Reformation Humanism: Reading the Classics in the New Theology

Scholarly discussions on what constitutes Christian humanism in the Renaissance and Reformation periods have typically concentrated on its manifestations before 1536, when Erasmus died. In this period, the old arguments for the reading of the Classics once set out by Basil and Augustine still predominated. Calvin’s teaching on the Fall and the noetic effects of sin, however, provided another basis for the incorporation of pagan thought into Christian learning. Christians who followed Calvin benefited from his precise and comprehensive theological position on the place of worldly knowledge in God’s original creation as a means for justifying their study of the Classics.