The Hidden Tradition: Women of the Reformation, Part III

The Hidden Tradition:
The Women of the Reformation, Part III

Reformation historian Roland Bainton proposed that the Reformation had a primary effect on the role of women in society. The dropping of monasticism in Protestant lands “made for the exaltation of the home, the especial domain of the wife, as the sphere for exercise of the gentler virtues of the Sermon on the Mount. In Catholic thought these have been called the counsels of perfection to be observed by monks. Protestantism made no distinction between the counsels to be observed by the few and the precepts binding upon all. The entire Christian ethic was held to be incumbent upon every believer.”[i]

Reformation Wives: Daughters of the King of Kings

Ruth Tucker explains the impact of this titanic change upon marital relationships. “For the first generation of Protestants, marriage was a far more significant decision than it was in the generations that followed. Renouncing celibacy was viewed by the Catholics as giving in to the sin of lust.”[ii] For the leading male Reformers, the decision whether or not to marry was thus mired in complexity, culture, and conflict. For the women who married them, the nature of their husband-wife relationship was equally multifaceted.

Idelette Calvin: The Unfading Beauty of a Gentle and Quiet Spirit

Idelette Calvin (1510-1549) met John Calvin when she and her first husband fled persecution in their native Holland. Coming to Strasbourg, they connected with Calvin’s church and converted to the Reformed faith. When Idellete’s husband died in a plague, Calvin conducted the funeral. He was impressed with how she had cared for her dying husband as well as for her two children. He also noted that she was an intelligent woman who was unafraid to speak her mind.[iii]

Calvin communicated his idea of the ideal wife in a letter written to his friend William Farel even before he met Idellete. “But always keep in mind what I seek to find in her; for I am none of those insane lovers who embrace also the vices of those with whom they are in love, where they are smitten at first sight with a fine figure. This only is the beauty which allures me, if she is chaste, if not too fussy or fastidious, if economical, if patient, if there is hope that she will be interested about my health.”[iv]

Though unlike the modern ideal of romantic love, Calvin saw in Idellete the unfading beauty of her gentle and quiet spirit. She ministered soul care to her husband through her patient love, and that was exactly what Calvin needed to counter his own “impatience and irritability.”[v]

Since Calvin’s mother died when he was three, and he had received little love from his stepmother, Calvin had modest experience of a loving home. His best model was Martin Bucer’s family life. “In his family during the entire time I saw not the least occasion of offense but only ground for edification. I never left the table without having learned something.”[vi]

Calvin saw Elizabeth Bucer as a good mother, a hospitable homemaker, and her husband’s best critic. Idelette played a similar role. Calvin called her “the faithful helper of my ministry” and “the best companion of my life.” Calvin’s biographers speak of her as a woman “of some force and individuality.”[vii]

From the beginning, Idelette’s marriage to John was filled with complications and frustrations. In addition to his pastoral ministry, Calvin was a teacher and houseparent at his own boarding house, governed by a domineering housekeeper with a sharp tongue. To make matters worse, sickness would plague them both throughout their marriage.[viii]

External circumstances improved when Calvin was called back to Geneva. Idelette had become “first lady” of the parish, and she could have enjoyed a lavish lifestyle. Instead, she chose to extend her soul care ministry beyond her home. “Idelette, if she had chosen, might have passed her time in presiding over brilliant social gatherings. But like her unostentatious husband, she devoted her time and energy for the most part to the performance of charitable duties. She often visited the sick, the poor, and the humble folk. On many occasions she entertained visitors from communities who sought inspiration from her husband.”[ix] Like so many feminine soul care-givers before her, Idelette cared for the body as well as the soul, living out Christ’s call to care for the least of these (Matthew 25:35-40).

John and Idelette endured traumatic personal grief together. Idelette became pregnant three times, but none of the children lived beyond infancy. Soon after coming to Geneva, Idelette gave birth to a boy, but baby Jacques lived only two weeks. At his birth, Idelette became quite ill. His death piled sorrow on top of her physical anguish. The next month, Calvin wrote a friend, sending greetings from his wife, who was unable even to dictate a letter due to her heartache. Calvin added, “The Lord has certainly inflicted a severe and bitter wound in the death of our infant son.”[x] Coming from a man like Calvin, known more for his head than his heart, these words are vital reminders of the normalcy of grief for all Christians.

Working through her grief, over time Idelette became known throughout the first-generation Protestant world. “Your hospitality in the name of Christ is not unknown to anybody in Europe,” wrote an acquaintance.[xi]

After only nine years of marriage, Idelette succumbed to her frequent illnesses. On her deathbed, she and her husband prayed together. He witnessed and wrote of her peaceful composure, and recorded her final words of tribute to God. “She suddenly cried out in such a way that all could see that her spirit had risen far above this world. These were her words, ‘O glorious resurrection! O God of Abraham and of all our fathers, the believers of all the ages have trusted on Thee and none of them have hoped in vain. And now I fix my hope on Thee.’ These short statements were cried out rather than distinctly spoken. These were not lines suggested by someone else but came from her own thoughts.”[xii] As Idelette lived, so she died—choosing to exalt God by encouraging others.

After her death, Calvin shared his profound sorrow, offering insight into what Idelette had meant to him. “I have been bereaved of the best companion of my life, who, if our lot had been harsher, would have been not only the willing sharer of exile and poverty, but even of death. While she lived she was the faithful helper of my ministry. From her I never experienced the slightest hindrance.”[xiii]

Soul care historically and currently takes many forms. Idelette Calvin epitomizes soul care in the home through loving, caring, patient empathy and encouragement, as well as soul care outside the home through holistic ministry to “the least of these.”


[i]Bainton, Women of the Reformation in Germany and Italy, 7.
[ii]Tucker, Private, 40.
[iii]Peterson, 25 Surprising Marriages, p 73.
[iv]Van Halsema, This Was John Calvin, 113.
[v]Peterson, “Idelette: John Calvin’s Search for the Right Wife,” 13.
[vi]Peterson, 25 Surprising Marriages, p 77.
[vii]Ibid.
[viii]Tucker, Private, 40-41.
[ix]Hyma, Life of John Calvin, 85.
[x]Van Halsema, 147
[xi]Ibid., 148.
[xii]Peterson, “Idelette,” 15.
[xiii]Walker, John Calvin: The Organizer of Reformed Protestantism, 1509-1564, 236.