HOW DO YOU COMPARE THEM? LUTHER AND CALVIN ON THE WILL AS
A TEST CASE FOR HISTORICAL COMPARISON
By Matthew C. Heckel
Ph.D. Candidate, Concordia Seminary, St. Louis
12183 McKelvey Rd.
Maryland Heights, MO 63043
(314) 209-7457
The Catholic Humanist Albert Pighius attacked Calvin`s 1539 Institutes with his Ten
Books on Human Free Choice and Divine Grace (Free Choice) (1542).
1
Pighius had
written against Luther and Melanchthon a year earlier
2
and kept Luther in view
throughout Free Choice as he was not just attacking Calvin but the whole cause of
reform.
3
One of the more serious charges that Pighius levelled against the Reformers was
dissension in the ranks, accusing them of backing away from Luther`s position that all
things happen by divine necessity. Luther had argued that the divine will, in ruling all
things, imposes necessity and produces good and bad effects in the godly and ungodly
respectively.
4
Calvin responded to Pighius with The Bondage and Liberation of the Will:
A Defense of the Orthodox Doctrine of Human Choice against Pighius (BLW) (1543).
5
In
BLW, Calvin defended Luther`s position and claimed solidarity with him on the bondage
of the human to the divine will and affirmed that all things happen by necessity.
6
Calvin
1
For treatments of Free Choice see Lane, Introduction, BLW, xvii. L. F. Schulze, Calvin's Reply
to Pighius (Potchefstroom, South Africa: Pro Rege-Press, 1971), 15-17.
2
Diligent and Lucid Exposition of the Controversies by Which the Faith and Religion of Christ
Are Being Disturbed (Controversies). For the significance of Controversies see A. N. S. Lane,
Introduction, in John Calvin, The Bondage and Liberation of the Will: A Defense of the Orthodox
Doctrine of Human Choice against Pighius (BLW), ed. A. N. S. Lane, trans. G. I. Davies (Grand Rapids:
Paternoster, Baker, 1996), xvii.
3
BLW 21, 22.
4
Assertio omnium articulorum. WA 7, 144.34-35, 146.4-8, 31-32.
5
Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia (OC), vol. 6, ed. J. W. Baum et al. (Brunswick,
1863-1900), 229-404. The only English translation is BLW.
6
While Pighius made Calvin speak to the issue of consensus with Luther on divine necessity, he
also saw the two Reformers as one on the issue of human inability in salvation because of bondage to sin.