Sentences, Books I–II

Chapter 1 (243).

1. He sets out the opinion of others, who say that evil acts are in no way from God and are not good, either in what they are or in any other respect. There are also many others who think very differently about sin and act. They assert that an evil will and evil act are sins, and good in no respect; nor are they from God as author in any respect, because they occur without God.

2. Why, according to these people, sin is called nothing. For without him, as the Evangelist says, “nothing was made”—that is, sin. It is called nothing not because there is no evil action or will, which is something, but because it separates human beings from true being, draws them to evil, and thus leads them to non-being. Those who withdraw from participation in the highest good, which alone truly and properly is, are deservedly said not to be. Therefore Augustine says in On John: “Sin is nothing, and human beings become nothing when they sin.” — For this reason they maintain that sin is nothing, because it draws the human being far from true being. They say that an evil will and an evil action or utterance are sin because they are transgression and disobedience and are done against the law of God. Nevertheless, they exist, but from the human being or the devil, not from God. They say in no way that these are from God, either insofar as they exist or in any other respect.

6 We execrate] We execrate (variant spelling) MTX. 11 here omitted in BCOPX. 22 said] says, BCW. 24 good omitted in MRVW. 30 Rubric omitted in MNRVW.

1 At the beginning of the preceding chapter. 2 That is, Pelagius in Booklet of Faith to Pope Innocent, nos. 10 and 13 (PL 45, 1718). 3 Dist. 28, chap. 4 (p. 491). 4 Book III, chap. 18, nos. 51–52 (PL 32, 1296; CSEL 74, 132ff.); cf. above, p. 541, lines 14–15.

No. 5. Cf. O. Lottin, The Problem of Intrinsic Morality..., in Psychology and Morality, II, 421ff.

3. How they determine Augustine’s words cited above, in which he says, “Everything that exists, insofar as it exists, is good.” They teach that Augustine’s words, in which he says that “everything that exists, insofar as it exists, is good and has God as its author,” are to be understood of natures or substances. By the name substance and nature they say that substances themselves and what they naturally possess are signified, namely the properties concretely belonging to them; thus the soul naturally possesses understanding, intelligence, will, and the like. This is gathered from Augustine’s words cited above, where he calls the human being a nature and a bad human being a bad nature.

4. According to these people, evil acts are not natures or substances *. According to this assertion or understanding, evil acts are not natures or substances, nor are good acts. Augustine seems to intimate this in the book Retractations, distinguishing substances or natures from good or evil actions. Explaining how something he had taught in the book On True Religion should be understood, he says: “This was said of substances and natures; for the discussion concerned them, not good actions and sins.” Here he clearly seems to distinguish natures or substances from actions or sins. Hence the doctors mentioned above assert that interior or exterior actions are not natures or substances; if they are evil, they are sins, and they are not from God. — Augustine also seems to note that evil acts are not a nature in his first response against the Pelagians, saying: “The works of the devil, which are called vices, are acts, not things.” Likewise in the fourth: “Every evil is not a nature, but an act that happens to something through a defect of good. Therefore, what is not a nature God did not make, because everything he made is a nature.” Again: “Everything that is naturally good God made from nothing, not the devil.”

5. According to these people, there are things that are not from God, by which human beings are evil. From this it is gathered that there are certain things that are not from God, and by them human beings are evil. They nevertheless grant this too, relying on Augustine’s words given above, in which he determines the prophetic statement Woe to those who call good evil in the Enchiridion, saying that “this should be understood of the things themselves by which human beings are evil, not of the human beings.” There are therefore certain things by which human beings are evil. — What makes a human being worse is not from God, because, as Augustine says in the book Eighty-Four Questions, “with God as author a human being is not made worse.” God is therefore not the author of the things by which a human being is made worse. But there are, as was said, certain things by which human beings become evil; there are therefore certain things that are not from God, because those things themselves are sins. For this reason Scripture testifies in many places that God is not the author of evils, that is, of things that are sins.

Chapter 2 (244).

1. The foregoing opinion is opposed on the part of these people by the statement, “God is not the author of evils.” This statement rightly opposes the opinion of those above, who say that God is not the author of things that are evil insofar as they are evil, but is their author insofar as they exist; and insofar as they are evil, they say that they are nothing. What wonder, then, if God is said not to be their author insofar as they are nothing, since nothing can have an author? Hence, when it is said that God is the author of everything that exists, these people want “good things” to be understood. They say that those things are good which exist naturally; and by existing naturally they mean not only things that are substances or concretely belong to substances, as they understood above, but everything that does not deprive nature of good. Thus, according to them, Scripture has a multiplicity of meanings wherever it speaks of nature or substance, or of things that exist naturally.

2. Augustine *. But on the passage of the Psalm, There is no substance, Augustine discusses substance in a way that seems to agree with the opinion cited above.

1 Augustine] They support their assertion with Augustine’s testimonies, rubric added in LMN. 6 84] 83, VX; corrected to 83 in W. 8 become] are, LRTV. 9 because] so that, OP. 27 discusses] discussed, BCOPX.

1 Chap. 19 (PL 40, 241; CCL 46, 59); see above, Dist. 34, chap. 5, no. 4 (p. 528). 2 Isa. 5:20. 3 Questions 3 (PL 40, 11); see above, Book I, Dist. 46, chap. 7 (pp. 319ff.). 4 See Gen. 1:31; Deut. 32:4. 5 Concerning this, above, Dist. 35, chap. 2, nos. 4ff. (pp. 531–534). 6 In chap. 1, no. 3 (p. 544). 7 Ps. 68:3. 8 Expositions on the Psalms 68, sermon 1, no. 5 (PL 36, 844ff.; CCL 39, 905ff.), with several omissions throughout.

No. 2. Augustine’s authority is read only in part in Lombard’s Gloss on Ps. 68:3 (PL 191, 627 B, 628 A).

Substance means what we are, whatever we are—human being, animal, earth, sun; all these are substances by the very fact that they exist. Natures themselves are called substances. For what is no substance is nothing at all. Substance therefore means being something. God made the human being a substance; but through iniquity the human being fell from the substance in which he was made. Iniquity itself is not a substance: iniquity is not the nature God formed, but the perversity the human being made. All natures were made through him; iniquity was not made through him, because iniquity is not a substance. In that hymn of the young men, every creature praising God is recalled. All things praise God, but the things God made. The serpent praises God there, but not avarice. All creeping things are named there, but not any vices: we have vices from ourselves and our own will, and vices are not substances.” — Let the proponents of the foregoing opinions attend carefully to these words; they will be able to understand the reason and cause of the statements wherever Scripture mentions nature or substance.

3. We leave the judgment concerning those opinions to the discretion of the prudent reader, to whom we have fully presented knowledge of both opinions, as we hasten to the matters that still remain for us to treat.

4. That when it is said that God is not the author of evil, this is understood of sin, not punishment. Since all Catholic teachers agree on this, namely that God is not the author of evils, care must nevertheless be taken not to include punishments generally under the name of evils, as sins. God is the author of punishments, as he himself says through the Prophet: There is no evil in the city that the Lord has not made. Elsewhere he says in his own person: I am God, creating evil and making good. Here he is said to have created and made evil; but the name evil means punishment, not sin. Conversely, when it is said, «God is not the author of evils», the name evil means sins.

5. That the punishment of evils is from God. — How the statement God did not make death was spoken. Augustine, who had said in Book 84 of the Questions that God is not the author of evil, explains in Book I of the Retractions how this should be understood: «Care must be taken lest what I said be misunderstood: God is not the author of evil, although he is the author of all things that exist, because insofar as they exist they are good; and lest it be thought from this that the punishment of the wicked, which is certainly evil for those who are punished, is not from him. I said this in the same sense as the statement: God did not make death, although elsewhere it is written: Death and life are from the Lord. The punishment of the wicked, therefore, which is from God, is indeed evil for the wicked, but it is among God’s good works, since it is just that the wicked be punished, and everything just is good». Thus God is said not to have made death because he did not make that for which death is inflicted, namely sin. — You have heard, reader, the reason for these statements; from this understanding sound doctrine is strengthened when it is said: God is not the author of evil, and God did not make death.