Dist. 10, Part 1, 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/4/d/10/q/bon-sent-IV-d10-p1-a1-q3
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### Question III. *Whether the body of Christ is under the species definitively.*

Thirdly it is asked, whether the body of Christ is under the species definitively. And that it is not, it seems:

1. Because that is defined to a place which is in one place; but the body of Christ under the Sacrament is in many places: therefore etc. *Proof of the minor:* everything that is, wherever it is consecrated, if it is consecrated in many places, is in many places; but the body of Christ is such: therefore etc.

2. Likewise, everything into which it is possible for many things to be converted in many places, is able to be in many places; but the body of Christ is of this kind: therefore etc. But no such thing has definite being: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, wherever the power of the word and the element extend themselves, there the Sacrament also extends itself; but the power of the word is not determined to a place, as is evident; likewise neither is the element, which is bread: therefore neither is this Sacrament, therefore neither is the body of Christ contained within.

4. Likewise, that which is in one place and can without change of itself be in another is not there definitively; but the body of Christ is of this kind, because it is in heaven and can without change of itself be in another place, as on the altar: therefore etc.

**To the contrary:**

**On the contrary:** 1. Every individual is *here and now*; but the body of Christ is an individual: therefore it is here and now. But what is *here and now* is in a place definitively: therefore etc. *If you say* that the body of Christ, although it is an individual, is nevertheless united to an

immense substance, and by reason of that union has it that it is in many places; if this is a sufficient reason: therefore from the instant of its conception it was in many places; which is foolish to say. *Furthermore,* that union does not take from it that it is an individual: therefore it does not take away its being *here and now* nor its being definite.

2. Likewise, if Christ in the Sacrament can be in many places, suppose there be only three places, in them it is possible for the body of Christ to be: therefore it is possible for it to be everywhere in them; but this, since it belongs to God alone, is impossible to befit another: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, what is in something, so that it is moved at the motion of that thing, is in it definitively; but Christ is moved at the motion of the whole species: therefore etc. *Proof of the minor:* when the species is transferred, the true body of Christ is truly said to be transferred: therefore etc.

### Conclusion.

> The body of Christ is under the species sacramentally, not properly definitively.

**I respond:** As Innocent says, « just as the Son of God according to his Divinity has a threefold mode of being: in all things by *essence,* in the just by *grace,* in Christ by *union;* so the body of Christ is *locally* in heaven, *personally* in the Word, *sacramentally* on the altar ». In this third mode he says that « it is found in many places », because there are many species containing it. Hence, properly speaking, it is in one place only, in which it is *defined,* like an individual; but because many things are converted into it, which are in diverse places, and it consequently is in diverse places according to that mode by which many things are converted into it, and this under the Sacrament.

Hence it must be noted, for the understanding of the objections, that the body of Christ is an *individual,* and an individual into which *many things are converted* in their own right. For as an *individual,* it is in heaven only in its proper and definite place. But because *many things are converted* into it, it does not have the term of its substance limited to one place, but extends itself to the place of conversion. And because the places of conversion cannot be all places nor one place only, but rather many; with regard to this it is neither immensely, like God, nor altogether definitively, like some individual, but in a *middle way,* just as God according to the mode of being by *grace* is not in all things, but in many.

If therefore the reason be asked, why the body of Christ is in many places; I believe that this is the reason, namely that many things are converted into it whole and in many *places.* — If it be asked why many; it must be said that the Lord instituted it. And if the *reason of the institution* be asked; it must be said that, because it is a spiritual and common food, it is therefore fitted to feed many, and therefore many things are converted into it; and it has the *aptitude* for feeding spiritually from its union with the Divinity, but the *act* from its existence under the Sacrament: and so it was instituted that many things should be converted into that body, and this under the Sacrament.

1. To what is objected first about the individual, the answer is evident: because beyond the account of an individual it has this, that many things are converted into it in diverse places. Hence just as an individual into which other things can be converted in part can be in a *greater place;* so that into which other things are converted totally in diverse places can be in *many places.*

2. To the other the response is evident, because conversion cannot take place in all places, because the priest would not have a place, for whose ministry it comes about. But supposing per impossibile that there were only three places; then it must be said that it would be everywhere, but not as God, because God is everywhere on account of his immensity, whence he can be absent from none; but the body of Christ would be everywhere on account of the fewness of the places.

3. To what is objected about the motion of translation, it must be said that the body of Christ holds the mean between immense being and definite being; and therefore in a certain way it is *immobile,* and in a certain way *mobile:* mobile indeed in one place and immobile in another; and in the same host it is not moved at the motion of the parts, neither in itself nor by accident, unless the whole host is transferred. If therefore it were *simply* changed and altogether, the argument would hold; but this has no truth.