The physician and philosopher Michael Servetus arrived in Geneva in 1553, a city dominated by the reformer John Calvin. There has been some debate as to whether or not Servetus and Calvin had met before: some accounts says they met briefly in Paris in either 1534 or 1536, other accounts say he was invited by Calvin to meet up so that Calvin could demonstrate the falsity of his beliefs but Servetus failed to show up. They certainly corresponded, but Calvin made plain that their views were incompatible.
Above all, Servetus held highly unorthodox views on the godhead and did not believe in the trinity as understood by both Catholics and Protestants. As Thomas Jefferson said, Servetus could not find in Euclid ‘ the proposition which has demonstrated that three are one, and one is three’. Servetus had been working as a physician in Lyon (and discovered the pulmonary circulation of blood). where he conformed outwardly to Catholic practice, but was denounced to the Inquisition and escaped – the Lyon authorities later settled for burning him in effigy instead,
In 1553, while on the run from the Inquisition, Servetus, for reasons that remain inexplicable. arrived in Geneva and went to hear Calvin preach. Possibly he felt that a face-to-face discussion with the fierce reformer would settle their differences. Calvin spotted Servetus in the congregation, which suggests they had met previously, but Geneva, like all godly places, was a city crawling with spies and informers and it is likely that a prominent intellectual dissident such as Servetus would have been identified within hours of stepping in to the city. Calvin certainly knew what the man looked like. Calvin then personally denounced Servetus and arranged for his arrest. Calvin had already said that if Servetus ever came to Geneva he would make sure the heretic died there.
Calvin is alleged to have visited Servetus in his cell on the day of his execution and to have ‘disputed’ theology with him. We know that Servetus was badly treated in the run-up to the stake, and was in terrible condition, so if this meeting did take place it will have been one of the most cruel and grotesque ‘disputations’ in history until the Stalinist era. Calvin is supposed to have asked the city magistrates for beheading rather burning, but was ‘overruled’. Green word was used for the burning, so that Servetus’ agony would be prolonged.
What Happened Next
The historian Edward Gibbon said ‘I am more deeply scandalised at the single execution of Servetus than at the hecatombs which have blazed in the autos-da-fé of Spain and Portugal". Servetus was burned for two main reasons: Calvin wanted to impress on his rivals in Geneva that he was a hard man with hard remedies, and he also wanted to show Catholics and Protestants everywhere that Calvinists would not flinch from burning heretics who did not believe in the Trinity. Gibbon believed that personal malice against Servetus was also a factor, and despite the best efforts of Calvin’s apologists, then and later, his reputation has never recovered from the burning of Servetus. Within weeks of the execution, Protestant intellectuals were expressing their horror at Calvin’s act, and in 1554 a historically significant pamphlet was published in Basle arguing against the punishment of ‘heretics’.