Scotus Academicus, Tomus secundus: De Deo Intelligente et Volente

This celebrated question was debated not only by the theological Doctors and by all the more recent among the holy Fathers, but also by the more skilled pagan philosophers, some of whom, as was observed in the previous Question, being unable to reconcile divine foreknowledge with the contingency of future things and with human freedom, denied to God the foreknowledge of future things: others, however, said that there is no contingency in things, and no freedom in men, but that all things come to pass by a certain blind necessity. From which it is evident how difficult is the resolution of the present Question, and how far it escapes the weak grasp of the human mind, unless it is first illumined and strengthened by the light of faith. In order, therefore, that this hidden truth may shine forth more evidently

To be supposed 1. The foreknowledge which God has of things that are to be freely future is not productive of those future things, nor does it influence their futurition in any way; rather, it presupposes them, just as the effect follows the cause. For this divine foreknowledge is a purely speculative act, immanent in God and not operative ad extra, by which God Himself merely contemplates and sees the object presented to Him by the creature, an object He certainly would not see, if it were not offered by the creature: indeed He would see the opposite, if the opposite were done by the creature. So that in that divine foreknowledge God is like a mirror representing diverse objects and the free gestures of men, and the movements opposed to them; or like a man who from a lofty tower should behold all those things which are done on the low-lying plain, and should see some men falling into a pit, others fighting with an adversary, others dancing, others doing something else: which diverse vision certainly would in no way be the cause of those diverse actions; rather, those diverse actions would be the cause of that diverse vision. And so, keeping the proportion, we must reason in the same way about divine foreknowledge; for since the divine intellect is of itself indifferent to knowing the futurition of a thing, or its non-futurition, it is as it were determined to see the futurition by the thing itself, which is truly going to be future, the divine decree being supposed: whence future things could rather be called the causes of divine foreknowledge, than foreknowledge be called the cause of future things; as the Greek holy Fathers openly teach: Origen indeed, in l. 3. in Epist. ad Rom., explaining those words of cap. 8., Whom He foreknew and predestined, says thus: In the foreknowledge of God lies neither the cause of our salvation nor of our perdition. For a thing will not therefore be, because He knows it to be future; but because it is future, it is known by God before it comes to be. For even if we imagine that God does not foreknow something future, without doubt it will be.

The same Justin Martyr, in question 58 ad Orthodoxos, where, giving the reason why the foreknowledge of God was not the cause of the sin of Adam and of the Angels, speaks thus: Foreknowledge is not the cause of that which is future: but that which is future is the cause of foreknowledge. For indeed the future does not follow upon foreknowledge, but foreknowledge follows upon the future; and the one who foreknows is by no means the cause of the future.

Similarly, Saint Athanasius in the sermon de Cruce Domini says that they did not dare such things against Christ as serving the Prophetic words; but they perpetrated them of their own accord, spontaneously and willingly, so that the Prophet is not the author or cause of those things: but their own will, or rather they themselves were the cause that the Prophets foretold such things about them. The Latin Fathers think the same, and above all St. Jerome on cap. 26. of Jeremiah: For it is not, he says, because God knows that something is future that it is therefore future: but because it is future, God knows it as the foreknower of future things: and Augustine, lib. 5. De Civitate, cap. 10.

For a man does not therefore sin because God foreknew that he would sin: rather, for this reason it is not doubted that he sins, when he sins, because He, whose foreknowledge cannot be deceived, foreknew not fate, not fortune, not something else, but that the man himself would sin; who, if he be unwilling, certainly does not sin; but if he should be unwilling to sin, this also He foreknew.

Doubtless because God accommodates Himself to the freedom of the creature, so that He foreknows nothing other than what it will freely have done or omitted, so much so that the free determination of the creature is, as it were, the rule and measure of that divine foreknowledge. Finally, St. Anselm in the Elucidatorio, around the middle: All the things which men were going to do as future, God foreknew as future, and foretold through the Prophets that they were to be done. Foreknowledge, however, brought no necessity upon them that they should be done; rather, they themselves brought the necessity, when they fulfilled their own will. By which it plainly appears that divine foreknowledge is not the cause of future things, nor are things therefore future because they were foreknown by God: but they are therefore foreknown, because they are future.

To be supposed 2. That a twofold necessity can be distinguished, namely antecedent and consequent, or of the consequent and of the consequence. That is called antecedent which does not presuppose the use of freedom, nor the exercise of the will, as, v. gr., a man is necessarily risible, because he is rational, independently of man's freedom. The consequent necessity is that which arises from a supposition following the use of freedom, and depends in some way on our will, so that such necessity would not have to follow from it, unless our will freely determined itself. Whence just as the will can absolutely not determine itself to the act which it freely produces, so it can bring it about that such a supposition never exists in the nature of things. Thus it is necessary that something be future ex hypothesi and on the supposition that it will be future. For it cannot simultaneously be future and not future in the composite sense. For just as it implies a contradiction for the same thing to be and not to be at the same time, so likewise it implies a contradiction for the same thing to be future and not future. The former necessity excludes the freedom of the act, because it certainly follows from a supposition antecedent to the use of freedom, such as, v. g., is the necessity of dying; for when the necessity is antecedent, then it is not in the power of the will to bring it about that, given such a supposition, the act which necessarily follows from it does not exist. The latter necessity, however, namely the consequent, does not destroy, but preserves the whole use of freedom, such as is the necessity of speaking while someone in fact freely speaks, because it neither takes away nor impedes the free potency; but rather presupposes it and its free exercise. Whence although while the will wills it cannot not will, because whatever is, when it is, necessarily is, nevertheless it can absolutely not will, because it was free to will or not to will.

To be supposed 3. From the Doctor, on the first book of the Sentences, dist. 39, single question, number 26, this is the difference between the determinate truth of propositions about the past, about the present, and about the future: that, says the Doctor, there is not a like truth in those about the future as in those about the present and the past. In present and past things, indeed, there is determinate truth, so that one of the extremes is posited, and, as it is understood to be posited, it is not in the power of the cause that it be posited, because although it is in the power of the cause, as it is naturally prior to the effect, to posit the effect or not to posit it, nevertheless the effect is not understood to be already posited in esse. Such, however, is not the determination on the part of the future, because although for some intellect one part is determinately true, and even one part is determinately true in itself, even if no intellect should apprehend it, nevertheless not so but that it is in the power of the cause, for that instant, to posit the opposite. By which he indicates that the necessity of the consequent is greater in the past and the present than in the future, because the past and the present are already outside their causes, so that the will cannot in any way take away or impede their position: the position of the future, however, since it is not yet outside its cause, can still be judged capable of having that supposition taken away and impeded, at least hypothetically: for when the will is not yet determined to willing, it is still judged able to suspend and not elicit the future volition; but where it has in fact willed, or wills, it can no longer suspend that volition. Hence consequent freedom is less with respect to a present or past act than with respect to a future act. Whence if, notwithstanding the consequent necessity, my actual speech is free, much more will my future speech also be free, notwithstanding such necessity.

First conclusion. — The certainty and infallibility of divine foreknowledge does not destroy the contingency of things. This is common among Theologians and

Proof 1. Divine foreknowledge does not produce, but presupposes, its object: therefore it does not destroy, but presupposes, the contingency of things. The antecedent is clear from the authorities of the holy Fathers cited in the first supposition, which is also urged by reason. The knowledge which is the cause of a work is that which directs the will and power of the artisan, from the knowledge of the one operating, in producing his work; but that which does not direct the artisan to produce the work, but the work would come to pass just the same, even if it did not exist, manifestly is not the cause of the work, but rather presupposes that work: such, however, is divine foreknowledge, which although in time it precedes existing things, nevertheless does not precede, but presupposes, their futurition represented in the divine Essence and decreed by the divine will: therefore it does not produce the futurition of a contingent thing, but presupposes it, and so does not destroy its contingency.

Proof 2. The contingency of things stands with their determination, made by the divine will, to one of the two parts of a contradiction: therefore much more will it stand with the infallibility of divine Knowledge, which presupposes that determination. The antecedent is clear. First, because a future contingent will come to pass through contingent causes and causes not operating necessarily: therefore although its existence is determined by the divine will, it will be no less contingent. — Secondly, a cause does not take away from something that which belongs to it from its formal notion, unless it confers on it something opposed: but the divine will determining a future contingent confers on it nothing intrinsic which is opposed to its contingency: therefore this determination does not destroy the contingency. — Finally, the determination of a future contingent is wholly free, and about a thing truly contingent; for in the same instant of eternity in which the divine will determined the thing as future, it could have not determined it as future: therefore that futurition was determined not necessarily, but freely. — The first consequence is also clear: for if the divine determination, which precedes and produces the futurition of things, does not destroy it, much less will knowledge, which presupposes that contingent futurition, destroy it. Add that, once the determination of the divine will about something future is made, that thing would come to pass infallibly, even if per impossibile God did not know it: therefore much less does the certainty of divine knowledge destroy the contingency of future things, than the determination of the will decreeing that futurition.

Proof 3. Just as our intuition is related to those things which we see, in the same way divine knowledge is related to those things which God intuits: but our intuition imposes no necessity on the things seen by us: therefore neither does the divine intuition impose any necessity on the contingent things known by Him. Whence Boethius, book 5 De consolatione, prose 6: What, then, do you demand that those things which are illumined by the divine light become necessary, when not even men make all the things which they see necessary? Does your intuition add any necessity to the things which you discern as present?

You will say 1. What God necessarily knew will necessarily come to pass: but God necessarily knew future things, v. g., that the Antichrist will be: therefore he will necessarily come to pass. The major is clear: for in a good argument, in which the antecedent is necessary, the consequent also is necessary: but the antecedent of this consequence, God knew that the Antichrist would be: therefore he will be, is necessary, namely, God knew, because that knowledge is eternal and absolute, since it is the very substance of God, and therefore is necessary: therefore also the consequent, namely, the Antichrist will be, is likewise necessary. But what is necessary is not contingent, because necessary and contingent are opposite modes of being; for the necessary is that which cannot not be, the contingent, however, that which can not be: therefore if divine knowledge is necessary, future things will not be contingent.

I distinguish the major. That they will necessarily come to pass, with absolute and antecedent necessity, I deny: with hypothetical and consequent necessity, I concede. Similarly, regarding the proof, I say that the antecedent of that consequence, God knew that the Antichrist would be: therefore he will be, is not necessary with simple and absolute necessity, but only with consequent and hypothetical necessity; for just as God freely decreed that the Antichrist would be, so likewise He could freely decree that the Antichrist would not be; and therefore just as He knows that the Antichrist will be, so likewise He could know that the Antichrist would not be; and consequently His divine knowledge about the future Antichrist is necessary only with the necessity of the consequent, and from the presupposed free divine decree about the futurition of the Antichrist. Nor does it matter that that divine knowledge is simpliciter necessary as to entity, because it is really the same as the divine Essence, which is the supremely necessary being: for it is not less free as to its termination upon secondary objects, upon which it terminates as they are. Whence it sees contingent things as contingent, and necessary things as necessary.

You will say 2. If divine foreknowledge cannot be deceived and is altogether certain, the things which God foreknew will necessarily come to pass: therefore either divine knowledge is not infallible and certain, or the things which are foreknown by God are not contingent, but necessary.

I distinguish the consequence of the antecedent. That they will necessarily come to pass with simple and absolute necessity, which would destroy the contingency of things, I deny; with conditioned and consequent necessity, which does not destroy, but presupposes, the contingency of things, I concede.

Second conclusion. — Divine foreknowledge does not hinder human freedom. This is of faith, and it is clear from all those texts of Sacred Scripture by which human freedom is established, but especially Deuteronomy, cap. 30: I call heaven and earth to witness today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose therefore life, that both you and your seed may live. Iosue 24.¹ A choice is given you: choose today what pleases you, whom you ought especially to serve. By which words Iosue entices the children of Israel to obey the true God freely, to whom all responded: We will serve our God, and we will be obedient to His precepts.

Psal. 94.: Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts. That is, if you perceive the internal voice and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, acquiesce to it and do not resist. It presupposes, therefore, that it is in their power either to obey the divine admonition or to resist it. — Ecclesiastici 15. vers. 14.: God from the beginning constituted man, and left him in the hand of his own counsel. And vers. 17.: He has set before you water and fire: stretch forth your hand to whichever you will. Before man are life and death, good and evil: that which shall please him shall be given him, etc. From which I argue thus: that which stands with freedom does not hinder our freedom: but the certainty and infallibility of divine foreknowledge stands with freedom: therefore it does not destroy it.

Proof 2. and this by the reason of St. Augustine lib. 5. De Civit. Dei, cap. 9. where he teaches that although God necessarily foresees the things which we are about to do, nevertheless they are to be done by us not necessarily, but freely, because in foreseeing our wills He also foreknew that they would operate spontaneously; for, answering Cicero, who says: If there is a certain order of causes, by which everything that comes to be comes to be, all things come to pass by fate, he says:

It does not follow that if the whole order of causes is certain to God, therefore nothing happens in the free choice of our will; for our wills themselves are in the order of causes, which is certain to God and is contained in His foreknowledge, since human wills are the causes of human works; and so He who foreknew all the causes of things certainly could not be ignorant, among those causes, of our wills too, which He foreknew as the causes of our works.

It is evident, therefore, that divine knowledge does not hinder freedom, but rather presupposes and establishes freedom. For if it hindered it, it would destroy itself, because it would know that something would be free which would not be free, nor would it know a free thing as being truly free.

Proof 3. That which presupposes freedom does not destroy it: but divine foreknowledge presupposes freedom: therefore, etc. The minor is proved. For knowledge presupposes the knowable: therefore knowledge of the future presupposes the future. The antecedent is evident: the consequence is proved from all those sayings of the holy Fathers in the first supposition. It is confirmed moreover from St. Jerome, Dialogo contra Pelagian.: Adam did not sin because He had known this as future; but God foreknew, as God, that he was going to do it by his own will. D. Leo, serm. 16.: The Lord did not thrust the impious hands of the raging men upon Himself, but admitted them; He did not, by foreknowing what was to be done, act that it should be done. St. John Damascene, Dialogo adversus Manichaeos:

That foreknowledge was by no means the cause to the Devil of his becoming evil is evident from this: for neither does a physician, while he foreknows a future disease, supply a cause to the disease. But the cause of the disease indeed consists in a perverse and immoderate manner of life, while the foreknowledge of the physician is a proof of his own learning. The cause of the foreknowledge, moreover, is this, that it was going to be so.

And Augustinus lib. 5. De Civit. Dei, cap. 6:

Therefore it is not for this reason that there is nothing in our will, because He foreknew what would be in our will. For it is not because He foreknew this that He foreknew nothing. Moreover, if He who foreknew what would be in our will foreknew not nothing, but something: assuredly, with Him foreknowing, there is something in our will. Wherefore we are in no way compelled, either, retaining the foreknowledge of God, to take away the free choice of the will, or, retaining the free choice of the will, to deny that God is the foreknower of future things (which is impious): but we embrace both, and we confess both faithfully and truthfully, the former that we may believe rightly, the latter that we may live rightly.

By which it is evident that divine foreknowledge presupposes our free acts, and so does not hinder them.

You will say. Divine foreknowledge presupposes the decree: but what is decreed by God is necessary, not free: therefore divine foreknowledge presupposes a necessary thing, not a free one. The major is clear from the preceding Question. The minor, however, is proved: that is necessary which cannot not be; but what is decreed by God cannot not be: therefore it is necessary.

I distinguish the major. That what is decreed is necessary with consequent necessity, I concede; with antecedent, I deny. For just as God decreed that the thing would be future, so likewise He could freely decree that it would not be future. And so although the thing decreed by God as future cannot not be future, because what is truly future cannot not be future, just as what is truly present cannot not be present: nevertheless this necessity is only consequent upon the free determination of God about future things. This consequent necessity, moreover, does not destroy freedom, but presupposes it; for God does not decree the future acts of our freedom, except where, in the instant of His eternity to which all things are objectively present, He sees it freely determining itself to its acts; for He does not predetermine it physically, but condetermines it, as we have proved in morals and in physics.