John Calvin was born in 1509 in Noyon France. He lived most of his life dedicated to developing thoughts and theories that today are recognized as the beginning of the Protestant religion. His followers were the common people of Europe; they were from Germany, Switzerland, France England, Scotland, and the Netherlands. He became the peoples voice, at the time, insisting that not just the kings and rulers should have a say in religios poloicy making. John Calvin died at the age of 55 having spent his life persuing relgios freedom and political freedom. .
He was educated in Paris, Orleans and Bourges, all cities in France. He followed in his father's footsteps and studied law. His father was a lawyer for the Roman Catholic church. After his fathers death in 1531 he studied Greek and Latin at the University of Paris. In 1533 at the age of 24, young John Calvin left the Catholic church and declared himself a Protestant. In 1534 he settled in Basel, Switzerland where he published the first edition of the "Institutes of the Christian Religion." Calvin achieved immediate recognition from this book. He continued to write additions to this book for most of his life. Calvin's ideas on religion and his thoughts on reformation were outlined here. Although he is recognized as a reformation leader, he was probably never ordained as a priest. .
In 1536 he was persuaded to become a leader of Geneva's first group of Protestant pastors.
He was the first major political thinker to model social organization from the Bible. .
In early 1538 Calvin moved to Strasbourg where he would write commentaries on the Bible. This is also where he got his doctrine in Protestant religion. In his commentaries came the thought of Calvinism. At first he wrote the commentaries for fun, but then he started to develop a theory on it and he took it away from there. Calvinism is thoughts of John Calvin and his followers about the churches.