John Calvin (10 July 1509 - 27 May 1564) was one of the most influential Christians of the last millennium. An influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation, Calvin was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later named after him. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530, and after religious tensions provoked a violent uprising against Protestants in France, Calvin fled to Basel, Switzerland, where he published the first edition of his seminal work Institutes of the Christian...

John Calvin (10 July 1509 - 27 May 1564) was one of the most influential Christians of the last millennium. An influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation, Calvin was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later named after him. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530, and after religious tensions provoked a violent uprising against Protestants in France, Calvin fled to Basel, Switzerland, where he published the first edition of his seminal work Institutes of the Christian...