Folia Theologica 18. (2007)

Zoltán Turgonyi: Compatibilism and Concursus Divinus - A (Hopefully) Possible Approach to the Problem of Freedom

FOLIA THEOLOGICA 18 (2007)

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Zoltán TURGONYI

COMPATIBILISM AND CONCURSUS DIVINUS A (Hopefully) Possible Approach to the Problem of Freedom

One of the most important statements of Catholic teaching is that a human act is due completely to man's freedom and at the same time it is also due completely to God. (This is underlined especially in the case of actual grace,1 but it is also a general statement about all human acts, and a similar double causality is attributed to the functioning of all secondary causes, since all of them are moved by God's concursus.1 2) This statement is a very old subject of controversies.

Hereinafter I would like to give a little contribution to this question. I must begin saying that I am a philosopher and not a theologian. So I don't want to examine how one can deduce the above-mentioned statement from the Holy Scripture and from the Tradition. I simply accept as given the fact that the Church insists sitnultaneously on the initiative role of God as Primary Cause and on the role of human freedom. All I wish to try is the reconciliation of these two roles by a merely philosophical argumentation. I want to give an interpretation of this statement which shows that it is credible, it is not a mere absurdity.

Let's start with the old philosophical problem of determinism, in order to prepare the discussion of the relation between God and the human will. Several authors think that if determinism is true, there is no room for morality, freedom, responsibility, rewards and punishments, persuasion, hortatory speeches etc. These authors are often called incompatibilists, and their opponents receive the name compatibilists. I'll also use these terms in this way.

1 See in particular DS 1525, 1553, 1554. (I have used the 36th edition of Denzinger’s work: DENZINGER - SCHÖNMETZER, Enchiridion Symbolorum, Definitionum et Declarationum, Herder, Barcinone - Friburgi Brisgoviae - Romae, MCMLXXVI)

2 Cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, Part I., Section II., Chapter I., Article I., Paragraph IV., 306-308.

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