As a classically trained humanist himself, John Calvin sought to extend and solidify his program of religious reform by training humanist Reformers. His was a decidedly scholarly Reformation, and while he considered the whole populace of Geneva to be students in the “School of God,” those who would be preachers and ecclesiastical leaders required advanced training in the Christian scriptures. The purpose of the Genevan Academy was to provide such instruction. Calvin himself lectured three times per week, and in the last years, he proceeded seriatim through several of the prophetic books of the Hebrew scriptures. In order to preserve these lectures (praelectiones), Jean Budé and Charles de Jonviller came up with the idea of transcribing them as Calvin spoke. Calvin began lecturing on Jeremiah on 15 April 1560, and finished on 9 September 1562. The collected praelectiones were published in 1563. These lectures represent a genre distinct from the commentary and the sermon; they are a professor’s lessons, intended for an academic audience.

The grand project to produce a modern critical edition of John Calvin’s works to replace the nineteenth-century Corpus Reformatorum calls for not only rigorous historical scholarship, but also the tedious-yet-crucial task of getting the text exactly right. Not every volume has succeeded. But Nicole Gueunier, with the assistance of Max Engammare, has produced a critical edition worthy of the name. These two volumes project a professionalism that gives the scholar confidence that the text is reliable and that the scholarship represented in the introduction and notes is sound and insightful. A notable methodological improvement over the old Calvini Opera is the editor’s decision to include the prayers that close each lecture, most of which were omitted in the former edition, on the mistaken assumption that they were merely formulaic. But as the editor observes, “Their presence testifies to the fact that, for Calvin, exegesis presupposes prayer” (xi).

The notes are judicious and beneficial. They are not excessively copious; they do attempt to identify every possible source. But they also point out important parallels in the text to Rabbinic, classical, patristic, and medieval sources, as well as the writings of Calvin’s contemporaries. The annotations also point out Calvin’s adept rhetorical moves; attention to rhetoric is what makes francophone Calvin scholarship superior. When of interest, the editor makes reference to Calvin’s 1549 sermons on Jeremiah, of which 91 out of 271 were recorded. The reader should be apprised that “Nompareille” in the introduction and notes refers to the 1545 annotated Latin Bible published in Paris by Robert Estienne, with annotations that Estienne attributed to François Vatable.

The introduction provides concise and insightful analyses of Calvin’s work as a biblical scholar and theological educator. The editor provides the historical context of the praelectiones, and examines Calvin’s interaction with other interpreters, his exegetical and interpretive principles, his identification of different genres in the biblical text, his practical implementation of the ideal of sola scriptura, and his focus on the text’s scopus (goal) and how it relates to Calvin’s own self-understanding as a prophet to a stubborn people. The editor’s introduction to Calvin’s rhetoric, building on Olivier Millet’s definitive work on Calvin’s style, is particularly valuable. The lectures are, of course, didactic in nature, and thus employ oratory (and dialectic) suited to teaching. One can identify three rhetorical movements in Calvin’s lectures: exposition (narrating or explaining the details of a text); argumentation, in which Calvin attempts to demonstrate the truth of Jeremiah’s declamations; and exhortation, where Calvin applies the text to the contemporary church and also to current controversies. It is in these parenetic turns that Calvin’s rhetorical skill is most evident. Contrary to a common assumption that Calvin exclusively employs rhetorical brevity, the editor rightly points out how both brevitas and copia serve the end of producing oratorical vehemence, required to convince one’s audience, and how, in the praelectiones, Calvin employs copia more than brevitas.

This volume is an example of how a critical edition should be prepared, and the learning and labor behind it are clear to see. It is a welcome addition to the new edition of Calvin’s works.