This volume is the product of the thirteenth quadrennial International Calvin Congress, which took place in Grand Rapids, Michigan in July 2023. The central theme of the Congress was exile for Calvin and his followers, a notion particularly associated with the highly distinguished Reformation scholar, Heiko Oberman (1930–2001), who wrote of a »reformation of the refugees«, in an influential article in Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte in 1992. This article was subsequently included in, and gave its name to, a collection of essays by Oberman published by Droz in 2009. It includes 16 of the more than 40 presentations that were delivered at that event: five of these are substantial plenary papers, while the remainder are shorter contributions. For reasons of space, this review will focus primarily on the former.

In his essay, Kenneth J. Woo picks up on Oberman’s suggestion that John Calvin’s biblical exegesis reflected his status as a religious refugee. Specifically, Woo focuses on Calvin’s exegesis of the first three instances of exile mentioned in the early chapters of Genesis – those of Adam, Cain and Abraham – as represented in his Commentary on Genesis of 1554, and his preaching on that book in 1559–60. In his analysis of Calvin’s interpretation of these important episodes, Woo demonstrates that while the Genevan reformer did, to an extent, draw on traditional modes of interpretation, he also reflected the sixteenth-century context within which he was writing, and particularly contemporary debates about crypto-religion. In her contribution, »Living in Babylon«, Mirjam van Veen analyses the letters which Calvin sent to the various stranger churches across Europe, their consistories, and above all their ministers. Van Veen notes that while Calvin’s letters to the communities were typically written in French and adopted a rather pious tone, his much more frequent letters to their ministers were in Latin and rather more prosaic, and concerned with specific and practical issues. These letters also often expressed personal sentiments, reflecting the sense that these theologians were all part of a wider international network. Perhaps most strikingly she suggests that, contrary to conventional thinking, these communities were not necessarily hotbeds of radical thinking: rather, Calvin encouraged forbearance, flexibility and moderation, all as means of survival in difficult circumstances.

In »Exile on Psalm Street« (a rather unexpected allusion to the Rolling Stones!), Max Engammare looks at Calvin’s interactions with the Psalms. The Psalms, Engammare emphasises, were a fundamental point of reference for Calvin, from which he drew solace and inspiration throughout his career, as well as writing regularly on the topic: he published Aulcunes pseaumes in 1539 and In librorum Psalmorum commentarius in 1557, for instance, and cited 113 different psalms in the final editions of his Institutes. In this contribution, Engammare looks in detail at a small selection of the marginal annotations which Calvin (and his amanuenses) made to a copy of that 1557 Latin commentary, likely in 1558/9 when he was suffering from illness, demonstrating the way that this engagement continued through to his last years. In his contribution, Michael W. Bruening looks at contributions to the debate about predestination in the period between Jerome Bolsec’s initial critique of the Calvinist position, and Theodore Beza’s contribution, and then its later treatment by William Perkins and Jacobus Arminius. After a brief summary of the so-called »Bolsec Affair«, Bruening considers the views of François de Saint Paul of Vevey; Paul Le Conte, from Lausanne; Sebastian Castellio; Jean Morély, the French theologian; Antonio del Corro, a Spanish Protestant who fled the Inquisition for exile; and Peter Baro, another Frenchman. Not only does this article demonstrate that this was a much more extensive debate than is often appreciated – and many of their often lengthy contributions would benefit from further analysis beyond what is possible in an article of this length – but Bruening also highlights the many interconnections linking this set of figures.

Finally, among the longer contributions, in his article Bruce Gordon looks at the ideas of pilgrimage (»peregrinatio«) and homeland (»patria«) in the thought of Huldrych Zwingli and John Calvin. Both, Gordon notes, saw themselves as exiles, who remained closely attached to their homelands. While both drew on Augustine’s thought in this area – including the idea that life is itself a form of exile and a journey – Gordon draws out some of the differences in the ways these two thinkers used these terms and their intersection with their theologies, allowing one to derive what he terms, in an evocative phrase, a »topography of salvation« (101). The set of short papers in the latter part of the volume covers a diverse set of topics, not all of which so closely align with the theme of the volume, but which nonetheless add to our understanding of Calvin and/or the Reformed movement. These include more historical contributions, such as Kalle Elonheino’s consideration of Calvin’s (unsuccessful) efforts to shape the Reformation in Sweden through a dedication and a letter, and Amanda Eurich’s effective examination of Jean de Coras, a judge and humanist from Toulouse, and his efforts to navigate the difficult return from exile, following the restoration of peace. There are also papers which focus more on theological themes, such as Sam Ha’s consideration of Calvin’s use of motifs of exile in three of his early writings, and Jeb Ralston’s use of Erasmus and Augustine in his exegesis of Original Sin in Romans 5, verses 12 to 14.

As one would expect in a collection like this, there is some variation in the quality and significance of the contributions, though the mixture of longer and shorter papers in some ways serves to recognise this more explicitly, and indeed to make a virtue of it. Moreover, while some of the contributors are among the most distinguished scholars in the field, several are PhD candidates: it is commendable that those earlier in their academic journeys are being nurtured in this way. In a similar way, there are both strengths and weaknesses to having a central organising theme for the volume. As each of the papers serves as a free-standing piece, there is inevitably some repetition, particularly in terms of the historiographical framing, and in the characterisation of the work of Oberman and others. Each article has its own bibliography and there is no index, so the extent to which this works as a coherent volume is limited. On the other hand, the theme of exile is indeed a fertile one, both in literal and metaphorical terms, and the experience of exile clearly did much to shape the thinking of Calvin and his followers. The contributions to this collection serve to demonstrate the kaleidoscopic way in which exile shaped the Reformed movement, while also pointing towards avenues for further research.