Pelagius
c. 354 - c. 418 · Latin Fathers · Prominent
Pelagius was a British-born ascetic teacher active in Rome from the 380s. He argued that God would be neither just nor good if he had commanded what we cannot do, so human nature as God made it is sound and the will is free to obey. Our difficulty in doing right comes from long habit at work rather than from a ruined nature. He won acquittal at Diospolis in 415 and condemnation at Carthage in 418, and he reaches us through his opponents.
Signature
The position Pelagius is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Society
- leans Individualism
- Agency
- Libertarian Free Will
Positions on the 4 axes the sources answer
- Society
- leans Individualism (75 on a 0–100 scale from Collectivism to Individualism)
- The Divine
- strongly leans Describable (6 on a 0–100 scale from Describable to Indescribable)
- Meaning
- strongly leans Inherent (94 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Ground of Being
- strongly leans Transcendence (92 on a 0–100 scale from Immanence to Transcendence)
16 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Pelagius refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Trinitarian Monotheism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Good and Evil
- Moral Realism
What is the fundamental nature of good and evil? - Ethics Basis
- Natural Law
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Libertarian Free Will
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Time
- Eschatological
What is the fundamental shape of time? - Death
- Judgement
What happens at death? - Human Nature
- Innate Good
What is human nature?