SUPERNATURAL GIFTS AND ORIGINAL JUSTICE
### I. Concepts
All Catholic theologians admit that the state of original justice, i.e., the state of innocence of Adam before sin, entailed, along with human nature, a set of supernatural gifts and preternatural endowments (v.). The former are called supernatural because they are essentially superior to every created or possible nature, whether human or angelic, since they are a participation in the divine nature, that is, in the intimate life of God; they elevate us above natural conditions to enable us to attain the supernatural end, which consists in the immediate vision of God.
These supernatural gifts are sanctifying grace (received in the essence of the soul as a divine graft, the germ of eternal life), the infused virtues (theological and moral) that derive from grace to our faculties, and the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, which render us docile to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit so as to perfect the action of the infused virtues, especially in difficult circumstances where these alone would not suffice.
### II. The Apologetic Problem
At first glance, Catholic teaching on the elevation of the first man above the conditions of his nature seems to contradict what prehistory reveals about the more than rudimentary civilization of primitive man. However, the most recent studies in the new ethnology, particularly those of G. Schmidt (*La révolution primitive*, Paris 1914, pp. 150-60), Mons. Le Roy (*La religion des primitifs*, ibid. 1909), and Th. Mainage (*Les religions de la préhistoire*, ibid. 1921, 1923, 1939, 1940), demonstrate that while the earliest known men were at a low level in terms of material civilization, they were not so in terms of spiritual civilization. These recent studies have indeed shown that the advancement of material civilization has increasingly oriented man toward earthly things and has been accompanied by moral and religious regression. Prehistory shows that this regression began with the earliest stages of human history and has continued to intensify.
This confirms the dogmas of the state of innocence and original sin, which are more or less altered in the traditions of various peoples regarding a golden age at the origin of humanity. What the earliest historical indications reveal is that, amidst peoples who became idolatrous, only the monotheism of the Hebrews and Christianity were able to stem this decline and restore to men the correct idea of a creator and rewarding God (cf. M. J. Lagrange, *Études sur les religions sémitiques*, Paris 1905, pp. 20-39). As A. Michel demonstrates (*Justice originelle*, in DThC, VIII, cols. 2024), the present conclusions of prehistory and ethnology do not at all preclude the belief that the first man was capable of receiving from God a supernatural revelation of a religious nature, nor that he was a primitive genius endowed with great moral rectitude. These superior gifts could coexist with a rudimentary material civilization, prior to the technical progress of the arts, sciences, and law.
St. Thomas (cf. *Sum. Theol.*, 1a, q. 79, a. 9) often distinguishes between the higher reason and the lower reason, which concerns temporal things. In the first man, the higher reason could have been highly illuminated by divine Revelation, while the lower reason remained that of a primitive.
### III. The Doctrine of the Church and Theology
Following Scripture and Tradition, the Church, through the Council of Trent (Denz-U, 788, 789), explicitly teaches that, having “disobeyed God in the earthly paradise, the first man fell from the state of grace and holiness in which he had been created... and thus lost for us as for himself the justice and holiness he had received.” The same Council further explains (loc. cit., 800) that this justice and holiness consist essentially in the infusion of sanctifying grace and the gifts that accompany II. This is given to us by Jesus Christ in place of that which Adam lost for himself and for us through his disobedience.
This doctrine is founded upon the great truth that Jesus is the new Adam who repairs what the first had lost (Rom. 5:9-21; II Cor. 5:15-21; Eph. 1:4-12; 4:22-24; Col. 1:12-22; 3:9-10). Since this state of interior justice and holiness consists essentially in sanctifying grace, it follows that it was given to the first man prior to sin. The supernatural gifts that accompany grace and derive from it, according to Scripture and Tradition, are the infused virtues (theological and moral) and the gifts of the Holy Spirit; hence sanctifying grace is also called the grace of the virtues and gifts (cf. *Sum. Theol.*, 3°, q. 62, a. 2). Together, they form in the just a spiritual organism. According to theologians, grace, “a participation in the divine nature” or “a second nature,” is instead in the essence of the soul as a divine graft, from which the theological virtues, specified by the supernatural end, derive in the faculties; the infused moral virtues, which concern the means; and the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, which render us docile to the special inspirations of the Holy Spirit to supply, especially in difficult circumstances, for the imperfection of the virtues (cf. *Sum. Theol.*, 1-2a, q. 62; q. 63, a. 4; q. 65; q. 67; q. 68; q. 110; q. 111; q. 112).
The grace of the virtues and gifts is essentially supernatural, as a participation in the divine nature or the intimate life of God; it is the germ of eternal life (*semen gloriae*) or of the beatific vision, by which we shall see God face to face immediately, without the mediation of any creature, as He sees Himself.
This essentially supernatural life of grace far surpasses, for example, the miracle of the Resurrection, which restores in a supernatural way the natural (vegetative and sensitive) life of the body. Therefore, the first man certainly possessed sanctifying grace, infused faith, by which he certainly believed in God as the ultimate and supreme rewarder (Hebr. 11:6), supernatural hope, infused charity, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit: the gifts of wisdom, understanding, knowledge, counsel, fortitude, piety, and filial fear of God (v. DONI DELLO SPIRITO SANTO).
Theologians have debated whether Adam received sanctifying grace at the very moment of his creation or at a later time. Contrary to Hugh of St. Victor and Peter Lombard, St. Thomas (*Sum. Theol.*, 1°, q. 95, a. 1), along with his school, holds that Adam received sanctifying grace at the instant he was created. This doctrine has become common because it is more in accord with Scripture as interpreted by tradition: Gen. 1:26, “Let us make man in our image”; Eccl. 7:28-30, “God made man upright”; Eph. 4:24, “Put on the new man, created according to God in true justice and holiness.”
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(from O. Bie, *Die Oper*, Berlin 1923, p. 136)
**DONIZETTI, GAETANO** – Portrait with autograph signature.
Lithograph by J. Kriehuber (1800–76).
Another equally controversial question was whether grace belonged intrinsically to the state of original justice to be transmitted with nature, or whether it was distinct from it, as it were a personal gift granted to Adam. In the Middle Ages, Hugh of Saint-Victor and Peter Lombard, who admitted that Adam had received original justice before sanctifying grace, considered them distinct things. Saint Thomas at first conceded some probability to this opinion, but later, especially in the Summa Theologica (1°, q. 95, a. 1; q. 100, a. 1, ad 2), held that sanctifying grace belongs intrinsically to original justice, as its root. In the De malo, q. 5, a. 2, ad 1, he states: «originali iustitia includit gratiam gratum facientem». According to the Angelic Doctor, the rectitude of the will toward God, the ultimate end, comes from habitual grace and charity from the moment of creation; grace is not merely a personal gift granted to Adam, but was granted to human nature as such, to be transmitted with it, just as humanity itself is transmitted, although the soul is created directly by God when the embryo is capable of receiving it (Sum. Theol., 1°, q. 100, a. 1). Moreover, according to Saint Thomas, original sin (the privation of original justice) is wiped out by Baptism, which restores sanctifying grace but not the gift of integrity. Thus sanctifying grace is the primary and principal element of original justice and holiness that Adam lost for himself and for us, according to the expression of the Council of Trent. The Thomist school generally admitted this doctrine.