Dist. 23, Art. 2, Q. 1
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/23/q/bon-sent-I-d23-a2-q1
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### ARTICLE II. *On the numbering of the four names.*

Consequently, in the second place there is a question concerning the numbering of the aforesaid names; and, supposing that the name *person* is numbered, it is asked concerning this:

First, whether in divine matters the name *substance* is numbered.

Secondly, it is asked whether *essence* is numbered.

Thirdly, [whether] the name *God* [is numbered], namely whether we can catholicly say several gods.

### Question I. *Whether several substances can be said in the divine.*

That, however, the name *substance* is numbered is shown thus.

1. Hilary, *On the Synods*: «There are indeed three through substance, but one through consonance».

2. Likewise, Anselm at the end of the *Monologion*: «More aptly are three said to be substances».

3. Likewise, Boethius in the book *On the Two Natures and One Person of Christ*: «We say one essence and three substances».

4. Likewise, this same thing seems [to follow] by reason, since substance is the middle between essence and person; but the middle savors of the nature of the extremes: therefore by parity of reasoning, by which one substance is said from the unity of essence, several can be said from the plurality of persons.

5. Likewise, every number is reduced originally to substance — for accidents or properties are never numbered except through substance — but acts are numbered and said in the plural in divine matters: therefore it is necessary to posit a number according to substance. That, however, [acts] are said in the plural is plain; for it is said: *The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit create.*

6. Likewise, the relative of *substance* is the same, just as *such* and *of what kind* [are relatives] of *quality*; but this is false: *The Father is the same with the Son*, since Hilary says that we cannot say *the same God*: therefore it is necessary that distinction fall in substance; therefore if on account of the distinction of persons we say several persons, therefore also several substances.

**On the contrary:**

1. Nothing is more said according to substance than this name *substance*: therefore if substantial names are said singularly of all [the persons], as is plain from the rule of Augustine placed above, it is plain etc.

2. Likewise, between whatever things distinction falls according to substance, a true diversity falls; but between the Father and the Son no diversity is to be confessed, therefore neither number according to substance: therefore one is not to say several substances.

3. Likewise, Augustine says: «that for God to subsist and to be is the same»; therefore since to-be is one, to subsist is one: therefore just as from one to-be one essence is said or conversely, so also from one to-subsist there must be said one substance or subsistence.

4. Likewise, Jerome to Pope Damasus: «Who has ever, except with sacrilegious mouth, predicated three substances»?

> **Conclusion.** *Substance and subsistence, as they express essence, are not pluralized: if they be taken in the sense of hypostasis, they are said in the plural.*

**I respond:** It must be said that the name both of *substance* and of *subsistence* is taken in two ways in divine matters, since each of these has in itself the understanding of the verb (*actus*) and of the preposition. *Substance* therefore can be said as if *standing through itself*, or *under another or under a property*. In the first way it is one only, or is not numbered, since there is one *that which is*. In the other way, insofar as it expresses a respect to a property, it is numbered or pluralized. In the first way it is worth as much as *usiosis*, in the second way it is worth as much as *hypostasis*. In altogether the same way the name *Subsistence* is distinguished, and according to one understanding it is equivalent to *usiosis*, according to the other to *hypostasis*; and according to one it is pluralized, according to the other indeed [not].

And because *substance* is said in two ways, and [so also] *subsistence*, hence comes a diversity of mode of speaking among the doctors. For Tullius [Cicero] and Boethius himself say that *subsistentia* is equivalent to *usiosis*, and therefore Boethius says that it is not pluralized; but they say *substantia* is equivalent to *hypostasis*, and therefore Boethius says that it is pluralized, and according to this mode of speaking Hilary, Anselm, and Boethius speak. But Jerome and Augustine hold that *substance* is equivalent to *usiosis*, and therefore say that it is not pluralized; but *subsistence* [is equivalent] to *hypostasis*, and therefore they say that it is pluralized. From these things the response to either side is plain.

It is also plain why the Greeks did not transfer the name *prosopon*, as the Latins [did], because it was necessary for us to transfer the name *person* on account of ambiguity; and therefore the Church preferred to answer *three persons* rather than *three substances* or *subsistences*.

Nevertheless, to the argument which urges that *substance* holds the middle; it must be said that *substance*, insofar as it is equivalent to *hypostasis*, holds itself more with *person*, and therefore is numbered, like *person*, or pluralized; but insofar as it is equivalent to *usiosis*, it holds itself more with *essence*, and therefore is neither numbered nor pluralized, just as neither is *essence*. Now all those reasons, both the preceding and the following, speak of *substance* insofar as it is equivalent to *hypostasis* or *supposit*, and in this way it is pluralized.

The reasons, however, for the opposed side run according to another acceptation of this name *substance*. Likewise it is to be judged concerning this name *subsistence*. But since the authority of Augustine and the custom of those using that name, namely *substance*, takes [it] more in that acceptation in which it expresses *that which is* (*ipsum quod est*) or *usiosis* or *the very common [thing]*: therefore it is not commonly received that three substances be said in divine matters.