Keeping faith : a study of Grotius' doctrine of natural law

Abstract

In the philosophical tradition, natural law has served as one designation of the borderline between human and divine. This tradition is associated with a complex of ideas which has been traced back as far as Heraclitus’ fragment according to which "all human laws are nourished by one which is divine" . In line with this, Aristotle’s definition of the right by nature as a kineton suggested that the right by nature is something ultimately moved by the prime unmoved Mover, the akineton. Something of the Heraclitan fragment is echoed in Augustine’s affirmation that "men derive all that is just and lawful in temporal law from eternal law" . Against the background of parts of various Greek, Stoic, Roman and Christian traditions the language of eternal, divine and human laws along with that of natural law and justice developed. It found a powerful synthesis in Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologiae in which natural law is conceived of as a participation of the eternal law, and as the source of human law. Of course, many things happened to the meaning of the concepts used, which I cannot here go into. Here I merely wish to point to the core of a tradition in which natural law stood as a philosophical symbol of the relation between God and man. [From the introduction]