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Chapter 12GratL.1.12

An negans fidem metu mortis ac poenarum, excusetur a culpa, vel destituatur libero arbitrio. Ubi negatio Petri discutitur.

The Problem of Fear-Driven Denial

Augustine introduces the question of whether someone who denies the faith out of fear of death or punishment can be excused from guilt, using Peter's denial as a test case, and argues that even coerced speech does not mean the will itself was changed.

But let us consider those who have been driven to deny the faith in word only, out of fear of punishment or death—so that perhaps, by framing it this way, either it was not their fault that they denied it with the voice, or they could be held at fault and their will held accountable—meaning that the person willed what he also chose not to will—and so free choice would be lost. Since this was impossible—willing and not willing the same thing at the same time could not happen—the question is where the blame should be placed, since it certainly should not be placed on those who did not want it. For this is not the same kind of thing as original sin, where a person is bound not only without consent but often without even knowing it, by a different mechanism, not yet reborn through baptism. Take the apostle Peter as an example: he, it seems, denied the Truth against his will, since he had no choice but either to deny or to die.✦ He denied because he was afraid to die. He did not want to deny, but he wanted even less to die. So he denied reluctantly, but he denied nonetheless, to avoid dying. But if a person has been compelled to say with the tongue, and not with the will, something he did not want—that still does not mean he willed something other than what he willed.

Peter's Two Wills Exposed

Augustine examines the interior conflict in Peter: his tongue spoke denial to escape death, yet his will remained that of a disciple of Christ, revealing that fear exposed rather than replaced his true desire.

His tongue moved against his will—but surely his will was not changed too? What did he want, after all? Plainly, to be a disciple of Christ—that is what he was. What was he saying? I do not know the man (Matt.1 XXVI, 72). Why this? He wanted to escape death.

Where the Guilt Lies

Augustine identifies two wills in Peter — the blameless wish not to die and the praiseworthy desire to be a Christian — and locates the sin in choosing bodily life over the soul, a choice made with the consent of a weak but free will.

But what was this guilt? We recognize two wills in the apostle: one by which he wished not to die, which is entirely blameless; and the other, much to be praised, by which he was glad to be a Christian. In what, then, will he be blamed? Is it for choosing to lie rather than to die? This will was clearly deserving of blame, because he chose to preserve the life of the body more than that of the soul. The mouth that lies kills the soul (Sir 1:11). And so he sinned, and not without the consent of his own will—weak and wretched, to be sure, but plainly free.

Fear Reveals, Does Not Create, Self-Love

Augustine argues that Peter's sin was not caused by fear but by an already-existing disordered self-love, which fear merely revealed; Christ foreknew this weakness, and Peter's two loves — for Christ and for himself — produced two simultaneous but opposed acts of the will.

He sinned, however—not by despising or hating Christ, but by loving himself too much. Nor did that sudden fear compel his will into this perverse self-love; but it did prove that it existed.2 Even then, without a doubt, he was already in that state—though he did not know it—when he heard from the One he could not hide from: "Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times" (Matt.✦34 XXVI, 34). That weakness of will, then—made known through the fear that struck him, not produced by it—revealed how much he loved himself and how much he loved Christ.5 But this was known not to Christ, but to Peter.6 For Christ already knew what was in the man.✦7 Insofar, then, as he loved Christ, that will was utterly overpowered—something that cannot be denied—so that he spoke against himself; but insofar as he loved himself, he freely and without a doubt gave his consent, so that he spoke in his own favor.8

The Paradox of Being Compelled by One's Own Will

Augustine explores the paradox that Peter was compelled — yet by his own will, not an external force — and argues that self-compulsion does not destroy freedom, since what the will inflicts on itself remains voluntary and therefore free.

If he had not loved Christ, he would not have denied him against his will; but if he had not loved himself any more, he would not have denied him to some degree. So it has to be admitted that the man was compelled—his own will, even if he did not change it, was at least forced to stay hidden. Compelled, I say, not to pull away from the love of God, but still to give in a little to the love of self. So what now? Has the whole preceding argument about free will fallen apart, since the will clearly turned out to be capable of being forced?9 It clearly can—but only if it could be forced by another, not by itself. But if the will compelled itself, both compelling and compelled, it could seem to lose freedom in one respect and regain it in another.10 It endured the force it inflicted on itself. Moreover, what the will endured from itself was a matter of will. What came from the will was now not from necessity, but voluntary. And if it was voluntary, it was also free.

The Will as Its Own Master Under Threat

Augustine insists that Peter's denial came from his own will consenting to escape death, not from the servant girl's voice, and contrasts this with Peter's later boldness when transformed by perfect love of Christ.

In the end, the will itself drove a person to deny the faith—and yet the person was driven because they chose to be. Or rather, they were not driven at all, but consented: not to an outside force, but to their own will, the very will that wanted to escape death by any means possible. Otherwise, when a weak woman's voice could have shaped her sacred tongue into unspeakable words, if the will—the tongue's mistress—had not given its consent? But afterward, when he restrained himself from that excessive self-love and began—as he should—to love Christ with all his heart, all his soul, and all his strength, no threats or punishments could any longer wring from him a tongue armed against the truth; instead, he boldly aligned himself with it.✦ We must obey God rather than human beings, he says (Acts 5:29).✦ V, 29) .

Two Kinds of Compulsion: Passive Suffering and Active Consent

Augustine distinguishes passive compulsion (suffering against one's will, which is blameless) from active compulsion (acting against one's will, which is always voluntary and therefore culpable), showing that Peter's denial fell into the latter category.

There are really two kinds of compulsion: we are forced either to suffer something or to act against our own will. Of these, the passive kind—for that is what the former is rightly called—can sometimes happen without the sufferer's consent; but the active kind, never. So whatever evil happens to us, or is inflicted on us, is not to be charged against us—if, that is, it happens against our will. But what we do is never without fault on the part of the will. That we will something is clearly our own doing, since it would not happen if we did not will it. There is therefore also a kind of active compulsion, but it has no excuse, since it is at the same time voluntary. A Christian was compelled to deny Christ—and, indeed, grieving—yet still not against his will. He wanted very much to avoid the striker's sword, and that will of his, presiding within, opened his mouth—not the sword that appeared outside.11

The Sword Proves but Does Not Compel the Will

Augustine argues that external threats reveal the state of the will without forcing it, that a sound will cannot be bent but only killed, and that torturers have power over the body but never over the soul.

Furthermore, it was the sword that proved such a will to be what it was—it did not compel it. Therefore it was the will itself that drove itself into guilt, not the sword. In the end, those whose will was sound could be killed, but they could not be bent. This is what had been foretold to them: They will do to you whatever they wish (Mark IX, 12)—but into your limbs, not into your hearts.✦ IX, 12) ; sed in membra, non corda. You will not do what they wish; rather, they will do it, and you will endure it. They will torture your limbs, but they will not change your will; they will rage against the flesh, yet they will have no power at all over your soul. Even if the sufferer's body is in the torturer's power, the will remains free.

The Weak Will Healed by the Spirit

Augustine teaches that the will's weakness is self-originated but its healing comes from the Spirit of the Lord, and that renewal is the remedy for a will that external force cannot create but only expose.

If it is weak, it will learn that through its own harsh treatment; they will not force it to be, if it is not. Certainly, its weakness comes from itself, but its wholeness does not come from itself—it comes from the Spirit of the Lord. It is healed, however, when it is renewed.

Free Choice Between Flesh and Spirit

Augustine concludes that the human will occupies a middle place between the divine Spirit and the fleshly desire, burdened by both original sin and habitual affection, and that neither salvation nor damnation occurs without voluntary consent, preserving freedom of choice.

So when it is renewed—as the Apostle teaches—by contemplating the glory of God, it is transformed into the same image from brightness to brightness, that is, from power to power, as if by the Spirit of the Lord (2 Cor.✦ 3:18). Between this divine Spirit and the desire of the flesh, what is called free choice in a person holds a middle place—that is, the human will—and it hangs, as it were, on the steep slope of a very high mountain between the two, so that in its desire it is weakened through the flesh, with the result that unless the Spirit earnestly helps its weakness through grace, it is not only incapable of justice, which according to the prophet is like the mountains of God (Ps.✦ 35:7), ascending from power to power to reach the summit, but also always falling from vice into vice, headlong, weighed down—burdened not only by the law of sin originally planted in the members, but also by the custom of earthly dwelling with its affections grown habitual. That both burdens of human will are recorded by Scripture in a single brief verse, which says: 'The body that is corrupted weighs down the soul, and the earthly dwelling presses down the mind that thinks many things' (Wis. 9:15). And these two evils of our mortality—just as they do not harm those who do not consent, but instead exercise them, so they do not excuse those who do consent, but condemn them—with the result that neither salvation nor damnation can be accounted to anyone on any grounds without prior voluntary consent, lest freedom of choice seem to be restricted in any way.

Read the original Latin

Sed videamus de his qui poenarum mortisve timore fidem verbo tenus negare compulsi sunt: 618 ne forte juxta hanc assertionem, aut culpa non fuerit, quod vel voce negaverunt; aut cogi in culpam et voluntas potuerit, ut vellet videlicet homo quod eum et nolle constiterit; et sic perierit liberum arbitrium. Quod quia impossibile erat (velle quippe et nolle idem eodem tempore non poterat), quaeritur unde malum nequaquam volentibus malum debuit imputari. Neque enim tale est hoc, quale originale peccatum: quo non solum non consentiens, verum plerumque et nesciens, alia ratione constringitur necdum renatus baptismate. Exempli causa, veniat in medium Petrus apostolus: ipse quippe visus est negare Veritatem contra propriam voluntatem; siquidem aut negare, aut mori necesse erat. Mori timens negavit. Negare nolebat, sed magis nolebat mori. Itaque invitus quidem: sed negavit tamen, ne moreretur. Quod si lingua, et non voluntate loqui homo compulsus est quod nolebat: non tamen velle aliud quam volebat.

Lingua mota est contra voluntatem: sed nunquid et mutata voluntas? Quid enim volebat? Prorsus quod erat, Christi esse discipulus. Quid loquebatur? Non novi hominem (Matth. XXVI, 72) . Cur ita? Mortem evadere volebat.

Sed quid istud criminis fuit? Duas apostoli tenemus voluntates: unam, qua voluit non mori, penitus inculpabilem; alteram, et multum laudabilem, qua sibi complacebat quod esset christianus. In quo ergo culpabitur? An in eo quod mentiri, quam mori maluit? Haec plane voluntas reprehensione digna fuit, quia corporis magis, quam animae voluit servare vitam. Os nempe quod mentitur, occidit animam (Sap. I, 11) . Et peccavit ergo, et non absque consensu propriae voluntatis, infirmae quidem et miserae, sed plane liberae.

Peccavit autem, non spernendo aut odiendo Christum, sed se nimis amando. Nec in hunc perversum amorem sui, voluntatem metus ille subitus compulit; sed esse convicit. Jam tunc procul dubio talis erat, sed nesciebat, cum ab illo quem latere non poterat, audivit: Priusquam gallus cantet, ter me negabis (Matth. XXVI, 34) . Illa itaque voluntatis infirmitas per incussum timorem nota, non orta, notum fecit quatenus se, quatenus Christum amaverit. Notum autem non Christo, sed Petro. Nam Christus et ante sciebat quid esset in homine. Quatenus ergo Christum diligebat, vim prorsus (quod negandum non est) passa est illa voluntas, ut contra se loqueretur: quatenus vero se, voluntarie procul dubio consensit, ut pro se loqueretur.

Si Christum non amasset, non negasset invitus: verum si se amplius non amasset, non aliquatenus negasset. Fatendum igitur hominem fuisse compulsum, voluntatem propriam etsi non mutare, occultare tamen: compulsum, inquam, non quidem recedere ab amore Dei; cedere tamen aliquantulum amore sui.

Quid ergo? forte dissoluta est tota superior assertio de libertate voluntatis, quia nimirum inventa est cogi potuisse voluntas? Est plane: sed si cogi ab alio potuit quam a se ipsa. Quod si sese ipsa coegit, compulsa, et compellens; ubi amittere ibi et recipere visa est libertatem. Vim quippe, quam ipsa sibi intulit, a se pertulit. Porro quod a se voluntas pertulit, ex voluntate fuit. Quod ex voluntate fuit, jam non ex necessitate, sed voluntarium fuit. Si autem voluntarium, et liberum.

Quem sua denique ad negandum voluntas compulit, compulsus est quia voluit: imo non compulsus est, sed consensit, et non alienae potentiae, sed propriae voluntati, illi utique, qua mortem omnimodis evadere voluit. Alioquin quando vox mulierculae linguam sacram in verba formare nefanda valuisset, si non linguae domina voluntas annuisset? Denique cum se a sui postmodum nimio illo temperavit amore, et Christum coepit, ut debuit, toto corde, tota anima, tota virtute diligere; jam nullis valuit minis 619 vel poenis extorqueri aliquatenus voluntati dare linguam arma iniquitati, sed potius audacter accommodans veritati. Obedire inquit, oportet Deo magis quam hominibus (Act. V, 29) .

Est sane gemina compulsio, secundum quod aut pati aliquid, aut agere contra propriam cogimur voluntatem. Quarum passiva quidem (sic enim prior illa recte nominatur) potest nonnunquam fieri absque consensu voluntario patientis, sed activa nunquam. Proinde malum quod fit in nos, sive de nobis, non est imputandum nobis, si tamen invitis. Caeterum quod fit a nobis, jam non sine culpa est voluntatis. Velle plane convincimur, quod non fieret, si nollemus. Est ergo compulsio quaedam etiam activa: sed non habet excusationem, cum sit et voluntaria. Cogebatur christianus negare Christum, et quidem dolens, non tamen nisi volens. Volebat nimis gladium vitare ferientis; atque illa talis voluntas intus praesidens os aperiebat, non gladius qui foris apparebat.

Porro talem esse illam voluntatem convincebat gladius, non cogebat. Ipsa igitur se in culpam, non gladius impellebat. Denique in quibus sana erat voluntas, occidi poterant, flecti nequibant. Hoc est quod eis praedictum fuerat, Facient in vos quaecunque voluerint (Marc. IX, 12) ; sed in membra, non corda. Non vos facietis quae voluerint: sed ipsi facient, vos patiemini. Membra cruciabunt, sed voluntatem non mutabunt: saevient in carnem, animae autem non habebunt quid faciant. Sit licet patientis corpus in potestate torquentis, sed voluntas est libera.

Infirma si fuerit, saeviendo cognoscent; non esse cogent, si non fuerit. Sane infirmitas ejus a se ipsa est, sanitas vero non a se, sed a Domini Spiritu. Sanatur autem, cum renovatur.

Porro renovatur, cum, quemadmodum docet Apostolus: Speculando gloriam Dei in eamdem imaginem transformatur a claritate in claritatem, hoc est de virtute in virtutem, tanquam a Domini Spiritu (II Cor. III, 18) . Inter quem utique divinum spiritum, et carnis appetitum, tenet medium quemdam locum id quod dicitur in homine liberum arbitrium, id est, humana voluntas: et tanquam in devexo latere montis admodum ardui inter utrumque pendens, ita in appetitu infirmatur per carnem, ut nisi sedulo spiritus adjuvet infirmitatem ejus per gratiam, non solum non valeat justitiae, quae est juxta prophetam sicut montes Dei (Psal. XXXV, 7) , ascendendo de virtute in virtutem, apprehendere culmen: sed etiam de vitio semper in vitium suo ipsius pondere devoluta ruat in praeceps; praegravata nimirum non solum lege peccati originaliter membris insita, verum et consuetudine terrenae inhabitationis usualiter affectionibus inolita. Quod humanae voluntatis videlicet utrumque gravamen uno breviter versiculo Scriptura commemorat, dicens: Corpus, quod corrumpitur, aggravat animam, et deprimit terrena inhabitatio sensum multa cogitantem (Sap. IX, 15) . Et haec duo hujus mortalitatis mala, sicut non nocent, sed exercent non consentientes: sic non excusant, sed damnant consentientes, ut nec salus, nec damnatio ulla ratione sine praecedenti consensu voluntario possit haberi; ne qua forte ex parte praescribi videatur libertati arbitrii.

Scripture echoes

  1. ↩Matt.26.69-Matt.26.75 — Now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard, and a servant girl came up to him and said, "You also were with Jesus the Galilean." Matt.26.70 — But he denied it before all of them, saying, "I do not know what you are talking about." Matt.26.71 — But when he had gone out to the courtyard gate, another girl saw him and said to those there, "This man was with Jesus of Nazareth." Matt.26.72 — And again he denied it, with an oath: "I do not know the man." Matt.26.73 — After a little while, those who were standing there came to Peter and said, "Truly, you are one of them, for your speech makes it clear." Matt.26.74 — Then he began to curse and to swear, "I do not know the man!" And immediately a rooster crowed. Matt.26.75 — And Peter remembered the word that Jesus had spoken to him: "Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times." And he went out and wept bitterly.
  2. ↩Matt.26.34 — Jesus said to him, "Truly, I say to you, that this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times."
  3. ↩John.2.25 — and because he had no need that anyone should testify about man, for he himself knew what was in man
  4. ↩Deut.6.5 — And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
  5. ↩Acts.5.29 — But Peter and the apostles answered, "We must obey God rather than men."
  6. ↩Mark.9.12 — And he said to them, 'Elijah does come first and restores all things. But how is it written of the Son of Man that he must suffer many things and be treated with contempt?'" This sharpens the turn from Elijah to the Son of Man.
  7. ↩2Cor.3.18 — And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord as in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.
  8. ↩Ps.36.6 — O LORD, your steadfast love reaches to the heavens; your faithfulness stretches to the skies.

Notes

  1. 1 ↩Rendering of 'Non novi hominem' follows the Vulgate phrasing of Matt 26:72. The Latin novi ('I know') in the perfect tense with negative and accusative is the denial of personal acquaintance, echoing Peter's actual words in Scripture. The abbreviation 'Matth' is preserved as given in the source.
  2. 2 ↩The distinction is between compelling the will to adopt a new disposition (which fear did not do) and exposing a disposition already present (which fear did do). The Latin plays on compulit (compelled) vs. convicit (proved/exposed).
  3. 3 ↩Scriptural quotation from Matthew 26:34. Final resolution deferred to tx-08 Moses stage.
  4. 4 ↩cum is rendered temporally ('when') rather than concessively ('although'); context favors temporal reading.
  5. 5 ↩The nota/orta distinction: the weakness was revealed (nota) by fear, not caused (orta) by it. The two quatenus clauses measure the relative strength of self-love versus love of Christ.
  6. 6 ↩The point is that Christ already knew Peter's heart; the revelation was for Peter's own self-knowledge.
  7. 7 ↩Alludes to Christ's divine knowledge of human hearts (cf. John 2:25).
  8. 8 ↩The two quatenus clauses form a precise contrast: Peter's love of Christ was genuine but was overpowered (passa est vim) by fear, while his self-love was a matter of free consent (voluntarie consensit). The parenthetical quod negandum non est underscores that the overpowering of his will is undeniable.
  9. 9 ↩Assertio de libertate voluntatis rendered 'argument about free will' for the broader claim being challenged; voluntas kept as 'will' per lexicon.
  10. 10 ↩The paradox of self-compulsion is preserved; 'lose freedom' and 'regain' render amittere/recipere applied to libertatem.
  11. 11 ↩ferientis genitive rendered as 'striker's' (person) rather than 'striking' (sword); context favors the person wielding the sword, but the ambiguity is real.

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