Dist. 27, 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/3/d/27/q/bon-sent-III-d27-dubia
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# Doubts concerning the text of the Master

### Doubt I.

In this part there are questions concerning the text, and first it is asked about that definition which the Master sets down, by which he says: *Charity is love by which God is loved for his own sake, and one's neighbor for God's sake*; and in connection with this it is asked, since many definitions of charity are found — since «of one thing there is a single definition» — how they are distinguished from one another. For besides the aforesaid definition it is found to be defined by Augustine in the book *On the Morals of the Church* thus: «Charity is the most upright affection of the soul, joining us with God». — Likewise, Augustine in the *Soliloquies*: «Charity is the virtue by which we desire to see God and to enjoy him fully». — Likewise, in the book *On the Spirit and the Soul*: «Charity is the life joining the lover with the beloved». — Lastly, it is defined by the Apostle in the first chapter of the first letter to Timothy: *The end of the precept is charity from a pure heart, a good conscience, and unfeigned faith.*

Against the first definition it is objected thus: love and charity are the same: therefore since the Master defines charity through love, he defines the same through itself. — Likewise, that definition befitted natural love in the state of innocence: therefore it does not seem to be convertible with charity.

Against the second definition it is objected thus: the affection of the soul is from the soul itself; but charity is not from the soul itself, but from God: therefore charity is badly called the affection of the soul. — Likewise, this definition can fit hope: therefore it is not rightly assigned of charity.

Against the third it is objected thus: because vision corresponds to faith, and to enjoy is common to every virtue: therefore charity is badly defined through *to see* and *to enjoy.* — Likewise, desire is of an absent thing and in some way imperfect: since therefore charity is most perfect, it is badly defined through the act of desiring.

Against the fourth it is objected thus: Dionysius in the book *On the Divine Names*, defining love generally, says that it is a «unitive power»: therefore to join the lover with the beloved is not proper to charity, since it is common to natural and animal love. — Likewise, life is an absolute perfection, the joining of lover with beloved is a relative quality: therefore charity is badly said to be a joining life.

Against the last it is objected thus: charity is the root of the virtues and the principle of meriting and the weight by which one is inclined and tends toward the end: therefore it does not seem that charity ought to be called the end.

Likewise, it is asked about those three members which are added, for what they stand, and how they are distinguished? — Likewise it is asked, why to the *heart* is attributed *purity*, and to the *conscience* *goodness*, and to *faith* *stability*, since purity of heart is from faith, in the fifteenth chapter of Acts: *Purifying their hearts by faith?* — And why is faith placed last, since it is itself first?

**I respond:** It must be said that charity, according to its manifold comparison, can be defined in manifold ways. For charity can be compared to the *object*; and thus the first definition is assigned, set down by the Master. — Again it can be considered through comparison to the *ultimate end*; and thus it is defined by Augustine in the *Soliloquies.* — It can also be compared to its *proper act*, which is *to unite* and *to adhere*; and thus it is defined by Augustine in the book *On the Morals of the Church* and in the book *On the Spirit and the Soul*, through the act of uniting and joining the lover with the beloved, namely our affection with God. — Again it can be compared to the *habit joined to it*, which in some way is the principle of charity itself; and thus it is defined by the Apostle, when it is said: *Charity is the end of the precept* etc. And this is clear from the explanation of the notification itself. For charity, compared to the *habits of the other* theological virtues, because it unites them to the end, holds the primacy among them, and therefore moves and informs and terminates or consummates; and on that account it is said to be the *end of the precept*; and because it is the end of the others, the acts of the others dispose toward the act of charity, and charity itself immediately elicits [it]. And therefore three conditions are set down there, and by the first, by which it is said to be *charity from a pure heart*, the condition of charity itself is touched on, whose [office] is to purify the affection of the heart from all earthliness. By the second, namely *from a good conscience*, the condition of hope is touched on; by the third the condition of faith; and according to this they are ordered, according as they more principally dispose toward the act of charity. And thus the distinction and understanding of the foregoing definitions is clear.

To that, therefore, which is first objected against the definition of the Master, that love and charity are the same; it must be said that although they are the same in *reality*, yet there is some difference of *account*; for love extends to more than charity. Whence a difference is wont to be assigned, that *love* belongs to nature, *love [as choice]* to the deliberative will, and *charity* to grace. — There is also another difference, because *charity* names a habit, but *love* names an act; and so charity is defined through love, as the less common through the more common, and the habit through its act.

To that which is objected, that that notification fits love in the state of innocence; it must be said that the difference is in the mode of loving God for his own sake, according as it is said of natural love and of charity itself, as was shown in the second book. And therefore from this that account is not shown not to be well assigned.

To that which is objected concerning the notification of Augustine *On the Morals of the Church*, that charity is the affection of the soul; it must be said that there the predication is *material*; therefore in that reasoning there is a sophism *according to accident.* — But to that which he adds, that this notification fits hope; it must be said that to hope, properly speaking, it does not belong *to unite*, but rather *to raise up*; for it belongs to faith *to direct*, and to hope *to raise up*, and to charity *to adhere*.

To that which is objected concerning the definition of Augustine *of the Soliloquies*, that charity ought not to be defined through *to see* and *to enjoy*; it must be said that just as faith knows for itself and for the other virtues, so charity desires for itself and for the others. And since the perfection of the reward consists in the vision and fruition of God; hence it is that charity is defined through the desire of both, not because *to see* is proper to it, but because the desire of having God is proper to charity.

To that which is objected, that desire is of an absent thing and an imperfect motion; it must be said that there charity *of the way* is defined, which has imperfection annexed to it. — It could nonetheless also be said that desire, inasmuch as it excludes weariness, is not only of an absent thing, but also of a present one; and in this way it is taken broadly in the matter proposed.

To that which is objected against the definition of Augustine *On the Spirit and the Soul*, that charity is a joining life; it must be said that although *to join* befits every love in some way, yet this whole, which is *joining life*, is proper to charity itself; because there is no love which properly has [the power] to vivify the soul, except gratuitous love, which joins with God who vivifies the soul itself.

To that which is objected, that those two cannot stand together, life and joining; it must be said that although life, inasmuch as it is *first act*, is an absolute perfection, yet, inasmuch as it is *second act*, it has a respect to an object outside, as is clear: because according to the Philosopher *to use food* and *to understand* are differences of that which is *to live*; and charity is life, according as life is called *second act*, as in the preceding [discussions] was shown.

To that which is objected concerning the notification of the Apostle, that it ought not to be called *end*, since it is *principle*; it must be said that since nothing prevents three causes from coinciding in one, as is clear in God with respect to the creature; there is no unfittingness in charity being at once *root*, *form* and *end*, according to the comparison of the threefold cause, since it makes us perfectly conformed to God, according as above was had.

To that which is asked concerning the sufficiency and number and order and appropriation of those conditions which are superadded; the response is clear enough from the explanation of the definition itself, and from those things which in the second book were determined, in the thirty-eighth distinction, which need not be repeated for the present. And therefore concerning that notification of the Apostle and the others let it suffice for the present to have said only this much.

### Doubt II.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *For which also there are two commandments.* For it seems that there ought to be one commandment only, because of one work according to one account there ought to be one commandment; but there is one account of loving in God and in one's neighbor: therefore there ought to be one commandment in both. — Likewise, if commandments are numbered according to the number of things lovable, since there are four things to be loved out of charity, there ought to be four commandments. — Likewise, *he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the Law*, as is said in the thirteenth chapter to the Romans; and in the same place it is said that every other commandment *is restored in that word*: therefore it seems that there ought to be one commandment only.

**I respond:** It must be said that since commandments must be diversified according to the order toward God and one's neighbor, as is clear by the distinction of the first tablet from the second; therefore, since charity has to order with respect to both, it was necessary that the precepts be distinguished; nevertheless, because there is one account of loving, one could be implied in the other.

To that, therefore, which is objected, that commandments are distinguished by the account of the habit itself; it must be said that this is false, but rather by the mode of ordering toward another.

To that which is objected, that there ought to be four commandments; it must be said that in the commandment concerning one's neighbor love of oneself is sufficiently included; and because man is ordered to this by nature, it was not necessary to be led to this by a divine precept.

To that which is objected: *he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the Law*; the response is clear: because the Apostle there speaks of the fulfillment of the second tablet. Furthermore, in the commandment concerning the love of neighbor is included the commandment concerning the love of God. For although one is included in the other, yet it cannot be inferred that one is not distinguished from the other; for this is on account of the connection and order, which does not exclude the distinction.

### Doubt III.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *The human mind is so constituted that it never fails to remember itself* etc. Against the first it is objected thus: memory is of an absent and past thing; the soul is never absent and past to itself: therefore it never remembers itself. — Likewise, against that which follows, that *it never fails to understand itself*; it is objected that the soul understands things other than itself; and it is impossible that it understand many things at once: therefore then it does not understand itself. Furthermore, many believe that they do not have a soul which is a spiritual substance: therefore it seems that in such people the soul does not understand itself. — Likewise, against the third which says: *That it never fails to love itself*; it is objected thus, that many kill themselves and hate their own life: therefore it seems that all that is false. Furthermore, in the following authority the contrary is at once subjoined: *He who loves iniquity hates his own soul.*

**I respond:** It must be said that those three things which are touched on in the text can be attributed to the soul in two ways, namely in *act* or in *habit.* If in *habit*, thus they are truly and always attributed to it, since the soul by its very self is born to remember itself, to understand itself, and to love itself. But if it is understood in *act*; thus they are not always attributed to it, because it does not always think of itself nor always turn upon itself. Augustine therefore speaks as to *habit*, not as to *act.*

To that which is objected, that memory is with respect to past things; it must be said that Augustine takes memory more broadly than the Philosopher, as in the first book was shown.

To that which is objected, that it does not always think of itself, but rather of other things; the response is already clear: because he does not speak of *to understand*, according as it signifies actual cognition and the turning upon oneself.

To that which is objected concerning love; it must be said that *to love* is in two ways, namely by *affect* and by *effect.* By *affect* there is no one who hates himself, but rather if he kills himself, this is that he may find greater rest; if he sins, this is because he seeks his own delight. But if we speak of love as to *effect*, thus many hate themselves, because by loving themselves inordinately they do evil to themselves and are hostile [to themselves], like many who, wishing to flee confusion or tribulation, kill themselves bodily; and those who wish to satisfy the desires of the flesh kill themselves spiritually and are hostile to themselves very cruelly.

### Doubt IV.

Likewise it is asked about what he says: *The mode of love is intimated, when it is said: from the whole heart, that is, from the whole intellect; from the whole soul, that is, from the whole will; from the whole mind, that is, from the whole memory.* For to love pertains to the affect, not to the intellect: therefore it is badly said to love from the intellect and memory. — Likewise, Bernard *On the Love of God*: «What is love but a vehement and well-ordered will»: therefore it seems that, from the fact that he said *from the whole soul*, it is superfluous to add the other conditions. — Likewise, blessed John sets down only two conditions, in the third chapter of the first letter of John: *Let us love in deed and in truth*: therefore it seems that in those three conditions there is superfluity. — Likewise, it seems that there is diminution, because in the sixth chapter of Deuteronomy this condition is set down: *And from the whole strength*, which is not set down here. — Likewise, in the twelfth chapter of Mark this condition is added besides the aforesaid conditions: *From thy whole power*: therefore it seems that there is diminution there, or superfluity here. Likewise in the tenth chapter of Luke this condition is added: *From all thy powers.* — It is asked therefore concerning the distinction and order, number and sufficiency of those three.

**I respond:** It must be said that although charity immediately regards the act of the concupiscible [power], about which it first consists, nevertheless it regards the acts of the other powers as disposing. Whence all the powers of the soul are in some way ordered to love itself, as to that which has the character of completion with respect to all the virtues. And since the higher powers of the soul are three, therefore three conditions are set down. — And again, because the threefold set of the soul's powers can be distinguished in two ways, such that one of those modes does not disagree with the other; therefore the conditions concerning the act of loving, regarding the powers of the soul, must be set down and distinguished in a twofold mode. For in one mode the powers of the soul are distinguished, according as in them the image consists, and they are said to be three potencies in the mind, namely *memory*, *intelligence* and *will*; and thus according to those three powers three conditions are set down, of which one regards *intelligence*, namely *from the whole heart*; another the *will*, namely *from the whole soul*; the third *memory*, namely *from the whole mind.*

— And thus these three conditions are assigned in the twenty-second chapter of Matthew and are expounded by Augustine thus: *from the whole heart*, that is, from the whole intellect without error; *from the whole soul*, that is, from the whole will without contradiction; *from the whole mind*, that is, from the whole memory without forgetfulness.

In another mode the powers of the soul are distinguished thus: into *rational*, *irascible* and *concupiscible*; and according to these three the conditions are set down, of which one regards the *rational*, namely *from the whole heart*, and another the *concupiscible*, namely *from the whole soul*, and the third the *irascible*, namely *from the whole strength.* — And thus they are assigned in the sixth chapter of Deuteronomy and are expounded by Bernard thus: *from the whole heart*, that is, wisely; *from the whole soul*, that is, sweetly; *from the whole strength*, that is, bravely; that we be not seduced by deceits, not led away by flatteries, not broken by injuries. And to these three can be reduced those three which are touched on in the first chapter of the first letter to Timothy: *From a pure heart, a good conscience, and unfeigned faith.* — Nor is there in these any repugnance, for the reason that the irascible power and memory itself are conformed in act; and therefore one virtue is reformative of both, and one endowment perfective of both, and it regards one principally and the other as a consequence. And therefore, where in Deuteronomy it is said *from the whole strength*, in Matthew it is said *from the whole mind.* And this is the reason why this condition *from the whole mind* is placed last. — And thus the sufficiency, number and distinction of those things which are assigned concerning the mode of love is clear, and that nothing is superfluous and nothing diminished; the solution of the objections is also clear.