Anselm on freedom / Katherin A. Rogers.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Rogers, Katherin A.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Anselm, Saint, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1033-1109.

Anselm.

Liberty.

Physical Description:

217 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2008.

Summary:

Can human beings be free and responsible if there is a God? Anselm of Canterbury, the first Christian philosopher to propose that human beings have a really robust free will, offers viable answers to questions which have plagued religious people for at least two thousand years: If divine grace cannot be merited and is necessary to save fallen humanity, how can there be any decisive role for individual free choice to play? If God knows today what you are going to choose tomorrow, then when tomorrow comes you have to choose what God foreknew, so how can your choice be free? If human beings must have the option to choose between good and evil in order to be morally responsible, must God be able to choose evil? Anselm answers these questions with a sophisticated theory of free will which defends both human freedom and the sovereignty and goodness of God. Katherin Rogers examines Anselm's reconciliation of human free will and divine omnipotence in the context of current philosophical debates.

Contents:

Introduction

Anselm's classical theism

The Augustinian legacy

The purpose, definition, and structure of free choice

Alternative possibilities and primary agency

The causes of sin and the intelligibility problem

Creaturely freedom and God as Creator Omnium

Grace and free will

Foreknowledge, freedom, and eternity : part I, the problem and historical background

Foreknowledge, freedom, and eternity : part II, Anselm's solution

The freedom of God.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [206]-211) and index.

ISBN:

9780199231676

0199231672

OCLC:

214305922