History of Calvinism (the Reformed tradition)

History & overview · every faith gets one

Grace chooses first — sovereignty all the way down.

The Reformed branch of the Reformation: God's sovereignty carried to system by John Calvin's Geneva. Election before merit, scripture as the final rule, and a work ethic that — on one famous argument — built the modern world by accident.

The founding

A French humanist on the run published the Institutes at twenty-six, was talked into staying in Geneva, and turned one city into the laboratory of Reformed Christianity.

Its founding is bound to John Calvin — 1536 CE.

What it holds

Reality. Authored by a sovereign God — history is not improvised.

The divine. One God in three persons.

Death and after. Resurrection and judgment.

The line

descent is public here — where it came from, what left it

Judaism — c. 1000 BCE Christianity — 30 CE Catholicism Protestantism — 1517 CE Calvinism (the Reformed tradition) — 1536 CE

Branches:

Presbyterianism — The church governed by elders, reformed by the Word.

Keep going

Back to the overview — the living page: elements, discussion, the web The Belief room — the claims themselves, with sources and context Branch Calvinism (the Reformed tradition) — inherit everything, change what you must