Dist. 8, Part 1, Dubia
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/8/q/bon-sent-II-d8-p1-dubia
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## Doubts on the Text of the Master.

### Doubt I.

In this part there are doubts concerning the text, and first it is asked about what he says: *that God appeared in corporeal forms*. For it seems that such an appearing is more an occasion of error than of truth. For God lacks form and figure in body and corporeity in truth, and he who believes or supposes the contrary, errs. If therefore we frequently form opinions of what appears to the senses, it seems that such an appearing is an occasion of error.

**I respond:** It must be said that bodily form and figure does not lead immediately to the knowledge of God, but by means of the rational spirit, by whose ministry that appearing took place. And since in ascending there is first an abstraction from bodily form and figure before one comes to God — while one ascends from body to God through the medium of an incorporeal spirit — therefore such an appearing is rather a ladder leading to the knowledge of truth than an occasion of going astray. — And as to what is objected, that we suppose inwardly what appears outwardly: it must be said that this is true if the opinion or reasoning descends to sense and leans upon it; but when it abstracts from sense and leans upon faith and revelation, it has no occasion of erring, but rather of seeking the truth.

### Doubt II.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *No man shall see me, and live*. The contrary of this is had in the thirty-third [chapter] of Exodus: *The Lord spoke to Moses face to face*. And in the twelfth of Numbers: *Openly, and not by figures and riddles, does he see God*; which is said of the same Moses.

**I respond:** It must be said to this that in the first authority it is signified that God cannot be seen by the wayfarer in his essence and brightness; but in the two following ones is hinted the familiarity of God toward Moses, both as to *appearing* and as to *contemplation*, in each of which he excelled the other Prophets. The familiarity of appearing is noted when it is said that *he spoke to him face to face* — wherein it must be understood, *in the underlying creature* —; the eminence of contemplation, when it is said: *Openly, and not by figures and riddles, does he see God*, because he shone not only with bodily or imaginative vision, but also with intellectual.

### Doubt III.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *For nothing is visible which is not changeable*. For the body of the empyrean heaven is visible, and yet it is not changeable. — Likewise, I ask, of what change he understands it; either of change as to position, or of change as to form. If of change as to position, this is nothing, because that does nothing for vision; if of change as to form, that likewise is false, because the supercelestial bodies are incorruptible and unalterable, and yet they are visible.

*An incidental question.* — Along with this it is also asked of what sight he understands it; for either he understands it of mental sight, or of bodily sight. If of mental sight, it is false; if of bodily

sight, the question is, what necessity there is that the visible be changeable, since this sense perceives incorruptible bodies just as well as corruptible ones.

**I respond:** *To the incidental question.* — It must be said that Augustine understood it of *bodily* sight, and concerning this what he says is true, that everything visible is changeable. For the bodily sense cannot see anything without extension of quantity; but wherever there is extension of quantity, there is composition; and where there is composition, resolution and change to less is possible, so far as concerns the nature of the thing. For only what is altogether simple is unchangeable absolutely; and therefore it follows of necessity that if anything is seen by the bodily sense, it is changeable.

To the objection then about the empyrean and the other celestial bodies, it must be said that neither the empyrean nor any other celestial body, nor any body which is or can be, is altogether unchangeable. For although they are not changed by the change which is from *being* into another *being*, or from one form into another, yet they were once changed by the change which is from *non-being* into *being*, and they are by their nature changeable by the change which is into *non-being*; and this, because they are composite, and therefore are not their own *being*. For no being is its own *being* except the supremely simple, just as no agent is its own *acting* except the supremely simple. And on account of this, because it begs its *being* from elsewhere, Hilary says, *to all created things being befalls as an accident*; and therefore by their nature all things are possible to *non-being*. And so the answer to the whole is clear.

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