I. Response to the question
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down, just as in speculative matters things that are known naturally would be known naturally even if they weren't revealed, and so on.
Moreover, the natural law is obligatory in every state, since what such a nature ought to do or not do is known. But the Decalogue was not obligatory in every state: it was not obligatory in the state of innocence, because at that point no law had been given, and a law is evidently not obligatory before it is given.
On the contrary:
At the beginning of the Decretum [pars 1, d. 6, c. 3], His itaque, we read that "The natural law abides as it is: whatever things are found in the Law or the Gospel."
And note 1 John 2.2
I. Response to the question A. The views of others
1. EXPOSITION OF THE VIEWS
There is one view3 that holds that the whole of the Decalogue belongs to the natural law.
The reasoning behind that view goes like this.4 The natural law proceeds from firstknown principles concerning possible actions. These are first practical principles, known from their terms, which are the primary seeds of the truth to which the intellect is naturally inclined on the basis of their terms; and the will is naturally inclined to assent to such a dictate from the intellect. All the precepts that are contained in the Decalogue follow either immediately or mediately from such principles. For all the things commanded in the Decalogue have a formal goodness by which they are directed, in and of themselves, toward the ultimate end, so that through them human beings are turned toward that end. And all the things prohibited in the Decalogue have a formal badness that turns people away from the ultimate end. Thus, the things commanded in the Decalogue are not good merely because they are commanded, but rather the reverse: they are commanded because they are good.
And the things prohibited in the Decalogue are not bad merely because they are prohibited; rather, they are prohibited because they are bad.
Consequently, it appears that the right reply5 to the first argument above [n. 2] is that God cannot give dispensations from such precepts, period. For what is illicit in and of 2 1 John 2:7: "Beloved, I am not writing a new commandment to you, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning; the old commandment is the word that you have heard."
3 Thomas Aquinas, ST I-II q. 100 a. 1 arg. in opp.; Richard Middleton, Sent. III d. 37 princ. 1 a. 1 in corp.
4 Thomas Aquinas, ST I-II q. 94 a. 2 in corp., q. 100 a. 1 in corp.; Richard Middleton, Sent. III d. 37 princ. 1 q. 1 in corp.
5 Thomas Aquinas, ST I-II q. 100 a. 8 in corp.; Richard Middleton, Sent. III d. 37 princ. 1 q. 5 in corp.
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itself evidently cannot be made licit by any will. For example, if killing is a bad act in virtue of being an act that has its external effect on such-and-such an object (say, one's neighbor), then, so long as that cause is what it is, the act will always be bad.
And thus no willing that leaves the essential elements [i.e., the nature of the act and its object] intact can bring it about that the act is good.
11 Of course, then you have to give some interpretation of the Scriptural passages that seem to say God made dispensations from such precepts [n. 4].
One way of interpreting them6 is as follows: Even if a dispensation for an act could be given insofar as that act falls under some general description, there can be no dispensation for an act insofar as it is prohibited, contrary to the intention of the one who issues the command; and thus, there can be no dispensation contrary to the prohibition.
12 An alternative interpretation7 is that an act that remains disordered cannot be made well-ordered. Now insofar as an act is contrary to a prohibition, it is disordered.
Therefore, God cannot give a dispensation for an act insofar as it is contrary to a prohibition.
2. REFUTATION OF THE VIEWS
Now these interpretations—which may well amount to the same thing—evidently fail to uphold the intended conclusion.
After all, giving a dispensation doesn't mean keeping the precept intact but allowing someone to act contrary to it. Giving a dispensation means either revoking the precept or else setting forth how it ought to be understood. For there are two kinds of dispensation: revocation of the law and clarification of the law. My question, then, is this: leaving all the circumstances in the act "killing a human being" just as they are, except for the one circumstance of the act's being prohibited or not, can God bring it about that that act, which with those very circumstances is at some time prohibited and illicit, is, at some other time, but with those same circumstances, not prohibited, but licit? If the answer is yes, then God has the power, without qualification, to give dispensations in just the same way that he changed the Old Law when he gave the New Law. With respect to the ceremonial law, he didn't make it the case that the precepts about ceremonial matters remained in force but were not to be observed; instead, he brought it about that the act remained the same but people were not required to perform it as they had been required before. This is also how any legislator makes unqualified dispensation when he revokes a precept of positive law he had established, making it so that the prohibited or illicit act remains the same in itself but the characteristic of being-prohibited or being-illicit is removed,
6 Richard Middleton, Sent. III d. 37 princ. 1 q. 5 ad 2–3; Thomas Aquinas, ST I-II q. 100 a. 8 ad 3.
7 Godfrey of Fontaines, Quodl. IV q. 11 in corp.
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and the act is made licit. But if God cannot make it the case that this act, which with such-and-circumstances was prohibited, is no longer prohibited, then he cannot bring it about that killing is not prohibited. But it is perfectly clear that God did just that in the case of Abraham as well as in many other cases.
Moreover, propositions that are true in virtue of their terms—whether they are necessary in virtue of their terms or follow from such necessary truths—have their truth prior to any act of will; or at any rate they have their truth even if, per impossibile, there is no willing. Therefore, if the precepts of the Decalogue (or those practical propositions that can be formed from them) had such necessity— say, if the following were necessary: "One's neighbor is not to be killed or hated,"
"Theft is not to be done," and so on—it would follow that, independently of any willing whatsoever on the part of an intellect that apprehends them, those propositions would be necessary. Thus the divine intellect, apprehending such propositions, would necessarily apprehend them as true in and of themselves. And then the divine will would necessarily conform to the apprehended propositions; otherwise, it would not be upright. And then one would have to posit practical knowledge in God, which was denied in the question on praxis in Book I, distinction 1.8 One would also have to posit that God's will is determined in an unqualifiedly necessary way with respect to possible objects of willing other than himself, which is contrary to what I said in Book I, distinction 2 [nn. 79–81], where I discussed the fact that God's will tends only contingently to anything other than God himself.
Now you might say9 that, necessarily, a created will ought to conform to these propositions in order to be upright, whereas the divine will is not required to will in conformity with these truths; rather, it is precisely because God wills in conformity with them that they are true. But that simply reaffirms my conclusion [that God's will tends only contingently to anything other than God himself], since this objection proves the opposite [of what it's intended to prove]. For the divine intellect's apprehending these terms and, on the basis of apprehending them, being able to apprehend the truth of the proposition—the truth, I mean, that the proposition has in virtue of its terms—is naturally prior to the divine will's having any act concerning them. Therefore, in the second instant of nature, when the will has an act concerning them, it must necessarily will in conformity with that dictate [of the divine intellect]; and thus it cannot will the opposite.10
8 Actually, this question is in the Prologue to the Ordinatio, nn. 330–1.
9 Richard Middleton, Sent. III d. 37 princ. 1 q. 5 ad 2 in opp.
10 The translation of this paragraph seeks to make sense of the reading of the critical edition, which is obscure. The manuscripts are very muddled here, and it is difficult to extract a clear and coherent line of argument from any of them.
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B. Scotus's view
1. THE TWOFOLD WAY OF UNDERSTANDING WHAT BELONGS
TO THE NATURAL LAW
In reply to the question, therefore, I say that there are two ways in which things can be said to belong to the natural law. The first way is as first practical principles known in virtue of their terms or as conclusions that necessarily follow from them. These belong to the natural law in the strictest sense.
17 The arguments given against the first opinion [nn. 13–14] prove that no dispensations can be given from such precepts. The Decretum speaks of these in the paragraph that begins Denique, at the end of distinction 4, where we read that "the natural law came to be from the beginning of rational creatures; it does not change with time, but abides unchangeably."11 I concede those arguments.
18 But this is not what we should say in general about all the precepts of the second table,12 since the nature of the things that they command or prohibit does not ground unqualifiedly necessary practical principles or unqualifiedly necessary conclusions.
For there is no goodness in the things that those precepts command that is necessary for the goodness of the ultimate end, and there is no badness in the things they prohibit that necessarily turns one aside from the ultimate end: thus, if that good were not commanded, the ultimate end could still be attained and loved, and if that evil were not prohibited, the attainment of the ultimate end would still be possible.
19 It is otherwise with the precepts of the first table because they have to do directly with God as their object.
20 Indeed, if we understand the first two commandments as purely negative—the first as "You shall not have other gods" and the second as "You shall not take up the name of your God wantonly," that is, "You shall not do irreverence to God"—they belong to the natural law strictly speaking, because this follows necessarily: "If God exists, he alone is to be loved as God." And it likewise follows that nothing else is to be worshiped as God and that no irreverence is to be done to him. Consequently, God himself cannot give dispensations from these precepts so that someone could [licitly] act contrary to this or that prohibition. Cite two authorities for this conclusion from Richard, question 5, in his own answer.13
11 Gratian, Decretum pars 1, d. 5. (Some codices of the Decretum place these words at the end of d. 4, hence Scotus's reference.) 12 The Ten Commandments are traditionally thought of as divided into two "tables" or tablets, the first containing those that prescribe how we are to act toward God and the second containing those that prescribe how we are to act toward other human beings.
13 Richard Middleton, Sent. III d. 37 princ. 1 q. 5 in corp., cites two passages from Augustine—Contra
Faustum 22.27 and De diversis quaestionibus 83 53.2—to prove that God cannot dispense from any of the commandments of the Decalogue.
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The third precept of the first table is about Sabbath observance. It is affirmative insofar as it requires that some worship be offered to God at a specific time, but insofar as it specifies this or that particular time, it does not belong to the natural law in the strict sense. The same goes for its negative part, which prohibits servile work during the specified time that would interfere with the worship to be offered, since such work is prohibited only because it impedes or restricts the worship that is commanded.
But there is some uncertainty about whether the precept concerning Sabbath observance, insofar as it requires that worship be offered to God at some specified time or other, belongs to the natural law in the strict sense. If it does not, then God could grant absolute dispensation so that a person would not be required to have any good motion toward God through the whole course of his life. And that doesn't seem probable, since without some good willing of the ultimate end, one cannot have any unqualifiedly good willing of things that are for the sake of the end; and thus one would never be obligated to have any unqualifiedly good willing of any kind. After all, if it doesn't follow from the natural law in the strict sense that one must worship God now, by parity of reasoning it doesn't follow that one must worship God five minutes from now, and so on for any specific time you care to name. Therefore, strictly speaking, there seems to be no way to reach the conclusion that anyone is obligated to worship God at any particular time; and so by parity of reasoning, there seems to be no way to reach the conclusion that anyone is obligated to worship God at some time or other—because no one is obligated to perform an act at some time or other unless he is obligated to perform it at some particular time, when certain [specified] conditions are met.
If, however, this third precept does belong to the natural law in the strict sense, in such a way that "God is to be loved" (at some particular time, and by some elicited act directed at God) follows necessarily from "God is not to be hated" or from some other given proposition, then the argument [in n. 22] from singulars to universals is not valid, but involves the fallacy of a figure of speech as in other arguments from multiple indeterminate causes to a single one of them.14
But if this third precept does not belong to the natural law in the strict sense, then we should draw the same conclusion about it that we drew about the precepts of the second table.
There is a second way in which some precepts are said to belong to the natural law, in that they are highly consonant with that law, though they do not follow necessarily from first practical principles that are known in virtue of their terms and are necessarily known by any intellect [that understands their terms].
14 See Peter of Spain, Tractatus tr. 7 nn. 92, 97–100 for a discussion of this fallacy.
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26 And it is certain that all the precepts even of the second table belong to the natural law in this second way, since their rectitude is highly consonant with first practical principles that are known necessarily.
27 An example will serve to make this distinction clear. Assuming the principle of positive law that people ought to live together peaceably in a community or state, it does not necessarily follow that everyone therefore ought to have private property, or property distinct from the property of others. For there could still be peace in communal life even if people held all things in common. Not even if we assume that those who are living together in community are of weak character does it follow necessarily that they ought to have private property. Nonetheless, private property for people of weak character is highly consonant with getting along peaceably. For people of weak character care more for their own goods than for goods held in common, and they would prefer that common goods be entrusted to their own possession rather than shared with the community and those who look out for the community's well-being; and thus strife and disorder would arise.
28 Perhaps something similar holds for all positive laws: that although there is some one principle that is the basis for all those laws or edicts, positive laws do not follow with unqualified necessity from that principle; instead, they elucidate or explicate the principle as it bears on particular matters, and those explications are highly consonant with the general first principle.
2. SUMMARY OF SCOTUS'S CONCLUSIONS
So, to sum up: first, I deny that all the precepts of the second table belong to the natural law in the strict sense. Second, I concede that the first two precepts of the first table belong to the natural law in the strict sense. Third, there is some uncertainty about the third precept of the first table. And fourth, I concede that all the precepts belong to the natural law in the wider sense.
3. OBJECTION TO THE FIRST CONCLUSION
I argue against the first of these as follows. According to the Apostle in his letter to the Romans [13:9], "'You shall not kill,' 'You shall not commit adultery,' and every other commandment are summed up in this sentence: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'" Therefore, the commandments of the second table are necessarily included in the commandment "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." For that is evidently what the Apostle is explicitly arguing in that passage; at the end, he draws this conclusion: "Those who love their neighbor have fulfilled the law." Now this same conclusion is established by the greater authority of the Savior in Matthew
22:40: "On these [two commandments, love of God and love of neighbor,] hang all the law and the prophets." Now love of neighbor follows necessarily from the necessary principle "God is to be loved." Therefore, etc.
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So, from the first to the last, all the precepts of the second table follow from the principle that is the first precept of the first table; and if the precepts of the first table belong unqualifiedly to the natural law because they are included in the first principle or first precept, which belongs unqualifiedly to the natural law, it follows that the precepts of the second table also belong to the natural law in the strict sense, as conclusions of that same principle.
The proof of what is assumed in this argument15 is evident from what I said in commenting on distinction 28 of Book III [nn. 10–11], where it was proved in two ways that perfect love of God and rightly ordered love cannot be possessive, in the sense of appropriating [the loved object to oneself]. The first reason was that loving a common good as a good to be appropriated to oneself is disordered; the second was that if someone is unwilling for the one he loves to be loved by others, his love is disordered and imperfect. It follows, therefore, that in order for God to be loved perfectly and in a rightly ordered way, those who love God ought to will that their neighbors love God. And in willing this for their neighbors, they are loving their neighbors: it is in fact only in this way that one loves one's neighbor through charity, as the Gloss on that passage16 says. Therefore, etc.
4. REPLY TO THE OBJECTION
There are three possible replies to this objection:
First, one could reply that the commandment "You shall love the Lord your God" does not belong to the natural law in the strict sense as affirmative, but only as negative, as prohibiting the opposite. What belongs to the natural law in the strict sense is "You shall not hate the Lord your God." Whether "You shall at some time love the Lord your God" belongs to the natural law in the strict sense was left unsettled in our discussion of the third commandment [n. 23]. And from the negative formulation it doesn't follow that one is required to will that one's neighbor love God. That would, however, follow from the affirmative formulation—but then it's not altogether clear that the affirmative formulation belongs to the natural law in the strict sense.
Second, one could reply that from the precept "You shall love the Lord your God" it doesn't follow that I ought to will that my neighbor love God.
To the argument that a rightly ordered and perfect love can't be possessive [n. 31],
I reply that I am not obligated to will that a common good be someone else's good, and thus I am not obligated to will that anyone else love that good. It might even be
15 Namely, that love of neighbor follows necessarily from love of God.
16 See Peter Lombard, In Epist. ad Rom. 3:7–10: "For this is the divinely established rule for love of neighbor: that one love one's neighbor for God's sake. . . . Therefore, no one loves his neighbor unless he loves God. So as much as we can, let us devote ourselves to our neighbors, whom we love as we love ourselves, so that they too may love God."
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inappropriate for me to will that that good be someone else's—say, because it does not please that good to belong to someone else, as God, who predestines one person and not another, wills to be the good of the one who is predestined and not the good of the other.
35 And along the same lines, it's clear how to reply to the argument that a person who loves someone perfectly wants the one he loves to be loved by others: one could say that this is true of anyone whose friendship is pleasing to the one he loves. But the natural law gives no assurance that God, who is (or ought to be) loved, accepts the love of any particular person.
36 Third, one could reply that even if the natural law in the strict sense does include the requirement to love one's neighbor in the way set forth earlier—namely, that one is obligated without qualification to will that one's neighbor love God, because that is just what it means to love one's neighbor—the precepts of the second table still don't follow from this: I mean, that one must will-against killing him (with respect to the good of his person) and that one must will-against committing adultery (with respect to the good of the person married to him), and that one must will-against stealing
(with respect to the goods of fortune that he has at his disposal), and that parents should be shown honor not only by marks of respect but also by help and support, and so on for the other precepts of the second table. It is, after all, possible for me to will that my neighbor love God and yet not will, or even will-against, the preservation of his bodily life or of the fidelity of his spouse, and so forth. Consequently, it's possible for both of the following to be true at the same time: that "I ought to will that my neighbor love God in himself just as I ought to will that I love God" is a necessary truth, derived from practical principles, and yet that "I ought to will for my neighbor this or that particular good enjoined by a precept of the second table" is not a necessary truth.
37 And then one could reply to the authoritative passages from Paul and Christ by saying that as a matter of fact God has elucidated love of neighbor beyond what it includes as following from principles of the natural law. Thus, although love of neighbor as derived from principles of the natural law requires only that one will that one's neighbor love God in himself,17 nonetheless, as elucidated [by God],18
17 Reading velle proximo ipsum diligere Deum in se with Q. The edition reads velle diligere proximum in se, "that one will to love one's neighbor in himself," which does not fit the argument Scotus is making or the characterization of love of neighbor that has been at issue in nn. 30–6.
18 "As elucidated [by God]" translates ut explicatum est. The edition takes these words to refer to the explanation given in n. 36 of the relationship between neighbor-love as included in the natural law in the strict sense and neighbor-love as commanded by the precepts of the second table, but that is clearly a mistake, since the argument of n. 36 supports exactly the opposite conclusion to the one Scotus is about to draw. Rather, the reference is to the claim in the first sentence of this paragraph that God "has elucidated"—explicavit—the requirements of neighbor-love beyond what is included in the natural law taken strictly.