Victor R. Claveau, MJ
The question of free will [1] 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.
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.”
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.”[2]
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.”[3]
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 any thing 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.
In all spiritual matters, the innovating theologians denied the existence of everything like 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 St. Paul.”[4]
Earlier heretics such as John Wyclif and his disciple, John Hus, entertained many of the opinions that were afterward adopted by Luther and his friends. 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.
Wyclif 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.”[5] Wyclif, 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.
These facts are derived from his principal work, published in 1524, The Trialogue.
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.”[6]
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 Deut. 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 Sir. 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!” (Luke 13:34; Mt. 23:37)
Also in the Acts of the Apostles: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit.” (Acts 7:51) The cooperation of free will and grace is emphasized in 1 Cor. 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.” See also Phil. 2:12 and 2 Cor. 6:1.
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.
(Sir. 15:11-20)
Franciscan scholar Alexander Di Lella, offers the following commentary on verses 11-13:
“The point of v 11a is that personal sin does not have its origin in God. V 11b explains why one may not blame God for one’s sins: “for what [God] hates, he does not do.” Cf. Wis. 11:24 and Jas. 1:13.…
“Here Ben Sira explicitly denies that God has any part in human sin. V 12a may also be translated: “Say not, ‘It is he who made me stumble.’” The point of the colon is that God is not the occasion of sin either, “for he has no need of the wicked men of violence, lawlessness….
“V 13a is in synonymous parallelism with v 11b — the Lord hates sin and wickedness. Those who fear the Lord will not commit “abominable wickedness”; hence Ben Sira may affirm that “God does not let it befall those who fear him” (v 13b). Cf. Prov. 12:21.”[7]
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] O’Hare, The Facts about Luther, p. 266.
[3] Marcy, Christianity and its Conflicts, p. 269.
[4] Ibid. pp. 270-271.
[5] Tanner, Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, Vol. I, Nicaea I to Lateran V. 411.
[6] Schroeder, Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 42.
[7] Patrick W. Skehan, ed., Anchor Bible, The Wisdom of Ben Sira (New York: Doubleday, 1987) 271.