Luck
LUCK
Luck, according to Aristotle, who made the first satisfactory analysis of it, is an accidental cause intervening in things that happen for the sake of an end and according to purpose (see Phys. 195b 31–198a 13). It is a species of chance, differing from other fortuitous causes in that it happens only to created agents having the use of intelligence. Luck may be good or bad. Many things commonly attributed to it, such as winning at so-called games of chance, are not, since they are intended, due to luck in Aristotle's sense, for in his view lucky events are neither intended nor foreseen: they happen to agents seeking other ends. Whatever their immediate accidental causes may be, lucky and unlucky events ultimately result from the indetermination and limitation of natural causes, and from the incompleteness of human knowledge. St. Thomas Aquinas adopted and developed Aristotle's teaching on luck, showing its compatibility with Catholic doctrine concerning providence by explaining God's foreknowledge and control of fortuitous events (see esp. In two phys. 7–10; Summa theologiae 1a, 115.6; 116.1).
Bibliography: c. de koninck, "Chance and Fortune," Laval theologique et philosophique 1.1 (1945) 186–191). m. j. junkersfeld, The Aristotelian-Thomistic Concept of Chance (Notre Dame, Ind. 1945).
[h. j. freeman]