In view of yesterday's posting, I'd thought I'd share a bit of Calvin on the subject of the Law of Moses.

The allegation, that insult is offered to the law of God enacted by Moses, where it is abrogated, and other new laws are preferred to it, is most absurd. Others are not preferred when they are more approved, not absolutely, but from regard to time and place, and the condition of the people, or when those things are abrogated which were never enacted for us. The Lord did not deliver it by the hand of Moses to be promulgated in all countries, and to be everywhere enforced; but having taken the Jewish nation under his special care, patronage, and guardianship, he was pleased to be specially its legislator, and as became a wise legislator, he had special regard to it in enacting laws. Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Bk. 4, Ch. 20, sec. 16, emphases mine.

Contrary to popular beliefs -- and "Calvin's Geneva" -- Calvin was not a theocrat. Indeed, a litle known secret is that his preferred system of government was a republic.