Dist. 19, Part 1, Dubia
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/1/d/19/q/bon-sent-I-d19-p1-dubia
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### DOUBTS ON THE MASTER'S TEXT.

### Doubt I.

In this part there are doubts concerning the *littera*, and first there is doubt about the placement of this part. For since unity in *substance* makes *identity*, unity in *quantity* [makes] *equality*, unity in *quality* [makes] *likeness*, by parity of reason it appears that he ought to determine [also] concerning identity and likeness; because, if he does not determine concerning these, it appears that neither concerning equality ought he to make a special treatment.

**I respond:** It must be said that, equality having been shown perfectly, it is shown that there is in [the divine] nature in every way identity and likeness; and therefore, equality having been determined, it is not necessary to determine concerning the others; but he treats more of equality on account of heresies to be extirpated, especially of the Arians, who posited inequality in the divine [persons]; and therefore the disputation that concerns this is more difficult and more useful.

### Doubt II.

Likewise it is doubted concerning what he says, that *equality consists in eternity*. For it appears to proceed wrongly, because he himself divides *coeternity* over against *equality*: therefore if [equality] is distinguished from [coeternity], with respect to eternity equality is not regarded.

**I respond:** It must be said that perfect equality consists in these three [eternity, magnitude, power], and the Master places equality in coordinate division against coeternity with respect to the other two members, namely magnitude and power.

### Doubt III.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *Not by another [is God] God, by another great* etc., because by parity of reason it appears, since by another he is God, by another Father, that by another he is God, by another great. If you say that quantity passes over into substance, but relation does not; the objection is raised that this does not solve it. For Augustine is speaking of formal predication, and it is established that, formally speaking, this [proposition] is just as false: *God is great by deity*, or *God by magnitude*, as also: *Father by magnitude*.

**I respond:** It must be said that although according to our manner of speaking or understanding on our part magnitude in divine matters is said in the manner of quantity, and deity in the manner of substance, yet on the side of the thing there is no difference whatsoever. For nothing is said of magnitude which is not said of substance. In the relation, however, of paternity it is not so. For something is predicated of paternity which cannot be said of essence, as to distinguish and to be distinguished.

### Doubt IV.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *In the generation of generations are thy years*. For it appears to say wrongly, because in eternity no variation falls: therefore since *year* has variation, it ought not to be transferred there. Likewise, in that eternity there is every kind of simplicity and impartibility: therefore *years* ought not to be said in the plural.

**I respond:** It must be said that according to the measure of our weakness we both understand and name the divine eternity. For since *year* states the complete revolution of time according to the course of the sun in the zodiac and its return to the same point, and the divine eternity is perfect and embraces all other durations: therefore Scripture transferred to it the name of *year*.

Again, because [it is] unterminated both from the side before and the side after, therefore it does not say *year* [in the singular], as though it had a terminus, nor *generation* singularly, but plurally *years*, and likewise *generations*. By reason therefore of perfection and unterminatedness it is transferred, not by reason of variation.

### Doubt V.

Likewise it is asked about what he says, that *in the generation of the saints are the years of God, eternity*. For it appears to be false, because the duration of the saints is finite from the side before; but the eternity of God is infinite from the side before and after: therefore the saints are not in it. Likewise, by which mode of being *in* is the generation of the saints in it? As measure, no, because the eternity of God is measure of God alone; as cause in effect [and so be in it]; but in this mode he is in the other creatures: therefore etc.

**I respond:** It must be said that this saying is not said by way of commensuration nor by way of equality, but by way of concomitance and conformity. For since the generation of the saints from the side after endures into infinity, it endures also without variation: therefore it accompanies that highest eternity in eternity and

is expressly conformed to it; and thus blessed Augustine expounds that [verse] of the Psalm: *In the generation of generations are thy years*: either in the unterminated generation, which is the generation of the Saint, or [because] the saints are that generation, both because it endures forever and because they are gathered out of many generations.

### Doubt VI.

Likewise it is asked about what he says, that *the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father*; because, if whatever is in God is God on account of the highest simplicity, therefore whatever is in the Son is the Son: therefore if the Father is in the Son, the Father is the Son.

**I respond:** It must be said that it is not similar, because, when something is said to be in God, this preposition *in* either states an essential distinction, and so not whatever is in God is God, since *in him we live, move, and have our being*; or it states no distinction except according to the mode of understanding, and this posits an utter identity; and therefore it follows that what is in God is God. But when it is said of a person, this preposition *in* states a personal distinction, and one person is not predicated of another; and therefore it is clear that it is not similar.

### Doubt VII.

Likewise it is asked about what Hilary says: *Nor will human comparison furnish an example for divine matters*. For it appears to be false, because image is an express likeness, and a vestige is in every creature: therefore it appears that *example* is in all things.

**I respond:** It must be said that there is an example expressing perfectly and altogether in like manner, and no such [example] exists in creatures, because image and the other creatures have more dissimilitude than likeness; and there is an example in some way leading-by-the-hand, and so [examples] are many, and from many is gathered one, yet not altogether perfect.

### Doubt VIII.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *That which is unintelligible to man is possible to God*. It appears false, «*because our soul is in some way all things*», and our intellect does not understand so many things that it cannot understand more.

**I respond:** It must be said that it is one thing to speak of the comprehending intellect, and so it is not true that it can understand all things, because neither God nor anything of God is comprehensible to us, since [he is] altogether infinite; and it is another to speak of the apprehending intellect, and this in two ways: either in the manner of *possible* [intellect] and receiving, and indeed everything that can come to be, [the intellect] can understand, because it is possible for understanding; or in the manner of *agent*, and because it does not have light of so great a power that it could [reach] over all things, namely things present and future, since many are against its judgment, so it is not [the intellect] of all things.

### Doubt IX.

Likewise it is asked about what Hilary says: *For if he received a part of the same one who begot, neither is perfect*. For it appears that this does not follow, because a perfect man begets a perfect son, and yet does not give him except a part.

**I respond:** It must be said that there is perfection simply, and perfection in a genus. Perfection in a genus well tolerates with itself the giving and receiving of a part, because in the giver it is supplied through restoration, in the receiver through increase and addition; but perfection simply does not tolerate with itself restoration nor addition. And since in God perfection is simply, therefore if he were to give a part, in the giver a defect would remain, likewise also in the receiver; therefore it is not similar in the case of man.

### Doubt X.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *Not by a coupling-together of two corresponding genera* etc.;

for either he touches modes of being, or [modes] of generating. Not [modes] of being, because they are far more than these; not [modes] of generating; and so in either way it is insufficient.

**I respond:** Some say that Hilary touches the two modes of generation which are in creatures, in order to exclude them from the Son. But he assigns only two modes, because he speaks only of the generation of a living thing; and a living thing capable of generation is divided into vegetable and sensible; and according to that twofold genus the mode of generating is twofold, which Hilary touches. For animals are generated through the coupling of male and female, and plants through grafting. He touches the first when it is said: «*Not by a coupling-together of two corresponding genera*», because male and female are of twofold genus with respect to sex, and yet are corresponding with respect to form and nature. He touches the second mode when he says: «*Nor by the engrafted nature of a more capacious substance*», as a shoot is grafted onto a tree, «*but by a likeness united to nature*», that is, a likeness altogether undifferentiated in nature.

It can be said otherwise that Hilary does not speak about the mode of generating, but speaks about how the Father is in the Son; and he excludes the mode of being-*in* by which a creature is said to be in a creature according to the customary mode; to which mode there concurs a twofold condition of creatures: the first is the diversity of creatures with respect to nature; the second is the capacity of the container. And he excludes these from that mode of existing which is in the divine [persons], by those two things which he says: «*That the Son is in the Father not by the coupling of two genera, nor by the engrafted nature of a more capacious substance*». This is clear from the text of Hilary which he immediately subjoins in the original [text], and which the Master omits: «*Because*, says Hilary, *by corporeal necessity outer things cannot become inner to those by which they are contained*», and he means that this is impossible in corporeal creatures, that they should mutually be in themselves, as the Father is in the Son; because on account of corporeal necessity and imperfection inner things cannot become outer to those by which they are contained, as if water is within a vessel, while it is within, it cannot come to be outside, and so the vessel is not contained, in such a way that the vessel might be in the water.

### Doubt XI.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *While nativity does not degenerate from the nature of God*, because not only in God, but in many creatures it does not degenerate.

**I respond:** It must be said that to degenerate is to go out beyond the genus of the begetter. To go out beyond the genus of the begetter is this: either with respect to the common form and nature; and so there is degeneration in equivocals, as a horse from a she-ass begets a hinny, and an ass from a mare a mule, whence the mule degenerates. In another way to degenerate is to leave behind the properties of the begetter, the nature being retained, as a son who is generated from a noble and beautiful father is rustic and ugly. In a third way to degenerate is to leave behind the nature of the begetter, not through dissimilitude, but through diversity; and in this mode every created nativity degenerates, because in every creature the begetter is something other than the begotten, and the divine generation alone is the one which does not degenerate, because nothing new is born, nothing alien is added, and therefore the begetter is not separated in substance from the begotten; and therefore that generation alone is the most noble.

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