Dist. 10, Art. 1, Q. 3
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/3/d/10/q/bon-sent-III-d10-a1-q3
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### Question III. *Whether this is true: Christ, as man, is an individual.*

Thirdly it is asked about this: Christ, as man, is an individual. And that it is true seems so.

*(Arguments for the affirmative side.)*

1. Christ is *something*, as man, as was held in the foregoing; therefore he is either *something universal* or *something singular*; but not *universal*, because Damascene says that "the Son of God assumed human nature *in an atom*," that is, in a singular, and this is an individual: therefore etc.

2. Likewise, Christ, as man, has properties whose collection it is impossible to find in another; but this is to be an individual, as is clear from the description of an individual which Porphyry gives: "An individual is what consists of properties whose collection it is impossible to find in another"; but this belongs to Christ, as man: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, Christ, as man, is predicated of one alone; but "the singular and the individual is that which is predicated of one alone": therefore Christ, as man, is an individual.

4. Likewise, this is true: Christ is man; therefore either an *accidental* predicate is predicated there, or a *substantial* one. Not *accidental*, this is clear, since man is truly said of Christ, as also of other men; if *essential*: therefore it is either a *genus*, or a *species*, or a *difference*. Not a *genus* or a *difference*: therefore a *species*; but the *most specific species* is predicated only of the individuals contained under it: therefore Christ is an individual of man.

5. Likewise, this is true: Christ, as man, is a substance; but substance is divided by a sufficient division by the Philosopher into first and second: therefore either Christ is a *first* substance or a *second*; not a *second*, since he is neither a genus nor a species: therefore a *first*. But *first substance* is the same as *individual*: therefore etc.

6. Likewise, this is true: Christ, as man, is white, and whiteness is in Christ, as man; but accidents are primarily and per se in individuals: therefore whiteness is in Christ insofar as he is an individual of man.

**On the contrary:**

*(For the negative side.)*

1. To be the individual of a substance and to be a hypostasis are the same; but in Christ there is only one hypostasis, since the union takes place in the hypostasis, as Damascene says, and that hypostasis is divine, not human except through the union: therefore if this is false: Christ, as man, is a hypostasis; this likewise is false: Christ, as man, is an individual.

2. Likewise, Christ, as *man*, is an individual, and as *God* is an individual substance — this is clear — and according to the account of individuation there is numbering: therefore Christ is two. But this is false, as was shown above: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, every individual is *one per se* and *one in number*; but nothing of this kind is united to another substance prior to it according to *being*: therefore since human nature in Christ is united to the eternal Word, it seems that it does not hold the account of individuation in him.

4. Likewise, whatever is said of the son of man is said of the Son of God: therefore, since "individual" denotes "a collection of properties which it is impossible to find in another and to be said of another individual"; it is impossible that Christ should be a different and different individual as man and as God: therefore just as in Christ there is a unity of personality, so there is a unity of individuation: therefore just as this is false: Christ is a person as man; so, as it seems, this will be false: Christ is an individual as man.

*(General question.)* It is asked therefore concerning this and similar matters, namely whether these are to be conceded: Christ is an individual as man; Christ is a suppositum as man; Christ is a hypostasis as man; and concerning other similar ones, what they have of truth and what of propriety.

> ### Conclusion.
> *(On the twofold mode of speech, conclusion.)* The locution: Christ, as he is man, is an individual, is conceded, insofar as "individual" is taken in the broader mode.

**I respond:** It must be said that, taking this word *secundum* (insofar as) properly, as it expresses the relation of a cause, some of such locutions are simply false and improper, and some are to be distinguished, in that they have something of propriety and something of impropriety. *(General conclusion to the questions.)*

For this is false and improper: Christ, as man, is a *person*; and this likewise: Christ, as man, is a *hypostasis*. But the first is false from a twofold cause: both because person imports a property of dignity, and also because it imports the foundation of the whole of natural existence. *(Note.)* But neither of these is in Christ by reason of the assumed nature, but of the assuming. — But the second is false by the other of those causes, since, although

a hypostasis does not express a property of excellence, it nevertheless expresses the foundation of existence; but this in Christ is not soul nor flesh nor that composed of both, but the uncreated Word. And therefore the aforesaid two locutions are improper and false; and if they are read anywhere, they are to be expounded and to be understood according to another acceptation of that determination "insofar as he is man."

*(On the two others.)* But this, of which there is now discourse, namely Christ is an *individual*, as man; and this: Christ is a *suppositum*, as man, can have propriety and impropriety according to the diverse intention of these words. — *(Distinction concerning "individual.")* For "individual" is said of something in two ways: in one way, because it is said *of one alone*; and in this way the whiteness of Peter is an *individual*, and in this way an *individual* is said to be what is *undivided in itself*. And so *(Conclusion 1.)* without doubt Christ, as man, is an individual. In another way an *individual* is said to be what is *divided from others* and *subsists in itself* and *per se*; and *(Conclusion 2.)* taking "individual" in this way, human nature in Christ is not an individual. For it is united to the uncreated Word, as to its suppositum.

*(Conclusion 3.)* In this same way too a distinction must be made, when it is said: Christ, as man, is a *suppositum*. *(Distinction concerning "suppositum.")* For there is a *suppositum in which* and a *suppositum of which*. If by "suppositum" is meant that *of which* another is predicated and which is subjected to a higher term; *(Conclusion 4.)* Christ, as man, is a suppositum. But if by it is meant that suppositum *in which* the whole *being* of the thing is established and founded; thus it is not to be conceded *(Conclusion 5.)* that Christ is a suppositum as man, unless the account of suppositum is narrowed, so that it be called a suppositum of accidents and of accidental properties.

*(Epilogue.)* Hence, since in its single acceptation both the name "individual" and the name "suppositum" are equivalent to "hypostasis," the aforesaid locutions are false from the same cause from which the aforesaid locution is also false, namely: Christ is a hypostasis as man. For it would follow that in Christ there would be two supposita and two hypostases; and so he would not be one, nor would there be in him a true union. — But according to another acceptation they can be conceded; and through this the reasons that are brought forward for both sides can be resolved. *(To the arguments for both sides.)* For the reasons that are brought forward for the first side proceed concerning the individual insofar as *individual* is said to be what is said of one alone. But the reasons for the following side proceed concerning the individual insofar as it not only is not divided into others, but also insofar as it is divided from another suppositum, and this indeed it does not have in Christ. And all this is clear to one who treats the individual reasons thoroughly.

*(To the general question.)* From these things it is clear what was asked last, namely which locutions in this matter are to be admitted, and which not. For those are to be conceded which so import the truth and propriety of the natures that they do not prejudice that supreme union, in which indeed the union was made in the person of the Word, not only insofar as it expresses *the dignity of a property*, but insofar as it expresses *an incommunicable suppositum*, namely the hypostasis itself, by reason of which there is mutual predication and communication of idioms. — *(The directive principle.)* And this is to be held as a directive principle, because in that union the blessed person of the Word made itself the suppositum of human nature, as was said many times in the foregoing. And to that extent human nature in Christ is said *to incline toward an accident*: and therefore some predicate which expresses a mode of existing is truly attributed to *us* according to human nature, which nevertheless is not truly attributed to Christ according to the human nature, but according to the divine, namely to be a *person*, and to be a *hypostasis*, to be a *suppositum*, to be an *individual*, insofar as they are equivalent to the word "hypostasis"; although, according to the broader mode of taking them, the last two can be attributed, as has been touched upon.

*(Objection concerning the individual.)* But against the aforesaid it seems possible to object, since it seems that Christ, as man, is truly and properly an individual. For as was shown in the second book, individuation is from the communication of matter with form, and comes to be known through the collection of accidents; but Christ, as man, is composed of soul and flesh, just as other men are: therefore he truly and properly has individuation, just as other men do: it does not seem therefore that what was said suffices. — *(Incidental question.)* On account of this there is a question, how much there is of the propriety of individuation in Christ, as man. For if it is not greater, except because it is said of one alone; then it has no more of the account of individuation than accidents do; which is utterly absurd, since Christ, as man, is a true substance.

*(Solution.)* And it must be said that, the accidents and properties being set aside, which do not *make* individuation but *show* it, individuation is from *intrinsic principles*, insofar as they constitute one suppositum, in which the whole being of the thing is established. And because from the concurrence

of those principles the individual is constituted, and there results the form of the whole, which is the specific form; hence it is, as Boethius says, that "the species is the whole being of the individual." But in Christ soul and flesh, or matter and form, are united not only in that which they *constitute*, but also in the *hypostasis of the eternal Word*. *(Note.)* And therefore the specific form does not express the whole being of Christ, and through this Christ, as man, does not altogether have the *full account* of an individual; whence he holds as it were a middle between the individual *properly said* and the individual according to which an *accident* is said to be something individual. For in an individual properly said there is the union of substantial principles and the constitution of a first suppositum in itself, not in another. But both of these are lacking in *accidents*, which subsist neither *in themselves* nor *per se*. In a middle way it is in Christ, where the principles come together according to human nature; yet the first suppositum is of another nature, not constituted from them. — And so it is clear that the things said above hold truth. And for these things the matters predetermined in the second book, distinction three, are of value.