William Farel ( ; 1489 – 13 September 1565) was a French evangelist, Protestant reformer and a founder of the Reformed Church in French-speaking Switzerland. He is most often remembered for having persuaded John Calvin to remain in Geneva in 1536, and for persuading him to return there in 1541, after their expulsion in 1538. The Genevan Reformation was so profound that it became known as the "Protestant Rome", where Protestants took refuge and their opponents such as Catholics and unitarians were driven out. Together with Calvin, Farel worked to train missionary preachers who spread the Protestant cause to other countries, especially to France.
Life
Farel was born in 1489 in Gap, in the French province of Dauphiné. He was the son of Antoine Farel, a papal notary, and Anastasie d'Orcières. Farel moved to Paris in 1509, where he studied with the pro-reform Catholic clergy at the University of Paris, in the earliest years of the Reformation. There he met the humanist scholar Jacques Lefevre d'Etaples, who influenced Farel and helped him obtain a professorship to teach grammar and philosophy at the Collège du Cardinal Lemoine. With Lefevre he became a member of the Cercle de Meaux gathered together from 1519 by the reform-minded bishop of Meaux, Guillaume Briçonnet. Farel soon became regent of the college. By 1522 he was appointed a diocesan preacher by the bishop. Farel now could invite a number of Evangelical humanists to work in his diocese to help implement his reform program within the Catholic Church.
This group of humanists also included Josse van Clichtove, , Gérard Roussel, and François Vatable. The members of the Meaux circle were of different talents but they generally emphasized the study of the Bible and a return to the theology of the early Church. While working with Lefevre in Meaux, Farel came under the influence of Lutheran ideas and became an avid promoter of them. After condemnation by the Sorbonne, Farel evangelized fervently in the Dauphiné. Although Farel later became a friend and ally of John Calvin, he had been a promoter of Lutheran ideas in his youth.
Farel was forced to flee to Switzerland because of controversy that was aroused by his writings against the use of images in Christian worship. In 1524, while in Basel, he wrote thirteen theses sharply criticizing Roman doctrine, but his argument was so heated that even Erasmus joined in the demand for his expulsion. He went on to Strasbourg and later Montbéliard, but was again forced to leave. Eventually he spent time in Zürich with Huldrych Zwingli, in Metz and back in Strasbourg, where he met Martin Bucer. In 1532, at the Synod of Chanforan in Piedmont, Farel took part in the discussions that led to the merger of the Waldensians with the Reformation.
After an initial hostile reception, he gained an increasing number of followers, so that the General Council of Geneva adopted the Reformation in May 1536. The couple did have a son six years later, although he died in infancy. In the winter of 1565, when the Protestants of Metz begged him to come to their aid, Farel visited the city and preached with all his old fire. Exhausted by his travels through the winter, Farel died in Neuchâtel on 13 September 1565.