ecide each matter. It can distinguish by itself between what to avoid and what to desire. But man pursues what he judges to be desirable and avoids what he thinks undesirable (Boethius 149).
Man could not make choice if there were no freedom, and choice is necessary. God does not determine existence but has given man freedom so that man can choose the good. Human beings do not see as clearly as heavenly souls, for the latter would make no wrong choices and so are not free in any real sense:
Human souls are of necessity more free when they continue in the contemplation of the mind of God and less free when they descend to bodies, and less still when they are imprisoned in earthly flesh and blood (Boethius 149).
This is a form of the mind-body problem, and for Boethius, freedom is to be found in a separation from the earthly flesh, with the appetites of the body determining our behavior while the rational part of the mind is free.. Freedom is a matter of choice and more specifically of the ability to choose. Those who cannot choose are not free. Human beings can choose, and their choice is free to the extent that it can be made without the force of fleshly appetites to determine the outcome.
Boethius sets forth the essential paradox in Christian thought between freedom and determinism, with determinism inherent in what he calls "God's universal foreknowledge," meaning the fact that God already knows all that is to happen. Since He knows what is to happen, how can there be freedom, the outcome having already been determined in the mind of God? Boethius says that what is in the mind of God and the freedom of the will that God says man has seem contrary and opposite:
If God foresees all things and cannot be mistaken in any way, what Providence has foreseen as a future event must happen. So that if from eternity Providence foreknows not only men's actions but also their thoughts and desires, there will be no freedom ...