The Truth about Jesus : Is He a Myth?Mangasarian, M. M. (Mangasar Mugurditch)
Religion
The Truth about Jesus : Is He a Myth?
Mangasarian, M. M. (Mangasar Mugurditch)
Jesus Christ -- Historicity; Rationalism
It is not our purpose to grudge Calvin any compliments which Felix
Adler wishes to pay him. What we grieve to see is, that he should,
indirectly at least, recommend to the admiration of his readers a man
who, if he existed today and acted as he did in the Geneva of the
sixteenth century, would be regarded by every morally and
intellectually awakened man, as a criminal. Has not Felix Adler
examined the evidence which incriminates Calvin and proves him beyond
doubt as the murderer of Servetus? "If he (Servetus) comes to Geneva,
I shall see that he does not escape alive," wrote John Calvin to
Theodore Beza. And he carried out his fearful menace; Servetus was put
to death by the most horrible punishment ever invented--he was burned
alive in a smoking fire. What did this mighty and noble man do to save
a stranger and a scholar from so atrocious a fate? Let his eulogist,
Prof. Adler, answer. It will not do to say that those were different
times. A thousand voices were raised against the wanton and cruel
murder of Servetus, but Calvin's was not among them. In fact, when
Calvin himself was a fugitive and a wanderer, he had written in favor
of religious tolerance, but no sooner did he become the Protestant
pope of Geneva, than he developed into an exterminator of heresy by
fire. Such is the "mighty and noble man" held up for our admiration.
"Mighty" he was, but we ask again, was he mighty in a noble sense?
Had Calvin been considered a "mighty and noble man" by the reformers
who preceded Prof. Adler, there would have been no Ethical Culture
societies in America today. Prof. Adler is indebted for the liberties
which he enjoys in New York to the Voltaires and the Condorcets, who
regarded Calvin and his "isms" as pernicious to the intellectual life
of Europe, and did all they could to lead the people away from them.
Think of the leader of the Ethical Societies exalting a persecutor, to
say nothing of his abominable theology, or of his five _aliases,_
as "that mighty and noble man;--John Calvin!" We feel grateful to
Prof. Adler for organizing the Ethical Societies in American, but we
would be pleased to have him explain in what sense a man of Calvin's
small sympathies and terrible deeds could be called both "noble and
mighty." [Footnote: See "The Kingdom of God in Geneva Under Calvin."--M.
M. Mangasarian.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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