Dist. 14, Art. 3, 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/14/q/bon-sent-III-d14-a3-q3
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### Question III. *Whether God communicated omnipotence to Christ's soul, as He communicated omniscience.*

Thirdly it is asked whether God communicated omnipotence to Christ's soul, as He communicated to it omniscience. And that He did, it seems.

1. To the Philippians, chapter two: *He gave Him a name which is above every name:* therefore if He did not give Him the name without the reality, He gave Him therefore a power above every power and a potency above every potency: therefore He gave Him omnipotence.

2. Likewise, since there are three things in the soul, potency, knowledge, and will, as Richard holds, will presupposes knowledge, and knowledge presupposes potency: therefore a nature which is capable of knowledge is capable of potency: therefore that which is capable of omniscience is capable of omnipotence; but Christ's soul was capable of omniscience, as was shown above: therefore it was capable of omnipotence.

3. Likewise, knowledge is of wider extension than potency — for everything that God can do, He knows, but it is not converse — but that which is capable of the greater thing is capable of the lesser: therefore if Christ's soul was capable of omniscience, it was also capable of omnipotence: therefore God ought to have communicated omnipotence to it.

4. Likewise, to be able to know one knowable belongs to a potency, therefore to be able to know two knowables belongs to a greater potency, and proceeding thus: therefore to be able to know infinite knowables belongs to a supreme and infinite potency; but Christ's soul was able to know infinite knowables: therefore God communicated omnipotence to it.

5. Likewise, a material craftsman communicates to his son not only the knowledge of simple acquaintance, but also practical knowledge: therefore much more strongly did God communicate this to Christ's soul; but practical knowledge has an operation joined to it, and the operation has a potency prior to it: therefore if God communicated to Christ's soul the practical knowledge of all things, He communicated therefore to it omnipotence.

6. Likewise, just as the intellect of Christ's soul is conjoined to the divine wisdom, so too the power of that soul is joined to the divine potency — for we call Christ *the power of God and the wisdom of God* — therefore just as the intellect of Christ's soul, on account of its conjunction with supreme wisdom, became all-knowing, so too the power, on account of its conjunction with supreme potency, ought to have become omnipotent.

**On the contrary:** 1. Every potency of a creature follows the very substance of the creature; but omnipotence precedes the substance of every creature, since it can produce every being: therefore omnipotence could be communicated to no creature.

2. Likewise, nothing having omnipotence can be exceeded or surpassed by anything, since nothing is greater than the omnipotent; but it is necessary that every creature be exceeded and surpassed by God: therefore it is impossible that omnipotence be communicated to any creature.

3. Likewise, « of no finite substance can there be an infinite power », as the Philosopher says, and reason makes manifest; but omnipotence is an infinite power: therefore to no finite substance can omnipotence be communicated. But every creature is of a finite substance, since it is created *in number, weight, and measure:* therefore etc.

4. Likewise, no power of a created being transcends *being*; but omnipotence transcends *being*, since it can make *being* out of *non-being:* therefore it is impossible that omnipotence be given to any created power.

> **Conclusion.** Neither to Christ's soul nor to any creature can omnipotence be communicated as a property inhering in it.

**I respond:** It must be said that neither to Christ's soul nor to any creature can omnipotence be communicated, except to the extent that the name and excellence of divinity is communicated to it, that is, through the communication of idioms, which has its origin from the personal union — for just as we can say that the man is God, so we can say that the man is omnipotent — and just as the *excellence of divinity* can be communicated to none as a form and property inhering in it substantially or accidentally; so neither can omnipotence.

But the reason why omnipotence cannot be communicated to any creature is that every creature, by the very fact that it is from nothing, falls short of supreme stability, whence it does not *exist* through itself; it falls short of supreme simplicity, whence it does not *act* through its whole self; it falls short of supreme immensity, whence the power in it can *stand apart* from the substance. And since *it does not subsist of itself nor in itself*, unless it be sustained by the divine potency; therefore it is impossible that it be *omnipotent*; for it cannot sustain *itself*. — Again, since it does not act of its whole self, it cannot reach the whole substance of a thing; and therefore it cannot be omnipotent, since it cannot produce the whole. — Lastly, because its power *stands apart* from the substance, it can be so far removed that it altogether fails, whence it cannot reach all things. — As therefore to God alone belong supreme stability, supreme simplicity, and supreme immensity also; so too omnipotence, which necessarily requires these three. And therefore omnipotence cannot be communicated to any creature, neither to Christ's soul nor to another. — And the reasons which show this are to be conceded.

1. To that which is objected, that He gave Him a name which is above every name; it must be said that the giving of that name was through the communication of idioms, so that that man might be called God and the Son of God. But of this communication there is no question at present; therefore that authority does nothing for the point at issue.

2. To that which is objected, that potency precedes knowledge; it must be said that potency is spoken of in two ways: with respect to the *interior* act and with respect to the *exterior* act. For we say that someone can *know* and *will*; we also say that he can *operate*. When therefore we say that in a creature potency precedes knowledge, this is true with respect to the interior act, but not the exterior, since operative potency follows knowledge. But when omnipotence is said to be in something, this is not understood with respect to the interior act only, but also with respect to the exterior; therefore it does not follow that, if omniscience be in something, omnipotence be in it.

3. To that which is objected, that knowledge is of wider extension than potency; it must be said that to be of greater extension is twofold: either with respect to the *object*, or with respect to the *subject*. If we speak of extension with respect to the *object*, omniscience is of wider extension than omnipotence, since it is with respect to more things. But if we speak of extension with respect to the *subject*, omnipotence is of greater amplitude than omniscience, as regards the *proper* account of each. For omnipotence posits its subject as altogether immense and infinite, but omniscience does not, as was shown in what precedes. And therefore it does not follow that, if omniscience can be communicated to some subject of a created nature, omnipotence can on this account be communicated to it. For the communication of omnipotence regards the amplitude of the *subject* more than of the *object*.

4. To that which is objected, that to be able to know every knowable is to be able [to do all]; it must be said that, since the soul knows in the Word, the *knowing* of the soul itself is more in *receiving* from the Word than in *acting* upon the Word; and therefore to be able to know some knowable in the Word belongs indeed to a potency *active and passive*, but *active* on the part of the illuminating Word, *passive* on the part of the receiving soul. When therefore it is inferred that to be able to know infinite things belongs to an infinite potency; it must be said that from this it does not follow that there be in the creature an infinity of *active* potency, but in it there is an infinity of *passive* potency; and this indeed is not repugnant to the creature, although an infinity of active potency would be repugnant to it. Since therefore to be able to do infinite things states an infinity of active potency, but to be able to know all things states an infinity of passive potency; hence it is that, although it befits some creature that it be able to know all things, yet it does not befit it that it be able to do all things. And if you object that to know is not only to *suffer*, but also to *act*; it must be said that this is true of actual knowledge, which indeed consists in the act of judging, and that is the property of God alone and could not be communicated to any creature. But it is not true of habitual cognition, as was shown in what precedes.

5. To that which is objected, that God ought to have communicated to Christ not only speculative knowledge, but also practical; it must be said that practical knowledge is spoken of in two ways: in one way that is called practical knowledge which is *concerning the work*; as moral philosophy is said to be concerning the work, which is concerning works proceeding from a free will. In another way that is called practical knowledge which is *concerning the work and in the work*; as a smith, when he forges, is said to have practical knowledge of forging. In the *first* way God communicated practical knowledge to Christ's soul, since Christ had cognition of all the divine works; in the *second* way He did not communicate it to Him, for the reason that Christ's soul in all His works could not cooperate with Him. Therefore the case is not similar regarding the craftsman and his son, since the son of a craftsman can be made equal in knowledge and power, but not so Christ's soul to the Word; but it will be similar, if we speak of Christ according to the divine nature. For *the Father shows all things to the Son, and whatever the Father does, all these the Son also does*, as is said in John, chapter five.

6. To that which is objected last, that power is united to power just as the intellect to wisdom; it must be said that the case is not similar, as has already been said, for the reason that the operation of the intellect is in *receiving*, but the operation of the active potency consists rather in *acting*. And a sign of this is that it is of much more excellent power to be able to *do* something than to be able to *know* it; for it is much more difficult to make one ant than to know heaven and earth. For the *knower*, by the very fact that he is a knower, does not flow into the thing known; but the *one who has power*, in the very fact that he has power, is related to the possible as to an effect. And hence it is that the operative power in Christ was not made *omnipotent*, just as His intellect was made *all-knowing*.

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