Calvin for the World: The Enduring Relevance of His Political, Social, and Economic Theology - Paperback

by Rubén Rosario Rodríguez (Author)

John Calvin was arguably the most influential of the sixteenth-century Reformers. His supporters praise his transformative influence on the ecclesial, political, and economic spheres of modern life, while his detractors paint him as a ruthless proponent of theocracy. These conflicting images suggest there is more to Calvin than meets the eye.

In Calvin for the World, Rubén Rosario Rodríguez offers a creative engagement with Calvin's theological and political thought and a critical reclamation of the Reformer's legacy. Rosario Rodríguez presents Calvin's theology in historical context and explores his global impact by examining his views on a broad range of social and cultural issues, including those that pertain to political theology, migration and dislocation, nationalism, social welfare policies, revolution, racism, and religious pluralism. This book shows how Calvin's theological legacy impacted the formation of the modern world, its worldview, and its social institutions and presents Calvin as an engaging interlocutor on contemporary matters of social, political, racial, and economic justice.

This book will be ideal for professors and students of theology for use in courses on Calvin, the Reformation, and church history. It will also be of interest to pastors and church leaders.

Back Jacket

Why Does John Calvin Matter for the Twenty-First Century?

Calvin for the World offers a fresh evaluation of John Calvin's theological and political thought, showing how his theological legacy impacted the formation of the modern world, its worldview, and its social institutions and why Calvin remains a valuable theological interlocutor for those interested in advancing the work of social, political, racial, and economic justice today.

"By setting Calvin's theology in its original contexts and following oft-neglected lineages of reception, Rosario Rodr?guez illuminates the experiences of dislocation and migration that stand behind Calvin's vision for reform and unveils that vision's liberative potential for theologies during and since the Reformation era."
--Kenneth J. Woo, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary

"This lively text ranges over many topics that contemporary people would see as their own concerns. Rosario Rodr?guez shares the exciting surprises that his students have encountered when he has brought voices from many contexts into dialogue with Calvin, and he makes a good case that the so-called dictator of Geneva has something relevant to say today, that this long misread (or rather, unread) pastor is a viable and even worthwhile conversation partner on these 'modern' issues."
--Elsie McKee, Princeton Theological Seminary (emerita)

"Calvin for the World shows us what it looks like to thoughtfully engage with a theological giant who bears a complicated legacy and yet still says much that may be of value for us today. In Rosario Rodr?guez's capable hands, Calvin is revealed to be a proto-liberationist by the lights of his own convictions as he is interpreted through the genius of his most radical followers."
--Jonathan Tran, author of Asian Americans and the Spirit of Racial Capitalism

"An excellent contribution to the analysis of the importance of Calvin as a leader of the emerging Protestant Christian theology. Rosario Rodr?guez carefully analyzes the various aspects of Calvinist thought and their implications for the convergences between Calvinism, Lutheranism, and Catholicism. I recommend attentive and careful reading of this extraordinary book."
--Luis N. Rivera-Pag?n, Princeton Theological Seminary (emeritus)

Author Biography

Rubén Rosario Rodríguez (PhD, Princeton Theological Seminary), an ordained Presbyterian minister, holds the Clarence Louis and Helen Steber Professorship in Theological Studies and directs the Mev Puleo Program in Latin American Politics, Theology, and Culture at Saint Louis University in St. Louis, Missouri. His recent publications include Dogmatics after Babel, the T&T Clark Handbook of Political Theology, and Theological Fragments: Confessing What We Know and Cannot Know about an Infinite God. He has also done advocacy work with Missouri Immigrant and Refugee Advocates (MIRA).