How God Is Not the Cause of Sin?

[Tannhauser_1509]

I am having difficulty wrapping my head around the idea of free will as it relates to God’s sovereignty over free will as its prima causa. I can state the Thomist position (below), but I really do not understand it.

Free-will is the cause of its own movement, because by his free-will man moves himself to act. But it does not of necessity belong to liberty that what is free should be the first cause of itself, as neither for one thing to be cause of another need it be the first cause. God, therefore, is the first cause, Who moves causes both natural and voluntary. And just as by moving natural causes He does not prevent their acts being natural, so by moving voluntary causes He does not deprive their actions of being voluntary: but rather is He the cause of this very thing in them; for He operates in each thing according to its own nature. (ST 1a, q. 83, a. 1, ad. 3)

How does the will remain accountable for its evil choices when God is the first cause of its movement? What happens between the first cause and the realization of the evil that makes it attributable wholly to human agency? In essence, how is it precisely that God is not the cause of sin (though he be the cause of the act of sin, as laid out in De Malo, q. 3, a. 2)?

 

[Vico]

I am having difficulty wrapping my head around the idea of free will as it relates to God’s sovereignty over free will as its prima causa. I can state the Thomist position (below), but I really do not understand it.

Free-will is the cause of its own movement, because by his free-will man moves himself to act. But it does not of necessity belong to liberty that what is free should be the first cause of itself, as neither for one thing to be cause of another need it be the first cause. God, therefore, is the first cause, Who moves causes both natural and voluntary. And just as by moving natural causes He does not prevent their acts being natural, so by moving voluntary causes He does not deprive their actions of being voluntary: but rather is He the cause of this very thing in them; for He operates in each thing according to its own nature. (ST 1a, q. 83, a. 1, ad. 3)

Read Summa Theologiae > First Part of the Second Part > Question 79. The external causes of sin

Now God cannot be directly the cause of sin, either in Himself or in another, since every sin is a departure from the order which is to God as the end: whereas God inclines and turns all things to Himself as to their last end, as Dionysius states (Div. Nom. i): so that it is impossible that He should be either to Himself or to another the cause of departing from the order which is to Himself. Therefore He cannot be directly the cause of sin. In like manner neither can He cause sin indirectly. For it happens that God does not give some the assistance, whereby they may avoid sin, which assistance were He to give, they would not sin. But He does all this according to the order of His wisdom and justice, since He Himself is Wisdom and Justice: so that if someone sin it is not imputable to Him as though He were the cause of that sin; even as a pilot is not said to cause the wrecking of the ship, through not steering the ship, unless he cease to steer while able and bound to steer. It is therefore evident that God is nowise a cause of sin.

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/2079.htm

 

[mrsdizzyd]

It all stems from the truth that God is Love and the truth that we are created to glorify God.

Free will is what allows us to love. Because coercive love is no love at all, we have the freedom to choose to love God. This is what he desires from us. We have been given all we need to choose to love Him.

Sin is a choice we make to reject God’s Love. This is not what He desires of us. In fact, if God is love itself he could not will that we sin. He could not will that we separate ourselves from him. Rather, we in and of ourselves choose to reject him.

 

[Wesrock]

There is a tendency nowadays to view all causes as having necessary effects: if there is cause A, effect Z always follows. The idea that a chain of causes is always deterministic. Aquinas does not adhere to that in all cases. There is also a tendancy to not distinguish between substances (things which have intrinsic ends proper to their own nature) and artifacts (things whose ends and purposes are imposed or crafted upon them, such as chairs, houses, boats).

The human will is caused. If God causes a human will, a human will necessarily will exist. However, God doesn’t will that it necessarily choose orange juice over apple juice this morning. Those choices are contingent and are voluntary to the human will. God just causes the will to be such that it is capable of acting according to its own nature, a nature capable of making voluntary choices based on its own intrinsic capabilities, knowledge, appetites, and so on.

This is a rough analogy, but imagine a computer. It is dependent on an electrical generator for its continued operation: the generator is a cause of the computer. But the generator just allows the computer to operate according to its own programming. It doesn’t determine move the computer’s operations about as if it’s a puppet. (A computer is an artifact, not a substance, though, so the analogy is limited.)

God does have some responsibility for evil (privations of good) being in the world, for he permits the absences of good. He allows people to act imperfectly. The permission is from God, but the choice belongs to the human nature he permits to continue to operate, and so that human nature is responsible for its own choices.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

Free will is what allows us to love. Because coercive love is no love at all, we have the freedom to choose to love God.

My question does not deal with coercion but with how it is that the human will is not necessarily moved when it chooses certain goods or evils. Aquinas does not conflate necessary movements with external coercion, anymore than he would call a falling object “coerced by gravity.” Nevertheless, he does not attribute necessity to movements of the will because doing so “subverts all the principles of moral philosophy” (On Evil, q. 6). Given that the will is not necessarily moved when it makes meritorious or demeritorious choices, I was confused as to how God as prima causa relates to free choices. From a Thomistic perspective, free will is good in so far as it wills the good. My issue is how it is that God permits human beings to stray from the path of grace while not being involved in the deliberations of the will to choose evil.

I do not think Aquinas attributes to God a “hands off” approach with regard to human freedom. He seems simply to say that God is the efficient cause of all good, but the effects are not necessary.

Not every cause necessarily brings about an effect even if the cause is sufficient, since the cause can be prevented from sometimes achieving its effect. For example, natural causes produce their effects for the most part but not necessarily, since they are prevented from so doing in relatively few cases. Therefore, the cause that makes the will will something need not necessarily achieve this, since the will itself can present an obstacle, whether by removing the consideration that induces the will to will it or by considering the contrary, namely, that what is presented as good is not good in some respect. (On Evil, q. 6, ad. 15)

The principle of merit applies to our choices, not because good is brought about in and of ourselves, but because the good having been brought about within us could have been impeded by the will. St. Augustine makes clear in his On Grace and Free Will:

Was it not to Timothy’s free will that the apostle appealed, when he exhorted him in these words: “Keep thyself continent”? He also explained the power of the will in this matter when he said, “Having no necessity, but possessing power over his own will, to keep his virgin.” And yet, “all men do not receive this saying, except those to whom the power is given.” Now they to whom this is not given either are unwilling or do not fulfil what they will; whereas they to whom it is given so will as to accomplish what they will. In order, therefore, that this saying, which is not received by all men, may yet be received by some, there are both the gift of God and free will. (XXI, no. 43)

The will is therefore free in so far as it may impede the gift of God to move the will.

So my next question is, isn’t stating that a sufficient cause does not always bring about an effect a bit Humean? It seems to make no sense to speak of a cause absent an effect, because a cause is only a cause in so far as it brings about an effect.

 

[mrsdizzyd]

Aquinas does not conflate necessary movements with external coercion, anymore than he would call a falling object “coerced by gravity.” Nevertheless, he does not attribute necessity to movements of the will because doing so “subverts all the principles of moral philosophy” ( On Evil , q. 6). Given that the will is not necessarily moved when it makes meritorious or demeritorious choices, I was confused as to how God as prima causa relates to free choices.

I’m happy to focus on St. Thomas. With regard to your questions about movement and first cause I refer you to Summa where St. Thomas discusses voluntary acts ( First of second part, q.6, Art. 1) where he says in part:

But those things which have a knowledge of the end are said to move themselves because there is in them a principle by which they not only act but also act for an end. And consequently, since both are from an intrinsic principle, to wit, that they act and that they act for an end, the movements of such things are said to be voluntary: for the word “voluntary” implies that their movements and acts are from their own inclination. Hence it is that, according to the definitions of Aristotle, Gregory of Nyssa, and Damascene [See Objection 1, the voluntary is defined not only as having “a principle within” the agent, but also as implying “knowledge.” Therefore, since man especially knows the end of his work, and moves himself, in his acts especially is the voluntary to be found.

While it is possible for the human to be acted upon, where he has some knowledge of the end he can move himself and act voluntarily.

In the same section we find this:

Objection 3. Further, he that acts voluntarily, can act of himself. But this is not true of man; for it is written (John 15:5): “Without Me you can do nothing.” Therefore there is nothing voluntary in human acts.
…
Reply to Objection 3. God moves man to act, not only by proposing the appetible to the senses, or by effecting a change in his body, but also by moving the will itself; because every movement either of the will or of nature, proceeds from God as the First Mover. And just as it is not incompatible with nature that the natural movement be from God as the First Mover, inasmuch as nature is an instrument of God moving it: so it is not contrary to the essence of a voluntary act, that it proceed from God, inasmuch as the will is moved by God. Nevertheless both natural and voluntary movements have this in common, that it is essential that they should proceed from a principle within the agent.

God created and gave us our free will; therefore, he is the first cause. But, once given it is not necessary that he continuously intervene to move our will (This is what I was getting at when I brought up coercive or in their word involuntary love). Rather, our will is such that we are able to move it ourselves for the purpose of achieving an end. Voluntary acts of the will must necessarily proceed from something within the human person. The responsibility for our voluntary acts rests with us.

 

[mrsdizzyd]

So my next question is, isn’t stating that a sufficient cause does not always bring about an effect a bit Humean? It seems to make no sense to speak of a cause absent an effect, because a cause is only a cause in so far as it brings about an effect.

I’ll have to get back to you on this question when I have more time.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

But, once given it is not necessary that he continuously intervene to move our will […]. Rather, our will is such that we are able to move it ourselves for the purpose of achieving an end. Voluntary acts of the will must necessarily proceed from something within the human person.

I do not think this is what Aquinas is getting at. It is indeed necessary that God “continuously intervene” to move the will, just as much as he must continuously intervene—though he does not intervene so much as move the cosmos into actuality—to sustain the natural order. “[J]ust as by moving natural causes [God] does not prevent their acts being natural, so by moving voluntary causes He does not deprive their actions of being voluntary” (ST 1a, q. 83, a. 1, ad. 3).

Like I said, we cannot conflate necessity of movement with coercion. In the case of non-sentient objects of nature, their movements are sustained by the action of the divine will, but this does not mean that the effects of their movements can be spoken univocally of their mover. This is why they may be spoken of as having “internal agents” of their own movement in so far as they pursue goods conducive to their ends. In the same way, the voluntariness of the human will is moved both by internal agents—and therefore attributable to ends proper to man though not to God—but also by the movement of God. Aquinas says it very plainly in the text you quoted: “God moves man to act […] by moving the will itself.”

It seems that the Thomistic position would be that God always moves the human will, but the human will is not necessarily moved by God. The choice between good and evil is not a balanced dichotomy: to choose evil is to be obstinate against the will to choose good, or willfully to flout higher goods. This sounds very confusing to me and it’s why I brought up Hume: if some sufficient cause does not necessarily produce its effect, this seems to negate the cause as a cause.

 

[Wesrock]

So my next question is, isn’t stating that a sufficient cause does not always bring about an effect a bit Humean? It seems to make no sense to speak of a cause absent an effect, because a cause is only a cause in so far as it brings about an effect.

There is an effect: The existence of the will at all acting according to its own nature. That there are choices at all seems necessary, what those choices are are contingent.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

There is an effect: The existence of the will at all acting according to its own nature.

But that isn’t what Aquinas said. He says:

For as the Philosopher says in the Metaphysics, if every effect were to result from a natural cause, and every natural cause necessarily to produce its effect, then everything would be necessary. But both of these suppositions are false. For some causes, even if they be sufficient, do not produce their effects, since the causes can be prevented from doing so, as is evident in the case of every kind of natural cause. (On Evil q. 6, ad. 21).

My question is, how can God be spoken of as a cause of the will—even when a human commits evil—if God permits impediments to his will? Cause and effect are terms relative to each other. Furthermore, whence the power to produce impediments to the divine will?

 

[Wesrock]

Wesrock:

There is an effect: The existence of the will at all acting according to its own nature.

But that isn’t what Aquinas said. He says:

For as the Philosopher says in the Metaphysics, if every effect were to result from a natural cause, and every natural cause necessarily to produce its effect, then everything would be necessary. But both of these suppositions are false. For some causes, even if they be sufficient, do not produce their effects, since the causes can be prevented from doing so, as is evident in the case of every kind of natural cause. (On Evil q. 6, ad. 21).

My question is, how can God be spoken of as a cause of the will—even when a human commits evil—if God permits impediments to his will? Cause and effect are terms relative to each other. Furthermore, whence the power to produce impediments to the divine will?

Do you have a link to the text of On Evil? My understanding here would be him distinguishing between voluntary agents, such as the will, and natural agents, as he does in ST I:49. And I believe we need further referenece to antecedant versus consequent will, as described in ST I, Q19, A6, when considering that God wills things to be according to their natures.

Maybe also it’s a misunderstanding of the word cause? To Aquinas, it had a broader meaning. Efficient cause, material cause, formal cause, final cause… And even when just talking of efficient causes it can simply mean an “ontological dependence.” God is a cause of the will insofar as there would be no such will if he did not maintain its existence.

 

[mrsdizzyd]

I do not think this is what Aquinas is getting at. It is indeed necessary that God “continuously intervene” to move the will, just as much as he must continuously intervene—though he does not intervene so much as move the cosmos into actuality—to sustain the natural order.

St. Thomas is making a distinction here which I think you are missing (and I have oversimplified for expediency).

There is a difference between the universal orientation of the will toward the good and the ability of man to will this or that thing based using his knowledge to achieve a particular end. “Reply to Objection 3. God moves man’s will, as the Universal Mover, to the universal object of the will, which is good. And without this universal motion, man cannot will anything. But man determines himself by his reason to will this or that, which is true or apparent good.” Summa 1st of 2nd part, q. 9, art. 6.

It seems that the Thomistic position would be that God always moves the human will, but the human will is not necessarily moved by God

I think it’s more along the lines of God always moves the will insofar as the will is universally oriented toward good, but humans can act within themselves to achieve this or that end.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

Do you have a link to the text of On Evil ?

Sorry, mate. I’m working from a hard copy. It’s the translation by Richard Regan. The De Malo seems hard to access on the Internet.

Maybe also it’s a misunderstanding of the word cause? To Aquinas, it had a broader meaning. Efficient cause, material cause, formal cause, final cause…

I will have to get back to you on this. I don’t recall how Aquinas defined his terms in that section.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

St. Thomas is making a distinction here which I think you are missing (and I have oversimplified for expediency).

There is a difference between the universal orientation of the will toward the good and the ability of man to will this or that thing based using his knowledge to achieve a particular end.

This point has not escaped me. It’s also laid out by Aquinas here:

[T]he form of a thing of nature is a form individuated by matter, and so also the inclinations resulting from the form are determined to one thing, but the understood form is universal and includes many individual things. And so since actualities regard singular things, and none of them exhausts the potentiality of the universal, inclinations of the will remain indeterminately disposed to many things. For example, if an architect should conceive the form of house in general, under which different shapes of house are included, his will can be inclined to build a square house or a round house or a house of another shape. (On Evil, q. 6)

It seems to me that Aquinas is saying our wills are moved necessarily when the good disposing it is particular. However, when the object being considered is complex, viz., containing some good but also lacking it in other respects, then the will is not moved necessarily in so far as the person considers the object, not with respect to its components, but on the whole, because then our disposition toward the thing is, as it were, rapidly wavering and indeterminate. This is the case, not only with complex objects composed of both goods and of deficiencies, but also with considering morally indifferent choices that all attain to the same end.

But I still fail to understand how the will is operating in relation to God as its first cause when it chooses things freely, as opposed to necessarily. I understand the what; I can’t comprehend the how.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

Do you have a link to the text of On Evil ?

If you have a subscription to EBSCO, the one edited by Brian Davies, OP, is available in their e-book collection.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

Wesrock:

Maybe also it’s a misunderstanding of the word cause? To Aquinas, it had a broader meaning. Efficient cause, material cause, formal cause, final cause…

I will have to get back to you on this. I don’t recall how Aquinas defined his terms in that section.

I did not find that Aquinas precisely defines “cause” in this section as “efficient cause,” so he probably means it broadly. But I did find other helpful sections:

ad. 16. The Philosopher in the Metaphysics by this means shows that an active power disposed toward contrary things does not necessarily produce its effect, not that a power disposed toward contrary things is not an active power. For if we suppose that an active power disposed toward contrary things necessarily produces its effect, it would obviously follow that contradictory things would exist simultaneously. But if we should grant that an active power is disposed toward contrary things, it does not follow that the contraries exist simultaneously, since one is not compatible with the other even though each contrary toward which the power is disposed is possible.
ad. 17. The will, when it freshly begins to choose, is transformed from its prior disposition regarding its previous potentiality to choose and its subsequent actual choice. And a cause indeed effects this change as the will moves itself to act and also as an external cause, namely, God, moves the will. And yet the will is not moved necessarily, as I have said. (On Evil q. 6)

It’s starting to become a little clearer, I think.