The notion of indifference of the will in the work of Francisco Suárez, SJ.

Abstract

This article deals with the philosophical and theological problem of freedom from the perspective of scholasticism during the period that covers the second half of the 16th century and the first half of the 17th century. In the context of the Lutheran reform and the De Auxiliis dispute, the Jesuit Francisco Suárez tried to solve the problem of the affirmation of the freedom of human will in the face of divine predestination and grace, laying the foundations for a metaphysics in which the Human choice is based on the indifference of the will, as an essential quality of all rational beings. In this work, the philosophical and theological work of Suárez is studied in order to understand how this author sustains freedom in the indifference of the will as a principle inherent to human nature; This concept allows us to distinguish the author's position regarding the determinism of reformists such as Martin Luther and John Calvin, and the theology of the Thomistic Dominicans in which grace exerts an effective influence despite the wishes of man's will. The author's philosophical and theological thought conceives of man as a being who can freely respond to the call that God makes to him to live with holiness in this world and achieve eternal life in the other; but it is a call that the creature can reject, since it is not determined by God to respond to such a vocation for being a free entity.