Journal for the History of Philosophy

Running head: PHILOSOPHY
Philosophy
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1PHILOSOPHY
Free choice is one of the most critical things that Anselm had described in his writings
regarding the human beings. He clarified that human beings had their free choice of committing
the sins both before and after their Fall. This is the very basic argument that stems from the
religious underpinnings of the Bible. The Fall of Adam and Eve has been written down in the
Bible and it constructs a huge section of the Biblical texts. Here Anselm goes on to argue the fact
that human beings had their choice to commit their sins (Williams, 2014). They could even
restrain themselves from committing these sins also. The philosophical arguments of Anselm
will be properly analyzed in this section of the paper. This is one of the most prolific ontological
arguments that have been presented for the understanding of the religious people. The
interpretation of these arguments has been in various ways also.
Saint Anselm is regarded as one of the most important and powerful Christian thinkers in
the 11th century. The ontological argument is one of the most philosophical discoveries that have
been done by Saint Anselm during his life (Barnwell, 2018). The works of Anselm has stretched
a lot from his philosophical arguments. Rather, he has presented many theological matters
through his discussion and discovered many things that were untouched by the previous key
thinkers ahead of him (Williams, 2014). He discussed about the proper understanding of the
divine nature and the will of God.
According to him, free choice was one of those things that were attributed to all the
human beings by God. In the writings of Anselm, the origins of the vices and virtues had been
recorded. Most of his arguments clearly surrounded on the Sacred Scriptures and the Biblical
writings (Rogers, 2016). The writings of Anselm show the importance of will and free choice
that all the human beings had. The implications of the original sin committed by Adam and Eve

2PHILOSOPHY
are also compiled in his documents (Rogers, 2014). Thus he became a magician philosopher in
bringing out all the inherent arguments of the man and his free choice.
The scholasticism of the Christian Scripture will always be indebted to Anselm because
of his writings and highlighting the main arguments in this section (Goebel, 2019). His approach
to all the philosophical and theological matters was very unique from all the perspectives.
According to Anselm, there is a dilemma i.e. always within the minds of the human beings. The
first one is related to the fact that “We can only sin” and the second one is “We can sin or not
sin”. The second argument presents the fact that human beings always have that freedom of
choice of committing the sin or avoid it in some ways (Rogers, 2016).
On the other hand, this view or doctrine will pose the significant challenge in front of the
grace of God. In his arguments, Anselm has shown through premises that God is free but He is
full of such positive elements that he will not sin (Williams, 2016). He is regarded as the epitome
of truth and positivity. On the other hand, human beings always had that opportunity or choice of
doing the sins. It was completely upon his will whether he will commit the sin or simply walk
past it. Adam committed the sin because it was his choice and he suffered the aftermath of
committing the sin since he was sent to earth (Rogers, 2016). Later on, God sent His son Jesus
Christ to the world and Jesus had to sacrifice his own life so he could salvage the sins of all
human beings.
Anselm believed that it was the ability of the human beings that he could be seduced to
do some sinful activities. God is noted as the entity that denotes the supreme good. Therefore, he
does not have the free will to anything evil since he cannot do anything evil (Williams, 2016).
Anselm goes on to say that the ability of human beings to be seduced to commit sinful activities