Dist. 35, 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/2/d/35/q/bon-sent-II-d35-a1-q2
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### QUESTION II.
### *Whether sin is the very corruption-as-passion, speaking essentially.*

Secondly it is asked, whether sin is the very corruption-as-passion, speaking essentially. And that it is, it seems.

*Fundamenta.*

1. « Sin, as Anselm says, is nothing other than the absence or lack of justice where it ought to be »; but the passive privation of justice is nothing other

than the lack of the justice that is due: therefore, speaking essentially, guilt is a corruption insofar as it is a passion.

2. Likewise, Augustine in the first book of the Confessions: « You have commanded, Lord, and so it is, that every disordered motion should be a punishment to itself »; but a disordered motion is guilt; and the punishment of a disordered motion is nothing but the very passive corruption which the human incurs from that disorder: therefore sin is the very privation-as-passion, speaking formally.

3. Likewise, « all the actions of the soul are passions », as the Philosopher holds: therefore every disordered action of the soul is a disordered passion; but what is disordered is guilt: therefore that disordered passion or corruption is guilt.

4. Likewise, when the soul deforms itself, the deformity itself by which the soul is deformed remains in it, and likewise the guilt; therefore either that deformity is guilt, or [it is] something else; and it is evident that the guilt which remains in the soul is nothing other than the very deformity by which the soul has been made deformed: therefore it seems that sin is the very corruption-as-passion.

5. Likewise, corruption-as-passion, in which there is a privation of measure, species, and order, is either guilt or punishment. If punishment: then it seems that such a privation is from God: therefore God renders the soul deformed and deprived of justice; which it is profane to say. It remains therefore that it is guilt.

**On the contrary:**

1. Augustine, *On Free Will*: « Guilt is the evil which we *do*, and punishment the evil which we *suffer* »: if therefore corruption-as-passion is an evil which we suffer, it seems that it is not guilt, but punishment.

2. Likewise, Augustine: « The evil of guilt is a voluntary affection, but the evil of punishment is an involuntary affection »; but corruption-as-passion is not voluntary, but involuntary, since no one wills to be corrupted or deformed: therefore it does not seem that it is guilt, but punishment.

3. Likewise, the Master in the text: « Sin is called a privation *actively*, not *passively*; for evil or sin is called a corruption precisely because it deprives the nature of some good ».

4. Likewise, this same thing seems [to follow] by reason. Every punishment is just and praiseworthy; but every corruption-as-passion is a punishment, since it harms and punishes him who is corrupted: therefore every corruption-as-passion is just and praiseworthy. But no guilt is just and praiseworthy: therefore no guilt is a corruption spoken of passively.

5. Likewise, cause and effect are essentially distinguished; but sin corrupts and is the principle of passive corruption, as was shown before: therefore corruption-as-passion and guilt itself are essentially distinguished: therefore guilt is not corruption of the good spoken of passively.

### Conclusion.

> Not only corruption or privation of the good spoken of *actively*, but the same also spoken of *passively*, has the character of guilt.

**I respond:** For the understanding of the foregoing it must be noted, as was touched upon before: sin is a corruption, consisting around the will and its act, since it is a deviation from the rectitude of justice. *(To be premised.)* But the will in its act is « an instrument moving itself »; whence, when the will is moved freely toward something, if it be moved or affected in a disordered way, that disorder regards the will as moving and the will as moved, because the will, while it is disordered in its affection, moves in a disordered way and is moved in a disordered way. Since therefore guilt, insofar as it is considered *in the act*, is nothing other than a disordered motion of the will, and to that motion both *action* and *passion* concur, it is not only corruption-*action*, but also corruption-*passion*. *(Conclusion 1.)* For both the disorder by which the soul disorders itself, and the disorder by which the soul is disordered, each is guilt, differing in comparison, yet one in essence. — And because as the acts are, such are the habits, especially since habits are generated from acts, as is the case in the genus of evil habits; hence it is that the deformity or privation left in the will both has in itself something corresponding to *action*, and something corresponding also to *passion*. For the will, while it sins actually, is rendered unfit, both insofar as it has the character of *mover* and insofar as it has the character of *moved*. And thus the guilt, considered as in habit, and insofar as it remains in the soul after the act of sin, is both a corruption or privation corresponding to *action*, and a corruption or privation corresponding to *passion*. And thus the same guilt is a corruption or privation of the good, not only spoken of *actively*, but also *passively*, speaking according to truth

[, essentially] speaking. *(Corollary.)* But according to *appropriation*, that corruption, insofar as it is understood *actively*, holds merely the character of guilt, but insofar as it is spoken of *passively*, holds the character of punishment; because, insofar as it is spoken of *actively*, it holds the character of the voluntary, but insofar as [it is spoken of] *passively*, [it holds] the character of the involuntary. *(It is explained.)* — Nor are these incompossible regarding the same action and motion. For we expressly see that in the same bodily action one and the same action both delights and wounds, and consequently saddens; just as, when a scabby person, by scratching, lacerates his own skin, both by lacerating he is delighted and by lacerating he is also wounded, and the one pleases, and the other displeases. Likewise also in the same spiritual action there is an aversion from the unchangeable good and a conversion to a changeable good, and the conversion pleases, and the aversion displeases. So too in the matter proposed it is to be understood that the same guilt can be spoken of *actively* and *passively*; yet insofar as it is spoken of *actively*, it properly holds the character of guilt, but insofar as [it is spoken of] *passively*, it holds the character of punishment. — Therefore the reasons are to be granted which show that some corruption-as-passion, namely that which is a privation of rectitude, is guilt.

*Solution of the opposing [arguments].*

1. 2. To that therefore which is first objected, that guilt is the evil which we *do*, etc.; the response is now clear from the things which have been said. For since the same motion can be *action* and *passion*, in which the will moves itself; so too the same action can be of punishment and of guilt, although under one and another character. — Likewise it must be responded to what follows, which is objected concerning the *voluntary* and the *involuntary*.

3. To that which is objected thirdly concerning the word of the Master, it must be said that this is said by a certain appropriation; for corruption-*action* is more properly called guilt than corruption-*passion*. *(To be noted.)* It is also true that someone, while he lacks the justice which he ought to have, is culpable. Yet the principal reason why he is culpable is from this, that he made that lack for himself; for if he were to sustain it involuntarily from elsewhere, then it would hold rather the character of *punishment* than of *guilt*.

4. To that which is objected, that every punishment is just and praiseworthy; it must be said that there is punishment *inflicted*, punishment *enacted*, and punishment *contracted*. *(Threefold punishment.)* And when it is said that every punishment is just and praiseworthy, this is understood of punishment *inflicted*; of punishment *enacted* or *contracted* it does not hold true, except insofar as they are understood under the character of punishment. But the passive privation of the good, or the deformation of the soul itself, is not a punishment *inflicted*, but is a punishment *enacted*, because the soul makes this punishment in itself while it sins.

5. To that which is objected, that sin is the cause of passive corruption; it must be said that this is understood of sin which is *in act*, which is the cause of corruption in the will by way of a habit; and in both ways, as was shown before, it has the character of action and of passion. — *(Another solution.)* Yet it can be said that, even though sin is said to corrupt, it is nevertheless not properly the cause of corruption, but rather the sinner himself. And if sin be said to be the cause of passive corruption, this is said by reason of the sinner himself, just as action is said to be the cause of passion by reason of the agent himself; for perhaps the same thing can be action and passion, differing in comparison alone.

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