Tractatus de Deo uno secundum naturam

Other texts of Scripture, which are objected to by some, are explained.

« Other texts, which certain theologians are wont to bring forward, pertain in no way more to teaching predestination to glory before foreseen supernatural merits: Sap. IV. 11; Matth. XXIV. 32. 24; Act. XIII. 48; Rom. VIII. 28-30. »

Just as in Rom. IX., so also in certain other places of Scripture, heretics not only abuse them to persuade their error of absolute predestination and reprobation, which we refuted in thesis LIV.; but also some Catholic doctors do not rightly appeal to testimonies of this kind, to confirm their opinion of predestination on account of foreseen merits. This happens because they are little concerned to discern, in the contexts, of what election and predestination in each passage the discourse is; whether its object is really eternal glory considered apart, or rather the gift of grace or the whole series of gifts that begins from gratuitous grace; whether it is about the antecedent will, which excludes all foresight of justice and holiness, or about the consequent will, which presupposes this foresight. For they seem to have persuaded themselves that predestination and election in the Scriptures are never referred to any object other than eternal glory as to an end absolutely predefined, to which merits are then decreed as means; so that they have themselves composed for themselves an order between heavenly glory and the merits of grace. How false these things are we have shown sufficiently in th. LVI. LX. We shall briefly examine the four testimonies indicated in the statement of the thesis; for concerning Eph. I. 4. 5. sq.¹ from which passage some also skirmish, it does not seem worth adding anything to what we touched on briefly in th. LX.

1°. It is adduced: Sap. IV. 11: « he was taken away, lest wickedness should change his understanding. » From these words they argue seriously in this manner: when God foresees that a just man, if he lived longer, would fall, he takes him away by untimely death; God is said to have been led to decree the death, they say, because antecedently he was unwilling that he should fall; this antecedent purpose of God of preventing the final fall connotes an absolute will to save that just man. Therefore the absolute will of salvation precedes and commands the election of the means. See the distinguished P. Cercia, Apparat. de Grat. lect. VII. p. 145.

But even the plain inspection of the words shows that nothing else is said here than that an untimely death is not an evil, as the crowd judges, but a great good conferred by God, so that man, while still innocent, «is withdrawn from the perils of this life and from the uncertainty of temptations,» as Augustine says (above p. 457.). But if this great benefit of God cannot be praised without its thereby being asserted that predestination precedes foreseen merits; indeed I confess that all Christians hold this opinion. Meanwhile let us look at the context. In c. II. Sapiens had introduced the wicked, who in the manner of the Epicureans deny the immortality of the soul and place all happiness in the most wicked pleasures of this life, and who at the same time pursue the just man, who is contrary to them, with deadly hatred. Then in cc. III-V. he draws a comparison between the wicked, who now seem happy but will be most unhappy in the future, and the just man, who in this life seems wretched but in the future will be most blessed, in order to prove that the afflictions of this life are not true evils for the just man, but are either permitted or sent by God for his greater good (cf. Rom. VIII.). Specifically, in these chapters III. and IV. he compares the long life and numerous offspring of the wicked with the untimely death and bereavement of the just man. He therefore says, at IV. 7-15, that this death is not an evil for the just man but a great good, ordained by God out of the love with which He loved the just man for the holiness of his life. «If the just man has been overtaken by death, he will be in refreshment» v. 7. Therefore that untimely death is not an evil. «Having become pleasing to God (that just man) was loved (ἐναρεστος θεῳ γενομενος ἠγαπηθη); and while living among sinners he was translated» v. 10.² Because by his own virtue he became pleasing to God, God therefore loved him and bestowed benefits upon him; among these benefits and tokens of love is that God snatched him from the midst of the wicked, among whom to live is no small evil, and carried him into refreshment, which is a great good. This very thing he explains further. «He was snatched away (which in the preceding verse he had called: was translated), lest malice should change his understanding, or lest deceit (δολος)³ should deceive his soul. For the fascination of frivolity (φαυλοτητος⁴ wickedness) obscures (ἀμαυροι, causes to vanish) good things, and inconstancy (ῥεμβασμος⁵ wandering, flitting hither and thither, never satisfied) turns the sense aside without malice» (νουν ἀκακον, an innocent mind) v. 11. 12. So great, namely, is the evil, so great the danger of living among sinners, that even the just are easily perverted, as if bewitched by the very proximity of wickedness and by the wandering concupiscence of the wicked. «Made perfect in a short time, he fulfilled many years» v. 13. Before God his life, although brief, is equal to the longest life; therefore one should not grieve over an untimely death. «For his soul was pleasing to God (a little before = made pleasing to God), therefore He hastened to lead him out of the midst of iniquities» v. 14. (a little before = «was translated while living among sinners;» «he was snatched away, lest malice change his understanding»).

You see that verses 7, 10, 11 and 14 all say nothing other than that the death of the just man, however untimely, is a great benefit for him, because through it the just man is carried into refreshment and snatched from the dangers of perversion.⁶. But God is not said to confer this benefit because he predestined the just man to eternal life before foreseeing his justice; rather God is said to love the just man on account of his holiness, and from this love, consequent upon his holiness, to carry him over, to snatch him, and to lead him out from the midst of iniquities through death while he is just; and therefore, consequently upon his holiness, he also decrees for him eternal life, which is connected with such a death, and on account of this connection death has the character of a benefit. The purpose of God to prevent the final fall of the just therefore includes the foreseeing of justice, and consequent upon that foreseeing God decrees the benefit of death in justice, and therefore also eternal life, either gratuitously or from congruous merit, the latter of which the Wise Man has here before his eyes. It is not therefore that God predestined the just to eternal life by an absolute will before any foreseeing of justice; rather the opposite is proved from this passage.

2°. The second testimony, which those theologians say seems to them «apodictic,» is Matth. XXIV. 22. 24. (coll. Marc. XIII. 20. 22.). «Unless those days had been shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened... There shall arise false Christs... so that, if it be possible, even the elect shall be led into error.»

Let us first consider «the shortening of the days for the sake of the elect,» of which there is mention in Matth. v. 22, and in Marc. v. 20. But these words pertain to that part of Christ's discourse in which he treats of the overthrow of Jerusalem.⁷. Christ therefore says that, unless those days of most savage war were shortened, all would perish by a most wretched death; but that, on account of the elect (that is, in the frequent usage of the New Testament, th. LVI.), it will come to pass for the sake of Christians that those days are shortened. What things, what, I ask, has this to do with our matter?

Nevertheless we grant that the elect are to be understood as also predestined, and that the discourse concerns not only temporal but also eternal salvation. Granting this, by what arguments will you persuade us that they were elected to eternal glory by an absolute will before the foreseeing of justice and of merits, in which they are supposed to be at the time when the days are shortened, and before the shortening of the days is decreed for them, while they were foreseen as future in justice acquired, indeed through grace, but not without their own free cooperation? In the words of Christ there is most certainly no indication of such an order of absolute election: first to glory, then to merits and to perseverance in merits.

When the elect are spoken of (in the hypothesis we now posit), election or predestination is supposed, in divine foreknowledge, to be complete from the first grace up to glory. If it is now asked in what order the gifts follow one another in predestination, this order cannot be drawn out from the fact that in execution preservation from falling, perseverance, and generally all grace are said to be conferred for the sake of the elect. For every grace is conferred, even on those who are reprobate in the foreknowledge of God, by the antecedent will of God, that they may become elect; a fortiori therefore on those who are predestined in the foreknowledge of God it is conferred by the will of election, and that they may be elect. Therefore certainly, in every opinion of predestination whether before or after foreseen merits, it is truly said that preservation from falling, removal of temptations, and shortening of the days come about for the sake of the elect (cf. p. 617.sqq.). Therefore nothing can be concluded from those words of Christ the Lord about the order of predestination to glory. Indeed, if this order were to be found in those words, it would rather be inverted. For reasoning within that hypothesis, one would have to conclude thus: antecedently, and in the prior logical order (in signo priori), before the foreseen justice in which they will then be, and before the decreed and foreseen removal of the dangers then impending, they are not yet absolutely elect; but in that logical order salvation is still, as it were, suspended: «no flesh would be saved;» just as elsewhere in Scripture, before foreseen final justice, salvation is presented as still uncertain (above th. LIX. n. 2.). Hence that clause «those days will be shortened for the sake of the elect» (in the hypothesis granted) would not mean: because antecedently to the foreseeing of merits and perseverance they are already absolutely elect, therefore those days will be shortened; but it would mean: while God sees that at that time they are just through grace and through His cooperation under grace⁸, He decrees for them the grace of preservation from great temptations, under which they would fall, so that they may be absolutely elect to glory by the consequent will, in view of foreseen merits and perseverance.

The other part of the text, which is objected, Matth. v. 24; Marc. v. 22, certainly pertains to that part of the discourse in which the Lord declares the signs of his second coming, which is soon to follow. Among these are the false Christs and false prophets, who will work portents, «so that, if it be possible, even the elect are led into error» according to Matthew; or «to seduce, if it be possible, even the elect,» as Mark has it. I do not see what follows from these words for confirming predestination before rather than after the foreseeing of merits; for in every opinion that is not heretical it is indubitable that the predestined cannot fall finally in the composite sense, but can fall finally in the divided sense. See above p. 592. 593. No one doubts the infallibility of predestination, which alone can be gathered from these words; but about the order in which foreseen merits and predestination to glory follow one another, there is no mention.

3°. The third testimony follows from Act. XIII. 48. «As many as were foreordained to eternal life believed.» I observe a) that here it is said that all and only the foreordained to eternal life believed. If therefore foreordination to eternal life signifies absolute predestination to glory, the Holy Spirit would have revealed to us that all those who then believed were predestined, and that all the others who did not believe in this preaching of Paul at Antioch of Pisidia were reprobate; all of which is at least not probable. b) Let us grant for the moment that it is so; what follows from it? A fact is stated: that all in that city who were predestined to glory received the faith through Paul's preaching; but it is not said that they were predestined to glory by the antecedent will before the foreseeing of faith and of supernatural merits. Thus it must without doubt be affirmed, for example: as many as are predestined to eternal life will believe, will be justified, will persevere; yet it is not thereby affirmed that predestination to life precedes foreseen merits. Cf. supra p. 647. 648. Moreover, c) the genuine sense of this passage seems to be entirely different, having nothing to do with the present dispute. For the ordering (ταξις) to eternal life here is nothing other than the disposition of the soul, necessary through grace, tending of itself and ordered to eternal life as to an end; for in the Greek is read not προτεταγμένοι or προωρισμένοι, but ὅσοι ἦσαν τεταγμένοι εἰς ζωὴν αἰώνιον. Therefore, as many as were then so disposed through grace, not resisting it, these all, and only these, believed.

4°. There remains the passage of the Apostle, Rom.VIII. 28–30, to be explained.

After describing in chapters VII and VIII the weakness of the flesh, and especially the suffering of inner afflictions on the one hand, and on the other the power of the Spirit by which we are sons of God, Paul goes on: « We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who according to purpose are called saints. For whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be made conformable to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Whom he predestined, these he also called; and whom he called, these he also justified; and whom he justified, these he also glorified » v. 28–30.

In the first place I observe that the holy Fathers very frequently teach from this very passage that predestination to eternal life is from the foreknowledge of merits. See Ambrose, Ambrosiaster, Theodoret, cited in thesis LIX. n. II. Further, Origen in Rom. I.VII. n. 8, Chrysostom hom. XV. n. 1, Isidore of Pelusium l. IV. ep. 51. ad Theonem, Theodoret, Oecumenius, Theophylact in h. l. interpret purpose not of God, but as the purpose and will of man. Although this explanation of the word is not true, it nonetheless shows very clearly how these Fathers understood the order between foreknowledge and predestination, namely in those words of the Apostle: « whom he foreknew and predestined. » Hence Oecumenius says that, as in calling, justification and glorification through grace, so in predestination there must everywhere be understood also the free purpose of man that was foreseen. « Whom he foreknew, these also he predestined, who are according to purpose... so that nothing absurd occurs if God does good to some and not to others. When according to purpose is understood, the virtue of those is established (under grace, surely) who believed according to their own purpose (freely but aided by grace), and God is freed from respect of persons » Oecumen. in h. l. T. I. p. 314. Theophylact has a parallel. « A man is called according to purpose, that is, according to his own will: for the calling (which is from God's antecedent will) does not suffice; otherwise all would be saved, for all are called: but a free will is also needed... Foreknowledge is first, then predestination » Theophylact. in h. l. T. II. p. 63. Not less plainly do Sedulius in his commentary (Bibl. Max. PP. T. VI. p. 519.) and Remigius (Altisiodorensis?) (ibid. T. VIII. p. 917.) explain the same passage of predestination after the foreseeing of merits.

We come to the text itself, and we shall first try to explain the individual expressions about which doubt may arise, and then the sense of the whole περιχοπης.

a) Explanation of the individual sentences. « Who according to purpose are called saints. » In the Greek text the word saints does not occur; it is however read in the Vulgate and among several Latin Fathers; in Greek it is τοις κατα προθεσιν κλητοις ουσιν⁹. Saints in the books of the New Testament are the Christians themselves; and so the sense is not changed whether that word is added or omitted.

Purpose (προθεσις) is predicated of God in the New Testament five times, namely h. l.; Rom. IX. 11; Eph. I. 11; III. 11; 2. Tim. I. 9, in all of which passages the purpose and will of God is signified, as it is referred from eternity to a benefit¹⁰ that is supernatural and is to be conferred in time by the effect itself; and therefore the effect that will in fact follow is also signified, and natural merit or human right to that very benefit is excluded. Hence purpose is not a conditional antecedent will; but it is always an absolute will, which, when it is referred to the free acts of creatures, includes foreknowledge (th. LVI.).

Moreover, called (κλητοί) can indeed, in opposition to elect, also be said of those who have not followed the calling, as Matth. XX.16; XXII. 14; but in other places κλητοί are the faithful who have in fact followed the calling, in which sense Paul in the following verse uses the verb to call: « whom he called, these he also justified. » But where « purpose, » is added, they cannot in any way be called called according to purpose unless they also have followed, as is clear from the declared meaning of the word προθεσις.

The other expression is more difficult than the rest, v. 29: « whom he foreknew. » Some refer its threefold meaning: simply to foreknow future things, to love or to elect, and to predestine. But that to foreknow is in itself an act of the intellect, by which a future object is known, and not of the will, by which it is predestined or loved, is sufficiently evident in itself. It is true, however, that the knowledge and foreknowledge of God, when it is referred to good things, is of approval, and therefore includes love; and if it concerns the knowledge of those things which are effected by God, it is practical foreknowledge, which includes an effecting will. In this way God is said in the Scriptures to know and foreknow especially his faithful ones in the composite sense, insofar as they are heaped with grace and supernatural gifts by him: Io. X. 14. 15; 2. Tim. II. 19; 1. Pet. I. 2. etc. (th. XL. n. 4.). In this sense therefore, as purpose (πρόθεσις) in God directly signifies a benign will and obliquely foreknowledge, so προγνώσις signifies foreknowledge with the co-signification of a benign will. For the word to predestine (προορίζω) the things said in th. LVI. n. II. suffice.

By these names, practical foreknowledge of approval, purpose, calling according to purpose, predestination, when they are referred to those things which do not come about without the free cooperation of the creature, is signified the operation of the divine will and the foreseen free cooperation of the created will; but what the relation is between the operation of God and our cooperation must be demonstrated not from the meaning of the names, but from elsewhere (supra p. 560. 561.).

Another question can arise about what conformity to Christ the Apostle speaks of, when he says that those who are called according to purpose, and whom God foreknew, are also predestined to be made conformable to the image of his Son. Paul is accustomed to consider conformity to Christ in two ways: that we die with Christ according to the old man, and rise with Christ and are glorified in the new life. He commended both these conformities in the whole preceding context of this chapter. «God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh..... that the justification of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the spirit.» «If Christ is in you, the body indeed is dead because of sin, but the spirit lives because of justification.» «If you mortify the deeds of the flesh, you shall live.» «Heirs indeed of God, and joint heirs with Christ, if yet we suffer with him, that we may also be glorified with him.» Thus also above, VI. 3–11: «For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection.» «Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live together with Christ.» Cf. Colos. III. 1. sqq. Therefore the conformity to which the predestined are said to be predestined is, from the context itself, double, or rather triple: that they may be made conformable to the likeness of his death by suffering with him, and to his glorification through co-glorification, begun, here, to be consummated there.

Lastly, it is asked about the meaning of glorification in v. 30: whether it is the glorification of the just in the future life, or rather glorification in the present life; which latter some contend, arguing from the form of the verb glorified (ἐδόξασε), as if Paul were speaking of a glorification already accomplished in all the just. This can be confirmed further from the fact that God is seen to have glorified all whom he justified; for this is true only of the present glory of adoption, of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, of the charisms, etc., and not of the future glory of blessedness. « He glorified through grace, through adoption, » says Chrysostom, hom. XV. n. 2. In the same way, with others, Theodoret on this passage: « By naming them sons who were justified, he glorified them, and gave them the grace of the Holy Spirit. » Yet in truth, just as conformity with the Son of God, so also glorification, from the context of the whole chapter, seems to pertain to the present life as well, but at the same time to the future, as others understand. The form of the aorist tense does not hinder this interpretation. But the connection of glorification with justification, « whom he justified, these he also glorified, » shows only that justification, of itself and by God's intention, tends to glorification, provided one persists in it. Moreover the discourse here is about those who are predestined in the foreknowledge of God to conformity with Christ, not only begun, but begun and completed at the same time, in whom justification indeed coheres with glorification even in eternal life.

b) Now that the difficulties which might arise from the single expressions have been forestalled, the interpretation of the whole sentence follows. « We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, to them who according to purpose are called saints » v. 28. The subject of which something is affirmed is « those who are called according to purpose and who love God; » the predicate affirmed of them is the cooperation of all events for their good; namely, that all adversities (for it was of these adversities that the discourse was in the preceding verses) « work together for good » for them; and so no adversities are to be feared by them, as long as they remain lovers of God, because God sends and permits them for their good. The Apostle proves and declares this full doctrine of consolation in what follows. « For whom he foreknew, and predestined to be made conformable to his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren » v. 29. Indeed these adversities do not befall « those who are called and who love God » by chance and without the counsel of God; but those whom he foreknew as such he predestined to be made conformable to his Son, which conformity is obtained, laborious in this life and glorious in the other, by suffering with Christ, and so by the endurance of adversities, as he had declared at length in the preceding verses of this chapter. By that counsel, therefore, by which he predestined them to conformity with his Son, first through the labors and the glory of the gifts and merits of grace, and then through consummated glory, he also sends them adversities, by whose endurance they are made conformable. But in such predestination of conformity with Christ, predestination to glory without supposed and foreseen merits is not included; rather the opposite is; for conformity through labors and merits is the condition under which, and the reason for which, conformity is predestined in the glory of the eternal kingdom: « heirs indeed of God, and joint heirs with Christ; if yet we suffer with him, that we may also be glorified with him. » Moreover it is plainly said: those whom he foreknew, with foreknowledge indeed benevolent and practical (as we grant), but he foreknew them as called and as lovers; these, given this foreknowledge, he predestined to complete conformity in eternal glory; which again is predestination after the foreseeing of merits.

Nor does anything help to prove the contrary from the last verse. « But whom he predestined, these he also called; and whom he called, these he also justified; and whom he justified, these he also glorified » v. 30. For predestination ought to be understood in the same way as in the preceding verse, and glorification in the same way as conformity with Christ, as we showed a little before. Hence the whole argument we drew from the preceding verse returns. Moreover predestination cannot in any way be taken here as predestination to glory considered separately; but it is necessarily predestination of conformity with Christ, either partial, to grace and merits, or complete, to grace and glory at once. Hence it is said: upon the supposed eternal predestination, there follows in time the order of execution, calling, justification, glorification. This is equally true in every opinion; except that in ours the order of execution corresponds to the order of predestination (th. LVII.), and on this account it agrees more fully with the words of St Paul.

What remains is that which is greatest and the one thing necessary: if we do it, none of the things that seem evil harm us; if we neglect it, none of the things that seem good profit us; so that we may, to be sure, obey the admonition of the Apostle: « Brethren, labour the more to make your calling and election sure by good works; for doing these things you shall not sin at any time » (2. Pet. I. 10.). Let us be strengthened for this great business by that sense, no less of most certain truth than of humility and of most secure hope in God, that we are saved by divine grace and mercy, and condemned by ourselves. « You ought therefore to hope for perseverance in obedience itself from the Father of lights, from whom descends every best gift and every perfect gift, and to ask for it in daily prayers, and in doing this to be confident that you are not strangers to the predestination of his people, since he himself bestows that you should do even this. Let it be far from you, therefore, to despair of yourselves, since you are bidden to have your hope in him and not in yourselves... Holding this hope, serve the Lord in fear and rejoice in him with trembling, since no one can be secure about eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised to the sons of promise before eternal times, unless this life, which is a temptation upon the earth, be consummated; but he will make us persevere in him to the end of this life, to whom we say every day: lead us not into temptation » (Aug. Don. persev. n. 62.), and for whom Mother Church supplicates on behalf of all of us, « that the book of blessed predestination may keep the names of all the faithful written in it. » The signs, therefore, of our predestination with God, who « foreknows that his own will be such in faith and work » in unchangeable knowledge, are for us, for good hope, generally all those things which we know to be necessary or useful for attaining eternal life. « But if, as is certain, certainty is wholly denied us, will not those signs be all the more delightful, if perhaps we can find some sign of this election? For what rest can our spirit have, while it holds no testimony yet of its predestination?... Now, to repeat briefly: to have the testimony from the blood and the water and the spirit is, if you refrain from sins, if you bring forth worthy fruits of penance, if you do the works of life » (S. Bernard. Serm. II. in Octava Pasch.). Theologians and spiritual men enumerate more particular signs: the eight beatitudes pronounced by the Lord himself, Matth. V.; zeal for perfection according to each one's own calling; intense charity toward God and neighbours; contempt for worldly things and desire for heavenly things; frequency of prayer and of the sacraments; devotion to the Virgin, Mother of God, whom we constantly beseech to pray for us now and at the hour of our death. To these we rightly add piety toward the other heavenly patrons, above all toward the spouse of the Virgin and foster-father of the Son of God, St Joseph, a singular intercessor at the hour of death. With regard to these signs, so that we may daily advance in them, the care is indeed rightly commended by that sentence whose genuine sense we explained in its place: « if you are not predestined, make yourself to be predestined. »

TERRIBLE IS THE LORD AND EXCEEDINGLY GREAT.... WHO WILL SEE HIM AND DECLARE HIM, AND WHO WILL MAGNIFY HIM AS HE IS FROM THE BEGINNING? MANY THINGS ARE HIDDEN, GREATER THAN THESE; FOR WE HAVE SEEN BUT FEW OF HIS WORKS (Eccles. XLIII.)

THERE IS NO GOD BUT THEE, TO WHOM CARE BELONGS FOR ALL.... FOR THY POWER IS THE BEGINNING OF JUSTICE, AND BECAUSE THOU ART LORD OF ALL, THOU MAKEST THYSELF MERCIFUL TO ALL (Sap. XII.)

O THE DEPTH OF THE RICHES OF THE WISDOM AND OF GOD'S KNOWLEDGE! HOW INCOMPREHENSIBLE ARE HIS JUDGMENTS, AND HIS WAYS UNSEARCHABLE! (Rom. XI.)