SOURCE: Cross, Richard. “Duns Scotus on Goodness, Justice, and What God Can Do.” Journal of Theological Studies. n.s. 48, no. 1 (April 1997): 48-76.

In the following essay, Cross analyzes and rejects Scotus's assertion “that God has libertarian freedom with regard to all his actions,” contending that such a claim creates an ethical contradiction between God's contingent action and the premise that God always acts in accordance with right reason.

The claim that God is omnipotent is not exactly the same as the claim that God can bring about any (broadly) logically possible state of affairs: i.e., any state of affairs all of the descriptions of which are logically possible. For example, God cannot bring about any logically necessary state of affairs.¹ He cannot bring about any contingent state of affairs the description of which entails that God does not bring that state of affairs about. (For example, I...