Consultez le site de Chalcedon Foundation pour les références bibliographiques.
Calvin’s Geneva came to be known as « the paradise of women ». There were good reasons for this. Calvin was strongly protective of « women’s rights ». Under his guidance, church consistories went after wife abusers. They prosecuted guardians who had misappropriated trust funds of widows and orphans. Deserted wives were protected, and so on. Prestwich has referred to « the attraction of Calvinism for women in that area ».
In that era, and for centuries before, powerful and prosperous elderly men and women contracted marriages with very young women and men. The families of the young complied with these arrangements for their personal advantages. Calvin felt strongly that such marriages should not be allowed. In January, 1557, the Consistory dissolved a marriage between a woman of « more than 70 » with a man of 27 or 28. Rules were published to protect both men and women in marriage. To avoid deception, many rules were established. Thus, « strangers coming from a distant country » could not be permitted to marry in Geneva until a careful investigation of their past and their family were made. A woman persecuted for her faith could legitimately leave her husband.
[…] What is clear is that Calvinist Geneva was seen in its day as « the paradise of women » because of the receptivity of Calvin and others to their plight and their need for justice. There was a reason for this attitude. It was the revival of the Old Testament as an inseparable part of the Bible […].
Because the Old Testament solidly links holiness with the law, and the law is concerned with everyday life, the result was what Henri Hauser called the « secularization of holiness », i.e., holiness was made a matter of everyday life for all believers. Holiness now was the pursuit of all Christians. It was, in Luthy’s words, an « insistence on saintly life as the duty of every believer ». […]
We have a remarkable fact here in Calvin’s reformation of Geneva. It was a city rightly called in its day « the paradise of women ». This is an aspect of the Reformation which has been given insufficient attention. The reason is that these reforms in civil and church law which made Geneva so remarkable in its day are now associated with patriarchalism, and patriarchy is a hated word to the feminists in both skirts and trousers. It suggests visions of male oppression, domination and rule. It has become a symbol of past and present evils.
The significant fact, however, is that patriarchalism was not male-centered but faith-[governed] and family-governed. Modern men in the atomistic family often have more power, if they choose to exercise it, than did patriarchal man. The reason was a very clear one : patriarchal man was a trustee from the past to the future. In 1 Kings 21, we see that Naboth did not feel that he had the right to sell the family land no matter how much money King Ahab offered. The land was not his except as a trust from his forefathers to the generations yet unborn. […]
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Compléments :
- Les femmes et la Réforme [Campus protestant]
- The Luther Family and the Reformation of Marriage [The Gospel Coalition]
- How Luther Reformed Marriage and the Family [Africa Christian Action]
- From Sacrament to Contract – Marriage, Religion, and Law in the Western Tradition [Westminster John Knox Press]
« C’est que le consistoire jugeait d’abord les affaires matrimoniales (protégeant de manière très moderne les épouses battues ou bafouées, facilitant les divorces), mais également des affaires morales et religieuses. »
Source : Max Engammare, ‹ Genève, la cité des saints ›, L’Histoire, N° 340, mars 2009, p. 53.