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QUESTION 104

OF OBEDIENCE
(In Six Articles)

We must now consider obedience, under which head there are six points
of inquiry:

(1) Whether one man is bound to obey another?

(2) Whether obedience is a special virtue?

(3) Of its comparison with other virtues;

(4) Whether God must be obeyed in all things?

(5) Whether subjects are bound to obey their superiors in all things?

(6) Whether the faithful are bound to obey the secular power?
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FIRST ARTICLE [II-II, Q. 104, Art. 1]

Whether One Man Is Bound to Obey Another?

Objection 1: It seems that one man is not bound to obey another. For
nothing should be done contrary to the divine ordinance. Now God has
so ordered that man is ruled by his own counsel, according to Ecclus.
15:14, "God made man from the beginning, and left him in the hand of
his own counsel." Therefore one man is not bound to obey another.

Obj. 2: Further, if one man were bound to obey another, he would have
to look upon the will of the person commanding him, as being his rule
of conduct. Now God's will alone, which is always right, is a rule of
human conduct. Therefore man is bound to obey none but God.

Obj. 3: Further, the more gratuitous the service the more is it
acceptable. Now what a man does out of duty is not gratuitous.
Therefore if a man were bound in duty to obey others in doing good
deeds, for this very reason his good deeds would be rendered less
acceptable through being done out of obedience. Therefore one man is
not bound to obey another.

_On the contrary,_ It is prescribed (Heb. 13:17): "Obey your prelates
and be subject to them."

_I answer that,_ Just as the actions of natural things proceed from
natural powers, so do human actions proceed from the human will. In
natural things it behooved the higher to move the lower to their
actions by the excellence of the natural power bestowed on them by
God: and so in human affairs also the higher must move the lower by
their will in virtue of a divinely established authority. Now to move
by reason and will is to command. Wherefore just as in virtue of the
divinely established natural order the lower natural things need to
be subject to the movement of the higher, so too in human affairs, in
virtue of the order of natural and divine law, inferiors are bound to
obey their superiors.

Reply Obj. 1: God left man in the hand of his own counsel, not as
though it were lawful to him