Giovanni Valentino Gentile

Who is Giovanni Valentino Gentile?

Giovanni Valentino Gentile was an Italian humanist and non-trinitarian.

As a young man he was influenced by Giorgio Siculo's teaching against paedobaptism and transubstantiation. In Naples he was exposed to Waldensian teachings, and those of Juan de Valdés, and was part of the Accademia Cosentina.

In 1546 he took part in the Collegia Vicentina in Vicenza, adopting the Unitarian view of Lelio Sozzini. After the 1550 Anabaptist Council of Venice antitrinitarians were persecuted by the Council of Ten and in 1557 Gentile fled with Apollonio Merenda to Geneva - already home to Giorgio Biandrata, Nicola Gallo, Giovanni Paolo Alciati and Matteo Gribaldi, and there, in 1558, he aligned with Alciati and Biandrata against Jean Calvin. On May 18, 1558 Calvin required all the Italian exiles in Geneva to affirm a Trinitarian statement, which Gentile first refused to sign, but then following the others, did so. At this period the Italian exiles in Geneva were forming the idea of Christ as a person subordinate to God, the Father, and of the Holy Spirit as simply God's power.