Can Virtuous Pagans be Saved? (Part 1)

A Preliminary Stab - in Medieval Style

Hey friends, for my first essay of the semester, I have decided to take on a question that has plagued me for at least a decade - “can non-Christians be saved?” Or to phrase the question in the way it was posed to us by Professor George Corbett: “Should virtuous pagans be sentenced to eternal condemnation?”

Casual, I know. This is a question that I have the intimidating privilege of finally being forced to focus my heart and mind upon in this first part of my module on Reason and Revelation in A Quest for God: The Religious World of Dante.

To set some context for my non-specialist readers, Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) was an Italian philosopher-poet from Florence who wrote what is considered to be one of the greatest works of literature ever to have come from human hands - The Divine Comedy. Or as Dante simply called it, the Commedia. Comedy, not to be confused with stand-up hilarity, but rather the optimistic counterpart of dramatic Tragedy, where a story is played out to an uplifting and positive ending - a ‘happily ever after,’ so to speak.

Photo by Tbel Abuseridze on Unsplash

However, despite its nature as an inspiring Comedy, Dante is better known for his harshness and aggression towards sinners in hell in the first third of his epic poem - the Inferno. This stereotype is interesting to us as we approach the question of whether virtuous pagans can be saved, because - if the scholars are right - Dante is highly original, even unorthodox, in his conception of the eternal destiny of virtuous pagans in Inferno 4.¹ Rather than placing them in the dark and fiery pit of Hell or the bright and dynamic heights of Heaven, Dante consigns them, in his theological imagination, to Limbo - a place of neither sadness nor happiness, “desire without hope.”

For those of us inclined to advocating for the salvation of virtuous pagans, this is somewhat hopeful - yet almost misleadingly so. Despite the fact that these virtuous pagans are not punished with physical suffering like the rest of those in Dante’s Hell, they are still consigned - after all - to Hell. Limbo is still in Hell.

With enough said for now, here was my thirty-minute stab from this afternoon (with some edits) at arguing for the stance that virtuous pagans should not be condemned eternally - in medieval disputatio-style.

Question: Should Virtuous Pagans be Condemned Eternally?

It would seem like virtuous pagans should be condemned eternally.

Objection 1: Virtue is largely pre-determined socio-biologically. Nature and nurture, both of which is largely out of one’s control, contributes directly to a person’s level of virtue. which renders it void of merit, and in turn renders the lack of virtue void of punitive dis-merit.

Objection 2: Virtuous pagans are not acting to please the true God, but are rather acting for the good of either false god, other people, or themselves - all of whom are not the right and just end of virtue, the sole prerogative belonging to God Himself. Furthermore, acting for the good of anyone other than the Christian God can and should be considered idolatry, which is gravely sinful in the fundamental sense of the term - ‘missing the mark.’

Objection 3: Ultimately, Jesus Himself maintained that the way of salvation lies exclusively within the domain of his name. Jesus said “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me.” (Jn 14: 6-7) Earlier in the fourth Gospel, the author makes this exclusion very explicit: “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” (Jn 3:18, italics mine) However, Jesus’ exclusivity reaches its height in Jn 6:53: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” (italics mine)

On the contrary, Jesus maintains that “an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgement.” (Jn 5:29, italics mine; cf. St Paul in Rom 2:6-16)

I say, virtuous pagans should not be condemned eternally because God is more just in rendering salvation according to the works of mankind, not according to their rational assent to religious propositions, which are only explicitly made known to a privileged minority in certain times and certain places.

Reply to Objection 1: Virtue is real and meritorious because free will is real and meritorious. Of course there are contributions from temperament and other congenital sources, but human beings will only be called to account for what we have done with what we are given (see Jesus’ parable of the talents in Matt 25:14-30 / Luke 19:11-27), not for what we have not been given.

Reply to Objection 2: As St Thomas Aquinas maintained, gratia non tollit naturam, sed perficit (“grace does not destroy nature, but perfects it”)² Accordingly, God will consider the virtuous deeds of pagans to be have been done in continuity with divine revelation, albeit unapprehended in its fullness, especially if done according to the dictates of Conscience (see below).

Reply to Objection 3: If St John Henry Newman is right in considering the universal human conscience as the “aboriginal vicar of Christ in the soul,”³ then ‘faith in Christ’ can be considered as the action or inaction of an individual upon the promptings of conscience - which is compatible with the salvation of virtuous pagans. “Conscience”, as Bishop Robert Barron says, “is not the voice of the individual himself, but rather the Voice of Another, who exercises sovereign authority, who makes demands and furnishes both reward and punishment.”⁴

What do you think? Of course, this was only a quick sketch of a position I am not sure I will even hold next week - especially because the most concerning element of this position is that it seems to render the atoning person and work of Christ irrelevant - but of which I am so inclined due to reasons both public and personal, which I will discuss in my next blog post: Part 2 - why does this even matter? Thank you for reading my friend, and stay tuned.

1. Marenbon, Dante and Boccacio, 189-191.

2. Aquinas, ST 1.1.8 ad 2.

3. Newman, The Grammar of Assent.

4. Robert Barron, ‘St. John Henry Newman,’ St. John Henry Newman - Word on Fire. Accessed 31 January 2025.