ARTICLE IV

In the Fourth Article We Ask: IS THE NUMBER OF PREDESTINED CERTAIN?

Difficulties:

It seems not, for

1. No number is certain if something can be added to it. But something can be added to the number of the predestined, because Moses' petition for such an increase is described in Deuteronomy (1:11) where he says: "The Lord God of your fathers add to this number many thousands." And the Gloss comments: "This number is fixed by God, who knows who belong to Him." Now, unless such an addition were possible, Moses would have asked in vain. Consequently, the number of the predestined is not certain.

2. As we are prepared for grace through the disposition of natural perfections, so are we prepared through grace for the attainment of glory. Now, grace is found in whomsoever there is sufficient preparation of natural gifts. Similarly, then, glory will be found wherever grace is found. But one not predestined may, at one time, possess grace. Therefore, he will possess glory and so be predestined. Consequently, one not predestined may become predestined. In this way, the number of the predestined can be increased; hence, it is not certain.

3. If one who has grace is not to have glory, his loss of glory will be due to a failure either on the part of grace or on the part of the one giving glory. However, this loss cannot be due to a failure on the part of grace, for, in itself, it sufficiently disposes for glory; nor can it be due to a failure on the part of the one giving glory, for, on His part, He is ready to give it to all. Consequently, whoever has grace will necessarily have glory. Thus, one who is foreknown [as lost] will have glory and be predestined. Accordingly, our original argument stands.

4. Whoever prepares himself sufficiently for grace, gets grace. But one foreknown [as lost] can prepare himself for grace. Therefore, it is possible for him to have grace. Whoever has grace, however, can persevere in it. So it seems that one who is foreknown [as lost] can persevere in grace up to the time of his death and thus become predestined. Consequently, the same must be said as before.

5. It was said, however, that God's foreknowledge that a man will die without grace is necessary by conditional necessity, not by absolute necessity.--On the contrary, any necessity which lacks a beginning and an end, and which is without succession, is not conditional but simple and absolute. Now, this is the kind of necessity that the necessity of foreknowledge is, because it is eternal. Therefore, it is simple and not conditioned.

6. A number larger than any finite number is possible. But the number of the predestined is finite. Therefore, a larger number is possible, and the number of the predestined is not certain.

7. Since good communicates itself, infinite goodness should not impose a limit on its communication. Now, the divine goodness communicates itself to the predestined in the highest possible degree. Therefore, it does not belong to the divine goodness to establish a certain number of predestined.

8. Like the creation of things, the predestination of men depends on the divine will. Now, God can make more things than He has made, because, as we read in Wisdom (12:18): "His power is at hand when He wills." Similarly, He has not predestined so many men that He cannot predestine more; and so our original argument returns.

9. Whatever God was at one time able to do He still is able to do. But from eternity God was able to predestine one whom He did not predestine. Consequently, He is still able to predestine him, and so an addition can be made to the number of the predestined.

10. In the case of all powers not determined to one course of action, what can be can also not be. Now, the power of the one predestining with respect to the one to be predestined, and the power of the one predestined with respect to his obtaining the effect of predestination, belong to this class of powers, because the one predestining predestines by His will, and the one predestined obtains the effect of predestination by his will. Consequently, the predestined can be non-predestined, and the non-predestined can be predestined. Hence, the conclusion is the same as before.

11. In commentary on that verse in Luke (5:6), "And their net broke," the Gloss reads: "In the Church, the net of circumcision is broken, for not as many Jews enter as were preordained by God to life." Consequently, since the number of the predestined can be diminished, it is not certain.

To the Contrary:

1'. Augustine says: "The number of the predestined is certain and can neither be increased nor diminished."

2'. Augustine says: "The heavenly Jerusalem, our mother, the City of God, will not be robbed of any of the number of its citizens nor will it reign with more than the predestined number." Now, the citizens mentioned are the predestined. Consequently, the number of the predestined cannot be increased or decreased. Hence, it is certain.

3'. Whoever is predestined is predestined from eternity. But what exists from eternity is unchangeable, and what did not exist from eternity can never be eternal. Consequently, he who is not predestined cannot be predestined and, conversely, he who is predestined cannot be non-predestined.

4'. After the resurrection, all the predestined will be in the highest heaven with their own bodies. Now, that place is finite, since all bodies are finite, and, as is commonly held, not even two glorified bodies can exist simultaneously [in one place]. Consequently, the number of the predestined should be determinate.

REPLY:

Treating this question, some have distinguished, saying that the number of the predestined is certain if we mean number understood actively or formally, but not certain if we mean number understood passively or materially. For example, one could say that it is certain that one hundred have been predestined, but it is not certain who these one hundred are. The occasion for such a position seems to be the words of Augustine mentioned previously. Augustine seems to imply that one can lose and another receive the predestined crown without the number of the predestined at all varying. But, if those holding this opinion are speaking about certitude of predestination in its relation to the first cause, that is, to God who predestines, then the opinion is entirely absurd, because God Himself has definite knowledge of the number of the predestined, whether the number be taken formally or materially. He knows exactly how many and who are to be saved, and, with respect to both, His ordination is infallible. Consequently, with respect to both numbers, God has certitude, not only of knowledge, but also of ordination.

On the other hand, if we are speaking about the certitude that can be had about the number of the predestined from its relation to the proximate cause of man's salvation (to which predestination is ordained), then our judgment about the formal number and the material number will not be the same. For, since the salvation of each individual has been produced through free choice as through its proximate cause, in some way the material number is subject to man's will, which is changeable. Consequently, the material number in some way lacks certainty. But the formal number is not determined in any manner by man's will, because by no kind of causality does the human will affect the number of the predestined taken as a whole. Consequently, the formal number remains completely certain. In this way the aforementioned distinction can be sustained, as long as we concede, without any qualifications, that both numbers are certain as far as God is concerned.

It should be noted, moreover, that the number of the predestined is certain in this respect, that it cannot be increased or diminished. The number could be increased if one who was foreknown [as lost] could be predestined; but this would be contrary to the certainty of foreknowledge or of reprobation. Again, the number could be diminished if it were possible for one who is predestined to become non-predestined; but this would be contrary to the certainty of predestination. Thus, it is clear that the certitude about the number of the predestined is made up of two certitudes, the certitude of predestination and the certitude of foreknowledge or reprobation. These two certitudes differ, however; for, as has been said, the certitude of predestination is the certitude of knowledge and of direction to an end, while the certitude of foreknowledge is merely the certitude of knowledge. For God does not preordain the reprobate to sin as He ordains the predestined to merit.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. That quotation from Deuteronomy should be understood as referring, not to the number of the predestined, but to the number of those who are in the state of present justice. This is clear from the Interlinear Gloss, which adds: "In number and in merit." Now, this number of those in present justice is both increased and diminished; but God's appointment, which predefines this number, too, is never wrong, because it is He who decrees that there be more of these at one time and fewer at another. Or we could even answer that God defines a certain number in the manner of a judgment in harmony with inferior reasons, and this limitation can be changed; but He predestines another number in the manner of an election in harmony with superior reasons, and this limitation cannot be changed. For Gregory says: "He changes His judgment but never His election."

2. No preparation disposes anything to have a perfection at a time other than its proper time. For example, his natural temperament may dispose a boy to be brave or wise--not, however, in the days of his childhood, but in the days of his manhood. Now, the time when one obtains grace is simultaneous with the time when nature is prepared. Consequently, no barrier can come between them. Thus, when the preparation of nature is found in a person, grace is also found in him. But the time when one obtains glory is not simultaneous with the time when he has grace. Consequently, a barrier can come between these two. For this reason, one who is foreknown to possess grace will not necessarily possess glory also.

3. That one who had grace is nevertheless deprived of glory is not due to failure either on the part of grace or on the part of Him who gives glory. It is due rather to a failure on the part of the recipient, in whom an impediment has arisen.

4. When we affirm that a person is foreknown [as lost], we thereby affirm that he will not have final grace; for, as we pointed out previously," God's knowledge is directed to future things as though they were present. Consequently, just as the condition of not having final grace cannot be reconciled with the condition of having final grace, even though the former condition is possible if taken by itself, so the condition of having final grace cannot be reconciled with the condition of being foreknown [as lost], even though the former condition is also possible if taken by itself.

5. The fact that such a thing known by God is not absolutely necessary comes, not from a defect in God's knowledge, but from a defect in the proximate cause. On the other hand, the reason why this necessity is eternal--without beginning and end, and, as it were, without succession--comes from God's knowledge, which is eternal, not from the proximate cause, which is temporal and changeable.

6. Even though finite number as finite number does not prevent a larger number from existing, the impossibility may come from another source, namely, from the fixed character of God's foreknowledge, which is apparent in the problem at hand. Similarly, when we consider the size of some natural thing, we see that a larger size cannot exist, not because of the nature of quantity, but because of the nature of the thing itself.

7. The divine goodness communicates itself only under the guidance of wisdom, for this is the best manner for its communication. Now, as we read in Wisdom (11:21), the ordering of God's wisdom requires that all things be made according to "number, weight, and measure." Consequently, that there be a definite number of predestined is in harmony with God's goodness.

8. As is clear from what was said previously, while it may be granted with reference to a determined person that God, absolutely speaking, can predestine or not predestine him, nevertheless, supposing that God has predestined him, He cannot not predestine him. Nor is the opposite possible, because God cannot change. Consequently, it is commonly said that the following proposition, "God can predestine one who is not predestined or not predestine one who is predestined," is false if taken in a composite sense, but true if taken in a divided sense. All statements, therefore, which imply that composite sense are absolutely false. Thus, we must not concede that the number of the predestined can be increased or diminished, because addition presupposes something which is increased, and subtraction, something which is diminished. For the same reason, we cannot concede that God can predestine more or fewer than He has already predestined.

Furthermore, the example drawn from the making of things is not to the point; for making is a particular action terminating exteriorly in an effect, and the fact that God makes something first and does not make it later indicates no change in God but only in the effect. On the other hand, predestination, foreknowledge, and similar things are acts intrinsic to God; and no change can take place in them without a change taking place in God. Nothing, therefore, that implies a change in these acts should be granted.

9-10. The answer to these arguments is clear, for they are based on an understanding of God's power as absolute, not as modified by a supposition of predestination or non-predestination.

11. That Gloss should be understood as meaning this: the number of Jews entering is not as large as the total number of all those who have been preordained to life, for it is not only Jews who have been predestined. Or one could reply that the Gloss is not speaking about the preordination of predestination but about the preordination of preparation by which the Jews were disposed for life by means of the Law. Or, finally, one could reply that not as many Jews entered the early Church as are predestined, because, as we read in the Epistle to the Romans (11:25-26): "When the fulness of the Gentiles should come in . . . all Israel will be saved" in the Church at the end of time.