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On August 5, 2025, I received the unwelcome news from Peter Enneson, another one-time student and long-time associate of Calvin Seerveld, that Cal had passed on from this life very much at peace just a few days shy of his 95th birthday. As Cal had just received the proofs for a fourth volume of his Tough Stuff from the Bible: Tendered Gently, a newly published collection of his meditations on scripture, I knew that that peace was born not only of his readiness to be at home with his Lord, but of his strong desire to bring to fruition several projects he had been pursuing over the last years, especially since the death of his beloved wife Inès in 2021. He had been steadily working, despite declining health and several stays in hospital, on donating his art collection to Trinity Christian College in Chicago, and his library to Redeemer University in Ancaster, Ontario, and on preparing the final manuscripts for the publication of his collected meditations on scripture. As Peter and others who were closely involved with those projects know, Cal was very upfront about his hope to be able to complete them before, in his words, “final earth issues” prevented him from doing so. How heartened we all are that he was able to bring them to completion and how blessed that his legacy as one of the most vibrant voices in reformational Christian thought has been increased in these ways in these last months and days.
Like so much of Cal’s orientation to his work as a professor of aesthetic theory at the Institute for Christian Studies (ICS) from 1972 to 1995, his drive to complete these projects bears the signature of the reformational philosophy that nurtured his scholarship throughout his life from his earliest days as a student in the 1950s at Calvin College in Michigan under H. Evan Runner and then at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam under Dirk Vollenhoven for his Ph.D. in Philosophy and Comparative Literature. What this drive especially reflects is the historical dimension of the reforming practice that is at the heart of reformational thinking, the idea that Christians need to be continuously engaged in all areas of life and study for the purpose of actively inflecting them in a Christian direction. Because this ongoing work of reformation requires deep involvement with the efforts of those who have gone before, it sustains, as Chris Cuthill has recently and so eloquently put it, a view of education as a “sacred trust.” Knowledge for Cal was “something to be shared, cultivated and passed on.” Thus, the completion of these projects was a vital passing of the torch for him “to the next generation of scholars, artists and students” for their continued work of re-formation.
Cal’s earliest formulation of his own understanding of the aesthetic as a dimension of God’s created order that calls out for “joyful finishing,” as he says, took shape in a series of lectures while he was Professor of Philosophy and German at Trinity. First published in 1968 as A Christian Critique of Art and Literature, these lectures introduced his key concept of “allusivity” as the core meaning of the aesthetic as well as his conviction that aesthetic “nuancefulness” is as relevant to everyday living as it is to the practicing artist. His later Rainbows for the Fallen World of 1980, undertaken during his years at ICS, extended these themes in a robust chapter on philosophical aesthetics while also examining the biblical foundation for artistic activity and the various roles of the aesthetic within schooling and biblical interpretation. These were life-altering insights for many in Cal’s own Reformed community as well as in conservative Protestant circles at large especially among those struggling to square their Christian faith with their vocation as artists. The exceptional impact of these books over the years, however, would likely have been less without Cal’s very singular and extraordinary gift of being able to translate into familiar, accessible, and often breath-taking words the complexities of the philosophical tradition that he knew held such promise for the work of artists who professed the Christian faith. Cal was the poet of the reformational tradition whose faithful commitment to its biblically founded “all of life” message literally radiated from every page. For those equally engaged by the challenge of shaping affecting truths from the materials at hand, his was both a compelling and cognizant voice full of that familiar yearning for expressive integrity that accompanies the gift of human creativity.
It was also a voice that very much coincided with who he was as a person – infinitely energetic, resourceful, imaginative, dedicated, faithful, and caring to name just a few. Not only did he endlessly prepare scholarly lectures, popular talks, and publications on the role and place of the aesthetic in Christian life, he had the energy to turn his passion for interpreting and translating scripture into several publications and even audio recordings. Ever resourcefully and imaginatively exercising his own aesthetic muscles, he even turned his 1966 translation of the biblical Song of Songs into an oratorio and his translation of Ecclesiastes into a staged performance. Few stones were left unturned in his efforts to make the biblical calling of an “obedient aesthetic life” a reality in his own life and in the lives of those he beckoned to the “joyful finishing” of God’s creation. Similarly, no occasion to extend his care to friends, students, acquaintances, and the many artists whose art and faith were revivified by his wise words and counsel was left un-extended. An email from Cal was as filled with verve, grace, and compassion as any of his writings. His desire to give his all was not limited to his professional life. It was his way of being. Invariably, those around him experienced him as a kind, generous, and extraordinarily gifted person.
Thanks be to God for the life of Calvin Seerveld. As he would hope, may future generations continue to build upon his faithful legacy.
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