Читать реферат по английскому: "Augustine And Freedom Essay Research Paper Augustine" Страница 2

(Назад) (Cкачать работу)

based upon motives. Prior to motives are desires and affections. Furthermore, antecedent to

desires is a pre-existing inclination, bias, or disposition toward good or evil. This inclination is

the first cause, so to speak, of human decisions.

But is there a cause beyond the inclination? In other words, “what cause lies behind willing?”6

Augustine’s answer to this question takes on a somewhat sarcastic tone, yet is intended to

show the absurdity of the question. “If I could find one, are you not going to ask for the

cause of the cause I have found? What limit will there be to your quest, what end to inquiry

and explanation?”7 While it may appear that he is avoiding the question, Augustine does point

out that the cause of evil is an evil will and the cause of the evil will is self-determining. And

the self is determined to choose for or against x based upon his/her inclination toward or away

from x.

This would appear to be in opposition with what has come to be known as one of the standard

definitions of freedom, viz., absolute power to contrary. This explanation of freedom is so

prevalent that some have understood it to make God contingent in some way.8 Alvin Plantinga

is often quoted on freedom as power to contrary.

If a person is free with respect to a given action, then he is free to perform that

action and free to refrain from performing it; no antecedent conditions [italics

mine] and/or causal laws determine that he will perform the action, or that he

won’t. It is within his power, at the time in question, to take or perform the action

and within his power to refrain from it.9

But Augustine understood that the antecedent condition for the movement of the will is a prior

inclination. Far from coercion, Augustine believed in a predisposed bias or inclination toward

either good or evil. Choices, motives, and desires do not happen in a vacuous environment nor

are they indifferent to or disinclined toward any direction. Whether human freedom entails

power to contrary choice or self-determination depends upon the inclination of the soul. And

the soul’s inclination depends upon which era of human existence is being assumed in the

defining stages of freedom.

There are four distinct epochs of history in which humans exist.10 At creation and before the

Fall, after the Fall and before regeneration, after regeneration and before glorification and the

eternal state after death. Each of these categories are necessary to keep in mind prior to

understanding freedom of a creature. It is necessary to define the conditions under which the

creature may operate. Otherwise the concept of freedom is unconstrained and confusion

results.

First, before the Fall humanity experienced power to contrary choice. Adam was endowed

with the capacity to love and obey God at creation. He was given the freedom to do what he

ought. “When we speak of the freedom of the will to do right, we are speaking of the freedom

wherein man was created.”11 In this state the gift of freedom was bestowed upon Adam. He

could “go straight forward, develop himself harmoniously in untroubled unity with God, and

thus gradually attain his final perfection; or he could fall away, engender evil ex nihilo by

abuse of his free will.”12

Humanity is anything but a static being at creation. Augustine says “Only as originally created,

i.e., before the Fall, had man freedom to will and to do right.”13 Adam was not created neutral

nor disinclined (simile Pelagius). For to remain equidistant from both good and evil is to be

indifferent, in which case indifference does not apply to the category of freedom since

inherent in freedom is the idea of movement. One is free to act or refrain from the act. In

either case movement is involved. Stated differently: to move toward the good is to move

away from evil and vice versa. As Shedd puts it:

Holy Adam at the instant of his creation did not find himself set to choose either

the Creator or the creature as an ultimate end, being indifferent to both, but he

found himself inclined to the Creator . . . His will if created at all must have been

created as voluntary, since it could not be created as involuntary or uninclined.

This inclination was self-motion. It was the spontaneity of a spiritual essence, not

an activity forced ab extra [italics his].14

To further demonstrate power to contrary before the Fall, Augustine distinguishes between

posse non peccare and possibilitas peccandi. That is, the possibility of sinning was necessary

unto Adam’s freedom but sinning itself was not. In the garden potential freedom from sin

belonged to Adam prior to the Fall and its opposite (viz., potential slavery to sin) was equally

implied.15 Had Adam chosen to follow his holy inclination, things would be somewhat different

today.

Second, after the Fall Adam had only one inclination, posse peccare, viz., the ability to sin.

Freedom is not thereby removed. It simply takes the shape of self-determination. Fallen

persons voluntarily determine to follow their own bent toward evil. They are self-determined

rather than God-determined. “Adam prior to the fall had freedom including both the ability not

to sin (posse non peccare) and the ability to sin (posse peccare). But all the descendants of

Adam, by reason of their inheritance, have only ability to sin (posse peccare)

Похожие работы