7/27/2019 Libera scelta e libertà in Anselmo

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/libera-scelta-e-liberta-in-anselmo 1/6

An Implicit Distinction Between Free Choice and Freedom in Anselm's

Thought

Anselm's treatises On Freedom of Choice, The Fall of Satan,

and The Compatibility of Foreknowledge, Predestination, and the

Grace of God with Free Choice are intriguing discussions inthemselves, but they are of particular interest for the light they

shed on Anselm's notion of freedom. Early in On Freedom of Choice,

in discussing how Satan and Adam fell, Anselm tells us:

They sinned through their own choice, which was free, and not

through that by which it was free, namely, the ability not tosin and not to serve sin. Rather, they sinned by the ability

they had for sinning, which neither helped them towards the

freedom of not sinning nor compelled them into the service ofsin.1

It is very clear from this passage that Anselm believes Satan and

Adam have free choice by virtue of possessing "the ability not tosin and not to serve sin." Elsewhere in his writings, he describes

this ability as the "ability to keep uprightness of will for the

sake of this uprightness itself."2 For Anselm, "uprightness ofwill" seems equivalent to "what God wills" and so freedom of choice

seems to be the ability to follow the will of God because it is the

will of God.3It is important to emphasize that Anselm in the quotation

stresses that an agent can have free choice and use free choice forsin without the sin involving what makes choice free. This

separation allows one to distinguish freedom of choice from the

ability to sin even in beings that never possess one without theother. The separation is, of course, useful for maintaining that

there is a univocal concept of "free choice" between beings who

have free choice and can sin and beings who have free choice but

cannot sin. That there is a univocal concept of "free choice" isa position Anselm explicitly endorses in the opening paragraphs of

On Freedom of Choice

Anselm's defining of freedom of choice as an ability issuggestive. Since we separate ability from the exercise of

ability, one can have the ability to keep uprightness for the sake

of uprightness without actually keeping uprightness for the sake ofuprightness.4 One can even sin, and thus effectively choose

against uprightness, and never lose the ability to follow

uprightness for its own sake. Moreover, one can be necessitated orcoerced in an action and still retain free choice since in cases of

necessitation or coercion one still retains the ability to follow

uprightness for the sake of uprightness.

7/27/2019 Libera scelta e libertà in Anselmo

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/libera-scelta-e-liberta-in-anselmo 2/6

  Anselm's careful focus on freedom of choice allows us to

speculate whether free choice is to be separated from or identifiedwith freedom. Is a being free solely by possessing free choice?

Hopkins in his A Companion to the Study of St. Anselm indicates

that free choice is to be identified with freedom.5 He is

certainly not alone, for many people understand Anselm to define'freedom' as "the ability to serve uprightness for the sake of

uprightness," which is Anselm's explicit definition of free

choice.6 If we do identify free choice with freedom, however, many problems arise. In the first place, all the acts a human being

 performs would be free acts - even those acts that are necessitated

or performed under coercion.7 But Anselm thinks such acts are notfree acts.8 Moreover, Anselm talks about different degrees of

freedom:

Which will seems the more free to you: the will whose

ability not to sin is such that it can in no way be turnedaway from the uprightness of not sinning, or the will which

can in some way be turned to sinning.9

But if freedom is the ability to keep uprightness of the will for

the sake of uprightness, it is difficult to see how there can bedegrees of freedom. One either has this ability or lacks the

ability. There thus seem to be reasons not to identify free choice

with freedom. What then is the relationship between free choiceand freedom? Anselm never explicitly tries to distinguish them. In

the texts, he tends to use voluntas libera, arbitrium liberum, andlibertas interchangeably. But there might be an implicit

distinction between 'free choice' and 'freedom' at work in the

texts. To see if this is the case, we need to turn to Anselm'sdistinction in The Fall of Satan between the affection for benefit

and the affection for justice.

Anselm claims that there are two dispositions found in the

wills of human beings and all angels before some of them fell. Thefirst disposition, "the affection for benefit" (affectio ad

commodum), is the ability of an individual to will what seems to

 benefit it, in the sense of bring it happiness. This dispositionis in play, for example, whenever a human being wills to eat, wills

to protect itself, wills to gather possessions, and so on. The

second disposition, "the affection for justice" (affectio ad justitiam), is the ability to will what an individual should do.

In particular, according to Anselm, it is the ability to follow the

commands of God.In an intriguing thought experiment, Anselm considers the

creation of Satan in a series of distinct steps. If Satan were

created with neither of the dispositions, he would be unable to

7/27/2019 Libera scelta e libertà in Anselmo

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/libera-scelta-e-liberta-in-anselmo 3/6

will at all. For the only way to move from the state of not

willing to the state of willing is to will, and without an alreadyexisting ability to will one cannot will. So, Satan must possess

one of the two abilities in order to will at all. If, however,

Satan were created with only the disposition to will what is

 beneficial (affectio ad commodum), he would not be free, for hecould only will what seemed beneficial to him. Likewise, if he

were created with only the disposition to will what is just

(affectio ad justitiam), he would not be free since he could willonly what is just. Satan can be free only if he possesses both

dispositions since choice is possible only with the possession of

 both dispositions. Thus, Satan's freedom requires the choice between what is beneficial and what is just. The same is true of

human beings.

One fascinating aspect of Anselm's claim that the possessionof both dispositions is necessary for the freedom of human beings

and Satan is that, according to him, an agent must be in a state ofignorance about the exact relationship between the two affections.10

If the agent were to know for certain, for example, that hisultimate benefit lies in following justice, the agent would not be

free to act in accordance with what seemed beneficial; he could

only act in accord with what is just. Likewise, if an agent knewthat he would be punished for acting in accord with what seems to

 be beneficial (in distinction to what was just), he would know that

choosing the seemingly beneficial would not ultimately benefit himand so he could only choose what is just. Consequently, he would

not be free. It follows, then, that Satan before he fell, and allangels before they fell, as well as all human beings when they act

freely, must possess the two abilities in ignorance of what is of

ultimate benefit. Moreover, the angels who did not fall and sawthe punishment of the angels who did fall now understand that

acting in accord with justice (the will of God) is in their

ultimate interest. They are therefore not able to will anything

 but what is just. This ability, of course, gives them freedom ofchoice, but it effectively eliminates any freedom in the sense that

human beings have freedom. Human beings, ignorant that it is to

their ultimate benefit to act in accord with justice, retain boththe affection for benefit and the affection for justice. They are

able to choose between the two affections, and, consequently, they

are able to sin. (Once human beings are numbered among the blessed, they lose their ignorance and no longer have a choice

 between the affections.) As Anselm points out at the end of On

Freedom of Choice, human beings have the freedom to retainuprightness of will (by serving justice) or to lose it (by

rejecting justice). Once they have lost uprightness of will, they

can regain it or never regain it. God's grace plays an important

7/27/2019 Libera scelta e libertà in Anselmo

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/libera-scelta-e-liberta-in-anselmo 4/6

role here in addition to the choice to follow justice.11 The fallen

angels, on the other hand, are never able to regain uprightness ofwill. Even though they, presumably, possess the two affections,

they will not receive God's grace and be restored to uprightness of

will. Their fall is irrevocable.

According to Anselm, God does not have the ability to sin. Itis less clear whether God has the two affections found in human

wills. In a sense, God's situation is a heightened version of the

situation of the good angels. Given that he is omniscient, heknows that ultimate benefit is really the same as acting in

accordance with justice - at least with regard to creatures. Since

his will is the measure of justice, it makes no sense to think thathis affection for benefit is other than his affection for justice.

He cannot choose between them because they are identical. It is

impossible for him to lose his uprightness of will.It is thus clear that while God and free creatures have the

same free choice, the freedom they enjoy is different. The freedomof human beings (and the evil angels) is a freedom inextricably

linked with the choice between following the affection for justiceand the affection for benefit. Another way of putting this is to

say that human freedom is the ability to follow justice or to

reject justice (and follow benefit).12 God's freedom, and that ofthe good angels as well as the blessed in heaven, is the ability to

follow justice. This freedom seems to be equivalent to freedom of

choice, but there is an important difference. In addition tohaving the ability to follow justice, God, the good angels, and the

 blessed are also unable not to follow justice. Their freedomconsists, then, of the ability to follow justice and the inability

not to follow justice.

The univocal concept of free choice - the ability to followuprightness of will for the sake of uprightness itself - is thus

consistent with both the ability to not follow justice (and pursue

 benefit) and the inability not to follow justice. Free choice is

thus linked to the different freedoms God and human beings possess, but it should not be equated with either type of freedom. Both

freedoms together, however, cover all the possible situations where

free choice can be exercised.13

Footnotes

1

This translation is from Truth, Freedom, and Evil: Three

Philosophical Dialogues by Anselm of Canterbury, translated andedited by Jasper Hopkins and Herbert Richardson (Harper and Row;

 New York; 1967), p. 124. The Latin text is to be found in Opera

Omnia, Volume I, edited by F.S. Schmitt (Friedrich Frommann Verlag;

7/27/2019 Libera scelta e libertà in Anselmo

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/libera-scelta-e-liberta-in-anselmo 5/6

Stuttgart-Bad Cannsatt; 1968), p. 120.

2

Truth, Freedom, and Evil, p. 127; Opera Omnia, Volume I, p. 212.

3See Truth, Freedom, and Evil, pp. 156-57; Opera Omnia, Volume I,

 pp. 241-42.

4

Throughout chapter four of his A Companion to the Study of St.

Anselm (Univ. of Minnesota Press; Minneapolis; 1972), JasperHopkins criticizes Anselm's separation between ability and the

exercise of the ability (especially pp. 145 ff.).

5

A Companion, p. 141.

6For other examples, see B. M. Bonansea's Man and His Approach to

God in John Duns Scotus (University Press of America; New York;

1983), chapter two; Stanley Kane's Anselm's Doctrine of Freedom andthe Will (Edwin Mellen Press; Toronto; 1981); Joseph Incandela's

"Duns Scotus and the Experience of Human Freedom" in The Thomist,

Volume 56, #2, April 1992, pp. 229-56.

7Compare Hopkins's remarks in A Companion, pp. 152-53.

8This is clear from his discussion of the case of a man confronted

with a forced option in On Freedom of Choice, Chapter 5 (Truth,

Freedom, and Evil, p.132: "Will you deny that a thing is free from

another if it cannot be forced or restrained by that other thingexcept as it wills to be?") as well as from the thought experiment

of making Satan in various stages in The Fall of Satan, chapters

12-14. It is also affirmed in Chapter 2 of On Freedom of Choice(Truth, Freedom, and Evil, p. 124) when Anselm distinguishes choice

that is free from choice that is compelled or necessitated.

9

Truth, Freedom, and Evil, p. 123; Opera Omnia, p. 208.

10

This position is made very clear in The Fall of Satan, chapters

21-25. It is difficult to ascertain precisely what Anselm means by

7/27/2019 Libera scelta e libertà in Anselmo

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/libera-scelta-e-liberta-in-anselmo 6/6

'know' when he talks about knowing what one's ultimate benefit is

the same as following justice. Believing Christians, for example,hold that their ultimate benefit (the beatific vision) is achieved

through doing what is just. Presumably, this does not qualify as

the knowledge Anselm has in mind. This knowledge seems to be

something like an absolute certainty from seeing it to be the casethat one's ultimate benefit is to serve justice. God has this

knowledge, of course, as do the angels and the blessed.

11

Stanley Kane treats the role of God's grace in Anselm's Doctrine

of Freedom and the will, pp. 160 f. But see also Jasper Hopkins'snegative analysis of Kane's treatment of Anselm: "Anselm on Freedom

and the Will: A Discussion of G. Stanley Kane's Interpretation of

Anselm," Philosophy Research Archives, Volume 9, 1983, pp. 471-94.

12There is no necessary conflict between benefit and justice. It is

often the case that doing what is just benefits a person. Thechoice here occurs when there is a conflict between benefit and

 justice.

13

Hopkins in A Companion talks about there being two different uses

of freedom: God's and human beings' (p. 157).It seems moreappropriate to talk about two different uses of free choice and to

say that God and human beings have different types of freedom.In writing this paper, I have also benefitted from other

discussions of Anselm's notion of freedom. Of particular note are:

Paul A. Streveler "Anselm on Future Contingencies: A CriticalAnalysis of the Argument of the De Concordia," Anselm Studies,

Volume 1, 1983, pp. 165-73; William L. Craig "St. Anselm on Divine

Foreknowledge and Future Contingency," Laval theologique et

 philosophique, Volume 42, #1, February 1986, pp. 93-104; Robert F.Brown "Some Problems with Anselm's View of Human Will, " Anselm

Studies, Volume 2, 1988, pp. 333-42; Richard Campbell "Freedom as

Keeping the Truth: The Anselmian Tradition," Anselm Studies, Volume2, pp. 297-318.