June 5, 1559

On June 5, 1559, John Calvin helped found the academy at Geneva. On this episode of 5 Minutes in Church History, Dr. Stephen Nichols explains the significant role that this school played in equipping young men to boldly proclaim the gospel.

June 5, 1559. That was a very important date for the city of Geneva. It was on that date that the academy at Geneva was officially founded. Some other key dates are 1798, and that year none other than Napoleon reformulated this academy, and in 1872, the academy at Geneva emerged as an entirely transformed university. But let's go back to its founding, and let's go back to that date, June 5, 1559.

There was already a school in Geneva, and this school tended to serve the younger ages. It was what we would call a public school. Calvin had an intense interest in this school, but he also wanted to found a new school, a new academy that would pick up the education from ages sixteen on—what we would consider a college. Now, this comes from his time in Strausborg. When he was in Strausborg, he was pastoring. This was, of course, his exile from Geneva. He had gone to Geneva, was pastor there, was kicked out of Geneva. He's in Strausborg. He's pastoring two congregations. These are French-speaking congregations that he's ministering to and essentially in his home, which was just down the street from one of the churches he pastored. In his home, he had a default college. He was training young men there in theology, even in law, in the humanities, in logic, in the languages, and it was there in Calvin's own home that this idea of the academy was born.

Well, Calvin is called back to Geneva from Strausborg and was able to open his academy in 1559. He had help, of course. One key figure that came alongside of him was Theodore Beza. Beza had been at Lausanne, and he was brought down to Geneva by Calvin to be the rector of the academy at Geneva, and on June 5th, he was the one who gave the inaugural address.

This academy was a fascinating place. For one, do you want to guess how much tuition was? Zero dollars. It was free! For another, it was open to anyone—didn't need to be of noble birth, but you did need to qualify. That is to say that you needed to know your Latin. And in addition to knowing your Latin, you also had to affirm a theological confession. This was the confession for the students of Geneva from 1559. It included statements on the doctrine of God, the doctrine of Christ. Of course, it's going to include a statement on sola fide. It's going to include a statement on sola Scriptura, and it is going to remind these students of their duties as citizens to obey the magistrates and to be good law-abiding citizens of the city of Geneva.

Philip Hughes said of Calvin's academy, there at Geneva, this:

Calvin's Geneva was something very much more than a haven and a school. It was not a theological ivory tower that lived to itself and for itself, oblivious to its responsibility in the gospel to the needs of others. Human vessels were equipped and refitted in this haven…that they might launch out into the surrounding ocean of the world's need, bravely facing every storm and peril that awaited them in order to bring the light of Christ's gospel to those who were in the ignorance and darkness from which they themselves had originally come. They were taught in this school in order that they in turn might teach others the truth that had set them free.

From the very beginning, Calvin's academy had three subjects: law, medicine, and theology. All of the students would have studied Bible. They had a smattering of Greek and Hebrew in order to be let in, but once they were there, they would know their Greek. They would know their Hebrew. They would know their Bible. They would know their theology, and they would also be trained in what we call today Reformed scholasticism. That is that rigorous method of logic and analysis of all of their subjects. So there it was, June 5, 1559, the founding of the academy at Geneva by Calvin and others. I'm Steve Nichols, and thanks for joining us for 5 Minutes in Church History.