Monday, June 18, 2012  Scotus the Voluntarist  As is well known,
Scotus is an evil voluntarist who separated morality from God by
making the divine will the foundation of morality. Since all
moral truths are contingent, there is no way for us humans to
know them short of divine revelation.   In Ord. IV d. 46 q. 1, a
slightly different picture emerges.  Here Scotus distinguishes,
following Anselm and Aristotle (oh, wait: everything he did was
to further Augustinianism. Anselm and Aristotle must just be wax
noses here), two senses of justice: legal justice and particular
justice.  Legal justice pertains to rules laid down by a
lawgiver, while particular justice, as far as I can gather,
pertains to relations between individuals (I beg the readers'
indulgence if I have bundled this; I generally find ethics
boring and don't claim to have mastered the terminology).  In
this context, Scotus discusses whether justice is in God.
(Wad.-Viv. XX, 400-401):  Prima istarum, scilicet legalis,
posset poni in Deo, si esset a