Alternative Teachings About Jesus Christ
Search the Scriptures:
Does Calvinism Line Up
with the Bible?
Investigate Calvinist doctrines. Click each case file, search the Scriptures, and see the evidence for yourself.
"Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."
— John 5:39
The Case Files
Select a doctrine to investigate it against the King James Bible.
Where Calvinism Really Came From
Greek philosophical fatalism dressed in Protestant clothing.
This doctrine did not begin with John Calvin. The Greeks had a philosophical school that taught fatalism: if there was a supreme God, then nothing could ever happen that was not His predetermined will. If you were born among the damned, you would spend eternity among the damned. If you were born among the elect, no religion or righteous living was necessary.
When Christianity arrived in Alexandria, it was adopted as part of Greek philosophy. A man named Origen altered the text of the Bible there to bring it in line with Greek thought. This Alexandrian Christianity spread into southern Europe and became the foundation for the Roman Catholic religion. A man named Jerome institutionalized this Greek fatalism into church theology. Then, a Roman Catholic priest named John Calvin (who believed in sprinkling babies, baptismal regeneration, and executing those who disagreed with him on doctrine), institutionalized Jerome's Greek philosophy and made it part of Protestant teaching.
~300 AD
Greek fatalism enters
Alexandria
~350 AD
Origen corrupts
biblical texts
~400 AD
Jerome codifies
the theology
1536
Calvin publishes
the Institutes
1619
Synod of Dort:
TULIP formalized
The line is clear: Greek fatalism → Alexandria → Origen → Jerome → Roman Catholicism → John Calvin → Protestant Calvinism. It is the same corrupted Alexandrian stream that produced the modern Bible versions. Same source. Same errors. Same fruit.
"Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ."
— Colossians 2:8
"O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called."
— 1 Timothy 6:20
Did Christ Die for All — or Only for the "Elect"?
Calvinism teaches "limited atonement," which means that Christ died only for the elect and not for everyone. The Bible says the opposite so many times that, to deny that Christ died for all, you must deny the Bible itself:
✓ 1 Timothy 2:4, 6 — God "will have all men to be saved"… Christ "gave himself a ransom for all."
✓ Hebrews 2:9 — He "by the grace of God should taste death for every man." The Bible doesn't say elect man, but every man.
✓ 1 John 2:2 — "He is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world."
✓ 2 Corinthians 5:14–15 — "If one died for all, then were all dead: and that he died for all."
✓ 1 Timothy 4:10 — God "is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe." He is the Saviour even of unbelievers — they just haven't trusted Him yet.
✓ Isaiah 53:6 — "All we like sheep have gone astray… and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." Everyone who went astray, Christ took their iniquity.
✓ John 4:42 — "This is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world."
✓ Luke 19:10 — "The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost." Not that which was elect, but that which was lost.
The Verse That Ends the Debate — 2 Peter 2:1
"But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction."
These are false teachers on their way to damnation, and the Lord still bought them. Jesus Christ paid the ransom required for their souls. Then how do they end up in damnation? Not because they were predetermined to be damned, but because they denied the Lord. He is the Saviour of all men, but they didn't get in on that "specially of those that believe" part.
The "World of the Elect" Test
When confronted with 1 John 2:2, which says, "He is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world," Calvinists say that "world" means "the world of the elect." Well, let's' test that theory in the same chapter by substituting "world" with "world of the elect":
"Love not the world [of the elect], neither the things that are in the world [of the elect]. If any man love the world [of the elect], the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world [of the elect], the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world [of the elect]. And the world [of the elect] passeth away, and the lust thereof…"
— 1 John 2:15–17
If "world" means "the elect" in verse 2, it must mean "the elect" in verses 15–17. However, that makes the passage nonsensical.
The Gospel Is for Whosoever Will
Nobody in the Bible ever preached election. They went everywhere and preached the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ and called on people to believe it. Because He died for everyone.
"For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."
— Romans 10:13
"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."
— John 3:16