is the truth that I must preach to-day, or else be false to my conscience and my God. I cannot shape the truth; I know of no such thing as paring off the rough edges of a doctrine. John Knox's gospel is my gospel. That which thundered through Scotland must thunder through England again. (Defence of Calvinism) 

To me, Calvinism means the placing of the eternal God at the head of all things. (An All Round Ministry, p. 337)

Calvinism is the Gospel. (Sermons, Vol. 1, p. 50)

Calvinism did not spring from Calvin. We believe that it sprang from the great Founder of all truth. (Sermons, Vol. 7, p. 298)

I am not a Calvinist by choice, but because I cannot help it. (Sermons, Vol. 18, p. 692)

Robert L. Dabney:

We Presbyterians care very little about the name Calvinism. We are not ashamed of it; but we are not bound to it. Some opponents seem to harbor the ridiculous notion that this set of doctrines was the new invention of the Frenchman John Calvin. They would represent us as in this thing followers of him instead of followers of the Bible. This is a stupid historical error. John Calvin no more invented these doctrines than he invented this world which God had created six thousand years before. We believe that he was a very gifted, learned, and, in the main, godly man, who still had his faults. He found substantially this system of doctrines just where we find them, in the faithful study of the Bible, Where we see them taught by all the prophets, apostles, and the Messiah himself, from Genesis to Revelation.

Calvin also found the same doctrines handed down by the best, most learned, most godly, uninspired church fathers, as Augustine and Saint Thomas Aquinas, still running through the errors of popery. He wielded a wide influence over the Protestant churches; but the Westminster Assembly and the Presbyterian churches by no means adopted all Calvin's opinions. Like the Synod of Dort, we draw our doctrines, not from any mortal man or human philosophy, but from the Holy Ghost speaking in the Bible. Yet, we do find some inferior comfort in discovering these same doctrines of grace in the most learned and pious of all churches and ages; of the great fathers of Romanism, of Martin Luther, of Blaise Paschal, of the original Protestant churches, German, Swiss, French, Holland, English, and Scotch—and far the largest part of the real scriptural churches of our own day. (The Five Points of Calvinism)

Radiations of Divine Light

Curt Daniel, The History and Theology of Calvinism, p. 405:

How is it that a totally non-Christian artist can paint a beautiful painting? Why is it that not all art by unbelievers is directly blasphemous? Calvinists such as Hans Rookmaaker have discussed the Calvinist theology of art, or Reformed Aesthetics. They point out that not all workers on the Temple were Israelites. Some were pagans, but they were good artists and architects. How? Because they had been endued by Common Grace with cultural gifts.

Abraham Kuyper, Lectures on Calvinism, p. 97:

I have already, more than once, called your attention to the important significance of the Calvinistic doctrine of "common grace," and of course in this lecture on art I must refer to it again. That which is to be ecclesiastical must bear the stamp of faith, therefore genuine Christian art can only go out from believers. Calvinism, on the contrary, has taught us that all liberal arts are gifts which God imparts promiscuously to believers and unbelievers, yea, that, as history shows, these gifts have flourished even in a larger measure outside the holy circle. "These radiations of Divine Light," [John Calvin] wrote, "shone more brilliantly among unbelieving people than among God's saints." And this of course quite reverses the proposed order of things. If you limit the higher enjoyment of art to regeneration, then this gift is exclusively the portion of believers, and must bear an ecclesiastical character. In that case it is the outcome of particular grace But if, at the hand of experience and history, you become persuaded that the highest art-instincts are natural gifts, and hence belong to those excellent graces which, in spite of sin, by virtue of common grace, have continued to shine in human nature, it plainly follows that art can inspire both believers and unbelievers, and that God remains Sovereign to impart it, in His good pleasure, alike to Heathen and to Christian nations. This applies not only to art, but to all the natural utterances of human life, and is illustrated by the comparison in early times between Israel and the other nations. As far as holy things are concerned, Israel is chosen, and is not only blessed above all nations, but stands among all nations, isolated In the question of Religion, Israel has not only a larger share, but Israel alone has the truth, and all the other nations, even the Greeks and the Romans, are bent beneath the yoke of falsehood. Christ is not partly of Israel and partly of the nations; He is of Israel alone. Salvation is of the Jews. But just in proportion as Israel shines forth from within the domain of Religion, so is it equally backward when you compare the development of its art, science, politics, commerce and trade to that of the surrounding nations. The building of the Temple required the coming of Hiram from a heathen country to Jerusalem; and Solomon, in whom, after all, was found the Wisdom of God, not only knows that Israel stands behind in architecture and needs help from without, but by his action he publicly shows that he, as the king of the Jews, is in no way ashamed of Hiram's coming, which he realizes as a natural ordinance of God.

Hans Rookmaaker, "We and Art" in The Complete Works of Hans R. Rookmaaker, Vol. 4, pp. 350-351:

For now we want to concentrate on the first question, namely, that of whether God has assigned his people a positive task in connection with art. Has he given us the vocation to create art, to make ‘Christian art’ in distinction from ‘worldly art’? For only too often people have said, thinking things through ‘consistently’, that we must claim all fields for Christ and therefore also let our distinctive voices be heard in the realm of art. Yet in this way we may perhaps out of self-willed religiosity saddle ourselves with possibly irresolvable problems and heavy burdens. If we have such zeal for God yet without comprehension – since not according to God’s word and commandment (Romans 10:2 [‘they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge’]) – then the Lord will also reproach us as in Micah 6:3 ‘My people . . . how have I burdened you?’ For already in Micah’s day there were some who thought to justify themselves in such matters by appealing to David’s example, while at the same time forgetting the covenant (Amos 6:5). If we turn now and search the Scriptures to see where and how they speak of art, then we find that that only happens a few times and then almost in passing, nd that the Lord nowhere gives us an explicit commandment, for or against.

We find that for the making of the ark, God himself designates some artisans and fills them with wisdom and understanding so that they know how to make all the work in the service of the sanctuary according to God’s commandments. Yet the matter is one of a very narrowly defined commission extended to a handful of selected people. In 2 Chronicles 2 and 3 we learn of the building and furnishing of God’s Temple by Solomon. And who does he seek out to be responsible for the decorating and furnishing? There is no one in the nation of Israel whom he regards as suited. And so he sends to Hiram, the king of Tyre, to ask for his help. And the king of Tyre sends him Hiram Abi, the son of a worker in precious metals from Tyre. We do not know if this smith was a believer, yes or no, only that his mother was of the tribe of Dan. However that may be, he had learned his art, including the style, in Tyre. He was renowned for his wisdom and his understanding in making works of brass, including works decorated with figures and scenes. Naturally Solomon would have seen to it that the fonts dedicated to God were not decorated with heathen images, but for the rest this art would in principle not have differed in appearance from that of Tyre.

There is little more to be found about these matters in the Scriptures, including the New Testament, so we can conclude that God has not assigned us a special task with respect to them. God does not demand of us that we create a distinctive art or style of our own! On the other hand, it is obvious that if one of the Lord’s people is an artist, one may not just go out and make anything one wants in the way a worldly person might do, in disobedience to God’s commandments. Yet no great difficulties should arise here. For it is obvious that one may not make blasphemous or immoral presentations. The latter might lead people into temptation and incite them to commit unholy acts. And naturally one will also keep one’s distance from art that clearly bears the stamp of an apostate way of life. I have in mind, for example, modern Surrealism, which holds up to us a world that is totally devoid of meaning, without norms, decadent and without hope: but what believer could possibly be won for such ideals? Thus it is not so much the positive task of the Christian artist to create a distinctive style from scratch unconnected with the world; it is much rather the negative task of not producing works in which the theme selected or the thought communicated is contrary to God’s commandments or could lead believers, God’s children, into temptation.

Cultured or "Jes' Growed"

H. Henry Meeter, "Calvinism and Culture," in Calvinism: An Interpretation of Its Basic Ideas, pp. 80-81:

It is important to notice that culture always implies the thought of improvement, not just development. Topsy of Uncle Tom's Cabin "jes' growed"; she wasn't cultured. The great contents of culture, or rather its tools, are, therefore, never merely mechanical and chemical powers of nature, but science, art, technique, ethics, law, the state, always some product of the human mind. It is rather the activity of the human mind applied upon the forces of nature, and bringing creation by the use of these human powers to higher and nobler levels. Culture, in a word, is the fulfillment of the command given to man, the king of creation, by His Maker, in the Garden of Eden: "Keep the garden and dress it." "Have dominion over the earth and subdue it" (Cf. Genesis II). Man was made in the image of God. Just as God is King over the universe and has brought to pass many and noble things in the creation which He made, so He has given to man His image bearer control over nature as his dominion, and said to him: "Subdue creation, and bring out the many possibilities in it and in your own nature." Culture is the execution of this divinely appointed task. In his cultural task man is to take the raw materials of this universe and subdue them, make them serve his purpose and bring them to nobler and higher levels, thus bringing out the possibilities which are hidden in nature. When thus developed man is to lay his entire cultural product, the whole of creation, at the feet of Him Who is King of man and of nature, in Whose image and for Whom man and all things are created.

Calvinism and Culture

Leon Wencelius, "The Word of God and Culture," in The Word of God and the Reformed Faith: Addresses Delivered at the Second American Calvinistic Conference held at Calvin College and Seminary, Grand Rapids, Michigan, June 3, 4 and 5, 1942 (1943), pp. 160-161:

Culture is therefore the accomplishment of the creative will of God. It is the way in which man has been called to achieve his dominion on the earth and to replenish it. As man had to plough the ground in order to receive its fruits, man has to plough his mind in order to give birth to Art, Science, and Philosophy, which are the fruits of his culture.

The Word of God gives us further teaching on the nature of culture. It is said in the Psalms that the heavens, the whole creation, declare the glory of God. This is the first step toward real culture: to acknowledge the beauty of creation and to recognize in God the divine artist who has drawn it from nothing. Let us remember the way in which psalmists, prophets, and Christ praise the starry sky, the endless sea, the birds of the heavens, and the lilies of the fields. Knowledge of nature, as the work of art created by God, is the beginning of civilization. We discover here a fundamental truth: it is that culture was intended to be the natural revelation of God to mankind. When we read the Bible, when we try to understand the comments of Calvin, we are always struck by the same fact that creation as such was called upon to acquaint us with the Creator, that creation reveals to us His attributes and makes us better able to understand His nature. Divine glory always expresses itself in the form of beauty, and when we know how to see the universe as it has been made by God, we are the presence of the beautiful.

Therefore we are not surprised when we see that for Calvin the angels, the soul, the human body, the sky, the stars, the precious stones, and the most humble animals are the ornaments of the world, the works of art in the palace which is earth, "in order," he says, "that we may therein contemplate the majesty of God."

If we would be civilized, we must first try to see in the universe the divine light which radiates in it, the arrangement of its parts, the excellency of its order. Full of admiration and of joy, we shall be inspired to render supreme homage to the Creator.

We must secondly see in God what Calvin calls the miraculous workman, that is, in modern terms, the great artist whose masterpiece is the universe. God is according to the Reformer auctor et dator omnium artium; the author and bestower of the liberal as well as the technical arts. Thus culture appears to be not only a gift of God, as anything else in the world, but culture, because it is the art which permits civilization to go on, has also its origin in the creative activity of God Himself.

The word of God teaches us therefore to see in the trend of human thought and activity toward higher forms of civilization, the continuation of the creative impulse. As God has created earth and man from nothing, he has also wanted the highest in rank of his creatures to go on in the fulfilment of his divine will. As the artist uses a piece of marble to transform it into a symmetrical work of art, the statue, so God uses his creation through it to realize his higher purposes; and because man has been given intelligence, and with it a certain consciousness of the physical and the human world, God has, by his common grace, charged the most intelligent of men to realize certain forms of civilization.

Calvin's Academy in Virginia?

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. -- Inscribed on the library of the Academy of Geneva

Although Thomas Jefferson's hatred of John Calvin and Calvin's God is well-known,* it is less well-known that he once viewed with great favor a proposal put forward by François D'Ivernois (1757-1842) to transplant Calvin's Academy from Geneva to Northern Virginia. A 1794 attempt by revolutionaries to overthrow Geneva's government which targeted the faculty and ministers with imprisonment led D'Ivernois to reach out to American contacts later that year, including both Jefferson and John Adams, to negotiate for the school's relocation to the States. The plan fell apart due to a return to the status quo in Geneva as well as a lack of support from the Virginia legislature, which never voted on the proposal but conveyed in back channels to Wilson Nicholas, a confidante and go-between of Jefferson, its reasons, which in turn Jefferson reported to D'Ivernois.

In a letter to D'Ivernois dated February 6, 1795, Jefferson wrote:

Your proposition, however, for transplanting the college of Geneva to my own country, was too analogous to all my attachments to science, & freedom, the first-born daughter of science, not to excite a lively interest in my mind, and the essays which were necessary to try it's practicability.

He then listed the reasons for the lack of support from the Virginia legislature:

The reasons which they thought would with certainty prevail against it, were 1. that our youth, not familiarized but with their mother tongue, were not prepared to receive instructions in any other; 2d. that the expence of the institution would excite uneasiness in their constituents, & endanger it's permanence; & 3. that it's extent was disproportioned to the narrow state of the population with us.

George Washington later wrote to Jefferson (March 15, 1795) about the matter and listed further reasons for the lack of support:

Hence you will perceive that I have, in a degree, anticipated your proposition. I was restrained from going the whole length of the suggestion, by the following considerations: 1st, I did not know to what extent, or when any plan would be so matured for the establishment of an University, as would enable any assurance to be given to the application of Mr. D'Ivernois. 2d, the propriety of transplanting the Professors in a body, might be questioned for several reasons; among others, because they might not be all good characters; nor all sufficiently acquainted with our language; and again, having been at variance with the levelling party of their own country, the measure might be considered as an aristocratical movement by more than those who, without any just cause that I have been able to discover, are continually sounding the alarm bell of aristocracy. and 3d, because it might preclude some of the first Professors in other countries from a participation; among whom some of the most celebrated characters in Scotland, in this line, I am told might be obtained.

It was not Reformed orthodoxy that appealed to Jefferson; the Genevan Academy by that time had forsaken theological orthodoxy for "enlightenment" and devoted itself to the pursuit of science instead. There was no plan to establish a bastion of Calvinism in Virginia, but Jefferson did earnestly desire to build public education in the young United States, and just as he appreciated Calvin's political theories of resistance, he appreciated the Academy of Calvin as it existed in 1795, if not 1559. He went on to establish the University of Virginia in Charlottesville some years later, which was ahead of its time in banning the teaching of theology altogether.**

As a Virginian, I hope that one day a home-grown institution along the lines of Calvin's vision more than Jefferson's will be planted "over the river and under the shade of the trees."

*Jefferson letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823:

I can never join Calvin in addressing his God. He was indeed an Atheist, which I can never be; or rather his religion was Daemonism. If ever man worshipped a false god, he did. The being described in his 5. points is not the God whom you and I acknowledge and adore; but a daemon of malignant spirit. It would be more pardonable to believe in no God at all than to blaspheme by the atrocious attributes of Calvin.

Jefferson letter to William Short, April 13, 1820:

The Presbyterian clergy are the loudest, the most intolerant of all sects; the most tyrannical and ambitious, ready at the word of the law-giver, if such a word could now be obtained, to put their torch to the pile, and to rekindle in this virgin hemisphere the flame in which their oracle, Calvin, consumed the poor Servetus, because he could not find in his Euclid the proposition which has demonstrated that three are one, and one is three, nor subscribe to the proposition of Calvin, that magistrates have a right to exterminate all heretics to the Calvinistic creed. They pant to re-establish by law that holy inquisition which they can now only infuse into public opinion.

**Jefferson letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, October 7, 1814:

I agree with yours of the 22d, that a professorship of Theology should have no place in our institution.

Jefferson letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, November 2, 1822:

The atmosphere of our country is unquestionably charged with a threatening cloud of fanaticism, lighter in some parts, denser in others, but too heavy in all. I had no idea, however, that in Pennsylvania, the cradle of toleration and freedom of religion, it could have arisen to the height you describe. This must be owing to the growth of Presbyterianism. The blasphemy of the five points of Calvin, and the impossibility of defending them, render their advocates impatient of reasoning, irritable, and prone to denunciation....

In our university you know there is no Professorship of Divinity. A handle has been made of this, to disseminate an idea that this is an institution, not merely of no religion, but against all religion. Occasion was taken at the last meeting of the Visitors, to bring forward an idea that might silence this calumny, which weighed on the minds of some honest friends to the institution. In our annual report to the legislature, after stating the constitutional reasons against a public establishment of any religious instruction, we suggest the expediency of encouraging the different religious sects to establish, each for itself, a professorship of their own tenets, on the confines of the university, so near as that their students may attend the lectures there, and have the free use of our library, and every other accommodation we can give them; preserving, however, their independence of us and of each other. This fills the chasm objected to ours, as a defect in an institution professing to give instruction in all useful sciences. I think the invitation will be accepted, by some sects from candid intentions, and by others from jealousy and rivalship. And by bringing the sects together, and mixing them with the mass of other students, we shall soften their asperities, liberalize and neutralize their prejudices, and make the general religion a religion of peace, reason, and morality.

Finding TULIPs

Some time ago, I blogged about the Five Points of Calvinism, commonly referred to today as TULIP. At the time, I wrote that:

It is generally believed that Loraine Boettner was the first to coin the TULIP acrostic as a mnemonic device for easier memorization in his 1932 book, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination.

Recently, however, Wayne Sparkman, Director of the PCA Historical Center, has uncovered documentation which shows that the mnemonic device was used before Boettner, although in a slightly different form.

William H. Vail, "The Five Points of Calvinism Historically Considered," The New Outlook, Vol. 104 (May-August 1913), p. 394:

Some eight years ago [ie., 1905] I had the privilege of hearing a popular lecture, by Dr. [Cleland Boyd] McAfee (1866-1944), of Brooklyn, upon the Five Points of Calvinism, given before the Presbyterian Union of Newark, New Jersey, which was most interesting as well as instructive. To aid the mind in remembering the Five Points, Dr. McAfee made use of the word Tulip, which, possessing five letters, lends itself nicely to the subject in hand, especially as it ends with the letter P, as will be seen later.

Taking the five letters, Dr. McAfee used them as follows:

1st, T stands for Total Depravity.
2d, U " " Universal Sovereignty.
3d, L " " Limited Atonement.
4th, I " " Irresistable Grace.
5th, P " " Perseverance of the Saints.

It will be noticed that McAfee's acrostic employs "U" to represent "Universal Sovereignty," while Loraine Boetter's "U" represents "Unconditional Election." Boetter also refers to "Total Inability" rather than "Total Depravity." Nevertheless, it appears, based on this research, that credit should go to Dr. McAfee for the earliest usage of the TULIP acrostic to convey the Five Points of Calvinism, and to Mr. Sparkman for bringing this fascinating bit of history to our attention.

Common Grace and the Arts

Abraham Kuyper, Lectures on Calvinism, Lecture 5: Calvinism and the Arts:

And therefore I must still illustrate the second factor, which alone decides the case. I have already, more than once, called your attention to the important significance of the Calvinistic doctrine of “common grace,” and of course in this lecture on art I must refer to it again. That which is to be ecclesiastical must bear the stamp of faith, therefore genuine Christian art can only go out from believers. Calvinism, on the contrary, has taught us that all liberal arts are gifts which God imparts promiscuously to believers and to unbelievers, yea, that, as history shows, these gifts have flourished even in a larger measure outside the holy circle. "These radiations of Divine Light,” he wrote, “shone more brilliantly among unbelieving people than among God's saints.” And this of course quite reverses the proposed order of things. If you limit the higher enjoyment of art to regeneration, then this gift is exclusively the portion of believers, and must bear an ecclesiastical character. In that case it is the outcome of particular grace. But if, at the hand of experience and history, you become persuaded that the highest art-instincts are natural gifts, and hence belong to those excellent graces which, in spite of sin, by virtue of common grace, have continued to shine in human nature, it plainly follows that art can inspire both believers and unbelievers, and that God remains Sovereign to impart it, in His good pleasure, alike to Heathen and to Christian nations. This applies not only to art, but to all the natural utterances of human life, and is illustrated by the comparison in early times between Israel and the other nations. As far as holy things are concerned, Israel is chosen, and is not only blessed above all nations, but stands among all nations, isolated In the question of Religion, Israel has not only a larger share, but Israel alone has the truth, and all the other nations, even the Greeks and the Romans, are bent beneath the yoke of falsehood. Christ is not partly of Israel and partly of the nations; He is of Israel alone. Salvation is of the Jews. But just in proportion as Israel shines forth from within the domain of Religion, so is it equally backward when you compare the development of its art, science, politics, commerce and trade to that of the surrounding nations. The building of the Temple required the coming of Hiram from a heathen country to Jerusalem; and Solomon, in whom, after all, was found the Wisdom of God, not only knows that Israel stands behind in architecture and needs help from without, but by his action he publicly shows that he, as the king of the Jews, is in no way ashamed of Hiram's coming, which he realizes as a natural ordinance of God.