Talk:Augustine's influence on John Calvin

Requested move 19 September 2019

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: Moved. (non-admin closure) Cwmhiraeth (talk) 10:27, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

Augustinian Calvinism → Augustine's influence on John Calvin – I was thinking about afding this, but I think there might be something to salvage. I don't think the term Augustinian Calvinism is notable. But the page isn't really about that term anyway, but the connection between Augustine and Calvin's theology on a few points. Jfhutson (talk) 21:01, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Support. Srnec (talk) 01:56, 22 September 2019 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

undiscussed change
, please note that the article's name was changed again, without discussion (by an editor who obviously strongly believes in identifying Calvin's views with St. Augustine's, also adding a lengthy quote to the lede of Calvinism). I'm really bad at wiki-lawyering, so if you could please alert the proper authorities or something. AddMore-III (talk) 10:11, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

Article name is a spurious argument
The article repeatedly describes Augustine as teaching "double predestination," which is of course not true. Who claims this? This is clearly fundamental to ascertaining whether Augustine even had remotely similar theology to Calvin. There simply is no such thing as Augustinian Calvinism if Augustine disagreed with central tenets of Calvinism.

Also, this name makes it sound like Augustine started his own branch of Calvinism, rather than Calvinists using Augustine's writings as prooftexts for Calvinist positions, over a millennium after his death. Even if we uncriticially granted the thesis that there is significant similarity between Augustine's theology and Calvinist theology, at best the article could be called "Augustine in Calvinism" or something along those lines. Instead this article seems to treat Augustine like a Calvinist, which is obviously a purely rhetorical device. So, the title of the article lends undue legitimacy to the arguments that Augustine was himself a "proto-Calvinist" or that Calvin was inspired by Augustine.

The reader is going to get the absurd impression that Augustine at least accepted the basics of Calvinism, and then perhaps elaborated on it, forming "Augustinian Calvinism." But instead, what's actually being claimed is that Calvinism as we know it IS Augustinian, i.e., consistent with Augustine's writings. So, the referent of the article's title is the same as the referent of the article Calvinism, making this article a duplicate. Of course, none of the references in the article support that impression anyway.

The only way it would stop being a duplicate is if the referent ceases to be Calvinism. For that to be the case, the article needs to explain how "Augustinian Calvinism" is a denomination or school of theology in its own right. Otherwise, the title needs to be changed so that, rather than referring to the subject of another article, it refers to something unique, e.g., "connections that have been drawn between Calvinist theology and Augustine's writings." That's what the actual body of the article is currently about. So, on top of being transparently motivated to mislead, the title doesn't accurately summarize the body of the article.

Additionally, I have never seen the phrase "Augustinian Calvinism" in scholarly literature. I have never even seen it in Reformed apologetics. It seems to have been contrived on the spot for the purpose of advancing some ideological assertions.

This article was scant to begin with. Some of the content clearly belongs in a section on Calvinism; some of it belongs in a section on Augustine of Hippo; and maybe, if more would be added in the future, some of it will belong in a section on John Calvin. Aminomancer (talk) 13:20, 11 March 2022 (UTC)


 * @Aminomancer
 * "whether Augustine even had remotely similar theology to Calvin"
 * --Did you read the quote by B.B. Warfield in the introduction?
 * "[Augustinian Calvinism] makes it sound like Augustine started his own branch of Calvinism"
 * --Paul Helm (cited in the introduction) is the one who introduced the term. While I agree the term "Augustinian Calvinism" will not be perfectly clear on its own to someone who does know who Calvin and Augustine are . . . it is literally explained in the first sentence of the article.
 * "Additionally, I have never seen the phrase "Augustinian Calvinism" in scholarly literature. I have never even seen it in Reformed apologetics. It seems to have been contrived on the spot for the purpose of advancing some ideological assertions."
 * --Did you read the first and second paragraphs of the article? Doesn't seem like it.
 * "This article was scant to begin with."
 * --. . . I'm not sure what to say. If you like working on large articles, you should do that. If you disagree with the term Augustinian-Calvinism you should find some reliable sources and write an opposition section.
 * Cheers, Readingwords (talk) 22:41, 13 March 2022 (UTC)
 * "--Did you read the quote by B.B. Warfield in the introduction?"
 * Yes. I meant that the theory that Augustine shared Calvin's theology is an assertion; an answer to a question. But the title of the article makes it sound like an established fact or at least a well-known school of theology that goes by that name. Obviously if some kind of institution chooses a tendentious name, and that institution goes on to become notable, then it would be unfair for Wiki to refuse to properly name it. But that isn't the case here, so the question is whether there's a consensus among theologians or historians that Augustine shared Calvin's theology. That obviously isn't the case either. Only Reformed theologians think anything resembling that, but most certainly would not advocate such an unqualified identification of Augustine with Calvin as to call it "Augustinian Calvinism." Anyway, Warfield's opinion as a Reformed Christian does not resolve the question, so I still think the title of the article is misleading.
 * "--Did you read the first and second paragraphs of the article? Doesn't seem like it."
 * I've seen the phrase used in this article, but elsewhere it seems uncommon. What I meant is that the number of sources who use the term is very small, yet there's a large body of literature drawing on Augustine to promote Reformed theology. So I don't think it would be problematic to either change the name of the article, or else merge it into the other aticles I mentioned above. Since there isn't a school of theology called Augustinian Calvinism, and since most Reformed theologians don't use the term when talking about supposedly Calvinist doctrines in Augustine's work, I don't think many would object. This view about Augustine isn't universally associated with the term, not even very commonly as far as I can tell. And the view that is commonly accepted by Calvinists is much more modest than what is implied by the phrase "Augustinian Calvinism."
 * I suppose you're right that it's fine for the title to be misleading if it's quickly addressed in the lede. However, that doesn't answer my objection that the subject is not notable enough to justify a separate article. Aminomancer (talk) 04:19, 26 April 2024 (UTC)