And what benefit, in turn, is to be gained from reading and rightly inter-
preting Holy Scripture? We will learn, says Calvin, that God‘is One whom all
ought to honor and adore’. Even more important, we will be
persuaded that [God] is the fountain of every good, and that we must seek
nothing elsewhere than in him. This I take to mean that not only does he sustain
this universe (as he once founded it) by his boundless might, regulate it by his
wisdom, preserve it by his goodness, and especially rule mankind by his right-
eousness and judgment, bear with it in his mercy, watch over it by his protection;
but also that no drop will be found either of wisdom and light, or of righteousness
or power or rectitude, or of genuine truth, which does notflow from him, and of
which he is not the cause. Thus we may learn to await and seek all these things
from him, and thankfully to ascribe them, once received, to him.^11This, says Calvin, is what he calls‘piety’. The benefit of reading and rightly
interpreting Scripture is piety. Piety‘is that reverence joined with love of God
which the knowledge of his benefits induces. Until men recognize that they
owe everything to God, that they are nourished by his fatherly care, that he is
the Author of their every good, that they should seek nothing beyond him—
they will never yield him willing service.’^12
This is classic Renaissance humanism in its evangelical version: we are
to immerse ourselves in an ancient text, in this case, Holy Scripture; we do
so under the guidance of an erudite scholar; we do so not for its own sake
but so as to be nurtured in piety.
Our word‘piety’is derived from the Latin word that Calvin used,pietas.
I judge that it is, nonetheless, a poor translation for what Calvin has in mind,
for its connotations in present-day English are all wrong. What we nowadays
call‘a pious person’is not what Calvin has in mind. Better, I think, is our word
‘devotion’. Reading and rightly interpreting Scripture is for the sake of build-
ing us up in Christian devotion.
Those who open theInstitutesin the expectation that they will be reading
philosophical theology will be disappointed. There is no discussion of God’s
simplicity, virtually no discussion of God’s immutability, virtually no discus-
sion of God’s impassibility, virtually no discussion of God’s eternity. Those
who open it in the expectation that they will be reading systematic theology
will likewise be disappointed. Calvin does indeed discuss the topics of which
systematic theologians are fond. To be sure, he discusses the Trinity and the
Incarnation, the central topics of the ecumenical creeds. He also deals with
atonement, election, and justification, the central topics of the Reformed
confessions. But his discussion of these topics is not organized as a systematic
theologian would organize it. TheInstitutesis neither philosophical theology
nor systematic theology. It isformationtheology, theology aimed at personal
(^11) Calvin,InstitutesI.ii.1, 40–1. (^12) Calvin,InstitutesI.ii.1, 41.
82 Nicholas Wolterstorff