Sentences, Books I–II

Sole chapter (18).

1. Whether the Father begot the Son by will or by necessity, and whether God is willing or unwilling. Further, it is commonly asked whether the Father begot the Son by will or by necessity. On this Orosius says to Augustine¹: «Did the Father beget the Son by will or by necessity? Neither by will nor by necessity, because there is no necessity in God; will cannot precede wisdom». «Therefore, as Augustine says in Book XV of De Trinitate², the dialectic of Eunomius, from whom the heretics called Eunomians arose, deserves ridicule. Unable to understand, and unwilling to believe, that God’s only-begotten Word is the Son of God by nature—that is, begotten from the Father’s substance—he said that he was not the Son of nature or substance, but the Son of God’s will. He meant to assert that a will had accrued to God by which he would beget the Son, as we sometimes will something that we did not previously will, a circumstance by which our nature is understood to be mutable. God forbid that we believe this to be in God».

2. A Catholic’s reply. Let us say, then, that the Word of God is the Son of God by nature, not by will, as Augustine teaches in Book XV of De Trinitate³. There he commends a certain Catholic replying to a heretic, saying: «A certain man answered with great acuity a heretic who asked with great cunning whether God begot the Son willingly or unwillingly. If he had answered “unwillingly,” the most absurd misery would have followed for God; if “willingly,” the heretic would at once have drawn the conclusion he intended, namely that the Son was a son not by nature but by will. But the Catholic, with great vigilance, in turn asked him whether God the Father is God willingly or unwillingly. If he answered “unwillingly,” there would follow a great absurdity and misery, which it is sheer madness to believe of God; if he said “willingly,” the reply would be: then he too is God by his will, not by nature. What remained, then, except that he fall silent, seeing himself bound by his own question in an unbreakable knot?» From what has been said it is taught that one must not concede that God is God by will or necessity, willingly or unwillingly; likewise, that he begot the Son by will or necessity, willingly or unwillingly.

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3. An objection to the foregoing. An objection is raised against this as follows: God’s will is God’s nature or essence, because for God to be and to will are not two things; and therefore, just as the three persons have one essence, so they have one will. If, then, God is God by nature, he is also God by will; and if the Word of God is the Son of God by nature, he is also the Son of God by will. — Reply. This is easy to refute. For God’s foreknowledge or knowledge, by which he knows or foreknows good and evil, is also the divine nature or essence; his predestination or will is likewise that same divine essence; and for God to know or to will is no other than for him to be. Although God’s knowledge and will are one and the same, however, not everything said of knowledge is said of will, or conversely; nor does God will by his will all that he knows by his knowledge, since his knowledge knows both good and evil, whereas his will wills only good. For God’s knowledge and foreknowledge concern good and evil, while his will and predestination concern good alone; yet in God knowledge and will, foreknowledge and predestination, are one and the same. Thus, although God’s nature and will are one, we say that the Father begot the Son by nature, not by will, and is God by nature, not by will.

4. How the words are to be understood: the Father is God neither willingly nor unwillingly, and he begot the Son neither willingly nor unwillingly. Still, I think that the foregoing words—wisely stating that God the Father is God neither willingly nor unwillingly, and begot the Son neither willingly nor unwillingly, either by will or necessity—should be understood in this sense: that we are to understand a will that precedes or accrues, as Eunomius understood it⁶. For he is not God by a will that precedes or produces him, as though he were willing before he was God; nor did he beget the Son by a will that preceded or accrued, or beget him as one who willed before he begot. Yet he begot willingly, just as he begot powerfully, well, wisely, and in such ways. For if the Father is said to have begotten the Son as wise and good, why not also as willing? For in God to be willing is just the same as to be God, as to be wise is just the same as to be God.

Let us therefore say that the Father begot the Son as willing, just as he did as wise, but not by a will that preceded or accrued. Augustine explains and confirms this sense, saying in his commentary on the Epistle to the Ephesians: «Of the Son of God, that is, our Lord Jesus Christ, it is written⁷ that he was always with the Father, and the Father’s will never preceded so that he might exist. He, indeed, is the Son by nature».

5. Hilary says in De synodo⁸: «Holy Church anathematizes those who say that the Son of God is from things that do not exist, and likewise those who say that the Father begot the Son neither by counsel nor by will». — Likewise: «If anyone says that the Son was born against the Father’s will, let him be anathema. For the Father did not beget the Son against his will, as though compelled or led by natural necessity when unwilling; rather, as soon as he willed, without time and without suffering, he manifested the Only-begotten from himself».⁹