Dist. 33, Art. 1, Q. 2
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/33/q/bon-sent-I-d33-a1-q2
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### Question II.
#### *Whether property is essence.*

Second, inquiry is made concerning the comparison of property to essence, and it is asked whether property is essence. And that it is so seems to be shown:

1. Because the Church sings: «Let property be adored in the persons»; but nothing is to be adored with latria except the divine essence: therefore etc. Whence Bernard: «That property, which is not God, I do not believe to be adorable to me».

2. Likewise, essence is in the person, and similarly property: therefore either they are there by difference, or by indifference. If by difference: then the person is composite, which is unfitting. If by indifference of every kind: then property is essence, and essence is property.

3. Likewise, property is either something or nothing. If nothing: then either the person is not distinguished, or the distinction of the person is nothing. If it is something: but everything that is something is essence, either created or uncreated; but property is not created essence — this is manifest: therefore uncreated.

4. Likewise, everything that is, either is God, or is better than God, or is less good, or is greater: therefore property either is God, or is better, or less, or greater. But it cannot be greater, because God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived. Nor can it be less, because then the Father would be less than himself: therefore it is God.

**On the contrary:**

1. Augustine says, and it is held above in distinction eighteen: «It is not by that by which he is Father that he is God, but by deity he is God, by paternity he is Father»: therefore deity is not paternity, but rather one thing and another.

2. Likewise, this seems by reason. This is a conception of the mind true through itself, that the principle of distinguishing and of uniting is not the same, formally speaking; but essence is the ground of uniting, while property is the ground of distinguishing: therefore essence and property are not the same.

3. Likewise, no property is properly predicated of any essence or substance unless it is in it: therefore if properties are said of the divine essence, then they are in it. But property places its thing about the subject in which it is: therefore since the property of a thing is a relation, and from a relation distinction follows, of necessity properties place a distinction about the divine essence, if they are in it. But this is unfitting: therefore etc.

4. Likewise, if essence is property, then it is so either *per se* or *per accidens*: if *per se*, then to whatever essence belongs, paternity also belongs; but this is false: therefore if it is true, it is true *per accidens*. Therefore since in the divine there is no place for the accidental, neither can it be *per accidens*: this is plain etc.

5. Likewise, if property is the divine essence, since the divine essence or substance is creator and creates, then property creates; which is not conceded. It is asked, therefore, why it is conceded that paternity is essence, and that it is also to be adored, yet not that it is creator or wise.

### Conclusion.

> *Although essence and property have a different mode of being-toward, because essence states the absolute, but property a relation to a term; nevertheless essence is property, and conversely.*

**I respond:** As the Master touches in the text, the position of certain ones was — and is imputed to the Poitevin — that property is neither essence nor in essence, but only assistant. — But this position has been manifestly disproved, because it is necessary that it be the divine essence, if it is anything.

For this reason, for the understanding of the objections, it must be understood, as has been noted before, that relation by reason of comparison to its subject passes into substance, and therefore property is divine substance; but by reason of comparison to its term or object it remains; and as to this it is distinctive and differs from essence, not because it states another essence, but another mode of being-toward, which by comparison to essence or person states a mode adding nothing; whereas in comparison to the correlative it truly states a thing and a distinction: and therefore there is no vanity in the account of understanding nor composition in the thing, but a true distinction. And since this relation states nothing other than essence, when compared to it, and likewise nothing other than person: therefore it truly is essence and person. — But because furthermore that relation is not of essence to another, but of person to person; therefore relations and references, properly speaking, are in the persons, not in the essence: because the persons according to them are referred and distinguished, but the essence is not, because it is neither referred nor distinguished. Yet they are in the divine essence, speaking commonly and improperly, so that it is said that whatever is divine essence, or whatever is in essence or person, is in the divine essence.

**To the arguments:**

*To 1.* To that which is objected, that by one thing he is God, by another he is Father; it must be said that the ablative makes the manner of speaking or denominating; whence also the otherness signified by the ablative is regarded only as to mode, not as to essence, as is plain.

*To 2.* Likewise to that which is objected, that the principle of distinguishing and of uniting is not the same; the response is plain, because property distinguishes in this — that what differs does so not by essence, but by mode; which mode does not state composition, because it passes into substance; nor does it state only an intellectual concept, because it is a thing and remains in respect to the object.

*To 3.* To that which is objected, that nothing is predicated of substance unless it is in substance; it must be

said that it is not predicated of substance as of a subject, nor by inherence, but only of the person it is so predicated. Whence it is predicated of the essence, because essence and property are one in the person, not because the one is in the other.

*To 4.* To that which is objected, whether it is predicated *per se* or *per accidens*; it must be said *per se*, because through the person; not *per accidens*, because the person is not other than the essence. Therefore, since divine things exceed inferior things, so also predication exceeds predication.

*To 5.* To that which is finally objected, that if essence creates, so also property; it must be said to this that, although property is essence, yet essence does not suppose property, nor conversely. Whence it does not follow that what belongs to the essence belongs to the person, or conversely; yet some things belong also to the property, others not.

**To the incidental question.** Whence it must be noted that some things are said of the divine essence in itself, namely those which are said in opposition to the creature, such as *immense*, *uncreated*, and the like; and these are said of the properties. Some things are said of the divine essence as in the persons, such as to be communicable, and to be one in three; such things belong to the essence as it has the relation of form, and in this differ the account of essence and the account of property; and such things are not said of the properties. Again, some things are said of the essence as being the principle of action, such as to be powerful, wise, willing, to create; and such things are not said of the properties. Whence it must be noted that essential adjectives which regard the essence in itself as diverse from the creature are said of the properties; but those which regard it formally, either as it is form, or as it is principle, are not said. And thus all the things asked are made plain.