[2007] Hoffmann, T Aquinas And Intellectual Determinism; The Test Case Of Angelic Sin

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Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism:

The Test Case of Angelic Sin

by To b i a s H o ff m a n n (Washington)

Abstract: This paper intends to show that Aquinas gives a non-deterministic account
of free decision. Angelic sin is the eminent test case: ex hypothesi, angels are su-
premely intelligent and not subject to ignorance, passions, or negatively disposing
habits. Nothing predetermines their choice; rather it ultimately depends on their free-
dom alone. All angels acted based upon reasons, but why certain angels acted for an
inadequate reason whereas others for an adequate reason cannot be fully explained.
Thomas’s action theory allows him to explain angelic choice as contingent and self-
determined. The salient features of this explanation are transferable to human free
decision.*

Shortly after his death, Aquinas was accused of having developed a de-
terministic account of liberum arbitrium (free decision). More specifi-
cally, his early critics argued that his account implied intellectual deter-
minism and that this entailed the denial of free decision.

Their concern

was premised by the view that in a given situation, the intellect as such
is active in a deterministic way.

To consider the activity of the will to be

I wish to thank Stephen Brock, Annie Hounsokou-Lefler, Alasdair MacIntyre,
Joe McCoy, Gloria Wasserman, and anonymous referees for helpful comments.

For the reactions against Thomas’s account of liberum arbitrium, see Lottin

1957, 243 f.; 271 f.; Kent 1995, 110 f.; Putallaz 1996, 93f.; Wippel 1995, esp. 255 f.

For late thirteenth century efforts to defend Thomas’s explanation of free deci-
sion, see Putallaz 1996, 112f. That Thomas’s explanation of free decision is not
immune against the charge of intellectual determinism was recently argued by
Williams 1998, 199 f.

The view that the intellect’s activity is deterministic was widespread in the 13

century, see, e.g., Albert the Great, Ethica 3.1.1 (ed. Borgnet 7: 196a); De homine
3.2 ad 23; 3.4.3 sol. (ed. Coloniensis 27/2: forthcoming). This idea is central in
Henry of Ghent’s critique of Aquinas and his followers, see, e. g., Quodl. 1.16 (ed.
Leuven 5: 107 f.). See also Duns Scotus, Quaestiones super libros Metaphysicorum
Aristotelis 9.15, n.36 (Opera philosophica 4: 684f.). In his Sentences Commen-
tary, Thomas himself holds the view that the intellect is less free than the will, In
Sent. 2.7.2.1 ad 2: “voluntas est domina sui actus magis quam intellectus, qui
ipsa rei veritate compellitur; et ideo secundum actum voluntatis homo dicitur

Archiv f. Gesch. d. Philosophie 89. Bd., S. 122–156

DOI 10.1515/AGPH.2007.007

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

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entirely defined by the intellect, a view they thought Thomas held,
would then entail that the will’s activity is predetermined by the intel-
lect, which in turn is predetermined by factors that are not in the per-
son’s control. Hence a person’s choices – which according to Thomas
originate in the will as informed by the judgment of the intellect – can-
not be free. It does not help to grant the will a certain role with regard
to the use of the intellect, commanding its deliberation and guiding its
attention, if the will’s act that commands this use is entirely accounted
for by previous acts of the intellect. According to his adversaries, Tho-
mas’s account implies that the causal chain of interactions between in-
tellect and will leads inevitably to a first cause which precedes the will’s
activity and is, therefore, not in control of the agent.

Necessity is not as such a threat to freedom; medieval thinkers agreed

in fact that God’s self-love is an eminently free and necessary act.

They

also agreed that freedom does not imply the ability to sin; the blessed in
heaven are in fact free, but they are unable to sin.

Yet before rational

creatures experience the fortunate situation of non posse peccare, they
have the ability to make bad choices. The moral responsibility for such
acts seems to presuppose that they result from contingent self-determi-
nation, i.e. that in a given situation in which a person chooses between
alternatives, he or she could have chosen otherwise.

malus vel bonus, quia actus voluntatis est actus hominis, quasi in ejus potestate
existens; non autem secundum actum intellectus, cujus ipse non est dominus.”
See also In Sent. 2.8.1.5 ad 7; In Sent. 2.25.1.2. Citations of the Sentences Com-
mentary refer to the edition by Mandonnet/Moos (Paris 1929–47).

See for example Richard of Middleton, In Sent. 2.38.2.2 (ed. Brescia 2: 471b f.);
Henry of Ghent, Quodl. 9.5 (ed. Leuven 13: 121 f.); the most clear and succinct
formulation of this objection is found in Duns Scotus, Lectura 2.25.1, n.31 (Vati-
can Edition 19: 238).

See, e.g., Thomas Aquinas, ST [Summa theologiae] Ia.19.3; Duns Scotus, Quodl.
16 n.7 (ed. Noone). Thomas defines ‘necessary’ as that which cannot not be,
“necesse est enim quod non potest non esse” (ST Ia.82.1), and as that which is
unchangeably determined to one effect, “quod est immutabiliter determinatum
ad unum” (DV [De veritate] 22.6 lines 69 f.). If not otherwise noted, citations of
Aquinas refer to the Leonine edition.

The idea that freedom is not the ability to sin goes back to Anselm of Canterbury,
De libertate arbitrii 1 (ed. Schmitt 1: 207). For the inability of the blessed to sin,
see, e.g., Aquinas, DV 22.6 lines 158 f.; 24.8 lines 127 f.; Duns Scotus, Ord. IV d.49
suppl. q.6 n.15 (ed. Paris 21: 234a). See also Gaine 2003.

For the ability to do otherwise see section 3.1 below. In section 3.4, the notion of
contingency with which Aquinas seems to operate with regard to free decision
will be described in terms not used by Aquinas himself. A description of the con-
tingent causality in free decision is found in SCG [Summa contra Gentiles] 3.73:

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The implications of Thomas’s account of free decision continue to be

heavily debated. Two interpretative questions intersect. One is whether
Thomas’s explanation amounts to a deterministic account. Another is
whether his account is strictly intellectualist or at least in some respects
voluntaristic.

The second problem is related to the first: according to

some, strict intellectualism implies determinism. This gives rise to three
main lines of interpretation: (1) Thomas’s account of free decision is in-
tellectualist and deterministic (determinism may in turn be conceived
as compatible with free decision); (2) it is intellectualist and non-deter-
ministic; (3) it is non-deterministic because it is in the last analysis vol-
untarist.

“Quod autem voluntas sit causa contingens, ex ipsius perfectione provenit: quia
non habet virtutem limitatam ad unum, sed habet in potestate producere hunc
effectum vel illum; propter quod est contingens ad utrumlibet.” Aquinas defines
‘contingent’ as that which can be or not: “contingens est quod potest esse et non
esse” (ST Ia.86.3). A contingent cause is one that is not determined to one effect,
ST Ia.14.13: “Alio modo potest considerari contingens, ut est in sua causa. Et sic
consideratur ut futurum, et ut contingens nondum determinatum ad unum, quia
causa contingens se habet ad opposita.” For a succinct exposition of Aquinas’s
modal semantics, see Goris 1996, 265f.

Hause 1997, 168, offers a suitable definition of voluntarism and intellectualism:
“an account of human action is voluntarist to the extent that the will, and not any
other power, controls its own activities. Likewise, an account of human action is in-
tellectualist to the extent that the will’s activities are under the intellect’s control.”

No one denies that Aquinas considers free choices to be determined (i.e. moti-
vated) by reasons. In this sense, he is not an indeterminist. The dispute is about
whether determination by reasons (rather than by physical events) entails deter-
minism. – For a compatibilist interpretation of Aquinas, see Pasnau 2002, 221 f.;
Hause 1997 and Eardley 2003, 839 f., characterize Aquinas as a “thoroughgoing
intellectualist”, denying that for Thomas the will has any innate spontaneity, but
they leave it open whether he is a compatibilist or an indeterminist. Stump 2003,
ch. 9, avoiding the labels of intellecualism and voluntarism, characterizes Aqui-
nas as non-deterministic but stresses that this does not imply in all instances of
free decision the ability to do otherwise than one does; MacDonald 1998 and
McCluskey 2002 offer an intellectualist but non-deterministic interpretation of
Aquinas; Gallagher 1994b and Sherwin 2005, ch. 2, reject an interpretation of
Aquinas as intellectualist determinist by granting the will a certain spontaneity
while leading the intellect’s attention and consideration of an object. Hence their
interpretation has a voluntarist trait. Bergamino 2002 provides a thorough and
original interpretation of Aquinas as non-determinist. She qualifies him as intel-
lectualist, yet arguably her interpretation has some voluntarist traits (see, e.g.,
278). Bowlin 1998 suggests that Aquinas is strict intellectualist and that in
his view the will is “bound on all sides by necessity” (147), but that the account of
the first sin of man, i.e. original sin, “requires a momentary voluntarist detour”
(151).

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The goal of this paper is to provide an original contribution to the

debate concerning Thomas’s account of free decision by expanding the
scope beyond the texts where he discusses the problem of free decision
as such.

The strategy adopted here is to analyze Thomas’s account of a

specific act of rational choice and to ask these questions: (1) Does he
consider it a self-determined and contingent choice between alternative
possibilities? (2) If so, can he successfully account for the contingency
of this act? (3) To what extent does he and can he make this rational
choice intelligible?

Whatever account of free decision medieval authors developed, it

had to encompass a case without possibility to fully account for the
decision by tracing it to external or internal determinants: angelic sin,
i.e., the evil choice of some angels who thereby separated themselves
from the good angels.

For the problem of determinism, angelic sin

is the eminent test case for two reasons.

First, the fact that this act

is a sin implies that it did not occur of necessity, since for Thomas, an
act cannot be considered sinful unless it was avoidable, at least in its
root.

Second, the case of angelic sin facilitates locating the origin of

For Thomas’s explanations of free decision, see In Sent. 2.25; SCG 2.47–48; DV
22–25, ST Ia.19; ibid., 59; ibid., 80–83, ST IaIIae.8–17, DM [De malo] 6.1.

A theological study of Aquinas’s doctrine of angelic sin, its patristic sources, and
its reception by the Thomistic commentators is provided by Montano 1955.
Montano does not focus on the role of liberum arbitrium in angelic sin. Angelic
sin became a focus of attention by theologians in the mid 20

century. The debate

regarded the relationship between natural peccability and grace, for the most
part initiated by de Lubac 1946, 231f., and partly by an earlier publication of the
same author (de Lubac 1939). More references to this debate are given in note
50 below. The philosophical aspects of the problem of angelic sin are mostly
neglected in these studies, with two exceptions: de Blic 1944 and Maritain 1956.
At points, Maritain interprets Thomas however too freely. Aquinas’s account
of angelic sin has recently been exploited to contrast two structurally different
approaches in medieval and modern ethical theories, see Toner 2005. – For recent
studies on angelic sin in authors other than Aquinas, see MacDonald 1999;
Adams 1992; Faes de Mottoni 1991; Cervellon 2004; Schmutz 2002.

For the purposes of this paper it is sufficient to take the existence of angels as a
hypothesis, although Thomas thinks they are real.

Concerning the evitable character of sins, see below, section 3.1. – A sin is not
only an act against reason, but also an offence against God. The moral philos-
opher, as Aquinas says, mainly considers sin in the first sense, whereas the theo-
logian focuses on the second sense of sin, see ST IaIIae.71.6 co. and ad 5. See also
ST IaIIae.18.5; ST IaIIae.19.3; ST IaIIae.21.1. – Occasionally, Thomas gives the
notion of sin (peccatum) a more general meaning, so that it extends beyond the
voluntary domain and comprehends also defects in nature. Thus he distinguishes
between sin (peccatum) and fault (culpa), where fault adds to the notion of sin

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the act unambiguously within the agent, i.e. the angelic intellect and the
will that make this choice. Good and bad angels were equally disposed
and had access to the same knowledge, yet some sinned and others did
not. The ultimate reason for their different choice cannot be anything
other than their free decision. Human failure is more complex and
cannot be unequivocally traced to acts of contingent free decision:
human choices are conditioned by one’s life story, by temptation, lack
of intelligence, ignorance of what is best, bad inclinations, habits, and
passions. Such conditioning may in fact amount to a full determination
of the choice. None of these factors explain angelic sin: angels choose
immediately after their creation;

according to Thomas, the fall of

Lucifer is the very first occurrence of sin in the universe, unexplainable
by any previous moral defect;

Lucifer was the most intelligent rational

creature; angels are not subject to ignorance or error; they have no ha-
bitual inclination to evil before their first sin, and by nature they have
no passions.

(Also from a theological perspective, angelic sin high-

lights self-determination. It cannot be traced to God – not even indi-
rectly, as though God did not grant all angels the grace of perseverance
in the good –, but only to the will of the sinning angels.

)

Hence the advantage of focusing on angelic sin is to reduce the

ambiguity that generally accompanies the analysis of free decision and
of its determining factors. Yet since the core problem of liberum arbi-
trium – to explain how intellect and will together generate free choices –

that the act is voluntary, i.e. in the power of the agent, so that it can be imputed to
him or her, see ST IaIIae.21.2; DM 2.2 lines 123 f. Yet in most cases, Thomas em-
ploys peccatum and its cognates as applying to voluntary acts alone.

See notes 72 and 73 below.

This differentiates Lucifer’s sin from the first human sin which occurred due to
temptation. As Thomas argues on the basis of Scripture, Lucifer led many other
angels to sin, see In Sent. 2.6.1.2; ST Ia.63.8. Thomas speaks of the sin of demons
in the singular (Lucifer) or in the plural (demons in general). The differences be-
tween Lucifer’s and the other demons’ sin are minimal and not relevant for the
purposes of this paper.

Lucifer was the supreme angel: In Sent. 2.6.1.1; ST Ia.63.7. Regarding the ab-
sence of error in the angelic intellect, see below, 11 f.; with regard to the lack of
passions and vicious habits, see ST Ia.63.1 ad 4. See also In Sent. 2.5.1.1; DV
24.10 lines 297 f.; SCG 3.108; ST Ia.59.4; DM 16.2 lines 223 f.

Due to their fallen nature, human beings can persevere in the good only by divine
grace, ST IaIIae.109.10. Angels, however, do not require grace in order to perse-
vere in the good, because they have no inclination to evil, DM 16.4 ad 22. Aqui-
nas says explicitly that angelic sin cannot be traced to God, but only to the angel’s
will, DM 16.4 ad 4. See also ST Ia.63.5: “Agens autem quod angelos in esse pro-
duxit, scilicet Deus, non potest esse causa peccati.”

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is the same for human and angelic choice, conclusions resulting from
the analysis of angelic choice will shed light on Thomas’s general ac-
count of free decision and the problem of intellectual determinism.

Likewise, elements of the general account of free decision will be used
to illuminate the problem of angelic sin.

In this paper, I intend to show that Aquinas’s explanation of the an-

gels’ free decision involves three things: first, that the decision of the
good and the bad angels is self-determined and contingent; second,
that their good or bad decision is not unmotivated, and third, that in
the last analysis he leaves the question of why some angels acted in one
way and others in a different way unanswered, arguably because in
cases of contingent free decision this question is unanswerable. From
this, I draw the general conclusion that free choices of rational agents
are determined by reasons, but why a person acts for a specific reason
rather than for an alternative reason is not fully explainable.

The main text-basis of this paper is the late writings of Aquinas,

where the most elaborate accounts of angelic sin are found: the Prima
pars of the Summa theologiae and, particularly, the Quaestiones dispu-
tatae de malo.

Developments in doctrine with regard to earlier texts

will be mentioned. Yet the salient points of Aquinas’s explanation of
angelic sin remain constant throughout his career.

The first section of this paper is preparatory. It examines some basic

assumptions of Aquinas’s action theory and their relation to angelic
knowledge, willing, and sinning. Section two contains an analysis of
Thomas’s explanation of angelic sin, focusing on the voluntary and
self-determined nature of this act as it originates in the angelic intellect
and will. The third section discusses the contingent and intelligible
character of angelic sin and of acts of free decision in general.

Though the circumstances of angelic sin are quite different from those of human
sin, the fundamental conditions of free decision are similar in both cases: most
importantly, both angelic and human sin consist in desiring something good out-
side of the order established by God, see DM 16.3 ad 1; the object of both the an-
gelic and the human will is the bonum conveniens apprehensum; and both angels
and humans tend toward their object under the aspect of the good (sub ratione
boni), see section 1.1 below. For important differences regarding the exercise of
free decision in human beings and angels, see sections 1.2 and 1.3.

Aquinas wrote the De malo late in his career. According to Torrell 2005, 201 f.,
questions 1–15 were written around 1270, and question 16, which contains the
treatment of the demons, probably 1272. The first part of the Summa theologiae
was written during Aquinas’s stay in Rome (1265–68), see Torrell 2005, 146.

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1. Intellectual Appetite, Free Decision, and peccabilitas

After presenting some general principles of Thomas’s action theory, this section por-
trays his conception of free choices as having their source in free judgments, and it il-
lustrates the implications of this doctrine for the explanation of angelic sin. It con-
cludes with a discussion of Thomas’s view that every creature endowed with the
power of liberum arbitrium, including angels, is by nature capable of sinning.

1.1. Margins for a Solution:

Some Basic Principles of Thomas’s Action Theory

A few fundamental principles of Thomas’s action theory set narrow boundaries
upon the explanation of contingent self-determination in general, and with regard to
angelic sin in particular. The principles seem to imply that the entire weight of free
decision is carried by the intellect, and that moral failure is nothing more than intel-
lectual failure.

(1) The will is a “moved mover” (movens motum). The will is thus not excluded

from the general principle according to which “Whatever is moved is moved by an-
other” (ST Ia.2.3). In some texts Aquinas describes it as a passive potency.

In later

texts, he occasionally describes the will as an active potency, without however deny-
ing that the will, as an appetitive power, is in a sense a moved mover, being moved by
the object it desires.

(2) What actualizes the will is its object (the volitum) as presented to it by the in-

tellect.

The proper object of the will is the bonum conveniens apprehensum (the good

apprehended as suitable, i.e. as fitting in a concrete situation). Consequently, things
can only be desired under the appearance of the good (sub ratione boni), even when

ST Ia.59.1 ad 3: “voluntas dicitur movens motum”. Thomas cites Aristotle
De anima 3.10.433b16. For the will as a passive potency, see DV 25.1 lines 116 f.:
“appetitus autem potentia passiva est, quia movetur ab appetibili quod est
movens non motum […] appetibile vero non movet appetitum nisi apprehen-
sum.” See also ST Ia.80.2; ibid., 80.3 ad 2; ST IaIIae.50.5 ad 2; DV 5.10 lines
102 f.

ST IaIIae.10.4, DM 6.1 lines 272 f. DM 6.1 arg.7 addresses the problem of the
passivity of the will directly. In his reply, Thomas does not concur with the ob-
jection that the passivity of the will makes its activity deterministic. Westberg
1994 discusses the development of Thomas’s view with regard to the will as an ac-
tive or passive potency, and the development of his account of free decision in
general, showing that his doctrine is relatively stable throughout his career.

ST IaIIae.9.1. In a more limited way than the intellect, sense cognition and the
sense appetite also move the will insofar as perception and the passions affect
whether or not a thing appears as desirable, ST IaIIae.9.2. In addition, the will
moves itself, insofar as by virtue of willing a certain end, it moves itself to desire
the means to that end, ST IaIIae.9.3.

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

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they are in truth evil.

In agreement with the Pseudo-Dionysius, Aquinas holds that

evil cannot be desired as such.

(3) Since it is inclined only to what appears as good and suitable, the will cannot

deviate from the practical judgment about what is good and suitable to do here and
now.

The third principle has two important implications. First, that free choices presup-

pose free judgments (see below, section 1.2). Second, together with the fact that the
will tends only to what is apprehended as good and suitable (cf. principle 2), the third
principle entails that choices of something evil can be accounted for only by some
intellectual error, i.e. by a misconception of the good. This is a fourth principle Aqui-
nas holds:

(4) One cannot do evil in full awareness of the good, and a person who does evil is

somehow ignorant of the true good.

(Thomas subscribes to the famous Aristotelian

adage that every evildoer is ignorant, “omnis malus ignorans”, EN 3.1.1110b28 f.)

See for example ST Ia.82.2 ad 1; ST IaIIae.8.1 and ST IaIIae.9.1–2; DM 6.1 lines
418 f. Thomas recalls this fact in the context of angelic sin: In Sent. 2.5.1.1 arg.3;
ibid., 2.7.1.1 ad 1; SCG 3.107; ST Ia.62.8; DM 16.2 lines 265 f.; ibid., 16.3 lines
189 f.; ibid., 16.5 lines 258 f.

Thomas repeatedly cites the Dionysian adage “nullus ad malum intendens oper-
atur”, see, e.g., In Sent. 2.41.2.1 ad 2; DV 24.2 lines 85 f.; ST IaIIae.72.1. Pseudo-
Dionysius, De divinis nominibus 4.31 (ed. Suchla 176, PG 3, 732).

ST IaIIae.13.3: “electio consequitur sententiam vel iudicium, quod est sicut
conclusio syllogismi operativi. Unde illud cadit sub electione, quod se habet ut
conclusio in syllogismo operabilium”; ibid., 77.1: “motus voluntatis […] natus est
sequi iudicium rationis”; DV 24.2 lines 79 f.: “Sed iudicium de hoc particulari
operabili ut nunc, numquam potest esse appetitui contrarium”; ST IIIa.18.4 ad 2:
“illud enim quod iudicamus agendum post inquisitionem consilii, eligimus […]”.
See also In Sent. 1.45.1.1; ST Ia.83.3 ad 2; DM 16.2 lines 261 f. Aquinas
admits of the possibility of acting against one’s better judgment (incontinentia),
but denies this possibility at the very moment in which the judgment is fully in the
agent’s consideration. In other words, he does not admit of what has been called
‘clear-eyed akrasia’. For his account of incontinence see Kent 1989; Müller 2005;
Bradley (forthcoming).

ST IaIIae.77.2: “cum voluntas sit boni vel apparentis boni, nunquam voluntas in
malum moveretur, nisi id quod non est bonum, aliqualiter rationi bonum appar-
eret: et propter hoc voluntas nunquam in malum tenderet, nisi cum aliqua ignor-
antia vel errore rationis”. See also In Sent. 2.34.3.3 ad 1; DV 22.6 lines 158 f.;
ibid., 24.8 lines 97 f.; ST IIaIIae.53.2.

Thomas gives this dictum two different meanings. In some places he interprets it
to mean that ignorance is a prerequisite for evil, see In Sent. 2.5.1.1, ibid., 2.21.2.1
ad 5; SCG 4.70; ibid., 4.92; ST Ia.63.1 ad 4. In other places, he takes it to mean
that the ignorance of the true good is a consequence of sin, see for example DV
18.6 ad 1; ST IaIIae.76.4. This second interpretation does not contradict the
first, since in Thomas’s view, ignorance or error can be either a cause of sin or a
consequence of sin.

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The margins that these principles impose on an explanation of free decision are so

confined that some of Thomas’s adversaries, considering them to entail intellectual
determinism, held contrary views with regard to each of these four principles.

With regard to angelic sin in particular, the implication that an act of free choice

presupposes free judgment and that moral failure presupposes a cognitive defect are
more problematic than may seem at first glance, as will appear in what follows next.

1.2. Free Choice and Bad Judgments

An intellectual or rational appetite (i.e. the angelic or human will) has as its object the
apprehended good. Accordingly, “the will is proportioned to the intellect”

. To the

extent that something is apprehended as good and suitable, the will is inclined to it. In
the context of angelic free decision, Thomas stresses the proportionality of intellect
and will with regard to the question of whether the liberum arbitrium of demons can
return to the good after sin, which he denies.

The angelic intellect attains at once all

knowledge that is by nature accessible to the angels, and thus the content of their
natural knowledge is invariable.

Because of the will’s dependence upon the intellect,

the inclination of the demons’ will is equally stable as is their intellectual knowledge.

Henry of Ghent and Duns Scotus are exemplary opponents to these principles.
(1) The will is not a moved mover, but a self-mover, e.g., Henry, Quodl. 9.5 (ed.
Leuven 13: 130 f.). The will is moved in actu primo (i.e. with regard to its being; it
depends on the source of its being) but moves itself ad actum secundum (i.e. with
regard to its activity), Scotus, Lectura 2.25.1, n.88 (Vatican edition 19: 259). (2)
The object is only a necessary condition for the will’s act, but not its cause,
e.g. Quodl. 9.5, 81 f. This seems to be the mature position of Scotus as well, see
Dumont 2001. Both Henry and Scotus agree with Thomas, however, that one can
desire things only sub ratione boni, see Henry, Quodl. 1.16 (ed. Leuven 5: 110); for
Scotus, see Hoffmann 2004, 505 f. (3) The will can act against the practical judg-
ment of what is best to do here and now, e.g. Henry, Quodl. 1.16 (ed. Leuven 5:
103 f., 106); ibid., 1.17 (125, 128 f.). Scotus holds this view also, see Hoffmann
2004, 504 f. (4) Error follows upon sin, rather than the reverse, Henry, Quodl. 1.17
(29); particularly Quodl. 10.9 (ed. Leuven 14: 248); ibid. 10.10 (260 f.). According
to Scotus, a sinful will does not necessarily cause the intellect to be erroneous, but
it averts attention from the practical judgment, see Hoffmann 2004, 512f.

DM 16.5 lines 317 f.: “voluntas proportionatur intellectui”. See also DM 16.2
ad 6; ST Ia.64.2.

In Sent. 2.7.1.2; DV 24.10 lines 303 f.; ST Ia.64.2; DM 16.5.

DM 16.3 lines 214 f.; see also note 36 below.

ST Ia.64.2; DM 16.5 lines 317 f. As a consequence of the stability of angelic
knowledge and willing, in angels the adherence to good or evil is proportional to
the perfection of the natural constitution: the greater the individual angelic intel-
lect, the more a good angel adheres to the good and a fallen angel to evil, see ST
IIaIIae.24.3 ad 3. Because of the discursive and hence changing nature of human
knowledge, such a proportion between the adherence to good or evil and the
natural constitution does not hold for humans (ibid.).

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131

Though Thomas explains this while discussing the demons’ intellect and will pos-

terior to sin, he makes a general point here regarding free decision: the will is free to
choose only to the extent that the intellect or reason is not determined to one activity.
Control over the inclination of one’s will presupposes therefore control over the ap-
prehension of the good. Free choices have their root in reason, which means that they
result from the ability to determine one’s own practical judgment. Humans deter-
mine their practical judgment by deliberating about what is best to do.

Free choices

thus follow upon free judgments.

Because its inclination is proportioned to apprehension, the will cannot desire any-

thing evil if there is no misapprehension which consists in (or follows upon) a certain
ignorance or error.

That voluntary failure presupposes a cognitive defect is particularly problematic in

the case of angelic sin, for two reasons. First, because angels do not seem to undergo
any cognitive deficiency that may be relevant for sin. Due to the perfection of their
intellect, angels are not subject to ignorance (lack of knowledge which by nature one
is meant to have) or error (the judgment that something which is false is true). There
is, however, in good and bad angels nescience (a lack of knowledge of things which
they are not bound to know) with regard to things that transcend the limits of their

See, e.g., DM 6.1 lines 377 f.: “Cum ergo uoluntas se consilio moueat, consilium
autem est inquisitio quedam non demonstratiua set ad opposita uiam habens,
non ex necessitate uoluntas seipsam mouet.”

ST IaIIae.17.1 ad 2: “Ex hoc enim voluntas libere potest ad diversa ferri, quia
ratio potest habere diversas conceptiones boni. Et ideo philosophi definiunt lib-
erum arbitrium quod est liberum de ratione iudicium, quasi ratio sit causa liber-
tatis.” Ibid., 109.2 ad 1: “homo est dominus suorum actuum, et volendi et non
volendi, propter deliberationem rationis, quae potest flecti ad unam partem vel
ad aliam.” DV 24.2 lines 70 f.: “Appetitus enim cognitionem sequitur, cum appeti-
tus non sit nisi boni quod sibi per vim cognitivam proponitur. […] Appetitum
autem si non sit aliquid prohibens, sequitur motus vel operatio. Et ideo si iudi-
cium cognitivae non sit in potestate alicuius, sed sit ei aliunde determinatum, nec
appetitus erit in potestate eius, et per consequens nec motus vel operatio abso-
lute. Iudicium autem est in potestate iudicantis secundum quod potest de suo
iudicio iudicare […] unde totius libertatis radix est in ratione constituta.” Also
angelic free decision results from control of the practical judgment (DM 16.5
lines 215 f.), even though angels do not deliberate prior to making decisions (see
note 96 below).

See note 25 above. – Though Thomas acknowledges in human beings, apart
from ignorance, also two other causes of evil, i.e. passion and malice (ST
IaIIae.76, prol.; see also ST IaIIae.78.1), both passion and malice cause evil by
virtue of a lack of awareness, either regarding the fact that the act is evil here
and now (in the case of passion) or concerning the fact that it should be avoided
in order to attain a certain good (in the case of malice), see ST IaIIae.78.1 ad 1.
In other words, it is only because passion and malice cause reason or intellect to
be ignorant about the true good that they prevent the will from adhering to the
true good.

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natural knowledge.

According to Thomas, there is no ignorance in angels, because

they immediately comprehend everything that is naturally knowable in the first
principles of their knowledge. The intelligible forms by which the angels attain
their knowledge are connatural to them from creation. Whatever they can know by
nature, they do in fact know. Whereas humans have immediate insight only into
the self-evident principles (such as ‘Every whole is greater than its part’), the entire
range of natural angelic knowledge is immediate.

Nor is the angelic intellect sub-

ject to error with regard to that which it is by nature meant to know. An error con-
sists in a false attribution of a predicate to a subject. Because the angelic intellect,
unlike the human intellect, is perfected from the very first moment of its existence,
it does not apprehend discursively by attaining new knowledge as a completion
of partial prior knowledge. Angels have full grasp of the essences of things and
of everything that can be said about them. Thus, unlike humans, they do not need
to perfect incomplete knowledge of things through the discovery of how certain
predicates may be attributed to (compositio) or denied of (divisio) the imperfectly
known subjects at hand. Hence they cannot undergo error due to a mistaken
attribution of a predicate to a subject.

Only after the corruption of their will by sin

can demons judge “presumptuously” about things that exceed their competence,
i.e. with regard to things pertaining to the supernatural order. For example, they
may mistakenly judge that a dead man will not rise from the dead, or that Jesus is
not God.

Secondly, to pose a cognitive defect as a condition for sin is problematic because

this defect is either voluntary or involuntary. If it is involuntary, as in the case of in-
voluntary ignorance (ignorantia invincibilis), it excuses from sin rather than causing it
(ST IaIIae.6.8; ibid., 76.2; DM 3.8). If it is voluntary, owing to negligence, then the

ST IaIIae.58.5 ad 1–3; DM 16.6 lines 271 f. – For the distinction between nes-
cience, ignorance, and error, see DM 3.7 lines 79 f., and DM 8.1 ad 7. Nescience is
a mark of all creatures, even in the beatific vision, since no finite intellect can
have all-encompassing knowledge of God’s infinite nature (ST Ia.12.7). Prior to
the beatific vision, angels had to rely on faith (ST IIaIIae.5.1). Even the blessed
angels get to know supernatural mysteries only to the extent that God wants to
reveal them (ST Ia.57.5). Ignorance, though a privation of knowledge (like blind-
ness is lack of eye-sight, which humans are meant to have), is not necessarily
sinful. It is only sinful when due to negligence one ignores that which one is
supposed to know to guide one’s actions. Error adds to ignorance a positive act:
to judge what is false to be true. For the distinction between nescience and igno-
rance, see also ST IaIIae.76.2.

ST Ia.55.2: “potentia vero intellectiva […] in angelis, naturaliter completa est per
species intelligibiles, inquantum habent species intelligibiles connaturales ad
omnia intelligenda quae naturaliter cognosci possunt”. Ibid., 58.3: “statim in illis
quae primo naturaliter cognoscunt, inspiciunt omnia quaecumque in eis cog-
nosci possunt”. DV 8.15 lines 129 f.: “sicut intellectus noster se habet ad ista prin-
cipia, sic se habet angelus ad omnia quae naturaliter cognoscit.”

DM 16.6 ad s.c.1; ST Ia.58.4–5; see also ibid., 85.5; DV 8.15 lines 117 f. and ad 2.

DM 16.6 lines 281 f; ST Ia.58.5.

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133

problem is only shifted back one step and the cause of negligence has to be found.
The chain of explaining a failure by a previous failure has to come to a stop, namely
at the first sin – and the very first sin is precisely what is at issue in the case of angelic
sin. How Thomas handles this difficulty will be examined in section 2.

In the various texts in which Thomas discusses angelic sin, the exclusion from the

angelic intellect of ignorance and error regarding natural knowledge gives rise to a
substantial difficulty. How can there be sin where evil does not appear under the as-
pect of the good?

1.3. The Ability to Sin (potestas peccandi)

According to Thomas, all creatures who possess liberum arbitrium are by nature li-
able to sin. The divine will alone is by nature incapable of sin, whereas a creature’s
will can become incapable of sin only by grace. The ultimate end of the intellectual or
rational appetite is complete goodness or perfection. In God the ultimate end of the
will coincides with his own goodness, so that his will is not subordinate to any end
other than himself, but rather all other ends are subordinate to the ultimate end of
the divine will. Since in rational creatures the ultimate end (God) does not coincide
with their own goodness, they can fail to act in accord with their ultimate end, as
Thomas says in the Summa contra Gentiles.

In his later writings, he states the same

idea in different terms: the rule or guideline of the creature’s will consists in God’s
will and thus lies outside the creature, whereas the rule of the divine will coincides
with God himself.

How then could the angels sin?

They could not sin by desiring evil under the aspect of the good: not only because

of their infallible intellect, but also since they can desire only spiritual goods, which
are by nature good in every respect (ST Ia.63.2). Neither could they sin by desiring
evil under the aspect of evil, because evil as such cannot be desired.

The angels have

a natural inclination to goodness as such (bonum simpliciter).

For the same reason,

they obviously cannot desire anything good under the aspect of evil. The only re-
maining option is that they sinned by desiring something good under the aspect of
the good.

In Sent. 2.5.1.1 arg.4; SCG 3.107; ibid., 3.108; ST Ia.63.1 arg.4; DM 16.2 arg.1, 2,
and 5; De substantiis separatis 20 lines 268 f.

SCG 3.109. See also DV 24.7 lines 168 f.

ST Ia.63.1; DM 16.2 lines 274 f. For God’s will as the rule of human will, see In
Sent. 1.48.1; DV 23.7; ST IaIIae.19.9.

See note 23 above.

DM 1.3 lines 149 f.; DM 16.2 lines 206 f. See also note 22 above. An inclination
to evil presupposes composition of two natures, like human beings are composed
of body and soul. The sense appetite can desire a particular good which conflicts
with the good of reason, see DM 16.2 lines 230 f.

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

According to Thomas, the evil choice of the demons consisted, indeed, in desiring

something good under the aspect of the good. The desire of something good is not in
itself blameworthy, unless – as happened here – it is desired in an unfitting manner.

Thomas specifies that the disorder in the demons’ desire consisted in not submit-

ting themselves to a superior rule: the divine wisdom, the divine government, the di-
vine will.

This disregard for the divine rule must be qualified as pride, i.e., “not to be

subject to a superior when subjection is due”

. Pride consists in coveting a singular

excellence. As a consequence of pride, the demons sinned by envy, because they con-
sidered the good of others an impediment to their own excellence.

What was it that the demons desired inordinately? Since all angels have attained

their full natural perfection from the first moment of their creation, they have at-
tained natural happiness from the beginning of their existence (ST Ia.62.1). They
could not desire what they already possessed in act, because desire regards goods that
one does not yet have (ST Ia.20.1). Hence they could only desire something toward
which they had potentiality, i.e. supernatural goods. Goods that exceed the limits of
one’s nature can only be desired in an ordinate manner if they are desired as a gift of
grace (ST Ia.62.2). Accordingly, Aquinas explains angelic sin like this: the devil de-
sired his supernatural happiness, as such a noble desire, unless it is aspired “inordi-
nately and immoderately” (DM 16.2 ad 4), wanting to obtain it through one’s own
natural abilities.

Thomas’s succinctly states the main points of his explanation:

DM 16.2 ad 1; ad 4. It is not sufficient that the object of the act be good (i.e. what
one does). It is also required that the mode or order of the act (how one does it)
be good. In other words, the will is good when it does what is good (bonum facit)
and when the manner of the act is good (bene facit), see In Sent. 2.7.1.2; ST
Ia.64.2 ad 5. The manner of the act depends mostly on the end, i.e. the reason for
which one acts. For the role of object and end in constituting a moral act, see
Gallagher 1994a, 37–60.

For the rule as divine wisdom, see DM 16.2 ad 1; DM 16.2 ad 4. In DM 16.2 ad 7,
Thomas describes the rule as divine government, and in ST Ia.63.1 ad 4 as the di-
vine will. – In the SCG and later he explains angelic sin as disobedience to the
higher rule of God’s wisdom and will. In the early Sentences Commentary
(written 1252–56, see Torrell 2005, 45), he accounts for the peccability of angels
and humans without reference to a higher rule, In Sent. 2.23.1.1. There he ex-
plains angelic sin as an error electionis, owing to a failure to consider certain fea-
tures of an object indicating that it ought not be chosen, In Sent. 2.5.1.1 co. and
ad 4.

ST Ia.63.2. See also DM 16.3 lines 235 f. For Thomas’s explanation of pride, see
Weithman 1996.

ST Ia.63.2; see also In Sent. 2.5.1.3. In the Summa theologiae pride and envy ap-
pear as the only possible sins of angels, but in the SCG 3.109, Thomas mentions
besides pride and envy also hate of God for punishing the demons “and many
other sins” which he does not specify.

That the inordinate desire consisted in the aspiration of supernatural happiness
(supernaturalis beatitudo) is stated most clearly in De malo (16.3 lines 242 f.). Ear-
lier, Thomas makes the same point without using this technical term, apparently
in order to reserve the term ‘desire of supernatural happiness’ for the desire of

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135

All angels were instituted such that they immediately at the moment of their cre-
ation had everything proper to their nature, although they had potentiality for
supernatural goods that they could obtain through God’s grace. And so the only
possible explanation is that the devil’s sin regarded something supernatural, not
something belonging to the order of nature. Therefore, the devil’s first sin was
that, to attain the supernatural happiness consisting of the full vision of God, he
did not elevate himself to God so as to desire with holy angels his ultimate perfec-
tion through God’s grace. Rather, he wanted to attain his ultimate perfection by
the power of his own nature without God bestowing grace, although not without
God acting on his nature.

The fact that the angels could only sin by desiring something pertaining to the super-
natural order does not contradict their natural ability to sin.

It is by nature possible

to desire something beyond the limits of one’s nature. To use an example of Aquinas
out of context, a person may desire to fly (by his own power), although (unassisted)
flying transcends natural human capacities (cf. DV 24.12 lines 280 f.). Rational crea-
tures can always desire something beyond their finite capacities.

2. Intellect and Will: The Origin of Angelic Sin

After these remarks about the nature of angels and their ability to sin,
we can now investigate the origin of their sin by analyzing the interac-
tion between their intellect and will at the moment when some angels
sinned and others did not. This will bring to light how Thomas ac-
counts for the voluntary character of the act by which the angels either
fell or were confirmed in the good.

The problem of whether the act is

happiness qua gift of grace, see In Sent. 2.5.1.2 (perfectio beatitudinis); ST Ia.63.8
ad 2 (ultima beatitudo). It is only verbally contrary to the De malo when Thomas
says in the Summa theologiae that the angels sinned by turning away from God as
object of supernatural happiness (ST Ia.63.1 ad 3), i.e. they refused happiness as
a gratuitous gift. See also SCG 3.110.

DM 16.3 (Leonine edition, lines 214f.; transl. Regan, 456, slightly emended). See
also DM 16.2 ad 4; ST Ia.63.1 ad 3; ibid., 63.3; ibid., 63.8 ad 2.

Regarding the natural ability of the angels to sin, see Maritain 1956, 998f.; de la
Trinité 1957; Journet 1958; Marieb 1964.

See de la Trinité 1957, 72 f.

Thomas’s basic definition of the voluntary is this: “ad rationem voluntarii
requiritur quod principium actus sit intra, cum aliqua cognitione finis” (ST
IaIIae.6.2). The voluntary extends to brute animals and human beings. Yet in
brute animals, voluntariness is found only imperfectly, because they cannot
rationally evaluate their ends and tend towards them without prior deliberation
(ibid.; DV 24.1–2). Hence for animals, all voluntary action is predetermined,
which is however not the case for humans (see note 76 below).

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contingent and avoidable will not be fully engaged until the third sec-
tion of the paper. I will consider the defect of the angels’ intellect and of
the will separately, examining above all to what extent these defects are
voluntary and sinful.

2.1. The Defect of the Angelic Intellect

Though the angelic intellect can neither undergo ignorance, nor make
erroneous judgments prior to sinning, it can be defective by failing to
consider specific portions of its habitual knowledge. In his entire
oeuvre, Thomas recurs to this solution.

To posit a cognitive defect

prior to a defective and hence sinful will allows him to reconcile the
possibility of angelic sin with his fundamental conviction (as stated
above in principles 2 and 3) that the will desires its object under the ap-
pearance of the good and that it cannot be inclined contrary to what the
intellect judges as best to do here and now. Though the Aristotelian
adage omnis malus ignorans does not apply to angelic sin, there is never-
theless a proportion between sin and some cognitive defect: “regarding
sin, defect of intellect or reason and defect of will always accompany
one another proportionately”

What the demons failed to consider prior to their evil choice is not a

negative feature of that which they desired, because there is nothing un-
desirable in it (i.e. in happiness). Rather they failed to consider some-
thing apart from this object, namely the rule of God’s will:

There are two ways in which sin can occur in an act of free decision. In one way if
something evil is chosen, as when a man sins by choosing to commit adultery,
which is evil in itself. And sin of this kind always follows upon some ignorance or
error; otherwise what is evil would not be chosen as good. […] The other way in
which sin can occur through free decision is by the choice of something good in
itself, but apart from the order of the appropriate measure or rule. In this case the
defect that leads to sin lies not in the thing chosen, but rather in the choosing
itself, which is not appropriately ordered. For example, someone might choose to
pray without heed to some ruling of the Church. Now sins of this kind do not
necessarily presuppose ignorance; all that they necessarily presuppose is that one
does not consider what one ought to consider (absentiam solum cognitionis eorum
quae considerari debent). And it was thus that the angel sinned: of his own free

In Sent. 2.5.1.1 ad 4; SCG 3.110; ST Ia.63.1 ad 4; DM 16.2 ad 4 and ad 5.

DM 16.2 ad 4 (English text: transl. Regan, 450). See also In Sent. 2.5.1.1; DM
16.6 ad 11; DM 16.6 ad s.c. 6.

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decision he turned himself toward his own good without regard for the rule of the
divine will.

Thomas’s point here is that in full consideration of the rule of action,

i.e. without any cognitive defect whatsoever, the angels could not have
sinned. To trace the origin of the act of angelic sin, it is therefore crucial
to look more deeply into the relation between sin and the lack of con-
sideration of the higher rule. In this regard, there are three pivotal ques-
tions. Two regard the will’s involvement in the cognitive defect: (1) is the
defect of the intellect voluntary, i.e. was it in the power of the angels to
consider the rule or not? (2) Can the lack of consideration be con-
sidered in itself a sin, or is it merely a necessary condition for sin? The
third question concerns the will’s act posterior to the cognitive defect:
(3) does the absence of consideration of the rule by necessity entail a de-
fective will (i.e. sin), as a per se effect of inattention, or does sin require
a condition in addition to the non-consideration, a condition which
may or may not obtain?

Only if the first question is answered affirmatively and the second

and third questions negatively can angelic sin be characterized as vol-
untary, as the following considerations should show. First, if the lack of
attention to the rule of action were not in the persons’ control, then the
agents would not have in their power to proceed to a choice in full at-
tention of the relevant factors. Whatever act of choice be made, it would
then be sinful. Second, if the inattention were voluntary and sinful in
itself, then it is this sin that would have to be accounted for. Under the
presupposition that lack of attention is a necessary condition for sin,
this would lead to an infinite regress. Third, if lack of attention inevi-
tably led to a sinful choice, then sin has its source primarily in the lack
of consideration and not in the choice that follows upon it. Conse-
quently, the inattention would have to be considered in itself sinful
(provided that it is voluntary), because something voluntary that has
evil as a per se effect is sinful (cf. ST IaIIae.20.5). If the inattention were
involuntary and a per se cause of sin, then sin would not be avoidable, a
consequence that Thomas considers unacceptable.

In what follows, I intend to show that Thomas answers in fact,

at least implicitly, (1) affirmatively and (2) and (3) negatively. This
requires me to take also texts into account where Thomas discusses lack

ST Ia.63.1 ad 4 (English text: transl. Blackfriars, 9: 251, emended). See also DM
16.2 ad 1, ad 4, ad 5, and ad 7.

See section 3.1 below.

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

of attention outside of the context of angelic sin. Thus it will appear
that, in Thomas’s view, the evil choice of the demons involves a contin-
gent act of the will in addition to the lack of consideration. What moti-
vates this act is the puzzling question.

2.2. The Will’s Control of the Cognitive Defect

Was the lack of consideration voluntary and avoidable or was it un-
avoidable? To answer this question, we must first ask whether the con-
sideration of the rule is voluntary. To qualify it as voluntary presup-
poses that the knowledge of the rule was accessible to the angels and
that it was in the power of their will to take it into account.

That Tho-

mas considered it knowable is implied by his choice of words: he de-
scribes the failure to attend to it as non-consideration rather than as
nescience.

In addition, the possibility to pay attention to it is insinu-

ated in the text quoted above: the rule was to be considered (ST Ia.63.1
ad 4). That the angels were supposed to consider the rule is also said in
the De malo:

And substances without bodies have only one kind of knowledge, namely, intel-
lectual knowledge, which is to be directed (dirigenda) according to the rule of
God’s wisdom. And so their will can be evil from the fact that it does not follow
the ordination of a higher rule, namely, God’s wisdom. And demons in this way
became evil by their will.

For Thomas, ‘ought’ implies ‘can’; one is not obliged to do what is
impossible, nor is one responsible for an omission of what was not in
one’s power to do (ST IIaIIae.79.3 ad 2). The rule was not only know-
able, but the actual consideration of it was subject to the will. It is in
fact in the power of the will to move the intellect to the consideration of
an object.

Hence the actual consideration of the rule must be qualified

as voluntary.

What about the failure to attend to the rule – was it an active dismis-

sal rather than a mere lack of awareness? Hardly could the sinning an-

According to Aquinas, the necessary and sufficient conditions for a voluntary ac-
tion are that the action results from a movement of the appetitive power with
prior knowledge of the cognitive power, Sententia libri Ethicorum 3.1, lines 70 f.;
ST IaIIae.6.1–2.

For the notion of nescience, see note 35 above.

DM 16.2 (Leonine edition, lines 300f.; English text: transl. Regan, 449, emended).

DM 6.1 lines 343 f.; ST IaIIae.9.1.

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139

gels have dismissed the rule and decided to ‘act in a state of unaware-
ness.’ At the moment that one dismisses information, one is at least
generally aware of this information. Moreover, the decision to neglect
relevant information is itself a deprived act, a sin that in turn requires
explanation. Hence the cognitive defect does not seem itself directly in-
tended and consciously chosen.

Was it nevertheless voluntary? An omission can be voluntary with-

out being chosen: one can fail to act without a decision to refrain from
acting.

Failing to consider the divine rule must be described in these

terms: a voluntary non-consideration that was not directly intended.

If the inattention was voluntary, was it a sin? The two above quotes

speak of an obligation to pay attention to the rule of God; does this ob-
ligation hold unconditionally? If it does, then this lack of attention is in-
deed a sin in itself and could be characterized as thoughtlessness (incon-
sideratio) owing to negligence, each of which is a sin by itself (peccatum
speciale, see ST IIaIIae.53.4; ibid., 54.1). Yet it is more plausible that the
obligation to attend to the rule holds only with regard to the moment
when one actually makes a choice that requires attention to the rule, or
better: the obligation is not to proceed to make a choice without con-
sidering the rule. As Thomas specifies, thoughtlessness is a sin only
when one fails to attend to the factors that allow one to judge correctly
in practical matters (ST IIaIIae.53.4 ad 3). Hence thoughtlessness of the
rule of action when one is not performing an action does not seem to be
a sin.

In accordance with this, both previous quotations state that sin is

consequent upon the non-consideration of the rule: sin presupposes in-
attention (ST Ia.63.1 ad 4); the will can become evil if it does not follow
the rule (DM 16.2). How it can become evil is to be considered next.

2.3. The Will Posterior to the Intellect’s Defect

The third problem mentioned above is the question of whether sin
necessarily follows upon non-consideration of the higher rule. Is this
lack of consideration merely a necessary condition for the will’s defi-
ciency or rather its sufficient cause?

ST IaIIae.6.3, esp. ad 3: “sicut non velle et non agere, cum tempus fuerit, est vol-
untarium, ita etiam non considerare”. See also ST IaIIae.6.8; DM 2.1 lines 236 f.

For an explicit statement by Thomas to this effect, see note 66 below.

For a general discussion of Thomas’s view that the non-consideration of the rule
of action lies at the origin of sin, see Maritain 1942, 24–37.

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

Thomas addresses this problem explicitly outside of the particular

context of angelic sin, namely in his discussion of the good as the cause
of evil. Tracing back any sin-human or angelic – to its first cause leads
to a will which is sinful because of a non-consideration of the rule of ac-
tion. Thomas states this repeatedly, though most clearly in DM 1.3,
where he discusses the cause of moral evil with particular attention to
human psychology.

Thomas explains that evil can be caused by previous evil; yet the first

cause of evil is not something evil, but rather something good which
causes evil incidentally: “[G]ood is the accidental cause of every evil”
(On Evil, 71; DM 1.3 lines 196 f.). Something good is the accidental
cause of evil either insofar as it is an “accidental efficient cause” (per
accidens agens, as fire destroys that which it burns, though fire aims at
spreading fire and not at destruction), or insofar as it is a deficient
cause (deficiens, as a defective seed causes a malformed offspring). With
regard to voluntary causes, the good may be either an accidental effi-
cient cause or a deficient cause of evil. The former is the case when the
will tends to something which as such is bad, though good from a cer-
tain perspective (as fornication is bad simply, yet good qua pleasur-
able). By contrast, the good is a deficient cause of evil when there is a
defect in the will prior to the evil choice.

The first possibility, that something good is an accidental cause of

evil, does not apply to the fall of the angels, since – at least before they
sinned – angels cannot have erroneous judgments and cannot appre-
hend as good what in truth is bad. But in angels, something good can be
a deficient cause of evil: a will that contains a certain defect. This defect
in the will consists in not making use of the rule of action. Thomas ar-
gues that this defect, the non-consideration of the rule, does not itself
constitute moral evil; he thus avoids the infinite regress of explaining
sin by previous sin. As long as the will does not proceed to a deficient
election, its failure to pay attention to the rule of action is not morally
evil:

And absolutely considered, not actually attending to such a rule is itself not evil,
neither fault nor punishment (nec culpa nec poena), since the soul is not held, nor
is it able, always actually to attend to such a rule. But not attending to the rule first
takes on the aspect of evil because the soul proceeds to make a moral choice with-
out actually considering the rule. Just so, the craftsman errs because he proceeds

For a close analysis of this text, see Dewan 1995.

DM 1.3; SCG 3.10; ST Ia.49.1; ST IaIIae.75.1. For an account of the Neo-
Platonic background of Thomas’s explanation of the cause of evil, see Steel 1994.

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141

to cut the piece of wood without using the measuring bar, not because he does not
always use the bar. And likewise, the moral fault of the will consists in the fact that
the will proceeds to choose without using the rule of reason or God’s law, not
simply in the fact that the will does not actually attend to the rule.

The lack of consideration alone does not of necessity entail the evil
election, since it was not necessary that the will proceeded to choose at
the moment of the non-awareness of the higher rule: at that moment, it
had the freedom to act or not, just as at the moment of action, it had the
freedom to consider the rule or not. The crucial point is not the lack of
consideration of the rule by itself, but rather that an agent can proceed
to the act without considering the higher rule. What causes him or her
to do so? Nothing external to the agent:

And there is no need to seek a cause of this non-use of the aforementioned rule,
since the very freedom of the will (libertas voluntatis), by which it can act or not
act, is enough to explain the non-use.

The freedom of the will to lead the intellect’s attention in one way or
the other should not be considered unmotivated.

The rule of action is

worthy of consideration. This is a sufficient motive for taking it into ac-
count. The failure to do so does not require a direct motive, as though
the non-consideration was intended. The will can fail to act without de-
ciding not to act.

How was the failure to consider the divine rule at play in angelic

choice? Only in the relatively early Summa contra Gentiles does Thomas
indicate a positive reason for the demons’ lack of attention: the inten-
sive focus on themselves.

Yet this explanation risks being circular: the

demons could commit a sin of pride because they failed to consider the
rule of God, and they did not consider the rule because of an excessive
focus on themselves.

DM 1.3 (Leonine edition, lines 271f.; English text: transl. Regan, 72, slightly
emended). See also In Sent. 2.34.1.3; SCG 2.41; SCG 3.10; In De divinis nomini-
bus 4.22; ST Ia.49.1 ad 3; ST IaIIae.75.1 ad 3.

DM 1.3 (Leonine edition, lines 268f.; English text: On Evil, 71 f.).

For a lucid, though not entirely conclusive explanation of the intellect’s causal
role in the lack of consideration of the rule, see Bergamino 2002, 268 f.

See note 61 above.

SCG 3.110: “Cuius quidem inconsiderationis ratio esse potuit voluntas in pro-
prium bonum intense conversa: est enim liberum voluntati in hoc vel illud con-
verti. Patet etiam quod non appetiit aliquod bonum nisi unum, quod est sibi
proprium: sed in hoc fuit peccatum, quod praetermisit superius bonum, in quod
debuit ordinari.”

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

In the De malo, Aquinas does not trace the lack of consideration to

the proud self-absorption of the demons, but rather conversely, he ex-
plains the possibility of the demons’ pride by the lack of attention. Not
considering the fact that supernatural happiness was to be received as a
gratuitous gift, they did not desire to receive it from divine grace but
wanted to attain it by their own power. Thereby they desired to be equal
to God; to possess the definitive happiness by nature is in fact proper to
God alone.

If the non-consideration of the rule is not a sufficient, but merely a necessary con-

dition for sin, then even the good angels may at a certain moment have failed to con-
sider the higher rule, yet under this hypothesis, they would have considered it again at
the moment of their active desire for supernatural happiness. Since this possibility in-
volves the succession of different moments in the angel’s operations, we must take
into account that there were only a limited number of acts of intellect and will that
led to the definitive confirmation in beatitude of the good angels and to the fall of the
demons. Angels are subject to time – a time which does not have an independent
measure outside the angels (as is the movement of the outermost sphere of the uni-
verse for material beings, according to medieval cosmology), but which is rather
measured by the succession of the acts of intellect and will (DM 16.4 lines 339 f.). The
angels could not sin in the first moment of their existence, because the first operation
of their intellect and will was ‘connatural’ to them, and in the natural order they were
not subject to sin.

In this first moment of their existence, there is no distinction be-

tween good and bad angels. Although Thomas does not pronounce himself with re-
gard to the hypothesis that both the yet to be good or bad angels may or may not
have taken into account the higher rule of God in this first moment, it is consistent
with his account of angelic sin. In the second moment, in which Thomas thinks that
the separation between good and bad angels occurred,

the good angels performed

an act of charity by which they merited supernatural happiness (ST Ia.62.4 ad 2,
ibid., 62.5) in full consideration of the divine rule, whereas the demons, while not
considering the rule, proceeded to their inordinate and immoderate desire for super-
natural happiness.

See note 49 above, and DM 16.3 lines 235 f.: “Et quia habere finalem beatitudi-
nem per uirtutem sue nature, non ex gratia alicuius superioris, est proprium Deo,
manifestum est quod quantum ad hoc appetiit diabolus Dei equalitatem”.

DM 16.4 lines 357 f.; ST Ia.63.5; ST Ia.63.6. See also note 49 above. For the dif-
ferent stages of angelic knowledge until their supernatural confirmation or their
fall, see Faes de Mottoni 1992. Though the angels could not sin in the first mo-
ment of their existence, they could however already exercise free decision (lib-
erum arbitrium), DM 16.4 lines 276 f.

Thomas states this explicitly in ST Ia.63.6. It is implicit also in DM 16.4.

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

143

3. Angelic Free Decision and Contingency

So far, this paper has concentrated on the voluntary and self-deter-
mined character of angelic sin and how this sin could occur. In this sec-
tion I will examine in which sense this act was contingent. I will attempt
to show that Thomas intends to attribute to rational agents alternative
possibilities of action – at least with regard to some acts – and how he
does so. It will then be asked whether his account implies determinism,
despite his efforts to avoid it. Finally, the precise notion of contingency
at work in his account will be analyzed. The problem of the motivation
of good or bad action will receive special attention, in order to show
that a choice can be contingent and nevertheless motivated.

3.1. Why Contingent Choice Matters to Thomas

Those angels who fell did so because of their free decision (DM 16.2; ST Ia.63.4–5).
Might it be the case that the angels sinned by their own will, but that they could not
have willed differently? Were some angels at the moment in which they made the deci-
sion unable to avoid sinning, whereas others could not but choose well? Was their
decision free, but nevertheless predetermined and without alternative possibilities?
In other words, can angelic sin be interpreted within a compatibilist framework?
Only if the act was chosen among alternative possibilities (i.e. to act or not to act; to
choose this or that) is it the case that the act was not determined to one outcome, and
only if the act was not so determined was is chosen contingently.

In the case of an-

gelic free decision, what is at stake is not merely the problem of moral responsibility
for the action, but above all whether the eternal destiny of an angel (beatitude or
wretchedness) depends on their free decision.

That an act was avoidable and that an agent could have done otherwise can mean

two different things. Could a different choice have been made under the exact same
set of conditions (synchronic contingency) or only under changed conditions (dia-
chronic contingency)?

If it were the latter, then a choice among alternative possibil-

ities may be done in a deterministic way after all. An act may in fact have resulted

For Aquinas, a contingent cause is not determined to one outcome, see note 6
above.

For the notion of synchronic contingency in late medieval philosophy, see
Knuuttila 1993, 143 f. Synchronic contingency was theorized only after Aquinas,
by Peter John Olivi and John Duns Scotus, see Dumont 1995. In his response to
Dumont, MacDonald 1995, 170, offers a useful formalization of the two notions
of contingency: “Synchronic view: X is contingent (at t) if (and only if) X occurs
at t and it is possible (at t) that the opposite of X occurs at t. Diachronic view: X is
contingent (at t

) if (and only if) X occurs at t

and it is possible (at t

) that the op-

posite of X occurs at t

(where t

and t

are different).”

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

necessarily from the sum of factors of a given situation, and the alternative act may
have been caused necessarily from the factors of the changed situation. A brute ani-
mal can pursue or avoid an object (alternative possibilities). But when the object is
perceived as pleasurable, it cannot but pursue it; when it is perceived as disagreeable,
it cannot but avoid it (DM 6.1 lines 297 f.). Likewise, a dog can bark or remain silent,
but when it is incited, it cannot but bark. Thomas calls this condicionata libertas
(DV 24.2 lines 119 f.). It falls under the description of diachronic contingency. This
“conditioned freedom” is compatible with determinism. Thomas does in fact hold
that animal movement is determined from the outside.

Diachronic alternative possibilities are compatible with determinism, but syn-

chronic ones are not. While the compatibilist paradigm is apt to describe the condi-
tioned freedom of brute animals, in Thomas’s view it fails as a description of liberum
arbitrium. At the very beginning of the corpus articuli of DM 6.1, Thomas discusses
an anonymous position that defends determinism. According to this view, the
human will is moved by necessity to make a specific choice, without the choice being
constrained, since constraint implies that the principle of the act is outside the agent,
whereas voluntariness merely requires that the principle of the act be inside the
agent. Thomas fervently rejects this position.

But even admitting indeterminism in principle, how can we know whether an act is

in fact not predetermined? In many cases it may be hard or impossible to establish
whether an action was truly avoidable. There are two limit cases of acts by rational
creatures, however, that can be safely classified as either chosen from alternative
possibilities or as elicited without alternative. According to Thomas, the love of God
in the beatific vision lacks alternative possibilities: the blessed cannot but love God.

An act of sin, by contrast, presupposes alternative possibilities, for the notion of sin
implies the ability to avoid the individual act of sin.

Although the capacity to avoid

sinning is diminished for human beings due to original sin,

Thomas regards sin as

According to Thomas, the animal appetite and hence animal behavior is deter-
mined by the heavenly bodies, DM 6.1 lines 398 f.: “Ponere autem quod uoluntas
hominum moueatur ex impressione celestis, sicut appetitus brutorum animalium
mouentur, est secundum opinionem ponentium non differre intellectum a sensu.”
See also DV 24.2 lines 121 f.

DM 6.1 lines 238 f.

DV 24.8 lines 127 f.

See, e.g., ST IaIIae.74.3 ad 2: “hoc solum sufficit ad rationem peccati voluntarii,
quod possit vitare singulos”. – What is called in contemporary philosophy the
‘Principle of Alternative Possibilities’ (PAP) is thus upheld by Aquinas with re-
gard to sin, though it is not required for every free act.

Thomas does not unqualifiedly subscribe to an adage that he frequently cites in
objections and that he attributes to Augustine, according to which “nobody sins
with regard to that which he could not avoid (nullus peccat in eo quod vitare non
potest)”, cf. Augustine, De libero arbitrio 3.18.50, CCL 29: 304 lines 9 f. Thomas
cites this adage frequently in the introductory arguments (e.g., DV 17.4 arg.8;
ibid. 24.12 s.c. 7; ST IaIIae.74.3 arg.2; IIaIIae.156.2 arg.1; DM 7.6 arg.8). The
precise meaning of ‘to avoid’ is in fact ambiguous. After original sin (secundum

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

145

voluntary and avoidable at least in the sense that the disposition that caused the sin-
ful act was avoidable (for this restriction, see, e. g., DV 17.4 ad 8). The act of angelic
sin was accordingly eminently avoidable: there was no disposition whatsoever that
would have made the sinning angel unable to avoid this act.

Accordingly, the voluntary evil choice of some angels must be considered a con-

tingent act, which means that it was possible for them to avoid it. At least with regard
to acts of sin, Thomas has to be considered a non-compatibilist. He may be called a
libertarian, if one considers it congruent with libertarianism that certain choices ex-
clude alternative possibilities, that they are motivated by reasons, and that each act of
choice is caused not by the agent alone, but also by God’s primary causality, which,
according to Thomas, does not impede the contingent self-determination of rational
creatures, but rather makes it possible.

3.2. The Action Theoretical Explanation of Contingent Choice

As has been seen above, the coherence of his explanation of angelic sin
requires Thomas to account for alternative possibilities. Does his ac-
tion theory offer him the tools to do so? This is to be considered now.
The key point for Thomas is that it is up to the person on which motives
he or she acts.

It is not puzzling as such that some angels did not consider the rule of

action, nor that they desired supernatural perfection. What calls for
elucidation is the combination of the two: the failure to pay attention to
the rule when an action is performed that is to be regulated. What moti-
vated this?

statum naturae corruptae), the human capacity to avoid sin is diminished. Of each
sin it may still be said that it can be avoided, yet without grace one cannot avoid
sinning for long (see DV 24.12–13; for Thomas’s definitive position, see ST
IaIIae.109.8–10). Before original sin (secundum statum naturae integrae), it was
possible to avoid sinning altogether, even without grace (ST IaIIae.109.8).

For the compatibility of freedom with lack of alternative possibilities, see Stump
2003, 304 f. – Although the problem of the divine primary causality in acts of free
decision is of great importance, it cannot be adequately addressed in this paper.
That the divine causality in a rational creature’s acts of free decision does not
undermine its contingent self-determined character has been convincingly ar-
gued by Shanley 1998 and Wright 1999. With regard to God’s primary causality
on created free decision, Aquinas has frequently been characterized as a com-
patibilist, since he considers acts of free decision to be caused by God, see, e.g.,
Kenny 1993, 77; Loughran 1999. Even if his account is compatibilist in this re-
gard, this implies neither the denial of contingent self-determination, as Shanley
and Wright have shown, nor does it entail that sin must be imputed to God rather
than to the creature, see ST Ia.63.5; DM 16.4 ad 4 and ad 6.

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

Neither the good act of the faithful angels, nor the bad act of the sin-

ning angels, is unmotivated. Both desired supernatural happiness.
Hence at one level, the known goodness of such happiness is what moti-
vates the acts of both. Now the good angels humbly subjected them-
selves to the divine rule, whereas the evil ones, overlooking it, com-
mitted a sin of pride. The motive of their pride was their own
excellence.

What was in turn the reason for their being absorbed by

their own excellence instead of heeding the divine rule? Can one go any
further in finding a reason for their act?

The question of how far one can trace the motivating causes of an-

gelic sin is connected to the question of contingency and self-determi-
nation. If the causes of the decision can be traced entirely to causes out-
side of the agent, causes that unfailingly produce their effect in the
person, then the decision is not contingently caused by the person. (The
decision may nevertheless be a contingent event, caused by contingent
circumstances, but this alone does not make the act imputable to the
person.

) Conversely, if the agent makes the decision contingently,

then the choice cannot be entirely accounted for by preceding causes
outside the agent, as though the agent did not contribute anything to
making this particular decision.

Regarding the contingent self-determination of the angels, the main

question is this: was the specific choice of the good or the evil angel
caused deterministically by the motive that was in fact in the angel’s at-
tention at the moment of choice? In more general terms: does the rea-
son which in fact motivates a decision cause the decision of necessity so
that the decision could not have been motivated by a different reason?

Thomas denies this. Anything perceived as good and fitting can spec-

ify the will’s act, i.e. it can motivate the will to adhere to this specific ob-
ject. It is in this sense that the intellect moves the will.

Yet the will can

move the intellect from one consideration to another.

Hence even at

the moment when a specific reason is in the person’s consideration, this
reason does not motivate of necessity so that the will could not will its
opposite:

ST Ia.63.7: “Fuit enim Daemonum peccatum superbia […] cuius motivum est
excellentia”. See also DM 16.2 ad 13: “peccant […] allecti […] a pulcritudine
sue nature.”

ST Ia.105.4 ad 3: “si voluntas ita moveretur ab alio quod ex se nullatenus
moveretur, opera voluntatis non imputarentur ad meritum vel demeritum.”

DM 6.1 lines 339 f.; 418 f. See also note 22 above.

See note 60 above.

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

147

But if the good is such as not to be found good in every conceivable particular, it
will not necessarily move the will even regarding the specification of the act. This
is so because a person will be able to will its contrary, even when thinking about it,
since the contrary is perhaps good or suitable regarding some other particular
consideration.

Thomas emphasizes that the possibility to will differently holds despite
the fact that one has a sufficient motive for willing a specific object:

Not every cause brings about an effect of necessity, even if it is a sufficient cause,
since the cause can be prevented from sometimes achieving its effect. […] There-
fore, it does not have to be the case that the cause, which makes the will will some-
thing, do so of necessity, since the will itself can present an obstacle, whether by
removing the consideration that induces the will to will it or by considering the
contrary, namely, that what is presented as good is not good in some respect.

Thomas explains here that an act of free decision is contingent and why
it is so. How do the preceding considerations apply to the sin of angels?
The motive for their sin of pride is their own excellence. There is no
need to look for a more particular motive as to why the proud angels
focused on their own excellence. Only the general desire for happiness
and the perception that their own excellence could be conducive to it
may serve as a further explanation.

Good and bad angels acted for a reason, then, but the bad angels did

not act for the best reason. The bad angels “abandoned what was better”

Had they considered the case at hand more carefully, they would have real-
ized that their motivation was inadequate. The failure to reconsider their
action in light of the divine rule need not be directly intended; it is never-
theless voluntary, since it was possible for them to be more attentive.

3.3. Intellectualism or Voluntarism?

Since the particular consideration that specifies the choice depends
on the way in which the will leads the intellect’s attention, one might
further ask what motivated the will to focus on a specific reason or mo-

DM 6.1 (Leonine edition, lines 441f.; English text: transl. Regan, 260, slightly
emended).

DM 6.1 ad 15 (English text: transl. Regan, 262, emended). For an extensive dis-
cussion of this text, see Bergamino 2002, ch. 5.

DM 16.3 ad 10: the devil “deseruit meliora, quia scilicet melior est regula divinae
iustitiae quam regula voluntatis angelicae.”

See note 61 above.

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

tive. When the person has a sufficient reason for an action and the will
leads the consideration away from it (cf. DM 6.1 ad 15), the will’s initi-
ative to change the focus of attention is not uncaused. What causes it?

It is at this point that whoever attempts to comprehend Aquinas’s

account of free decision more fully wishes that Thomas had provided
a more detailed explanation.

Had he done so, he could have been

clearly classified as either a voluntarist or an intellectualist. That he
does not intend to be determinist is clear from DM 6.1, among other
texts. Whether in the last analysis he is successful depends on whether
he admits that the change of consideration which shapes an act of free
decision cannot be traced to necessitating causes.

There are two possible explanations for what causes the change of

consideration. One is to say that what accounts for the change of focus
is the content of the altered consideration that is habitually present to
the intellect. The new consideration is more appealing to the will. An-
other explanation would be to say that an additional reason is needed
to motivate the change of perspective.

This second hypothesis ex-

plains the activity of the will entirely by antecedent cognitive states,
whereas the first hypothesis does not exclude a certain spontaneity in
the will to direct the focus on one rather than the other consideration,
albeit without stipulating that such an activity of the will is unmoti-
vated and unmoved. In addition, according to this explanation, each
act of the will is preceded and informed by the intellect,

yet not in such

a way that the intellect determines it to one activity.

When discussing human free decision, Aquinas indeed traces the ac-

tivity of the will to a series of acts by the intellect: a specific choice
is preceded by deliberation; the decision to start deliberating is in turn
preceded by an anterior deliberation, and so forth. What is to be ex-
plained by this chain is how the will can move from potency to act, i.e.
from inactivity to activity. The first link in this chain is God’s primary
causality on the will. If Aquinas had intended to account for free deci-
sion according to an intellectual determinist framework, he could have

More explicit statements than Aquinas’s regarding the will’s control of its own
operation and thereby of the intellect are found in his student, Giles of Rome. See
Eardley 2003, esp. 854 f.

Eardley 2003, 845, explicitly attributes the latter hypothesis to Aquinas. This
hypothesis also seems to be implied by Hause 1997, 175, 177f. Hause does not
provide a text basis for his strictly intellectualist reading, but merely claims that
the voluntarist reading is not warranted by texts.

Cf. ST Ia.82.4 ad 3: “Omnem enim voluntatis motum necesse est quod praecedat
apprehensio, sed non omnem apprehensionem praecedit motus voluntatis.”

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

149

traced the series to a deterministically operative act of the intellect
rather than to God’s causality.

As Thomas insists repeatedly, God

moves the will without jeopardizing its own contingent causality.

The passage from inactivity to activity of the will requires an

antecedent cause, a reason that makes the will want to start to consider
a certain object. Yet when the object is already habitually present in
one’s intellect, the focus on one rather than another characteristic of
the object does not seem to require an antecedent cause in addition
to the object that receives special attention. Indeed Thomas nowhere
posits a chain of motives to consider a specific aspect of an object. The
efficacy of a specific motive is in fact not to be traced to ever more spe-
cific reasons, but rather to the inclination of the will to the ultimate
end.

It is by virtue of the desire for an end that the will moves itself to

consider what is apt to attain the end (ST IaIIae.9.3), and it is the desire
for the ultimate end that motivates the adherence to that which is per-
ceived as a means to this end (ST IaIIae.1.6). In other words, anything
understood as conducive to this end is able to motivate the will’s ad-
hesion to it.

Angelic rational choice can only be explained according to the first

hypothesis. That which moves the will to focus on one aspect rather
than another is the very content of such consideration. The angelic in-
tellect is not in potency to any natural knowledge and does not proceed
discursively by way of deliberation.

All the relevant factors to make

the decision are in the angel’s reach. No newly available information
can lead the angel to change perspective. The evil angels could have

Eardley’s intellectual determinist account of Aquinas’s position overlooks
the key role played by God in making the contingent activity of the will possible
(2003, 845 f.).

SCG 3.88–90; De potentia 3.7 ad 13 (in Quaestiones Disputatae, vol. 2); ST
Ia.82.4 ad 3; ST IaIIae.10.4; ibid., 17.5 ad 3; ibid., 109.2 ad 1; DM 6.1 lines 407 f.;
Expositio libri Peryermenias 1.14 lines 437 f. For secondary literature on these
texts, see Fabro 1988 and note 81 above.

ST IaIIae.17.5 ad 3: “cum imperium sit actus rationis, ille actus imperatur, qui
rationi subditur. Primus autem voluntatis actus non est ex rationis ordinatione,
sed ex instinctu naturae, aut superioris causae, ut supra dictum est.”

For the perfection of their knowledge, see note 36 above. With regard to the
knowledge that the angel has actually attained, it is no longer “in potentia essen-
tiali” (the state of the intellect prior to learning), but it can still be “in potentia ac-
cidentali”, i.e. in potency with regard to actual consideration of this knowledge.
When it is in accidental potency, it can make its knowledge actual by itself
(“potest per se exire in actum”), see DV 8.6 ad 7. For the non-discursive character
of angelic decision-making, see DM 16.4 lines 269 f.

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

considered all factors adequately, without having to do any rational
investigation, but they failed to do so. This failure is to be traced to
their will.

3.4. Free Decision and Synchronic Contingency

The rational choice that either leads to the confirmation of the good
angels or to the fall of the evil angels is not predetermined. It is contin-
gent, not necessary. In what respect is it contingent and what notion of
contingency best describes angelic choice in particular and rational
choice in general? Thomas does not provide us with a thorough analysis
of the notion of contingency involved in acts of free decision. Yet in
order to account for the free decision of angels, it is useful to attempt to
bring to light what kind of contingency is implicit in Thomas’s expla-
nation of free decision.

If one considers the act of choice in relation to the cognitive condi-

tions at the moment of choice, then contingent free decision must be de-
scribed in terms of diachronic contingency. In light of the practical
judgment of what is best to do here and now, the will’s choice conforms
to the practical judgment. A different choice is possible, provided that a
different practical judgment be made.

Yet under equal conditions –

i.e. under the same external circumstances, with the same internal dis-
positions, and in the case of humans with the same passions – different
practical judgments may be made that result in different choices.

How

so?

The way the will guides the attention of the intellect is not necessarily

defined by antecedent factors. Practical judgments and choices are
what they are because of the way one considers an object. At the outset,

See note 24 above. Pasnau 2002, 232, argues that “given the entire state of the
universe, including an individuals’s higher-order beliefs and desires, a choice will
inevitably follow”. Pasnau holds that this implies determinism. But this need not
be the case. It is true that the higher-order beliefs and desires at the moment of
choice are never contrary to the choice. Yet Aquinas argues that rational crea-
tures have control of their higher-order beliefs and desires, i.e. that these beliefs
and desires are not predetermined. Therefore rational creatures can determine
themselves to have different beliefs and desires and hence they can choose dif-
ferently, see DV 24.1 lines 288 f.; ibid., 24.2 lines 92 f. (partly quoted in note 33
above). Until one actually performs a choice, no consideration predetermines
what choice will be made, see above, 146 f.

See, e.g., ST IaIIae.10.3; ST IaIIae.13.6 ad 3; DM 6.1 lines 467 f.

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

151

the external and internal conditions were the same for the angels who
fell and for those who did not. Under these conditions, some directed
their attention to the rule when they proceeded to their act, whereas
others did not. With regard to the will’s exercise of directing the atten-
tion of the intellect and of proceeding to make a choice, synchronic
contingency seems to apply: synchronic contingency implies that it is
possible to act or not to act, or to make the choice of A or the choice of
~A, in exactly the same external (agent-independent) circumstances
and under the same internal conditions. The internal conditions in-
clude not only dispositions, but also cognitive states: what the intellect
actually considers and how it judges. Whatever the external or internal
conditions of the angels at the first moment of their creation, the will is
free to direct or not direct the attention of the intellect to the relevant
rule of action at that moment. In the second moment, while some are
not attending to the rule, their intellect is free to judge or not to judge
that a specific choice is to be made, and therefore their will is free to
proceed or not to proceed to the act of choice. Their attitudes with re-
gard to the rule and their choice are not traceable to a previous cogni-
tive state, but only to their libertas voluntatis.

If it were traceable to an

antecedent cognitive state, it would have to be the cognitive conditions
at the moment of their creation. According to Thomas, in the first mo-
ment or their existence the act of the angelic intellect was self-knowl-
edge and the act of the angels’ will was adherence to the naturally per-
ceived good (ST Ia.63.6 ad 3 and ad 4). At this moment, there is
nothing that distinguishes the cognitive states of those who a moment
later were confirmed in the good or of those who then fell. Yet in the
second moment, the decisive act of free decision was made.

100

The con-

tent of this act cannot be traced to the previous cognitive state, since
that state was the same for all. Every attempt to trace the act of free
decision to deterministic factors antecedent to this choice fails in the
case of angelic sin.

101

See note 67 above.

100

See note 73 above. For a detailed interpretative analysis of the moments in the
angel’s operation towards their definitive confirmation in the good or in evil, see
Maritain 1956, 1017f.

101

Without mentioning the notions of diachronic and synchronic contingency, a
similar interpretation of free decision as underpinned by free consideration is
elaborated in great detail by Laporte 1931–34. Such as view is also advanced by
Gallagher 1994b.

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To b i a s H o ff m a n n

Conclusion

The study of angelic sin has provided us a close-up view of the interre-
lation of intellect, the will, and their object in free decision. It sheds light
on how Thomas’s theory of action accounts for contingent self-deter-
mined choice of rational agents: under the same circumstances, equally
disposed rational agents made different choices. The ultimate reason
for this difference lies in their free decision alone.

Although human and angelic choice is exercised differently, the ac-

tion-theoretic principles that apply to human and angelic free decision
are comparable, because both angels and humans are rational crea-
tures. Aquinas did not need to modify the principles of his action the-
ory substantially in order to accommodate angelic sin.

102

He explained

it within the framework of his general account of free decision and of
the cause of moral evil. At the core of human and angelic choice alike is
the interaction of intellect and will in light of an object that is perceived
as good. Defective choice has a common trait as well: like angelic sin,
human sin presupposes a voluntary lack of consideration of the rule of
action.

103

Since his theory of action provides the tools for the contin-

gent self-determined act of angelic choice, there is no theoretical con-
straint on Aquinas to deny contingent self-determination in human free
decision.

In short: Aquinas’s account of free decision is not determinist. This

is at the same time a fortunate and a troubling result. If the good or evil
choice of the angels had not depended on them, it would be hard to see
how they could have earned eternal satisfaction or eternal frustration
from something that did not lie in their power to do or to avoid. On the
other hand, the contingent aspect of their choice poses a challenge with
regard to its rationality. Angelic choice, and acts of free decision in gen-
eral, seem to be rational up to a point, but not intelligible through and
through. What is puzzling in angelic sin is not the desire for supernatu-
ral happiness. The desire for perfection is natural. Yet what cannot be
entirely accounted for is why the evil angels desired happiness immod-
erately. Aquinas adduces as a motive the desire for excellence that is
characteristic of pride. Yet such inordinate desire was possible only as
long as the demons failed to consider the higher rule. What moved them

102

Contrary to Bowlin’s stipulation with regard to the analogous case of Adam’s
sin, see note 8 above.

103

SCG 3.10; ST Ia.49.1; ST IaIIae.75.1; DM 1.3.

Aquinas and Intellectual Determinism

153

to their evil choice in disregard of the rule of action? Why did they not
evaluate their own practical judgment and thereby consider its deprav-
ity? In a word: why did they let themselves be motivated by an inad-
equate motive rather than by a good one? The preference for one reason
over another is not traceable to a cause other than the person who
makes the choice. Good and bad angels acted for a reason, but why
only some acted for an adequate reason, while others acted for an inad-
equate one, escapes full intelligibility: there is no reason why some
focused exaggeratedly on themselves instead of paying attention to the
divine rule, other than that they were absorbed in themselves. All Aqui-
nas does to shed light on the mysterious evil choice is to provide a stat-
istical consideration:

More angels remained good than sinned, because sin is against the natural incli-
nation; and what is unnatural happens only in the minority of cases, for nature ob-
tains its effect either always or for the most part.

104

Even if Thomas is free from the charge of intellectual determinism,
matters are far from being solved. Contingent choices can be described,
but not fully explained. At most it is possible to say post eventum that
one person acted for this reason and another for that reason. Any
attempt to give an a priori account of an individual act of free decision
is destined to fail. Hence the decision of the good angels cannot be fully
illuminated any more than the evil decision of the demons: even with re-
gard to the good angels it cannot be said in the last analysis why they
acted for an adequate reason; only in retrospect can it be said that they
did so. To say that it is because of their will that good or bad angels
decided the way they did surely means to indicate a cause, but not a rea-
son why some chose in one and others in a different way. The fact that
natural inclination decreases the probability of sinning does not help to
explain the individual choice. In the last analysis, the dilemma to rec-
oncile the non-deterministic and the rational character of free decision
remains unsolved.

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