French Jean Cauvin
born July 10, 1509, Noyon, Picardy, France
died May 27, 1564, Geneva, Switz.
French Protestant theologian and major figure of the Reformation .
He studied religion at the University of Paris and law in Orléans and Bourges. When he returned to Paris in 1531 he studied the Bible and became part of a movement that emphasized salvation by grace rather than by works. Government intolerance prompted him to move to Basel, Switz., where he wrote the first edition of Institutes of the Christian Religion (1536). Gaining a reputation among Protestant leaders, he went to Geneva to help establish Protestantism in that city. He was expelled by city fathers in 1538 but returned in 1541, when the town council instituted the church order outlined in his Ecclesiastical Ordinances , including enforcement of sexual morality and abolition of Catholic "superstition." He approved the arrest and conviction for heresy of Calvinism .