Paul as Calvin's (Ambivalent) Pastoral Model

Abstract

For the last two decades,1 scholars have been drawing attention to the fact that the academy has not yet delved fully enough into the fate of the clergy during the Reformation.2 That oversight has only been somewhat corrected in those two decades, not only for social and cultural historians, but also for theologians and historians of doc trine. We can demonstrate this in the case of John Calvin and Geneva. Frequendy, a less than helpful glance at Calvin's two 'marks' of the church, the pure preaching and hearing of the Word and the right administration of the sacraments, suffices for having 'dealt with' pastoral activity in Calvin's Geneva. Anyone who has ever been, or actually ever seen a pastor senses that this is incomplete, yet the scarcity of studies into what Calvin actually believed about the nature of the pastorate remains a stark reminder of that which awaits completion.3