Because of the choices he makes, his free will, Meursalt is a stranger to society.  Throughout the entire novel, he constantly demonstrates through narration and action that he is entirely indifferent to societal expectations, first discovered by the reader when Maman dies.  His behavior is perceived as callous: he smokes, drinks coffee, does not comfort her friends, does not show true grief.  He acts as he, and only he, sees fit.  This of course leads to him helping Raymond attack a woman and his murder of the Arab on the beach.

In Part Two, the paradox of free will becomes evident.  Meursalt is imprisoned and on trial for murder, put in solitary confinement.  He has limited interaction with others.  However, once he has accepted his circumstances– “apart from these annoyances, I wasn’t too unhappy.  Once again, the main problems was killing time.  Eventually, once I learned to remember things, I wasn’t bored at all” (78)– he manages to stay alive, sane, and yet still is disconnected.  Most tellingly, he does not see his imprisonment as lacking freedom until it is explicitly pointed out to him by a guard.  While he then agrees, he is told he is different than the others.  Meursalt accepts his fate: that is the paradox, that it is decided for him.  What makes it fascinating is that he still makes decisions for himself.  He still believes he is under his own control.  He does not care about the others, only himself.

Amongst the many considerations and problems of our day- wars are caused and waged by choice; homosexuality is a choice; homelessness is a choice, ignorance and poverty is a choice, even what we term religion has become a choice. And while representatives of faulty decisions they are indicative of the rights of choice nonetheless.  Many may disagree wondering why one would choose the negative when we supposedly are inclined to make positive decisions for ourselves. And yet understand the inherent offspring of choice is -consequence. Disagree if you must but the issue remains the “bad” things we experience are as much a part of choice as the “good” things we experience. They are both parts of the gift of choice, and partially why humanities greatest dilemma is choice. What do we do with it? How do we deal with it?

From a spiritual perspective one would say this is an easy answer and yet it requires us to utilize what we don’t yet understand, our freedom of choice, Free Will.  In the eyes of some the perception of choice is black and white; a clearly defined right or wrong pick, however for others choice is more systematic; it is based upon smaller choices on more grey matters comprising our ultimate decision and beliefs. The most pressing question we pose… In the end who ultimately will, and how much will someone else control our life? This is the question that every man inherently seeks to answer; thereby making the choice…

What’s more, in the process of deciding a matter there are various tools men use to accomplish the task. The most predominant being religion but this word in itself contradicts choice, which is why I included it amongst the faulty choices men make. The foremost characteristic of choice is its individual/ personal nature. I.e. you can not choose for me nor can I choose for you, but we both are individually accountable to choose. Religion stipulates otherwise

As I said the problem is choice. But so too is the answer.

And it invariably is… whose voice will I obey? To some this may seem overly religious and others it appears horrendously harsh until one realizes the stakes at wager… i.e. you can only receive the reward or consequence of your choice. As I stated, the “good” and the “bad” are both accessories to the gift of choice. See it in this perspective… famine as a choice- the choice to starve or the decision to eat: its offspring hopelessness is a choice- the choice to fight and labor to eat or surrender and cry because no one has given me to eat. Simple logic would say labor to eat and be filled but again this is a choice.

In the same pattern many understand that smoking and some foods among other things are addictive, and one must spend many dollars to control or stop the behavior, in effect cease the addiction. Yet knowing this many are claimed to have fallen victim to these things and excused of accountability without considering the contradiction. I know from evidence these things do not profit my body or my life and I gain nothing from them worth having. Instead I lose what is of some value. Knowing this why would I subject myself to these things unless I decide to exercise my choice? I have created the problem which I seek solution.

Understand the circumstances we encounter happen to us only because of choice. More specifically, the lack of choosing correctly. Again every moment is an opportunity to choose. If I gauge every aspect of my decisions (choices) would I so readily choose certain things? If knowing the prospect of loosing all my material matters would I choose to be a gambler? Ponder this for a moment with its applications toward life. In the same opportunity ponder this; even as I have offended some to this point, the primary cause of the problem i.e. failing choices is not necessarily you it also includes faulty information. You are not totally the blame. In military terms it’s called unreliable intelligence or as some say bad surveillance. Sometimes situations appear one way as to mislead one into unpromising choices thereby creating and furthering the problem. But this doesn’t excuse poor choice

As you further consider weigh this thought. While choice in itself is the perfect gift it carries with it a responsibility. This responsibility holds the answer to the problem I address and many others. One must know the consequence of choice. With this knowledge one can make truly intelligent decisions and increase the probability of “good” things occurring on most occasions. As I said again the problem and answer are both choice. You decide be willing to accept. After all it is your choice

From my personal aspect of the issue the choice is simple source reliance. I didn’t make the world it’s not mine to control I should just enjoy the view I’m given… as many understand there is a well of wisdom in God alone, and an abundance of life’s necessities at His throne but first one must choose to serve Him.

As I said the problem and solution is choice and its answer rests with you.

•In the Crown Chakra entities will confuse you, mess up your thinking, maybe to the point you seem schizophrenic or delusional. It is also common for people to think they are talking to guides or to God and the messages just wreak havoc in their lives. It usually takes really powerful entities to attach to the Crown Chakra, but when they do it is to keep you removed from the Highest Source.
•In the Brow Chakra entities impair your psychic ability, encourage obsessive thinking, worry, and even frightening images that come unbidden. You might see things in a negative light, have a poor memory, or have headaches/migraines. Entities are here to keep you from being able to receive the Truth to help yourself and others.
•In the Throat Chakra entities will make you feel shy, insecure, and make it hard to communicate with other people, especially new people. It will be very hard for you to confront people and you will likely avoid facing problems, conflicts, and anything ‘unpleasant’. People with entities in their Throat Chakra are being kept from sharing their Truth with other people to help them.
•In the Heart Chakra I don’t remember ever finding an entity here. It could be they cannot attach here.
•In the Solar Plexus entities in the Solar Plexus will make you feel weak, vulnerable, paranoid, anxious, depressed as in Bi-Polar or Manic, overwhelmed, intimidated, and powerless. Flip-flopping from one extreme to the other is also really common.
•In the Sacral Chakra entities are somewhat rare, but when they are there people are very negative and have very heavy energy. People who complain that the world is horrible and they’ve never been given a break, people who whine about how unfair things are to them, people holding grudges, hatreds, jealousies, and other heavy emotions often have entities here. These people will often feel entitled and show very little gratitude and appreciation towards others, which blocks blessings to themselves. They may also experience sudden sexual urges that get themselves in trouble, or even impotency.
•In the Root Chakra entities aren’t very common but when they are there people have panic attacks and terror and feel their life is threatened for no reason. They may be afraid to drive, swim, or have other strange phobias. These people are often hypochondriacs and live in fear.

Because these entities are attached to these centers, they can more strongly affect you. But how do they attach in the first place? We live in a world that is governed by a principal called Free Will. Therefore, these entities aren’t just attaching to us at random, they have to have our permission to do so. Of course no rational person would ever allow an entity to attach to them, so they have developed many ways to trick people into allowing the attachment.

Join our free forums to share your ideas and experience and to learn more at http://www.completelifehealing.com/apps/forums/topics/show/4845138-entities-and-how-they-attach-

Erin Heaven is resident Clairvoyant Healer and founder of Complete Life Healing in Boise, Idaho. Giving psychic readings since age 12, she has 22 years of experience in metaphysical studies and energetic healing.
Read her site http://www.guaranteedhealing.com/ .

•In the Crown Chakra entities will confuse you, mess up your thinking, maybe to the point you seem schizophrenic or delusional. It is also common for people to think they are talking to guides or to God and the messages just wreak havoc in their lives. It usually takes really powerful entities to attach to the Crown Chakra, but when they do it is to keep you removed from the Highest Source.
•In the Brow Chakra entities impair your psychic ability, encourage obsessive thinking, worry, and even frightening images that come unbidden. You might see things in a negative light, have a poor memory, or have headaches/migraines. Entities are here to keep you from being able to receive the Truth to help yourself and others.
•In the Throat Chakra entities will make you feel shy, insecure, and make it hard to communicate with other people, especially new people. It will be very hard for you to confront people and you will likely avoid facing problems, conflicts, and anything ‘unpleasant’. People with entities in their Throat Chakra are being kept from sharing their Truth with other people to help them.
•In the Heart Chakra I don’t remember ever finding an entity here. It could be they cannot attach here.
•In the Solar Plexus entities in the Solar Plexus will make you feel weak, vulnerable, paranoid, anxious, depressed as in Bi-Polar or Manic, overwhelmed, intimidated, and powerless. Flip-flopping from one extreme to the other is also really common.
•In the Sacral Chakra entities are somewhat rare, but when they are there people are very negative and have very heavy energy. People who complain that the world is horrible and they’ve never been given a break, people who whine about how unfair things are to them, people holding grudges, hatreds, jealousies, and other heavy emotions often have entities here. These people will often feel entitled and show very little gratitude and appreciation towards others, which blocks blessings to themselves. They may also experience sudden sexual urges that get themselves in trouble, or even impotency.
•In the Root Chakra entities aren’t very common but when they are there people have panic attacks and terror and feel their life is threatened for no reason. They may be afraid to drive, swim, or have other strange phobias. These people are often hypochondriacs and live in fear.

Once a low-vibration entity has attached to us, they are able to begin influencing us. They can shape our thoughts, influence our emotions, and sometimes alter our behavior and perceptions. We often experience that “little voice” in the back of our minds that rattles off the day’s chores, the groceries we need, what we are going to say in our interview, etc. This is also one of the primary ways we become influenced by entities. We are programmed to listen to that voice and accept it as our own. So when an entity attaches and starts whispering, in our own mental voice, we listen and accept it as our own. We have all experienced this at one time or another. When we are out having a great day, buying clothes, talking to random people we meet, and feeling especially good since we lost that last 10 lbs, and then, by the time we get home, we are berating ourselves for wasting all that money, thinking people were just humoring us, and hating our reflection for looking so fat, we have experienced low-vibration entity influence! Low-vibration entities are one of the largest reasons some people never see their lives getting better. Some people never see their efforts pay off, and experience nothing but problems. No matter what they do, they are stuck in their misery.

Luckily there are methods of identifying and removing low-vibration entities from your chakras, and remove their influence from your life. The first thing you must keep in mind is that these beings do not deserve your fear. They are nothing more than parasites living off of us. They are subject to our wills and we do have the power to be rid of them. It is necessary to identify these entities and determine what role they are playing in your issues. Learning to identify them and their influence and being able to separate from it is important. By far, the most important thing you can do is identify your resistance and work through it! These beings influence us by making us feel resistant to things and people that can improve our lives. Posting on forums, confronting others, sharing our truth, working with healers, resolving issues with others, etc, are all things that entities commonly make us feel resistant to. When we allow this resistance to rule our lives, we are choosing to live our lives in fear. Moving past this is the first step to weakening our entities.

Working with a qualified clairvoyant energetic practitioner is a quicker method to removing these entities from your life. They can identify these beings and how they are influencing you, and work with you to remove them from your life instantaneously. Work with a practitioner who understands and honors Free Will. If the practitioner just removes these beings, they will be able to reattach, and you might even draw more in. This is because, on some level, we have allowed these beings to attach to us. For example, take a child who is abused by his father because he talks too much, or is too loud. On a spiritual level an entity approaches and promises to help. The boy’s spirit allows it to attach. Now the child doesn’t talk, is excessively shy, wont confront anyone, and grows up with severe communication and self-expression issues. Or in another case, a child is abused and feels weak and helpless. The entity she allows to attach promises to make her feel stronger. Now she flies into rages, becomes violent, and may even harm others. She no longer feels helpless, but the dubious ‘help’ this thing has provided has caused more problems than it’s solved. Because we have allowed these beings to attach to us on some level, it is essential that your practitioner involve you in breaking this agreement. Otherwise they are not working in Free Will. Cutting off entities or erasing them from existence bears severe karmic repercussions if Free Will isn’t observed. Working with Free Will simply means that you are involved in breaking your old agreement and making a new one that these beings cannot attach to you. It doesn’t mean that the entity can choose to remain. In fact, if your practitioner is skilled in erasing them out of existence, they will be forced to leave and not return once you have broken the agreement you made in Spirit!

If you are suffering with entity attachments, you are not alone! Many people have experienced this and you can join in discussions about it now! http://www.completelifehealing.com/apps/forums/topics/show/4845252-low-vibration-entities-what-they-are-and-what-they-do-

Erin Heaven is resident Clairvoyant Healer and founder of Complete Life Healing in Boise, Idaho. Giving psychic readings since age 12, she has 22 years of experience in metaphysical studies and energetic healing.
Read her site http://www.guaranteedhealing.com/ .

We don’t live. We live to earn money to give ourselves a false sense of security and purpose. We have been spoon fed, force fed and we have been tricked into liking it. We are now so dependent that we are incapable otherwise of being told what to do. We think we need governments and politicians. We believe we need the police and military because we are now paranoid of our fellow human. Rightly so. We have created monsters in our society by exchanging our humanity for ego. It’s all about us. All 7 billion of us. We gladly exchange life for the commuting – 9-5 – for – two- free – days lifestyle. We hardly take time out. When we think, its for work. The only questions we ask is How can I make more money? And How can I take advantage of this situation so that I can prosper? We all want something. We all want it more than the next person, to the point where we would take advantage of another so we can “win”. You ask what is wrong with the world? Its our mentality and frame of mind. We are the problem. Can we be blamed? This world was already set out like this for us. They say we were born with free-will. This may have been correct once upon a time, but now I think we are born with no choice. If I had a choice money wouldn’t be an issue because it wouldn’t exist. There would be no need for this rat race powered machine.

The arguments against the existence of Free Will are fueled by mechanistic and materialistic talking points, while the argument for Free Will usually has it’s origin in religious thought.

The more complex the argument becomes, the more rules are affixed to the proposed philosophy. To Free Will believers, the qualifications for what comprises and accomodates the belief might postulate that man has Free Will because he has a divine spirit, or because his actions are not always predictable. The Determinists and Fatalists might discount the presumption of divinity, thereby eliminating an imperceivable, invisible, or imaginary organizing force that might allow for Free Will. The Free Will opponents might use the claim that all events are subject to causality, which eliminates any randomness that might be mistaken for Free Will. The proof that Free Will does not exist lies in the assertion that every action is predetermined; there are no random acts, and all actions must be predictable.

Here is the fatal flaw in the argument against Free Will. The Determinists set up the criterion that every act must be predictable, but that only invites the possibility for the perception of Free Will, whenever an event transpires without prediction to said event.

So, while I agree that we cannot escape the chain of causality, I cannot say with any surety that Free Will is an illusion, until man has the ability to predict every single action by every single human being.

As long as one person makes one unpredictable action, that stands as proof of Free Will.

The criterion set by Determinists and Fatalists, is that every action a person makes is contingent on causal factors…a chain of events that precedes and determines the eventual outcome of any action. There can be no randomness, as randomness lacks specificity, and every event must adhere to a specific pattern.

If we had the ability to weigh the possiblities and probabilities of any given action a person would (not could!) make, then we could say without a doubt that there is no Free Will, but the burden of proof lies on the side of the Free Will doubters who lack the ability to perceive the specific pattern of reality; who lack the ability to predict every action in every given situation that any, and every person could ever possibly and probably make.

Further, one would have to predict not only the probable outcomes of every individual act, but the only outcome that every single person would have to arrive at.

There may come a day when every possibility and probability can be measured, weighed, and set towards predicting every realized outcome, but until that day, there is no proof that Free Will does not exist.

To summarize, the end result of each of our choices and decisions in life is pre-destined. How we arrive at the end result is a direct consequence of free will. If one can thoroughly understand this rational concept, then the jump from having free will to being tested for our actions in this life, on the Day of Judgment, is the logical next step.

Reflecting on some valid criticisms concerning the “Occupy Wall Street” protests it appears that there is some form of sociodynamic entropy at work. If too many people break into too many groups representing too many causes, then the unifying message will be lose power and clarity.

The unifying message s that there is too much disparity in this nation (and all nations of the world), as the result of a steady barrage of class warfare and redistribution of wealth from the lower and middle class citizens to the wealthiest CEO’s of multinational conglomerate corporations.

While the obverse side of the coin may represent the weakening of the protest through rapid growth and dissolution of purpose, the reverse concerns the possibility that a well organized movement with singularity of purpose will be easier for corporatists to abduct and control.

Therefore, there must remain a degree of diversity within the ranks of the protesters in order to make the immunize the collective from external attack.

The degree of diversity must be inversely proportional to the level of organization. If the scales are tipped too far to one side the movement will lose its structural integrity, and if it tilts too far to the opposite side it will be vulnerable to opponents who wish to control and redirect the movement.

If the movement is too clean and organized; if the message is too clear and focused; if the collective devolves to a hive mentality, then it will become another easy target…like the Tea Party.

Matthew West

Players or Pawns?

     The mere coexistence of two ideas has proven causally efficacious. Separately, the notions are not so problematic. God is all-knowing. Human beings freely choose their actions. Developed together though, the apparent reality of human choice and the generally accepted omnipotence and fore-knowledge of God repeatedly gives rise to one of the most intriguing yet puzzling questions available for consideration: Do we have free will or are our actions causally determined? The Stoics, Cicero, and St. Augustine all grappled with this question to the extent that in Augustine’s days as a bishop he valiantly tried to reconcile, from his interest in the Stoics’ response to the problem, and may have succeeded in reconciling, this apparent disjunction that Cicero considered unavoidable.

     Socrates thought that the form of the good, a heavenly ruling force dispensing with reality for the sake of lesser forms, heavily influences the actions of wise folk because wise folk know the good. Their actions are a function of their desire for the good and are therefore tailored to it. St. Augustine and the Stoics however, took a more radical view, arguing that all human action is pre-determined, with the Stoics claiming that all action proceeds according to fate. Cicero, for his part, expressed the puzzling nature of the Stoics’ claim with the objection that, if human action is predetermined then free will is impossible. Without free will, it seems that humans are not morally responsible for their actions, but are simply like inanimate, passive pawns in a sort of game played by whatever or whoever rules the world. The Stoics and St. Augustine recognized this apparent contradiction and did what they could to deal with it satisfactorily. With consideration then, it looks as if St. Augustine’s attempt to resolve the free will-fatalism dilemma Cicero poses, which utilizes God’s eternality and implication of human wills into his own, serves not to conclusively calm one’s contradictory intuitions about the dilemma, but to make more intelligible the reality of both free will and God’s fore-knowledge.

     Socrates’ idea that the form of the good causally determines the action of wise people is one of the first instances of a determinism-type outlook that we know of. A somewhat different philosophical view than the larger conflict between free will and God’s foreknowledge, the bold idea Socrates propounded nevertheless seems to have set the stage. Socrates wanted to say was that it was impossible for one to knowingly act contrary to the good. To reach this claim he had to take for granted a hardly indisputable idea that we see in a few of Socrates’ dialogues, including Protagoras and Apology. This is the claim that no one knowingly harms themselves. Socrates remarks in Protagoras that “no one freely goes for bad things or things he believes to be bad” in his search for virtue in discussion with Protagoras and others.1 Virtue was “an art that embodies exact knowledge,” and Socrates implicitly meant that knowledge is the ultimate good.2 So if one has knowledge, then one has the ultimate good. If one has reached the ultimate good and cannot choose the bad for oneself, then one cannot act contrary to the good with all knowledge of what would harm one, since Socrates understands that acting contrary the good is harmful to oneself. Those who have not attained the good simply strive to attain what they “believe to be [good],” which is often bad.3

      For Socrates, the possibility of not knowing the good proved to be pretty important in the Apology, where Socrates is accused of willingly corrupting the youth of Athens. Calling absurdity, Socrates points out that willingly corrupting the youth would amount to willingly creating wicked associates. As “the wicked do some harm to those who are ever closest to them” and “good people benefit them,” it is utterly foolish to think Socrates knowingly instilled wickedness into the minds of his students.4 Further attacking his accusations, Socrates cautions that if he corrupted the youth unwillingly he would not be due for punishment, since Athenian law could not punish folk for “such unwilling wrongdoings,”5 but should “instruct them and exhort them” since, if they “learn better, [they] shall cease what [they] are doing unwillingly.”6 Socrates so strongly held that the good was knowledge that he relies on the claim for the defense of his life. Wrongdoers should not be punished for simply not knowing the good, but should be instructed and lead to the good.

        Although Plato did not explicitly write on the concept of free will in any of the work we have, the upshot of the foregoing is essentially that Socrates (or Plato, or both for that matter) felt quite firmly that the desire for the good is a powerful force that both causes all to pursue what they think is good, or at the very least is overwhelmingly influential in directing human action, in both the lives of those ignorant and knowledgeable of the good. The claim becomes almost radical for those who know the good, since by implication Socrates meant that those knowing the good could not possibly act immorally, since knowing the good meant they know that immoral action is bad for them. To be clear, Socrates was not a fatalist.

         With the laid underpinnings of the idea and related ideas of the goodness of ends acting on the means towards those ends, the group of dogmatist philosophers known as the Stoics came along as a group within a larger, general Hellenistic school, taking these ideas a step or two further. Fatalism heavily characterized the philosophy of the Stoics, which is the idea that all human action proceeds according to fate. It is not just that the good, or whatever the Stoics version of Socrates’ ‘the good’ might have been, causes wise people to act virtuously, but every single human action from taking a step to leading a popular revolution is meant to happen and could not have not happened. Whatever the force behind or within fate may be, it causes every single event in the world.

          Interestingly enough, the Stoics were all about ethics and moral duty and it turns out that they took a line on virtue similar to that of Socrates. It was an intellectualist approach to ethics, namely, that if one knows what is good, then one will not fail to attempt to do it. In their pursuit of ataraxia, a sort of pleasant existence free from disturbance, the Stoics supported the prescription of an ethically responsible, disciplined life in which, ideally, one does not deny oneself but masters one’s mind with a reason that does not assent to pain or pleasure. The Stoics recognized the apparent inconsistency in their lines of thought, since it is at best bewildering to imagine how both fatalism and moral responsibility can exist. How am I morally responsible for my actions if all that I do is essentially done by the forces of fate and not myself? Trying to resolve the problem, the Stoics came up with something like the ‘free will’ we talk of today. The free will they envisioned however is a free will amidst bondage, or a type of bondage to the forces of fate. It is like a cart pulled by a horse and driven by a farmer, with a dog tied to the back of the cart. The farmer whips the horses and the cart proceeds forward, the dog powerless to stop it. The dog is still left with a choice. It can walk or be dragged in an immature rebellion. The realities of this situation are like the realities of the human predicament. We, like the dog, have a kind of free will, but not enough to halt or speed up the natural flow and order of nature. In essence it is a mode of free will: our response to our larger lack of freedom from fatalism. Given this, it behooves us to comport ourselves to an admittedly harsh reality in rational way, exercising our limited but influential power to decide if we are going to walk or be dragged. The free will we have then is ideally a free will amidst reason as well as harsh reality, and this is still an autonomous, deliberate act that is worthy of moral praise by those that all actions affect within the Stoics’ profoundly holistic, inter-connected world. Not surprisingly then, the Stoics praised deliberate action and prudence over mere action in their quest for ataraxia. So with the Stoics, prudent action was the perfect example action done freely but still subject and bonded to fate.

         The motivation for an actor’s decision to get up and walk is rooted in one of the Stoics’ most important ideas: that there is a supreme plan for the world and we are fools to try to reject it. The plan then is thought up and implemented by God, presumably, and all that occurs in the world, even the most trivial and most evils of acts, somehow fits into that plan. It might be understood by this then that an evil act is in a sense not ‘evil’, but just extremely removed from God, “merely the absence [or paucity] of good.”7

          The famous Christian philosopher and theologian, St. Augustine of Hippo, sort of jumped on the bandwagon. When he entered the philosophical scene, he began to use some of these ideas as the foundation for much of his version of Christian theology, not to mention as useful problem-solving tools.

           Retaining and accepting similar strands of Plato’s conception of the form of the good, Augustine, for his own philosophy, considered God to be this perfect entity, with many of the same attributes that Plato attributed to the form of the good: eternality, immutability, wholeness, purity, and transcendence. The difference for Augustine was that he thought God had a personality as an all-knowing, loving, and fatherly figure with a supreme plan and order for world events. The supreme good is God, but He is not an impersonal ruling force, but it is a father-like personality that is actively engaged with humans and the world at large on a daily basis.

            As Augustine maintained that God, being all-knowing and all-powerful, had fore-knowledge of all events to come, Cicero recognized the now familiar, glaring issue, which the Stoics had already tried to resolve. It does not seem possible for humans to have free will if God knew and ordered events before they happened. Augustine then, in his City of God, knowing Cicero’s concern, laid out Cicero’s argument against the compatibility of free will and God’s fore-knowledge, and offered his own response and attempt to reconcile the competing notions. Cicero started with the harmless observation that “if all future events are known in advance,” then they will happen in exactly the order in which they are known.8 Implicit here though is the assumption of the connection between knowledge and implementation. It is theoretically possible for God to know what is going to happen but still totally remove himself from it all. If events happen in the exact order in which God foreknows them, then “there is a certain order of things foreknown by God.”9 This seems to follow easily enough. Continuing though, if there is an established order of things, then there should also be a “certain order of causes, for nothing can come about which is not preceded by some sufficient cause.”10 Cicero may mean to identify events and causes here, such that every thing that happens is a result of some cause and is a cause itself. But, Augustine does have him saying just that every event requires a cause, and that if this is so, someone ordering events would also be ordering causes and therefore caring not just that the ordered events happen, but that they happen for certain reasons. For our purposes it is enough to assume events are both events and causes of other events.

            If there is a “certain order of causes by which everything that happens happens, then, Cicero says, all things that happen happen by fate.”11 If all things happen by fate, there must not be any free choice of the will, and “if we concede that, [Cicero] says, then the whole of human life is undermined.”12 Humanity’s great ideas, writings, revolutions, tragedies, and successes all shrink into standard procedure. In vain do humans implore, persuade, act, rebuke, and persuade, so it seems. These possibilities are intolerable for Cicero and in order to deny them he “wishes to say that there is no foreknowledge of things to come.”13 For Cicero, either we have freedom of the will or God, or someone, has foreknowledge of all events in the world.

             Augustine denies the incompatible disjunction that Cicero poses. He assures us that with a developed understanding of Christian theology that we can have both free will and God’s foreknowledge and pre-determination of events. According to Augustine, this argument “restricts the mind of the religious man,” into a false question.14 If a certain order of causes exists in the mind of God, then, for Augustine, it still does not automatically follow that we have no free will in the matter. As Augustine thinks that God works out his master plan through men, he claims that “our wills are themselves included in the order of causes which is certain to God and contained within his foreknowledge.”15 God works through our wills. It is actually the case that God gave men free will and knew that they would exercise their free will in a particular manner. God did pre-determine the events that happen in the world, as well as their causes, and men’s’ wills and actions are not exceptions. For Augustine it is not so much fate that causes our wills, but “the will of God” which “can do all things.”16 God, if He is in fact properly so called, could not have overlooked men’s wills in laying out his order of causes and events, so it is simply the case that the free will we experience and exercise, along with its power, is a part of God’s foreknowledge and plan. This does not look too different from the supreme plan that the Stoics spoke of.

               Augustine’s resolution may also take the form of what some call “The Guarantor Solution.”17 The effect of this response is to claim that God also has foreknowledge of our powers and choices within our wills, and to “remove the threat foreknowledge poses for free will” by God’s fore knowledge guaranteeing, rather than eliminating, our free will.18 This is precisely because of what Augustine suggested in his response to Cicero: God knows and plans and gives us the ability to do exactly what we end up doing with out free will.

               Although it may seem unacceptably simple, Augustine’s method of solving the conundrum resonates, especially when qualified with a few argumentative and speculative points.

               Even while God (I am assuming His existence) is omnipotent, concepts like necessity and fate seem to be poorly defined, impersonal, vague forces. They might have been erected by man in the fear that he is not nearly as in control of his life as he would like to believe, or subconsciously assumes on a daily basis. If one worries about the rule of necessity and fate as meaning that things absolutely had to happen exactly as they did, then there seems to be a blatant overlooking of a person’s enormously influential mind and will in relation to events in their environment. For instance, it is plainly absurd to think parents do not exercise heavy causal influence upon their children. If God is the all-powerful, contemporaneous (constantly causing) and first-causer we assume He is, then any other force like ‘fate’ or ‘necessity’ that exists is even at its greatest power still subject to God’s power. God is not God if he is subject. It is apparent to me that the real worry we have is that we are not in control of our lives or that the story of world history will turn out to be boring and uninteresting because it was all planned out beforehand and our roles in the story mean little if anything.

                Because we are largely ignorant of the future and especially so relative to God, I do not find this worry worthwhile. We must deal with our relative ignorance as best we know how, likely by faith, as Augustine would surely maintain. The story of the world guided by an all-powerful hand who knows all and directs all before and during our lives remains an exciting, intensely meaningful story for human beings, precisely because we are largely ignorant of God’s plans. We don’t know what is coming next. Whatever the Truth about the free-will and pre-determination debate turns out to be, it is more than clear that in their regular, day-to-day lives humans operate with an overwhelmingly strong mindset of free will. We are sure that if we decide to drop our keys on the ground, it will happen. This appears to be the case for most, save a small percentage of intensely introspective and frequently religious hermits and ascetics that try their utmost to avoid free action. But even they choose not to choose, as Sartre and the existentialists might cry. To be sure, some people do not see a point in acting like they are freely choosing because they adamantly believe in something like hard-determinism, where we have absolutely no free will and are pawns moved about by God at His own will. For these folk, this belief so deeply pervades their everyday thought that it ironically affects their action, or lack thereof. Most of us though, including those of us still believing in something like God’s foreknowledge and pre-determination, confidently perceive a reality of free choice, such that we feel we do not have to do what we choose to do and that our thoughts cause our actions. These daily decisions (like what to wear in the morning) expose themselves as manifest options to our inner mental reality from our observations of the world, even for those believing in pre-determination. It is my contention that even one believing in God’s foreknowledge and pre-determination of events can acknowledge these kinds of choices and must, willingly or not, and make them. This perceived reality of choice seems to be true despite, or rather because of, a larger, cosmic, or Godly reality characterizing the universe.

         This latter reality however, if it exists, is one that only God knows. This distinction makes it is possible that the most influential social reformer deliberately choosing to protest, persuade, and write for a cause whose goal materializes does in fact act freely. But the freedom with which this person acts is not a heavy, comprehensively defined type of freedom making claims about the True and final reality that only God knows and controls. It is not a freedom that would exist if God did not order our every action. It is a freedom, a kind of mental separation from the knowledge of God’s comprehensive plan, which is perceived and acted upon by an individual, having a measurable effect in the world. But it is not free from God’s causing hand, if God orders all. A natural reaction is to think that this freedom* is purely illusory, a fiction of the individual mind that does not reflect a reality of hard-determinism. Although I do not find it illusory, whether it is or not it is safe to say just about all of us experience it.

                          This sort of truncated version of freedom remains a valid freedom of the will, does not deconstruct into the lifelessness of a moved but unmoving chess piece, and is the reality that we are ignorant of God’s plans. Both this ignorance and our perception of free choice prevent the destruction of moral responsibility and final judgment. Even if our sinful mistakes are part of God’s plan, it is usually still the case that we made a wrong choice within out immediate panoramas of free options. If God ordained that we would act immorally and we ordained no such thing, but chose to act within our perceived reality, we shall still be morally responsible for what we do and subject to God’s final judgment in the end. If we were given knowledge of the order of all things moral and immoral we would know how our immorality fits within God’s plan and free will would truly be a fiction. But it is not a fiction because the reality is that our freedom exists, save in a limited manner. We are punishable, interestingly, both because we knew an act to be wrong and did it anyway and because we are ignorant of God’s plans. If, for some reason, we humans had our own developed plans for the world and foreknowledge of everything to come, then aside from rivaling God there would likely be no free will (except maybe for intelligent animals!). As long as everyone could synchronize their plans with those of all else in the world so that, among other constraints, two people are not in the same place at the same time, then all mini-plans would fit into God’s master plan and all actions would be pre-determined. Life would be almost meaningless, given that we would each have foreknowledge of our own and other’s lives. Undoubtedly, no free will would exist.

           It is abundantly clear that no human has any foreknowledge that could begin to constitute a plan half as comprehensive as God’s, yet just about all understand basic rights and wrongs, without knowing all of the effects of their choices. We are free and morally responsible in this way. We have a bit of limited, perceptual power and it seems God is interested in what we do with it. We choose because God causes us to choose, but also because we are ignorant of the order and exact causes of events in the world and all we know to do is to try. It comes to mind as the best we can do is something like learning from history, such that we’ve figured out that military intervention is hardly a great way to spread democracy. Free will exists then, but in a weaker sense than is generally given to the term, a weakness reminding that our control of our own lives is limited, at best. We are free not because we are free from God’s intimate hand of causation, nor even just because we perceive that we act freely. We have a type of free will both because we are not obviously forced to act as we do (both physically and mentally) and because we are largely ignorant of God’s plans for the world. We are not free from those plans as Augustine pressed, but are sort of derivatively implicated in them. God implements His plans powerfully, in part the power that He gives us, and the plans seem to be characterized by men’s thoughts, choices, wills, and actions. God knew and ordained what choices we would make and what actions we would perform. Separated from that knowledge, we are deeply implicated in it (hence the need to listen to the one with the foreknowledge). Aside from prophecy, the closest we may come to it is a kind of retrospective confidence, maybe securing us from the debilitating doubt of mistake, that questionable events in our lives could and should not have gone any other way to bring us where we are today. We carry out an ordained plan of God’s without knowing a lot about the plan or about the effects of our deeds and just how they fit into the supreme plan.

1 Taylor, C.C. W. Protagoras. 358c7-d

2 Ibid. 357b5.

3 Ibid. 358d.

4 Apology. 25c6-8.

5 Ibid. 26a2-3

6 Ibid. 26a3-5

7 Jones, W.T. A Discussion of Neoplatonism and Its Influence on Augustine and the Christian

Tradition. The Medieval Mind (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, Inc., 1969). p.3.

8 Augustine. City of God, V: VIIII

9 Augustine, V:VIIII

10 Ibid.

11 Ibid.

12 Ibid.

13 Ibid.

14 Ibid.

15 Augustine, V: VIIII

16 Ibid.

17 Matthews, Gareth B. Augustine. P. 97.

18 Ibid, p.98.

            Within the sublime realm of possibility, all choice is laid before thee.  One may choose to be whatever one wishes.  One may live as King or Queen, Sorcerer or Sage, Warrior or Peasant, Friend or Foe, or Someone Else or simply Self.  This choice opens the doorway of belief.  For when the partaker of death realizes he may become anyone at any time by simply choosing to be, one also realizes he may choose to become himself at the moment of his death.  And in choosing to do so may also choose to remove the experience of that death and continue living on.

            One realizing he is at total choice of his experience after partaking of death can only summarize that he has always been at total choice.  This he has.  Death was a choice he made to bring himself to remembrance of his free choice.  The seemingly unpleasant choice of death (at the time it was made) was unconsciously made, because of the fact he did not yet remember he was at free choice.  He accepted the feelings and emotions of his body as being the decision maker, and felt powerless to overcome those decisions.  Now, after his experience, one can again know that his soul has ultimate power in decision making, and again regain control of his own destiny.

Now one can decide to stop death before it happens.

One can catch the body in a lie.