Franciscan Studies

IS TO WILL IT AS BAD AS TO DO IT? THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY DEBATE1 In De Conceptu Virginali, Anselm defends the Augustinian thesis that the created will alone is the root of injustice; the senses, the bodily powers, and the bodily emotions are not. "If they are accused of voluntary actions which are sinful, the limbs and the senses performing them can answer, "God has subjected us... to the will...! We cannot but... act and do what it wills. In fact, it controls us as its instruments and produces the effects which we seem to be producing, We are not able by ourselves to resist it, and the things it does cannot but be done. What, then, do the limbs or the senses or the things produced commit sin^e God subjected them...? Whatever they do, therefore, is to be imputed totally to the will."2 Anselm reasons, the acts of a power have a moral value of their own only if the power is sovereign with respect to them, while the senses and the bodily powers are ruled by the will. In the next century, Peter Abelard, in his Ethics,3 identifies sin with the internal consent to what we believe is unfitting (i.e. contrary to divine will). For "what is less within our power is less worthy of being commanded" (24/25-26/27). Consent is always within our power (16/17), whereas certain sorts of desires, dispositions (such as irascibility ), and external acts are not (4/5, 12/13, 26/27). Further, sin is contempt for God, and consent to what we believe is contrary to 1 We are happy to acknowledge the help of Fr. Gedeon Gal, who encouraged us to work on this topic. 2 Anselmus, De Conceptione Virginali et de Originali Peccato, cap. 4, ed. F. S. Schmitt (Rome, 1940) II: 142-5, trans. J. M. Colleran (Albany, 1969), 174-6. Cited by Adam Wodeham in Lectura Oxoniensis, Book IV, d. 10, § 3, 27-35, below. 8 Peter Abelard's Ethics. Edited and translated by D. E. Luscombe, Oxford University Press (1971). The English and Latin are on facing pages, page references to Abelard are to this edition. 6 MARILYN MCCORD ADAMS and REGA WOOD His will for us shows contempt for Him, whether or not it is accompanied by such desires, dispositions, or external acts (6/7). Abelard concludes that consent or intention is the exclusive focus of God's pleasure or displeasure with us (46/47, 52/53), whereas external acts are good or bad only in the derivative sense that they proceed from good or bad intentions. Given consent, the external act cannot even increase sin (16/17-18/19). For reasons somewhat obscure, this conclusion of Abelard was condemned at the Council of Sens in 1141.4 By contrast, Aquinas attempts a balance: since any object must be presented to the will under an aspect of goodness, the willed external act must have some value prior to and independently of being wiUed (Summa Theologica I—II, q. 20, aa. 1 and 3 c). But the goodness that pertains to an act insofar as it is ordered to an end depends entirely on the wiU (ibid. I—II, q. 20, aa. 3-4). The wiU, like any moving cause, is perfected by its effect. But where the will has done its part and the body fails to execute the will's command, the absence of the external act is involuntary and does not affect the praise or blame, reward or punishment, due the agent (Summa Theologica I—II, q. 20, a. 5 c). Is to will it as bad as to do it? Or does the deed compound the crime? Debate on these questions among fourteenth century Franciscans was lively, for the issue was absolutely fundamental for ethics and theology then as now. Equally fascinating to watch is how, even at this stage of the discussion our impressive cast—of Duns Scotus and Walter Chatton on the one side, William Ockham and Adam Wodeham on the other—is still able to bring out of the storeroom of arguments "things both new and old." (Matthew 13, 51) 4 Henricus Denzinger ed...