John Calvin on God's Two Kingdoms

I want to once again emphasize my fealty to classical two kingdoms theology and reassert my view that it is the foundation of historical Protestant political theology. The entire thrust of the Big Eva criticism of the New Christian Right so often fails to understand both our commitment to this doctrine, and paradoxically, their own confusion of God's two kingdoms when they attempt to use gospel categories in order to push back against our Natural obligations.

Here is John Calvin on 2K Theology from the Institutes:

“The former [the spiritual government] has its seat within the soul, the latter [the temporal government] only regulates the external conduct. We may call the one the spiritual, the other the civil kingdom.

Now, these two, as we have divided them, are always to be viewed apart from each other. When the one is considered, we should call off our minds, and not allow them to think of the other.

For there exists in man a kind of two worlds, over which different kings and different laws can preside."

And here is from his commentary on 1 Corinthians:

"Christ's spiritual kingdom has nothing to do with the body and has nothing to do with the outward relationships of mankind, but has solely to do with the mind."

I should re-emphasize for those new to this debate that Classical Two Kingdoms theology is not to be confused with modern 2K theology.