medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

Judging by the expression 'pre-determination' (Latin: praedeterminatio), the reference to Catholicism and to the city of Rome, I guess what you have in mind are the so-called congregations (meetings) 'De auxiliis (gratiae)' [On the help/power of grace], which started under pope Clement VII in Rome in 1598 but were already suspended by Paul V in 1607. But even in those nine years there were over 120 meetings. The debate was on the efficacy of God's grace versus human free will.

On one side were the Dominicans, led by Domingo Banez, who defended the theory of 'physical' predetermination: God's will effectively causes everything, including the acceptance of divine grace by a person. On the other side were the Jesuits, led by Luis de Molina, who held the theory of 'middle knowledge': Before deciding to create, God already knew what each possible creature would in fact freely choose in any particular set of circumstances. Both parties claimed they interpreted Thomas Aquinas faithfully.

The controversy was so heated - Dominicans accusing the Jesuits of being Pelagians, the Jesuits calling the Dominicans Calvinists - that it weakened the unity of the Catholic Church and Paul V silenced the discussion: no more mutual accusations, all writings had to be submitted to the Inquisition for approval before publication. In the papal statement issued in 1607 the pope declared that he would "promulgate the declaration and the decision that was expected, in due time (Latin: opportune)" (Denzinger nr. 1997). Apparently, the due time hasn't come yet and we are still waiting for the papal decision.

Nonetheless, the Dominican position became more or less the commonly held view of Catholic theologians.

Recently a number of less known texts dating from the De Auxiliis controversy were published by Ulrich Lehner: http://www.bautz.de/rfn/9783883093659.html (all in Latin).
The literature already mentioned by the other distinguished members of this list offer good introductions.
 
Harm Goris

Harm Goris
Lecturer in systematic theology
Faculty of Catholic Theology (Utrecht campus)
Tilburg University
The Netherlands
tel: +31-30-253 3129
fax: +31-30-253 3665
Visit the site of the Thomas Institute Utrecht: http://www.thomasinstituut.org/

 


From: medieval-religion - Scholarly discussions of medieval religious culture [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Paul Chandler
Sent: dinsdag 14 april 2009 23:02
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [M-R] Free Will V Pre-Determination

medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture 2009/4/14 Steve Higham <[log in to unmask]>
> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

I am undertaking some research on the free will v destiny debate in Catholicism. A few years ago I read a couple of Calderon's plays in this area and vaguely remember that there was a Council of Rome (or something similar) during which these serious theological issues were raised. 

This is perhaps the 2nd Council of Orange (529), which issued a series of dogmatic decrees on grace and predestination.

The dry old seminary text-book by Ludwig Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma (St Louis: Herder, 1958) is a decent vademecum to traditional (post-Tridentine) Catholic theology and its technical vocabulary, with the main points usually illustrated with references to conciliar decrees and the most important patristic, medieval and early modern authors -- highly summary, apologetic, and systematised, but careful to report unresolved differences of theological opinion, it is all in all, a useful guide to the Latin terminology and a good springboard to further research. -- Paul Chandler



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Paul Chandler, O.Carm.  |  Institutum Carmelitanum
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