Natural law and will in Ockham

Descartes held, apparently, that God could have created an entirely different set of eternal truths; God 'was free to make it not true that all the radii of the circle are equal'. If it is said that if God established these truths he can change them, 'the answer is: Yes he can, if his will can change'; I think Descartes supposes that God's will is immutable. [1] Similarly, Ockham is supposed to have held a voluntarist [2] view of morality or natural law: that the content of morality is entirely determined by God's will, that he could have willed an entirely different moral law. In fact, Ockham is supposed to go further and say that even now God can will a different moral law. The distinction between God's absolute power and his ordinate power may be invoked here: it is said that although the existing morality is willed by God, he could 'by his absolute power' will an entirely different morality. In fact, Ockham holds that nothing ever happens by God's absolute power and not by his ordinate power. But some historians point out that on Ockham's account of this distinction, in contrast with the account given by Duns Scotus, God's ordinate power is not restricted to general ordinances. God may have willed from eternity a kind of detailed schedule according to which moral laws will be suspended or even changed on various dates, just as (according to Christians) he did will that the religious law revealed to Moses should cease from the time of Christ; God doesn't change his will, but it may be that he has always willed that at certain times the moral law will change. So we may find, tomorrow, or the day after, that murder, adultery, lying, etc., are not forbidden, and they may even be obligatory. It may never happen, but we can't be sure it won't. The moral future may not resemble the past. Now Ockham himself never says anything like this. Historians like to sensationalise Ockham's thinking, to make him seem more exciting than he was. The radical view sketched above is not expressed by Ockham, in fact he says many things inconsistent with it, but it is supposed to follow from various other things he does say. [3] In this paper I will suggest that perhaps it does not. [4]

Some confusion in studies of Ockham's moral theory has been caused, I believe, by a latent disagreement about what counts as a natural law theory. I suggest that a theory is a natural law theory if it holds that moral obligations are knowable in some way by natural reason, meaning reason unaided by divine revelation. But there are (at least) two different possible ways in which moral obligations may be knowable by natural reason, and therefore two kinds of natural law theory.

1. Some theories try to establish obligations by inference from non-ethical features of nature: either from the nature of the universe or from human nature (sociability, for example) or from the nature of human actions (for example, it may be argued that lying is wrong because it is contrary to the nature of speech, which has as its end the communication of thought). Ockham does not try to establish moral principles by means of such inferences, and those who regard it as essential to natural law theories to infer ethical obligations from facts about nature will therefore say that Ockham does not have a natural law theory. However, the knowability of moral principles by natural reason can mean something else:

2. According to Ockham (and others [5] , the basic precepts of morality are not inferred at all, but are principles per se nota, known as soon as their terms are understood; [6] other moral precepts can be inferred from the self-evident basic principles by demonstrative argument. [7] This is a 'natural law' theory not in the sense that it derives moral principles from facts about nature but in the sense that it derives some moral principles by natural reasoning from others that are self-evident to natural reason; natural law is available, immediately or by inference, to natural reason.

Another source of confusion, I believe, is the tacit inference that because (according to Ockham) God's will overrides moral principles, therefore those principles are principles only because God wills them. This does not follow. Ockham seems to hold that there are a number of moral principles per se nota, one of which is that God is to be obeyed, and that this principle overrides the others when there is conflict. But it does not follow from this that the other principles are principles by virtue of God's will. That the rule 'Obey God' takes precedence over the rule 'Thou shalt not kill' does not imply that 'Thou shalt not kill' binds (when it does bind) only by virtue of a divine command. As in W.D. Ross's theory, the basic principles in Ockham's theory are a plurality and are independent of one another, though one overrides the others in case of conflict.

Earlier theories of Natural Law

Natural law is the law common to all peoples, in that it is everywhere held by the instinct of nature, not by any enactment: as, for instance, the union of man and woman, the generation and rearing of children, the common possession of all things and the one liberty of all men, the acquisition of those things which are taken from air and sky and sea; also, the restitution of an article given in trust or money loaned, and the repelling of force with force. For this, or whatever is similar to this, is never considered unjust, but natural and equitable.

Another conflict among the law texts raised the question whether natural law and the law of nations are the same or different. Gratian quoted Isidore to the effect that they are different. Some texts of the civil law also seemed to distinguish them. For example, in the Digest, 1.1.4: 'According to natural law all persons were born free . . . but after slavery was admitted by the law of nations . . . '. But there are other civil law texts that seem to identify them. For example, in Justinian's Institutes, 2.1.11-12, we read:

By natural law we obtain the ownership of some things which, as we have already stated, is called the law of nations . . . Therefore . . . all creatures that exist on the earth, in the sea, or in the air, as soon as they are taken by anyone, immediately become his property by the Law of Nations, since whatever formerly belonged to no one is conceded by natural reason to the first person obtaining possession of the same. [10]

The general opinion among medieval writers seems to have been that the natural law and the law of nations are distinct; the law of nations was generally held to be part of human positive law, though a very fundamental part. The civil lawyers generally held that property existed by natural law, the canon lawyers and theologians that it existed by human law. But if human law is subject to natural law and if, as we read in the passage quoted above from Isidore of Seville, natural law requires the opposite of property ('the common possession of all things'), then how can property be a legitimate institution, and even, as in the later part of the passage from Isidore, somehow part of natural law? One possible answer, short of saying that Isidore was in a hopeless muddle, was to say that natural law has layers, that while the deepest layer cannot be contradicted by human positive law other layers can, at least under some circumstances. It could also be said that some less fundamental natural law required the common possession of all things under some circumstances and allowed property under other circumstances; and it could be said that the less fundamental natural law by which property is sanctioned is identical with the most fundamental layer of human positive law, the law of nations. This would seem to resolve all the inconsistencies noted earlier.

One version or another of this solution was adopted by many canon lawyers and theologians.

• For example, the canonist Rufinus distinguished between the absolute commands or prohibitions of natural law and 'demonstrations' or 'indications' which point out what is better but not obligatory; 'common possession of all things and the one liberty of all men' belong to the 'demonstrations'. Human laws can therefore, for good reasons, set them aside; to do so may indeed serve ideals indicated or recommended by natural law, such as peace. [11]

Alexander of Hales, Bonaventure and other Franciscan theologians said that natural law gives different directions for different stages of human history; according to them slavery and property were contrary to nature before the fall from innocence but not afterwards.

• Thus Alexander of Hales said that the first two items in Isidore's list belong to natural law as it applies to all living things, the next two (common possession and the one liberty) belong to it as it applies to mankind in their original innocent state, and the rest belong to it as it applies to mankind in their fallen state. [12]

• Bonaventure said that some things are dictates of nature simply, valid for every state of human existence (e.g. that God is to be honoured), others are dictates of nature as it was first instituted, valid for the state of innocence (e.g. that all things should be common), and others are dictates of nature in its fallen state (e.g. property). [13]

• According to Duns Scotus, natural laws in the strict sense of the term are known per se, are immutable, and are not dependent upon any will. But besides natural laws in the strict sense there are rules that are 'very consonant' with natural law. [14] These include rules of property, such as the commandment 'thou shalt not steal'. The 'very consonant' rules are not immutable and may be suspended or revoked by God. Thus appropriation was forbidden before the fall and permitted after it. [15]

Human moral doctrine has two parts, one of which is positive . . . Positive moral science is the science that contains human and divine laws that obligate one to pursue or to avoid what is neither good nor evil except because it is commanded or prohibited by a superior whose role it is to establish laws. Nonpositive moral science is the science that directs human acts apart from any command of a superior [18] . . . Nonpositive moral learning is a demonstrative science. I prove this from the fact that a cognition that deduces conclusions syllogistically from principles that are known either per se or through experience is demonstrative. But moral learning is like this. Therefore, etc. . . . the minor premise is proved from the fact that in moral philosophy there are many principles that are known per se: e.g., that the will ought to conform itself to right reason, that every blameworthy evil is to be avoided, etc.' [19]

Three Kinds of Natural Law

According to Ockham there are three kinds of natural law. The first are laws that hold everywhere and always; the second hold for the state of innocence; the third hold for other states, contingently upon decisions by the persons concerned. Behind natural laws of the third kind there is a process combining reasoning and decision: We (the human race, or the people of some community) reason that, given certain conditions, it would further the common good to institute a certain arrangement; the reasoning does not demonstrate that this arrangement must be instituted, merely that it would be advantageous. We may then decide together to institute this arrangement. If it is adopted, then various universal principles, conditional in form, apply, and, together with factual statements about the institutions established, generate obligations. The last stage of this process is strictly deductive but the earlier stages are not. The obligations generated in the end are not immutable, they do not hold always and everywhere; they are obligations only on certain suppositions of fact.

This scheme is outlined in III Dialogus, II, 3.6 (i.e. Dialogue between Master and Student, part III, tract II, book 3, chapter 6). [20] Master and Student are discussing the question whether the Romans have the right to elect the pope by divine law. The Master says that it is answered that the Romans have the right to elect the pope by divine law, 'extending "divine law" to include all natural law'. This suggests (i) that there may be layers of natural law and (ii) that some natural laws may be divine only by some extension of the term 'divine'. [21] So the student asks for an explanation.

The Master then distinguishes three modes of natural law.

1. 'In one way, that is called natural law which is in conformity with natural reason that in no case fails, such as "Do not commit adultery", "Do not lie", and the like'. These are laws to which everyone is 'indispensably obliged'; they are 'immutable, invariable and indispensable' (i.e. no one - except, as we will learn, God - can grant a dispensation).

2. 'In another way, that is called natural law which is to be observed by those who use natural equity alone without any custom and human legislation . . . This is called "natural" because its contrary is contrary to the state of nature as [originally] established, and if all men lived according to natural reason or divine law it [i.e. the contrary] should not be observed or done.' He is referring to the state of innocence, before the original sin. 'In this second way, and not in the first, all things are common by natural law, because in the state of nature as [originally] established all things would have been common, and if after the fall all men lived according to reason all things should have been common and nothing owned, for ownership was introduced because of wickedness'. He says that all things are common 'in this second way, and not in the first', because if natural law in the first sense required that all things be common, then appropriation would never have become permissible, even after the fall: natural law in the first sense is in conformity with natural reason that in no case fails, i.e. it applies to all states in which mankind may live.

3. 'In a third way that is called natural law which is gathered by evident reasoning from the law of nations or another [law] or from some act, divine or human, unless the contrary is decided on with the consent of those concerned'. 'Those concerned' may be the parties to some transaction, or, in some cases, someone else with authority over them, a superior. The 'law of nations' is human law or custom; 'or another [law]' covers other human law, such as the civil law, and also divine positive law; thus property, rather than community of goods, exists by human positive law. We gather by evident reason from the law establishing property, for example, that if you lend me some piece of your property, then I should return it when you ask for it - unless the contrary is decided on with the consent of those concerned (e.g. if I ask can I keep it longer and you consent). What reason gathers here is in fact gathered not only from the law of property but also from the relevant facts, e.g. that you lent me this thing. So the Master says, 'gathered by evident reasoning from the law of nations or another [law] or from some act, divine or human'.

In III Dial., II, 1.10 the Master says:

Some natural commandments are absolute, and without any condition, qualification, specification or determination, such as 'Do not worship strange gods', 'Do not commit adultery', 'Do not bear false witness', 'Do not lie' and the like. And some are not absolute but are subject to some condition, qualification . . . such as 'use something of another's even against the owner's will - if you are in a situation of extreme necessity'

For as we read in the Decreta, dist.1, Ius gentium, 'To the law of nations belong wars, captivities, enslavements' [and he might have added, property], yet these do not exist by natural law absolutely . . . because then the opposites would never be permissible, because what is against the absolute natural law is never permissible but always impermissible and beyond dispensation . . . The absolute natural law . . . does not vary, but remains unchangeable and immutable.

Natural laws of the third kind may be overridden

Natural equity can be taken in two senses. In one sense it means what is in conformity with right reason that cannot be false or not right . . . In another sense natural equity means what should regularly be observed by those who have the use of reason unless there is some special reason why it cannot be observed. Not to use something belonging to another against his will belongs to natural equity in this sense, yet in a time of extreme necessity it is permissible to use a thing against the will of its owner. Not only the pope but also the emperor, and anyone else, can occasionally act against natural equity in this sense [22]

Natural right based on conditional natural law can be restricted by human law

They [the attackers, including Ockham] say that the word 'right' is sometimes taken for a right of the forum [i.e. a positive legal right] and sometimes for a right of heaven. . . . 'The just' that is established by human or explicit divine pact or ordinance is called 'the right of the forum' . . . After this pact or ordinance [has been] confirmed by custom or law, it should not be violated at the will of anyone at all, as Augustine testifies in book 2 of his Confessions [quoted by Gratian, Decreta, dist. 8, c. 2] . . . But the natural equity that, without any human ordinance or any merely positive divine ordinance, is in harmony with right reason . . . is called 'the right of heaven'. Accordingly, this right is sometimes called 'natural right,' for every natural right pertains to the right of heaven . . . To use temporal things pertains to the right of nature, which no one can licitly renounce. [25] However, it does not pertain to natural right in such a way that it cannot in many cases be limited and in a way restricted and impeded, so that it does not licitly issue in an act . . . However, this natural right cannot be emptied totally, because temporal things can never be appropriated in such a way that it is not true that they ought to be common in time of necessity. . . . the power to use temporal things cannot be eradicated totally. And therefore, anyone can use by right of heaven any temporal thing whatever that he is not prohibited from using either by natural law or by human law or by divine law or by his own act. And therefore, in time of extreme necessity, anyone can use by the law of heaven any temporal thing whatever without which he cannot preserve his own life; for in this case he is not obliged not to use a temporal thing by any law whatever or by his own act. When someone is prevented from using some determinate temporal thing only by the fact that it is another's (for except in case of extreme necessity one ought not to use another's thing in which one has no right, apart from natural right, against its owner's will), the mere permission of the owner, expressed through a licence, is enough for him to use that thing by right of heaven. The permission, and consequently the licence, merely removes the impediment preventing one who has a natural right of using from going on to an act of using.

To what natural law does the natural right to use things correspond? Since it is a right that exists both in the state of innocence and (under some circumstances) in the fallen state, the natural law from which the right derives must be a conditional law belonging among natural laws of the first of the three kinds distinguished in III Dial., II, 3.6. Perhaps it is the law Ockham mentions elsewhere: 'By a natural law which is immutable, when something does me good and you no harm, it is fair that you should not prohibit me'; [ 27] or perhaps it is something more specific. If the natural right to use things can be overridden by human law establishing property, then there must be another general law, also belonging (presumably) to conditional natural law of the first kind, that (under some circumstances) generally accepted human customs or laws are to be respected. In the passage above Ockham does not say that there is such a natural law, preferring to rely on the authority of St Augustine; but it seems reasonable to suppose that he thinks that there is. The natural law that customs are to be respected has under some circumstances enough weight to override the natural right to use things, but under other circumstances, in a situation of extreme necessity, the right to use has more weight. This passage illustrates that Ockham's natural law theory envisages rules of various kinds, some of which may under some circumstances be overridden by considerations which in other circumstances have lower priority.

Absolute natural laws may be overridden by God's command

Because Abraham received the command about sacrificing his son, he was obliged to prepare himself to kill his innocent son; and yet he was obliged to take care not to kill other innocents, because it was commanded to him simply to sacrifice his son, and not others, and he could therefore not have drawn any other meaning from the words of the commandment except that which they first expressed. And they were so explicit, being free from all ambiguity, that there was there no room for interpretation, and he could not have drawn any other meaning. And by reasoning, also, he could have drawn no other meaning from these words of God, since he was not ignorant that God was the lord of life and death. . . . If they are simply commandments of natural law, no case should be excepted for any necessity or utility whatever, unless God specially excepted some case (as, notwithstanding the commandment of purely natural law about not knowingly killing the innocent God, made a special exception in commanding Abraham to sacrifice his son). [ 28]

Necessity may justify an exception to an explicit divine commandment in a matter left open by natural law

For the sake of necessity it is permissible to act against a divine commandment, even one that is explicit, in things not evil in themselves but evil only because they are prohibited. . . . From these and a great many other [texts] we gather that the rule, 'Necessity has no law' . . . should be understood not only of positive human laws, but also of positive divine laws, unless in those divine laws the opposite is laid down expressly . . . (It is otherwise with natural law [i.e. of the first kind], because to that law necessity does submit, and neither can any necessity excuse.)

At various points I have suggested analogies between W.D. Ross's intuitionism and Ockham's theory of natural law. Perhaps Ross's theory can help us understand the structure of Ockham's. According to Ross there are a number of intuitively obvious basic principles each of which establishes a prima facie obligation in every case to which it applies, but in some cases one obligation may be overridden by another. Our actual obligation in the situtation is the obligation imposed by the overriding principle, but the overridden obligation still has some residual force. In Ross's scheme there is no exceptionless order of priority among principles; the weight due to a principle varies in different situations, and it may happen that one overrides another in one situation but is overridden by it in another. Ross seems to expect that each principle will on some occasion be overridden, but it is no drastic amendment to his scheme to suppose that there may be some principle which prevails whenever it comes into conflict with any other. The other principles would not be derived from this superior principle, and they would in some cases determine actual obligation, namely when the superior principle does not come into play. In Ockham's thinking the principle that God's commandment is to be obeyed (a principle of natural law) seems to have this status. Thus it is a self-evident and obvious principle of natural law that we must not kill the innocent, yet Abraham did right in preparing to kill his innocent son when God commanded it. The overriding force he attributes to God's command does not prevent Ockham from distinguishing between things wrong in themselves and things wrong because forbidden by God: that is, as I interpret his position, between things wrong by virtue of natural laws of the first kind and things wrong on the supposition that God (or some other legitimate authority - e.g. human law) has forbidden them. Necessity can override obligations upon supposition, even obligations imposed by explicit divine command, but not natural laws of the first kind - even though natural laws of the first kind may be overridden by divine command.

1. we ought to do what we know (or non-blamably believe) to be right for the reason that it is right;

2. we ought to love God for his own sake above all things;

3. we ought to will what God wills us to will, i.e. obey God's commandments.

Normally Ockham expects these principles to reinforce one another: if we think things through, we will come to believe that it is right to love God and obey his commandments, and, in return, God commands that we do what we believe to be right; if we love God we will obey his commandments, and, in return, one of his commandments, the first and greatest, is to love God. But what if God commanded (as he does not) that we hate him? One possible answer is that such a command is impossible, but Ockham does not say that. [33] Another possible answer is that, although the command is possible, it would be impossible, logically or psychologically, to carry it out; some interpreters think that this is Ockham's answer, but I don't. I think his answer is that if God gave that commandment we could and should obey it. In other words, I think that Ockham holds that principle (2), love God, would be overridden by principle (3), obey God. What if God commanded us not to do what we believed to be right - i.e. to set aside principle (1)? Ockham doesn't discuss this question, and I am not at all sure how he would answer it. There are a few places in which he says that principle (1) holds 'while the present divine ordinance stands', which seems to imply that principle (3) takes priority over (1). If this is so, then obedience to God's will is the ultimate value; or rather, God's goodness is - the reason why obedience is due to God is his goodness.

But the overriding authority of principle (3) is not enough to make Ockham a voluntarist. If we ask whether in God will is prior to intellect Ockham's answer is that in God (and indeed in human beings) there is only a distinction of reason between will and intellect. God's will is necessarily reasonable; his will, intellect, goodness, and wisdom are identically the one simple reality. [34] It is therefore illegitimate to single out God's will and slip in the word 'arbitrary' and say that Ockham holds that the ultimate principle is obedience to God's arbitrary will; [35] the ultimate principle is obedience to God, who is eminently good and wise. If principle (3) takes priority over (1), then human reason (what we believe to be right) must give way to God's will/intellect. This is not voluntarism but the subordination of human judgment to the wisdom and goodness of God.

Turning now to the texts, let me first illustrate Ockham's adherence to the first principle:

No act is perfectly virtuous unless the will through that act wills something dictated by right reason because it is dictated by right reason; because if it willed what is dictated by right reason not because it is dictated, but because it is pleasurable or for some other reason, it would already will that thing dictated if it were only shown it by apprehension without right reason; and consequently that act would not be virtuous, because it would not be elicited in conformity with right reason. Because to elicit in conformity with right reason is to will what is dictated by reason because it is dictated. [36]

For a right act to be elicited by the will necessarily requires some right reason in the intellect . . . That will which can, so far as itself is concerned, indifferently act well or ill, because it is not right by itself, necessarily requires, to act rightly, some directing rule other than itself. This is clear, because the reason why the divine will does not need anything directing it is that it is itself the first directive rule and cannot act badly. But our will is such that it can act rightly and not rightly. Therefore it needs some right reason directing it. [37]

Another passage, from Quodlibet II, q. 14, was quoted earlier, but I will quote part of it again:

Nonpositive moral science is the science that directs human acts apart from any command of a superior . . . in moral philosophy there are many principles that are known per se: e.g., that the will ought to conform itself to right reason, that every blameworthy evil is to be avoided, etc. [38]

Two passages somewhat modify the principle:

It is impossible for an act of will elicited against conscience and against the dictate of reason (right or erroneous) to be virtuous. This is clear of right conscience, because such would be elicited against a divine precept and the divine will willing [us] to elicit such act in conformity with right reason. [39]

A created will following a reason invincibly erroneous is right, because the divine will wills it to follow non-blamable reason.

As for principle (2), it should be understood that although Ockham does not think that the existence of the Christian God can be demonstrated, he does think that it is possible to demonstrate the existence of one or more, possibly finite, gods, arguing from the concept of God as that than which nothing is better or more perfect. [43] The duty to love this god (or gods) above all and for his own sake is clear to natural reason: 'By purely natural powers we can know the proposition, "God is the supreme good"';'I say that only God is to be loved above all, because he is the supreme good' [44] Ockham argues that love of God is necessarily a good act and the most basic of good acts:

[T]here is another way to understand what it is for an act to be necessarily virtuous, viz., that it is virtuous in such a way that it cannot be vicious as long as the [relevant] divine precept remains in force; likewise, the act cannot be caused by a created will without being virtuous . . . Third, I claim that an act that is necessarily virtuous in the way just explained is an act of the will, since an act by which God is loved above all things and for his own sake is an act of this sort. For this act is virtuous in such a way that it cannot be vicious, and this act cannot be caused by a created will without being virtuous - both because (i) everyone in his own time and place is obliged [45] to love God above all things, and, as a result, this act cannot be vicious; and because (ii) this act is the first of all good acts. [46]

Order between principles (2) and (3)

1. First, it is certainly possible to derive the duty to obey from the duty to love. But,

2. second, it is also possible to derive both duties independently of one another from God's goodness in conjunction with principle (1): we ought to love God because we know that he is good, and we ought to obey his commands because we know that a good person will issue right commands. I do not know of any texts in which Ockham suggests either of these derivations. He does, however, suggest

3. a third, that the duty to love follows from the duty to obey: 'The created will is obliged by God's precept to love God, and therefore, while this precept stands, it cannot do well in hating God . . . because it is obliged by God's precept to the opposite'. [48]

A divine command to hate God would lead to impossibilities if love and obedience were identical or if the duty to obey were derived from the duty to love, but if the derivation goes the other way, or if neither is derived from the other, there is no inconsistency. Let us look at several passages in which Ockham is thought to have discussed this matter.

The first is from Quodl. III, q. 14. To the proposition that an act of love of God is necessarily virtuous someone might object:

God can command that, for some time, he be not loved: because he can command that the intellect should be so intent upon study, and the will likewise, that it not be able to think anything of God for that time. Then I suppose that the will then elicits an act of loving God; and then that act is either virtuous - and this cannot be said, because it is elicited against a divine command; or else it is not virtuous, and the point is won, that some act of loving God above all things is not virtuous.

I answer: If God could command this (as it seems he could without contradiction), I say then that the will is not able during that time to elicit such an act [of loving God above all things]. For by the fact that it elicited such an act, (1) it would love God above all, and consequently it would fulfill [by not loving] the divine precept [not to love]; for to love God above all is to love [variant: God and] whatever God wills to be loved. And by the fact that it thus loved [by eliciting the act of love] (2) it would not carry out the divine precept for this case. And consequently, loving thus, it would and would not love God, would and would not carry out his precept. [Which is absurd; so the hypothesis that after receiving this command it can still elicit the act of loving God above all things must be impossible]. However, it could [consistently with the supposed command] love God by a simple and natural love, which is not love of God above all things. Just as [this illustrates not the last sentence but the point that in the supposed case the will could not love God] if someone does not believe that God exists he cannot love him, because nothing can be loved except what exists or can exist. [ 49]

The second is from Sent., II, q. 15:

I say that . . . hate, theft, adultery and the like . . . could be done by the wayfarer even meritoriously if they were to fall under a divine precept, just as now in fact their opposites fall under divine precept . . . But if they were thus done meritoriously by the wayfarer, then they would not be called or named theft, adultery, hate, etc., because those names signify such acts not absolutely but by connoting or giving to understand that one doing such acts is obliged to their opposites by divine precept. [51]

The third is from Sent., IV, q. 16. Here, in just one sentence, almost in passing, Ockham does say that it would be right to obey if God commanded us to hate him:

Everything that can be a right act on the way [i.e. on earth], also [can be right] in the fatherland [i.e. in heaven]. But to hate God can be a right act on the way, for example if it is commanded by God, therefore in the fatherland. [53]

It seems to me that Ockham was wrong to say that God could command someone to hate him. [54] But I think it could be said, without any damage to the general structure of Ockham's moral theory, that if God could give such a command, then, if principle (3) has priority over principle (2), it would be right to hate God. At any rate, these speculations leave principle (1) intact. On the suppositions that God can give such a command and that obedience to God takes precedence to love, then it will be in accordance with right reason to hate God. The conscientious person will reason: 'I ought to do the right thing; normally it is wrong to hate God, but it is always wrong to disobey him; now he commands that I hate him, therefore it is right for me to do so'. Perhaps this attitude is even compatible with belief that God is the highest good and therefore (prima facie) to be loved: 'If hatred of God is caused by God alone', or by a human will acting in obedience to a divine commandment, 'it will always be for a good end' [55] because God is good. We may find it impossible to think of any such end, but we can be sure that if God issues a command it has a good end, that in obeying we are doing the right thing. If we hate God because we believe that this is the right thing to do, given this commandment, then we simultaneously satisfy principles (1) and (3).

Order between principles (1) and (3)

The upshot is that when suitably informed by speculation and revelation, right reason . . . finds another rule in divine commands. Thus, there is a double criterion of a morally virtuous act - the dictates of right reason, on the one hand, and divine precepts on the other. But within the sphere of non-positive morality, the latter derives its authority from the former. [56]

Would any paradox or impossibility follow if we supposed that God might command us to act in disregard of what we think is right? I don't think so. There are many analogues: The Catholic argument that a Christian should be guided by the Church rather by private judgment, the conservative argument that we should trust the wisdom of tradition rather than our own personal opinion, the idea that we should trust instinct rather than thought, that we should trust experts, etc. In none of these cases is there any contradiction or paradox: there is a train of reasoning that leads to the conclusion that other trains of reasoning should not be trusted. Similarly, it is conceivable that God's wisdom and goodness might be taken as a reason for following the hypothesised divine command not to act by what we believe to be right. If God commanded us to give up following our consciences and to use some other decision procedure instead (such as opening the bible at random, or drawing straws, or examining the entrails of chickens), then we might reason that since God knows best we should obey him and give up following our own judgment. Reason could reason itself out of a job.

Could we resolve for no reason, simply out of obedience to God, to follow the command to give up following reason? I don't see any logical impossibility in this, though ex hypothesi it would be unreasonable, and probably not psychologically possible (without some miracle) for people who have always tried to act reasonably.

In one passage, from Sent., II, q. 15, Ockham seems to go beyond saying that God's commands override moral principles. I quoted it in part earlier. Here it is again, with some omissions restored:

I say that although hate, theft, adultery and the like have a bad circumstance annexed de communi lege, in so far as they are done by someone who is obliged by divine precept to the contrary, nevertheless, in respect of everything absolute in those acts they could be done by God without any bad circumstance annexed. And they could be done by the wayfarer even meritoriously if they were to fall under a divine precept, just as now in fact their opposites fall under divine precept . . . But if they were thus done meritoriously by the wayfarer, then they would not be called or named theft, adultery, hate, etc., because those names signify such acts not absolutely but by connoting or giving to understand that one doing such acts is obliged to their opposites by divine precept.[59]

Suarez takes the quatenus differently. He instances Ockham as one who holds that 'the natural law consists entirely in a divine command':

This is the view one ascribes to William of Ockham (on the Sentences, Bk. II, qu. 19, ad 3 and 4 [in the older edition q. 15 was numbered 19]), inasmuch as he says that no act is wicked save in so far as it is forbidden by God, and that there is no act incapable of becoming a good act if commanded by God. [60]

These authors rest their case chiefly on the position that all actions which come within the range of the law of nature are evil only in so far as they are prohibited by God . . . the foundation of their opinion . . . being the belief that all evil in human actions springs from an external prohibition. [61]

Linwood Urban has also commented on this passage. He does not think that Ockham held a 'divine command' theory of morality, but he thinks that the passage quoted above reveals a serious defect in his moral insight. 'The reason why God is morally free to command theft and murder is that theft and murder are morally neutral.' [62] 'Ockham asks us to believe that pouring gasoline upon a child and igniting it is a morally neutral act at least insofar as natural reason is concerned.' [63] He interprets this alleged moral neutrality by means of Julius Kovesi's distinction between the material and formal components of an act: 'By the material component . . . is meant the administration of poison, or the plunging of a knife into the heart, or the placing of a pillow over the face. From such a description it does not follow that those actions are wrong.' [64] Similarly 'a simply empirical description of the act of pouring gasoline on an object and lighting it does not entail any moral conclusions.' [65] He contrasts this 'material' mode of description with Thomas Aquinas's characterisation of lying: 'it is not the material element, speaking a falsehood, but the intention to deceive, which constitutes lying.' [66]

Now it seems to me that Ockham is not at all committed to such 'material' descriptions of the acts that he says can be made good by divine command. Consider God's command to Abraham to kill his son. This act would have been directly against the natural law prohibiting the killing of the innocent, and those are the terms in which Ockham describes it in the passage in which he discusses the case: 'Because Abraham received the command about sacrificing his son, he was obliged to prepare himself to kill his innocent son . . . '. There is nothing here about the thrust of the knife or the lighting of the sacrificial fire. Ockham does not ask us, either in so many words or by implication, 'to believe that pouring gasoline upon a child and igniting it is a morally neutral act'.

To sum up: In many places Ockham says that the basic principles of morality are evident to natural reason. He never says that morality rests upon the command of God. The passages from which some historians have inferred that he must or should have thought that morality rests upon divine command do not imply this. It would seem that Ockham's moral theory is not voluntarist.

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