John Knox, who had met Calvin in…
1558 CE
John Knox, who had met Calvin in Geneva, had returned for a nine-month preaching tour in Scotland before settling in Geneva in 1556 as the minister of the English refugee church here.
Knox continues to develop his theology, which stresses God's sovereignty, along Calvinist lines but travels well beyond Calvin in his political theory.
In 1558, Knox publishes a notorious work, The First Blast of the Trumpet against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, a scathing denunciation of rule by women monarchs.
Knox directs this diatribe at three rulers in particular, all Catholic monarchs: the queen regent of Scotland, Marie de Guise; Mary, Queen of Scotland (also in line, through her recent marriage to the dauphin, to become queen of France), and England's Mary Tudor.
The work's major effects, however, are to embarrass Calvin and to offend the Protestant Elizabeth Tudor, who in 1558 succeeds her half-sister Mary to the throne of England, where Knox remains persona non grata.