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St Francis Magazine Nr. 3 Vol. IV (December 2008)

St Francis Magazine is published by Interserve and Arab Vision

www.stfrancismagazine.info - www.interserve.org - www.arabvision.org

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John Calvin and Messianic Islam

By Bill Nikides

1. Authentic Witness: Split personality or unambiguous identity?

We humans love to tell ourselves stories. As an 18 year old, I imagined coming back to the

fourth grade with my 18 year old physical abilities. I could therefore win the high jump for the

first time. I had always wanted to believe that I was a champion athlete, but in reality I never

managed better than second place. I also dreamed, in my child scientist period, that I could

invent a tree that produced stuffed olives, the kind you often see in martini glasses. I thought I,

by sheer will, could overcome the limitations of nature and my own intellect. I was, sad to say,

quite the rationalizer. We have a boundless talent for imagination connected with will that

produces both art and rationalization. Missionaries in particular among believers seem to have a

bottomless well of creative energy. We for example now tell ourselves that we can indeed see the

conversion of the world without the world hating us. In other words, confronting the world with

Jesus can be done in such a way that it engenders the world’s respect and appreciation. This of

course is sheer fantasy. It is first of all to forget the scandal of the cross. The cross is a sign of

perversion and obscenity to the world that earned both Christ and his followers its ire. In fact, our

pursuit of a crossless witness both imperils our mission to the world and our souls as well, as it

separates us from Christ and his true body. It is an infection that now afflicts the church in the

West.

Well, you might ask, what has all this to do with Calvin? He had no ministry to Muslims. Some

even take the view that he had no missionary orientation at all. On the second point, we can

dispense with this quickly. The movement he started and equipped that emanated from Geneva in

the 16th century, spiraling its way throughout Northern Europe, in less than 10 years accounted

for 2,150 church plants. Somehow, these statistics are discounted. We say, these are not properly

missionary since they involved France, his home country and other European domains. But this

is surely applying definitions for “mission” that read backwards into events. They were, of

course, missionary because Calvin himself saw these initiatives as taking the gospel where it had

never been heard. The fact that medieval Roman Catholicism was the established religion did not

alter the fact that this was not seen as gospel religion by second-generation reformers such as

Calvin. To him, this was missionary ministry. Furthermore, Calvin indeed sent out missionaries

from Geneva to Brazil. This should dispense with any claim that Calvin was not missional in a

proper sense.

Our topic also has a great deal to do with Calvin for another reason. The entire topic of messianic

Islam which we will treat here is, in a sense, nothing new. There is an old history of professing

believers, under the pressure of persecution or opposition, that are willing to hide or obscure their

open identity to Christ by remaining visibly within their original faith systems. Calvin wrote

extensively on the phenomenon in his time, within a Roman Catholic, European context, but the

situation he described is analogous to the one faced by the church as it witnesses of Christ to the

Muslim world. It not only happens today, but it is taught as a preferred tactic by scores of

Western missionaries. To them, it is completely acceptable to love Jesus in your heart, but

worship in the mosque as a visible, observant Muslim. What a contrast with our past.

2. Legacy of Martyrs: The Formation of the Believer's identity




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I hope to demonstrate in this short work that historic, biblical Christianity is anchored in a

tradition of sacrificial witness that runs through the OLD Testament, Second Temple Judaism, the

early church and the Reformation. This is so because orthodox, historic Christianity’s

understanding of faithful witness was shaped by its covenantal connections to Judaism, what

Rodney Stark calls a “pre-existing network” (Stark 20). The Old Testament testifies to the

premium placed on faithful witness lived out among unbelievers. Daniel “resolved that he would

not defile himself with the king’s food, or with the king’s wine that he drank (Dan 1:8).” The

testimonies of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego’s faithfulness as they faced death for not

worshipping idols reinforced the Jewish ideal of covenantal purity in the midst of physical threats

(Dan 3).

3. Establishing authentic faith Jewish style

Second Temple Judaism repeated and extended the ideal. It developed a detailed concept of

martyrdom for example. Martyrs were those who:

Publically declared their allegiance to God and the Torah despite official demands

to betray their commitments or die

Perceived that the act of dying for this testimony fulfilled a religious imperative to

die rather than commit apostasy

Believed that their deaths served a larger redemptive purpose for Israel as a whole

(Lander).

2 Maccabees set in second century BC Judea treats the period of the tyranny of Antiochus

Epiphanes IV. Chapters six and seven, in particular, describe the Hellenistic attempt to wipe out

Jewish devotion or subvert it by contaminating it with paganism. These chapters also embodied

the ideal of faithfulness rather than compromise the truth or identify with unbelief. Chapter six

described the nature of the persecution. “A man could neither keep the Sabbath, nor observe the

feasts of his fathers, nor as much confess himself to be a Jew (6-7 RSV).” Additionally, the

king’s birthday, celebrated monthly, was accompanied by the forced Jewish participation in

pagan sacrifices, the ritual eating of pork etc. Two women were arrested for circumcising their

sons. Consequently, the text tells us, they were all thrown off the battlements surrounding the

city of Jerusalem and killed(10). Others were burned alive for observing the Sabbath in a cave

(11). A 90 year old scribe, Eleazar, after refusing to eat pork, was killed on the rack (28). His

words expressed what every Jew knew was right, even as many compromised in order to save

their own lives. When asked to just pretend to eat (the act of eating was enough to satisfy the

authorities since it signaled a fatal syncretism) he stated, “Such pretense is not worthy of our time

of life lest many of the young should suppose that Eleazar in his 90th year has gone over to an

alien religion, and through my pretense, for the sake of living a brief moment longer, they should

be led astray because of me, while I defile and disgrace my old age (24-25).”

Chapter seven recounts the story of a woman and her seven sons arrested and tortured in order to

force them to eat pork and defile their religion. The first son refused, claiming “we are ready to

die rather than transgress the laws of our fathers (2).” His stubbornness led to his captors cutting

off his tongue and hands, finally frying him in a giant pan (4-5). The second son, while breathing

his last, exclaimed, “You dismiss us from this present life, but the king of the universe will raise

us up to an everlasting renewal of life (9).” The story concludes with the mother’s own death,

also without compromise. This formed the ethic of the early church as it dealt with persecution.




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Though, in the course of events many soiled their garments through compromise and syncretism,

it was clear that orthodox faith was exemplified by faithful witness confirmed by suffering.

4. Revelational witness and the DNA of the Church

Martyrdom became a recognized and celebrated heritage of the church. Its central role in the

forming identity of the Church is obvious in the book of Revelation. To the church in Smyrna,

the angel said: “Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold the devil is about to throw some

of you into prison, that you may be tested, and for ten days you will have tribulation. Be faithful

unto death and I will give you a crown of life (2:9-10).” The Word to the Thyatirans who have

not been corrupted by syncretism was, “Only hold fast what you have until I come. The one who

conquers and who keeps my works until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations

(2:25-26).” Chapter six contains the image of martyrs huddled under an altar asking how long

they have to remain in their condition. “Then they were given a white robe and told to rest a little

longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were

to be killed as they themselves had been (6:11).” Suffering, faithful witness without limits or

compromise lay at the heart of what it meant to be a follower of the Lamb of God. To equivocate

was to separate oneself from that identity.

Persecutions of Christians were sporadic initially as both the Roman Empire and Jewish

synagogal authorities attempted to come to grips with the new faith. It fell to later generations to

experience the brunt of opposition to the gospel. The anniversary of martyrdoms became part of

the church’s sacred calendar beginning with the second century. After the fourth, martyrs became

a special class of saints. In the beginning, however, martyrs embodied the ideal of the believer

(Davidson 205). There was no distinction between mortal and superhero examples of faith.

There was only truth that was witnessed to by faithfulness and a lack of compromise.

5. The Roman Holocaust and Early Christianity

Roman persecution of the early church came in waves, largely after 150 AD. The church in

Lyons, for example, suffered martyrdom at the hands of the mob. People apostatized, claiming

never to have been true believers, sparing themselves of torture. Most professing Christians,

however, chose to remain faithful, dying in captivity or being used as gladiatorial substitutes in

the Coliseum. In all, 48 believers were martyred (Davidson 208). In 180, 12 more North African

believers gave thanks for their death sentences. The emperor Decius unleashed a ferocious

persecution, particularly in the Eastern half of the Roman Empire. Like the Jews under the reign

of Antiochus Epiphanes IV, Christians were forced to make pagan sacrifice. Initial resistance

was weak and Roman officials could scarcely cope with the rush of Christians willing to “make

things right” by performing acts of ritual sacrifice. The bishop of Smyrna, Euctemon personally

led his congregation to the temple. People feared for both their lives and their confiscation of

property.

A few, such as the presbyter of Smyrna, Pionius, defied the authorities and died along with a few

followers. As time went on, the numbers of uncompromised Christians multiplied. The church

recognized these as confessors, since they alone had earned the right to hear the confessions of

the lapsed (Davidson 324). Both the resisters and the compromisers acknowledged the

recognition that their principled defiance of Roman coercion reflected the genuine heritage of the

apostles. Furthermore, the early church saw the rightness of the confessors’ stance in the fact that

the church did not, in fact, shrink under the persecution. It grew. Stark explains the

phenomenon: Christianity grew “because Christians constituted an intense community, able to




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generate the ‘invincible obstinacy’ that so offended …but yielded immense religious rewards

(Stark 208).” God was in the martyr’s legacy, not in outward compromise masking inward faith.

By the time of Diocletion and the last Great Persecution, deprivations, threats of loss of social

status, death by burning, and prevention of legal recourse in the courts led to both capitulation on

the part of some Christians as they cracked under the pressure, and a large and growing number

of defiant martyrs. At this point in the early fourth century AD, many believers began to seek out

martyrdom (Davidson 337). Roman policies had unwittingly forced a confrontation that the

Romans could not win unless they were willing to decimate their own empire. The Empire could

not quench the fire of witness. Again, in the aftermath of persecution, as the Roman Empire

officially embraced Christianity, it was the witness of the faithful that was considered definitive.

In other words, to be a genuine believer was to remain a faithful witness to Christ without

compromising by also accommodating other religions. This was not seen simply as a cultural

matter, but as an essential commitment of the new birth.

6. Reformational rediscovery of authentic Faith

This is the heritage of the church with which John Calvin identified. In a sense, he lived through

many of the same things, as had his ancestors in the third century. To be sure, he enjoyed a

protected status unimaginable for his forefathers, but he did live during the beginnings of the

Catholic Counter-Reformation as well. He was a second-generation son of the Reformation.

While the first generation had encountered serious opposition, the second generation, echoing the

experience of the early church, felt the full brunt of imperial persecution. Both the Holy Roman

Empire and the Roman Catholic hierarchy only reached a point where they could organize and

coordinate an effective response against Protestantism during the late 1540s with the advent of

the Council of Trent (1545-1563) and the creation of the Jesuits, the Society of Jesus under

Ignatius Loyola (1540) (Ozment 397-418). Interestingly, both Calvin and the Counter-

Reformation claimed the legacy of the martyrs.

16th century Rome was the sight of a massive rebuilding program centered around the restoration

and expansion of St. Peters. Just as the magisterial Reformers harkened back to the early church

for their inspiration, so did the Papacy. As much of Rome was unearthed, the ancient catacombs

were unearthed to include the millions of bones interred there. This sparked a celebration and

embracing of the tradition of martyrdom in contradistinction to Protestant claims and tentative

expressions of protest on the part of Italian or Spanish reformers (MacCulloch 404). The new

Catholic initiative to embrace their own early history also found encouragement as new Jesuits

went on the mission field and experienced martyrdom first-hand.

Calvin saw the legacy of martyred witness affirmed by the mainstream of the Reformation as

well, also calling for the first Protestant missionaries to Brazil, all of which died on the field. On

the other hand, some who flew the banner of reform but only surreptitiously, scandalized him.

These were termed “Nicodemites” because they only chose to come to Jesus at night. The largest

numbers of these were Italians who attempted to embrace the Reformation, but only inwardly.

Outwardly they remained active and consistent Catholics. Most were associated with Italian

Anabaptism and decided to remain in Italy under the Inquisition, publically appearing as earnest

Catholics (Williams 892). Others appeared in France who felt that, because spiritual rebirth was

invisible, outward conformity was not a matter of fatal compromise. George Huntston Williams,

long the acknowledged expert in the left wing of the Reformation, categorized Nicodemites as

largely associated with spiritualists who could not take polity or doctrine as seriously as had

Catholics, Lutherans, and the Reformed. They were, in a sense, what we would today call broad

evangelicals. What mattered to them was survival and inner experience of the new birth. “In




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Nicodemism, the original humanistic indifference to dogma was, in any case, often transformed

by the exigencies of the Inquisition ‘into practical indifference and in some cases hypocritical

submissiveness’ (Williams 893, quoting J.R. Charbonnel).”

7. The Nicodemites: Authentic faith or fatal compromise?

Enter John Calvin. Calvin was repelled by the Nicodemite dualism that separated spiritual and

physical realities, noting: “Since both body and soul are both consecrated to God, his glory has to

shine in both (Calvin 36, “A Letter to Some Friends” 1540).” In other words, Calvin saw the

dualism of the Nicodemites as an essential repudiation of God’s identity as the creator of the

entire universe, spiritual and material. He clarified what he thought this required of believers. “I

do not require a public confession of everyone, as if all Christians were bound to climb up into a

pulpit, or gather the people to declare everything the Lord has given them to know of his Word.

Yet I do desire the believing man make an effort to declare that he is a servant of God, and by the

signs which are provided for us in his scripture.” To Calvin this meant associating himself

visibly with the believing community, the church. He believed that the Roman Catholicism of the

time was apostate, compelling true Christians to worship elsewhere.

He went further. Not only were true believers to identify with evangelical churches, they were

also to cease participation in ungodly practices. Some things believers must forego:

“Specifically, he should not participate in any ceremony that involves manifest impiety. For, as

the ceremonies that God has instituted are exercises to involve us in his service and in the honor

of his name (so that in observing them, we testify that we are his servants), likewise whoever

observes ceremonies which are contrary to his glory (such as those that involve idolatry and

wicked superstition) pollutes the name of God and defiles himself. I consider that the Popish

Mass is a pure abomination which is disguised with the title of the Supper in just the way the

devil transforms himself into an angel of light (Calvin 37-40).” Discussions concerning the status

of Rome notwithstanding, we can see clearly that what Calvin is saying is that a Christian’s

witness has to be clear and uncompromising, otherwise God’s glory is defiled and witness is

muddied.

He also anticipated the special pleading of modern missionaries to Muslims. “They maintain that

the man who fears God only goes there (Mass) to share with the Christians in prayers and

invocations and to honor God by remembering his sacrament, and that in his heart he detests all

the blasphemies that are done there, because he cannot condemn them openly (Calvin 41).” This,

to Calvin, is rationalization in order to avoid the force of the Word. “This does not seem at all

solid to me. For, as the prophet says, ‘He keeps himself from idolatry, who does not partake of

sacrifices to idols (Ps16:4).’ Now it cannot be denied that the Mass is an idol set up in the temple

of God.” This, of course, is analogous to participation in the religious life of the mosque. It is to

worship a false understanding of God and to do it falsely. It dishonors God and damages those

who profess faith in Christ. “Being constrained to worship strange gods is not a small hurt to

God (Calvin 44).”

Again, my purpose in exposing these writings is not to comment on Rome but to illustrate how

Calvin, in line with the historic church, would separate himself from non-Christian practice,

regardless of cost. It is also a matter of truth. For Calvin, this sort of practice constitutes two

kinds of lying, both dissimulation and simulation. As he explained, “Dissimulation is committed

by hiding the truth one has within the heart. Simulation is more; it is pretending and faking

something that is not so (Calvin 54 citing “A Short Treatise Setting Forth What the Faithful Man

Must Do When He is Among Papists and He Knows the Truth of the Gospel”).” “No one can be

at once a partaker of the Lord’s Table and of the devil’s, nor drink of the cup of the Lord in order




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to mix it with that of devils (1Co 10:21). Whoever takes the one, utterly renounces the other.” In

other words, it is a matter of integrity and identity.

The act of worship, as Calvin explains, is not simply conforming to a cultural pattern. It has

fundamental theological implications. Worship, theology, and even hermeneutics are not three

distinct and separated elements of faith systems. Rather, they are inextricably intertwined. To

compromise one is to fatally compromise all. True faith is undermined by the lack of integrity

and coherence. “For even if a man secretly mocks the idol while pretending to honor it, he is still

guilty of having transferred the honor of God to the creature (Calvin 56).” Calvin sees this as

equating the disingenuous practices of the Nicodemites not only with Roman Catholicism, which

is bad enough, but it is even worse than that. “It is no more permitted to partake of an idolatry

which has the name of God imposed on it, than if it was purely something of the Saracens (i.e.

Turks-Muslims) or pagans. Just as the worship of God done in the church, or in the company of

the faithful, is a solemn recognition we render him, acknowledging him to be our God, and

publically doing him homage; also to unite with Turks or pagans, to join in the worship they do

(which is perverse), is a form of renunciation of God which renders a man polluted and accursed

(Calvin 60f).”

8. The clarity and exclusivity of genuine faith

Calvin’s bottom line is to remain faithful witnesses just as the true church had always done. “I

say I require nothing of them except to follow what so many thousands of martyrs have done

before us, men and women, rich and poor, small and great (Calvin 90).” Believers had always

meditated on the nature of their union with Christ and with the cross. “And through this

meditation they fortified themselves to overcome the horror and fear of prisons, torture, fire, the

scaffold, the sword and all other sorts of death (Calvin 91).” This is the sort of invincibility to

which Rodney Stark brought our attention. It is what the church always counted on in its witness

to the world. Perversely and ironically today, it is often better embodied by Muslims who see it

as a seal of the righteousness of their cause, than by Christian missionaries who seem more

committed to have their cake (conversions) and eat it too (without the cross).

Works Cited

Calvin, John. Come Out From Among Them: “Anti-Nicodemite” Writings Dallas: Protestant

Heritage, 2001.

Davidson, Ivor J. The Birth of the Church: From Jesus to Constantine AD 30-312 Vol 1 Baker

History of the Church Grand Rapids: Baker, 2004.

Londer, Shira. “Martyrdom in Jewish Traditions” Catholic and Jewish Consultation Committee

Meeting Baltimore 11 December 2003.

MacCulloch, Diarmaid. Reformation: Europe’s House Divided 1490-1700 London: Penguin,

2003.

Ozment, Steven. The Age of Reform 1250-1550: An Intellectual and Religious History of Late

Medieval and Reformation Europe New Haven: Yale University, 1980.

Stark, Rodney. The Rise of Christianity San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1997.




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Williams, George Huntston. The Radical Reformation Third Edition Kirkville, Mo: Truman State

University, 2000.

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