Dist. 5, Part NaN, Art. 1, 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/5/q/bon-sent-I-d5-a1-q1
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### Article I

*On the comparison of generation to substance or essence in the account of principle.*

### Question I

*Whether substance or essence begets.*

On the first point: that substance does not beget, it is shown thus:

**1.** *To beget* expresses a relation: therefore to that to which it belongs to beget, it also belongs to be referred; but it does not belong to the essence to be referred: therefore neither does it belong [to the essence] to beget.

**2.** Likewise, *to beget* imports distinction: therefore to that to which it belongs to beget, consequently also [it belongs] to be distinguished; but the essence, since it is one, is not distinguished: therefore, etc. Or if it begets, there are several essences. And to these two inconveniences the Master reduces [the argument].

**3.** Likewise, *to beget* expresses a personal action: therefore it is said only of that which either supposits for a person; but the essence does not signify a person, since it is common — nor does it supposit for a person, since it is altogether abstract: therefore, etc.

**4.** Likewise, *to beget* is a property of the person, *communicability* of the essence: therefore, as communicability stands to the person, so personal property stands to the essence; but communicability is never of the person — for this is false: «*the Father is communicable*»; therefore neither will personal property be of the essence: therefore neither *to beget*, since it is of the person.

*On the contrary:*

**1.** Whatever things are such that one is the same as the other and they do not have diverse properties, whatever is said of one is also said of the other; but person and essence are such, because the person is the essence, nor do they have diverse properties, because a property in divine things is a distinguishing relation; but if the essence had any property, then it would be distinguished and referred: therefore, etc. — If you say that, although person and essence do not have diverse properties, yet they differ through one having a property and the other not having it; on the contrary: the highest opposition is contradiction, but such a diversity is by contradiction: therefore essence and person differ more than person and person; but person is not predicated of person: therefore neither is person predicated of essence; but this is false: therefore, etc.

**2.** Likewise, whatever things are such that one is predicated of the other, one supposits for the other, because the subject is truly subjected to the predicate; but essence is truly predicated of the Father — whence this is true: «*the Father is essence*»; therefore it also supposits: therefore, just as «*God the Father begets*», so it can be said «*essence begets*».

**3.** Likewise, of whatever the subject is predicated, also its proper property; but *to beget* is as it were the proper property of the Father; and this is true: «*the divine essence is the Father*»: therefore likewise this: «*the divine essence begets*».

**4.** Likewise, of whatever the defined is predicated, so also its definition; but the definition of *father* is *the father of a son*. Since, then, this is true: «*the divine essence is the Father*», this too will be true: «*the divine essence is the father of the Son*»: therefore, by conversion: «*the Son is the Son of the essence*».

### Conclusion

> *The expression «the divine essence begets» is altogether improper and is to be denied, or at least piously expounded.*

**I respond:** For the understanding of the foregoing it should be noted that the true faith says, as a kind of foundation, that God is triune and one — and so triune that the trinity is not confounded, and so one that the unity is not multiplied. If therefore what we believe had to be signified, names were aptly invented in divine matters — indeed, manifested to us by God — which signify the trinity under distinction and the unity without any multiplication. Just as, therefore, the names imposed upon the persons are altogether incommunicable, both with respect to the supposit and with respect to the signified — whence this expression is false: «*the Father is the Son*», or «*the Father is communicable*» — so on the side of the essence or nature it was necessary that names be imposed which would not be distinguished, either with respect to signification or with respect to supposition.

*Threefold genus of names.* It should be noted that there is a threefold genus of names signifying the essence. For some signify *in concretion*, as this name *God*; some *in every kind of abstraction*, as this name *essence*; some *in an intermediate mode*, as *light*, *wisdom*, *will*, and the like — and these are said to signify in an intermediate mode because they do not concern the supposit in the manner of inherence, but they concern the supposit by reason of what they express — some account of an act or origin, which belong to the supposits themselves. Since, therefore, there are three differences of names, a *concrete* name properly supposits for a person; a *medium* name supposits partly properly, partly improperly; an *abstract* and *absolute* name does not supposit except altogether improperly.

Hence this is proper: «*God begets*», and is to be brought into use; but this: «*wisdom begets* *from wisdom*» is partly proper, partly improper — therefore it is to be sustained but not extended; but this: «*essence begets*» is altogether improper, and therefore it is to be denied — and if it is read anywhere, it is to be expounded. For the Saints sometimes, in order to confound heresies, speak more expressly than the propriety of speech sustains.

**1.** To the first objection, that essence and person do not have diverse properties: it must be said that there is a twofold diversity of account in divine things. In one way — through having diverse properties; and this induces distinction, and in this way they differ in account and are not predicated of the same [subject], as Father and Son. In another way — through one having a property and the other not having it; and this does not induce distinction, nor does it cause one not to be predicated of the other; but it does cause that something is said of one which is not said of the other — as is clear in Peter and man: «*Peter is an individual*», «*man [is] not»; and yet *man* is truly predicated of Peter.

To the [objection] that the highest opposition is of affirmation and negation: it must be said that this is true where the negation posits nothing, as between *something* and *nothing*; but where it posits extremes, it can be minimal and arises from however small a difference, whether of thing or of account; whence it does not suffice for distinguishing.

**2.** To the second objection, that the predicate supposits for the subject: it can be said in one way that — just as in lower things there is *predication according to substance*, as «*man is animal*», and there is *predication according to account (ratio)*, as «*animal is a genus*»; and the predicate supposits for that of which it is predicated according to substance, but when the predication according to substance is changed into a predication that is according to account, there is an accident there; whence it does not follow: «*animal is a genus*», «*man is animal*», therefore «*man is a genus*» — similarly they say in divine matters that, since *thing* and *account* are there, there is predication according to substance; and this being preserved, whatever is said of the predicate [is said] also of the subject; but when the predication according to substance is changed into a predication according to account, there is an accident there; and such is this: «*the Father begets*», «*the divine essence is the Father*»: therefore «*the divine essence begets*».

But this similitude does not seem suitable, because in divine things *ratio* [account] is predicated of the essence — whence this is true: «*the essence is paternity and generation*» — which indeed is not found in lower things. And therefore it must otherwise be said that in divine things there is a *twofold mode of predicating*: by identity and by inherence. By identity, as when it is said: «*the essence is the Father*»; by inherence or denomination, as adjectives and verbs do. Predication by identity exists in divine things by reason of the supreme simplicity, which does not allow the person to be less simple than the essence; and since this [simplicity] is not in creatures, therefore in them is not found predication by every-mode identity, unless the same be predicated of itself, as when it is said: «*humanity is humanity*»; but every proper predication is by inherence, since nothing is altogether simple; whence this is false: «*humanity is animality*». But in predication by inherence the term signifies one thing and supposits for another, because it signifies a common form and supposits for an inferior, and in such [predication] it is true that what is predicated of another supposits for it. But in predication by identity the same [thing] is signified and supposited. Whence then the sense is that what is signified by this term *Father* is the same as what is signified by this term *essence*, and therefore *paternity is essence*; and because this name *essence* does not signify a person, therefore it does not supposit for it, since it is in no way predicated of it except by predication by identity.

**3.** To the third objection concerning property (*passio*) and subject and the like: it must be said that *there is a twofold species of terms*: some are substantial terms in divine things, which enclose within themselves the thing about which they place the form imported through themselves, as this name *Father*; and such [terms] can be predicated by identity, as when it is said: «*the essence is the Father*», that is, *He who is the Father*. Some are [terms] which are altogether in adjacency, like verbs and nouns retained adjectively, as *begets* and *begotten* and *born*; and such [terms] place their thing about those of which they are predicated, and therefore they are predicated only by inherence. And therefore *to beget* places the distinction which it imports about the essence, when it is said of the essence; and therefore this is false: «*the essence begets*»; this, however, is true: «*the essence is generation*». And when one passes from predication by identity to predication by inherence, an accident can be there. As to what is said: «*of whatever the subject is predicated, so also the proper property*» — this has an instance, where the property is extraneous to that of which the subject is predicated, as this intention *species*, although it is a property of man, and *man* is said of Peter, yet what is *species* is not said of him.

And if you object that in divine things the account of the extraneous does not fall, because no accident falls there: it must be said that, although there is no extraneousness nor diversity as to the thing, there is nevertheless [a diversity] as to the account or as to the mode of predicating, which is threefold in divine things, as will appear below. Whence just as here there is an accident: «*the essence is the person*»; but «*the person is distinguished*»: therefore «*also the essence*»; so also in the matter at hand.

**4.** To the final objection concerning «*the essence is the Father of the Son*»: it is distinguished, following Prepositivus, that *Father* can place its thing or [relative] respect imported through itself about the very subject, which is the essence; and then the expression is false; for the sense is that the essence is referred to the Son. Or [*Father*] can enclose within itself the thing of its substantive, so that the sense is: «*the essence is the Father of the Son*», that is, *the essence is He who is referred to the Son*; and in this way the expression is true, and the argument does not hold: «therefore the Son is the Son of the essence»; rather, there is an accident there. For just as it does not follow: «*the Son is referred to Him who is the Father*», and «*He is the essence*»: therefore «*[the Son] is referred or distinguished from the essence*»; so also in the matter at hand.