Dist. 4, 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/4/q/bon-sent-III-d4-dubia
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### Dub. I.

In this part there are questions concerning the text, and first it is asked about that which is said: *When one is named, three are understood*; for, when the essence is named, the person is not of necessity understood: therefore, when one person is named, much less is another understood. — Likewise, if, when one person is named, another is understood: therefore, given that the Father generates, it seems that the Son too generates.

**I respond:** It must be said that a person can be named with respect to a substantial act, or a personal one. If with respect to an essential act; then because one essence is in the three, and whatever essential belongs to one belongs to another; and when one person is named, the other too is named by the necessity of consequence, especially when that act is with respect to a created effect, in which there shine forth the things appropriated to the three persons. — And thus the reply to both objections is clear: for each proceeds according to some predication, which so belongs to one that in another way it is foreign to the other.

### Dub. II.

Likewise it is asked about that which is said, that *those born of water and the Holy Spirit are not called sons of the water, but of mother Church*. For if the Church is called *mother* only according to some transferred [sense], and a transferred likeness can be found in water, just as in the Church; it seems that they could be called *sons of the water*, just as *sons of the Church*. — In connection with this it is asked (*a connected question*), since the earthworm is naturally born from man, why it is not called his *son*?

**I respond:** It must be said that *son* and *father* are named not only from the relation of origin, but they must (*two things pertain to the account of a son*) have an express likeness. Since therefore *water* does not have an express likeness to him who is reborn, but rather to the grace through which he is reborn; whereas the *Church* does have an express likeness to him who is born in her, which [Church] is nothing other than the congregation of the faithful: therefore those reborn of water are called *sons of the Church*, not *sons of the water*. — By this same reasoning (*to the connected question*) the *earthworm* must not be called the *son* of man, although it is born from him, by the fact that it does not have a likeness to him. And therefore Augustine rightly refutes that argument by those examples: this is born from that, therefore it is its son; for *sonship* says more than *birth*. For sonship says origin together with assimilation.

### Dub. III.

Likewise it is asked about that which he says: *They are called sons of Gehenna also not as born of it, but as prepared for it*. For from this, that something is prepared for something after its own being, it seems rather to have in itself the account of a *father* than of a *son*: therefore it seems that they ought rather to be called *fathers* of Gehenna than *sons*.

**I respond:** It must be said that a son has a twofold property with respect to a father: one is regarded as to *emanation*, and the other as to *the inheriting of a possession*; and the first precedes, and the second follows. And they are called *sons of Gehenna* not by reason of the first property, but by reason of the second, for which they are prepared through some assimilation in perverse acts, in which they imitate the devil, whose dwelling is Gehenna.

### Dub. IV.

Likewise it is asked about that which he says, that *Christ was bodily filled with divine grace*. For if grace was not in the body, but in the spirit; it does not seem that he was filled *bodily*, but *spiritually*.

**I respond:** It must be said that this word, by which Christ is said to be *bodily filled with grace*, is expounded in three ways (*a threefold exposition*). In one way *bodily filling* is said by opposition to the shadow of a figure; for truth is to a figure as a body to a shadow; whence he is said to be *filled bodily*, that is, truly, not only figuratively. — In another way it can be expounded, so that he is said *to be filled bodily*, because the body itself was assumed into the unity of the person. Whence by bodily filling we understand the perfect and gratuitous union of the body and the soul. — In a third way it can be expounded, so that he is said to be *filled bodily* by a likeness to the threefold dimension: because the deity was in Christ by *essence*, as in all creatures, and thus by the mode of length; and by *grace*, as in all the Saints, and thus by the mode of breadth; and by *union*, and thus by the mode of depth. And this was touched upon and more fully expounded in the first book, in the thirty-seventh distinction.

### Dub. V.

Likewise it is asked about that which he says: *Born of the Holy Spirit, because he made him*. For this is not had in the Creed; but «conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary». It is asked, therefore, why conception is rather attributed to the Holy Spirit than birth?

**I respond:** It must be said that each can be attributed to each; in the Creed, nevertheless, the conception itself is rather attributed (*to be noted*) to the Holy Spirit than the birth, on account of the sanctification which was in the conception itself, and because the name of birth approaches more nearly the act of generation, and the conception itself the fabrication of the body. Whence he is more properly called *conceived of the Holy Spirit*. For this preposition *of* is taken there not materially nor substantially, but by power. And the conception itself is most fittingly to be attributed to the Holy Spirit.

### Dub. VI.

Likewise it is asked about that which he says: *Conceived of the Holy Spirit... because by the grace of God and operation* etc. For if this is the reason, it seems by parity of reasoning that the Holy Spirit generated him; and this is proved by the Gloss, on Matthew chapter three: *God is able from stones* etc.: «In testimony of this thing God generated a son from Sara»: therefore it seems that it could much more strongly be said that he generated a son from the Virgin Mary, if she conceived of the Holy Spirit.

**I respond:** It must be said to this that, as is had in the following chapter, *to generate* and *to make* differ (*to generate and to make differ*): for *to make* says the operation of an effective power or of an efficient cause, especially through the will; whereas *to generate* says the production of something by the mode of nature, especially when it is regarded as to the bringing forth of a thing into being. And therefore it is in no way conceded that he generated him, because he formed him from the Virgin by will and grace, not by nature. — But as for what he objects from the Gloss, it must be expounded *causally*: *God generated a son from Sara*, that is, he made it that Sara might beget a son. But improper expressions are not to be extended.

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