Catholic Predestination
by Ludwig Ott
Introduction
The Catholic Church, following St. Augustine (e.g., Grace and Free Will, 1,1; Sermon 169, 11,13),
accepts predestination of the elect to heaven, but also affirms the freedom of the human will, thus
staking out a position distinct from Calvinism. Predestination to hell, in Catholicism, always
involves man's free will, and foreseen sins, so that man is ultimately responsible for his own
damnation, not God (double predestination is rejected).
God is sovereign, in our view, every bit as much as in Protestantism (particularly Calvinism), as
will amply be demonstrated below. All that is disputed are the intricacies of the grace / free will
antinomy, which is one of the most mysterious and difficult questions in the history of both
Christian theology and theistic philosophy. Of course, the allowance of free will is also present in
Lutheran, Anglican, Methodist, most charismatic, non-denominational and Baptist theologies, etc.
The Catholic Church affirms predestination as a de fide dogma (the highest level of binding
theological certainty), while at the same time affirming free will and the possibility of falling away
from the faith. The following material from Catholic theologian Ludwig Ott's Fundamentals of
Catholic Dogma (Rockford, IL: TAN Books, 1974 {orig. 1952}, pp.242-45) ought to be most
helpful for Protestants seeking to understand what Catholics believe about this ever-mysterious,
controversial, complex, highly abstract theological question:
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1) GOD, BY HIS ETERNAL RESOLVE OF WILL, HAS PREDETERMINED CERTAIN
MEN TO ETERNAL BLESSEDNESS (De fide)
[ De fide = "of faith" - dogmas are absolutely binding on all Catholics]
This doctrine is proposed by the Ordinary and General Teaching of the Church as a truth of
Revelation. The doctrinal definitions of the Council of Trent presuppose it . . . The reality of
Predestination is clearly attested to in Rom 8:29 et seq: . . . cf. Mt 25:34, Jn 10:27 et seq., Acts 13:
48, Eph 1:4 et seq. . . . Predestination is a part of the Eternal Divine Plan of Providence.
2) BASIS OF PREDESTINATION
a) The Problem
The main difficulty . . . lies in the question whether God's eternal resolve of Predestination has
been taken with or without consideration of the merits of the man (postorante praevisa merita).
Only incomplete Predestination to grace is independent of every merit (ante praevisa merita), as
the first grace cannot be merited. In the same way, complete Predestination to grace and glory
conjointly is independent of every merit, as the first grace cannot be merited, and the consequent
graces, as well as the merits acquired with these graces and their reward, depend like the links of a
chain, on the first grace . . .
b) Attempts at Solution
The Thomists, the Augustinians, the majority of the Scotists and also individual older Molinists
(Suarez, St. Bellarmine) teach an absolute Predestination (ad gloriam tantum), therefore ante
praevisa merita. According to them, God freely resolves from all Eternity, without consideration of
the merits of man's grace, to call certain men to beatification and therefore to bestow on them
graces which will infallibly secure the execution of the Divine Decree (ordo intentionis). In time
God first gives to the predestined effective graces and then eternal bliss as a reward for the merits
which flow from their free cooperation with grace (ordo executionis). The ordo intentionis and the
ordo executionis are in inverse relation to each other (glory-grace; grace-glory).
Most of the Molinists, and also St. Francis de Sales (+1622), teach a conditioned Predestination
(ad gloriam tantum), that is, postand propter praevisa merita. According to them, God by His
scientia media, sees beforehand how men would freely react to various orders of grace. In the light
of this knowledge He chooses, according to His free pleasure a fixed and definite order of grace.
Now by His scientia visionis, He knows infallibly in advance what use the individual man will
make of the grace bestowed on him. He elects for eternal bliss those who by virtue of their
foreseen merits perseveringly cooperate with grace, while He determines for eternal punishment of
hell, those who, on account of their foreseen demerits, deny their cooperation. The ordo intentionis
and the ordo executionis coincide (grace-glory; grace-glory).
Both attempts at explanation are ecclesiastically permissible. The scriptural proofs are not decisive
for either side. The Thomists quote above all passages from the Letter to the Romans, in which
the Divine factor in salvation is brought strongly to the foreground (Rom 8:29; 9:11-13, 9:20 et
seq.) . . . The Molinists invoke the passages which attest the universality of the Divine desire for
salvation, especially 1 Tim 2:4, as well as the sentence to be pronounced by the Judge of the
World (Mt 25:34-36), in which the works of mercy are given as ground for the acceptance into the
Heavenly Kingdom. But that these are also the basis for the 'preparation' for the Kingdom, that is,
for the eternal resolve of Predestination, cannot be definitely proved from them . . .
While the pre-Augustinian tradition is in favour of the Molinistic explanation, St. Augustine, at least
in his later writings, is more in favour of the Thomistic explanation. The Thomist view emphasizes
God's universal causality while the other view stresses the universality of the Divine salvific will,
man's freedom and his cooperation in his salvation. The difficulties remaining on both sides prove
that Predestination even for reason enlightened by faith, is an unfathomable mystery (Rom 11:33
ff.).
3) PROPERTIES OF PREDESTINATION
a) Immutability
The resolve of Predestination, as an act of the divine knowledge and will, is as immutable as the
Divine Essence itself. The number of those who are registered in the Book of Life (Phil 4:3, Rev
17:8; cf. Lk 10:20) is formally and materially fixed, that is, God knows and determines with
infallible certainty in advance, how many and which men will be saved . . .
b) Uncertainty
The Council of Trent declared against Calvin, that certainty in regard to one's Predestination can
be attained by special Revelation only . . . Holy Scripture enjoins man to work out his salvation in
fear and trembling (Phil 2:12). He who imagines that he will stand should take care lest he fall (1
Cor 10:12). In spite of this uncertainty there are signs of Predetermination which indicate a high
probability of one's Predestination, e.g., a persevering practice of the virtues recommended in the
Eight Beatitudes, frequent reception of Holy Communion, active love of one's neighbor, love for
Christ and for the Church . . .
[For scriptural proofs against absolute assurance of salvation I submit the following passages: 1 Cor
9:27, 10:12, Gal 5:1,4, Phil 3:11-14, 1 Tim 4:1, 5:15, Heb 3:12-14, 6:4-6, 2 Pet 2:15,20-21. These
I consider the most compelling, but there are many others as well: e.g.: 1 Sam 11:6, 18:11-12,
Ezek 18:24, 33:12-13,18, Gal 4:9, Col 1:23, Heb 6:11-12, 10:23,26,29,36,39, 12:15, Rev 2:4-5.]
[Many evangelical Protestants claim to have an absolute "assurance," but when all is said and
done, both biblically and epistemologically, they simply can't attain to this certitude, and are no
more "certain" than a devout Catholic or Orthodox is. Such claims are simply unproven and
unprovable. In other words, Protestant "assurance" involves the following "argument" in a vicious
circle: in order to possess assurance of salvation you must believe that you have salvation. This has
been called "fiducial faith," and is completely subjective, every bit as much as the Mormon
"burning in the bosom." Martin Luther himself illustrates the incoherence of this innovation:
We must day by day struggle towards greater and greater certainty . . . Everyone should therefore
accustom himself resolutely to the persuasion that he is in a state of grace . . . Should he feel a
doubt, then let him exercise faith; he must beat down his doubts and acquire certainty . . . The
matter of justification is difficult and delicate, not indeed in itself, for in itself it is as certain as can
be, but in our regard; of this I have frequent experience.
{In Hartmann Grisar, Luther, London: 1917, v.4, pp.437-443} ]
4) CONCEPT AND REALITY OF REPROBATION
By Reprobation is understood the eternal Resolve of God's Will to exclude certain rational
creatures from eternal bliss. While God, by His grace, positively cooperates in the supernatural
merits, which lead to beatification, He merely permits sin, which leads to eternal damnation.
Regarding the content of the resolve of Reprobation, a distinction is made between positive and
negative Reprobation, according as the Divine resolve of Reprobation has for its object
condemnation to the eternal punishment of hell, or exclusion from the Beatific Vision. Having
regard to the reason for Reprobation, a distinction is made between conditioned and unconditioned
(absolute) Reprobation, insofar as the Divine resolve of Reprobation is dependent on, or
independent of the prevision of future demerits.
GOD, BY AN ETERNAL RESOLVE OF HIS WILL, PREDESTINES CERTAIN MEN, ON
ACCOUNT OF THEIR FORESEEN SINS, TO ETERNAL REJECTION (De fide)
The reality of Reprobation is not formally defined, but it is the general teaching of the Church.
5) POSITIVE REPROBATION
Heretical Predestinationism in its various forms (the Southern Gallic priest Lucidus in the 5th
century; the monk Gottschalk in the 9th century, according to reports of his opponents, which,
however, find no confirmation in his recently re-discovered writings; Wycliffe, Hus, and esp.
Calvin), teaches a positive predetermination to sin, and an unconditional Predestination to the
eternal punishment of hell, that is, without consideration of future demerits. This was rejected as
false doctrine by the Particular Synods of Orange, Quiercy & Valence and by the Council of
Trent. Unconditioned positive Reprobation leads to a denial of the universality of the Divine Desire
for salvation, and of the Redemption, and contradicts the Justice and Holiness of God as well as
the freedom of man.
According to the teaching of the Church, there is a conditioned positive Reprobation, that is, it
occurs with consideration of foreseen future demerits (post et propter praevisa demerita). The
conditional nature of Positive Reprobation is demanded by the generality of the Divine Resolve of
salvation. This excludes God's desiring in advance the damnation of certain men (cf. 1 Tim 2:4,
Ezek 33:11, 2 Pet 3:9) . . .
6) NEGATIVE REPROBATION
In the question of Reprobation, the Thomist view favours not an absolute, but only a negative
Reprobation. This is conceived by most Thomists as non-election to eternal bliss (non-electio),
together with the Divine resolve to permit some rational creatures to fall into sin, and thus by their
own guilt to lose eternal salvation. In contrast to the absolute Positive Reprobation of the
Predestinarians, Thomists insist on the universality of the Divine Resolve of Salvation and
Redemption, the allocation of sufficient graces to the reprobate, and the freedom of man's will.
However, it is difficult to find an intrinsic concordance between unconditioned non-election and
the universality of the Divine Resolve of salvation. In practice, the unconditioned negative
Reprobation of the Thomists involves the same result as the unconditioned positive Reprobation of
the heretical Predestinarians, since outside Heaven and Hell there is no third final state.
Like the Resolve of Predestination the Divine Resolve of Reprobation is immutable, but, without
special revelation, its incidence is unknown to men.
Edited and uploaded by Dave Armstrong in 1996.
Predestination
Predestination (Lat. prœ, destinare), taken in its widest meaning, is every Divine decree by which
God, owing to His infallible prescience of the future, has appointed and ordained from eternity all
events occurring in time, especially those which directly proceed from, or at least are influenced
by, man's free will. It includes all historical facts, as for instance the appearance of Napoleon or
the foundation of the United States, and particularly the turning-points in the history of
supernatural salvation, as the mission of Moses and the Prophets, or the election of Mary to the
Divine Motherhood. Taken in this general sense, predestination clearly coincides with Divine
Providence and with the government of the world, which do not fall within the scope of this article
(see DIVINE PROVIDENCE).
I. NOTION OF PREDESTINATION
Theology restricts the term to those Divine decrees which have reference to the supernatural end
of rational beings, especially of man. Considering that not all men reach their supernatural end in
heaven, but that many are eternally lost through their own fault, there must exist a twofold
predestination: (a) one to heaven for all those who die in the state of grace; (b) one to the pains of
hell for all those who depart in sin or under God's displeasure. However, according to present
usages to which we shall adhere in the course of the article, it is better to call the latter decree the
Divine "reprobation", so that the term predestination is reserved for the Divine decree of the
happiness of the elect.
A. The notion of predestination comprises two essential elements: God's infallible foreknowledge
(prœscientia), and His immutable decree (decretum) of eternal happiness. The theologian who,
following in the footsteps of the Pelagians, would limit the Divine activity to the eternal
foreknowledge and exclude the Divine will, would at once fall into Deism, which asserts that God,
having created all things, leaves man and the universe to their fate and refrains from all active
interference. Though the purely natural gifts of God, as descent from pious parents, good
education, and the providential guidance of man's external career, may also be called effects of
predestination, still, strictly speaking, the term implies only those blessings which lie in the
supernatural sphere, as sanctifying grace, all actual graces, and among them in particular those
which carry with them final perseverance and a happy death. Since in reality only those reach
heaven who die in the state of justification or sanctifying grace, all these and only these are
numbered among the predestined, strictly so called. From this it follows that we must reckon
among them also all children who die in baptismal grace, as well as those adults who, after a life
stained with sin, are converted on their death-beds. The same is true of the numerous predestined
who, though outside the pale of the true Church of Christ, yet depart from this life in the state of
grace as catechumens, Protestants in good faith, schismatics, Jews, Mahommedans, and pagans.
Those fortunate Catholics who at the close of a long life are still clothed in their baptismal
innocence, or who after many relapses into mortal sin persevere till the end, are not indeed
predestined more firmly, but are more signally favoured than the last-named categories of persons.
But even when man's supernatural end alone is taken into consideration, the term predestination is
not always used by theologians in an unequivocal sense. This need not astonish us, seeing that
predestination may comprise wholly diverse things. If taken in its adequate meaning (prÅ
“destinatio adÅ“quata or completa), then predestination refers to both grace and glory as a whole,
including not only the election to glory as the end, but also the election to grace as the means, the
vocation to the faith, justification, and final perseverance, with which a happy death is inseparably
connected. This is the meaning of St. Augustine's words (De dono persever., xxxv): "Prædestinatio
nihil est aliud quam præscientia et præparatio beneficiorum, quibus certissime liberantur [i. e.
salvantur], quicunque liberantur" (Predestination is nothing else than the foreknowledge and
foreordaining of those gracious gifts which make certain the salvation of all who are saved). But
the two concepts of grace and glory may be separated and each of them be made the object of a
special predestination. The result is the so-called inadequate predestination (prÅ“destinatio inadÅ
“quata or incompleta), either to grace alone or to glory alone. Like St. Paul, Augustine, too, speaks
of an election to grace apart from the celestial glory (loc. cit., xix): "Prædestinatio est gratiæ
præparatio, gratia vero jam ipsa donatio." It is evident, however, that this (inadequate)
predestination does not exclude the possibility that one chosen to grace, faith, and justification goes
nevertheless to hell. Hence we may disregard it, since it is at bottom simply another term for the
universality of God's salvific will and of the distribution of grace among all men (see GRACE).
Similarly eternal election to glory alone, that is, without regard to the preceding merits through
grace, must be designated as (inadequate) predestination. Though the possibility of the latter is at
once clear to the reflecting mind, yet its actuality is strongly contested by the majority of
theologians, as we shall see further on (under sect. III). From these explanations it is plain that the
real dogma of eternal election is exclusively concerned with adequate predestination, which
embraces both grace and glory and the essence of which St. Thomas (I, Q. xxiii, a. 2) defines as:
"Præparatio gratiæ in præsenti et gloriæ in futuro" (the foreordination of grace in the present and
of glory in the future).
In order to emphasize how mysterious and unapproachable is Divine election, the Council of Trent
calls predestination "hidden mystery". That predestination is indeed a sublime mystery appears not
only from the fact that the depths of the eternal counsel cannot be fathomed, it is even externally
visible in the inequality of the Divine choice. The unequal standard by which baptismal grace is
distributed among infants and efficacious graces among adults is hidden from our view by an
impenetrable veil. Could we gain a glimpse at the reasons of this inequality, we should at once hold
the key to the solution of the mystery itself. Why is it that this child is baptized, but not the child of
the neighbour? Why is it that Peter the Apostle rose again after his fall and persevered till his
death, while Judas Iscariot, his fellow-Apostle, hanged himself and thus frustrated his salvation?
Though correct, the answer that Judas went to perdition of his own free will, while Peter faithfully
co-operated with the grace of conversion offered him, does not clear up the enigma. For the
question recurs: Why did not God give to Judas the same efficacious, infallibly successful grace of
conversion as to St. Peter, whose blasphemous denial of the Lord was a sin no less grievous than
that of the traitor Judas? To all these and similar questions the only reasonable reply is the word of
St. Augustine (loc. cit., 21): "Inscrutabilia sunt judicia Dei" (the judgments of God are inscrutable).
B. The counterpart of the predestination of the good is the reprobation of the wicked, or the
eternal decree of God to cast all men into hell of whom He foresaw that they would die in the state
of sin as his enemies. This plan of Divine reprobation may be conceived either as absolute and
unconditional or as hypothetical and conditional, according as we consider it as dependent on, or
independent of, the infallible foreknowledge of sin, the real reason of reprobation. If we
understand eternal condemnation to be an absolute unconditional decree of God, its theological
possibility is affirmed or denied according as the question whether it involves a positive, or only a
negative, reprobation is answered in the affirmative or in the negative. The conceptual difference
between the two kinds of reprobation lies in this, that negative reprobation merely implies the
absolute will not to grant the bliss of heaven while positive reprobation means the absolute will to
condemn to hell. In other words, those who are reprobated merely negatively are numbered among
the non-predestined from all eternity; those who are reprobated positively are directly predestined
to hell from all eternity and have been created for this very purpose. It was Calvin who elaborated
the repulsive doctrine that an absolute Divine decree from all eternity positively predestined part of
mankind to hell and, in order to obtain this end effectually, also to sin. The Catholic advocates of
an unconditional reprobation evade the charge of heresy only by imposing a twofold restriction on
their hypothesis: (a) that the punishment of hell can, in time, be inflicted only on account of sin,
and from all eternity can be decreed only on account of foreseen malice, while sin itself is not to be
regarded as the sheer effect of the absolute Divine will, but only as the result of God's permission;
(b) that the eternal plan of God can never intend a positive reprobation to hell, but only a negative
reprobation, that is to say, an exclusion from heaven. These restrictions are evidently demanded by
the formulation of the concept itself, since the attributes of Divine sanctity and justice must be kept
inviolate (see GOD). Consequently, if we consider that God's sanctity will never allow Him to will
sin positively even though He foresees it in His permissive decree with infallible certainty, and that
His justice can foreordain, and in time actually inflict, hell as a punishment only by reason of the
sin foreseen, we understand the definition of eternal reprobation given by Peter Lombard (I. Sent.,
dist. 40): "Est præscientia iniquitatis quorundam et præparatio damnationis eorundem" (it is the
foreknowledge of the wickedness of some men and the foreordaining of their damnation). Cf.
Scheeben, "Mysterien des Christentums" (2nd ed., Freiburg, 1898), 98—103.
II. THE CATHOLIC DOGMA
Reserving the theological controversies for the next section, we deal here only with those articles of
faith relating to predestination and reprobation, the denial of which would involve heresy.
A. The Predestination of the Elect
He who would place the reason of predestination either in man alone or in God alone would
inevitably be led into heretical conclusions about eternal election. In the one case the error
concerns the last end, in the other the means to that end. Let it be noted that we do not speak of
the "cause" of predestination, which would be either the efficient cause (God), or the instrumental
cause (grace), or the final cause (God's honour), or the primary meritorious cause, but of the
reason or motive which induced God from all eternity to elect certain definite individuals to grace
and glory. The principal question then is: Does the natural merit of man exert perhaps some
influence on the Divine election to grace and glory? If we recall the dogma of the absolute gratuity
of Christian grace, our answer must be outright negative (see GRACE). To the further question
whether Divine predestination does not at least take into account the supernatural good works, the
Church answers with the doctrine that heaven is not given to the elect by a purely arbitrary act of
God's will, but that it is also the reward of the personal merits of the justified (see MERIT). Those
who, like the Pelagians, seek the reason for predestination only in man's naturally good works,
evidently misjudge the nature of the Christian heaven which is an absolutely supernatural destiny.
As Pelagianism puts the whole economy of salvation on a purely natural basis, so it regards
predestination in particular not as a special grace, much less as the supreme grace, but only as a
reward for natural merit.
The Semipelagians, too, depreciated the gratuity and the strictly supernatural character of eternal
happiness by ascribing at least the beginning of faith (initium fidei) and final perseverance (donum
perseverantiœ) to the exertion of man's natural powers, and not to the initiative of preventing
grace. This is one class of heresies which, slighting God and His grace, makes all salvation depend
on man alone. But no less grave are the errors into which a second group falls by making God
alone responsible for everything, and abolishing the free co-operation of the will in obtaining
eternal happiness. This is done by the advocates of heretical Predestinarianism, embodied in its
purest form in Calvinism and Jansenism. Those who seek the reason of predestination solely in the
absolute Will of God are logically forced to admit an irresistibly efficacious grace (gratia
irresistibilis), to deny the freedom of the will when influenced by grace and wholly to reject
supernatural merits (as a secondary reason for eternal happiness). And since in this system eternal
damnation, too, finds its only explanation in the Divine will, it further follows that concupiscence
acts on the sinful will with an irresistible force, that there the will is not really free to sin, and that
demerits cannot be the cause of eternal damnation.
Between these two extremes the Catholic dogma of predestination keeps the golden mean, because
it regards eternal happiness primarily as the work of God and His grace, but secondarily as the fruit
and reward of the meritorious actions of the predestined. The process of predestination consists of
the following five steps: (a) the first grace of vocation, especially faith as the beginning, foundation,
and root of justification; (b) a number of additional, actual graces for the successful
accomplishment of justification; (c) justification itself as the beginning of the state of grace and
love; (d) final perseverance or at least the grace of a happy death; (e) lastly, the admission to
eternal bliss. If it is a truth of Revelation that there are many who, following this path, seek and
find their eternal salvation with infallible certainty, then the existence of Divine predestination is
proved (cf. Matthew 25:34; Revelation 20:15). St. Paul says quite explicitly (Romans 8:28 sq.):
"we know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to
his purpose, are called to be saints. For whom he foreknew, he also predestinated to be made
conformable to the image of his Son; that he might be the first born amongst many brethren. And
whom he predestinated, them he also called. And whom he called, them he also justified. And
whom he justified, them he also glorified." (Cf. Ephesians 1:4-11) Besides the eternal
"foreknowledge" and foreordaining, the Apostle here mentions the various steps of predestination:
"vocation", "justification", and "glorification". This belief has been faithfully preserved by Tradition
through all the centuries, especially since the time of Augustine.
There are three other qualities of predestination which must be noticed, because they are important
and interesting from the theological standpoint: its immutability, the definiteness of the number of
the predestined, and its subjective uncertainty.
(1) The first quality, the immutability of the Divine decree, is based both on the infallible
foreknowledge of God that certain, quite determined individuals will leave this life in the state of
grace, and on the immutable will of God to give precisely to these men and to no others eternal
happiness as a reward for their supernatural merits. Consequently, the whole future membership of
heaven, down to its minutest details, with all the different measures of grace and the various
degrees of happiness, has been irrevocably fixed from all eternity. Nor could it be otherwise. For if
it were possible that a predestined individual should after all be cast into hell or that one not
predestined should in the end reach heaven, then God would have been mistaken in his
foreknowledge of future events; He would no longer be omniscient. Hence the Good Shepherd
says of his sheep (John 10:28): "And I give them life everlasting; and they shalt not perish forever,
and no man shall pluck them out of my hand." But we must beware of conceiving the immutability
of predestination either as fatalistic in the sense of the Mahommedan kismet or as a convenient
pretext for idle resignation to inexorable fate. God's infallible foreknowledge cannot force upon
man unavoidable coercion, for the simple reason that it is at bottom nothing else than the eternal
vision of the future historical actuality. God foresees the free activity of a man precisely as that
individual is willing to shape it. Whatever may promote the work of our salvation, whether our
own prayers and good works, or the prayers of others in our behalf, is eo ipso included in the
infallible foreknowledge of God and consequently in the scope of predestination (cf. St. Thomas, I,
Q. xxiii, a. 8). It is in such practical considerations that the ascetical maxim (falsely ascribed to St.
Augustine) originated: "Si non es prædestinatus, fac ut prædestineris" (if you are not predestined,
so act that you may be predestined). Strict theology, it is true, cannot approve this bold saying,
except in so far as the original decree of predestination is conceived as at first a hypothetical
decree, which is afterwards changed to an absolute and irrevocable decree by the prayers, good
works, and perseverance of him who is predestined, according to the words of the Apostle (2 Peter
1:10): "Wherefore, brethren, labour the more, that by good works you may make sure your calling
and election."
God's unerring foreknowledge and foreordaining is designated in the Bible by the beautiful figure
of the "Book of Life" (liber vitœ, to biblion tes zoes). This book of life is a list which contains the
names of all the elect and admits neither additions nor erasures. From the Old Testament (cf.
Exodus 32:32; Psalm 68:29) this symbol was taken over into the New by Christ and His Apostle
Paul (cf. Luke 10:20; Hebrews 12:23), and enlarged upon by the Evangelist John in his
Apocalypse [cf. Apoc., xxi, 27: "There shall not enter into it anything defiled ... but they that are
written in the book of life of the Lamb" (cf. Revelation 13:8; 20:15)]. The correct explanation of
this symbolic book is given by St. Augustine (De civ. Dei, XX, xiii): "Præscientia Dei quæ non
potest falli, liber vitæ est" (the foreknowledge of God, which cannot err, is the book of life).
However, as intimated by the Bible, there exists a second, more voluminous book, in which are
entered not only the names of the elect, but also the names of all the faithful on earth. Such a
metaphorical book is supposed wherever the possibility is hinted at that a name, though entered,
might again be stricken out [cf. Apoc., iii, 5: "and I will not blot out his name out of the book of
life" (cf. Exodus 32:33)]. The name will be mercilessly cancelled when a Christian sinks into
infidelity or godlessness and dies in his sin. Finally there is a third class of books, wherein the
wicked deeds and the crimes of individual sinners are written, and by which the reprobate will be
judged on the last day to be cast into hell (cf. Revelation 20:12): "and the books were opened; ...
and the dead were judged by those things which were written in the books according to their
works". It was this grand symbolism of Divine omniscience and justice that inspired the soul-
stirring verse of the Dies irœ according to which we shall all be judged out of a book: "Liber
scriptus proferetur: in quo totum continetur". Regarding the book of life, cf. St. Thomas, I, Q.
xxiv, a. 1—3, and Heinrich-Gutberlet, "Dogmat. Theologie", VIII (Mainz, 1897), section 453.
(2) The second quality of predestination, the definiteness of the number of the elect, follows
naturally from the first. For if the eternal counsel of God regarding the predestined is
unchangeable, then the number of the predestined must likewise be unchangeable and definite,
subject neither to additions nor to cancellations. Anything indefinite in the number would eo ipso
imply a lack of certitude in God's knowledge and would destroy His omniscience. Furthermore, the
very nature of omniscience demands that not only the abstract number of the elect, but also the
individuals with their names and their entire career on earth, should be present before the Divine
mind from all eternity. Naturally, human curiosity is eager for definite information about the
absolute as well as the relative number of the elect. How high should the absolute number be
estimated? But it would be idle and useless to undertake calculations and to guess at so and so
many millions or billions of predestined. St. Thomas (I, Q. xxiii, a. 7) mentions the opinion of
some theologians that as many men will be saved as there are fallen angels, while others held that
the number of predestined will equal the number of the faithful angels.
Lastly, there were optimists who, combining these two opinions into a third, made the total of men
saved equal to the unnumbered myriads of berated spirits. But even granted that the principle of
our calculation is correct, no mathematician would be able to figure out the absolute number on a
basis so vague, since the number of angels and demons is an unknown quantity to us. Hence, "the
best answer", rightly remarks St. Thomas, "is to say: God alone knows the number of his elect".
By relative number is meant the numerical relation between the predestined and the reprobate. Will
the majority of the human race be saved or will they be damned? Will one-half be damned the
other half saved? In this question the opinion of the rigorists is opposed to the milder view of the
optimists. Pointing to several texts of the Bible (Matthew 7:14; 22:14) and to sayings of great
spiritual doctors, the rigorists defend as probable the thesis that not only most Christians but also
most Catholics are doomed to eternal damnation. Almost repulsive in its tone is Massillon's sermon
on the small number of the elect. Yet even St. Thomas (loc. cit., a. 7) asserted: "Pauciores sunt
qui salvantur" (only the smaller number of men are saved). And a few years ago, when the Jesuit
P. Castelein ("Le rigorisme, le nombre des élus et la doctrine du salut", 2nd ed., Brussels, 1899)
impugned this theory with weighty arguments, he was sharply opposed by the Redemptorist P.
Godts ("De paucitate salvandorum quid docuerunt sancti", 3rd ed., Brussels, 1899). That the
number of the elect cannot be so very small is evident from the Apocalypse (vii, 9). When one
hears the rigorists, one is tempted to repeat Dieringer's bitter remark: "Can it be that the Church
actually exists in order to people hell?" The truth is that neither the one nor the other can be
proved from Scripture or Tradition (cf. Heinrich-Gutberlet, "Dogmat. Theologie", Mainz, 1897,
VIII, 363 sq.). But supplementing these two sources by arguments drawn from reason we may
safely defend as probable the opinion that the majority of Christians, especially of Catholics, will
be saved. If we add to this relative number the overwhelming majority of non-Christians (Jews,
Mahommedans, heathens), then Gener ("Theol. dogmat. scholast.", Rome, 1767, II, 242 sq.) is
probably right when he assumes the salvation of half of the human race, lest "it should be said to
the shame and offence of the Divine majesty and clemency that the [future] Kingdom of Satan is
larger than the Kingdom of Christ" (cf. W. Schneider, "Das andere Leben", 9th ed., Paderborn,
1908, 476 sq.).
(3) The third quality of predestination, its subjective uncertainty, is intimately connected with its
objective immutability. We know not whether we are reckoned among the predestined or not. All
we can say is: God alone knows it. When the Reformers, confounding predestination with the
absolute certainty of salvation, demanded of the Christian an unshaken faith in his own
predestination if be wished to be saved, the Council of Trent opposed to this presumptuous belief
the canon (Sess. VI, can. xv): "S. q. d., hominem renatum et justificatum teneri ex fide ad
credendum, se certo esse in numero prædestinatorum, anathema sit" (if any one shall say that the
regenerated and justified man is bound as a matter of faith to believe that he is surely of the
number of the predestined, let him be anathema). In truth, such a presumption is not only
irrational, but also unscriptural (cf. 1 Corinthians 4:4; 9:27; 10:12; Philippians 2:12). Only a private
revelation, such as was vouchsafed to the penitent thief on the cross, could give us the certainty of
faith: hence the Tridentine Council insists (loc. cit., cap. xii): "Nam nisi ex speciali revelatione sciri
non potest, quos Deus sibi elegerit" (for apart from a special revelation, it cannot be known whom
God has chosen). However, the Church condemns only that blasphemous presumption which
boasts of a faithlike certainty in matters of predestination. To say that there exist probable signs of
predestination which exclude all excessive anxiety is not against her teaching. The following are
some of the criteria set down by the theologians: purity of heart, pleasure in prayer, patience in
suffering, frequent reception of the sacraments, love of Christ and His Church, devotion to the
Mother of God, etc.
B. The Reprobation of the Damned
An unconditional and positive predestination of the reprobate not only to hell, but also to sin, was
taught especially by Calvin (Instit., III, c. xxi, xxiii, xxiv). His followers in Holland split into two
sects, the Supralapsarians and the Infralapsarians, the latter of whom regarded original sin as the
motive of positive condemnation, while the former (with Calvin) disregarded this factor and
derived the Divine decree of reprobation from God's inscrutable will alone. Infralapsarianism was
also held by Jansenius (De gratia Christi, l. X, c. ii, xi sq.), who taught that God had preordained
from the massa damnata of mankind one part to eternal bliss, the other to eternal pain, decreeing at
the same time to deny to those positively damned the necessary graces by which they might be
converted and keep the commandments; for this reason, he said, Christ died only for the
predestined (cf. Denzinger, "Enchiridion", n. 1092-6). Against such blasphemous teachings the
Second Synod of Orange in 529 and again the Council of Trent had pronounced the ecclesiastical
anathema (cf. Denzinger, nn. 200, 827). This condemnation was perfectly justified, because the
heresy of Predestinarianism, in direct opposition to the clearest texts of Scripture, denied the
universality of God's salvific will as well as of redemption through Christ (cf. Wisdom 11:24 sq.; 1
Timothy 2:1 sq.), nullified God's mercy towards the hardened sinner (Ezekiel 33:11; Romans 2:4;
2 Peter 3:9), did away with the freedom of the will to do good or evil, and hence with the merit of
good actions and the guilt of the bad, and finally destroyed the Divine attributes of wisdom, justice,
veracity, goodness, and sanctity. The very spirit of the Bible should have sufficed to deter Calvin
from a false explanation of Rom., ix, and his successor Beza from the exegetical maltreatment of I
Pet., ii, 7—8. After weighing all the Biblical texts bearing on eternal reprobation, a modern
Protestant exegete arrives at the conclusion: "There is no election to hell parallel to the election to
grace: on the contrary, the judgment pronounced on the impenitent supposes human guilt .... It is
only after Christ's salvation has been rejected that reprobation follows" ("Realencyk. für prot.
Theol.", XV, 586, Leipzig, 1904). As regards the Fathers of the Church, there is only St.
Augustine who might seem to cause difficulties in the proof from Tradition. As a matter of fact he
has been claimed by both Calvin and Jansenius as favouring their view of the question. This is not
the place to enter into an examination of his doctrine on reprobation; but that his works contain
expressions which, to say the least, might be interpreted in the sense of a negative reprobation,
cannot be doubted. Probably toning down the sharper words of the master, his "best pupil", St.
Prosper, in his apology against Vincent of Lerin (Resp. ad 12 obj. Vincent.), thus explained the
spirit of Augustine: "Voluntate exierunt, voluntate ceciderunt, et quia præsciti sunt casuri, non sunt
prædestinati; essent autem prædestinati, si essent reversuri et in sanctitate remansuri, ac per hoc
prædestinatio Dei multis est causa standi, nemini est causa labendi" (of their own will they went
out; of their own will they fell, and because their fall was foreknown, they were not predestined;
they would however be predestined if they were going to return and persevere in holiness; hence,
God's predestination is for many the cause of perseverance, for none the cause of falling away).
Regarding Tradition cf. Petavius, "De Deo", X, 7 sq.; Jacquin in "Revue de l'histoire
ecclésiastique", 1904, 266 sq.; 1906, 269 sq.; 725 sq.
We may now briefly summarize the whole Catholic doctrine, which is in harmony with our reason
as well as our moral sentiments. According to the doctrinal decisions of general and particular
synods, God infallibly foresees and immutably preordains from eternity all future events (cf.
Denzinger, n. 1784), all fatalistic necessity, however, being barred and human liberty remaining
intact (Denz., n. 607). Consequently man is free whether he accepts grace and does good or
whether he rejects it and does evil (Denz., n. 797). Just as it is God's true and sincere will that all
men, no one excepted, shall obtain eternal happiness, so, too, Christ has died for all (Denz., n.
794), not only for the predestined (Denz., n. 1096), or for the faithful (Denz., n. 1294), though it
is true that in reality not all avail themselves of the benefits of redemption (Denz., n. 795). Though
God preordained both eternal happiness and the good works of the elect (Denz., n. 322), yet, on
the other hand, He predestined no one positively to hell, much less to sin (Denz., nn. 200, 816).
Consequently, just as no one is saved against his will (Denz., n. 1363), so the reprobate perish
solely on account of their wickedness (Denz., nn. 318, 321). God foresaw the everlasting pains of
the impious from all eternity, and preordained this punishment on account of their sins (Denz., n.
322), though He does not fail therefore to hold out the grace of conversion to sinners (Denz., n.
807), or pass over those who are not predestined (Denz., n. 827). As long as the reprobate live on
earth, they may be accounted true Christians and members of the Church, just as on the other
hand the predestined may be outside the pale of Christianity and of the Church (Denz., nn. 628,
631). Without special revelation no one can know with certainty that he belongs to the number of
the elect (Denz., nn. 805 sq., 825 sq.).
III. THEOLOGICAL CONTROVERSIES
Owing to the infallible decisions laid down by the Church, every orthodox theory on predestination
and reprobation must keep within the limits marked out by the following theses: (a) At least in the
order of execution in time (in ordine executionis) the meritorious works of the predestined are the
partial cause of their eternal happiness; (b) hell cannot even in the order of intention (in ordine
intentionis) have been positively decreed to the damned, even though it is inflicted on them in time
as the just punishment of their misdeeds; (c) there is absolutely no predestination to sin as a means
to eternal damnation. Guided by these principles, we shall briefly sketch and examine three
theories put forward by Catholic theologians.
A. The Theory of Predestination ante prœvisa merita
This theory, championed by all Thomists and a few Molinists (as Bellarmine, Suarez, Francis de
Lugo), asserts that God, by an absolute decree and without regard to any future supernatural
merits, predestined from all eternity certain men to the glory of heaven, and then, in consequence
of this decree, decided to give them all the graces necessary for its accomplishment. In the order of
time, however, the Divine decree is carried out in the reverse order, the predestined receiving first
the graces preappointed to them, and lastly the glory of heaven as the reward of their good works.
Two qualities, therefore, characterize this theory: first, the absoluteness of the eternal decree, and
second, the reversing of the relation of grace and glory in the two different orders of eternal
intention (ordo intentionis) and execution in time (ordo executionis). For while grace (and merit), in
the order of eternal intention, is nothing else than the result or effect of glory absolutely decreed,
yet, in the order of execution, it becomes the reason and partial cause of eternal happiness, as is
required by the dogma of the meritoriousness of good works (see MERIT). Again, celestial glory is
the thing willed first in the order of eternal intention and then is made the reason or motive for the
graces offered, while in the order of execution it must be conceived as the result or effect of
supernatural merits. This concession is important, since without it the theory would be intrinsically
impossible and theologically untenable.
But what about the positive proof? The theory can find decisive evidence in Scripture only on the
supposition that predestination to heavenly glory is unequivocally mentioned in the Bible as the
Divine motive for the special graces granted to the elect. Now, although there are several texts (e.
g. Matthew 24:22 sq.; Acts 13:48, and others) which might without straining be interpreted in this
sense, yet these passages lose their imagined force in view of the fact that other explanations, of
which there is no lack, are either possible or even more probable. The ninth chapter of the Epistle
to the Romans in particular is claimed by the advocates of absolute predestination as that
"classical" passage wherein St. Paul seems to represent the eternal happiness of the elect not only
as the work of God's purest mercy, but as an act of the most arbitrary will, so that grace, faith,
justification must be regarded as sheer effects of an absolute, Divine decree (cf. Romans 9:18:
"Therefore he hath mercy on whom he will; and whom he will, he hardeneth"). Now, it is rather
daring to quote one of the most difficult and obscure passages of the Bible as a "classical text" and
then to base on it an argument for bold speculation. To be more specific, it is impossible to draw
the details of the picture in which the Apostle compares God to the potter who hath "power over
the clay, of the same lump, to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour"
(Romans 9:21), without falling into the Calvinistic blasphemy that God predestined some men to
hell and sin just as positively as he pre-elected others to eternal life. It is not even admissible to
read into the Apostle's thought a negative reprobation of certain men. For the primary intention of
the Epistle to the Romans is to insist on the gratuity of the vocation to Christianity and to reject the
Jewish presumption that the possession of the Mosaic Law and the carnal descent from Abraham
gave to the Jews an essential preference over the heathens. But the Epistle has nothing to do with
the speculative question whether or not the free vocation to grace must be considered as the
necessary result of eternal predestination to celestial glory [cf. Franzelin, "De Deo uno", thes. lxv
(Rome, 1883)].
It is just as difficult to find in the writings of the Fathers a solid argument for an absolute
predestination. The only one who might be cited with some semblance of truth is St. Augustine,
who stands, however, almost alone among his predecessors and successors. Not even his most
faithful pupils, Prosper and Fulgentius, followed their master in all his exaggerations. But a problem
so deep and mysterious, which does not belong to the substance of Faith and which, to use the
expression of Pope Celestine I (d. 432), is concerned with profundiores difficilioresque partes
incurrentium quœstionum (cf. Denz., n. 142), cannot be decided on the sole authority of
Augustine. Moreover, the true opinion of the African doctor is a matter of dispute even among the
best authorities, so that all parties claim him for their conflicting views [cf. O. Rottmanner, "Der
Augustinismus" (Munich, 1892); Pfülf, "Zur Prädestinationslehre des hl. Augustinus" in
"Innsbrucker Zeitschrift für kath. Theologie", 1893, 483 sq.]. As to the unsuccessful attempt
made by Gonet and Billuart to prove absolute predestination ante prœvisa merita "by an argument
from reason", see Pohle, "Dogmatik", II, 4th ed., Paderborn, 1909, 443 sq.
B. The Theory of the Negative Reprobation of the Damned
What deters us most strongly from embracing the theory just discussed is not the fact that it cannot
be dogmatically proved from Scripture or Tradition, but the logical necessity to which it binds us,
of associating an absolute predestination to glory, with a reprobation just as absolute, even though
it be but negative. The well-meant efforts of some theologians (e. g. Billot) to make a distinction
between the two concepts, and so to escape the evil consequences of negative reprobation, cannot
conceal from closer inspection the helplessness of such logical artifices. Hence the earlier partisans
of absolute predestination never denied that their theory compelled them to assume for the wicked
a parallel, negative reprobation — that is, to assume that, though not positively predestined to hell,
yet they are absolutely predestined not to go to heaven (cf. above, I, B). While it was easy for the
Thomists to bring this view into logical harmony with their prœmotio physica, the few Molinists
were put to straits to harmonize negative reprobation with their scientia media. In order to disguise
the harshness and cruelty of such a Divine decree, the theologians invented more or less palliative
expressions, saying that negative reprobation is the absolute will of God to "pass over" a priori
those not predestined, to "overlook" them, "not to elect" them, "by no means to admit" them into
heaven. Only Gonet had the courage to call the thing by its right name: "exclusion from heaven"
(exclusio a gloria).
In another respect, too, the adherents of negative reprobation do not agree among themselves,
namely, as to what is the motive of Divine reprobation. The rigorists (as Alvarez, Estius, Sylvius)
regard as the motive the sovereign will of God who, without taking into account possible sins and
demerits, determined a priori to keep those not predestined out of heaven, though He did not
create them for hell.
A second milder opinion (e. g. de Lemos, Gotti, Gonet), appealing to the Augustinian doctrine of
the massa damnata, finds the ultimate reason for the exclusion from heaven in original sin, in
which God could, without being unjust, leave as many as He saw fit. The third and mildest opinion
(as Goudin, Graveson, Billuart) derives reprobation not from a direct exclusion from heaven, but
from the omission of an "effectual election to heaven"; they represent God as having decreed ante
prœvisa merita to leave those not predestined in their sinful weakness, without denying them the
necessary sufficient graces; thus they would perish infallibility (cf. "Innsbrucker Zeitschrift für
kath. Theologie", 1879, 203 sq.).
Whatever view one may take regarding the internal probability of negative reprobation, it cannot be
harmonized with the dogmatically certain universality and sincerity of God's salvific will. For the
absolute predestination of the blessed is at the same time the absolute will of God "not to elect" a
priori the rest of mankind (Suarez), or which comes to the same, "to exclude them from heaven"
(Gonet), in other words, not to save them. While certain Thomists (as Bañez, Alvarez, Gonet)
accept this conclusion so far as to degrade the "voluntas salvifica" to an ineffectual "velleitas",
which conflicts with evident doctrines of revelation, Suarez labours in the sweat of his brow to
safeguard the sincerity of God's salvific will, even towards those who are reprobated negatively.
But in vain. How can that will to save be called serious and sincere which has decreed from all
eternity the metaphysical impossibility of salvation? He who has been reprobated negatively, may
exhaust all his efforts to attain salvation: it avail's him nothing. Moreover, in order to realize
infallibly his decree, God is compelled to frustrate the eternal welfare of all excluded a priori from
heaven, and to take care that they die in their sins. Is this the language in which Holy Writ speaks
to us? No; there we meet an anxious, loving father, who wills not "that any should perish, but that
all should return to penance" (2 Peter 3:9). Lessius rightly says that it would be indifferent to him
whether he was numbered among those reprobated positively or negatively; for, in either case, his
eternal damnation would be certain. The reason for this is that in the present economy exclusion
from heaven means for adults practically the same thing as damnation. A middle state, a merely
natural happiness, does not exist.
C. The Theory of Predestination post prœvisa merita
This theory defended by the earlier Scholastics (Alexander of Hales, Albertus Magnus), as well as
by the majority of the Molinists, and warmly recommended by St. Francis de Sales "as the truer
and more attractive opinion", has this as its chief distinction, that it is free from the logical
necessity of upholding negative reprobation. It differs from predestination ante prœvisa merita in
two points: first, it rejects the absolute decree and assumes a hypothetical predestination to glory;
secondly, it does not reverse the succession of grace and glory in the two orders of eternal
intention and of execution in time, but makes glory depend on merit in eternity as well as in the
order of time. This hypothetical decree reads as follows: Just as in time eternal happiness depends
on merit as a condition, so I intended heaven from all eternity only for foreseen merit. -- It is only
by reason of the infallible foreknowledge of these merits that the hypothetical decree is changed
into an absolute: These and no others shall be saved.
This view not only safeguards the universality and sincerity of God's salvific will, but coincides
admirably with the teachings of St. Paul (cf. 2 Timothy 4:8), who knows that there "is laid up"
(reposita est, apokeitai) in heaven "a crown of justice", which "the just judge will render" (reddet,
apodosei) to him on the day of judgment. Clearer still is the inference drawn from the sentence of
the universal Judge (Matthew 25:34 sq.): "Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the
kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave me
to eat" etc. As the "possessing" of the Kingdom of Heaven in time is here linked to the works of
mercy as a condition, so the "preparation" of the Kingdom of Heaven in eternity, that is,
predestination to glory is conceived as dependent on the foreknowledge that good works will be
performed. The same conclusion follows from the parallel sentence of condemnation (Matthew 25:
41 sq.): "Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and
his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave me not to eat" etc. For it is evident that the "everlasting
fire of hell" can only have been intended from all eternity for sin and demerit, that is, for neglect of
Christian charity, in the same sense in which it is inflicted in time. Concluding a pari, we must say
the same of eternal bliss. This explanation is splendidly confirmed by the Greek Fathers. Generally
speaking, the Greeks are the chief authorities for conditional predestination dependent on foreseen
merits. The Latins, too, are so unanimous on this question that St. Augustine is practically the only
adversary in the Occident. St. Hilary (In Ps. lxiv, n. 5) expressly describes eternal election as
proceeding from "the choice of merit" (ex meriti delectu), and St. Ambrose teaches in his
paraphrase of Rom., viii, 29 (De fide, V, vi, 83): "Non enim ante prædestinavit quam præscivit,
sed quorum merita præscivit, eorum præmia prædestinavit" (He did not predestine before He
foreknew, but for those whose merits He foresaw, He predestined the reward). To conclude: no
one can accuse us of boldness if we assert that the theory here presented has a firmer basis in
Scripture and Tradition than the opposite opinion.
Besides the works quoted, cf. PETER LOMBARD, Sent., I, dist. 40-41: ST. THOMAS, I, Q.
xxiii; RUIZ, De prœdest. et reprobatione (Lyons, 1828); RAM�REZ, De prœd. et reprob. (2
vols., Alcalá, 1702); PETAVIUS, De Deo, IX—X; IDEM, De incarnatione, XIII; LESSIUS, De
perfectionibus moribusque divinis, XIV, 2; IDEM, De prœd. et reprob., Opusc. II (Paris, 1878);
TOURNELY, De Deo, qq. 22-23; SCHRADER, Commentarii de prœdestinatione (Vienna,
1865); HOSSE, De notionibus providentiœ prœdestinationisque in ipsa Sacra Scriptura exhibitis
(Bonn, 1868); BALTZER, Des hl. Augustinus Lehre über Prädestination und Reprobation
(Vienna, 1871); MANNENS, De voluntate Dei salvifica et prœdestinatione (Louvain, 1883);
WEBER, Kritische Gesch. der Exegese des 9 Kap. des Römerbriefes (Würzburg, 1889).
Besides these monographs cf. FRANZELIN, De Deo uno (Rome, 1883); OSWALD, Die Lehre
von der Gnade, d. i. Gnade, Rechtfertigung, Gnadenwahl (Paderborn, 1885); SIMAR, Dogmatik,
II, section 126 (Freiburg, 1899); TEPE, Institut. theol., III (Paris, 1896); SCHEEBEN-
ATZBERGER, Dogmatik, IV (Freiburg, 1903); PESCH, Prœl. Dogmat., II (Freiburg, 1906);
VAN NOORT, De gratia Christi (Amsterdam, 1908); P0HLE, Dogmatik, II (Paderborn, 1909).
J. POHLE
Transcribed by Gary A. Mros
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XII
Copyright © 1911 by Robert Appleton Company
Online Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. Knight
Nihil Obstat, June 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor
Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
by Ludwig Ott
Introduction
The Catholic Church, following St. Augustine (e.g., Grace and Free Will, 1,1; Sermon 169, 11,13),
accepts predestination of the elect to heaven, but also affirms the freedom of the human will, thus
staking out a position distinct from Calvinism. Predestination to hell, in Catholicism, always
involves man's free will, and foreseen sins, so that man is ultimately responsible for his own
damnation, not God (double predestination is rejected).
God is sovereign, in our view, every bit as much as in Protestantism (particularly Calvinism), as
will amply be demonstrated below. All that is disputed are the intricacies of the grace / free will
antinomy, which is one of the most mysterious and difficult questions in the history of both
Christian theology and theistic philosophy. Of course, the allowance of free will is also present in
Lutheran, Anglican, Methodist, most charismatic, non-denominational and Baptist theologies, etc.
The Catholic Church affirms predestination as a de fide dogma (the highest level of binding
theological certainty), while at the same time affirming free will and the possibility of falling away
from the faith. The following material from Catholic theologian Ludwig Ott's Fundamentals of
Catholic Dogma (Rockford, IL: TAN Books, 1974 {orig. 1952}, pp.242-45) ought to be most
helpful for Protestants seeking to understand what Catholics believe about this ever-mysterious,
controversial, complex, highly abstract theological question:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1) GOD, BY HIS ETERNAL RESOLVE OF WILL, HAS PREDETERMINED CERTAIN
MEN TO ETERNAL BLESSEDNESS (De fide)
[ De fide = "of faith" - dogmas are absolutely binding on all Catholics]
This doctrine is proposed by the Ordinary and General Teaching of the Church as a truth of
Revelation. The doctrinal definitions of the Council of Trent presuppose it . . . The reality of
Predestination is clearly attested to in Rom 8:29 et seq: . . . cf. Mt 25:34, Jn 10:27 et seq., Acts 13:
48, Eph 1:4 et seq. . . . Predestination is a part of the Eternal Divine Plan of Providence.
2) BASIS OF PREDESTINATION
a) The Problem
The main difficulty . . . lies in the question whether God's eternal resolve of Predestination has
been taken with or without consideration of the merits of the man (postorante praevisa merita).
Only incomplete Predestination to grace is independent of every merit (ante praevisa merita), as
the first grace cannot be merited. In the same way, complete Predestination to grace and glory
conjointly is independent of every merit, as the first grace cannot be merited, and the consequent
graces, as well as the merits acquired with these graces and their reward, depend like the links of a
chain, on the first grace . . .
b) Attempts at Solution
The Thomists, the Augustinians, the majority of the Scotists and also individual older Molinists
(Suarez, St. Bellarmine) teach an absolute Predestination (ad gloriam tantum), therefore ante
praevisa merita. According to them, God freely resolves from all Eternity, without consideration of
the merits of man's grace, to call certain men to beatification and therefore to bestow on them
graces which will infallibly secure the execution of the Divine Decree (ordo intentionis). In time
God first gives to the predestined effective graces and then eternal bliss as a reward for the merits
which flow from their free cooperation with grace (ordo executionis). The ordo intentionis and the
ordo executionis are in inverse relation to each other (glory-grace; grace-glory).
Most of the Molinists, and also St. Francis de Sales (+1622), teach a conditioned Predestination
(ad gloriam tantum), that is, postand propter praevisa merita. According to them, God by His
scientia media, sees beforehand how men would freely react to various orders of grace. In the light
of this knowledge He chooses, according to His free pleasure a fixed and definite order of grace.
Now by His scientia visionis, He knows infallibly in advance what use the individual man will
make of the grace bestowed on him. He elects for eternal bliss those who by virtue of their
foreseen merits perseveringly cooperate with grace, while He determines for eternal punishment of
hell, those who, on account of their foreseen demerits, deny their cooperation. The ordo intentionis
and the ordo executionis coincide (grace-glory; grace-glory).
Both attempts at explanation are ecclesiastically permissible. The scriptural proofs are not decisive
for either side. The Thomists quote above all passages from the Letter to the Romans, in which
the Divine factor in salvation is brought strongly to the foreground (Rom 8:29; 9:11-13, 9:20 et
seq.) . . . The Molinists invoke the passages which attest the universality of the Divine desire for
salvation, especially 1 Tim 2:4, as well as the sentence to be pronounced by the Judge of the
World (Mt 25:34-36), in which the works of mercy are given as ground for the acceptance into the
Heavenly Kingdom. But that these are also the basis for the 'preparation' for the Kingdom, that is,
for the eternal resolve of Predestination, cannot be definitely proved from them . . .
While the pre-Augustinian tradition is in favour of the Molinistic explanation, St. Augustine, at least
in his later writings, is more in favour of the Thomistic explanation. The Thomist view emphasizes
God's universal causality while the other view stresses the universality of the Divine salvific will,
man's freedom and his cooperation in his salvation. The difficulties remaining on both sides prove
that Predestination even for reason enlightened by faith, is an unfathomable mystery (Rom 11:33
ff.).
3) PROPERTIES OF PREDESTINATION
a) Immutability
The resolve of Predestination, as an act of the divine knowledge and will, is as immutable as the
Divine Essence itself. The number of those who are registered in the Book of Life (Phil 4:3, Rev
17:8; cf. Lk 10:20) is formally and materially fixed, that is, God knows and determines with
infallible certainty in advance, how many and which men will be saved . . .
b) Uncertainty
The Council of Trent declared against Calvin, that certainty in regard to one's Predestination can
be attained by special Revelation only . . . Holy Scripture enjoins man to work out his salvation in
fear and trembling (Phil 2:12). He who imagines that he will stand should take care lest he fall (1
Cor 10:12). In spite of this uncertainty there are signs of Predetermination which indicate a high
probability of one's Predestination, e.g., a persevering practice of the virtues recommended in the
Eight Beatitudes, frequent reception of Holy Communion, active love of one's neighbor, love for
Christ and for the Church . . .
[For scriptural proofs against absolute assurance of salvation I submit the following passages: 1 Cor
9:27, 10:12, Gal 5:1,4, Phil 3:11-14, 1 Tim 4:1, 5:15, Heb 3:12-14, 6:4-6, 2 Pet 2:15,20-21. These
I consider the most compelling, but there are many others as well: e.g.: 1 Sam 11:6, 18:11-12,
Ezek 18:24, 33:12-13,18, Gal 4:9, Col 1:23, Heb 6:11-12, 10:23,26,29,36,39, 12:15, Rev 2:4-5.]
[Many evangelical Protestants claim to have an absolute "assurance," but when all is said and
done, both biblically and epistemologically, they simply can't attain to this certitude, and are no
more "certain" than a devout Catholic or Orthodox is. Such claims are simply unproven and
unprovable. In other words, Protestant "assurance" involves the following "argument" in a vicious
circle: in order to possess assurance of salvation you must believe that you have salvation. This has
been called "fiducial faith," and is completely subjective, every bit as much as the Mormon
"burning in the bosom." Martin Luther himself illustrates the incoherence of this innovation:
We must day by day struggle towards greater and greater certainty . . . Everyone should therefore
accustom himself resolutely to the persuasion that he is in a state of grace . . . Should he feel a
doubt, then let him exercise faith; he must beat down his doubts and acquire certainty . . . The
matter of justification is difficult and delicate, not indeed in itself, for in itself it is as certain as can
be, but in our regard; of this I have frequent experience.
{In Hartmann Grisar, Luther, London: 1917, v.4, pp.437-443} ]
4) CONCEPT AND REALITY OF REPROBATION
By Reprobation is understood the eternal Resolve of God's Will to exclude certain rational
creatures from eternal bliss. While God, by His grace, positively cooperates in the supernatural
merits, which lead to beatification, He merely permits sin, which leads to eternal damnation.
Regarding the content of the resolve of Reprobation, a distinction is made between positive and
negative Reprobation, according as the Divine resolve of Reprobation has for its object
condemnation to the eternal punishment of hell, or exclusion from the Beatific Vision. Having
regard to the reason for Reprobation, a distinction is made between conditioned and unconditioned
(absolute) Reprobation, insofar as the Divine resolve of Reprobation is dependent on, or
independent of the prevision of future demerits.
GOD, BY AN ETERNAL RESOLVE OF HIS WILL, PREDESTINES CERTAIN MEN, ON
ACCOUNT OF THEIR FORESEEN SINS, TO ETERNAL REJECTION (De fide)
The reality of Reprobation is not formally defined, but it is the general teaching of the Church.
5) POSITIVE REPROBATION
Heretical Predestinationism in its various forms (the Southern Gallic priest Lucidus in the 5th
century; the monk Gottschalk in the 9th century, according to reports of his opponents, which,
however, find no confirmation in his recently re-discovered writings; Wycliffe, Hus, and esp.
Calvin), teaches a positive predetermination to sin, and an unconditional Predestination to the
eternal punishment of hell, that is, without consideration of future demerits. This was rejected as
false doctrine by the Particular Synods of Orange, Quiercy & Valence and by the Council of
Trent. Unconditioned positive Reprobation leads to a denial of the universality of the Divine Desire
for salvation, and of the Redemption, and contradicts the Justice and Holiness of God as well as
the freedom of man.
According to the teaching of the Church, there is a conditioned positive Reprobation, that is, it
occurs with consideration of foreseen future demerits (post et propter praevisa demerita). The
conditional nature of Positive Reprobation is demanded by the generality of the Divine Resolve of
salvation. This excludes God's desiring in advance the damnation of certain men (cf. 1 Tim 2:4,
Ezek 33:11, 2 Pet 3:9) . . .
6) NEGATIVE REPROBATION
In the question of Reprobation, the Thomist view favours not an absolute, but only a negative
Reprobation. This is conceived by most Thomists as non-election to eternal bliss (non-electio),
together with the Divine resolve to permit some rational creatures to fall into sin, and thus by their
own guilt to lose eternal salvation. In contrast to the absolute Positive Reprobation of the
Predestinarians, Thomists insist on the universality of the Divine Resolve of Salvation and
Redemption, the allocation of sufficient graces to the reprobate, and the freedom of man's will.
However, it is difficult to find an intrinsic concordance between unconditioned non-election and
the universality of the Divine Resolve of salvation. In practice, the unconditioned negative
Reprobation of the Thomists involves the same result as the unconditioned positive Reprobation of
the heretical Predestinarians, since outside Heaven and Hell there is no third final state.
Like the Resolve of Predestination the Divine Resolve of Reprobation is immutable, but, without
special revelation, its incidence is unknown to men.
Edited and uploaded by Dave Armstrong in 1996.
Predestination
Predestination (Lat. prœ, destinare), taken in its widest meaning, is every Divine decree by which
God, owing to His infallible prescience of the future, has appointed and ordained from eternity all
events occurring in time, especially those which directly proceed from, or at least are influenced
by, man's free will. It includes all historical facts, as for instance the appearance of Napoleon or
the foundation of the United States, and particularly the turning-points in the history of
supernatural salvation, as the mission of Moses and the Prophets, or the election of Mary to the
Divine Motherhood. Taken in this general sense, predestination clearly coincides with Divine
Providence and with the government of the world, which do not fall within the scope of this article
(see DIVINE PROVIDENCE).
I. NOTION OF PREDESTINATION
Theology restricts the term to those Divine decrees which have reference to the supernatural end
of rational beings, especially of man. Considering that not all men reach their supernatural end in
heaven, but that many are eternally lost through their own fault, there must exist a twofold
predestination: (a) one to heaven for all those who die in the state of grace; (b) one to the pains of
hell for all those who depart in sin or under God's displeasure. However, according to present
usages to which we shall adhere in the course of the article, it is better to call the latter decree the
Divine "reprobation", so that the term predestination is reserved for the Divine decree of the
happiness of the elect.
A. The notion of predestination comprises two essential elements: God's infallible foreknowledge
(prœscientia), and His immutable decree (decretum) of eternal happiness. The theologian who,
following in the footsteps of the Pelagians, would limit the Divine activity to the eternal
foreknowledge and exclude the Divine will, would at once fall into Deism, which asserts that God,
having created all things, leaves man and the universe to their fate and refrains from all active
interference. Though the purely natural gifts of God, as descent from pious parents, good
education, and the providential guidance of man's external career, may also be called effects of
predestination, still, strictly speaking, the term implies only those blessings which lie in the
supernatural sphere, as sanctifying grace, all actual graces, and among them in particular those
which carry with them final perseverance and a happy death. Since in reality only those reach
heaven who die in the state of justification or sanctifying grace, all these and only these are
numbered among the predestined, strictly so called. From this it follows that we must reckon
among them also all children who die in baptismal grace, as well as those adults who, after a life
stained with sin, are converted on their death-beds. The same is true of the numerous predestined
who, though outside the pale of the true Church of Christ, yet depart from this life in the state of
grace as catechumens, Protestants in good faith, schismatics, Jews, Mahommedans, and pagans.
Those fortunate Catholics who at the close of a long life are still clothed in their baptismal
innocence, or who after many relapses into mortal sin persevere till the end, are not indeed
predestined more firmly, but are more signally favoured than the last-named categories of persons.
But even when man's supernatural end alone is taken into consideration, the term predestination is
not always used by theologians in an unequivocal sense. This need not astonish us, seeing that
predestination may comprise wholly diverse things. If taken in its adequate meaning (prÅ
“destinatio adÅ“quata or completa), then predestination refers to both grace and glory as a whole,
including not only the election to glory as the end, but also the election to grace as the means, the
vocation to the faith, justification, and final perseverance, with which a happy death is inseparably
connected. This is the meaning of St. Augustine's words (De dono persever., xxxv): "Prædestinatio
nihil est aliud quam præscientia et præparatio beneficiorum, quibus certissime liberantur [i. e.
salvantur], quicunque liberantur" (Predestination is nothing else than the foreknowledge and
foreordaining of those gracious gifts which make certain the salvation of all who are saved). But
the two concepts of grace and glory may be separated and each of them be made the object of a
special predestination. The result is the so-called inadequate predestination (prÅ“destinatio inadÅ
“quata or incompleta), either to grace alone or to glory alone. Like St. Paul, Augustine, too, speaks
of an election to grace apart from the celestial glory (loc. cit., xix): "Prædestinatio est gratiæ
præparatio, gratia vero jam ipsa donatio." It is evident, however, that this (inadequate)
predestination does not exclude the possibility that one chosen to grace, faith, and justification goes
nevertheless to hell. Hence we may disregard it, since it is at bottom simply another term for the
universality of God's salvific will and of the distribution of grace among all men (see GRACE).
Similarly eternal election to glory alone, that is, without regard to the preceding merits through
grace, must be designated as (inadequate) predestination. Though the possibility of the latter is at
once clear to the reflecting mind, yet its actuality is strongly contested by the majority of
theologians, as we shall see further on (under sect. III). From these explanations it is plain that the
real dogma of eternal election is exclusively concerned with adequate predestination, which
embraces both grace and glory and the essence of which St. Thomas (I, Q. xxiii, a. 2) defines as:
"Præparatio gratiæ in præsenti et gloriæ in futuro" (the foreordination of grace in the present and
of glory in the future).
In order to emphasize how mysterious and unapproachable is Divine election, the Council of Trent
calls predestination "hidden mystery". That predestination is indeed a sublime mystery appears not
only from the fact that the depths of the eternal counsel cannot be fathomed, it is even externally
visible in the inequality of the Divine choice. The unequal standard by which baptismal grace is
distributed among infants and efficacious graces among adults is hidden from our view by an
impenetrable veil. Could we gain a glimpse at the reasons of this inequality, we should at once hold
the key to the solution of the mystery itself. Why is it that this child is baptized, but not the child of
the neighbour? Why is it that Peter the Apostle rose again after his fall and persevered till his
death, while Judas Iscariot, his fellow-Apostle, hanged himself and thus frustrated his salvation?
Though correct, the answer that Judas went to perdition of his own free will, while Peter faithfully
co-operated with the grace of conversion offered him, does not clear up the enigma. For the
question recurs: Why did not God give to Judas the same efficacious, infallibly successful grace of
conversion as to St. Peter, whose blasphemous denial of the Lord was a sin no less grievous than
that of the traitor Judas? To all these and similar questions the only reasonable reply is the word of
St. Augustine (loc. cit., 21): "Inscrutabilia sunt judicia Dei" (the judgments of God are inscrutable).
B. The counterpart of the predestination of the good is the reprobation of the wicked, or the
eternal decree of God to cast all men into hell of whom He foresaw that they would die in the state
of sin as his enemies. This plan of Divine reprobation may be conceived either as absolute and
unconditional or as hypothetical and conditional, according as we consider it as dependent on, or
independent of, the infallible foreknowledge of sin, the real reason of reprobation. If we
understand eternal condemnation to be an absolute unconditional decree of God, its theological
possibility is affirmed or denied according as the question whether it involves a positive, or only a
negative, reprobation is answered in the affirmative or in the negative. The conceptual difference
between the two kinds of reprobation lies in this, that negative reprobation merely implies the
absolute will not to grant the bliss of heaven while positive reprobation means the absolute will to
condemn to hell. In other words, those who are reprobated merely negatively are numbered among
the non-predestined from all eternity; those who are reprobated positively are directly predestined
to hell from all eternity and have been created for this very purpose. It was Calvin who elaborated
the repulsive doctrine that an absolute Divine decree from all eternity positively predestined part of
mankind to hell and, in order to obtain this end effectually, also to sin. The Catholic advocates of
an unconditional reprobation evade the charge of heresy only by imposing a twofold restriction on
their hypothesis: (a) that the punishment of hell can, in time, be inflicted only on account of sin,
and from all eternity can be decreed only on account of foreseen malice, while sin itself is not to be
regarded as the sheer effect of the absolute Divine will, but only as the result of God's permission;
(b) that the eternal plan of God can never intend a positive reprobation to hell, but only a negative
reprobation, that is to say, an exclusion from heaven. These restrictions are evidently demanded by
the formulation of the concept itself, since the attributes of Divine sanctity and justice must be kept
inviolate (see GOD). Consequently, if we consider that God's sanctity will never allow Him to will
sin positively even though He foresees it in His permissive decree with infallible certainty, and that
His justice can foreordain, and in time actually inflict, hell as a punishment only by reason of the
sin foreseen, we understand the definition of eternal reprobation given by Peter Lombard (I. Sent.,
dist. 40): "Est præscientia iniquitatis quorundam et præparatio damnationis eorundem" (it is the
foreknowledge of the wickedness of some men and the foreordaining of their damnation). Cf.
Scheeben, "Mysterien des Christentums" (2nd ed., Freiburg, 1898), 98—103.
II. THE CATHOLIC DOGMA
Reserving the theological controversies for the next section, we deal here only with those articles of
faith relating to predestination and reprobation, the denial of which would involve heresy.
A. The Predestination of the Elect
He who would place the reason of predestination either in man alone or in God alone would
inevitably be led into heretical conclusions about eternal election. In the one case the error
concerns the last end, in the other the means to that end. Let it be noted that we do not speak of
the "cause" of predestination, which would be either the efficient cause (God), or the instrumental
cause (grace), or the final cause (God's honour), or the primary meritorious cause, but of the
reason or motive which induced God from all eternity to elect certain definite individuals to grace
and glory. The principal question then is: Does the natural merit of man exert perhaps some
influence on the Divine election to grace and glory? If we recall the dogma of the absolute gratuity
of Christian grace, our answer must be outright negative (see GRACE). To the further question
whether Divine predestination does not at least take into account the supernatural good works, the
Church answers with the doctrine that heaven is not given to the elect by a purely arbitrary act of
God's will, but that it is also the reward of the personal merits of the justified (see MERIT). Those
who, like the Pelagians, seek the reason for predestination only in man's naturally good works,
evidently misjudge the nature of the Christian heaven which is an absolutely supernatural destiny.
As Pelagianism puts the whole economy of salvation on a purely natural basis, so it regards
predestination in particular not as a special grace, much less as the supreme grace, but only as a
reward for natural merit.
The Semipelagians, too, depreciated the gratuity and the strictly supernatural character of eternal
happiness by ascribing at least the beginning of faith (initium fidei) and final perseverance (donum
perseverantiœ) to the exertion of man's natural powers, and not to the initiative of preventing
grace. This is one class of heresies which, slighting God and His grace, makes all salvation depend
on man alone. But no less grave are the errors into which a second group falls by making God
alone responsible for everything, and abolishing the free co-operation of the will in obtaining
eternal happiness. This is done by the advocates of heretical Predestinarianism, embodied in its
purest form in Calvinism and Jansenism. Those who seek the reason of predestination solely in the
absolute Will of God are logically forced to admit an irresistibly efficacious grace (gratia
irresistibilis), to deny the freedom of the will when influenced by grace and wholly to reject
supernatural merits (as a secondary reason for eternal happiness). And since in this system eternal
damnation, too, finds its only explanation in the Divine will, it further follows that concupiscence
acts on the sinful will with an irresistible force, that there the will is not really free to sin, and that
demerits cannot be the cause of eternal damnation.
Between these two extremes the Catholic dogma of predestination keeps the golden mean, because
it regards eternal happiness primarily as the work of God and His grace, but secondarily as the fruit
and reward of the meritorious actions of the predestined. The process of predestination consists of
the following five steps: (a) the first grace of vocation, especially faith as the beginning, foundation,
and root of justification; (b) a number of additional, actual graces for the successful
accomplishment of justification; (c) justification itself as the beginning of the state of grace and
love; (d) final perseverance or at least the grace of a happy death; (e) lastly, the admission to
eternal bliss. If it is a truth of Revelation that there are many who, following this path, seek and
find their eternal salvation with infallible certainty, then the existence of Divine predestination is
proved (cf. Matthew 25:34; Revelation 20:15). St. Paul says quite explicitly (Romans 8:28 sq.):
"we know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to
his purpose, are called to be saints. For whom he foreknew, he also predestinated to be made
conformable to the image of his Son; that he might be the first born amongst many brethren. And
whom he predestinated, them he also called. And whom he called, them he also justified. And
whom he justified, them he also glorified." (Cf. Ephesians 1:4-11) Besides the eternal
"foreknowledge" and foreordaining, the Apostle here mentions the various steps of predestination:
"vocation", "justification", and "glorification". This belief has been faithfully preserved by Tradition
through all the centuries, especially since the time of Augustine.
There are three other qualities of predestination which must be noticed, because they are important
and interesting from the theological standpoint: its immutability, the definiteness of the number of
the predestined, and its subjective uncertainty.
(1) The first quality, the immutability of the Divine decree, is based both on the infallible
foreknowledge of God that certain, quite determined individuals will leave this life in the state of
grace, and on the immutable will of God to give precisely to these men and to no others eternal
happiness as a reward for their supernatural merits. Consequently, the whole future membership of
heaven, down to its minutest details, with all the different measures of grace and the various
degrees of happiness, has been irrevocably fixed from all eternity. Nor could it be otherwise. For if
it were possible that a predestined individual should after all be cast into hell or that one not
predestined should in the end reach heaven, then God would have been mistaken in his
foreknowledge of future events; He would no longer be omniscient. Hence the Good Shepherd
says of his sheep (John 10:28): "And I give them life everlasting; and they shalt not perish forever,
and no man shall pluck them out of my hand." But we must beware of conceiving the immutability
of predestination either as fatalistic in the sense of the Mahommedan kismet or as a convenient
pretext for idle resignation to inexorable fate. God's infallible foreknowledge cannot force upon
man unavoidable coercion, for the simple reason that it is at bottom nothing else than the eternal
vision of the future historical actuality. God foresees the free activity of a man precisely as that
individual is willing to shape it. Whatever may promote the work of our salvation, whether our
own prayers and good works, or the prayers of others in our behalf, is eo ipso included in the
infallible foreknowledge of God and consequently in the scope of predestination (cf. St. Thomas, I,
Q. xxiii, a. 8). It is in such practical considerations that the ascetical maxim (falsely ascribed to St.
Augustine) originated: "Si non es prædestinatus, fac ut prædestineris" (if you are not predestined,
so act that you may be predestined). Strict theology, it is true, cannot approve this bold saying,
except in so far as the original decree of predestination is conceived as at first a hypothetical
decree, which is afterwards changed to an absolute and irrevocable decree by the prayers, good
works, and perseverance of him who is predestined, according to the words of the Apostle (2 Peter
1:10): "Wherefore, brethren, labour the more, that by good works you may make sure your calling
and election."
God's unerring foreknowledge and foreordaining is designated in the Bible by the beautiful figure
of the "Book of Life" (liber vitœ, to biblion tes zoes). This book of life is a list which contains the
names of all the elect and admits neither additions nor erasures. From the Old Testament (cf.
Exodus 32:32; Psalm 68:29) this symbol was taken over into the New by Christ and His Apostle
Paul (cf. Luke 10:20; Hebrews 12:23), and enlarged upon by the Evangelist John in his
Apocalypse [cf. Apoc., xxi, 27: "There shall not enter into it anything defiled ... but they that are
written in the book of life of the Lamb" (cf. Revelation 13:8; 20:15)]. The correct explanation of
this symbolic book is given by St. Augustine (De civ. Dei, XX, xiii): "Præscientia Dei quæ non
potest falli, liber vitæ est" (the foreknowledge of God, which cannot err, is the book of life).
However, as intimated by the Bible, there exists a second, more voluminous book, in which are
entered not only the names of the elect, but also the names of all the faithful on earth. Such a
metaphorical book is supposed wherever the possibility is hinted at that a name, though entered,
might again be stricken out [cf. Apoc., iii, 5: "and I will not blot out his name out of the book of
life" (cf. Exodus 32:33)]. The name will be mercilessly cancelled when a Christian sinks into
infidelity or godlessness and dies in his sin. Finally there is a third class of books, wherein the
wicked deeds and the crimes of individual sinners are written, and by which the reprobate will be
judged on the last day to be cast into hell (cf. Revelation 20:12): "and the books were opened; ...
and the dead were judged by those things which were written in the books according to their
works". It was this grand symbolism of Divine omniscience and justice that inspired the soul-
stirring verse of the Dies irœ according to which we shall all be judged out of a book: "Liber
scriptus proferetur: in quo totum continetur". Regarding the book of life, cf. St. Thomas, I, Q.
xxiv, a. 1—3, and Heinrich-Gutberlet, "Dogmat. Theologie", VIII (Mainz, 1897), section 453.
(2) The second quality of predestination, the definiteness of the number of the elect, follows
naturally from the first. For if the eternal counsel of God regarding the predestined is
unchangeable, then the number of the predestined must likewise be unchangeable and definite,
subject neither to additions nor to cancellations. Anything indefinite in the number would eo ipso
imply a lack of certitude in God's knowledge and would destroy His omniscience. Furthermore, the
very nature of omniscience demands that not only the abstract number of the elect, but also the
individuals with their names and their entire career on earth, should be present before the Divine
mind from all eternity. Naturally, human curiosity is eager for definite information about the
absolute as well as the relative number of the elect. How high should the absolute number be
estimated? But it would be idle and useless to undertake calculations and to guess at so and so
many millions or billions of predestined. St. Thomas (I, Q. xxiii, a. 7) mentions the opinion of
some theologians that as many men will be saved as there are fallen angels, while others held that
the number of predestined will equal the number of the faithful angels.
Lastly, there were optimists who, combining these two opinions into a third, made the total of men
saved equal to the unnumbered myriads of berated spirits. But even granted that the principle of
our calculation is correct, no mathematician would be able to figure out the absolute number on a
basis so vague, since the number of angels and demons is an unknown quantity to us. Hence, "the
best answer", rightly remarks St. Thomas, "is to say: God alone knows the number of his elect".
By relative number is meant the numerical relation between the predestined and the reprobate. Will
the majority of the human race be saved or will they be damned? Will one-half be damned the
other half saved? In this question the opinion of the rigorists is opposed to the milder view of the
optimists. Pointing to several texts of the Bible (Matthew 7:14; 22:14) and to sayings of great
spiritual doctors, the rigorists defend as probable the thesis that not only most Christians but also
most Catholics are doomed to eternal damnation. Almost repulsive in its tone is Massillon's sermon
on the small number of the elect. Yet even St. Thomas (loc. cit., a. 7) asserted: "Pauciores sunt
qui salvantur" (only the smaller number of men are saved). And a few years ago, when the Jesuit
P. Castelein ("Le rigorisme, le nombre des élus et la doctrine du salut", 2nd ed., Brussels, 1899)
impugned this theory with weighty arguments, he was sharply opposed by the Redemptorist P.
Godts ("De paucitate salvandorum quid docuerunt sancti", 3rd ed., Brussels, 1899). That the
number of the elect cannot be so very small is evident from the Apocalypse (vii, 9). When one
hears the rigorists, one is tempted to repeat Dieringer's bitter remark: "Can it be that the Church
actually exists in order to people hell?" The truth is that neither the one nor the other can be
proved from Scripture or Tradition (cf. Heinrich-Gutberlet, "Dogmat. Theologie", Mainz, 1897,
VIII, 363 sq.). But supplementing these two sources by arguments drawn from reason we may
safely defend as probable the opinion that the majority of Christians, especially of Catholics, will
be saved. If we add to this relative number the overwhelming majority of non-Christians (Jews,
Mahommedans, heathens), then Gener ("Theol. dogmat. scholast.", Rome, 1767, II, 242 sq.) is
probably right when he assumes the salvation of half of the human race, lest "it should be said to
the shame and offence of the Divine majesty and clemency that the [future] Kingdom of Satan is
larger than the Kingdom of Christ" (cf. W. Schneider, "Das andere Leben", 9th ed., Paderborn,
1908, 476 sq.).
(3) The third quality of predestination, its subjective uncertainty, is intimately connected with its
objective immutability. We know not whether we are reckoned among the predestined or not. All
we can say is: God alone knows it. When the Reformers, confounding predestination with the
absolute certainty of salvation, demanded of the Christian an unshaken faith in his own
predestination if be wished to be saved, the Council of Trent opposed to this presumptuous belief
the canon (Sess. VI, can. xv): "S. q. d., hominem renatum et justificatum teneri ex fide ad
credendum, se certo esse in numero prædestinatorum, anathema sit" (if any one shall say that the
regenerated and justified man is bound as a matter of faith to believe that he is surely of the
number of the predestined, let him be anathema). In truth, such a presumption is not only
irrational, but also unscriptural (cf. 1 Corinthians 4:4; 9:27; 10:12; Philippians 2:12). Only a private
revelation, such as was vouchsafed to the penitent thief on the cross, could give us the certainty of
faith: hence the Tridentine Council insists (loc. cit., cap. xii): "Nam nisi ex speciali revelatione sciri
non potest, quos Deus sibi elegerit" (for apart from a special revelation, it cannot be known whom
God has chosen). However, the Church condemns only that blasphemous presumption which
boasts of a faithlike certainty in matters of predestination. To say that there exist probable signs of
predestination which exclude all excessive anxiety is not against her teaching. The following are
some of the criteria set down by the theologians: purity of heart, pleasure in prayer, patience in
suffering, frequent reception of the sacraments, love of Christ and His Church, devotion to the
Mother of God, etc.
B. The Reprobation of the Damned
An unconditional and positive predestination of the reprobate not only to hell, but also to sin, was
taught especially by Calvin (Instit., III, c. xxi, xxiii, xxiv). His followers in Holland split into two
sects, the Supralapsarians and the Infralapsarians, the latter of whom regarded original sin as the
motive of positive condemnation, while the former (with Calvin) disregarded this factor and
derived the Divine decree of reprobation from God's inscrutable will alone. Infralapsarianism was
also held by Jansenius (De gratia Christi, l. X, c. ii, xi sq.), who taught that God had preordained
from the massa damnata of mankind one part to eternal bliss, the other to eternal pain, decreeing at
the same time to deny to those positively damned the necessary graces by which they might be
converted and keep the commandments; for this reason, he said, Christ died only for the
predestined (cf. Denzinger, "Enchiridion", n. 1092-6). Against such blasphemous teachings the
Second Synod of Orange in 529 and again the Council of Trent had pronounced the ecclesiastical
anathema (cf. Denzinger, nn. 200, 827). This condemnation was perfectly justified, because the
heresy of Predestinarianism, in direct opposition to the clearest texts of Scripture, denied the
universality of God's salvific will as well as of redemption through Christ (cf. Wisdom 11:24 sq.; 1
Timothy 2:1 sq.), nullified God's mercy towards the hardened sinner (Ezekiel 33:11; Romans 2:4;
2 Peter 3:9), did away with the freedom of the will to do good or evil, and hence with the merit of
good actions and the guilt of the bad, and finally destroyed the Divine attributes of wisdom, justice,
veracity, goodness, and sanctity. The very spirit of the Bible should have sufficed to deter Calvin
from a false explanation of Rom., ix, and his successor Beza from the exegetical maltreatment of I
Pet., ii, 7—8. After weighing all the Biblical texts bearing on eternal reprobation, a modern
Protestant exegete arrives at the conclusion: "There is no election to hell parallel to the election to
grace: on the contrary, the judgment pronounced on the impenitent supposes human guilt .... It is
only after Christ's salvation has been rejected that reprobation follows" ("Realencyk. für prot.
Theol.", XV, 586, Leipzig, 1904). As regards the Fathers of the Church, there is only St.
Augustine who might seem to cause difficulties in the proof from Tradition. As a matter of fact he
has been claimed by both Calvin and Jansenius as favouring their view of the question. This is not
the place to enter into an examination of his doctrine on reprobation; but that his works contain
expressions which, to say the least, might be interpreted in the sense of a negative reprobation,
cannot be doubted. Probably toning down the sharper words of the master, his "best pupil", St.
Prosper, in his apology against Vincent of Lerin (Resp. ad 12 obj. Vincent.), thus explained the
spirit of Augustine: "Voluntate exierunt, voluntate ceciderunt, et quia præsciti sunt casuri, non sunt
prædestinati; essent autem prædestinati, si essent reversuri et in sanctitate remansuri, ac per hoc
prædestinatio Dei multis est causa standi, nemini est causa labendi" (of their own will they went
out; of their own will they fell, and because their fall was foreknown, they were not predestined;
they would however be predestined if they were going to return and persevere in holiness; hence,
God's predestination is for many the cause of perseverance, for none the cause of falling away).
Regarding Tradition cf. Petavius, "De Deo", X, 7 sq.; Jacquin in "Revue de l'histoire
ecclésiastique", 1904, 266 sq.; 1906, 269 sq.; 725 sq.
We may now briefly summarize the whole Catholic doctrine, which is in harmony with our reason
as well as our moral sentiments. According to the doctrinal decisions of general and particular
synods, God infallibly foresees and immutably preordains from eternity all future events (cf.
Denzinger, n. 1784), all fatalistic necessity, however, being barred and human liberty remaining
intact (Denz., n. 607). Consequently man is free whether he accepts grace and does good or
whether he rejects it and does evil (Denz., n. 797). Just as it is God's true and sincere will that all
men, no one excepted, shall obtain eternal happiness, so, too, Christ has died for all (Denz., n.
794), not only for the predestined (Denz., n. 1096), or for the faithful (Denz., n. 1294), though it
is true that in reality not all avail themselves of the benefits of redemption (Denz., n. 795). Though
God preordained both eternal happiness and the good works of the elect (Denz., n. 322), yet, on
the other hand, He predestined no one positively to hell, much less to sin (Denz., nn. 200, 816).
Consequently, just as no one is saved against his will (Denz., n. 1363), so the reprobate perish
solely on account of their wickedness (Denz., nn. 318, 321). God foresaw the everlasting pains of
the impious from all eternity, and preordained this punishment on account of their sins (Denz., n.
322), though He does not fail therefore to hold out the grace of conversion to sinners (Denz., n.
807), or pass over those who are not predestined (Denz., n. 827). As long as the reprobate live on
earth, they may be accounted true Christians and members of the Church, just as on the other
hand the predestined may be outside the pale of Christianity and of the Church (Denz., nn. 628,
631). Without special revelation no one can know with certainty that he belongs to the number of
the elect (Denz., nn. 805 sq., 825 sq.).
III. THEOLOGICAL CONTROVERSIES
Owing to the infallible decisions laid down by the Church, every orthodox theory on predestination
and reprobation must keep within the limits marked out by the following theses: (a) At least in the
order of execution in time (in ordine executionis) the meritorious works of the predestined are the
partial cause of their eternal happiness; (b) hell cannot even in the order of intention (in ordine
intentionis) have been positively decreed to the damned, even though it is inflicted on them in time
as the just punishment of their misdeeds; (c) there is absolutely no predestination to sin as a means
to eternal damnation. Guided by these principles, we shall briefly sketch and examine three
theories put forward by Catholic theologians.
A. The Theory of Predestination ante prœvisa merita
This theory, championed by all Thomists and a few Molinists (as Bellarmine, Suarez, Francis de
Lugo), asserts that God, by an absolute decree and without regard to any future supernatural
merits, predestined from all eternity certain men to the glory of heaven, and then, in consequence
of this decree, decided to give them all the graces necessary for its accomplishment. In the order of
time, however, the Divine decree is carried out in the reverse order, the predestined receiving first
the graces preappointed to them, and lastly the glory of heaven as the reward of their good works.
Two qualities, therefore, characterize this theory: first, the absoluteness of the eternal decree, and
second, the reversing of the relation of grace and glory in the two different orders of eternal
intention (ordo intentionis) and execution in time (ordo executionis). For while grace (and merit), in
the order of eternal intention, is nothing else than the result or effect of glory absolutely decreed,
yet, in the order of execution, it becomes the reason and partial cause of eternal happiness, as is
required by the dogma of the meritoriousness of good works (see MERIT). Again, celestial glory is
the thing willed first in the order of eternal intention and then is made the reason or motive for the
graces offered, while in the order of execution it must be conceived as the result or effect of
supernatural merits. This concession is important, since without it the theory would be intrinsically
impossible and theologically untenable.
But what about the positive proof? The theory can find decisive evidence in Scripture only on the
supposition that predestination to heavenly glory is unequivocally mentioned in the Bible as the
Divine motive for the special graces granted to the elect. Now, although there are several texts (e.
g. Matthew 24:22 sq.; Acts 13:48, and others) which might without straining be interpreted in this
sense, yet these passages lose their imagined force in view of the fact that other explanations, of
which there is no lack, are either possible or even more probable. The ninth chapter of the Epistle
to the Romans in particular is claimed by the advocates of absolute predestination as that
"classical" passage wherein St. Paul seems to represent the eternal happiness of the elect not only
as the work of God's purest mercy, but as an act of the most arbitrary will, so that grace, faith,
justification must be regarded as sheer effects of an absolute, Divine decree (cf. Romans 9:18:
"Therefore he hath mercy on whom he will; and whom he will, he hardeneth"). Now, it is rather
daring to quote one of the most difficult and obscure passages of the Bible as a "classical text" and
then to base on it an argument for bold speculation. To be more specific, it is impossible to draw
the details of the picture in which the Apostle compares God to the potter who hath "power over
the clay, of the same lump, to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour"
(Romans 9:21), without falling into the Calvinistic blasphemy that God predestined some men to
hell and sin just as positively as he pre-elected others to eternal life. It is not even admissible to
read into the Apostle's thought a negative reprobation of certain men. For the primary intention of
the Epistle to the Romans is to insist on the gratuity of the vocation to Christianity and to reject the
Jewish presumption that the possession of the Mosaic Law and the carnal descent from Abraham
gave to the Jews an essential preference over the heathens. But the Epistle has nothing to do with
the speculative question whether or not the free vocation to grace must be considered as the
necessary result of eternal predestination to celestial glory [cf. Franzelin, "De Deo uno", thes. lxv
(Rome, 1883)].
It is just as difficult to find in the writings of the Fathers a solid argument for an absolute
predestination. The only one who might be cited with some semblance of truth is St. Augustine,
who stands, however, almost alone among his predecessors and successors. Not even his most
faithful pupils, Prosper and Fulgentius, followed their master in all his exaggerations. But a problem
so deep and mysterious, which does not belong to the substance of Faith and which, to use the
expression of Pope Celestine I (d. 432), is concerned with profundiores difficilioresque partes
incurrentium quœstionum (cf. Denz., n. 142), cannot be decided on the sole authority of
Augustine. Moreover, the true opinion of the African doctor is a matter of dispute even among the
best authorities, so that all parties claim him for their conflicting views [cf. O. Rottmanner, "Der
Augustinismus" (Munich, 1892); Pfülf, "Zur Prädestinationslehre des hl. Augustinus" in
"Innsbrucker Zeitschrift für kath. Theologie", 1893, 483 sq.]. As to the unsuccessful attempt
made by Gonet and Billuart to prove absolute predestination ante prœvisa merita "by an argument
from reason", see Pohle, "Dogmatik", II, 4th ed., Paderborn, 1909, 443 sq.
B. The Theory of the Negative Reprobation of the Damned
What deters us most strongly from embracing the theory just discussed is not the fact that it cannot
be dogmatically proved from Scripture or Tradition, but the logical necessity to which it binds us,
of associating an absolute predestination to glory, with a reprobation just as absolute, even though
it be but negative. The well-meant efforts of some theologians (e. g. Billot) to make a distinction
between the two concepts, and so to escape the evil consequences of negative reprobation, cannot
conceal from closer inspection the helplessness of such logical artifices. Hence the earlier partisans
of absolute predestination never denied that their theory compelled them to assume for the wicked
a parallel, negative reprobation — that is, to assume that, though not positively predestined to hell,
yet they are absolutely predestined not to go to heaven (cf. above, I, B). While it was easy for the
Thomists to bring this view into logical harmony with their prœmotio physica, the few Molinists
were put to straits to harmonize negative reprobation with their scientia media. In order to disguise
the harshness and cruelty of such a Divine decree, the theologians invented more or less palliative
expressions, saying that negative reprobation is the absolute will of God to "pass over" a priori
those not predestined, to "overlook" them, "not to elect" them, "by no means to admit" them into
heaven. Only Gonet had the courage to call the thing by its right name: "exclusion from heaven"
(exclusio a gloria).
In another respect, too, the adherents of negative reprobation do not agree among themselves,
namely, as to what is the motive of Divine reprobation. The rigorists (as Alvarez, Estius, Sylvius)
regard as the motive the sovereign will of God who, without taking into account possible sins and
demerits, determined a priori to keep those not predestined out of heaven, though He did not
create them for hell.
A second milder opinion (e. g. de Lemos, Gotti, Gonet), appealing to the Augustinian doctrine of
the massa damnata, finds the ultimate reason for the exclusion from heaven in original sin, in
which God could, without being unjust, leave as many as He saw fit. The third and mildest opinion
(as Goudin, Graveson, Billuart) derives reprobation not from a direct exclusion from heaven, but
from the omission of an "effectual election to heaven"; they represent God as having decreed ante
prœvisa merita to leave those not predestined in their sinful weakness, without denying them the
necessary sufficient graces; thus they would perish infallibility (cf. "Innsbrucker Zeitschrift für
kath. Theologie", 1879, 203 sq.).
Whatever view one may take regarding the internal probability of negative reprobation, it cannot be
harmonized with the dogmatically certain universality and sincerity of God's salvific will. For the
absolute predestination of the blessed is at the same time the absolute will of God "not to elect" a
priori the rest of mankind (Suarez), or which comes to the same, "to exclude them from heaven"
(Gonet), in other words, not to save them. While certain Thomists (as Bañez, Alvarez, Gonet)
accept this conclusion so far as to degrade the "voluntas salvifica" to an ineffectual "velleitas",
which conflicts with evident doctrines of revelation, Suarez labours in the sweat of his brow to
safeguard the sincerity of God's salvific will, even towards those who are reprobated negatively.
But in vain. How can that will to save be called serious and sincere which has decreed from all
eternity the metaphysical impossibility of salvation? He who has been reprobated negatively, may
exhaust all his efforts to attain salvation: it avail's him nothing. Moreover, in order to realize
infallibly his decree, God is compelled to frustrate the eternal welfare of all excluded a priori from
heaven, and to take care that they die in their sins. Is this the language in which Holy Writ speaks
to us? No; there we meet an anxious, loving father, who wills not "that any should perish, but that
all should return to penance" (2 Peter 3:9). Lessius rightly says that it would be indifferent to him
whether he was numbered among those reprobated positively or negatively; for, in either case, his
eternal damnation would be certain. The reason for this is that in the present economy exclusion
from heaven means for adults practically the same thing as damnation. A middle state, a merely
natural happiness, does not exist.
C. The Theory of Predestination post prœvisa merita
This theory defended by the earlier Scholastics (Alexander of Hales, Albertus Magnus), as well as
by the majority of the Molinists, and warmly recommended by St. Francis de Sales "as the truer
and more attractive opinion", has this as its chief distinction, that it is free from the logical
necessity of upholding negative reprobation. It differs from predestination ante prœvisa merita in
two points: first, it rejects the absolute decree and assumes a hypothetical predestination to glory;
secondly, it does not reverse the succession of grace and glory in the two orders of eternal
intention and of execution in time, but makes glory depend on merit in eternity as well as in the
order of time. This hypothetical decree reads as follows: Just as in time eternal happiness depends
on merit as a condition, so I intended heaven from all eternity only for foreseen merit. -- It is only
by reason of the infallible foreknowledge of these merits that the hypothetical decree is changed
into an absolute: These and no others shall be saved.
This view not only safeguards the universality and sincerity of God's salvific will, but coincides
admirably with the teachings of St. Paul (cf. 2 Timothy 4:8), who knows that there "is laid up"
(reposita est, apokeitai) in heaven "a crown of justice", which "the just judge will render" (reddet,
apodosei) to him on the day of judgment. Clearer still is the inference drawn from the sentence of
the universal Judge (Matthew 25:34 sq.): "Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the
kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave me
to eat" etc. As the "possessing" of the Kingdom of Heaven in time is here linked to the works of
mercy as a condition, so the "preparation" of the Kingdom of Heaven in eternity, that is,
predestination to glory is conceived as dependent on the foreknowledge that good works will be
performed. The same conclusion follows from the parallel sentence of condemnation (Matthew 25:
41 sq.): "Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and
his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave me not to eat" etc. For it is evident that the "everlasting
fire of hell" can only have been intended from all eternity for sin and demerit, that is, for neglect of
Christian charity, in the same sense in which it is inflicted in time. Concluding a pari, we must say
the same of eternal bliss. This explanation is splendidly confirmed by the Greek Fathers. Generally
speaking, the Greeks are the chief authorities for conditional predestination dependent on foreseen
merits. The Latins, too, are so unanimous on this question that St. Augustine is practically the only
adversary in the Occident. St. Hilary (In Ps. lxiv, n. 5) expressly describes eternal election as
proceeding from "the choice of merit" (ex meriti delectu), and St. Ambrose teaches in his
paraphrase of Rom., viii, 29 (De fide, V, vi, 83): "Non enim ante prædestinavit quam præscivit,
sed quorum merita præscivit, eorum præmia prædestinavit" (He did not predestine before He
foreknew, but for those whose merits He foresaw, He predestined the reward). To conclude: no
one can accuse us of boldness if we assert that the theory here presented has a firmer basis in
Scripture and Tradition than the opposite opinion.
Besides the works quoted, cf. PETER LOMBARD, Sent., I, dist. 40-41: ST. THOMAS, I, Q.
xxiii; RUIZ, De prœdest. et reprobatione (Lyons, 1828); RAM�REZ, De prœd. et reprob. (2
vols., Alcalá, 1702); PETAVIUS, De Deo, IX—X; IDEM, De incarnatione, XIII; LESSIUS, De
perfectionibus moribusque divinis, XIV, 2; IDEM, De prœd. et reprob., Opusc. II (Paris, 1878);
TOURNELY, De Deo, qq. 22-23; SCHRADER, Commentarii de prœdestinatione (Vienna,
1865); HOSSE, De notionibus providentiœ prœdestinationisque in ipsa Sacra Scriptura exhibitis
(Bonn, 1868); BALTZER, Des hl. Augustinus Lehre über Prädestination und Reprobation
(Vienna, 1871); MANNENS, De voluntate Dei salvifica et prœdestinatione (Louvain, 1883);
WEBER, Kritische Gesch. der Exegese des 9 Kap. des Römerbriefes (Würzburg, 1889).
Besides these monographs cf. FRANZELIN, De Deo uno (Rome, 1883); OSWALD, Die Lehre
von der Gnade, d. i. Gnade, Rechtfertigung, Gnadenwahl (Paderborn, 1885); SIMAR, Dogmatik,
II, section 126 (Freiburg, 1899); TEPE, Institut. theol., III (Paris, 1896); SCHEEBEN-
ATZBERGER, Dogmatik, IV (Freiburg, 1903); PESCH, Prœl. Dogmat., II (Freiburg, 1906);
VAN NOORT, De gratia Christi (Amsterdam, 1908); P0HLE, Dogmatik, II (Paderborn, 1909).
J. POHLE
Transcribed by Gary A. Mros
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XII
Copyright © 1911 by Robert Appleton Company
Online Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. Knight
Nihil Obstat, June 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor
Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
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