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Wednesday, May 20, 2009
A pretty good sale on Calvin's major works
I just wanted to make people aware that Monergism again has the 23 volume set of Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion and his Commentaries available for just $120. That's less than $6/book! The reason this set is so good is because it does not use the MacNeill/Battles edition of the Institutes. While that version is undoubtedly the best English translation the problem with it is that they have added in additional Scripture references into the text without marking out which are Calvin's and which are theirs. Those verse references in the Institutes are meant to function as footnotes as Calvin never intended for the Institutes to be read apart from the Commentaries. When you read the Institutes his intention was that if you wanted to know why he came to a particular conclusion you would look up the referenced passage in the Commentaries and see how he arrived at that conclusion exegetically. The version of the Institutes in this passage is not as easy to read in English but it is helpful to have so that you can make those movements between the two.
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An alternative to buying the big set of physical books is to get an absolutely monster set of electronic books. Logos Bible software has a new product in the works that has the Institutes in English (Beveridge, Allen, and Norton translations), as well as French and Latin. The product also includes the 46 volume commentary, 4 volumes on letters, 8 volumes of Tracts & Treatises, a 10 volume collection of biographies written on the life & work of Calvin, and a 20 volume collection on Calvinism and the history of Calvinism. Of course it all runs inside the Logos software so you can easily mouse-over and see the commentary references from notes in Institutes without having to yank another book off the shelf. Anyway, for those interested, more can be read at: http://www.logos.com/products/prepub/details/5169
Lastly, although I've spent thousands on Logos books over the years, I gain nothing personally from others buying their software. Just wanted to share. One day you may have to move, and you'll really appreciate moving a single hard drive instead of a tractor-trailer full of books.
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