Saint Augustine: Grace and Free Will - Essay Example

Saint Augustine: Grace and free will According to Saint Augustine, people have frequently determined the roles of a freewill in their life. He assumes that the free will is automatically free and seeks on how to determine in choosing between good and evil. It is common in our daily debates and has a huge influence on a person’s perspectives about life. Through the catholic faith, we come to understand how the free will operates. Unfortunately, many in our societies do not adhere to this. Thus, in answering questions concerning free will help one determine whether to believe in one’s life may have any ultimate meaning. In his approach on the free choice on the will, he assumes that we cannot deny that we posses free will. Instead, he defines the good will in terms of the will that seeks to live both a good and an upright life in attaining a perfect wisdom that assumes it as free. The catechism in the catholic church have seconded to this asserting that endowed with the spiritual soul, free will and with intellect, human being is from the conception that has been ordered to God and has the eternal beatitude as its destiny. More so any free will, which does not seek God, attaches its interests towards the material things, which are easily lost right from the hurricanes to death. On earth, those people who choose evil end up being ruled by their own passions and the desires for the worldly things. This is dangerous as such people have the love of the things that each of them can easily lose against his own will. It is quite ironic that one who decides to choose doing good, gains everything due to lack of fear attached to losing the things because of lack of attachment given to them. In this world those who become more perfect end up losing every material thing but gain all precisely due to their ability to attain perfection which is wisdom. In this regard, we cannot lose wisdom when we have good will. The question that we need to ask ourselves is, why should we choose evil? Human beings always choose doing good but it depends whether one decides to choose a lesser good. This situation occurs when one allows desires and passions to rule his soul that tends towards material things. In addition, Augustine’s friend called Evodius claim that there occurs a big difference between fear and passion-desire. Thus, someone of good will tries to seek and order oneself with the help of God. Augustine answers the age old questions on why man choose to do evil when he clarifies that the big difference between animals and human beings is the fact that human beings have the capability to reason. He also adds that men are unique because they can laugh and have the power to jest. Furthermore, they have the love to praise and glorify and are of low order. Thus, when reason rules the human soul the perfect one is made the subject towards the less perfect, which is desire and passion. Unfortunately, people in our modern society do not realize the importance of having reason rule their lives. According to psychology, humans need their desires and passions rule their lives. In this regard, rigid people are those who have reason, as their ruler because reason tries to assume that one can find truth that may be impossible. People who have such thinking claim to be self-determined and posses their own reality. He helps Christians in understanding the importance of free will. With free will, we have the mandate to make conscious decisions on good and bad. Therefore, we have the duty to determine evil and good based on truth with desires and passions as the subject that rule one’s life. A person is diminished when feelings overrule his life. Furthermore, a person may be diminished when his soul becomes disorderly. Rather, we are obligated to order our souls in the correct manner. Martin Luther’s resistance and Submission Martin Luther was a religious reformer in the 16th century who advocated for protestant reformation by questioning the authority of the Catholic Church in society. Through his charismatic character and actions, Luther engaged in movement that gave birth to new basic tenets of Christian belief which later led to division of the western Christendom between Protestantism and Roman Catholicism. He rejected the authority of the pope and argued that many church ceremonies were not necessarily useful in advancing the kingdom of God. According to Luther, a person’s conscience and the bible outweighed the authority of the pope. Martin Luther was one of the leaders who called for protestant reformation in that his main objective was to attain the means of justification that Paul taught in reading Romans 1:17 and the bible. According to Luther, he refuted the fact that the Catholic Church priests had God given power to secure for common man remission from sin. He argued that men were supposed to be submissive to God for them to be blessed and that services and rituals had to be simplified in the worship of God. In this statement he meant that rituals alone did not move man closer to God but rather there was a danger of getting lost in the ritual and losing focus on God. In addition, he called for peaceful resistance that was non-violent since such kind of resistance would not impose harm on humanity. Martin Luther believed that submission was vital in enhancing peace in society while on the other hand, it was important for humanity to reject oppressive regimes that undermined human dignity. People had to apply non-violent resistance since use of force could lead to destruction of society. Barth’s the New Man Barth’s writings on church dogmatic emanated from his classroom teachings touching on dogmatic theology. Barth’s dogmas concerning the church were shaped by the teachings of Martin Luther especially his 95 theses that called for respect of humanity. Barth’s approach is given the name “Neo Orthodoxy” which derives its doctrines or teachings from backing the concept of faith in our fathers while still retaining genuine insights which originates from theological liberalism. His work majorly consists of constant criticism to ideals of the liberals. He does this by rejecting the creation of God in human’s emotions, feelings or rationality. Barth puts more emphasis on the sinful part of the humanity, absolute transcendence of God and also centrality of Christ. He puts effort in separating theology from the influences of modern day religious philosophy to the basics of prophetic teaching in the Bible and reformation. According to Barth, God reveals Himself to man through Jesus Christ. Contrary to Evangelical theology, Barth disputes Biblical inerrancy which forms the foundation of evangelical theology. He emphasizes as futility the man’s concept of revelation to that Of Gods. In this instance even the Scripture is in human language and partly expressing the concepts of humans. This in close Relation to Pauline’s philosophy advocates for centrality in Christ in human undertakings. With high regard to the Scriptures, He felt the Bible is given much pre eminence than God .He saw most religions as worshipers of the Holy book and rejected such an approach towards the Bible. A belief that some parts of the scriptures contain errors was regarded by Barth as inevitable and that it did not pose any problem to faith unless one insisted foolishly on inerrancy. If meditated upon, one is likely to feel that Barth and his concepts have been misunderstood. In conclusion, from the analysis of the above the writings by Saint Augustine on free will, Martin Luther on resistance and submission and Barth’s writing on New man justifies the claim made by Adolf Von Harnack that people write history of dogma as history of Pauline teachings or reactions in the church. Work cited Meeks, Wayne (Ed) and Fitzgerald, Paul (Ed). The writings of St. Paul, 2nd Edition. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2007. Print. Read More