Victor R. Claveau, MJ
Free Will[1]
The question of free will ranks among the foremost philosophical problems of all time. The view adopted in response to it will determine a person’s position in regard to the most important issues that present themselves to the human mind.
Questions on the one hand include: Does a person possess genuine moral freedom, the power of true choice and the real ability to determine the course of his thoughts and actions? Does he have the power to decide which motives shall dominate in his mind? Does a person have the power to modify and form his character?
Questions on the other hand: Are a person’s thoughts and actions and character all merely the inevitable outcome of circumstances? Are they all unavoidably predetermined in every detail, along inflexible lines by events of the past, over which he himself has had no control?
These questions reveal the magnitude of the free will problem.
Protestant Reformers on Free Will
Luther maintained “that man is devoid of freedom; that every (pretended) free action is only apparent; that an irresistible divine necessity rules all things, and that every human act is actually only an act of God.”[2]
Luther claimed the human will is like a beast of burden: “If God mounts it, it wishes and goes as God wills; if Satan mounts it, it wishes and goes as Satan wills; nor can it choose the rider it would prefer, or betake itself to him, but it is the riders who contend for the possession.”[3]
Calvin, Melanchthon and Zwingli all entertained the same views respecting free will. Nicholas Van Amsdorf (1483-1565), one of Luther’s most eminent disciples, wrote:
“By His will and speech, God works all things with all creatures. When God wills and speaks, stone and wood are carried, hewn and laid, how, when, and where He will. Thus, if God wills and speaks, man becomes converted, pious, and just. For, as stone and wood are, in the hand and power of God, so, in like manner, are the understanding and will of man in the hand and power of God; so that man can absolutely will and choose nothing, but what God wills and speaks, either in grace or in wrath.”[4]
This denial of free will and free agency in man arose naturally and spontaneously from the peculiar views of the Reformers respecting original sin. If, by the fall, Adam lost all basic goodness, all spiritual similarity and affinity with God, and all capacity to be divinely influenced in consequence of his totally perverted and corrupt nature, the inference is he also was deprived of free will and the power to contribute anything to his own spiritual elevation and destiny.
The reformers claimed Adam was placed in this terrible position by God, independent of his own volition, without any power on his part to alter his fixed destiny. The act of disobedience was predetermined and prearranged before his creation, and he was a passive and powerless instrument in the hands of God, a necessary link in the grand design of the creation.
Another predestined link in the divine program, according to Calvin and his disciples, was the selection of a certain number of souls for salvation and a certain number of souls for eternal condemnation. God alone makes these selections, independent of any efforts or works on the part of the person. To those whom He has elected for salvation, He gives faith — and by this gift alone they are justified and assured of salvation. Even if they commit the worst of sins daily, while the condemned victims are already judged, sentenced, and held for eternal punishment, though they commit no sin and act uprightly and justly in all things.
Luther taught that if a person declared that he accepted Jesus as his personal Lord and Savior, he could not have done this without the power of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, by simply verbalizing this statement a person knew that he was saved. And, as God is not a God of confusion and does not change His mind, he could not lose salvation. Luther said that a “saved” person could commit murder and fornication 1,000 times a day and they would not lose their salvation. He said, “God does not save those who merely fancy themselves sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe more boldly still.”[5] Belief was all that was necessary for salvation. This was the origination of Luther’s doctrine of Faith Alone.
Mere faith in the application of the merits of Christ is not sufficient. Actual grace assists man to be converted and persevere in doing good.
In all spiritual matters, the reformist theologians denied the existence of everything resembling free will and individual influence. As clouds are blown about by the winds, men are regarded as the powerless puppets and playthings of a preordained, predestined, and inexorable fate, powerless to change their destiny for good or evil, for heaven or hell.
According to the Reformers, God alone possesses free will. He alone conceived and created the universe. He alone planned the laws that preside over the kingdoms of nature. He alone foreknew all things that should transpire in the world. Therefore, all things have been ordered and arranged by Divine Providence in an immutable and inevitable manner so that men are necessarily creatures of foreordained circumstances, without free agency or power to change their predestined conditions.
Hence, they infer God is the author of sin. Upon this point, Luther expresses himself: “God forms in us evil as well as good; and the great perfection of faith consists in believing that God is just, although He has predestined us, from the beginning of the world, to be damned. … The foreknowledge of God renders free will absolutely impossible …” and “God was not less the cause of the treason of Judas Iscariot than of the conversion of Saint Paul.”[6]
Earlier heretics such as John Wycliffe (1320-1384) and his disciple, John Hus (1369-1415), entertained many of the opinions that were afterward adopted by Luther and his friends. “Like Wycliffe and Hus, Luther contended that the Church was essentially an invisible society of ‘true believers’:‘The Church is believed in but not seen…she is a society of hearts in faith.’ Hence, there was no need for a hierarchy or priesthood, and he reduced his clergy to mere ‘ministers of the word…without jurisdiction in the legal sense.”[7] Even so, they were regarded by Melanchthon as men full of errors, deception and trickery, and he perceived their doctrines were calculated to lead men into all sorts of errors and excesses.
Wycliffe contended all things occur from absolute necessity, and God acts from necessity in all things. He taught that God rules over a world with fixed and immutable laws, necessities, and developments. Therefore, God is the author and approver of all sins, crimes, and calamities, as well as of all that is good and merciful.
The Council of Constance was right in declaring, according to this hypothesis, “God ought to obey the devil.”[8] Wycliffe, however, believed in the invocation of saints, in purgatory, in the veneration of images and in many of the essential doctrines of the Church. But he denied the supremacy of the Pope and several of the disciplinary canons of the Church.[9]
The Catholic Church’s Teaching on Free Will
The Council of Trent declared against the Reformers: “If any one says that man’s free will, moved and aroused by God, by assenting to God’s call and action, in no way co-operates toward disposing and preparing itself to obtain the grace of justification, that it cannot refuse its assent if it wishes, but that, as something inanimate, it does nothing whatever and is merely passive, let him be anathema.”[10]
The belief in free will is an Article of Faith for Catholics. Holy Scripture stresses the human factor of the freedom of the will and the divine factor of grace. The numerous admonishments to penance and to good works presuppose that grace does not nullify the freedom of the will.
The freedom of the will as against grace is expressly affirmed in Deuteronomy 30:19: “I call on you this day, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore, choose life, that you and your descendants may live.” And in Sirach 31:10: “Who has had the power to transgress and did not transgress, and to do evil and did not do it?”
The gospels reiterate the same view: “How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!”[11]
Also, in the Acts of the Apostles: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit.”[12] The cooperation of free will and grace is emphasized in 1 Corinthians 15:10: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God which is with me.”[13]
Scripture makes the point that when we sin, we do so freely — we, not God, are responsible for our choices good or evil.
The classic formulation of this truth is found in the book of Sirach:
Do not say, “Because of the Lord I left the right way”;
for he will not do what he hates.
Do not say, “It was he who led me astray”:
for he has no need of a sinful man.
The Lord hates all abominations;
and they are not loved by those who fear him.
It was he who created man in the beginning,
and he left him in the power of his own inclination.
If you will, you can keep the commandments,
and to act faithfully is a matter of your own choice.
He has placed before you fire and water;
stretch out your hand for whichever you wish.
Before a man are life and death,
and whichever he chooses will be given to him.
For great is the wisdom of the Lord;
he is mighty in power and sees everything;
his eyes are on those who fear him,
and he knows every deed of man.
He has not commanded any one to be ungodly, and he has not given any one permission to sin.[14]
Free will under the influence of grace is the necessary foundation for the merit of good works. The testimony of human common sense also supports Catholic teaching.
[1] The faculty of choosing the means in view of an end to be attained.
[2] Johann Alan Moehler, Symbolism, etc., Translated by James Burton Robertson, (New York: Crossroads Publishing) 1997, p.32.
[3] Patrick O’Hare, The Facts about Luther, ((Rockford, IL: TAN Books and Publishers, INC.) 1987, p. 266.
[4] Marcy, p. 269.
[5] Luther in a letter to Melancthon. Dr. M. Luthers Briefwechsel, (correspondence), III, 208.
[6] Marcy, pp. 270-271.
[7] Eberhardt, p. 144.
[8] Tanner, Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, Vol. I, Nicaea I to Lateran V., p. 411.
[9] These facts are derived from his principal work, published in 1524, The Trialogue.
[10] Schroeder, p. 42.
[11] Luke 13:34; Matthew 23:37.
[12] Acts 7:51.
[13] See also Philippians. 2:12 and 2 Corinthians 6:1.
[14] Sirach 15:11-20.