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“ God’s Providence” by Franciscus Junius translated by Ryan M. Hurd
The following is a translation of Franciscus Junius’s De Providentia Dei, “God’s Providence,” a short disputation held while he was professor. Abstaining from further introduction about Junius himself, I will add a word regarding the translation below. I have made no effort to establish a critical text and have simply translated from the Kuyper volume. A few notes occur for explanation. 1
with style: people who set their heart on proving to themselves with drawn-out arguments “that some providence is,” actually deserve whips, not words; a reply from an executioner, not a philosopher (nor, I add, a theologian). And what is more: if “that fire is hot,” something we perceive with touch; or “that noonday is light to our sense perception,” something we perceive with sight, do not require demonstration, then much less will divine providence require it. For nothing more is or must be persuasive [to give assent], for Christian men drawing from God’s word (Eccl. 5:5; Wisdom 8; Isa. 10:15; Matt. 6:30–32; 10:19; Luke 12:11–12) as well as for pagans (even for creatures without speech), gathering from the natural light of reason (Rom. 1:10; Job 12:7, etc.; Ps. 19:1) and especially from the arrangement, order, and conservation of all things. Hence, skipping over the question “whether providence is” (an sit), we proceed to the question “what it is” (quid sit)—but not without first noting “what the word ‘providence’ signifies.” The term is usually taken sometimes in a broad way, and other times more precisely. Taken more broadly, it includes the eternal decree of creation, governance, and ordination and then the execution of such; taken more precisely, it pertains to the economy of created things only. 2. At the moment, we take the word “providence” in this second sense. And we define providence thus: this is the act of the supreme, universal principle (i.e., God), whereby all individual creatures are governed best and led on through unto their order and end (even though they are entirely disordered), for the glory of God. Here, all kinds of causes come into view that we can assign in this analysis. We cannot provide an efficient cause for providence, except maybe within the subject himself (i.e., God), if we settle on his absolutely free will as an efficient cause. The formal cause is the THESIS 1. ARISTOTLE SAID IT
Franciscus Junius the Elder (1545–1602)
