Thomas Aquinas, Disputed Questions on Truth (De Veritate)

1. Free choice is a capability of will and reason. But reason is not attributable to God, since it designates discursive knowledge, whereas God knows all things in a simple intuition. Free choice, then, is not attributable to God.

2. Free choice is the capacity by which good and evil are chosen, as Augustine makes clear. But in God there is no capacity for choosing evil. Hence there is no free choice in God.

3. Free choice is a potency capable of opposite acts. But God is not capable of opposites, since He is immutable and cannot turn to evil. There is therefore no free choice in God.

4. The act of free choice is to choose, as is clear from the definition given. But choice is not proper to God, since it depends upon a deliberation, which is proper to one who doubts and inquires. Hence there is no free choice in God.

To the Contrary:

1'. Anselm says that if the ability to sin were a part of free choice, God and the angels would not have free choice, but that that is most absurd. It is therefore fitting to say that God has free choice.

2'. Commenting on the words of the first Epistle to the Corinthians (12:11): "But all these things one and the same Spirit worketh, dividing to every one according as He will," the Gloss adds: "according to the free choice of His will." The Holy Spirit therefore has free choice, and by the same token, also the Father and the Son.

REPLY:

Free choice is to be found in God, but it is found in Him in a different way than in angels and in men. That there is free choice in God is apparent from the fact that He has for His will an end which He naturally wills, His own goodness; and all other things He wills as ordained to this end. These latter, absolutely speaking, He does not will necessarily, as has been shown in the preceding question, because His goodness has no need of the things which are ordained to it, and the manifestation of that goodness can suitably take place in a number of different ways. There remains for Him, then, a judgment free to will this or that, just as there is in us. On this account it must be said that free choice is found in God, and likewise in the angels; for they too do not of necessity will whatever they will. What they will they will by means of a free judgment, just as we.

Free choice is found in us and in the angels, however, in a different way than in God. When what is prior changes, what is posterior must also change. The capacity of free choice presupposes two things: a nature and a cognitive power.

Nature is of a different sort in God than in men and in angels. The divine nature is uncreated and is its own act of being and its own goodness. Consequently there cannot be in it any deficiency either in existence or in goodness. But human and angelic nature is created, taking its origin from nothing. Hence, viewed in itself, it is capable of deficiency. For this reason God's free choice is by no means able to be turned to evil, whereas the free will of men and angels, considered in its natural endowments, is capable of turning to evil.

Knowing also is found to be a different sort in man than in God and in the angels. Man has a process of knowing which is obscured and gets its view of the truth by means of a discourse. From this source comes his hesitation and difficulty in making decisions and in judging; for "the thoughts of . . . men are fearful, and our counsels are uncertain" (Wisdom 9:14). But in God, and also in angels in their own way, there is a simple view of the truth without any discourse or inquiry. There consequently does not occur in them any hesitation or difficulty in deciding or judging. And so God and the angels have a ready choice on the part of their free will, whereas man experiences difficulty in choosing because of his uncertainty and doubt. It is evident, then, that the free choice of an angel occupies a middle ground between that of God and that of man, having something in common with each of the two.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. Reason is sometimes taken broadly for any immaterial cognition; and in this sense reason is found in God. Dionysius accordingly places reason among the divine names. It is also taken properly, as meaning a power which knows with discourse. In this sense reason is not found in God or the angels, but only in men. It can be said, then, that reason is used in the definition of free choice in the first sense. But if it is taken in the second sense, then free choice is defined after the manner in which it is found in men.

2. The ability to choose evil is not essential to free choice. It is a consequence of free choice as found in a nature which is created and capable of failing.

3. The divine will is capable of opposites, not in the sense that it first wills something and afterwards does not (which would be repugnant to its immutability), nor in the sense that it can will good and evil (for that would put defectibility in God), but rather in the sense that it can will or not will this particular thing.

4. The fact that choice follows a deliberation, which involves inquiry, is accidental to choice, occurring because it is found in a rational nature, which gets its view of the truth through a reasoning process. But in an intellectual nature, which has a simple acceptance of the truth, choice is found without any previous inquiry. It is thus that choice is in God.