Thomas Aquinas on Reprobation

Res Philosophica 99 (1):1-23 (2022)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Given certain anti-Pelagian assumptions he endorses, Aquinas faces an “arbitrariness problem” explaining why God predestines and reprobates the particular individuals he does. One response to the problem that Aquinas offers—biting the bullet and conceding God’s arbitrariness—has a high theoretical cost. Eleonore Stump proposes a less costly alternative solution on Thomas’s behalf, drawing on his notion that our wills may rest in a state of “quiescence.” Her proposal additionally purports to answer the general question why God reprobates anyone at all. I argue that Aquinas’s understanding of the relationship between divine causation and human freedom prevents him from accepting Stump’s proposal as she herself puts it forward; he couldn’t accept it as an answer to the general question. Nevertheless, I claim, granted one controversial but widely accepted assumption—that he isn’t a divine determinist—Aquinas could accept a slightly modified version of her quiescence solution to the arbitrariness problem. Indeed, there is evidence that he did accept some of its key components.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,616

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Aquinas in Dialogue with Contemporary Philosophy. [REVIEW]Thomas Williams - 2005 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 79 (3):483-491.
Thomas Aquinas’s Commentary on the Ethics.Christopher Kaczor - 2004 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 78 (3):353-378.
St. Thomas Aquinas 1274-1974. [REVIEW]M. K. - 1975 - Review of Metaphysics 29 (1):142-142.
Knowledge and Faith in Thomas Aquinas. [REVIEW]Thomas S. Hibbs - 2000 - Review of Metaphysics 54 (1):152-153.
Participation and Substantiality in Thomas Aquinas.David B. Burrell - 1997 - International Philosophical Quarterly 37 (1):101-104.
Seeing Double.Eileen C. Sweeney - 2009 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 83 (3):389-420.
Seeing Double.Eileen C. Sweeney - 2009 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 83 (3):389-420.
The De Malo of Thomas Aquinas.Thomas Hibbs - 2002 - International Philosophical Quarterly 42 (4):562-563.
Aquinas’s Exemplarism; Aquinas’s Voluntarism.James Ross - 1990 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 64 (2):171-198.
Thomas Aquinas and His Legacy. [REVIEW]Patrick Lee - 1997 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 71 (4):633-634.
Aquinas on “Exists”.Thomas D. Sullivan - 1993 - American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 67 (2):157-166.

Analytics

Added to PP
2022-02-16

Downloads
33 (#419,244)

6 months
8 (#158,054)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Adam Wood
Wheaton College, Illinois

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

The Problem of Evil.Eleonore Stump - 1985 - Faith and Philosophy 2 (4):392-423.
Grace and Free Will: Quiescence and Control.Simon Kittle - 2015 - Journal of Analytic Theology 3:89-108.
Dante's Hell, Aquinas's Moral Theory, and the Love of God.Eleonore Stump - 1986 - Canadian Journal of Philosophy 16 (2):181-198.
Divine Sovereignty and the Freedom of the Will.Hugh J. McCann - 1995 - Faith and Philosophy 12 (4):582-598.

View all 27 references / Add more references