Friday, July 24, 2009

Humor in Calvin?

Two weeks ago at the Calvin Jubilee at Montreat, I was in a Q&A session with Randall Zachman, an Episcopalian who teaches Reformation Studies at Notre Dame (really!) when someone asked, "Did Calvin have a sense of humor?" Zachman simply answered, "no." And I have to confess I don't much humor in Calvin; joy, yes, but no humor, except of the cutting, sarcastic kind.

However, today, while looking at Calvin's comments on John 6, I noted this sentence: "Christ did not provide great delicacies for the people, but they who saw his amazing power displayed in that supper, were obliged to rest satisfied with barley-bread and fish without sauce." There's a Frenchman for you! The greatest hardship he can imagine is going without sauce. I don't know if Calvin intended it to be funny, but I think he just might have.