Does God Intend Death?

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Christopher Tollefsen

Abstract

In this paper, I argue that God never intends a human being’s death. The core argument is essentially Thomistic. God wills only the good; and human life is always a good, and its privation always an evil. Thus, St. Thomas holds that “God does not will death as per se intended,” and he gives an account of the act of divine punishment that conforms to this claim. However, some further claims of St. Thomas are in tension with this position – particularly his claims as regards the permissibility of intentional killing by agents of the state. I argue that alternative conclusions on these matters are in fact more harmonious with St. Thomas’s claims about God and God’s willing than are his own.

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How to Cite
Tollefsen, Christopher. 2013. “Does God Intend Death?”. Diametros, no. 38 (December):193-202. https://doi.org/10.13153/diam.38.2013.545.
Section
Special topic – THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY OF THOMAS AQUINAS AND CONTEMPORARY PRACTICAL ETHICS
Author Biography

Christopher Tollefsen, University of South Carolina

Christopher Tollefsen Professor of Philosophy Department of Philosophy University of South Carolina Columbia, SC 29208 USA e-mail: Christopher.Tollefsen@gmail.com Christopher Tollefsen is Professor of Philosophy at the University of South Carolina. He is the author, with Robert P. George, of Embryo: A Defense of Human Life. His book Lying and Christian Ethics is forthcoming in March 2014 with Cambridge University Press.
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References

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