Harvard Divinity School

The Recovery of Free Agency in the Theology of St. Augustine

Author(s): James Wetzel
Source: The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 80, No. 1 (Jan., 1987), pp. 101-125
Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Harvard Divinity School
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HTR80:1 (1987) 101 -25

THE RECOVERY OF FREE AGENCY IN THE

THEOLOGY OF ST. AUGUSTINE

James Wetzel
Columbia University

In The Spirit and the Letter Augustine claims that grace not only avoids abrogating human freedom it actually establishes free will.1 His claim raises some intriguing questions. What sort of freedom is it that can be established only by the
influence of another agent-in this case, God-and what sort of bondage is it
that is overcome by grace? If we remain exclusively within Augustine's theological discourse, the answers come straightforwardly and by now have a ring of
familiarity. The freedom in question is the state of loving God over and above
his worldly and time-bound creations, fulfilling (with divine assistance) the
demands of the Law, and finding one's happiness in reconciliation with the eternal through the mediation of Jesus Christ. Bondage is conversely the blindness
and perversity of keeping one's attention fixed on creation apart from its relation
to its Creator and of courting the satisfaction of only those desires which are
1 De
spiritu et littera 30.52 (CSEL 60. 208): Liberum ergo arbitriumevacuamus per gratiam?
Absit, sed magis liberum arbitriumstatuimus. (Do we thereforerid ourselves of free will through
grace? On the contrary,we establish free will.)
The task of translatingAugustine's terminology for discussing the will has frequentlybecome a
source of disagreementamong scholars. In his The Christian Philosophy of Saint Augustine (trans.
L. E. M. Lynch; New York: Random House, 1960) 323 -24, Etienne Gilson tries to sort things out
as systematically as possible. Liberumarbitriumseems generally to be reservedfor describing the
freedom in action that all humans, whether saintly or benighted, enjoy by virtue of acting on what
they desire. Liberatus and libertas, however, seem only to apply to those whose desires are conformed to the will of God. The latterterms in particularadmitdegrees of freedom.
While Gilson's observationsare helpful, glaring exceptions still can be expected. A case in point
is the above citation, where liberumarbitriumdoes not have the simple meaningof the facility to act
on one's desires, but instead comes closer to the usual meaning of libertas. (Augustine is probably
playing on the ambiguityof his own terminology for rhetoricaleffect.) As a rule, it is always better
to rely on context than on consistency in terminology for sorting out Augustine's reflections on the
will.

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framed independentlyof God's claims on every humanbeing. Freedom is loving well or having a bona voluntas; bondage is loving aimlessly, unreflectively,
and hence destructively.2
Despite the availability of Augustine's theology, the assumptionsabout the
nature of human freedom which it embodies bear an uneasy and often antagonistic relationshipto our contemporarysensibilities. In linking the exercise of
free will with substantivetheological claims about the proper sort of love, he
seems to include too much within the concept of freedom, and in tying the possibility of free will to divine beneficence, he seems to include too little. As a
result, when it has come to evaluating his complex theological reflections on
grace and sin for their consistency with what we would normally wish to say
about humanautonomyand moral responsibility,Augustine is found wantingor
simply unintelligible.
Unfortunately,whenever Augustine is so drawn into considerations about
free will and determinism, it generally amounts to an exercise in matching
well-informed articulationsof his theological vision with relatively inarticulate
intuitionsabout what is to count as "real" freedom. The one possibility never
entertainedwith any seriousness is that contemporarywisdom about freedom
might not be a desideratumeither for assessing Augustine's theology or for a
fully persuasive understandingof human freedom. It may well be the case that
Augustine disturbs contemporarysensibilities with good reason, such that the
burdenof rethinkingand reformulationshifts to us. In orderto test thatpossibility, however, we would need to be able to reconstructan Augustiniantheory of
freedom that was not simply a requirementof Augustine's theology; otherwise
there would be no commensurability between contemporary concerns and
Augustine's interests(except among convinced Augustinians),and a preference
for Augustinianfreedom would simply beg questions.
I doubt whether anyone could manage such a reconstructionand still seriously call it a historicallyaccurateinterpretationof Augustine's thought. This is
probablyone reason why few if any Augustine scholars have given the exercise
much consideration. On the other hand, a lack of historicityneed not be especially troublesomeif the end in view is an understandingof freedom inspiredby
Augustine ratherthan one directly attributableto him. A reconstructionwould
of course begin with Augustine's own theological and philosophical
2 For a first-rate
exposition of the theology bearingon the will and its states of freedomand bondage, see John M. Rist, "Augustine on Free Will and Predestination,"JTS n.s. 20 (1969) 420-47;
reprintedin R. A. Markus,ed., Augustine:A Collection of Critical Essays (GardenCity: Doubleday,
1972). For a general understandingof Augustine's theology, I am especially indebted to Eugene
TeSelle, Augustine the Theologian (London: Burns & Oates, 1972); Peter Brown, Augustine of
Hippo (Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress, 1967); John Burnaby,Amor Dei: A Study of the
Religion of St. Augustine(London:Hodder& Stoughton, 1938); and Oliver O'Donovan, The Problem of Self-Lovein St. Augustine(New Haven:Yale UniversityPress, 1980).

JAMES WE'IZEL

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presuppositions,but unlike an interpretationit would not have to remain there.

Contemporaryphilosophical reflection on free will could be used to elaborate
lines of thoughtinitiatedby Augustine at the same time Augustine posed a challenge to aspects of the contemporarydebate. Although such a strategyperhaps
risks anachronismand misunderstanding,it is by no means committed to these
errors. As long as moments of exposition are distinguishablefrom moments of
reconstruction,we can approachAugustine in the same mannerhe approached
the best pagan thought of his day-with a healthy relish for plundering truth
whereverit may be found.3
The various levels at work in reconstruction-interpretation,redescription,
reevaluation-serve not so much to distinguishseparatesteps in an argumentas
they do to keep straightpartnersin a conversation. I intend to set up a number
of conversations between Augustine's theology and contemporaryphilosophy.
The first will concern the understandingof freedom usually felt to be at stake
when determinismlooms and whetherit is freedom worthdefending (here theology challenges philosophy). The second will temporarily set aside worries
about determinismand attemptto motivate a richerconception of freedom (here
philosophy elaborates theology). Finally, the third will reintroduce
determinism-the kind occasioned by a certain kind of God-and investigate
whether the freedom having emerged from the second conversationcan still be
maintained(here theology responds to philosophy). The drift of the conversations should be towards an understanding of free will compatible with
Augustine's thoughtyet engaged as well with contemporaryreflection.
The Problem of Free Will
Determinismis the thesis that from some point of view-be it that of God,
causality, the subconscious, or something else-all human actions can be
described as having occurrednecessarily. From determinismworries about the
possibility of free will follow. Those who overcome the worries are called compatibilists, and those who succumb incompatibilists. Although each side
disagrees with the other over whetherhumanfreedom is possible, both compatibilists and incompatibilistsagree that the view of freedom at issue depends on
the analysis of counterfactualsin the form: "The agent could have done other-

3 See, e.g., De doctrina Christiana 2. 40. 60 (CCSL 32. 73-74). Augustine believed that the
Christiansof his day could happily mine the liberal disciplines of pagan culturefor truthsnot necessarily intended by their pagan articulators(e.g., theological truths). The point cuts both ways.
Augustine's theological reflectionscan be readby us in ways that go beyond his own intentions. The
theology, of course, must be understoodin its own terms first.

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wise, if he or she had so chosen." Only compatibilistsbelieve that determinism

can preservecounterfactualsof this form as expressionsof genuine possibility.4
Augustine's theological determinism, with its emphases on divine
sovereignty, the necessity of grace, and universal predestination,tends to land
him squarely within this debate. Commentatorsscrutinize his theology to see
whether Augustine ever allows for an "ability to do otherwise" on the respective roads to salvationand perdition.5If he does, he is a compatibilistand human
freedom is preserved. If not, he is an incompatibilistand all is not well in God's
universe.
Recently in the American Philosophical Quarterly ArthurFalk has argued
that Augustine is the rightful father of compatibilismand that compatibilismis
radically defective.6 For a numberof reasons, Falk's article recommendsitself
as a useful framework for discussing the limitations of the counterfactualor
modal condition of freedom as an interpretivetool for understandingeither
Augustine or free will. Not only is his argument clear and precise, it is
sufficiently general to apply to a broadrange of debates adoptinga modal focus
on free will and its compatibility with determinism. Even more importantly,
Falk's interpretationand criticism of Augustine qua compatibilistfails and fails
for illuminatingreasons-reasons which move us away from the temptationto
define freedom solely against the threat of determinism and toward richer
Augustinianformulations.
In setting up his case, Falk takes his cue from a well-known passage in The
Spirit and the Letter, where Augustine distinguishespower (potestas) from will
(voluntas). Power is the ability to act, and will is the effecting of what is in
one's power to do. According to Augustine, whatever someone wills is ipso
facto an expression of power, whereas not everything within someone's power
finds expression as will.7 This analysis rests on the intuitionthat someone can be
4 Most, but not all, varieties of compatibilismhave been concernedwith counterfactualsand with
questions of modality in general. The exceptions are not consideredhere, since they have been less
prominentin evaluationsof Augustine.
5 Rist's evaluationof
Augustine in his seminal article(above, n. 2) is a case in point. He assumes
that Augustinepreserveshumanfreedomonly if grace is resistible.
6 "Some Modal Confusions in Compatibilism," American Philosophical Quarterly 18 (1981)
141 -48.
7 De
spiritu et littera 31.53 (CSEL 60. 209- 10). Falk (143) excerptsJohn Burnaby'stranslation
in Augustine: Later Works(Philadelphia:Westminster,1955) 237, as follows:
Willing is one thing, ability another;willing does not necessarily imply ability nor ability willing;
we sometimes will what we are not able to do, and sometimes are able to do what we do not will.
... If you act ... it can never be without willing; and since the willing is carriedinto effect, we
cannot say the actor was powerless. If in yielding to compulsion you willed an act which you
could not perform,we should say that the will was present, albeit forced, but the power lacking.
But when you do not act because you will not, the power is there [Falk's emphasis] but the will is
lacking so long as your resistance to compulsion withholds the act. We have then a sufficient

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EL

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both able and unwillingat the same time-an intuitionthat Falk identifies as the
bedrock of any compatibilist defense of free will. The intuition can be
expressed more precisely, Falk contends, as the analytic claim that whatever
causes an agent to will some act, A, is not partof the circumstanceswhich define
A as a possibility.
His reinterpretationof Augustine's voluntaslpotestasdistinctioncan be illustratedas follows. In the firstbook of the ConfessionsAugustinerecalls that, as a
boy, he once became ill and nearly died. During the period of his fever, his
mother Monica agonized over whether her son ought to be baptized into the
faith. Although he was then only a catechumen and at best lukewarm about
Christianity,Monica accounted it a great evil if he should die without having
received the sacrament. On the other hand, she also knew of the young
Augustine's profane ambitions and marked susceptibility to temptationsof the
flesh-qualities which made it likely that he would experimentwith intemperate
pursuits and heretical beliefs should he survive. A prematurebaptism might
saddle Augustine with responsibilitieshe would be ill-equippedto handle. After
weighing the relevant features of the situation-the evil of death without baptism, the evil of a wayward life with baptism, and the likelihood of deathMonica decided not to have him receive the sacrament. According to
Augustine's analysis, she had the power but was unwilling to arrangehis baptism. According to Falk's reinterpretation,the circumstances which made
Augustine's baptism a live possibility did not include the desire(s) effective in
determiningMonica's will for or againstthe possibility.8
Compatibilistsfollowing Falk's reinterpretationof Augustine can allow the
circumstances of possibility to fall within some net of necessitation and still
have something left over-the "cause" of the will-whereby the agent is left
free to act or refrainfrom acting. Falk, however, wants to go on to argue that
the intuition allowing for something to be left over from the descriptionof the
circumstancesof possibility is ultimatelyunsupportable,and he suggests the following thoughtexperimentto expose its inadequacy. If the distinctionbetween
the determinationof the will and the descriptionof what makes an act possible
is held analytically,then the attemptto include the determinationof the agent's
will as part of the circumstancesof an action's possibility should produce conceptual confusions. The incompatibilistcan demonstratethe absence of condefinition of power in the union of the will with the capacity to act. We say that any man has in
his power that which he does if he wills and does not if he wills not.

8
Compatibilismdoes not requirethat all agent-relativeitems (beliefs and desires, for instance)be
excluded from the circumstancesof possibility. In deliberationI can reflect upon my own beliefs
and desires as partof the situationunderconsideration. What compatibilismdoes requireis that the
desire associated with the outcome of the deliberationand effective in action remain outside the
descriptionof the circumstancesmakingthe action possible.

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ceptual confusion simply by generatinga descriptionD of the circumstancesof

possibility for some intentional action A, such that A can be inferred directly
from D.
This experiment strikes directly at the heart of the compatibilist position.
The fact thatA is intentionalmeans that the circumstancesof possibility preface
an action describable only with reference to certain beliefs and desires of the
agent. With D, those desires and beliefs are precisely the ones needed for
describingA, and they enter into D in such a way as to cause A to follow. Compatibilists can admit an agent's beliefs and desires within the circumstancesof
possibility (even those which rationalizeA), but they cannot admit a causal connection between D and A. Withoutthat proviso, nothing bars the determination
of the will from falling within what makes an action possible.
In orderto demonstratethe possibility of D, Falk contends that the incompatibilist needs only to make a distinctionbetween two times before the time of A 's
occurrence. At tp, the time of possibility, the agent is still far enough away
from the time of occurrence that changes of mind, incomplete deliberation,or
problems of an akratic naturecould block the inference from any putativeD to
A. But as the time moves closer and closer to the time of occurrence,any unwillingness to perform A begins to take on the character of a disabling circumstance. When tp finally becomes tn, the time of the onset of necessitation,
the intervalbetween the time of occurrenceand tn is small enough such that if at
tn the agent is still unwilling to performA, A cannot be performed;otherwiseA
follows from D at tn.9 In other words, at tn there is no longer enough time for
the usual agent-relativeblocks to inferring actions. Whatever way the will of
the agent is determinedat tn is the same determinationof the will for action.
Contrary to compatibilist intuitions, then, there is a description of the circumstancesof A 's possibility which (1) makes referenceto how the agent's will
is determinedand (2) facilitatesthe inference to A.
An example of the incompatibilistintuitionwould probablyhelp to make the
argumentclearer. Let's suppose, in a modificationof our earlier example, that
at tb, time of baptism,Monica arrangesto have her ailing son baptized. It is an
intentionalact in that "arrangingto have her son baptized" accords with what
Monica believes and desires herself to be doing. At tp, the circumstancesof
possibility include the illness of Augustine, the existence of a certain kind of
9 Falk, "Some Modal Confusions," 142-43: "This point is reachedwhen the time of possibility is so close to the time of the act that there is not enough time left to permitchangingone's mind.
At this point one can no longer say that one is then still able though unwilling to performthe act,
because one's willingness as of that moment is a circumstancedisabling one from becoming willing
in the brief moments left. Deliberation also stops at this moment because to continue would be
pointless. Here we do intuit an inability relevantto deliberation,and this implies that there are conditions underwhich what one is willing to do is a circumstanceof the possibility of doing otherwise,
and is in fact a disablingcircumstance."

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church, the availability of rites, and other external contingencies. They also
include the state of Monica's will, which at tp is likely to be one of internal
conflict stemming from doubts about the gravity of Augustine's fever and the
benefits of an early baptism. But if the action as described is to take place at tb,
that internal conflict must be resolved so that at some tn, not only has Monica
decided which of her conflicting desires will determine her course of action, tn
is close enough to tb to rule out further wavering and conflict. The state of
Monica's will at tn (intending to have her son baptized) results in her acting
intentionally at tb (arranging to have her son baptized). 0
The notion of the time of the onset of necessitation and its associated description of the circumstances of an action's possibility are supposed to have rendered dubious the compatibilist analysis of the contrast between voluntas and
potestas. If so, that would leave us with two ways of recasting the situation
where one is both able and unwilling to perform some action, each of which is a
variety of incompatibilism. The first would be to join with fatalists and admit
that the performance or nonperformance of an action follows from inexorable
necessities having their source both within and outside of the agent. In that case
the conjunction of ability and unwillingness would have to refer to the state of
the agent prior to the onset of necessitation.1 After that time the unwillingness
becomes what might be termed a psychological necessity and hence counts as
disabling. The other option, rather more desperate and patently ad hoc, would
be to admit all the usual psychological items associated with willing into the
description of an action's possibility but then refuse to identify any part of them
with the act of will. This strategy, generally dubbed "libertarian," turns acts of
will into metaphysical curiosities, since all such acts are by definition dissociated from the psychological history of the agent.
With compatibilism theoretically discredited and incompatibilism coming
across as fatalistic or fantastical, Falk believes that he has critically undermined
a way of talking about free will that goes at least as far back as Augustine.
While I sympathize with his motivations,12 I think he has failed to establish his
10Monica's action at can be inferredfrom her state of mind at
tb
tn only when it is assumed that
no externalcontingencies frustrateher intentionin the interim. The qualificationis important,since
it remindsus that Falk's thoughtexperimenthas no bearingon whethera science of humanaction is
feasible. For decisive doubts about the latter,see Donald Davidson, "Freedomto Act," in Ted Honderich, ed., Essays on Freedom of Action (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1973); reprintedin
Davidson, Essays on Actions and Events(New York: OxfordUniversityPress, 1980).
1 Falk, "Some Modal Confusions," 143: "Even a fatalist can admit that he is
simultaneously
both able-and-unwilling-at-a-timeto perform an act at a later time provided the circumstances-ofpossibility include the impulses and assentingsand habits of thoughtthatcause one's willing."
12 Falk himself does not believe that modal or counterfactualapproachescan generate
interesting
conclusions about human freedom. His excursus into the determinismdebate is consequently an
attemptto discreditthe understandingof freedom it assumes. His strategyis as follows: (1) Assume
that free will turnson the analysis of counterfactualsabout actions; i.e., it is a modal issue; (2) it fol-

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desired reductio of the traditionaldebate. To see why this is so, we need to

returnto Augustine and reexamine an assumptionthat was for the purposes of
argumentinitially taken for granted;namely, thatthe supposedfatherof compatibilism was in fact a compatibilist.
I follow a number of commentatorsin thinking that during the mid-390s,
when Augustine was absorbed with interpretingthe Letter to the Romans, his
understandingof election and the interactionof freedom and grace shifted fundamentally.13His initial views can be culled from Propositionsfrom the Epistle
to the Romans,one of the earlierworks of this period, where he divides the field
of human agency into four types. Agents ante legem (before the Law) are said
to pursue their own desires blindly, without due regardfor the sort of life those
desires constitute. Those sub lege (under the Law) are able to recognize the
temperateand well-directedlife and their own accountabilityfor not pursuingit,
but the continuinghold of past practices and present temptationsprevents them
from acting on their knowledge. Only when agents are sub gratia (undergrace)
do they find the power to overcome the legacy of sin and the lure of temptation.
Finally in pace, beyond the dissipatingforces of time and change, the blessed in
eternalbeatitudeare freed from all temptationsand enjoy rightlyordereddesires
and intentions. Within this typology of agent stances, it is the transitionbetween
sub lege and sub gratia that is especially relevantfor the doctrinesof grace and
election. In the view of the Propositions, the transitionoccurs by way of the
free consent of the person sub lege to accept the grace that would facilitate an
obedient life. By "free consent" (liberumarbitrium) Augustine means in this
context a decision made withoutdivine assistanceto reject the perversionof past
ways and accept God's offer for renewal. The doctrine of election, the dogma
that some are destinedfor salvationand some not, can then be foundedon God's

lows that incompatibilism is theoretically more plausible than compatibilism (the burden of his
case); (3) incompatibilismis either fatalism or libertarianism.Since both fatalism and libertarianism
are unacceptableto the majorityof philosophers,Falk believes that he has offered a reductio of (1).
While I agree with Falk that free will is not helpfully defended or denied within an exclusively
modal context, I doubt whetherthe thesis of incompatibilismis sufficientlyclear to force any issues.
For similardoubts, see Peter Strawson'sbrilliantpiece, "Freedomand Resentment,"Proceedings of
the BritishAcademy48 (1962) 1 - 25.
13 Scholarlyinterest in this period of Augustine's intellectual development is growing. I have
availed myself of discussions in TeSelle, Augustine the Theologian, 156-82; Brown, Augustine of
Hippo, 146-57; and William S. Babcock, "Augustine's Interpretationof Romans (AD 394- 396),"
AugustinianStudies 10 (1979) 55- 74. Babcock is particularlyadeptat detailingthe transformations
in Augustine's doctrine of election. I have to dissent, however, from his conclusion that by 396
"Augustine has, in effect, sacrificedboth man's freedom and God's justice on the altarof the sheer
gratuityof God's grace."

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foreknowledge of an individual's willing acceptance or rejection of his or her

own redemption.14
The reconciliation of grace and freedom in the Propositions is certainly
elegant, in so far as it manages to preserve God's justice without undermining
the sufficiency of grace for renewal. It does the former by finding a distinction
between persons on which election can be based, and the latterby picking a distinction that does not depend on the accomplishmentof unassistedobedient acts.
Placing one's trust in God is not to count (at this point) as an expression of the
rightly orderedlove that comes only with grace. Instead, the act of faith is the
one prerequisite for receiving grace and benefiting from the divine work of
regeneration. This view of election fits quite well, I think,with the compatibilist
readingof humanfreedom which Falk is anxious to attributeto the Augustine of
The Spirit and the Letter, written in 412. At the juncturebetween sub lege and
sub gratia, the circumstancesestablishingconversion as a possibility include the
offer of divine assistance and a person's recognition of a need for assistance.
What remainsoutside the circumstancesof possibility is the determinationof the
person's will for or against the offer. At all times the person sub lege is free to
reject the call to a new life. Acceptance, then, is by compatibilist lights a
genuine expression of agent autonomy.
Scarcely two years after writing the Propositions, however, Augustine reexamined Rom 9:10-29 at the request of his friend Simplicianus and rethought
radically his earlier understandingof election. In particular,he noticed how
Paul's renditionof Jacob's election over Esau ruled out any distinctionbetween
the two brotherson which to hang the election of one and the rejection of the
other. In neither case did the disposition of God follow from an assessment of
their respective merits. Augustine's earlier solution-the appeal to God's foreknowledge of faith-could not be borne out from the text, which emphasized
only the effectiveness of God's merciful calling and made no mention at all of
the freely willed acceptance of faith by the one elected. Reluctantly,Augustine
began to abandonthe distinctionhe had drawnbetween consent to the influence
of grace and the works enabled by that influence. The turn to God and the life
sub gratia were joined within a seamless narrativeof the work of redemption,
such that when the person sub lege opted for God, even that decision depended
on the supportingexercise of divine agency.15
14For the Latin text and
English translationof Expositio quarundamPropositionumex Epistola
ad Romanos, see Paul FredriksenLandes, Augustine on Romans (Chico: Scholars Press, 1982).
Propositions 13-18, 35, 44-46, 55, and 60-61 are the most importantfor my argument.
15De diversis
quaestionibus ad Simplicianum 1.2.7 (CCSL 44. 31- 32): Nemo enim credit qui
non vocatur. Misericors autem deus vocat nullis hoc vel fidei meritis largiens, quia merita fidei
sequunturvocationem potius quam praecedunt.... Nisi ergo vocando praecedatmisericordiadei,
nec crederequisquampotest, ut ex hoc incipiatiustificariet acciperefacultatembene operandi.
(For no one believes who is not called. FurthermoreGod in his mercy does not granta calling as a

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Even the casual reader of Ad Simplicianum 1.2 will be struck by how greatly
the Pauline version of Jacob and Esau taxed Augustine's sensibilities. The intuition that had been so fundamental for his earlier views of grace and electionthat election depended in some way on what individuals did-no longer served
as a rule for interpretation. On the question of God's justice, Augustine found
himself backed into a corer and reduced to appealing (rather lamely) to a "hidden equity far removed from human perception" for the standard God used to
distinguish elect and damned.16 Moreover, once he had included the acceptance
of grace within the scope of divine intervention, he needed to explain how it
could be that some individuals seemed to frustrate the purposes of an omnipotent God by refusing the call. Any temptation he might have had to restrict calling (vocatio) to the elect was overruled by Matt 20:16: "Many are called but
few are chosen."17
When he began to formulate an understanding of calling that would reconcile
the dynamics of grace with his revised understanding of election, Augustine
sorted out two modes of calling-general
and suitable. For those outside the
elect, who were called generally but not suitably, callings failed to engage them
in a way that would motivate them to accept. They were unwilling to convert
and necessarily unwilling in that their callings failed to establish circumstances
conducive to their respective conversions. By contrast, the elect were called
suitably (congruenter), or in a manner congruent with the external features of
their situation and their internal frame of mind. When the omnipotent and
omniscient deity tailored the circumstances of possibility to match the psychological history of the person sub lege, human willing necessarily followed suit.18
The reformulation of callings worked out in Ad Simplicianum was not just an
occasional position for Augustine. The notion of a suitable calling laid the foundation for his theology of grace and gave him all the ammunition he needed for
combating the Pelagians. In The Spirit and the Letter, appearing in 412 as a
major sally against Pelagian assumptions, his reflections on Paul in Ad Simrewardfor faith, since the merits of faith follow the calling ratherthan precede it. Therefore,unless
the mercy of God sets the stage by means of a calling, no one is able to believe in such a way that he
or she begins to be justified and to receive the power for acting well.)
16Ad Simplicianum 1.2.16 (CCSL 44. 42). Babcock ("Augustine's Interpretation,"66-67)
offers an interestingassessment of Augustine's views on divine justice as they change from his earlier interpretationsof Paul to his position in Ad Simplicianum.
17 This verse appearsin the Vulgate in Matt 20:16 and 22:14. The RSVcites it only in Matt22:14.
18Ad Simplicianum1.2.13 (CCSL 44.38): Illi enim electi qui congruentervocati, illi autem qui
non congruebantneque contemperabanturvocationi non electi, quia non secuti quamvis vocati. ....
Cuius autemmiseretur,sic eum vocat, quomodo scit ei congruere,ut vocantemnon respuat.
(For they have been elected who have been called suitably;the ones, however, who neithersuited nor
obeyed their calling have not been elected, since they have not followed although they have been
called.... God calls the one on whom he has mercy in the way God knows will suit that person,
with the result thathe or she does not rejectthe calling.)

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plicianum are certainlypresupposed.19Historically,the suitablecalling comes as

a revolution in Augustine's thinking; philosophically, it causes us to resituate
Augustine's thoughtwithin the debate over free will.
In particular,if the notion of a suitable calling is normativefor Augustine's
maturetheology, then he cannot be the compatibilistFalk thinks he is. To put
the manner in somewhat anachronistic (but, I think, accurate) terms, when
Augustine casts the conversion to God as a function of a divine calling, he in
effect admits the determinationof the agent's will into the circumstancesof the
possibility for the agent's opting for God. Not only does this abrogatehis compatibilism,it commits him to what Falk is calling fatalism. For if the interaction
of human and divine agency were modeled on either compatibilistor libertarian
schemes, it would be impossible to account for the flawless manner in which
God converts and sanctifies exactly and only those chosen few whom he wishes
to convert and sanctify. Weakness of will, failures in deliberation, stubbornness, or sheer force of will would remain permanentpossibilities for human
agents to lay aside the best laid plans of Almighty God. With a suitablecalling,
however, it is assumed that all agent-relativeand agent-independentcontingencies are factored into the calling in such a way that possibilities embarrassingto
divine omnipotenceand omniscience are eliminated.
If we accept Falk's analysis of the modal approachto the problem of free
will, then Augustine has managed to give us the reductio of his own theological
assumptions. Such a conclusion would tend to supportthe feeling among many
students of Augustine that his doctrines of grace, election, and predestination
involve the suppressionof humanfreedom for the greaterglory of God. But if
the charge is fatalism, I strongly suspect that most objections to Augustine have
been based more on offended sensibilities than reasoned arguments. Certainly
the fatalism depicted by Falk and embracedby Augustine is more terribleas an
epithet than as a substantiveclaim about human agency. What, after all, is so
terrible about being "determined" by one's own beliefs and desires? I should
think that any reasonable understandingof human agency would have in some
fashion to advancethatkind of determinismas a requirementfor freedom.
19For those who have worked
throughAd Simplicianum,the judgmentof Eugene Portalieis fairly
typical: "If his teaching of predestinationdestroyedliberty, Augustine denied it alreadyin 397, for
at the very beginning of his episcopacy (fifteen years before the Pelagian controversybegan) he formulated his system in a famous reply which has not been sufficiently studied or understood. Simplicianus, Ambrose's successor to the see of Milan, posed several questions to his old pupil. Among
them, he asked Augustine about ChapterIX of the Epistle to the Romans. The reply, On Various
Questionsfor Simplicianus,constitutesa true key to the Augustiniansystem because of its accuracy,
its fullness, its clarity, and especially because of the rationalexplanationwhich it gives to the dogma.
It must be rereadif one wishes to grasp the depth of its thoughtand the significanceof the formulas
which, though in constantuse later, are rarelyexplainedelsewhere" (Eugene Portalie,A Guide to the
Thoughtof St. Augustine[trans.RalphJ. Bastian;Chicago:Regnery, 1960] 182).

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The rub, of course, is supposed to be the time of the onset of necessitation,

when agents are, as it were, locked into a frame of mind suited for only one kind
of intentionalaction. The intuitionwhich inclines us to view this as a problem,
however, is a red herring. All that the time of the onset of necessitationtells us
is that all actions involve a determinationof the will at some point priorto their
performance. But that much is requiredsimply for explaining how a person's
desires and beliefs can result in intentionalactions. Free will pertainsto a capability for a particularsort of intentionalaction, and thereforeits possibility rests
with how the will is determined. The debate between compatibilistsand incompatibilistsis over whetherthe will is determinedpriorto action. Incompatibilists
win, but nothingaboutfreedom follows.
As long as the determinationof the will is treated as a discrete item within
the circumstancesof possibility, we fail to engage the issue of humanfreedom.
That is precisely the lesson we could have learned from a sympatheticreading
of Augustine's theological reflectionsin Ad Simplicianum. His account of a calling given suitably, whereby willing is brought within the circumstancesof an
action's possibility, explains the congruence of humanaction with divine intentions without prejudgingthe issue of human freedom. It is fatalistic (whatever
thatmeans) only by reputation.
The final moral I wish to draw from this excursion into modality is that we do
not have sufficientlyreliable intuitionsabout freedom and its relationto the will
for judging or even framing issues about determinism. Free will is, to use a
fashionableterm, theory-laden. It has to be reconstructedout of a host of complicated assumptionsaboutdesires, intentions,values, deliberation,and practical
reason generally. In other words, the "will" componentof free will requiresas
much attentionas the "free" part.
The Recovery of Free Agency
This next section begins the work of reconstructionproper. If freedom is primarily a function of how a will is determined,we need to know what the nature
of the determinationis and what sorts of capabilitiesagents must have to make it
possible. In the Propositions Augustine has already supplied us with a convenient typology of agent stances, rangingfrom a state of complete bondage to a
state of full freedom. For our purposes, we need only concern ourselves with
the recovery ratherthan with the full restorationof freedom, since the latteris a
possibility only in pace, beyond this life. That leaves for investigation the
stances ante legem, sub lege, and sub gratia, each of which reveals a different
stage of a person's capabilitiesand limitationsvis-a-vis free agency. By reconstructingthe transitionsbetween these stances, we can tease out the assumptions
behind a properlyAugustinianunderstandingof freedom.

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A curious phenomenologicalfeature of agency ante legem is that, despite its

condition of bondage, the agent does not experience lack of freedom as such.20
On the contrary,the condition is fairly self-containedand may even be mistaken
for happiness. Desires, often of a sophisticated sort, are experienced, become
the subject for deliberation,and finish as the motivations for action.21The purported bondage of the agent, which can only be detected from a perspective
external to the stance ante legem, is in not having certainkinds of desires come
up for review-specifically, those desires that would order all temporalpursuits
within a frameworkof love for God. But what sort of incapacity is it that is
involved with the failure to love God?
Augustine's theological presuppositions are sufficiently woven into the
description of the stance ante legem to make the question difficult to answer.
We seem simply to want to say that not loving God is an incapacitysui generis.
This theological formulation, however, is too opaque to be of much use for
explicatingfree agency.
Fortunately,there is a way to get behind it. A number of contemporary
philosophers-ones who have tended to set free will within a comprehensive
theory of action-have engaged themselves with what amounts to genealogies
of rational agency in an effort to isolate the capabilities involved in willing
freely and rationally. Their investigations stand roughly as nontheological
counterpartsto Augustine's arrayof agent stances, and the work of at least two
such philosophersbears suggestively on Augustine's position.
One is HarryFrankfurt,who in his influentialarticle, "Freedom of the Will
and the Concept of a Person,"22has arguedthat the key transitionbetween persons and nonpersonsrests on the reflexive capabilitypersons have for evaluating
their own desires. Only persons deliberateeffectively over whetherthe desires
20 For a concise
description of ante legem as a stance of agency lacking the resources for selfevaluation, see Augustine's comment about his own stormy adolescence in the Conf. 2.2.2 (CCSL
27. 18).
21 Because of
Augustine's own fascinationwith the threatinordinatesexual desires posed to selfintegrity, there is an understandabletemptationamong his readersto equate all forms of concupiscence with unbridledsensual passions and biological drives. The life ante legem is then picturedas a
round of debaucheryand profligateindulgence, and spiritualstruggle ends up as a fight against the
beast within. To recognize just how distortedsuch a pictureis, one need only call to mind some of
the other varieties of concupiscence described in the Confessions-excessive attention to refinements in speech, unreasonableconcern for finding favor in the eyes of friends, and inordinateattachment to the pleasuresof music and theatre. In Conf. 10.35 Augustine describes what might even be
called a form of intellectual concupiscence. Curiositas is an inquisitiveness having its source in a
thirstfor knowledge but lacking in the appropriateconcern for truth. Although it is a form of concupiscence, it cannot be identified simply with the pursuit of pleasure, since curiositas may entice
someone to court unpleasantexperiences simply for the sake of new information(see CCSL 27.
184- 86).
22 Journal
of Philosophy 68 (1971) 5 - 20.

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defining their usual preferences and pursuits (first-orderdesires) should be the

desires determiningtheir will. This sort of deliberationinvolves both a preference for certain kinds of desires (a second-order desire) and a resolution to
allow that preference to order one's will (a second-ordervolition). Protopersons, what Frankfurt calls "wantons," have plenty of first-order desires,
perhapseven occasional second-orderdesires, but never second-ordervolitions.
Consequently, wantons have sufficient resources for deliberating over how,
when, and where certaindesires are best satisfied,but they cannot engage in the
kind of reflection that would lead to an unforced decision not to gratify those
desires at all.
Following Frankfurt'slead, Annette Baier has complicatedthe genealogy by
introducing an intermediate stage between wantons and persons. "Halfwantons" are social creatures who, by virtue of their initiation into a host of
customs and conventions, are able to judge the proprietyof their actions without
makingreferenceto their desires qua individuals. Unlike wantons,half-wantons
are not egoistic calculatorsof self-satisfaction. They can and do seek the approbation of their fellow half-wantons, and the social dimension of their motivations lends a greater complexity to their mental life. The principal incapacity
which keeps them from fully rationalagency is their inability to put into question the values ensconced in their own social conventions. As Baier puts it,
"Half-wantonshave customs, but not the custom of custom-criticism."23
Frankfurt's wantons and Baier's half-wantons each reveal an important
aspect of what Augustine means by the stance ante legem. Like wantons, persons ante legem are impaired from making certain kinds of reflective
judgments-not only concerning whether their wills should be determinedby
customarydesires, but also how a complex variety of desires, at times perhaps
conflicting, should be ordered. To say that loving God is never entertainedas a
possibility ante legem is not to say, as we may have first supposed,that one sort
of desire (albeit an exalted one) is simply absent from the usual fray. It is
instead indicative of a more systemic failure. Persons ante legem cannot (or do
not) assume a perspective from which to evaluate, order, and control their
desires in the mannerrequiredfor maintainingself-integrity.
Disorderin this case does not mean chaos. Although those ante legem are in
many ways the slaves of their own passions, they continue to be able, like the
half-wantons, to participatein wide varieties of social activity. This ability to
manage at least tolerably well at an intersubjectivelevel accounts for the possibility in the stance ante legem for achieving a semblance of order among one's
desires-one that mimics and can be mistaken for the order proper to higher
23 Annette Baier, "Mind and
Change of Mind," Midwest Studies in Philosophy, Metaphysics 4
(1979) 157 - 76; reprintedin idem, Postures of the Mind:Essays on Mind and Morals (Minneapolis:
Universityof MinnesotaPress, 1985).

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stances. It also helps to capture some of the flavor of Augustine's use of consuetudo, which is usually translatedas "custom" or "habit," although it actually falls somewhere between the two. Consuetudorefers to the formationof a
person's characterout of the patternsof interplaybetween wanton desires and
half-wantonsensibilities. The wantonpartmakes it a little less thancustom, and
the half-wanton part makes it a little more than habit. As long as a person
remainsante legem, consuetudocontinues to constrict the possibilities for character change.
The stance ante legem is not, however, a simple composite of wantonness
and half-wantonness. It instead stands related to these conditions within a continuumof increasinglycomplex incapacitiesof agency. Wantons cannot reflect
critically on the organizationof their desires qua individuals, half-wantons on
the organizationof their intersubjectiverelations,and persons ante legem on the
organizationof the loves regulatingtheir individualprojects and social commitments. Once the continuum has swung to the ability to love, a great deal has
already been presupposedabout abilities to organize desires, function socially,
and cultivate refined sorts of pleasure. The one crucial capability not presupposed is for making accuratejudgments about the natureof the good and how it
may be pursued. All those ante legem simply lack the reflective capability
needed for coming to recognize what a fully realized human life (beatitudo)
would look like. Their attentionis riveted elsewhere.24
Many assumptions are incorporated into the seemingly innocent phrase
"judgment about the good." For instance, Augustine assumes that its content
will always bear on the truthof Christianityand that its frameworkwill involve
the organizationof all loves into two general sorts-those oriented toward the
eternal, and those oriented toward the temporal. While these assumptions are
foundations for Augustine's theologizing, neither one is indispensable for
characterizingthe freedom (or lack of freedom) dovetailing with the theology.
So far, all that we are really committed to is some version of a moral realism,
where beatitudocan be characterizedin terms of what human beings are rather
than in terms of what they may suppose themselves to be. Persons ante legem
are the ones who suppose themselves to be what they are not and therebyaccept
seeming for genuine happiness.
24

Augustine generally associates the failure to recognize the natureof beatitudo with a failure to
understandhow God is relatedto the created world. The latterfailure is in turnrooted in a myopic
attention to creation. Persons ante legem become so enamored with the immediacy of the created
order that their love loses its propermeasure and proportion. The result is impairedjudgment. See
Conf. 10.6.10 (CCSL 27. 160): Homines autem possunt interrogare,ut invisibilia dei per ea, quae
facta sunt, intellecta conspiciant, sed amore subduntureis et subditi iudicarenon possunt. (Humans
are able to examine the created order with an eye toward discerning the unseen nature of God
throughcreation, but their love for created things draws them away and having surrenderedthemselves they lose theircapacityfor judgment.)

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The advancementto the stance sub lege, with its newly acquiredrecognition
of where beatitudolies, does not (usually) arrive as a gestalt perception. There
are tributaries of reflection feeding into the first glimmers of wisdom. In
Augustine's own case, for instance, Cicero, the Manichees, and the NeoPlatonistshad to be digested before St. Paul could be read with any insight. Nor
is the advancementexclusively a cognitive achievement. Judgmentsas to what
constitutes a good life require subsidiary feats of attention and resolution in
orderto achieve a criticalperspective.
Augustine emphasizes two such feats. One is continence, which, as the Latin
suggests (con + teneo), involves holding oneself in check against the lure of
immediatepleasures and customarydistractions. Withoutthe restraintand resolution of continence, the tide of consuetudo would sweep over reflection and
wipe out occasions for self-evaluation. The other feat, which presupposes a
measure of continence, amounts to a sophisticated exercise of memory. As
humanagents begin to recognize the path to beatitudo,they become involved in
reinterpretingtheir past to align with their present stance and with where they
wish to go. No longer are acts of recall simple re-presentationsof past times.
Instead, they are elements in the reorganizationof the self in accordance with
the knowledge (however fragmentary) of beatitudo. Both continence and
memory, in concert with judgment, work together to regatherthe self out of its
dissipationwithin aimless pursuitsof worldly satisfactions.25
The proper coordinationof memory, continence, and judgment enables the
person sub lege to frame intentions for living the well-ordered and properly
oriented life. At what precise moment having such intentionsconstitutesa new
capabilityis difficult to pinpoint,given that the various cognitive, affective, and
volitional components at work may be in various stages of development and
integration with one another. Phenomenologically, the transition from ante
legem to sub lege is marked by a gradual change in the experience of consuetudo. The familiarityof customarypursuitsand habitualpatternsof desires
and actions turns increasinglyinto a constrainingnecessity.26Finally a point of
crisis may be reached, when the lack of congruence between intentions and
actions results in a kind of paralysis.
25 The
importanceof continence for self-integrity is expressed clearly and succinctly in Conf.
10.29.40 (CCSL 27. 176). Memory is the subject of most of Book 10. The sections most germane
to my reading of Augustine include 10.23-26 (CCSL 27. 172-75), where he links acts of
rememberingwith the searchfor God and beatitudo.
26 See Conf. 8.5.10 (CCSL 27. 119): Velle meum tenebatinimicus et inde mihi catenamfeceratet
constrinxeratme. Quippe ex voluntate perversafacta est libido, et dum serviturlibidini, facta est
consuetudo,et dum consuetudininon resistitur,facta est necessitas. (The enemy was taking hold of
my will, and from it he had forged my chains and constrainedme. For indeed perversedesire sprang
from my perverse will, and while I was serving desire, its familiaritywas established, and while I
failed to resist that familiarity,it was made my necessity.)

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In Augustine the locus classicus for this moment comes with the garden
scene in Book 8 of the Confessions, where he agonizes over why he has yet to
commit himself to Christianity. He has by then understoodand accepted the
essential doctrinesof the faith, grown dissatisfiedwith the accolades broughtby
rhetoric, recognized in turn the desirability of Christianbeatitudo, and has set
before him the example of the conversion of Victorinus(a great orator). Despite
the favorablecircumstancesand his own desires, Augustine fails to find the will
within himself to follow through on his intentions to pursue a Christianvocation. He experiences in dramaticfashion the key incapacity of the person sub
lege -the inabilityto will what is known to be good.
The peculiar feature of this sort of situation is its unintelligibilityfrom the
agent's point of view. Consuetudomay supply some explanationfor the residual hold of familiarpatternsof action and desire, but it does not give the agent a
reason to opt for what, in the agent's own best judgment, ought not to be
chosen.27Once a person faced with forced and momentousalternativeshas considered all the relevantcircumstancesand assessed the options, he or she can no
longer appeal to reasons to account for an unwillingnessto act on preference. If
preference cannot lead to the appropriateresolution of the divided will, then
either the self-understandingof the agent is frustrated or the situation is
somehow restructuredto meet the needs of the agent.
We know what occurred in Augustine's situation-the fig tree, the voice in
the garden, the verses from Romans, then catharsis. Restructuringcame in the
form of a suitablecalling, and Augustine suddenlyfound himself in a position to
consent to the way of life he had already sufficient reason for wanting.28From
then on he lived sub gratia and pursuedactively the path to beatitudo,although
(presumably)not without occasional backsliding and furthercases of internal
conflict.
Since I have already discussed what is involved with calling congruenter,I
have little to add about the transitionbetween sub lege and sub gratia, except
perhaps to issue a precautionarynote. Augustine's autobiographicaldescriptions, though illustrativeof his theological reflections, should not be allowed to
constrict arbitrarilythe range of experience conforming to his agent typology.
In particular,the acute mental distress and cathartic resolution of his garden
scene conversion are not necessary ingredients in everyone's experience of
coming to be able to act on the good. The transitionmay be as gradual and
27 I am indebted here to Donald Davidson's discussion of the
essentially "surd" characterof
intentionally acting counter to one's own best judgment. See his "How Is Weakness of the Will
Possible?" in Joel Feinberg, ed., Moral Concepts (Oxford Readings in Philosophy; New York:
OxfordUniversityPress, 1970); reprintedin Davidson, Essays on Actions and Events.
28 TeSelle (Augustinethe Theologian, 197) also draws the connection between Augustine's theological convictions in Ad Simplicianumand his descriptionof his own conversion in Book 8 of the
Confessions.

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imperceptibleas the move away from the stance ante legem potentially is. In
Augustine's typology, the progression between the various agent stances
requiresconversions, but not conversionexperiences.
The stance sub gratia, with its capabilityfor knowing and acting on the good,
marks the beginning of the recovery of free agency and the end of this reconstructionof Augustine's agent types. Along the way the notion of freedom that
has emerged is one where freedom (1) requiresjudgmentsabout what sort of life
is appropriatefor a humanbeing, (2) requiresthose judgmentsto be correct,and
(3) requires those judgments to determine the agent's will. Whether such an
understandingof freedom is workable depends ultimately on whether it makes
sense to importjudgmentsof truthand falsity into the arenaof ethics. Although
I happen to think that some version of a moral realism is defensible, I am not
presently preparedto undertakeany such defense. Nevertheless, a primafacie
argumentin Augustine's favor is his apparentability to generatecomplex views
of human agency which promise to illuminate a wide variety of moral experience.
TheologicalDeterminism
I claimed at the close of the first section that a more articulatedand theoryladen understandingof freedom was needed before the question of determinism
could be posed with any seriousness. Although I have managed only a rough
sketch of free agency and its recovery in Augustine's theology, it supplies us
enough of a frameworkfor wonderingwhetherfree will constitutesa problemin
a theological context. Specifically, does the introductionof a certain kind of
God into humanaffairs prejudicethe possibilities for freedom in a mannerdetrimental to humanbeings qua agents?
I intendto conduct a brief meditationon this issue from two sides, both variations on the theme of the interactionof divine and human agency. One side
highlights God's influence on those who navigate successfully between agent
stances, and the other God's lack of influence on those who remainperpetually
perverse or weak-willed. This asymmetryof theological determinismalong the
lines of salvation and damnationtracks some of the complexity of Augustine's
puzzling contentionthat sinners are culpable for their moral failings even while
saints are not commendablefor theirmoral successes.29
29 The thesis that determinationfor what is
good bears differentlyon humanfreedom than determinationfor evil has recentlyenteredthe contemporarydebate on free will by way of Susan Wolf's
article, "AsymmetricalFreedom," Journal of Philosophy 77 (1980) 151 -66. In good Augustinian
fashion Wolf arguesthat the condition of freedomcannotbe specified withoutreferenceto notions of
truthand goodness. Consequently,she finds determinationfor the good acceptablefor human freedom in a way that determinationfor evil cannot be. On the whole, her articleconfirmsmy suspicion
that many of Augustine's assumptionsabout the natureof human freedom have validity apartfrom

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In turningfirst to the dynamics of redemption,it proves surprisinglydifficult

to produce a candidate for "the problem of free will." Within Augustine's
typology of agent stances there are certainly occasions for internallyconflicted
wills, failed intentions,and moral lapses, but the family of phenomenarelatedto
weakness of will comprises a set of local problems, which are clearly recognizable to afflicted agents. By contrast, the traditionalworry about free will has
generally been of global scope, encompassing all agents at all times with or
withouttheir knowledge. Interestin a more global issue may seduce the unwary
back into thinkingthat the elect cannot truly be said to enjoy freedom unless at
every step along the road they could have rejected their election. There is no
quarterhere, however. Freedomnot to pursuebeatitudois, for Augustine,either
elliptical for the responsibilityanyone would have for acting on perversedesires
and corruptreasons, or it is plain nonsense.
Of course there is no sense in looking for trouble. If the problemof free will
cannot be located within the work of redemption,perhaps it is not there in the
first place. But at the risk of sounding contentious,I would pause to consider a
few Augustinian habits of thought before dropping the issue. For instance,
Augustine rarelydevelops his notion of consuetudooutside of its role as a problem for the achievement of beatitudo. Familiarpatternsof desires and actions
are as a rule taken to shape the wrong sort of character. There are no comparable discussions of what positive role consuetudo might have for renderingthe
characterof a person sub gratia consistently virtuous.30Furthermore,Augustine
often treatscontinence and temperanceas synonymousconcepts. Both are used
to refer to a person's capability sub gratia for successfully resisting the
onslaught of temptation. Temperantia, Augustine's Latin translation of
sophrosyne, retains none of its Aristotelian sense as a freedom from base
appetites.31
I mention these habits of thought in order to suggest that while Augustine
was perfectly willing to speak of a reformationin the desires and affections of
those under the influence of grace, he was much less at home with the idea that
members of the elect might become habituatedto the life of virtue and obedient
service and cease finally to experience temptation as such. The theological
sources for his reservationsare manifest. The doctrineof original sin convinced
him that temptationcould never cease to plague even the most favored of God's
servants,and the doctrineof grace confirmedhis appreciationfor the fragility of
the context of his theology. His comparableviews about moral responsibility,however, are wedded
firmly to doctrinesaboutgrace and humanfallenness. Some of the complexity of Augustine's understandingof responsibilitywill come out in a discussion of theological determinismbut certainlynot
the whole picture.
30 In De doctrina ChristianaAugustine does make mention of "the peace of properconsuetudo,"
but he never develops the idea at any length. See 1.24.25 (CCSL 32. 20).
31 See De civitate Dei 19.4
(CCSL 48. 665).

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humanvirtue and his distrustof Christianhumanismin the style of a Pelagius or

a Julian. But regardless of whether his reservations were well motivated,
Augustine's preferencefor strong doctrinesof sin and grace tends to throw into
relief a likely candidatefor the theological version of the problem of free will.
Namely, if the exercise of divine agency continually shapes and sustains the
saintly life, hasn't the work of characterformation been withdrawnaltogether
from humanagents?32
This challenge receives its particularonus from an understandingof human
and divine interactionmodeled, quite literally, on infusion. Persons qua vessels
are supposed to receive passively the installmentsof grace which progressively
regeneratetheir wills and implantdispositionstowardvirtue and obedience. We
know enough alreadyabout the dynamics of grace to recognize how this picture
distorts Augustine's position. For a start, although human responses to divine
overtures are receptive when the calling is suitable, they are not passive.
Conversionrequiresabove all else the knowledgeableconsent of the convert. In
order to motivate that consent, God structuresthe conversion situationto meet
the particularvolitional stance of the human agent in question. When conversion follows, it arrivesas the fulfillmentof both a humanand a divine intention.
Infusion views tend to collapse everything into the divine intention, thereby
strippinghumanbeings of their agency.
If we extend the notion of a suitable calling beyond the moment of conversion, we can generatethe full sweep of divine influence in determinationfor the
good. Moving forward into sanctification,the convert is enabled to translate
conviction ever more effectively into works, as divine callings begin to bring
togetherhumanintentionsand actions within an unfoldingnarrativeof a unique
Christianlife. The suitable callings are the high points of the story, since they
mark the successes, but there can be an importantrole as well for general callings. When general callings fail directly to motivate human agents to will the
good, they may not always be functioning as indications of perdition. Sometimes they may serve as the preparatorystages for the cognitive and volitional
abilities requiredcrucially at a later time; that is, they may set the stage for callings given congruenter. Certainlythis is the picture we get in the Confessions,
where Augustine reads the providentialhand of God back into the events leading up to his conversion.
As God's modus operandi, callings suggest a model of human and divine
interactionmore along the lines of edificationthan infusion. God-in the capacity of a perfect teacherof virtue and beatitudo-discerns the disinclinationsand
propensities certain individuals have and arranges for them to receive the
influences and stimuli that will facilitate their arduous pilgrimage from
32 The
possible conflict between a theology of grace and an ethics of characterwas first broughtto
my attentionby Scott Davis.

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confusion and depravity to gradual enlightenment,recovery of moral agency,

and final reconciliation. One singularadvantageof this edification analogy lies
in its ability to illuminate why Augustine apportionsresponsibilityand agency
asymmetrically within the saintly life. According to Augustine, although
members of the elect are in fact the agents of the good works they accomplish
intentionally,they are not responsible (in the sense of being directly commendable) for them. Consequently saints must never pride themselves (glorior) on
what they can achieve. The analogy of edificationadopts a two-agent model to
unpackthis curious claim.
Considerfirst the case of a humanteacher-a Socrates,for instance-and his
student. To the extent that Socrates is effective, he is able to pose just those
questions and considerations which draw the student out of a state of selfdelusion and moral perversityinto the beginnings of moral enlightenment. The
insights of the dialectical exchange remain the student's own, but it is Socrates
who has elicited them and earned due credit. Presumablythe sort of life the
recipient of Socratic edification leads after the edification is a matterof his or
her own responsibilityand can be praisedor blamed accordingly.
The replacement of a human with a divine teacher requires a few
modifications in how the situation is described. Unlike Socrates, God has an
unfailing influence on whether individuals become virtuous and achieve beatitudo. Omnipotence opens up the fullest possible range of influences upon
human agents, omniscience guaranteesthat influences will address agents suitably as individuals, and benevolence prevents God from ever abandoning
edification once it has begun. The result is the continuous presence of providence in the lives of the elect, eliciting from each of them the sorts of
knowledge and action appropriatefor rational beings on the way to beatitiudo.
In so far as anotheragent (God) is continually and necessarily involved in their
moral successes, membersof the elect are never stronglycommendablefor what
they manage to accomplish. They are weakly commendable,however, simply
for being the agents of their own actions and for being the sorts of people God
has led them to become. That is enough commendation for a sense of selfintegrity,but not enough for self-satisfaction.
It would be foolish to think that the analogy of edification is anything but
suggestive for Augustine's understandingof responsibilityin the Christianlife.
The analogy itself is somewhat inexact, and it leaves out of the account entirely
some crucial featuresof Augustine's theology (such as the role of the mediator).
On the other hand, I would want to claim that the dynamicsof grace and the distinction between attributionsof responsibilityand agency-the points of departure for the edification analogy-forestall any problems with free will in determinationfor the good. If there are still difficulties with Augustine's account of
election and the work of redemption,they are occasions for furthertheological

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reflectionratherthan for furtherrethinkingon the natureand exercise of human

freedom.
We are left to consider the matter of determinationfor evil. Theologians
have as a group been relatively uninterestedin this sort of determination,shelving it away either as a mystery or an impossibility, and philosophershave been
insufficientlypuzzled by its possibility. Under what conditions, if any, can we
claim that circumstanceswork to corruptcharacterinexorablyand withouthope
of reform? I doubt whether anyone has managed a convincing answer to this.
Nevertheless, the questionmust be addressedin some form if we are to evaluate
theological determinismon the damnationside. Augustine contends that those
who fall short of election necessarily lead perverse lives, for which they are
solely responsible and justly condemned. We want to know whether he can
connect necessity and responsibilityin this mannerwithout saddling his theology with a problemaboutfree will.
In the context of determinationfor the good, we discovered that the problem
of free will is not easily motivated. The case with determinationfor evil, despite
some troubledintuitions,is not much clearer. Persons slotted for damnationare
not even supposed to have free will. Throughouttheir lives, they are said to
remain bound to their own misguided desires and false beliefs. Free will may
indeed be a practicalproblemfor them, but why should it end up as a theoretical
problemfor Augustine's theology?
If there is a theoreticalproblemlurkingabout, it has less to do with freedom
directly than with responsibilityand the extent to which responsibilityrequires
freedom. Augustine is alreadycommittedto a distinctionbetween freedom and
responsibilityby virtue of the link he forges between freedom and the pursuitof
the good. In particular,responsibilitydoes not always (or even usually) entail
freedom; otherwise, anyone who acted without the proper orientation toward
beatitudo would, ipso facto, fail to be responsible for his or her actions. The
doctrine of election, however, commits him to a position more radical than a
simple distinction. Since those who are damnedare denied in advance the possibility of reform and redemption,the condition of damnationlacks not only
freedom but escape as well. Responsibilitymust be compatible with a lack of
freedom and with an incorrigiblelack of freedom.
When incorrigibility as well as bondage accrues to membership in the
nonelect, the condition of damnationtakes on its peculiar necessity. It is this
sort of necessity, moreover, which seems to motivate worries about free willnot that agents don't have wills determinedfor the good (simple bondage), but
that they can't have wills determinedfor the good (necessary or predestined
bondage). The modal qualification of bondage as a necessary condition of
unfreedomthreatensto remove the responsibilityfor characterout of the hands
of the humanagent. For even if a lack of freedom manages to preserverespon-

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sibility, it is much more difficult to comprehend how an incorrigible lack of

freedom could.
In determinationfor evil, there is evidently a nastiness to the necessitation
involved-a nastiness which is notably absent when human agents are
flawlessly guided by God to pursuebeatitudo. Nevertheless, we are no closer to
formulatinga theoreticalobjection to its consequences for freedom and responsibility than we were before, and I have serious doubts about whether any such
formationis even possible. For one thing, we simply do not have a normative
theory of responsibilitywhich could be used for making invidious comparisons
with Augustine's own claims, and our intuitions about responsibilityare arguably worse than our intuitions about freedom. So we are on shaky ground to
start with. Furthermore,Augustine himself is notoriously vague about the
nature of the necessity involved in unredeemedbondage to sin. Presumablyit
has something to do with inherited depravity and the adverse effects of consuetudo on characterchange. But since the doctrine of original sin has never
been famous for its clarity, it is of little help as an explanatoryprinciple.
Given the obscuritysurroundingthe natureof responsibilityand what capacities of agency it may require,I propose a modest strategyof indirectionfor coming to some conclusion about determinationfor evil. First we begin by asking
what sort of necessity (1) would be relevant for theological determinism,(2)
would lock individuals into corrupt and perverse lives, and (3) would clearly
abrogate the responsibility those individuals would normally have for leading
such lives; then we determinewhether this sort of necessity could plausibly be
attributedto Augustine. If so, then the lack of freedom associated with those
bound to sin is theoreticallytroubling,and theological determinismposes a challenge to an Augustinianunderstandingof God. If not, then at least primafacie
theological determinismfor evil does not raise a problemaboutfree will.
There is really only one plausible candidatefor a necessity satisfying conditions (1)-(3), and it assumes the dynamics of a calling given congruenter. As
with determinationfor the good, God coordinates circumstancessuitably with
an agent's volitional stance in order to elicit certainkinds of intentionalaction,
and over the course of time these actions give shape to a certain kind of life.
The kind of life taking shape, however, is quite different. Callings are designed
specifically to confirm and encourage individuals in ill-formed and pernicious
characters,either directly by presenting corruptinginfluences or indirectly by
preventing the occurrence of salutary influences.33 As a result, affected
33 George Orwell's 1984 can be interpretedas a literaryillustrationof this sort of determination
for evil. The "Big Brother" State parodies Augustine's God in all essentials. It pretendsto omniscience through techniques of surveillance and manipulationof access to information,to omnipotence through the rigid control of thought and language, and it is wholly malevolent, exercising
power solely for power's sake. Salvationcomes in loving Big Brother;damnationis having any love
other than for Big Brother. When the State detects deviance among its subjects, it watches carefully

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individualsnecessarily lead perverse lives and serve as the agents of their own
perdition,all in perfect accordance with what God has intended. Even though
such lives would also be rationalized by the very desires and beliefs of the
human agents themselves, the guiding and fully compelling exercise of divine
influence upon their wills clearly absolves them of any responsibilityfor their
conduct, at least in a strong(condemnable)sense.
Augustine anticipatedthis possible extension of a suitable calling into determinationfor evil and rejectedit as illicit. God neithercompels anyone to sin nor
in general contributes to the corruptionof anyone's character. According to
Augustine, God merely allows depravity to take its usual course and refrains
from ever interveningto arrestits fixation of character. Putting the two directions of determinationtogether,we get a pictureof God actively workingfor the
salvationof some and passively permittingthe perditionof others.34
The restrictionof God's direct influence to determinationfor salvation rests
on sound theological instincts, since the lack of influence on the damnationside
makes the corruptionof humancharactersomethingmore thana mere artifactof
divine engineering. It therefore holds some promise for preserving human
responsibility, even when the damned life is incorrigible. As long as human
beings are either solely or mainly the agents of the necessity of their characters
(by way of consuetudo), responsibility can be compatible with at least some
forms of an incorrigiblelack of freedom.
The remainingobstacle for Augustine's view of determinationfor evil lies in
whetheroriginal sin-the source of general depravity-handicaps humanagents
unfairly and arbitrarilyfrom the start. If individualscannot be reasonablyheld
responsible for beginning their careers as agents with corruptpreferences,then
they cannot be condemned for turningthose preferences into encrustationsof
character. Unfortunately,original sin is either too complex or too confused a
doctrine to yield much in the way of a conclusion. In absence of a clear
demonstrationof the doctrine's incoherenceor utterincompatibilitywith human
responsibility,I tend to give Augustine the benefit of the doubt. Enough of a
doubt lingers, however, to say that theological determinismis freer of potential
conceptual conflicts with humanfreedom and responsibilitywhen it is determinationfor the good.
and learnseverythingthereis to know aboutthe personwho has erred,waiting for thatmomentwhen
it can in its omniscience and omnipotencesuitably call the deviant back to conformity. Conversion
finally comes in Room 101, where the situation is always structuredperfectly to elicit love for Big
Brotherand betrayalof all otherloves.
34Ad Simplicianum1.2.15-16 (CCSL 44. 39-42). Augustine develops the idea that the hardening of sinnersresults from the denial of God's mercy and grace ratherthan from any directintervention on God's part. In his later writings on predestination,these reflectionsbecome the basis for his
distinctionbetween God's active and permissive will.

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My investigation of theological determinism has not had as its object a

blanket endorsementof Augustine's theology. As far as I know, there may be
many problems with his understandingof grace, election, and sin quite apart
from issues about free will. My only goal has been to show that theological
determinism poses no obvious problems for human freedom-not when the
problemscome directly as worries aboutthe formationof characterand the attribution of agency, nor when they come indirectlyas worries about responsibility
and the attributionof merit and blame. We can in fact conceive of God as
necessarily and decisively involved in humanprogresstowardbeatitudoand still
have an interestingnotion of freedom left to show for it.
Conclusion
This essay has been an attemptto set theological and philosophicalreflection
in counterpoint,so that one is made alternatelyto answer the other and their
common focus on free will correspondinglyadvances in nuance and complexity.
Throughoutthe exercise, Augustine's notion of a suitablecalling has served as a
unifying theme. In The Problem of Free Will it entered as a challenge to the
adequacy of the compatibilist debate as a starting point for reflection on the
nature and possibility of human freedom. When the focus in The Recovery of
Free Agency shifted towards an agency-centeredunderstandingof freedom, the
suitablecalling broughttogetherexactly those capabilitiesneeded for a recovery
of free agency. Finally, in Theological Determinism, when the question of
determinismwas reissued, callings-suitable and otherwise-centered reflection
on the interactionof divine and human agency and the possible difficulties it
posed for making sense out of humanfreedom and/orresponsibility.
The contrapuntalmethodology tends to deny my essay a comfortable home
either within mainline theological and historicalstudies of Augustineon the will
or within contemporaryphilosophical discourse on free will and determinism.
Nevertheless, it is not my intention to be an exile from either camp. If there is
one lesson to be drawnfrom the entire investigation,it is that an examinationof
what Augustine means by a calling can be the occasion both for advancingour
understandingof his theology and for advancingcontemporarytheory of action.