Pars 4, Cap. 8
by St. Bonaventure
Source text: Public Domain Mark 1.0. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://bonaventure.wrootpress.com/browse/5/d/4/q/bon-brev-p4-c8
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### Chapter VIII. *On the passion of Christ as regards the state of the sufferer.*

After the union of the natures has been considered concerning the incarnate Word, and the fullness of the charisms considered no less, next there is to be considered the *endurance of the sufferings*; and concerning this there is to be considered the *state of the sufferer*, the *mode of suffering* and the *outcome of the passion*.

Concerning the *state of the sufferer* these things are to be held, namely that Christ assumed not only human nature, but also the *defects* about the nature. For he assumed *bodily* penalties, such as hunger, thirst and weariness; he assumed also *spiritual* ones, such as sadness, groaning and fear; nor yet did he assume *all bodily* ones, such as are the defects of manifold sicknesses. nor *all spiritual* ones, such as are ignorance and the rebellions of the flesh against the spirit; nor *in any manner whatsoever*, since he took upon himself the necessity of suffering in such a way that he could suffer nothing *unwillingly*, neither according to the will of the *Deity* nor according to the will of *reason*, although the passion was against the will of the *sensuality and of the flesh*, as the prayer of the Saviour expresses, which says: *Not as I will, but as thou wilt*.

Now the reason for the understanding of the foresaid is this: since, seeing that the reparative principle in reconciling necessarily has the office of a mediator, it is therefore necessary that it have a fittingness with both of the extremes not only as regards *nature*, but also as regards *those things which are about nature*. Since therefore God is just and blessed, impassible and immortal, while man, fallen, is a sinner and wretched, passible and mortal, it was necessary that there be a mediator *of God and of men*, so that he might be able to lead man back to God, having in common with God justice and beatitude, but with man passibility and mortality; so that thus, having « a passing mortality and an abiding beatitude », he might lead man back from the present misery to the blessed life; just as, on the contrary, the evil angel, having immortality together with misery and injustice, was a mediator making him fall into fault and misery through his own suggestion. Since therefore Christ the mediator had to have innocence and the beatitude of fruition together with mortality and passibility, hence it is that he had to be at once *wayfarer* and *comprehensor*. — For of every state he had something in himself, according to which he is said to have assumed from the state of *innocence* immunity from sin, from the state of *fallen nature* mortality, but from the state of *glory* the beatitude of perfect fruition.

Again, since vicious penalties, such as are those four inflicted on account of original sin, namely ignorance, infirmity, malice and concupiscence, cannot stand together with a most perfect innocence, hence it is that these he neither had to assume nor did assume. — But since those penalties which are *exercitative* of perfect virtue and *testificative* of a true, not simulated, humanity are chiefly those which regard nature in common, such as hunger and thirst in the absence of nourishment, sadness and fear in the presence of harm, hence it is that those he had to assume and did assume.

Lastly, since no innocent person ought unwillingly to undergo any penalty, because this would be against the order of divine justice; and since no mortal wills to die and to suffer according to the *appetite of nature*, which naturally flees death: hence it is that Christ had to have penalties of this sort, yet in such a way that he could suffer nothing *unwillingly according to reason*, not only on account of the beatitude and the omnipotent Deity united to him, through which he was able to repel all things; but also on account of that most perfect innocence, which according to the order of natural justice is permitted to suffer nothing unwillingly; so also he would suffer, yet in such a way that this was *against the natural inclination* and the appetite of nature, which is in the sensuality and the flesh. — And hence it is that Christ, praying according to reason, expressed the will of the *flesh*, by which he fled the passion, when he said: *Let this chalice pass from me*; yet he conformed the will of *reason* to the will of the Father and set it before the appetite of the flesh, when he said: *Not my will, but thine be done*. — And thus the one will was not contrary to the other: since « according to the *divine* will he willed what was just, according to the will of *reason* he consented to justice, but according to the *will of the flesh* he refused the penalty, yet nevertheless did not accuse justice. And thus each will did what was its own and followed what pertained to itself: the *divine* will justice, the *rational* will obedience, the will *of the flesh* nature »; and through this there was in Christ no wrestling and struggle, but a peaceful ordering and an ordered tranquillity.

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