Dist. 27, Art. 1, Q. 1
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/27/q/bon-sent-IV-d27-a1-q1
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### Article I.
### *On the quiddity of marriage.*

### Question I.
### *Whether marriage is the union of male and female.*

Concerning the first point it is asked whether marriage is the union (*coniunctio*) of male and female. And that it is so, it seems:

1. By the reason which the Master sets down in the [Lombard's] text: «Marriage, he says, is the union of male and female».

2. And that it is so is shown *by reason*. With the man alone existing, there is no marriage; likewise with the woman alone existing, there is no marriage: therefore marriage lies in a togetherness and in the joining of one to the other.

3. Likewise, nothing absolute is one in two subjects; but marriage is one in the man and the woman: therefore it does not signify something absolute, but relative. But that [relation], whatever it be, since it is not a disparity but a conformity, is not a disjunction but a union.

4. Likewise, that upon which those three goods follow — namely fidelity, offspring, and the Sacrament — is properly marriage; but this is the union of male and female, where there is *fidelity* in singleness, *offspring* in fruitfulness, and *signification* in indissolubility: therefore etc.

**On the contrary:** 1. When the superior essential [thing] is multiplied, the inferior is multiplied: therefore if marriage is a union, as often as husband and wife are joined, so often is a marriage contracted, and thus between the same man and the same woman there will be several marriages; which if it is false: therefore etc.

2. Likewise, no Sacrament is repeated over the same matter: therefore if marriage is a union of the man with the woman, once he is joined, he ought not to be joined again with the same [woman]. But this is false and unfitting: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, every Sacrament is a sensible sign; but no relation is a sensible sign, and the union of male and female is a relation: therefore such a union is not a sign, therefore neither a Sacrament; therefore, *by simple conversion*, no Sacrament is a union, therefore neither is marriage.

4. Likewise, if marriage is a union, then it is either *of bodies* or *of souls*. Not *of souls*, because then marriage would exist in the fatherland [heaven]; not *of bodies*, because then between Mary and Joseph there would have been no marriage.

5. Likewise, whether it be a union *of bodies* according to commingling, or *of souls* according to consent; it happens that such a union is removed through hatred: therefore marriage too [would be] dissolved and destroyed. But this is false, as will presently be shown: therefore marriage is not a union.

### Conclusion.

> *Marriage is rightly called the union of male and female.*

**I respond:** It must be said that marriage according to its *remote genus* is a *sign*; but the specification or descent to the *inferior genus* is taken according to comparison to the *thing signified*; hence, since the thing signified in this Sacrament is the *union of Christ and the Church*, and a union cannot be better signified than by an exterior union, just as the washing of baptism [is signified] by the exterior washing of water: therefore, just as baptism is called a *washing*, so marriage is called, essentially and according to its genus, a *union*. — And note that, just as in the *washing of baptism* there is something *permanent*, like the interior impression of the character, and something *transient*, like the exterior washing, and each is called baptism; so in *marriage* there is something *permanent*, and this is the bond by which the man and the woman are bound, however far they be exteriorly separated; and there is something *transient*, like the union first made by the exterior word, or by the exterior act; and each is called *marriage*, and each is a union. And therefore marriage is rightly called, and is, a union, as the first arguments show.

1. To that which is objected, that they are often joined; it must be said that a certain union *is called a bond*, a certain [union] *makes a bond*, a certain [union] *is the use of the bond*. I say therefore that the first and the second, because they regard the substance of marriage, are not repeated, but only the third; and upon the multiplication of that [third] there does not follow a multiplication of marriage, since it is not a *genus in being*, but an *act in using*, that is, a *use in acting*.

2. And from this the following [objection] is made clear, that there is no repetition of the Sacrament; and just as to *eat the body of Christ* frequently does not signify a *repetition* of the Sacrament, but its *use*; so it is to be understood in the case at hand; although it is not wholly similar, because what has once been eaten cannot be eaten again, whereas this woman, who has once been known, can be known again.

3. To that, then, which is objected, that it is a sensible sign; it must be said that, just as a *bodily likeness* is perceived by sense not by reason of itself, but by reason of the qualities in which there is the assimilation, which are apprehended by sense; so it must be understood in the case at hand, that although a union *in itself* is not perceptible as a relation, it is nevertheless [perceptible] *by reason of the things which are joined*, such as of the man and the woman, and *by reason of the sign* into which, or through which, they are joined.

4. 5. To that which is asked, whether it be *of bodies* or *of souls*; it must be said that [it is] of souls in bodies, because it is a union by reason of those who use and possess distinct sexes; but that union which regards the *whole joined thing* and is marriage essentially, is not an affection *of souls*, or an approximation *of bodies*, but a certain *binding bond*, which is not destroyed, whether they be separated in affection or in body. And by this the response to the last [objection] is made clear.