Free will and predestination constitute a polarity in many of the religions of the world: is salvation determined by a divine choice or is it a matter of personal self-determination? Free will in this article does not refer to the general philosophical problem of the will's freedom but to the specific meaning and function of willing and self-determination in the process of salvation. Some religious thinkers have sharply distinguished between the will's freedom in the material and civil affairs of life and its freedom or unfreedom with regard to the spiritual life, and it is with the latter that this article is concerned.

At least two ways of thinking about the freedom of the will in spiritual matters have been common: free will as a freedom of choice, whereby one does freely what one has also had the power to choose to do, and free will...