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Re-Evaluating Augustinian Fatalism Through the Eastern and Western Distinction Between God's Essence and Energies Stephen John Plecnik Marquette University

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Re-Evaluating Augustinian Fatalism Through the Eastern and Western Distinction Between God's Essence and Energies Stephen John Plecnik Marquette University Marquette University e-Publications@Marquette Dissertations (2009 -) Dissertations, Theses, and Professional Projects Re-Evaluating Augustinian Fatalism through the Eastern and Western Distinction between God's Essence and Energies Stephen John Plecnik Marquette University Recommended Citation Plecnik, Stephen John, "Re-Evaluating Augustinian Fatalism through the Eastern and Western Distinction between God's Essence and Energies" (2019). Dissertations (2009 -). 872. https://epublications.marquette.edu/dissertations_mu/872 RE-EVALUATING AUGUSTINIAN FATALISM THROUGH THE EASTERN AND WESTERN DISTINCTION BETWEEN GOD’S ESSENCE AND ENERGIES by Stephen J. Plečnik A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School, Marquette University, in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Milwaukee, Wisconsin August 2019 ABSTRACT RE-EVALUATING AUGUSTINIAN FATALISM THROUGH THE EASTERN AND WESTERN DISTINCTION BETWEEN GOD’S ESSENCE AND ENERGIES Stephen J. Plečnik Marquette University, 2019 In this dissertation, I will examine the problem of theological fatalism in St. Augustine and, specifically, whether or not Augustine was philosophically justified in his belief that his views on divine grace and human freedom could be harmonized. As is well-known, beginning with his second response To Simplician (ca. 396) and continuing through his works against the semi-Pelagians (ca. 426-429), Augustine espoused the Pauline doctrine of all-inclusive grace: that the fallen will’s ability to accomplish the good is totally a function of God’s elective grace. What, then, does the fallen will do to work out its own salvation? There is the further issue of how to reconcile Augustine’s rather extreme emphasis on grace in his later works with the more balanced picture we receive in his sermones ad populum, written throughout his forty-year preaching career. In many of these sermons, even those written during the Pelagian controversy, Augustine is careful to leave space for both divine and human initiative in the process of our justification within the totus Christus, or ‘whole Christ.’ How we can understand Augustine in his role as doctor gratiae and as preacher of human freedom will be a major inquiry of this dissertation. The most serious obstacle to moving forward on these problems has been and remains the essentialist interpretation of Augustine’s Trinitarian theology by most commentators. On their interpretation, Augustine thought that there were no real distinctions within the Trinity, with each of the three divine persons and their actions sharing in the absolute unity of the divine essence. Holding this interpretation not only does away with the distinctness of each of the persons, but also requires all of God’s different powers and attributes, including willing and foreknowing, to be coalesced into one another without distinction in the divine essence. God’s foreknowledge is thereby identified with God’s will, which necessarily leads to theological fatalism: God would have to will everything that He foreknows, and God would have to foreknow everything that He wills. Since God is omniscient, He wills everything that will happen, including the future willings of the fallen human will. It cannot be denied that there are texts in the Augustinian corpus that seem to point to a reading of the Trinity as absolutely simple. But this study will endeavor to show that there are also other largely overlooked texts in On the Trinity, the Confessions, and his Commentaries on the Literal Interpretation of Genesis (among others) that argue for various distinctions within the Trinity to make sense of the relation between Creator and creature, and the differences between the divine processions of generation/spiration, and the act of creation. These texts will be shown to parallel very closely the position of the Eastern Orthodox Christian tradition, which consistently uses the real distinction between God’s essential being and energetic activities (also known as the essence-energy distinction) to avoid the problem of theological fatalism. This rich theological and philosophical tradition, from the time of the fourth-century Greek Fathers to the Byzantine tradition that followed, differs less with Augustine concerning the essentials of Trinitarian theology and its practical implications for solving the problem of making human freedom and divine grace compatible than has been hitherto thought. i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Stephen J. Plečnik In working on and completing my dissertation, I would first like to thank my dissertation director, Fr. John D. Jones, who not only is responsible for much of my understanding of the Eastern Orthodox Christian tradition, but was also extremely patient with me during the entire writing process. His encouragement and many verbal and written comments on various drafts of the dissertation were essential to its completion. Much thanks must go to Dr. Anselm K. Min (Claremont Graduate University), who with no hesitation agreed to be my second reader and whose work in Trinitarian theology influenced me a great deal. I also acknowledge the contributions of my other two committee members, Dr. Marcus Plested and Dr. Ericka Tucker. For their support, from the time of my dissertation proposal to the time of my dissertation defense, I am grateful. Finally, I give special mention to my parents, Karen and John. They were my first teachers and continue to teach me to this day. My education and this dissertation would not have been possible without them. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgments ........................................................................................................... i Table of Contents ............................................................................................................. ii Chapter 1: Statement of the Problem ................................................................................ 1 Chapter 2: Augustine’s Teachings on Sin and Grace ....................................................... 22 Chapter 3: Augustine as Preacher of Grace ..................................................................... 54 Chapter 4: The Divine Ideas: A Predestination of Potentialities ...................................... 95 Chapter 5: Augustinian and Eastern Arguments for Divine Simplicity ............................. 140 Chapter 6: Augustine’s Conception of God: One in Essence, Three by Relation .............. 162 Chapter 7: The Common and the Particular: God’s Oneness of Essence and Threeness of Person according to the Cappadocians ............................................................................ 198 Chapter 8: The Augustinian Distinction between God’s Essence and God’s Will ............ 221 Chapter 9: Conclusion: Our Liberty in the ‘totus Christus’ .............................................. 255 Bibliography ...................................................................................................................... 312 1 Chapter 1 Statement of the Problem In religion it must be the case that corresponding to every level of devoutness there is a form of expression that has no sense at a lower level. For those still at the lower level this doctrine, which means something at the higher level, is null and void; it can only be understood wrongly, and so these words are not valid for such a person. Paul’s doctrine of election by grace, for instance, is at my level irreligious and ugly nonsense. So it is not meant for me since I can only apply the wrong picture offered me. If it is a holy and good picture then it is so for a quite different level, where it must be applied in life quite differently than I could apply it.1 This quotation from Ludwig Wittgenstein’s Culture and Value sums up rather well the common reaction to both Saint Paul’s doctrine of election by grace and the mature theology of sin and grace defended by Saint Augustine (354-430), who explicitly and frequently invited the comparison of Paul’s doctrine to his own. As is well-known, beginning with his second response To Simplician (ca. 396) and continuing through his last four works sent to the semi-Pelagians (ca. 426-429),2 Augustine often espoused the Pauline doctrine of all-inclusive grace from Romans 9: that fallen humanity’s ability to do the good, whether in thinking, in willing, or in acting, is totally a function of God’s grace, and that, on its own, the fallen will only has the power to accomplish evil, because of the damaging effects of original sin. The worry, of course, is that under the thralldom of sin, by which we all find ourselves trapped, we can only be freed by God choosing to bestow His graces upon us according to His unchanging redemptive purposes. We can do nothing to merit or earn these graces, for they are by definition gratuitous (free) gifts of 1 Wittgenstein, Culture and Value (1937), 37e. 2 These works are On Grace and Free Choice, On Rebuke and Grace, On the Predestination of the Saints, and On the Gift of Perseverance. 2 God. Such a position, however, appears to present God’s salvific decisions as being made regardless of the lives we may lead. And yet, somewhat paradoxically, He also winds up being totally responsible for the lives we end up leading, either by His granting or withholding His graces. Augustine maintains this somewhat strange-sounding position because of his view of God’s grace, which he tells us God grants or withholds solely as the effects of His predestination, for which Augustine gives the now famous definition: “This is the predestination
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