Dist. 25, Art. 2, 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/25/q/bon-sent-IV-d25-a2-q3
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### Question III. *Whether integrity of the flesh is necessary for receiving an order.*

Thirdly it is asked whether, for the reception of an order, integrity of the flesh is necessary. And that it is, seems [to be the case].

1. First to Timothy, chapter three: *A bishop must be the husband of one wife*; and the same is said of a deacon.

2. Likewise, Ambrose to the Vercellenses, and it is found in the thirty-fourth distinction: «We recognize that not only concerning a bishop and a presbyter did the Apostle so establish, but that the Fathers also, in the tract of the Council of Nicaea, added that no cleric ought to be one who has obtained a second marriage».

3. Likewise, he who has had a wife whose flesh is divided cannot be promoted: therefore much less can he who has had several wives. *The first* is clear from what Pope Innocent says in the thirty-fourth distinction: «If anyone, even a layman, has married a widow, whether before baptism or after, let him not be admitted to the clergy».

4. Likewise, a priest or bishop bears the figure of Christ; but Christ was not divided, but rather united by unity: therefore the signification of the order is deficient in such a one: therefore the order also [is deficient], since signification is essential to the Sacrament.

5. Likewise, bigamy is a property which is never relinquished, nor can he who is a bigamist become a non-bigamist: therefore, if it impedes the Sacrament, it seems that it renders him incapable of the reception of an order.

**On the contrary:** 1. The corruption of the flesh does not impede the reception of the Sacrament: therefore neither does division, by a like reasoning.

2. Likewise, if the division of the flesh which is with a wife impedes, since that which is with a harlot is much more blameworthy, it would impede much more strongly; but that does not impede: therefore neither does this.

3. Likewise, if the division of the flesh impedes, [it does so] either by reason of something that occurs in the *flesh*, or by reason of that which occurs in the *soul*. By reason of something that occurs in the *flesh*: this does not seem [so], because it leaves no other disposition than [that found] in the knowledge of one [woman]. By reason of something that occurs in the *soul*: not [so], since, the wife having died, nothing remains of the marriage.

4. Likewise, I ask: why does it impede? If on account of a *defect of the Sacrament*; I ask: of which? If of *matrimony*; on the contrary: he who has never contracted [marriage] is more deficient in the Sacrament of matrimony than he who has contracted twice: therefore he is not deficient in the Sacrament of matrimony. — If [a defect] of the Sacrament of *order*; on the contrary: bigamy is not considered according to the Sacrament of *order*, but according to *matrimony*: therefore the order is not deficient.

There is therefore the question: why does *division* impede, and not *corruption*?

And again: why does corruption impede in a woman, so that she is not consecrated, [and] why not likewise also in a bishop?

And again: why does the fornication of a wife rather make the husband irregular than the fornication of the husband, since he is the more to be punished on account of the division of his own flesh than of another's?

### Conclusion.

> *Bigamists, on account of the defect of signification, are unfit for the reception of an order, especially a sacred one; yet in such wise that they validly receive the order.*

**I respond:** For the understanding of the aforesaid it must be noted that the Sacrament of order abounds beyond the others in the character of *signifying*, since not only does that which is applied externally signify, but rather the very one receiving is a sign, and the very bishop consecrated or presbyter ordained signifies Christ himself, according to what was touched on above. And in this property it differs from the other Sacraments, except from matrimony, in which the man himself, who is the subject of the Sacrament itself, is a sign of Christ himself, just as the woman is a sign of the Church, and thus they concur unto the same signification.

Since therefore it belongs to the *primary* signification of order that the ordained signify Christ as the spouse of the Church; and a bigamist cannot signify this, who has had a widow to wife, since the Church has had a single spouse, and Christ a single bride: hence it is that such persons are unfit for the orders, especially the *principal* and *sacred* ones, in which a man now begins expressly to figure Christ. Hence bigamy renders one unfit for the diaconate and subdiaconate and priesthood and most of all for the episcopate; and therefore in these orders one never reads of a dispensation being granted, nor ought one to be granted; not because the Sacrament is *essentially deficient* — rather the bigamist receives the character — but because the *perfection* of the Sacrament is *deficient* in him, which can in no way be supplied or compensated by a man. Yet in the lesser orders, by reason of necessity, he does receive a dispensation, as is said in the thirty-fourth distinction, *Necessity compelling*; and again, *A lector, if [he has married] a widow*, etc. — From these things it is clear that division of the flesh impedes, and why it impedes, and what division [impedes].

**1, 2.** To that, then, which is objected concerning corruption, it must be said that it is not similar: because it is not repugnant to the *necessity* of the Sacrament nor to its *signification*, as bigamy is. Likewise division by fornication does not impede, because it is not a division by *signification*; but this [bigamy] is a division *signifying*.

3. To that which is objected — [namely, whether] this is on the part of the soul, or on the part of the flesh — it must be said that the reason is taken on the part of the *whole man*, whose it is to contract matrimony, and who is the subject of matrimony; in which indeed there is an impediment, not by reason of *uncleanness* or of an *absolute quality* which occurs in the flesh, but on account of the *deficient signification*. For because he contracted with one [woman], he signified Christ; but because he withdrew from the one and contracted with a second, he withdrew from the signification; and thus there is a *defect of the Sacrament*, namely of unity, which ought to be signified in the Sacrament of matrimony and of order.

4. And by this the following is made clear, which is objected concerning the defect of the Sacrament; for I say that in him is deficient the Sacrament of *unity*, which, whether it be deficient on his own part, or on the part of the wife, renders him less suitable for the Sacrament of order. If therefore you ask: which Sacrament is deficient, whether of order or of matrimony? I say that the Sacrament of *order* is deficient, because there is not the perfection which could signify what the order requires. *Moreover*, there is a defect of the Sacrament of *matrimony* — a defect, I say, not of simple *negation*, as is the case in one who was never married, but a defect of *privation*, where there is something of signification, something of privation, which begets a certain enormity or deformity, by reason of which he ought not to be admitted to so noble a Sacrament.

From these things the following questions are made clear, namely why division impedes, [and] not corruption, because no Sacrament is deprived, nor is [the Sacrament] made defective on account of *corruption*, as [it is] on account of *division*.

To that which is asked: why does corruption not impede the consecration of a man, as [it does] of a woman? some jurists say that a bishop signifies the Church militant, but a virgin signifies Christ, who was a virgin. But right reason does not accept that. — And therefore it must be said otherwise, that a bishop signifies Christ, but a woman signifies the Church triumphant, or the Church herself, who is a virgin and never was [anything] except the bride of Christ; but Christ, although he was a virgin, nevertheless had the Synagogue not as a wife, but as a concubine.

And by this the last [question] is made clear, why he who betroths a woman corrupted by another and knows her is unfit,  and is judged a bigamist. It must be said that [this is] because he is not one [man] of one [woman]; for she is not one [woman] of one, and the greater unity ought to be signified on the part of the wife than of the husband, since the Church was joined to none save Christ, neither matrimonially nor in any other way. But Christ was joined to the Synagogue, though not indissolubly, and thus not matrimonially. — And thus it is clear that all such statutes are exceedingly reasonable, because in their establishment fault is not weighed, but rather fitting signification.

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