Dist. 4, Art. 1, Q. 4
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/4/q/bon-sent-I-d4-a1-q4
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### Question IV

*Whether the name God supposits for a person, or for the nature.*

Fourth and last, the question is asked concerning the supposition of this name *God*. And it is asked whether this name *God* of itself supposits for a person, or for the nature. And that [it supposits] for a person, seems thus:

**1.** Through that [verse] of Ambrose upon: *May God our God bless us; may God bless us*. Ambrose: «The threefold confession of *God* indicates the Trinity of persons»; therefore, since *God* stands there without any adjunct, of itself it supposits for a person.

**2.** Likewise, it is objected by reason thus: this name *man* properly supposits for everything in which humanity inheres: therefore, by a similar [reasoning], also this name *God* [supposits] for everything

in which deity inheres; but this is a person: therefore etc.

**3.** Likewise, this name *God* signifies deity in concretion; but not except in concretion to a supposit, which is a person; but a concrete term properly supposits for that with respect to which it imports the form, just as *white* more properly supposits for the white thing than for the form: therefore etc.

**On the contrary:**

**1.** A pronoun refers a thing for its proper supposit; but when it is said: *May God bless us etc., our God*, this pronoun *us* refers the nature, not the person: therefore etc.

**2.** Likewise, since this term *man* properly supposits for the individual, this is false: *man is Socrates and Plato*, because the same individual does not receive that predication; but this is true: *God is Trinity*, or: *God is the Father and the Son*: therefore, since that predicate does not belong to one person [alone], it is plain etc.

**3.** Likewise, a term that properly supposits for a person, when a partitive term is added to it, stands for one only, as when it is said: *one man is running*: therefore similarly, when it is said *one God*: therefore this is simply false: *one God is the Father and the Son*.

### Conclusion

> *The name God, since it has the nature both of a common term and of a singular term, can properly supposit both for the nature and for the person.*

**I respond:** It must be said that here there has customarily been a twofold opinion.

The one indeed is, that this name *God* properly signifies the nature and supposits for a person — sometimes for one, as when it is said: *God generates*; sometimes for two, as when it is said: *God spirates*; sometimes for three, as when it is said: *God is Trinity*. And the reason of this, as they say, is that since it has many supposits, it has the nature of a common term; but a common term properly supposits for the individual, but for the nature or for the form does not properly supposit, unless it be drawn [to do so], as if it be said: *man is a species*. So they speak in the proposed case. Further they say, that because all the supposits are in it by a single supposition, therefore it can at one and the same time supposit for many persons, although this the term *man*, or any other common term, cannot [do]; and thus they solve the objections.

Another opinion is, that it properly supposits for the nature, as it signifies, and does not supposit for a person, unless it be drawn [to do so] by another, as when it is said: *God generates*; and these say that when it is said: *God is Trinity*, there it stands for the nature, not for the person; and one nature is the three persons: therefore the locution is true. And the reason of this position is that this name *God* has the nature of a discrete term, since it has no plural; therefore it signifies and supposits properly for the same thing; therefore, since it signifies the nature, it properly supposits for that.

But it is better to say both — because it has the nature both of a common term and of a discrete term: of a common term on account of the plurality of supposits, of a discrete term by reason of the unmultipliable form — that it properly supposits for both the nature and the person. Nevertheless the reasons on both sides conclude what is true, each in its own way. But this cannot be found in any other term, and therefore neither [can] any similar mode of suppositing.