Dist. 6
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/6/q/bon-sent-I-d6-littera
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### DISTINCTION VI.

*Whether the Father begot the Son by will or by necessity; and whether He is God willingly or unwillingly.*

It is moreover customarily asked whether the Father begot the Son by will or by necessity. Concerning this, Orosius to Augustine says thus: "Did the Father beget the Son by will, or by necessity? Neither by will, nor by necessity, because necessity is not in God, [and] will cannot precede wisdom." "Wherefore, as Augustine says in the fifteenth book *On the Trinity*, the dialectic of Eunomius is to be derided — from whom the Eunomian heretics took their origin — who, since he could not understand and would not believe that the only-begotten Word of God was the Son of God by nature, that is, begotten of the substance of the Father, said that He was the Son not of nature or substance, but the Son of the will of God, wishing to assert in God an acceding will, by which He begot the Son, just as we sometimes will something which we did not previously will; on account of which our nature is understood to be mutable — far be it that we should believe this to be in God." Let us say, therefore, that the Word of God is the Son of God by nature, not by will, as Augustine teaches in the fifteenth book *On the Trinity*, where he commends a certain Catholic answering a heretic, saying: "Aptly indeed did a certain man answer a heretic who was most cunningly asking whether God begot the Son willingly or unwillingly, so that if he should say 'unwillingly,' the most absurd misery of God would follow; but if 'willingly,' he would at once conclude what he intended, namely that the Son is not of nature, but of will. But that man most vigilantly in turn asked of him whether God the Father is God willingly or unwillingly, so that if he should answer 'unwillingly,' great absurdity and misery would follow, which to believe of God is great madness; but if he should say 'willingly,' it would be answered him: therefore He Himself also is God by His own will, not by nature.

What then remained, except that he should fall silent, seeing himself bound by his own questioning in an insoluble bond?" From the foregoing it is taught that it must not be conceded that God is God by will or by necessity, willingly or unwillingly; likewise, that He begot the Son by will or by necessity, willingly or unwillingly.

*But against this it is objected thus [objection]:* the will of God is the nature or essence of God, because for God to be is not other than to will; and therefore, just as there is one essence of the three persons, so also there is one will. If, then, God is God by nature, He is also God by will; and if the Word of God is the Son of God by nature, He is also the Son of God by will.

*This, however, is easy to refute [it is refuted].* For the foreknowledge of God, or knowledge by which He knows or foreknows good and evil things, is also the divine nature or essence; and predestination, or His will, is the same divine essence, nor is it other for God to know or to will than to be. And although the knowledge or will of God is one and the same, yet whatever is said of will is not said of knowledge, and conversely. Nor does God will by His will all those things which He knows by His knowledge, since by His knowledge He knows both good and evil things, but by His will He wills only good things. For the knowledge and foreknowledge of God is of good and evil things, but the will and predestination is of good things only; and yet in God knowledge and will, and foreknowledge and predestination, are one and the same. Thus, although the nature and will of God are one, the Father is nevertheless said to have begotten the Son by nature, not by will, and to be God by nature, not by will.

*Yet the foregoing words [the foregoing words are explained],* by which it has been prudently said that God the Father is God neither willingly nor unwillingly, and begot the Son neither willingly nor unwillingly, whether by will or by necessity, seem to me to be taken in such a sense that we understand a preceding or acceding will, in the manner in which Eunomius understood it. For He Himself is not God by a preceding or efficient will, nor willing before being God; nor did He beget the Son by a preceding or acceding will, nor was He willing before begetting when He begot the Son, nor was He begetting before willing when He begot the Son. He nevertheless begot willingly, just as He begot powerfully, and begot good, and begot wise, and the like. For if the Father is said to have begotten the Son wisely and good, why not also willingly? — since to be willing is the same thing for God as to be God, just as to be wise is the same as to be God. Let us say, therefore, that the Father, just as wise, so willing begot the Son, but not by a preceding or acceding will. This sense Jerome opens up and confirms, speaking thus on the Epistle to the Ephesians: "Concerning the Son of God, that is, Our Lord Jesus Christ, it is written, that He was always with the Father, and the paternal will never preceded Him, that He might be; and He indeed is the Son by nature."

*Notula.* Hilary in the book *On the Synods*: "Those who say that the Son of God is from non-existent things, likewise those who say that the Father begot the Son neither by counsel nor by will, holy Church anathematizes. Likewise if anyone should say that the Son was born with the Father unwilling, let him be anathema. For not, with the Father unwilling, did the Father, compelled or led by natural necessity, when He would not, beget the Son; but as soon as He willed, without time and impassibly He showed forth from Himself the Only-begotten."

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