Max Weber in his book Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism sets out to systematically investigate what makes Protestantism different from Catholicism and how it changed the course of European history. Weber in his own words sets out to not “substitute for a one-sided materialistic an equally one-sided spiritualistic causal interpretation of culture and of history” (Weber 125). In order to do that Weber investigates the Reformation, its doctrines and how they impacted the history of Western Europe. Weber seems to ultimately to focus on Calvinism and how its doctrine of predestination led to two different and connected conclusions about the religion’s “rational character” and how its creation of what is called “worldly asceticism”
Weber contextualizes the importance of Calvinism and its impact by saying that it was the faith over which the great political and cultural struggles of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were fought in the most highly developed countries, the Netherlands, England, and France.” (Weber 56) According to Weber what made Calvinism different and created such conflict its central doctrine, predestination. (Weber 56). It is worth taking the time to explain the doctrine of predestination Weber himself cites the Westminster Confession which laid out systematically laid out Calvinist doctrine and its emphasis on predetermination as what separated it from other religions.
The main thrust of what Weber was trying point out by citing the Westminster Confession is basically laid out in the following passages. First, “By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels are predestinated unto everlasting life, and others foreordained to everlasting death.” Second, is the belief by Calvinists that predestination was a call towards so-called “wordly ascesticism,” since God “extendeth, or with-holdeth mercy, as He pleaseth, for the glory of His sovereign power over His creatures, to pass by, and to ordain them to dishonour and wrath for their sin, to the praise of His glorious justice” (Weber 57) Furthermore, the belief by Calvinists in “effectual calling” that predetermination leads men to do good works is another cornerstone of the faith. (Weber 57) Or as Weber himself so succinctly put it “God helps those who help themselves. Thus the Calvinist, as it is sometimes put, himself creates his own salvation, or, as would be more correct, the conviction of it.” (Weber 69)
The doctrinal basis of Calvinism and what it means for believers is the factor that most heavily influences its impact on its historical and cultural impact on Western Europe namely the belief in asceticism and its rational nature. Weber’s argument for the rational nature of Calvinism can simply be put into the concept of the “elimination of magic” from the world which was implied in Catholicism through miracles and the person of the priest. (Weber 61) For the average Calvinist did not have:
the comforts of atonement did not exist instead was doomed by an inexorable fate, admitting of no mitigation. For him such friendly and human comforts did not exist. He could not hope to atone for hours of weakness or of thoughtlessness by increased good will at other times, as the Catholic or even the Lutheran could. The God of Calvinism demanded of his believers not single good works, but a life of good works combined into a unified system. (Weber 61)
Weber implication of Calvinism’s need for a systematic rational belief system ultimately connects the first part of the equation with the second. The need for rationality ultimately underlies its ascetic and “monastic” character in the Western tradition. The tradition of the Benedictine, Cistercian and Jesuit orders that used a “systematic method of rational conduct” to overcome the state of nature and to free him from irrationality and to “subject man to the supremacy of purposeful will,” and self-control was what Calvinism had in common with the monasticism. (Weber 77)
The connection between a rational and systematic embodied in Calvinism’s monastic character is it’s penchant towards asceticism and righteousness. In Weber’s view Calvinism qas unique its tendency in promoting good economic behaviors. Because it looked down upon the idea of making money for its own sake and the other bad things that it symbolized. Calvinists saw acquiring wealth as “a fruit of labour in a calling was a sign of God’s blessing. And even more important: the religious valuation of restless, continuous, systematic work in a worldly calling.” (Weber 116). Since no one knew that if they were assured salvation or not it was in their best interest to make your own salvation on earth.
Calvinism as laid out by Weber in this book makes it look like less of a religion in itself but ultimately nothing but a belief system that divorced the worst qualities of the medieval church with the best qualities of monasticism. A life of asceticism, rational systematic thought and moral self-control is in large part what made Calvinism such a great precursor for similar capitalist values. It must be said this could be nothing more than a coincidence but Weber’s argument in thorough enough that it is easy to tend to believe that there is a connection between the rise of capitalism in the seventeenth century Western Europe and the rise of different protestant sects, Calvinism chief among them.
Works Cited
Weber, Max. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. London: Routledge, 2001. Print.
