Francis Turretin On Human Free Choice: Walking The Fine Line Between Synchronic Contingency And Compatibilistic Determinism

By HyunKwan Kim

[HyunKwan Kim is currently a PhD student in Historical Theology at Calvin Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, MI.]

One of the historical stereotypes that older scholarly critiques imposed on the Reformed theology of the Reformation and post-Reformation eras is the assumption that Reformed thought denies human free will and thus undermines the foundation of human moral responsibility.[1] Much of this thinking has contributed to identifying the Reformed doctrine of free choice during those periods as “philosophical determinism” or “Stoic fatalism” by contemporary scholars.[2] This unfavorable assessment mostly arises from an interpretation of the Reformed doctrines that stresses both divine absolute sovereignty and human total depravity.[3]

However, a group of recent scholarly works, through their examination of the original texts and contexts, have demonstrated that these criticisms were not produced on a sound methodological foundation.[4] The critics’ interpretation shows the meager reliance of these criticisms on the primary sources as well as the absence of careful scrutiny for understanding the intellectual context of the Reformed doctrine on free choice during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.[5]

Richard A. Muller points out that the scholars’ criticisms of the Reformed doctrine of free choice have not only been triggered by historical prejudgment relying on predestination-centered so-called central dogmas[6] but have also been deepened by their viewing the Reformation and post-Reformation periods primarily through the lens of “rather recent developments in the tradition, namely, the eighteenth-century rise of Calvinistic philosophical determinism.”[7] Indeed, with the alteration of a traditional faculty psychology that was the characteristic of Reformed scholastics, the scholastic language of causality, necessity, and contingency was used in a more deterministic way during the eighteenth century.[8]

Accordingly it becomes necessary to examine theological works of Reformed thought on free choice in their original texts and consider their intellectual contexts, especially during the Reformed orthodox era when the doctrine of free choice had been intricately examined in the codification of the Reformed doctrines ad intra and the theological debates with the Jesuits, the Socinians, and the Remonstrants ad extra.

This ad intra development has been analyzed recently by Willem J. van Asselt and other scholars in Reformed Thought on Freedom. There, they try to discover the concept of free choice in early modern Reformed theology by examining six significant Reformed orthodox thinkers: Girolamo Zanchi, Franciscus Junius, Franciscus Gomarus, Gisbertus Voetius, Francis Turretin, and Bernardinus de Moor. They apply the Scotist notion of synchronic contingency to the Reformed orthodox thinkers’ understanding of human free choice in an attempt to show that “divine will precisely established a realm for human willing.”[9]

To be specific, the modal term “contingency” is used when a thing or event is either “able to be otherwise” or “possible not to be.”[10] Then, an actual state of a thing or event can be said to be in a state of synchronic contingency “when it could be non-actual at the very moment of time at which it is actual.”[11] Applying this concept to an act of human willing, synchronic contingency is the notion that “at the very time of willing one thing,” a person “retains a power for willing its opposite.”[12] By tracing this notion of synchronic contingency in the Reformed orthodox thinkers’ explanation of human free choice, the editors of Reformed Thought on Freedom try to show that God’s decree still leaves room for alternative possibilities in a human action even when the decreed human action is being actualized.

While the editors’ analyzing of original texts clearly shows that previous scholars’ criticism of the Reformed doctrine of free choice as determinism fails to correspond with the writings of these six Reformed orthodox thinkers, a strong objection to these editors’ employment of synchronic contingency was launched by Paul Helm.[13] In fact, Helm’s objection to Reformed Thought on Freedom is basically an extension of his ongoing debate with Antonie Vos and Andreas J. Beck.[14] Helm casts doubts on their suggestion that the Scotist notion of synchronic contingency was held by the Reformed scholastics in their understanding of the divine decrees and human agency, suggesting instead the influence of Thomas Aquinas on the Reformed scholastics. Consequently Helm’s objection against the editors of Reformed Thought on Freedom is based upon the same assumption since the editors adopt Vos and Beck’s model as their framework.

Among the conflicting issues between the two understandings, one of the most recent debates is associated with Francis Turretin’s concept of human free choice. While the editors of Reformed Thought on Freedom, focusing on Turretin’s concept of the indifference of the will, place Turretin’s view of human free choice under John Duns Scotus’s concept of synchronic contingency, Helm considers their arguments as “a gross distortion and exaggeration of Turretin’s stated views” and traces Turretin’s view back to Thomas Aquinas rather than to Scotus.[15]

In this debate, Helm seems to be cautious of establishing another kind of conceptual framework under the name of Scotist synchronic contingency, reminding us of the fact that Reformed orthodoxy shows eclectic tendencies in their use of various medieval sources.[16] At this point, he proves himself right with providing well-grounded various evidences. However, Helm’s model of Turretin’s free choice also seems problematic in that his view does not show any substantial difference from the modern concept of compatibilistic determinism. Thus, while both Helm and Vos and Beck certainly offer insightful perspectives in understanding Turretin’s doctrine of free choice, they respectively seem to interpret Turretin’s view within their own framework.

In this vein, therefore, I will demonstrate that Francis Turretin’s doctrine of free choice does not exactly fit into either Helm’s model or Vos and Beck’s. To show this, I will examine Francis Turretin’s human free choice in its original text,[17] considering the intellectual context of the seventeenth century. Then, I will point out what both sides ignore or miss based upon my understanding of Turretin’s human free choice. From these observations, I will show that Turretin’s doctrine of free choice is neither conceptualized by one single notion of Scotist synchronic contingency nor thoroughly explained by the modern concept of compatibilistic determinism in that Turretin adopted highly sophisticated scholastic distinctions and utilized diverse philosophical traditions to defend the Reformed doctrine of free choice against his opponents in the seventeenth-century context.

I. Francis Turretin On Human Free Choice

In Turretin’s placement of the various loci, human free choice[18] is mostly treated in relation to human sin. After dealing with sin in general and in particular in locus 9, therefore, Turretin mainly develops his argument of human free choice in locus 10. Here, Turretin stipulates the extent and the nature of human free choice in a state of sin through answering five different questions, centering on the following subjects: (1) the term free choice and faculty psychology, (2) freedom and necessity, (3) the formal reason of free choice, (4) the bondage of free choice to do good in a state of sin, and (5) the free choice of the heathen.

Among these, the present article intends to scrutinize the first three questions not only simply because these questions are in the very midst of the debate between Helm and Vos and Beck, but also because they deal directly with the metaphysics of human willing and choosing; thus, these questions occupy the most critical part in understanding Turretin’s doctrine of free choice.

1. The First Question: The Term Free Choice And Faculty Psychology

Turretin begins by asking whether the term “free choice” or αὐτεξούσιος (self-determining power) may properly be retained in the Christian schools. Since he presented the totally corrupted state of human nature by original sin and actual sin in the previous locus, Turretin tries to set up a justifiable boundary in using the term “free choice” given the state of that sinful nature.

Thus, Turretin starts with criticizing those who overlook the impurity of human nature as they extol the strength of free choice. For Turretin, this misunderstanding of human free choice has been a perennial annoyance through the ages in the history of the church, which is representatively taken by the supporters of Pelagianism or semi-Pelagianism, not to speak of heathen philosophers. Turretin describes its tenacious vitality:

Neither the authority of various councils, nor the labor and industry of the brightest lights of the church (Jerome, Augustine, Prosper, Hilary, Fulgentius and others) broke so much as to prevent their renewing and causing to sprout again the very same thing in succeeding ages; so that you would say these enemies had been triumphed over rather than entirely conquered by the fathers. (Inst. 10.1.1)

Turretin believes that this false doctrine of free choice is still a pervasive threat in his era especially in the thought of the Jesuits, the Socinians, and the Remonstrants. Given this situation, Turretin reveals his intention to establish the right doctrine of free choice against his opponents, through which he tries to ascribe the responsibility for human sin to man and “the whole glory of salvation to God alone” (Inst. 10.1.1).

Turretin goes on to examine the origin of the term “free choice” to consider in what way it should be dealt with. According to him, “the word ‘free choice,’ usually expressed as αὐτεξουσιος by the Greek fathers, does not appear in Scripture but was received by the Christian schools as a more suitable word to designate the faculty of the rational soul by which it spontaneously does whatever it pleases, a judgment of the reason going before” (Inst. 10.1.2).[19] Here, Turretin points out that while Paul uses the phrase “the power of his own will” (ἐξουσίαν περὶ τοῦ ἰδίου θελήματος) in 1 Cor 7:37, his use of ἐξουσίαν[20] does not signify the freedom of choice, but the faculty of acting (Inst. 10.1.2). Thus, Turretin traces the source of the term “free choice” or αὐτεξούσιος back into the Platonic school, not into Scripture in that many Greek fathers were the followers of the Platonic school before they turned to Christ (Inst. 10.1.2).

Considering its Platonic origin, the term “free choice” can be misapplied to human beings as if they possess autonomous self-determining power, which is properly attributed to God alone. Although aware of the possibility of misapplication, Turretin does not think that the term should be rejected in the Christian schools. Rather, by rectifying the misuses and abuses of “free choice,” Turretin tries to provide a right place where human free choice can be situated in a proper way.

For this, Turretin first deals with a matter of faculty psychology. That is, he attempts to investigate what faculty of the soul free choice properly belongs to—the intellect or the will? As with other Reformed thinkers who adopted Christian Aristotelianism and scholastic faculty psychology,[21] Turretin claims that the subject of free choice is “neither the intellect, nor the will separately, but both faculties conjointly” (Inst. 10.1.4). That is, the faculty of free choice comes from a mixture of both the intellect and the will.

Specifically, Turretin ascribes the decision of choice to the intellect and the freedom to the will. However, it does not mean that free choice is made up of a separable function of each faculty. For Turretin, the intellect and the will are so closely interrelated that each faculty in no way works separately in the act of free choice. Turretin explains, “As the decision of the intellect is terminated in the will, so the freedom of the will has its root in the intellect” (Inst. 10.1.4). As a result, it could be said that each faculty cannot operate properly unless it is accompanied by the other in the whole process of free choice.

Thus, Turretin even says, “One and the same faculty of soul both judges by understanding and by willing embraces what it judges to be good,” as if there were no intrinsic distinction between the intellect and the will (Inst. 10.1.5). Here, stressing the conjoined operation of both faculties in free choice, Turretin directly cites the philosopher Aristotle: “It is either the ‘appetitive intellect’ or the ‘intelligent appetite’ (Ethic. V, 2).”[22]

At this point, Turretin’s terminology does not seem to provide any distinct clues in deciding which faculty has priority over the other. That is, the intellectual aspect and the volitional aspect are described so closely connected to each other that there appears to be no hierarchical order between the two. However, Turretin’s use of Aristotelian language and his emphasis of the inseparable bond between the intellect and the will offer some hints that render his view to be relatively closer to Thomas Aquinas’s interpretation of Aristotle than Scotus’s in the matter of free choice, echoing the intellectualist tradition.

In dealing with free choice, Aquinas quotes the term “appetitive intellect” from Aristotle (Eth. nic. 6.2) to describe the conjoined faculty of the will just as Turretin does, and he subordinates the will to the intellect.[23] In Aquinas’s view, accordingly, the intellect and the will reciprocally form a more stable relationship where the will must follow the judgment of the intellect.

According to Muller, however, Scotus avoided using the term “appetitive intellect” because of its intellectualistic implication.[24] Instead, Scotus preferred to use “rational power” (potentia rationalis) or “rational appetite” (appetitus rationalis) in an attempt to guarantee room for the rationality of the will and “protect the freedom of the will over against the intellect.”[25] This arises from Scotus’s peculiar interpretation in understanding Aristotle’s distinction between rational potency and irrational potency.[26] In his Questions on the Metaphysics of Aristotle 9, Q. 15, Scotus identifies the intellect as natural, which means irrational, and the will as rational.[27] For Scotus, the intellect is passive and natural potency because it cannot refuse to know a thing that surrounds it, like the eye cannot fail to see when sufficient external conditions exist. Thus, Scotus ascribes rational potency to the will, not to the intellect. In Scotus’s view, then, the amalgamation of the intellect and the will is relatively loose in that the will is not always bound to the judgment of the intellect.

Given their interpretations of Aristotle, Turretin seems to follow Aquinas’s way rather than Scotus’s insofar as he uses the term “appetitive intellect” that bears an intellectualist implication and stresses the tight connection between the intellect and the will.[28] Indeed, in the subsequent question, Turretin clearly gives a certain primacy to the intellect over the will by saying, “It [the will] is determined by the intellect whose last judgment of practical intellect it must follow” (Inst. 10.2.8). This shows that Turretin’s understanding of Aristotelian faculty psychology certainly leans toward that of Aquinas.

2. The Second Question: Freedom And Necessity

In the second question, Turretin asks if all kinds of necessity (necessitas) are repugnant to freedom (libertas).[29] This question provides a significant implication before he stipulates the nature and formal reason (ratio formalis)[30] of free choice in the next question. According to Turretin, his opponents, the papists and the Remonstrants, claim that every kind of necessity is opposed to freedom; on that basis, they believe that the essence of freedom lies in indifference (Inst. 10.2.1). To repudiate their insistence, Turretin tries to demonstrate that “not every necessity is at variance with freedom” by showing different kinds of freedom according to different cases of necessity (Inst. 10.2.2).

It is noticeable that Turretin basically accepts the medieval threefold distinction of freedom that was held by Bernard of Clairvaux and Peter Lombard, as John Calvin also does in his Institutes:[31] freedom from necessity (libertas a necessitate), freedom from sin (liberates a peccato), and freedom from misery (libertas a miseria) (Inst. 10.2.3). Among these, human beings intrinsically enjoy freedom from necessity insofar as there is no physical necessity or coactive necessity implied. Due to sin, however, human beings are tied to the state of sin and misery until they are redeemed respectively by grace and glory.

While adopting this medieval distinction, Turretin also goes beyond it in elaborating the case of “necessity” into six forms, from which he addresses what kinds of necessities do not take away freedom while others do. Here are the six forms of necessity that Turretin classifies: (1) the necessity of coaction arising from an external agent, (2) physical and brute necessity occurring from a blind impulse of nature, (3) the necessity of the creature’s dependence on God, (4) rational necessity of the determination to one thing by a judgment of the practical intellect, (5) moral necessity arising from good or bad habits, and (6) the necessity of the existence of the thing or of the event (Inst. 10.2.4).

Prior to explaining each case of necessity, Turretin distinguishes two characteristics of free choice “in which its formal reason consists”: the choice and the willingness. The choice signifies “a previous judgment of reason” going before a thing is done. The willingness is required for a thing to be done “voluntarily and without compulsion” (Inst. 10.2.5). As we shall see later in this regard, Turretin claims that the formal reason of free choice consists in rational willingness (lubentia rationali), “by which man does what he pleases by a previous judgment of reason” (Inst. 10.3.10).

For Turretin, therefore, any necessities that interrupt the act of “the choice” (προαίρεσις) or of “the willingness” (ἑκούσιον) will deprive the nature of freedom. According to Turretin, the first two necessities, “the necessity of coaction” and “physical and brute necessity,” are incompatible with freedom in that the former takes away the willingness and the latter excludes the choice (Inst. 10.2.5). To be specific, the things done from “the necessity of coaction” by compulsion rule out voluntariness, and the things done from “physical and brute necessity” by the natural agents lack the judgment of reason.

Turretin explains the other four kinds of necessity that are compatible with freedom; they even preserve and perfect freedom (Inst. 10.2.6). Among them, notably, “the necessity of creatures’ dependence on God” in no way harms freedom; rather, this type of necessity presupposes freedom. Turretin explains that God, “as the highest ruler and first cause in being,” requires any creatures to rely on him for their being and operations (Inst. 10.2.4), but does not hamper their own proper manner of operating (Inst. 6.6.6). This is because when God determines and moves them, he ordains it to be done according to their own nature, and uses their own will as a second cause.[32] Therefore, based on the foundational involvement of God’s will, the proper place of the creature’s freedom is established.

Secondly, “rational necessity of determination to one thing by practical intellect” also does not impair free choice. It is the nature of the will that it must follow the ultimate judgment of the practical intellect. In his dealing with faculty psychology, Turretin manifestly designates the choice as belonging to the intellect, and the willingness to the will. In this intellectualistic framework, once the choice is determined by the practical intellect, subsequently the will acts upon it.

However, the obedience of the will to the intellect is always done freely without compulsion, since it is our natural inclination that we always seek the good and avoid the evil according to our human nature; as Turretin says: “For all, by a universal and natural appetite, always seek good and happiness for themselves” (Inst. 10.2.8). Therefore, the will follows the intellect’s judgment of good, or denies its judgment of bad most willingly and voluntarily. In this sense, Turretin explains that when the will seeks the evil, “it does not gravitate to the evil under the notion of evil, but under the notion of good either useful or pleasant” (Inst. 10.2.7).[33]

Thirdly, Turretin says that “moral necessity” arising from good or bad habits does not destroy freedom. At first glance, this kind of necessity seems to limit freedom since any acts done from a certain disposition can be seen as lacking a deliberate judgment. However, Turretin clearly says, “Still this servitude by no means overthrows the true and essential nature of freedom” (Inst. 10.2.13), because Turretin assumes human beings are innately either morally good or bad according to their nature: “One or the other must necessarily be in him; nor can there be a man who is not either righteous or a sinner” (Inst. 5.9.6). While human beings are originally created as “morally good and upright” in that they were made “in the image of God,” they now became morally bad after the fall in a state of sin (Inst. 5.9.5).

Citing Aquinas, Turretin describes sin not only as “the negation of good,” but also as “a corrupt disposition” (Inst. 9.1.5).[34] As a result, human beings in a state of sin necessarily exude morally bad acts arising from a corrupt habit, but they do it most freely in that they are faithful to their sinful nature. Thus, Turretin says, “Although the sinner is so enslaved by evil that he cannot but sin, still he does not cease to sin most freely and with the highest freedom” (Inst. 10.2.9).

Lastly, “necessity of event” refers to the certainty and truth of the existence of a thing. This is a not a causal necessity, but a logical necessity that is usually called necessity of the consequence (necessitas consequentiae).[35] For Turretin, this kind of necessity does not properly deteriorate the nature of freedom. Turretin explains this necessity more specifically in locus 3, when he deals with divine knowledge of future contingent things: “The infallibility and certainty of the event does not take away the nature of the contingency of things because things can happen necessarily as to the event and yet contingently as to the mode of production” (Inst. 3.12.23). That is, an event is infallibly certain in that God knows the event, yet still contingent in that it takes place by contingent causes.

This implies that God’s infallible knowledge of a thing per se does not impose absolute necessity on the existence of the thing. Although a thing has an extrinsic necessity like divine foreknowledge, the existence of the thing occurs by contingent causes according to its nature. For this reason, Turretin clearly distinguishes necessity of consequence (necessitas consequentiae) and necessity of consequent (necessitas consequentis),[36] saying “all things would take place necessarily by necessity of consequence, by the necessity of infallibility; not by necessity of the consequent and absolute” (Inst. 3.12.23).[37]

3. The Third Question: Formal Reason Of Free Choice

After having established that freedom essentially presupposes foundational necessities, Turretin poses a more fundamental question to argue against his opponents: “Where does the formal reason of free choice consist—in indifference (indifferentia) or in rational willingness (lubentia rationali)?” According to Turretin, the Jesuits, Socinians, and Remonstrants place the essence of free choice in indifference, but Turretin vehemently denies it and asserts that the formal reason of free choice is in rational willingness (Inst. 10.3.2–3).

What, then, is indifference? Turretin explains that his opponents define it as “the faculty by which all things requisite for acting being posited, the will can act or not act” (Inst. 10.3.3). To be more specific, it refers to the state of motivational equilibrium where the will finds no reason to desire to do a certain act over the others, even when all kinds of prerequisite conditions for doing the act are applied. Indeed, this definition is clearly found in the writing of the Jesuit Luis de Molina, according to whom “with all the prerequisites for acting posited,” the will is “able to act and able not to act, or is able to do one thing in such a way that it is able to do some contrary things.”[38] That is, Molina believes that the will keeps being indifferent, having both “the freedom of contradiction” and “the freedom of contrariety” even when the prerequisites for a certain act are applied.[39]

For Turretin, this concept of indifference cannot be the true place for human free choice because it rules out all foundational necessities for freedom, including rational necessity, moral necessity, and even God’s decree and concurrence to the human will. However, Turretin does not entirely deny the indifference of the will itself. Turretin acknowledges that the will can be indifferent in a certain state, but in a very different way from his opponents.

To situate the indifference of the will in the right place, Turretin classifies the concept of actuality (actus)[40] into two actualities through using medieval scholastic distinctions: the primary actuality (actus primus), and the secondary actuality (actus secundus). Turretin claims that in the state of the primary actuality, the will is “determinable to various objects and holds itself differently towards them”; thus “it can either elicit or suspend the act” (freedom of contradiction) or “be carried to both of opposite things” (freedom of contrariety), but in the secondary actuality the will is determined to one way (Inst. 10.3.4). Here, the primary actuality means “the bare existence of a thing distinct from its operation,”[41] and the secondary actuality refers to “the existence of a thing in its operation.”[42] That is, according to Turretin, the will is indifferent and undetermined if it remains in the mere existence of itself before it starts to operate, that is, in actu primo; but when all the requisites for acting are posited, the indifference of the will disappears in actu secundo.

What, then, are the requisites that drive the will to move from the primary actuality to the secondary actuality? As we have seen above, Turretin says that the will must follow the last judgment of the practical intellect. Therefore, the intellect intrinsically determines the will towards a certain way in this process. At the same time, the providence of God also extrinsically moves the will according to its own nature. Thus Turretin says, “The will can never be without determination as well extrinsic from the providence of God, as intrinsic from the judgment of the intellect” (Inst. 10.3.7).

In the primary actuality, the will keeps being indifferent away from any requisites for further action, but it is conjoined by intrinsic and extrinsic requisites in the secondary actuality. In this regard, Turretin addresses the divided sense (sensus divisus) and the compounded sense (sensus compositus) in a parallel way with the primary actuality and the secondary actuality (Inst. 10.3.4). This distinction between the divided sense and the compounded sense is originally found in Aristotle’s Soph. elench. 166a22–30. Here Aristotle shows that the meaning of a sentence can be changed according to whether a part of the sentence is understood in the divided or compounded sense. For instance, the proposition, “Someone who is sitting can stand” is a logically false sentence if the predicates both “sitting” and “standing” are considered to be applicable to the subject at the same time (in sensu composito). But this sentence would be true if we apply those two predicates respectively at different times (in sensu diviso). That is, someone who is sitting now can have a potency to stand or to do some other things at different times.

This Aristotelian view is called “statistical interpretation of modality,” which was coined by Hintikka.[43] In fact, this statistical modal logic was commonly adopted by medieval scholastics in the form of de dicto and de re.[44] Notably Aquinas, by using the distinction of de dicto and de re, demonstrated that things do not occur necessarily simply because of the fact that God knows them.[45]

Likewise, Turretin applies this distinction to the potency of the will in order to show that the will is indifferent with possessing a potency to produce multiple effects from alternatives in the divided sense, although it can actualize only one determined act in the compounded sense. Therefore, Turretin situates the existence of the simultaneity of potency (simultas potentiae) in the primary actuality or in the divided sense, and denies the potency of simultaneity (potentia simultatis) in the second actuality or in the compounded sense (Inst. 10.3.4).[46] Using this framework, Turretin also displays that the things that will happen derive their existence from their contingent mode, although they are said to be necessary insofar as God knows it.

By adopting the medieval scholastic’s use of logic and languages, Turretin clearly demonstrates that the indifference of the will is validated only in the primary actuality or in the divided sense. For Turretin, his opponents’ concept of indifference is in no way found in any free agent, whether created or uncreated (Inst. 10.3.5). According to Turretin, God cannot be indifferent as if he had a possibility to be evil beyond his goodness (Inst. 10.3.5). Likewise, Christ should not be considered to be indifferent as if he were able to sin. The same is true of the angels and the saints in heaven, who are not able to sin. That is, all free agents cannot be indifferent insofar as they are faithful to their nature.

Adopting an Aristotelian view, Turretin postulates human beings as eudaimonistic and teleological according to their nature. That is, all human beings have an inclination to act for their proper purpose under the notion of good. For this reason, human beings cannot be indifferent in that they continuously seek their apprehension of the highest good or ultimate end according to their nature. Turretin says, “We cannot abstain from seeking the highest good because no one can bring himself to be miserable” (Inst. 10.3.8). Based on this assumption, Turretin strongly believes that the formal reason of free choice cannot be placed in indifference, but in rational willingness (Inst. 10.3.10). This is because, according to Turretin, “the volition of the highest good and of the ultimate end cannot be without the highest willingness” (Inst. 10.3.8), and this willingness should be rational so that what is done should not be done by a blind impulse (Inst. 10.3.10).

Two things, therefore, must be conjoined for the formal reason of free choice: the choice (τὸ προαιρετικόν) and the willingness (τὸ ἑκούσιον). By the choice, human beings do what they please “by the previous light of reason and the judgment of the practical intellect,” and by the willingness, what is done might be done “spontaneously and freely without compulsion” (Inst. 10.3.10). At this point, Turretin cites again Aristotle: “Hence the philosopher calls it ἑϰούσιον προβεβουλευμένον (Ethic. III. 2)” (Inst. 10.3.10). For Turretin, these two elements are always found in any free agent in whatever state they may be, whether created or uncreated (Inst. 10.3.11). Therefore, Turretin concludes, “It is not necessary that there should be indifference in the will to either of two opposites. It suffices that there be a spontaneity and willingness depending upon a judgment of the reason” (Inst. 10.3.9).

In sum, through the foregoing questions, Turretin clearly demonstrates that human freedom intrinsically depends on prerequisite necessities for its proper operation. By adopting medieval scholastics’ use of modal logic and language, Turretin carefully explores the relationship between necessity and freedom, through which he shows that although the will freely acts with the highest freedom, this does not prevent its dependence on God, its subjection to the intellect, and its moral inclination belonging to its nature. For Turretin, human beings have a natural inclination to follow their judgment of the highest good or ultimate end for themselves. Thus, the conjoined faculty of the rationality and the willingness becomes the essential structure for human free choice. Consequently, Turretin proves that the indifference of the will itself cannot be the essential place where the formal reason of free choice consists. It should be noted, however, that the indifference of the will in the primary actuality plays a significant role in Turretin’s doctrine of free choice. By situating the indifference of the will in the divided sense or in the primary actuality, Turretin secures room for the contingency where the freedoms of contradiction and of contrariety are preserved, and shows that the things that will occur in the future are not the result of the necessity of consequent, but of the necessity of consequence.[47]

II. The Problems With Modern Approaches

The preceding examination of Turretin’s dealing with free choice clearly reflects the development of the Reformed doctrine of free choice during the post-Reformation era. That is, Turretin employs finely nuanced distinctions and concepts taken from medieval scholastics. He does so because the theological debates with the Jesuits, Socinians, and Remonstrants required “a sharper and more codified polemic against their doctrinal adversaries and more explicit grasp of the tradition, especially of the contribution of the medieval scholasticism.”[48] Given the fact that Turretin adopts diverse philosophical terms and highly developed logical apparatuses eclectically, both Antonie Vos’s Scotist synchronic contingency model and Paul Helm’s compatibilistic determinism model fail to bear the weight of Turretin’s doctrine of free choice exclusively.

1. The Limitation Of Antonie Vos’s Model

The editors of Reformed Thought on Freedom plainly reveal their intention in the introduction by saying that “the most important results of Vos’s innovative research project” are found in their edited volume.[49] That is, they firmly believe that the Reformed scholastic use of medieval modal logic and terminology “mainly rest on Scotian innovations,” which is represented by synchronic contingency.[50] Applying this concept to the Reformed doctrine of free choice, they strongly insist that “only this synchronic contingency can account for real freedom of choice, both on God’s part and on our part.”[51]

In the case of Turretin, the editors especially focus on the indifference of the will in the primary actuality and directly connect it with so-called Scotist synchronic contingency.[52]

However, their assumption does not seem to have been founded on confirmable evidences, because Scotus, by introducing synchronic contingency, empowers the will to possess a far more extended form of freedom than Turretin allows.

Scotus basically describes the will as having both freedom of contradiction and of contrariety: “It is not of itself so determined, but can perform either this act or its opposite, or can either act or not act at all.”[53] On this basic assumption, Scotus categorizes the freedom of the will more specifically in his Lectura I 39:

For our will is free in regard to opposite acts (as in relation to willing and not-willing, and loving and hating), and second, mediated by opposite acts, it is free in regard to opposite objects to direct freely to them, and thirdly, it is free in regard to effects, which it produces either immediately or by activating other executive potencies.[54]

Here, Scotus broadens the scope of the freedom of the will to the opposite objects to which it exerts beyond the freedom for opposite acts. For example, the will not only has a freedom to love or hate a certain thing, but also has a freedom to love or hate a certain thing or another thing.

For Scotus, freedom for opposite acts is an imperfect type of freedom insofar as it actualizes its possibilities successively.[55] For instance, to love and to hate the same thing cannot happen at the same time, but can happen successively. Scotus thinks that successive actualization entails mutability, thus is somewhat imperfect. Freedom for the opposite objects, however, is the perfect type of freedom since the will does not lose its ability to tend to opposite objects simultaneously.[56] From this distinction, Scotus distinguishes statistical or diachronic freedom (freedom for opposite acts) and synchronic freedom (freedom for opposite objects).[57]

Based on this assumption, Scotus examines what possibilities or contingencies are derived from these two freedoms in the will.[58] From this investigation, Scotus clearly contrasts diachronic contingency with synchronic contingency. For Scotus, the Aristotelian distinction of divided and compounded sense can only explain successively actualized potencies, which implies diachronic contingency. However, for the will to be truly free, Scotus believes that at the moment of willing one thing, the will must not lose its possibility of willing its opposite, although the opposite cannot be factually actualized simultaneously, which entails synchronic contingency. In this regard, Simo Knuuttila portrays Scotus as decisively parting from the Aristotelian concept of diachronic contingency.[59]

As we have seen, however, Turretin manifestly follows the Aristotelian diachronic framework that was mediated by Aquinas in distinguishing in sensu diviso and in sensu composito or de dicto and de re. Turretin acknowledged the freedom for opposite acts only in the divided sense. Turretin does not refer to any kind of synchronically existing unrealized potency in the compounded sense. Therefore, it is hard to find clear evidence of synchronic contingency in Turretin’s doctrine of free choice.

Moreover, Scotus could develop his peculiar concept of the freedom of the will by endowing the will with “self-determining” power based on the fact that the will is “the sole rational potency.”[60] However, Turretin definitely locates rationality in the intellect, and says that the will “cannot be determined itself” because it is determined by the intellect (Inst. 10.2.14). That is, Turretin’s faculty psychology distinctively follows Aquinas’s intellectualistic approach. Consequently, Turretin does not bestow the privilege upon the will by which it goes beyond the last judgment of the practical intellect.

For these reasons, Vos and Beck’s insistence that “the Reformed scholastics clearly deviate from Aquinas’s line of thinking” seems unconvincing, at least in relation to Turretin’s doctrine of free choice.[61] Along with this, the opinion expressed in Reformed Thought on Freedom that Turretin’s adoptions of diverse medieval logical distinctions “suggest an ontology of synchronic contingency” also seems to require more robust evidence.[62] Therefore, it is too much to say that Turretin appeals to the Scotist notion of synchronic contingency in developing his doctrine of free choice.

2. The Limitation Of Paul Helm’s Model

Paul Helm’s objection to Vos’s model certainly gains its ground from the foregoing analyses. However, Helm unfairly claims that Turretin’s understanding on the indifference of the will is “consistent with determinism,” which is “found in the presence of significant features that are typical of compatibilistic determinism in their account of free choice.”[63]

Helm seems to downplay Turretin’s account of the indifference of the will in the primary actuality. However, by placing the indifference of the will prior to the engagement of the will and the intellect, Turretin manifestly provides the ontological source of human freedom where the freedom of contradiction and of contrariety exists. In Turretin’s framework, therefore, God’s predetermination does not destroy the contingency of the things by virtue of the indifference of the will in the divided sense: “Although what is predetermined is not any more indifferent to act or not to act in the second act and in the compound sense, yet it can always be indifferent in the first act and in the divided sense (as the will, when it determines itself, can still be in itself indifferent)” (Inst. 6.5.11).

However, Helm considers the indifference of the will not as the essential apparatus in Turretin’s doctrine of free choice, but simply as the by-product of the Aristotelian faculty psychology. Helm writes, “I believe it is a consequence of their faculty psychology, which enables them to ascribe distinct properties to each faculty.”[64] By doing so, Helm limits the role of the indifference of the will and its significant implication in Turretin’s understanding of free choice.

In order to identify Turretin’s account of the intellect and the will with compatibilistic determinism, Helm boldly argues that there is no interactivity between the intellect and the will in Turretin’s faculty psychology, simply because Turretin says that the will must follow the last judgment of the practical intellect (see Inst. 10.3.2). However, Helm appears to overlook Turretin’s account of four different intellectual judgments, three of which the will can oppose.

To be specific, Turretin first distinguishes three kinds of intellectual judgments: “the theoretical judgment of intellect,” “the absolute and simple judgment of practical intellect,” and “the comparative and last judgment of practical intellect”; then he argues that the will can oppose the first two intellectual judgments, but never oppose the last kind (Inst. 10.2.15).[65] For example, the will of Adam did not follow the absolute judgment of intellect, “by which it judged that the fruit must not be eaten,” but it followed the relative and last judgment of practical intellect, by which it judged the fruit of the tree to be good for food (Inst. 10.2.16).

Further, Turretin divides “the relative judgment of practical intellect” into “first relative judgment” and “last relative judgment” in order to explain the sin committed against the Holy Spirit. In this case, according to Turretin, while the will follows the last relative judgment of practical intellect where “the flesh judges here and now that the gospel should be denied and Christ forsaken,” it opposes the first relative judgment by acting against “conscience and the knowledge of truth” (Inst. 10.2.17).

All of these distinctions prove that there is a dynamic interactivity between the intellect and the will. As we have seen above, Turretin does not think that the will is always obedient or totally passive in relation to the intellect. Therefore, Helm went too far when he claimed, “there is a ‘necessitarianism’ in the relation between the working of the intellect and the will” in Turretin’s faculty psychology.[66]

Consequently Helm’s interpretation of Turretin’s doctrine of free choice nullifies the subtle demarcation line between the primary and the secondary actuality, which Turretin delicately establishes in order to show that the will is free “not merely because it is spontaneous and uncoerced but also because it has a root indifference prior to its act of willing.”[67] In this way, Helm’s interpretation reduces Turretin’s concept of the freedom of the will simply to the level of the freedom from coercion, and renders it consistent with compatibilistic determinism.

However, Turretin’s doctrine of free choice does not allow any attempt to jettison finely drawn scholastic distinctions, since, by using those, Turretin preserves the freedom of contradiction and contrariety, distinguishes the freedom of consequence and consequent, reconciles necessity and contingency, and thus harmonizes God’s decrees and human freedom.

III. Conclusion

From the overall investigation of Turretin’s doctrine of free choice, this article has demonstrated that Turretin’s doctrine of free choice is neither conceptualized by Scotist synchronic contingency nor identified with compatibilistic determinism.

As with other Reformed thinkers, Turretin accepts that what has been lost in the fall is neither “the loss of the faculty of will” nor the inward freedom of the will, but “the freedom of choice, specifically, the ability freely to choose the good and freely to avoid that which is evil.”[68] Thus, Turretin says, “Although the orthodox thinks human free choice is always in man as an essential property, no powers to do the good are left” (Inst. 10.4.8).[69]

To prove this, Turretin intricately develops the Reformed doctrine of free choice through using medieval modal logic and terminology, mainly taken from Aristotelian sources. He employs various distinctions and concepts, and applies them to the metaphysics of human willing and choosing. From these, Turretin clearly demonstrates that the Reformed doctrine of free choice in no way echoes philosophical determinism or fatalism. While Turretin highly extols the sovereignty of God, he preserves human freedom in its proper place.

In harmonizing God’s eternal decrees and human free choice, Turretin locates the indifference of the will prior to the secondary actuality. By doing so, Turretin shows that although the will moves to a determined direction in secondary actuality, it does not lose its potency to produce multiple effects between alternatives.

However, in interpreting this framework, Antoine Vos maximizes the indifference of the will so as to connect it with a Scotist notion of synchronic contingency, while Paul Helm minimizes the indifference of the will so as to identify it with compatibilistic determinism. Therefore, both Helm’s model and Vos’s model seem unsuccessful in understanding the sophistication of Turretin’s position.

Notes

1. For examples of works that reflect on this issue, see Alexander Schweizer, “Die Synthese des Determinismus und der Freiheit in der reformirten Dogmatik. Zur Verteidigung gegen Ebrard,” Theologische Jahrbücher 8 (1849); Heinrich Heppe, “Der Charakter der deutsch-reformirten Kirche und das Verhältniss derselben zum Luthertum und zum Calvinismus,” TSK 23 (1850): 669-706; translated as “The Character of the German Reformed Church, and Its Relationship to Lutheranism and Calvinism,” Mercersburg Quarterly Review 5 (1853): 181-207; Randolph S. Foster, Objections to Calvinism as It Is (Cincinnati: Swormstedt & Poe, 1860; repr., Salem, OH: Schmul, 1998); Fisk Harris, Calvinism Contrary to God’s Word and Man’s Moral Nature (Chicago: Woman’s Temperance Publishing Association, 1890); Andrew Martin Fairbairn, The Place of Christ in Modern Theology (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1894).
2. Among them, see Basil Hall, “Calvin Against the Calvinists,” in John Calvin, ed. G. E. Duffield (Appleford, UK: Sutton Courtney Press, 1966); Brian Armstrong, Calvinism and the Amyraut Heresy (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969); Clark H. Pinnock, ed., Grace Unlimited (Minneapolis: Bethany Fellowship, 1975); Clark Pinnock, “God Limits His Knowledge,” in Predestination and Free Will, ed. David Basinger and Randall Basinger (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1986); H. Ray Dunning, Grace, Faith, and Holiness: A Wesleyan Systematic Theology (Kansas City: Beacon Hill Press, 1988); Bruce R. Reichenbach, “Freedom, Justice and Moral Responsibility,” in The Grace of God, The Will of Man, ed. Clark H. Pinnock (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1989); Richard Rice, “Divine Foreknowledge and Free-Will Theism,” in The Grace of God, The Will of Man; William R. Estep “Doctrines Lead to ‘Dunghill’ Prof Warns,” The Founders Journal 29 (1997); Gordon Olson, Getting the Gospel Right: A Balanced View of Calvinism and Arminianism (Springfield, MO: Global Gospel, 2005); Roger E. Olson, Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2006); “The Classical Free Will Theist Model of God,” in Perspectives on the Doctrine of God: 4 Views, ed. Bruce A. Ware (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2008); Kenneth Kealthy, Salvation and Sovereignty: A Molinist Approach (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2010); William L. Craig, “Response to Paul Kjoss Helseth,” in Four Views on Divine Providence, ed. Stanley N. Gundry and Dennis Jowers (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011).
3. It is claimed that the Reformed doctrines such as immutable divine decree, infallible divine foreknowledge, irresistible grace, and predestination do not leave any room for human freedom given the state of total depravity. For the detailed implications of the Reformed doctrines that the critics take for their claims, see Jeongmo Yoo, “John Edwards (1637-1716) on the Freedom of the Will: The Debate on the Relation between Divine Necessity and Human Freedom in Late Seventeenth Century and Early Eighteenth Century England” (PhD diss., Calvin Theological Seminary, 2011), 10-17.
4. Among the recent works regarding the Reformed understanding of free choice, see esp. Richard A. Muller, “Grace, Election, and Contingent Choice: Arminius’s Gambit and the Reformed Response,” in The Grace of God, The Bondage of Will, ed. Thomas R. Schreiner and Bruce A. Ware (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1995); Eef Dekker, “An Ecumenical Debate between Reformation and Counter-Reformation? Bellarmine and Ames on liberum arbitrium,” in Reformation and Scholasticism: An Ecumenical Enterprise, ed. Willem J. van Asselt and Eef Dekker (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001), 141-54; Aza Goudriaan, Reformed Orthodoxy and Philosophy, 1625-1750: Gisbertus Voetius, Petrus van Mastricht, and Anthonius Driessen (Boston: Brill, 2006); Luca Baschera, “Peter Martyr on Free Will: The Aristotelian Heritage of Reformed Theology,” in CTJ 42 (2007): 325-40; Willem J. van Asselt, J. Martin Bac, and Roelf T. de Velde, eds., Reformed Thought on Freedom: The Concept of Free Choice in Early Modern Reformed Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010).
5. Since many critics focus on some representative figures such as Zwingli, Calvin, or Jonathan Edwards to explain the Reformed doctrine on free choice, they overlook the systematic development of the Reformed understanding of human free choice during the Reformed orthodox era. See, e.g., Reichenbach, “Freedom, Justice, and Moral Responsibility,” 282-85; James D. Strauss, “A Puritan in a Post-Puritan World: Jonathan Edwards,” in Grace Unlimited, 244.
6. For the problem of central dogma and its claims, see the following works by Richard A. Muller: Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520 to ca. 1725, 2nd ed., 4 vols. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), 1:123-32; “The Problem of Protestant Scholasticism: A Review and Definition,” in Reformation and Scholasticism: An Ecumenical Enterprise, 48-50; “The Placement of Predestination in Reformed Theology: Issue or Non-issue?,” CTJ 40 (2005): 184-89; Christ and the Decree: Christology and Predestination in Reformed Theology from Calvin to Perkins (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 1-27; “Was Calvin a Calvinist?,” in Calvin and the Reformed Tradition: On the Work of Christ and the Order of Salvation, by Richard A. Muller (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), 62-65. See also Willem J. van Asselt et al., Introduction to Reformed Scholasticism (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage, 2011), 10-12; Dolf te Velde, The Doctrine of God in Reformed Orthodoxy, Karl Barth, and the Utrecht School: A Study in Method and Content (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 26-27, 34.
7. Richard A. Muller, “Jonathan Edwards and the Absence of Free Choice: A Parting of Ways in the Reformed Tradition,” Jonathan Edwards Studies 1 (2011): 21-22.
8. See ibid. for a specific explanation of the transition from the older Reformed tradition to the eighteenth-century rise of Calvinistic philosophical determinism. Muller clearly says, “The older Reformed theology followed a traditional faculty psychology whereas Edwards did not. The older tradition understood that there had to be a root indifference prior to the engagement of will and intellect, defined by the potency of the will to multiple effects and characterized by freedom of contradiction and contrariety, in order for there to be freedom of choice” (pp. 20-21).
9. van Asselt, Bac, and de Velde, eds., Reformed Thought on Freedom, 15.
10. For a definition of contingency, see Richard A. Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms: Drawn Principally from Protestant Scholastic Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1985), 81. For a detailed explanation of the Scotist notion of synchronic contingency, see Antonie Vos, The Philosophy of John Duns Scotus (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2006); J. Martin Bac, Perfect Will Theology: Divine Agency in Reformed Scholasticism as against Suárez, Episcopius, Descartes, and Spinoza (Leiden: Brill, 2010).
11. Simo Knuuttila, review of The Philosophy of John Duns Scotus, by Antonie Vos, Ars Disputandi 7 (2007): 6.
12. Pieter L. Rouwendal, “The Method of the Schools: Medieval Scholasticism,” in Introduction to Reformed Scholasticism, 65.
13. Paul Helm, “Reformed Thought on Freedom: Some Further Thoughts,” Journal of Reformed Theology 4 (2010): 185-207; Paul Helm, “‘Structural Indifference’ and Compatibilism in Reformed Orthodoxy,” Journal of Reformed Theology 5 (2011): 184-205.
14. For their debates on synchronic contingency, see Paul Helm, “Synchronic Contingency in Reformed Scholasticism: A Note of Caution,” NedTT 57 (2003): 207-22; a reply by Andreas J. Beck and Antonie Vos, “Conceptual Patterns Related to Reformed Scholasticism,” NedTT 57 (2003): 223-33; and a final word by Paul Helm, “Synchronic Contingency Again,” NedTT 57 (2003): 234-38.
15. Helm, “Reformed Thought on Freedom: Some Further Thoughts,” 206-7.
16. See ibid., 207.
17. For this, I will mainly examine the tenth topic of Francis Turretin’s Institutes, “The Free Choice of Man in a State of Sin.” In many parts, I will rely on Giger’s translated version of Institutio theologiae elencticae from the 1847 Edinburgh/New York edition: Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, ed. James T. Dennison Jr., trans. George Musgrave Giger (Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian & Reformed, 1992). However, where there are mistranslations or ambiguities, I will use my own translation as well as have recourse to Muller’s Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms.
18. Giger translates the Latin liberum arbitrium as “free will.” However, Muller points out that it is “often loosely and incorrectly rendered.” Liberum arbitrium is closer to the sense of “free choice.” See Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, 176. See also J. B. Korolec, “Free Will and Free Choice,” in The Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy: From the Rediscovery of Aristotle to the Disintegration of Scholasticism, 1100-1600, ed. Norman Kretzmann, Anthony Kenny, and Jan Pinborg (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 630. Korolec says, “Freedom of choice is probably a less misleading translation of liberum arbitrium; but here too there is the difficulty that the Latin expression does not contain the technical word for choice (eletio) … therefore, we shall use freedom of decision.” In the present article, I will use the commonly accepted term “free choice” instead of “free will” or “freedom of decision” in reference to liberum arbitrium.
19. Vox Liberi Aribitrii, ut &αὐτεξουσιος, qua Patres Graeci illud exprimere solent, in Scriptura non occurrit; Sed a Scholis Chirstianis recepta est, tanquam commodior ad designandam facultatem illam animae rationalis, qua quodcunque libet, sponte agit praeeunte rationis judicio.
20. For the specific definition and the Protestant Scholastics’ use of the term ἐξουσίαν, see Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, 110-11.
21. Concerning Christian Aristotelianism on faculty psychology, Muller writes, “Faculty psychology, with its characteristic distinction of spiritual life into the faculties of intellect and will, or, more precisely, of the soul into four faculties—intellect, will, sensitive power, and vegetative power—had its roots in Aristotle and became, in the thirteenth century development of a Christian Aristotelianism, the dominant view of spiritual or rational existence” (Richard A. Muller, God, Creation, and Providence in the Thought of Jacob Arminius: Sources and Directions of Scholastic Protestantism in the Era of Early Orthodoxy [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991], 143). For the Protestants’ adoption of the Aristotelian faculty psychology at the time of the Reformation and post-Reformation, see Richard A. Muller, The Unaccommodated Calvin: Studies in the Formation of a Theological Tradition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 159-73; and Muller, God, Creation, and Providence, 143-49, 167-69, 191-207.
22. The editors of Reformed Thought on Freedom, 176, point out that this section from Aristotle should really be 6.2.
23. Thomas Aquinas, S.T. 1, Q. 83, A 3.
24. Muller, Unaccommodated Calvin, 166.
25. Ibid.
26. To be specific, Aristotle differentiates rational potency from irrational potency according to its ability to produce contrary results. For example, according to Aristotle, medical science is rational potency because it can produce disease and health, but heat is natural or irrational potency because it can produce only heat. See Aristotle, Metaph. 9, c.2, 1046b5-7.
27. John Duns Scotus, Questions on the Metaphysics of Aristotle, trans. Girard J. Etzkorn and Allan B. Wolter (St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 1998), 2:603-39.
28. To emphasize the inseparable unity of the intellect and the will, Turretin in another place describes it as follows: “Thus the image of God is one although it embraces newness of mind and of the affections; and free choice is one, although it resides in the intellect and will” (Inst. 1.2.8).
29. While Giger’s translation uses both “freedom” and “liberty” for the term libertas, I will adopt only “freedom” in every translation of libertas.
30. Giger translates the term ratio formalis as “formal relation” (1:661) or “formal nature” (1:662) and the editors of Reformed Thought on Freedom, 176, translate the term as “essential structure.” But in every use of Turretin’s ratio formalis, I will translate it as “formal reason.” For the different meanings of the term ratio, see Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, 257.
31. See John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, translated from the original Latin, and collated with the author’s last edition in French, by John Allen (Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1813), 1.2.5.
32. For a detailed explanation, see Inst. 6.6.6.
33. Quia non appetit illud sub ratione mali, sed sub specie boni apparentis, vel utilis, vel jucundi.
34. “Hence Thomas Aquinas: ‘As bodily sickness has something of privation, inasmuch as the equality of health is taken away, and has something positive (viz., the humors themselves inordinately disposed), so original sin ... is not a pure privation, but a certain corrupt habit’” (S.T. 1, Q. 82, A. 1).
35. The necessitas consequentiae is “a necessity brought about or conditioned by a previous contingent act or event so that the necessity itself arises out of contingent circumstance” (Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, 200).
36. The necessitas consequentis is “the necessity of something that cannot be other than what it is, when it is to say, a simple or absolute necessity” (ibid.).
37. For a detailed explanation of the difference between the necessity of the consequences and the necessity of the consequent, see van Asselt, Bac, and de Velde, eds., Reformed Thought on Freedom, 35-38.
38. Alfred J. Freddoso, introduction to Part IV of the Concordia, by Luis Molina, trans. Alfred J. Freddoso (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2004), 24-25. Francisco Suárez also offers a definition similar to that of Molina: Nam causa libera est quae, positis omnibus requisitis ad agendum, potest agere et non agere (Francisco Suárez, Disputationes Metaphysicae in Opera Omnia, vol. 25 [Paris: Vives, 1866], 19.4.1).
39. “Freedom of contradiction or exercise consists in this, that the will is free to elicit or to not elicit some action, e.g., to love some thing or not. Freedom of contrariety consists in this, that the will is free to wish an object or its opposite” (W. L. Gildea, W. H. Fairbrother, and H. Sturt, “Symposium—The Freedom of the Will,” in Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 3, no. 1 [1895]: 47).
40. For the scholastic use of actus, see Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, 20.
41. Ibid., 24.
42. Ibid.
43. See Jaakko Hintikka, Time and Necessity: Studies in Aristotle’s Theory of Modality (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973); Hintikka, Aristotle On Modality and Determinism (Acta Philosophica Fennica) (Amsterdam: North-Holland, 1977).
44. “The contemporary distinction between de dicto and de re modalities derives from a distinction drawn by Scholastic philosophers in the Middle Ages. According to this distinction, there are two different sentence structures that can be used to make modal attributions in different senses. The first is sensu composito—the compounded sense, corresponding to modal attributes de dicto, in which a modal term prefixes a sentence. The second is sensu diviso—the divided sense, corresponding to modal attributions de re, in which a modal term divides a sentence” (Gary Rosenkrantz and Joshua Hoffman, Historical Dictionary of Metaphysics [Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2010]). For the medieval use of this distinction, see Alfonso Maierù, Terminologia Logica della Tarda Scolastica (Rome: Edizioni dell’Ateneo, 1972), 499-600; Norman Kretzmann, “Sensus Compositus, Sensus Divisus and Propositional Attitudes,” Medioevo 7 (1981): 195-229; Simo Knuuttila, “Modal Logic,” in Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy, 345-50.
45. Thomas Aquinas, De veritate 1, Q. 2, A. 12, ad. 4: “‘Whatever is known by God is necessary,’ can concern either the manner of speaking or the thing spoken about. If the necessity is applied to the manner of speaking, then the proposition is composite and true [Si sit de dicto, tunc est composita et vera].… If the necessity is applied to the thing spoken about, then the proposition is divided and false [Si sit de re, sic est divisa et falsa].”
46. Here, Giger (or the editor) mistakenly translated the term potentia simultatis as “simultaneity of power,” which should be translated as “potency (or power) of simultaneity.”
47. For a detailed explanation, see esp. Inst. 11.5.11-19.
48. Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics, 1:31.
49. van Asselt, Bac, and de Velde, eds., Reformed Thought on Freedom, 17. For Vos’s research project, see Vos, Philosophy of John Duns Scotus; and John Duns Scotus, Duns Scotus On Divine Love: Texts and Commentary on Goodness and Freedom, God and Humans, ed. Antonie Vos et al. (Burlington, VT; Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2003).
50. van Asselt, Bac, and de Velde, eds., Reformed Thought on Freedom, 17.
51. Ibid., 41.
52. See ibid., 195.
53. Scotus, Questions on the Metaphysics of Aristotle, 9, q. 15, n. 22 (2:608).
54. John Duns Scotus, Contingency and Freedom. Lectura I 39, ed. Antonie Vos et al. (Boston: Springer, 1994), § 45.
55. Ibid., § 46.
56. Ibid.
57. For a detailed explanation of this distinction, see Nico den Bok, “Freedom in Regard to Opposite Acts and Objects in Scotus’ Lectura I 39, §§ 45-54, ” Vivarium 38 (2000): 243-54; Stephen D. Dumont, “The Origin of Scotus’s Theory of Synchronic Contingency,” The Modern Schoolman 72 (1995): 149-67.
58. See Scotus, Lectura I 39, §§ 48-51.
59. Simo Knuuttila, “Duns Scotus’ Criticism of the ‘Statistical’ Interpretation of Modality,” in Sprache und Erkenntnis im Mittelalter, ed. Jan P. Beckmann et al. (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1981), 1:441-50; Knuuttila, “Time and Modality in Scholasticism,” in Reforging the Great Chain of Being: Studies in the History of Modal Theories, ed. Simo Knuuttila (Dordrecht: Springer, 1981), 163-257.
60. Mary Beth Ingham and Mechthild Dreyer, The Philosophical Vision of John Duns Scotus: An Introduction (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2004), 153.
61. Beck and Vos, “Conceptual Patterns Related to Reformed Scholasticism,” 229.
62. van Asselt, Bac, and de Velde, eds., Reformed Thought on Freedom, 47.
63. Paul Helm, “Jonathan Edwards and the Parting of the Ways?,” Jonathan Edwards Studies 4 (2014): 50.
64. Ibid., 47.
65. Quamvis voluntas possit refragari judicio theoretico intellectus, vel judicio absolute & simplici intellectus practice.… Nunquam tamen refragari potest judicio comparator & ultimo.
66. Helm, “Jonathan Edwards and the Parting of the Ways?,” 52.
67. Muller, “Jonathan Edwards and the Absence of Free Choice,” 19.
68. Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, 177.
69. Here, I am following the translation of van Asselt, Bac, and de Velde, eds., Reformed Thought on Freedom, 199.