ARTICLE VI

In the Sixth Article We Ask: COULD CHRIST MERIT?

Difficulties:

It seems that He could not, for

1. All merit proceeds from free choice, which is undetermined with regard to many things. But in Christ free choice is determined to good. He therefore could not merit.

2. The relation of the one meriting to the reward is the same as that of a recipient to the thing received, because a person merits in order to receive what he merits. But "the recipient must be devoid of the thing received," as is made clear in The Soul. Then one who merits must be without reward. But that cannot be said of Christ, since He was a true possessor. It therefore seems that Christ could not merit.

3. Whatever is due to someone does not have to be merited. But because Christ was a possessor, impassibility of mind and body was due Him. He therefore did not merit these.

4. Merit does not have to do with events that occur necessarily as if by a natural sequence, because merit concerns that which is voluntarily given by another in return for something as its recompense. But the glory of the body comes from the glory of the soul by a certain natural sequence, as is seen from Augustine. Since Christ was blessed in His soul, enjoying as He did the possession of the divinity, it seems that He could not merit the glory of the body.

5. The saints who are now in glory have glory of soul and not of body, just as Christ had before His passion. But the saints do not now merit the glory of the body. Then neither did Christ.

6. The same thing cannot be the principle and the term of merit, and so the same thing cannot be the reward and the principle of meriting. But the charity which was found in Christ was a part of His reward, because it belonged to the perfection of His beatitude, since by its means He had enjoyment. It could therefore not be the principle of meriting. But all merit is from charity. Consequently there could not have been any merit in Christ.

7. Do away with what goes before, and you do away with what comes after. But before all else merit refers to the blessedness of the soul, which Christ did not merit, because He had it from the instant of His conception. Then neither could He have merited anything else.

To the Contrary:

1'. On the words of the Psalm (15:1): "Preserve me, O Lord," the Gloss comments: "Behold the reward"; and on the words "for I have put my trust in thee" the comment is: "behold the merit." Christ therefore merited.

2'. Whoever is given any recompense in proportion to his deed, merits. But because of the humility of His passion Christ was given the recompense of exaltation, as is shown in the Epistle to the Philippians (2:9): "For which cause, God also hath exalted him. . . ." Therefore Christ merited.

3'. Merit is the act of a wayfarer just as enjoyment is that of a possessor. But as a possessor Christ had enjoyment. Then He also merited as a wayfarer.

REPLY:

Christ merited before His passion when He was both a wayfarer and a possessor. This is shown as follows. There are two requisites for merit: the state of one who merits and the ability to merit. For the state of one who merits, the lack of that which is said to be merited is required, though some say that a person can merit what he already has. Thus they say of the angels that they merited their blessedness, which they received simultaneously with grace, by the subsequent actions performed with regard to us.

But this does not seem to be true for two reasons: (1) Because it is contrary to Augustine's argument by which he proves against the Pelagians that grace cannot fall under merit because before grace there are no deserts except evil, since before receiving grace man is a sinner and not grace but punishment is what sinners deserve. For [if the opinion in question is admitted] it could be said that one merits grace by the deeds which he does after receiving grace. (2) Because it is against the nature of merit; for merit is the cause of reward, not as a final cause (for in this sense the reward is rather the cause of the merit), but rather by reduction to efficient causality, inasmuch as merit makes a man worthy of a reward and in this way disposes him for it. Now anything that is a cause in the line of efficiency can by no means be posterior in time to that of which it is the cause. It is impossible, then, for a person to merit what he already has. If in human affairs someone serves his master in return for a favor received, this is more of the nature of thanksgiving than of merit.

The ability to merit is required both on the part of nature and on that of grace. It is required on the part of nature because no one can merit by his own act unless he has dominion over his act. If he has that dominion he can, as it were, give his act as a price for the reward. Now a man has dominion over his own acts through the power of free choice. The natural ability of free choice is therefore required for meriting. On the part of grace it is required because the reward of blessedness exceeds the capabilities of human nature, and so man is not able to merit it by his unaided natural powers. Grace by which he is enabled to merit is accordingly required.

Now all these conditions for merit were fulfilled in Christ. He was lacking in some of the factors required for perfect blessedness: impassibility of soul and glory of body. By reason of this lack He was a wayfarer. There was in Him, moreover, the ability of nature by reason of His created will, and the ability of grace because of the fullness of grace. He was therefore able to merit.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. Although in the line of moral conduct the soul of Christ was determined to one course of action, that is, good, it nevertheless was not determined to one in an unqualified sense; for it could perform this or that particular act or not perform it. He therefore retained the freedom which is required for meriting.

2. He did not merit blessedness of soul, by reason of which He was a possessor, but only the blessedness of body and impassibility of soul. These were lacking to Him.

3. Christ did not merit anything not due Him in such a way that it became due, as men merit in their first meritorious act. Nor again did He merit in such a way that what was due Him should become more due, as occurs in those whose grace increases. But He merited in such a way that what was due Him in one way--by reason of grace--should become due Him in another way--by reason of merit.

4. The glory of the body results from the glory of the soul when the soul is glorified in every respect, both in its relation to God and in its relation to the body. It was not in this way that the soul of Christ was glorified, but only in its relation to God. Inasmuch as it was the form of the body, it was passible.

5. The souls of the saints in their heavenly home are entirely out of the state of wayfarers because they are already blessed both by enjoyment and by impassibility. The soul of Christ was not. There is therefore no parallel.

6. As far as charity itself is concerned, it is always a source of merit; but sometimes it is not in fact a source of merit because of the one who has it, since he is out of the state of meriting. This is seen in the saints in heaven. Christ, however, was not out of the state of meriting, because He was a wayfarer. By the same charity, accordingly, He both enjoyed and merited, as also by the same will. Yet the same thing was not both the source of merit and the reward, because He did not merit glory of soul, to which charity is relevant, but glory of body, as has been said.

7. That argument would prove something if it resulted from any defect on Christ's part that He could not merit glory of soul. From what has already been said it is clear that that is false.