A Study of Order: Lessons for Historiography and Theology

Transcription

1 A Study of Order: Lessons for Historiography and Theology BY JAKUB VOBORIL The medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas and the Renaissance historian Niccolo Machiavelli present radically different worldviews in terms of order and design. In his treatment of the relationship between theology and the concept of law in the Summa Theologiae, Aquinas paints a picture of the physical and moral universes as marked by divinely endowed order. Where Aquinas saw natural order, however, Machiavelli saw natural chaos. He presents a radical alternative to the Thomistic worldview by replacing divine order with the human order enacted by worldly princes. Aquinas, of course, saw himself as a theologian whereas Machiavelli viewed the world as a historian does. Taking these two scholars as archetypes of their disciplines, they present a ready contrast between theology and history. At the same time, the nuances of this contrast suggest that the theological and historical perspectives complement each other with the theologian viewing the world in terms of divine agency and the historian viewing the world in terms of human agency. Aquinas gives his worldview clear expression in his treatment of law. 1 Before turning to the different kinds of law, Aquinas offers a consideration of the nature of law in Question 90 of the Summa Theologiae. He summarizes his conclusions in article 4: Law is nothing else than a certain promulgated ordinance of reason to the common good by one who has charge of the 1 Though I have chosen to treat the Thomistic conception of order through his discussion of law, Aquinas also discusses this conception in his delineation of the so-called four orders. For a helpful discussion of that topic see Germain Grisez, Beyond the New Theism (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1975), Valley Humanities Review Spring

2 community. 2 Of these distinct features, two matter most for the project at hand. First, Aquinas presents law as an ordinance of reason. This fact indicates that law creates a kind of rational order whether in human actions, the physical world, or reality itself. Second, law comes from one who has charge of the community. If law governs reality itself, as Aquinas will suggest below, that law could only come from one who has charge of the whole of reality. Aquinas implies that if reality has legal order, only its governor could give that order. From a Christian viewpoint, only God could give that order. These intimations about the nature of order in reality receive confirmation in Question 91 of the Summa on the different kinds of law. Relying on arguments developed earlier in the Summa, Aquinas remarks, But it is clear, supposing the world to be governed by divine providence, as was proved in Part I, that the whole community of the universe is governed by divine reason. 3 This law Aquinas calls the eternal law. In this explanation, Aquinas reaffirms the rational and divine characteristics of this law; each of these features matter. The rational nature of this order means that human beings, as rational creatures, can understand the order in reality. An order to reality would do little work for Aquinas if human beings could not somehow grasp that order. The reference to a divine origin makes clear that the universe does not ultimately derive its order from itself or from the human mind but from God himself. While the passage from Aquinas above might suggest that humans have no participation in the ordering of reality, a return to his treatment of law dispels that notion. Just after the discussion of eternal law, Aquinas turns in article 2 to natural law. In his general 2 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1 2, in Selected Writings, trans. Ralph McInerny (London: Penguin, 1998), Ibid., 618. Valley Humanities Review Spring

3 response to the objections against the notion of natural law, he notes that a rational creature can participate in the eternal law such that he has a natural inclination to the fitting act and end. Such a participation in eternal law in the rational creature is called natural law. 4 Two helpful points follow from this passage. First, natural law participates in eternal law. In that case, while humans have a role in the order of reality, they do not create that order independently of God. Humans help to order reality, but natural law still derives from God as its ultimate source. Second, natural law directs to the fitting act and end. Natural law has an overtly practical status as a guide to human action. In short, natural law means ethical guidance of divine origin. 5 In summary, the Thomistic worldview has a legal order both in reality and in human action that derives from God. Humans participate in this order but do not create or originate the natural law, much less the eternal law. In contrast to this ordered Thomistic world, Machiavelli paints a radically different picture in The Prince. While Machiavelli will ultimately allow for a human construction of order in reality, the first move he makes away from the kind of worldview that Aquinas offers comes through a demolition project. Before erecting human order, Machiavelli eliminates the concept of knowable divine order. The concept of fortune provides the engine which drives Machiavelli s march of disorder across reality. Translator Leo Paul S. de Alvarez has suggested that fortune plays a central role in the plot of The Prince. He writes, One of the great questions, and it is perhaps the 4 Ibid., To suggest that a theological viewpoint will see natural law as having divine origin is not to imply that a person could not have grounds to accept natural law independent of the existence of God. On this point see Robert P. George, Natural Law, Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 31, No. 1 (Winter 2008): , Valley Humanities Review Spring

4 great question, which Machiavelli raises in The Prince, is the extent to which fortune can be mastered. 6 Rather than attempting to offer an answer, or Machiavelli s answer, to this question, I want to use this suggestion as a starting point to examine the extent to which fortune defines the worldview offered in The Prince. If fortune provides the defining feature of The Prince and of its worldview that fact would indicate the extent to which Machiavelli repudiates the concept of knowable natural order instituted by God. Machiavelli first introduces the concept of fortune already in the Epistle Dedicatory in connection with his own station in life. At the end of the letter, he writes about personally suffering a malignity of fortune. 7 In this passage, Machiavelli blames his own state on the machinations of fortune. His statement implies that fortune functions as not merely an abstract concept, but a reality that he has experienced personally. He tempts his readers to imagine that some personal experience, rather than history or reason, might have led him to give fortune such a large place in his worldview. However, the text alone cannot adequately support that hypothesis. In any case, he certainly attributes his own place in life to fortune, and thereby, introduces the general idea that fortune can make or break a human being. The most frequent usage of fortune in Machiavelli appears in his constant contrasting and pairing of fortune with virtue. He offers this contrast countless times throughout The Prince as the two ways that a human being can rule. 8 In order to use this contrast to explain the importance Machiavelli places on fortune, the enigmatic concept of virtue needs clarification. On this concept, Alvarez provides helpful elucidation. Commenting on a particularly confusing 6 Leo Paul S. de Alvarez, introduction to The Prince, by Niccolo Machiavelli, trans. Leo Paul S. de Alvarez (Long Grove, IL: Waveland, 1989), xvii. 7 Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince., trans. Leo Paul S. de Alvarez (Long Grove, IL: Waveland, 1989), 2. 8 See Machiavelli, The Prince, 5, 32, 42, 52, 66, 83, 152, 153. Valley Humanities Review Spring

5 usage of virtue in Chapter VIII and contrasting two meanings of virtue as both manliness and moral rectitude, he suggests, The simple conclusion is that Machiavelli deliberately wishes to confuse the two meanings. 9 While I accept this conclusion about the passage in question and about The Prince as a whole, the context of the contrast between fortune and virtue seems to make clear that in those passages, Machiavelli only intends the meaning which Alvarez describes as the older sense which is connected with manliness, of having strength of body and mind, and especially of being able to acquire and keep a state. 10 This concept seems to fit prima facie better with the contrast between fortune and virtue as ways of ruling. In the contrast between fortune and virtue, virtue refers especially to the ability of a prince to rule through his own skill. If virtue, in the relevant passages, means something like rule imposed by human skill, then fortune must mean rule imposed independent of human skill. By presenting only these two alternatives, Machiavelli suggests that the only two possibilities for imposing rule on reality come from human skill or from the randomness of fate. In short, neither the concept of divine order, nor any notion that God could impose order on reality, enters the picture. Indeed, the nature of fortune raises questions about whether a person can intelligently speak of fortune imposing order on reality. Fortune can certainly place princes in positions of power, as Machiavelli suggests. Whatever method fortune might have to its madness, however, lies beyond the ability of humans to grasp. Fortune may impose order or rule in some sense, but certainly not in the sense of rational order. Independent of human action, a world of fortune 9 De Alvarez, introduction to The Prince, xx. 10 Ibid., xix. Valley Humanities Review Spring

6 means a world where no rational order exists. Independent of human action, a world of fortune means a world marked by chaos. 11 Despite the emphasis that Machiavelli places on fortune, he does not contend that reality has no order at all. Instead, he suggests that order enters reality through human action. He explicitly affirms the ability of humankind to create order when he writes in Chapter XXV, [F]ortune is the arbiter of half our actions, but... she lets the other half, or nearly that, be governed by us. 12 In this way, he introduces the possibility of rational order in nature by human means after having denied the existence of divine order. As Alvarez aptly notes, The need to establish method means that man, through his reason, must impose an order where there is none. 13 The order reality possesses does not exist ready-made for human beings, but must enter reality through their actions. Though de Alvarez seems to share the interpretation of Machiavelli developed above, he seems to back away from its implications elsewhere. He suggests that some kind of order must exist independent of humankind. Specifically, he writes, Nature herself presents men with an order capable of being understood and followed. But the state is whatever is willed by the prince it is whatever he pleases. 14 Insofar as de Alvarez intends to suggest any kind of cooperation between humankind and nature, he misreads Machiavelli. First, even if Machiavelli admitted that some kind of divine order exists, to claim that order as knowable by humankind is an altogether separate claim as argued above. Second, the text would not seem to 11 For a valuable discussion of fortune in Machiavelli s works see Oded Balaban, The Human Origins of Fortuna in Machiavelli s Thought, History of Political Thought 11, No. 1 (Spring 1990): 21 36, See especially his discussion of the views of Leo Strauss on p. 25, Neal Wood on p. 26, Hanna Pitkin on p , and Balaban s own view on p Machiavelli, The Prince, De Alvarez, introduction to The Prince, xvi. 14 Ibid., xviii. Valley Humanities Review Spring

7 support Alvarez s claim. In Chapter XXV Machiavelli writes, [F]ortune is a woman, and if one wishes to keep her down, it is necessary to beat her and knock her down. 15 Setting aside the gender-relation implications of this comment, Machiavelli paints a picture of the dominance of nature rather than cooperation. He presents nature as hostile to humankind and demands an equally hostile reaction from his readers. Just as Machiavelli assigns the prince the power to create order in reality, he seems to suggest that moral order derives, not from an order intrinsic to reality, but from the needs of the ruler. Two examples make this point clear. First, Machiavelli writes in Chapter XVIII, A prudent lord, therefore, cannot, nor ought he, observe faith when such observance turns against him. 16 In other words, a prince should keep promises when that action will benefit him, but should break promises when keeping them would harm him. In a similar vein, he writes in Chapter XVII, [O]ne would wish to be both [loved] and [feared], but since it is difficult to mix these qualities together, it is much safer to be feared than loved, if one of the two must be lacking. 17 In this passage, Machiavelli does not unequivocally endorse love or fear but merely maintains that the prince should value these traits in accordance with their likely benefit to the prince as the subsequent diatribe against human nature makes clear. Moral virtues derive their worth instrumentally from the efforts of the prince to create order in reality. Though human beings do not directly and spontaneously create moral values, these values are contingent upon the human actions of the prince. Thus, moral order ultimately derives from a human source rather than a transcendent divine source. 15 Machiavelli, The Prince, Ibid., Ibid., 101. Valley Humanities Review Spring

8 The contrast between the Thomistic and Machiavellian worldviews could and does derive from any number of differences between Aquinas and Machiavelli. Aquinas represents one of the highest achievements of medieval political thought, while Machiavelli finds himself squarely in the Renaissance. Aquinas lived his life in service to the Church, while Machiavelli devoted his life to the state. The difference that most readily accounts for their diverse worldviews, however, stems from the fact that Aquinas studied reality as a theologian, while Machiavelli studied as a historian. By examining the implications of these distinct ways of studying reality, Aquinas and Machiavelli provide a compelling case for seeing these methods as complementary rather than exclusionary and teach a compelling lesson on the respective limits of theology and history. The way Aquinas saw the world stemmed directly from the fundamental implications of theological study. Aquinas views order primarily as the product of divine institution rather than human creation, though he does not deny the participation of humankind in the order of reality through natural law. This fact makes sense because theologians must take God as the starting point of their studies, and an appreciation of God as the origin of reality requires a real appreciation of the implications of the divine activity of sustaining reality. Philosophertheologian Germain Grisez demonstrates this point clearly in his work on proving the existence of God. He writes, Possibly there is something call it God for short which has what it takes to make everything which happens happen. 18 For a theologian, divine order need not rest on some kind of scientific proof that identifies an event as an empirical effect and God as the empirical first cause of the effect, but God must serve as the source of all reality because of 18 Grisez, Beyond the New Theism, 53. Valley Humanities Review Spring

9 his very nature. To study reality theologically and not take God as the ultimate source of order would require a kind of internal contradiction. In other words, Aquinas could not have done otherwise than see the world as divinely ordered. 19 Machiavelli, of course, studied reality from the perspective of history, and that commitment too has implications for his view of the world. Historian John Lewis Gaddis has suggested, The recognition of human insignificance did not, as one might have expected, enhance the role of divine agency in explaining human affairs: it had just the opposite effect. It gave rise to a secular consciousness that, for better or for worse, placed the responsibility for what happens in history squarely on the people who live through history. 20 While not claiming to identify the intention of the author, I suggest that readers can take Gaddis s statement in two ways. We may take Gaddis to suggest that a historical worldview must deny the existence of divine providence. This view, however, oversteps the boundaries of proper historical study. History cannot prove or disprove God, or His providence, because His acts of providence do not refer to mere historical facts. For example, history cannot claim to disprove events like the Resurrection of Jesus or the Incarnation because these events do not refer to purely historical facts. As Roch Kereszty writes, The virginal conception itself is not a historically verifiable datum, and clarifies, Historical evidence, however, does not contradict this affirmation of faith. 21 In the case of the present study, historiography cannot disprove divine order in reality or in morality because divine providence and natural law do not refer to 19 Though I speak of God as the starting point for theology, I do not mean to suggest that theologians have to assume the existence of God. Theologians have used a variety of arguments to justify those assertions, but I would suggest that theology proper only begins after that initial step of justifying the existence of God. 20 John Lewis Gaddis, The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), Roch Kereszty, Jesus Christ: Fundamentals of Christology (Staten Island: St. Paul, 2002), 76; Ibid., 77. Valley Humanities Review Spring

10 historical facts but to philosophical conclusions. To respond to these limitations with the philosophical claim that all facts must be historical facts leads only to self-contradiction. These reflections suggest a more fruitful way that the reader can understand Gaddis s claim. The reader may take Gaddis to mean that the study of divine existence and causes belongs to a discipline outside of history. Historians do not study the way God may or may not cause actions, but instead, the human and natural causes of events. With this view, the reader could conclude that Machiavelli saw order as a human product because he studied reality in the historical terms of human action. If historians attempt to explain reality by simply stating that God ultimately causes everything, they provide no insight that theology could not have provided. For that reason, historians properly choose to examine the human causes of events. In this way, the two disciplines complement each other. To imagine otherwise confuses divine and human causation. As Germain Grisez writes, Almost inevitably, when one says that the creator causes x, one imports into the meaning of causes some property of some other causality, for example, of causality through freedom. But there is no justification for doing this. 22 Just as theologians ought to understand God as fundamentally different from all created reality, they ought to understand divine causality as fundamentally different from any kind of created causality like physical or the causality of free human choices. For theologians, or historians, to confuse the two forms requires a fundamental misconception of God and divine causality. The avoidance of such a misconception represents but one of the lessons that comparing Aquinas and Machiavelli can teach. Their worldviews, of course, differ on many counts. 22 Grisez, Beyond the New Theism, 279. Valley Humanities Review Spring

11 Aquinas the theologian saw a world marked by divine order both in the whole of reality and in the moral sphere. Machiavelli the historian saw a chaotic world governed by unknowable fortune, but orderable by the power of the prince. Insofar as theologians and historians recognize the limitations of the worldviews these scholars represent, they can fruitfully learn from each other. To the extent that they refuse to recognize the legitimate autonomy of the other, they distort the nature of reality I am not necessarily claiming that the worldviews of Aquinas and Machiavelli, as they stand, are already compatible. Both scholars may or may not have recognized the lesson which we can learn by comparing their worldviews. I am inclined to think that Aquinas, or at least scholars like Grisez working in the Thomistic tradition, would have space in their world for the legitimate autonomy of historical study. In contrast, I am skeptical that Machiavelli merely intended to suggest that divine order lay outside of his competence rather than wholeheartedly asserting that no divine order knowable by human beings exists. Nonetheless, I will not attempt here a formal defense of this claim and am open to arguments to the contrary. Valley Humanities Review Spring