The Incipient Probabilism of Francisco de Vitoria

Many Appeal To Francisco de Vitoria (ca. 1483–1546) for their grand narratives of moral and political modernity. The place he occupies in the doctrine of natural rights and international law are well-documented.¹ Within these genealogies, Vitoria is often used to bridge the medieval tradition and the modern world. Some interpret him as a conservative reader of St. Thomas, while others interpret him as a progressive thinker. In a recent article, Luis Valenzuela-Vermehren acknowledges how the past century of scholarship has failed to adequately comprehend the Thomistic cast of Vitoria's thought, leading in turn to intractable disputes regarding his place in the tradition.² To remedy the current state of affairs, Valenzuela-Vermehren argues that one must distinguish the basic tenets of the relevant Thomistic teaching in order to understand Vitoria in context. In his article, Valenzuela-Vermehren recapitulates a standard interpretation of Thomistic natural law theory to contend against what he holds are unfounded claims regarding Vitoria's place in the development of international law. Interestingly though, after Valenzuela-Vermehren exposits the Thomistic doctrine, he simply claims it for Vitoria, and then critiques contemporary construals.³ He does not engage directly or adequately with Vitoria as an independent thinker (even suppositionally), nor does he make an adequate textual study of Vitoria's reception of St. Thomas.

While it is certainly helpful to know the relevant Thomistic teaching in which Vitoria was steeped, this method appears to presume an essentially conservative approach on the part of Vitoria. Furthermore, it effectually precludes the identification of what may be a subtle reappropriation of Thomistic terms and concepts at work in Vitoria's theology. In the following, I will argue for a sense in which Vitoria is progressive in his appropriation of St. Thomas. But, rather than attempt to show this in a thorough-going or exhaustive manner, I will simply supply one interpretative building block in what is a much larger project. I will show that Vitoria contributed to the genesis of probabilism, a moral theory foreign to the thought of St. Thomas. Based on this particular proof, I hope to problematize the overly facile use of Vitoria as an interpreter of St. Thomas in the fashioning of grand narratives in contemporary discourse. By grasping one sense in which Vitoria is original, we can better appreciate the novelty of his thought more broadly and so approach contemporary debates with the requisite care.

In recent literature, historians and theologians typically cite Bartolomeo de Medina, O.P. (1522–1580), as the originator of probabilism, or at least as the theologian who gave it a standard formulation.⁴ In what follows, I concede the importance of Medina. I simply intend to shine the spotlight one generation earlier, in order to shed some light on the role played by his professor who occupied a position of considerable influence both within the School of Salamanca⁵ and in the deliberations of Spain's international crisis of conscience.⁶

In what follows, I will first give a summary explanation of probabilism. Then, I will highlight certain features of Vitoria's formation which laid the groundwork for probabilism in his thought. Finally, I will examine certain texts which illustrate Vitoria's departure from St. Thomas, and thus the originality of his approach to the Thomistic tradition.

Probabilism

Probabilism describes two things. First, it names a genus of moral systems which resolve cases of conscience; this genus includes laxism, probabilism, aequiprobabilism, probabiliorism, and rigorism. Used in a narrower sense, probabilism is a species within the aforementioned genus that names "the moral system which holds that, when there is question solely of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of an action, it is permissible to follow a solidly probable opinion in favor of liberty even though the opposing view is more probable."⁷ The following observations treat of probabilism in the generic sense except when noted otherwise.

Probabilistic reasoning begins with uncertainty. For St. Thomas,⁸ intellectual uncertainty comes in three main forms: doubt, suspicion, and opinion. A doubting mind is suspended between two opposing positions, not inclining toward...