Luther--But No Calvin

[Desmond Hume]

I was reading Max Weber's "Protestant Ethic" tonight, and I came across this comment:

"...although the Reformation would have been inconceivable without Luther's personal religious development and has always borne the stamp of his personality, his work would never have achieved outward permanence without Calvinism"

Now, I've seen what-if's about Luther being removed from history (there's that story about him narrowly avoiding being struck by lightning, for instance), but I don't recall seeing anything about Luther living as OTL but Calvin being removed without making any impact on history. So, say Calvin gets fried by a lightning bolt but Luther still does everything he did in OTL: what effect does this have on early modern religious conflict?

 

[Fibis]

An excellent topic I dread to think what could of happened

On the British stage the civil war would not have lasted as long if it started at all. The new model army would not have as hardline puritan values.

The Union of Scotland and England would have happened in a more amiable way than the 1707 version

The intellectual vigour of the non-conformists would have been missing and the conquest of North America would have had different intellectual drivers and values

 

[dreadnought jenkins]

An excellent topic I dread to think what could of happened

On the British stage the civil war would not have lasted as long if it started at all. The new model army would not have as hardline puritan values.

The Union of Scotland and England would have happened in a more amiable way than the 1707 version

The intellectual vigour of the non-conformists would have been missing and the conquest of North America would have had different intellectual drivers and values

Not to mention the affect of no Calvin would have on the Huguenots, which then has knock on effects for the French Wars of Religion. Or how it affects John Knox and his own reformation in Scotland. Or the Marian exiles who fled to the Calvinist bastion of Geneva during Mary's persecutions.

The knock on effects would be immense. This is actually a rather interesting POD.

 

[Strategos' Risk]

No TULIP or predestination, Protestantism remains mainly a lite version of Catholicism with some dramatic differences, Christian theology is forever changed.

 

[Foryn]

Protestantism probably would have stayed closer to Catholicism in both form and function (remember Luther started out to reform the church, not split it in two) as well as being far more amicable for a long time.

These changes would easily filter on down through time, the more violent sects of Protestantism would most likely not exist or at least be subdued without having a clerical backing in early church history.

 

[Jasen777]

The Swiss Reformation started without Calvin and was already most of the way to Calvinism and sufficiently different from Lutheranism (symbolic view of Lord's Super, throwing out everything not in scripture instead of just throwing out stuff that was anti-scriptural - much greater break from Catholicism). No Calvin does not mean the Reformation is only Lutheranism. This (perhaps) Zwinglianism will still be a major player, if a bit less popular without Calvin's writings.

 

[jycee]

The Swiss Reformation started without Calvin and was already most of the way to Calvinism and sufficiently different from Lutheranism (symbolic view of Lord's Super, throwing out everything not in scripture instead of just throwing out stuff that was anti-scriptural - much greater break from Catholicism). No Calvin does not mean the Reformation is only Lutheranism. This (perhaps) Zwinglianism will still be a major player, if a bit less popular without Calvin's writings.

It will probably be quite less popular. Mostly confined to Switzerland, where it might still become the majority. But it might not be able to make it past France and parts of the HRE (where it would be easily crushed by Catholicism and Lutheranism).

So the French wars of Religion might still happen but at a much smaller scale.

Scotland and England are too far away. So we might see big changes here from OTL.

 

[Alex Richards]

Looks like Scottish Probestrianism is gone. That's going to make England and Scotland much more unified than OTL (because with a PoD in the 1530s and the Tudors record on producing heirs, it seem most likely that there will be a union of the crowns at some point soon.)

 

[mikegold]

Wouldn't Zwingli or someone else just serve as the inspiration for alt-Calvinism?

At the very least, once you are willing to question Roman doctrine and analyze the bible individually, all sorts of creative theologies become possible.

 

[Dathi THorfinnsson]

Looks like Scottish Probestrianism is gone. That's going to make England and Scotland much more unified than OTL (because with a PoD in the 1530s and the Tudors record on producing heirs, it seem most likely that there will be a union of the crowns at some point soon.)

Why? Why can't they do Zwinglianism? Or some variant of Lutheranism?

Googling, it looks like Knox picked up his leanings under the influence of George Wishart, who studied with.... Zwingli. So, no Calvin, no matter

 

[black angel]

one should note In the start Luther didn't mean to make a new church, he didn't view Lutheranism as a different religion than Catholicism, Luther viewed Lutheranism as a purified Catholicism the way the Apostles would of liked it, soon the whole Church would reform it self to be that way, Lutheranism was a temporary separation till the Church reformed. Calvinism did a lot to force Lutherans to come to terms with the fact that it wasn't a temporary separation but a full blown split

 

[Susano]

The Swiss Reformation started without Calvin and was already most of the way to Calvinism and sufficiently different from Lutheranism (symbolic view of Lord's Super, throwing out everything not in scripture instead of just throwing out stuff that was anti-scriptural - much greater break from Catholicism). No Calvin does not mean the Reformation is only Lutheranism. This (perhaps) Zwinglianism will still be a major player, if a bit less popular without Calvin's writings.

I agree that in Switzerland it would make little difference.
However, the reason that Calvinism became so popular outside the Germanic speaking nations is that he was so widely translated (and that he was francophone in the first place, IIRC), while Luther and Zwingli were not. I see no reason why the latter would change, so without Calvin there would be much less protetsantism, epriod, and probably no major hugenot-equivalent movement, either.

 

[Jasen777]

France is still going to be exposed to the Protestant ideas from French speaking Geneva. Likely not as effectively as Calvin did, but tough to say how much less.

 

[Dathi THorfinnsson]

I agree that in Switzerland it would make little difference.
However, the reason that Calvinism became so popular outside the Germanic speaking nations is that he was so widely translated (and that he was francophone in the first place, IIRC), while Luther and Zwingli were not. I see no reason why the latter would change, so without Calvin there would be much less protetsantism, epriod, and probably no major hugenot-equivalent movement, either.

Except that 1) John Knox is still likely going to be going to Switzerland and Zwinglian stuff will be translated into English.
2) The Dutch are one of the hotbeds of Calvinism OTL, and French translations won't help there. Oh, you said 'non-Germanic' Missed that. Still.
3) as someone else pointed out, Geneva is French and Zwinglian.

Jean Chauvin (whom we know as John Calvin) was, indeed, French.

 

[Epimethius]

Umm I'm not so sure that just getting rid of John Calvin would eliminate Calvinism. The evidence suggests that Zwingli did have a larger impact on the development of Reformed thought then is generally accorded him. I think that getting rid of John Calvin would create a more relaxed version of Calvinism but there would still be something that may not be called Calvinism (perhaps Zwinglism) but would essentially be a more relaxed version of Calvinism. I think the biggest change may be in the Netherlands where the division between the hardline Calvinists and the Arminian Calvinists was a major source of strife (economic and political issues were argued under those banners). If you get rid of the inflexible elements in the movement called Calvinism (all brought in by Jean Calvin, who was not the most tolerant man) you may see less strife in the Netherlands during the formative period of the Eighty years wars as the country is more unified on religious grounds.

 

[Fearless Leader]

Without Jean Calvin and his major work The Institutes of the Christian Religion Reformed thought, though it would still exist, would be much less cohesive, and far less popular. Protestant thought as a whole would be a lot weaker than OTL without Calvin's comphrensive Institutes to provide a sort of ideological framework and guide. That being said, I'd wager that without Jean Calvin, the Counter-Reformation would be a good deal more successful, perhaps forever changing the face of Europe.

 

[Jord839]

I always thought that there were still significant differences between Zwingli and Calvin's teachings, and the few things they had in common were more opposition to the church. For example, AFAIK predestination was not part of Zwingli's teachings at all, unlike Calvin. Full disclosure, I haven't read any info on the subject in upwards of five years so you'll excuse me if I'm screwing this up in my head.

Also, IOTL I was fairly certain Geneva was Calvinist, not Zwinglist.

Granted, it's been a long time since I read over the subject, but from what I remember even if Zwinglism takes over for Calvinism as a major strain of the Reformation it's not going to be the same thing as Calvinism.

 

[Tobit]

Removing Calvin might not be that big a deal. He did have his movement in Geneva but he was one of many learned men in a time of upheaval. Alot of people and movements that were already making huge changes the world Arianism, Lutherism, Zwingli, and Anabaptists. Calvin was a great writer and smart man, but there are plenty of others we probably never heard of before who could do similar.

I don't see it changing much the big struggle between Reformation and Counter Reformation. There was too much momentum for the Reformation prior to Calvin, and with later movements like Socinianism and Arminianism, there will still be a lot of life in the reformation.

So yeah I will have to ask Max Weber what the hell are you smoking? Inventor of sociology, more like inventor of loserology!

 

[Epimethius]

I always thought that there were still significant differences between Zwingli and Calvin's teachings, and the few things they had in common were more opposition to the church. For example, AFAIK predestination was not part of Zwingli's teachings at all, unlike Calvin. Full disclosure, I haven't read any info on the subject in upwards of five years so you'll excuse me if I'm screwing this up in my head.

Also, IOTL I was fairly certain Geneva was Calvinist, not Zwinglist.

Granted, it's been a long time since I read over the subject, but from what I remember even if Zwinglism takes over for Calvinism as a major strain of the Reformation it's not going to be the same thing as Calvinism.

No it won't be the same and in fact if Zwinglism were to be the predominate reformed alternative to Luther, you might see more theocratic reformed States. Having done some basic research in terms of differences between Zwingli and Calvin, from a purely theological stand point they are pretty close in doctrine, with two differences, one being how they approach the Eucharist (Zwingli thought it was purely symbolic, Calvin wasn't quite ready to go that far) and separation of Church and State. Zwingli did not think there should be separation of Church and state (Something he apparently was very firm on), while Calvin acknowledged the separation but thought states should be run in a Christian fashion (this is never explicitely stated by Calvin, I'm paraphrasing the Calvinist mindset that I grew up with). So you get a much more militant form of Calvinism originating out of the mountains. Anyone care to figure out what happens next especially if you have a POD that involves Zwingli living longer?