Dist. 21, 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/21/q/bon-sent-III-d21-a1-q3
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### Article I. *On the separation, made in death, by comparison to the bond of union.*
### Question III. *Whether the Word was united to the flesh and the soul by a twofold union.*

Thirdly it is asked, whether the Word was united to the flesh and the soul by a twofold union. And that it was so, it seems.

1. A union is numbered according to the unitable extremes; but the flesh and the soul are diverse unitables, for the one is corporeal and the other spiritual: therefore if they are united to the Word, they are united by several unions.

2. Likewise, if some one thing is united to certain things mutually divided, it is united to them by diverse unions; but the hypostasis of the Word was united in death to the flesh and the soul, which were mutually divided: therefore it was united to them by diverse unions. But the Divinity was united to the flesh and the soul in the same manner in the incarnation and in death and after death, since that union was not varied: therefore if after death it was united by diverse unions, it necessarily followed that this was so even in the incarnation itself.

3. Likewise, wherever there is an order of prior to posterior, there is numeration and distinction; but the soul is united to the Word prior to the flesh, for the flesh is united by the mediation of the soul: therefore if in unions of this kind there is order, there is distinction therein: therefore they are united by several unions.

4. Likewise, the soul is united to the Divinity and is united to the flesh; nor is it united by a single union, but by a twofold one: therefore by parity of reasoning it seems that the hypostasis of the Word, when it is united to the flesh and the soul, is united by a twofold union. If you say that the case is not alike, because from the Deity and the flesh there is not made one thing, as there is from the flesh and the soul; then it is objected: granted that from the flesh and the soul one thing is not made, as was the case in death; it then seems that this is no longer one union, but two.

**On the contrary:** 1. A union is terminated at one thing; but the flesh and the soul are united to the Word himself into one person: therefore it seems that they are united to him by a single union.

2. Likewise, the union was made through assumption, therefore where there is one assumption, there is one union; but the Word assumed the whole human nature by a single assumption: therefore he united the flesh and the soul to himself by a single union.

3. Likewise, just as the whole man is composed of flesh and soul, so the whole body is composed of organic parts: therefore if there were diverse unions of the flesh and the soul to the divine nature, by parity of reasoning there would be diverse unions of the hand and the foot to the same, and of the other members. But if this is unfitting, it remains that there is one union of the flesh and the soul to the Deity.

4. Likewise, since the flesh and the soul are united by a natural union, they are united by one union: therefore by parity of reasoning, when they are united by a personal union — since that which is one in person is just as truly one as that which is one in nature; but the flesh and the soul are united to the Word by a personal union — therefore they are united by a single union, not by a manifold one.

> ### Conclusion.
> Speaking of union in the active and passive sense, the flesh and the soul were united to the Word by a single union; speaking of union as a relation, before death they were united by a single union in act and several in potency, but after death by several in act.

**I respond:** For the understanding of the foregoing it must be noted that "union" is said in three ways: in one way union is called the action of the one uniting, in another way it is called the passion of the unitable, in a third way it is called the relation of the things united. When therefore it is asked whether the soul and the body are united to the hypostasis of the Word itself by a twofold union, it must be answered that, if we speak of union-as-action, there is there but a single union. For the Word united the flesh and the soul to himself by a single union, just as by a single assumption he assumed the body and the soul. Likewise, if we speak of union passively, there was there but a single union. For the flesh and the soul were not united to the Word as divided in the first beginning of the union, but as conjoined into one substance and nature; therefore they were assumed and united by a single assumption and union. — But if we speak of union according as it is a relation of unitables, then it must be said that, since a relation is numbered according to the extremes, it has to be multiplied in the same way as the unitable itself has to be made several. Since therefore the unitable on the side of the human nature was one in act and several in potency — because that extreme was the human nature, consisting of body and soul, which concurred into one according to act and could be divided and distinct — hence it is that, so long as the body and the soul were conjoined, they were united to the Word by a single union, single, I say, in act, but several in potency; but when they were separated from one another in death, they were united by several unions. For the flesh was said to be united to the Word and united to the soul; and this relation on the side of the flesh and the soul was one thing and another. For granted that the flesh were not united, the soul could still be understood to be united.

And according to this the reply to the question proposed is clear. For in one way it can be conceded that the flesh and the soul are united to the Divinity by a manifold union, according to what is customarily said, namely that there was there a threefold union: one of the Divinity to the flesh, another of the Divinity to the soul, another of the soul to the flesh. And along this way the arguments proceed which show that there were several unions there. — But in other ways it must be said that there was there but one union; and along this way the arguments to the opposite proceed. And so the whole matter is clear. But since some of the arguments brought forward for the first part are sophistical and conclude also that the union is multiplied simply, they must therefore be answered.

1. To that, then, which is objected first, that the flesh and the soul are diverse unitables, because the one is spiritual, the other corporeal; it must be said that, although the flesh and the soul have a diversity between themselves, they are nevertheless parts constituting one thing in essence and nature; and because they concur into one nature, hence it is that in that union, by which the Son of God assumed the human nature, they hold the account of one extreme.

2. To that which is objected, that in death the Word was united to two diverse and divided things; it must be said that, even though those were locally divided, they were nevertheless ordered toward one another according to a natural inclination, and by reason of that order the flesh was fit to be united to the Deity. Moreover, granted that there were several unions after death, according as union names a relation, it does not nevertheless follow that they would be so in life; for although the union remained uniformly and immutably as to the bond, there was nevertheless made a certain change in the other of the extremes, namely in the human nature, whose constituting principles were sundered in death, although they were united in life.

3. To that which is objected, that there is order there, therefore distinction; it must be said that there is a certain order which posits distinction simply, when it is an order that is regarded according to position and grade among things of a like genus; but when some things are so ordered that there is one thing on account of another, it is not necessary that there be numeration there; just as if I hold a horse by the bridle, I hold the bridle prior to the horse, because I hold the horse by the mediation of the bridle; nevertheless I do not hold both by a twofold holding, but by a single one. And so it is clear that that argument does not compel. Yet the case of such holding and of union is not altogether alike; but this has been adduced for the dissolution of that argument.

4. To that which is objected, that the soul is united to the Divinity and to the flesh by a twofold union, etc.; it must be said that the case is not alike, because the Divinity and the flesh do not yield into one nature, but rather are naturally and essentially distinct; whereas it is not so with the flesh and the soul, since they constitute one nature; and therefore it is not necessary that the Deity be united to them by diverse unions.