This appears much more splendidly from the circumlocutions employed by him and the appositions by which he explains and illustrates τὸ πρῶτον θέλημα, the first will. For what is τὸ πρῶτον θέλημα, the first will, according to him? Namely, I. it is εὐδοκία, a benign and inclined will; ἡ ἀρίστη καὶ καλλίστη τοῦ Θεοῦ ἑκούσιος θέλησις, “the best and most beautiful will of God, prompted not from without”; τὸ ἀγαθὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ θέλημα, “the good will of God”1; πολλὴ τοῦ Θεοῦ περὶ ἡμᾶς φιλοστοργία τε καὶ ἀγάπη, “the greatest paternal affection and love of God toward us”2; and likewise ἐπ᾽ εὐεργεσίᾳ βούλησις, “a will arisen from the intention of doing good”3. These are so many circumlocutions of τῆς εὐδοκίας, most frequent among ecclesiastical writers.
It is II. θέλημα προηγούμενον, the will which precedes in the order of origin4, which of itself occupies the very mind of God and spontaneously springs forth from him of whom John5 writes, ὁ Θεὸς ἀγάπη ἐστί, “God is charity.”
It is III. τὸ σφοδρὸν θέλημα, not a remiss but an intense and inflamed will; τὸ μετ᾽ ἐπιθυμίας θέλημα, a desirous will joined with the desire of doing good; ἡ ἐπιθυμία Θεοῦ, the very desire of God; and finally τὸ πεῖσμα, the most firm determination of mind.
But there is no one who does not understand and, as it were, perceive with his own eyes that by these expressions there is set forth not a sign and a feigned appearance of a will, but a true and interior will; not a sluggish and inert will, but one especially solicitous and efficacious6; not a will sterile in effects and works, but fruitful, as being the germ of a love which7 cannot lie idle in the mind of one who loves.
Footnotes
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These are the words of Theodoret on Ps. V. ↩
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By these words Theodoret continues in the same place to explain the force and rationale of τῆς εὐδοκίας. ↩
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This is the description of Oecumenius in his commentary on this passage. ↩
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Isaac Habert, Bishop of Vabres, writes concerning Chrysostom’s circumlocution, by which he interprets εὐδοκίαν as τὸ προηγούμενον θέλημα, in book II of The Theology of the Greek Fathers on Grace, chap. VIII, § III: “It is called τὸ προηγούμενον θέλημα, that is, either the antecedent or even the excellent, principal, or preeminent will, in this sense: because it is the first act of the will which is conceived in God with respect to the creatures whom he decrees to create, not for destruction - for God did not make death, Wis. I - but for salvation. It is also called by Chrysostom the principal will because it regards the good insofar as it is good absolutely and simply, without any circumstances determining it. And as for what he adds, that πρῶτον θέλημα σφοδρότερον, that first will, is more vehement, it is true in this sense: because that first or antecedent volition occupies the divine will, as it were, first of itself, and applies it to willing the good of the creature; then, because it is most agreeable to the divine goodness and more nearly attains its εὐεργετικήν, beneficent, nature, as Dionysius discusses at length in chap. IV of The Divine Names, and Chrysostom at chap. II of the Epistle to the Romans. Nevertheless, in another sense the second or consequent will can be called σφοδροτέρα, more vehement, by reason of the absolute decree and final efficacy.” ↩
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I John IV. 8-16. ↩
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I call it efficacious not in the meaning received in the Schools, but in that meaning which alone obtains among Latin writers, by which that is called efficacious which has power for acting and which effects much. In this meaning Pliny mentions an herb most efficacious against poisons; Seneca, a reason efficacious for repressing by shame the depraved desires of men; and Horace, Hercules efficacious. ↩
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For what Augustine affirms in the Tractate on Psalm CXXI is undoubted: “Every love has its own force, nor can love lie idle in the soul of the one who loves.” ↩