Dist. 37, 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/37/q/bon-sent-IV-d37-a2-q3
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### Question III. *Whether uxoricide impedes marriage.*

Thirdly it is asked, whether uxoricide impedes marriage. And that it does, it seems.

1. Cause thirty-three, question two: «The slayers of their own spouses are to be reduced to penance, to whom marriage is utterly denied».

2. Likewise, under the same title, in the penance of Arnulf, who had killed his wife, it is said: «Never dare to take a wife, never to keep a concubine, nor to commit adultery».

3. Likewise, in that in which a man sins, in that he must be tormented; but this man sinned against marriage, by killing his wife: therefore, etc.

4. Likewise, above, in the thirty-fifth distinction the Master says in the text, and it was treated of the canon expressly, *Extra, "Concerning him who took into marriage a woman whom he had defiled by adultery"*, where it is said that the marriage is null and must be dissolved: therefore that which impedes, this is on account of the homicide of the husband, which he perpetrated: therefore if this man killed his wife, it is plain, etc.

**On the contrary:**
1. If someone were to kill another man's wife, on account of the homicide he is not rendered incapable of marriage: therefore if he has more power over his own wife, it seems that on account of her killing he ought not to be barred from marriage.

2. Likewise, it is possible that a man kill his wife out of zeal, which he has in detestation of adultery: therefore it seems that it stands for marriage: therefore he ought not to be punished by the privation of marriage.

3. Likewise, every sin can be blotted out through penance: if therefore this penalty is by reason of the sin, and this penalty can be an occasion of sin, especially for a young man who has the incentive of lust: therefore it seems that he cannot be impeded, at least once penance has been done.

4. Likewise, adultery is more repugnant to the good of marriage than homicide; but adultery simply does not impede: therefore neither does uxoricide.

### Conclusion

> *Spouse-killing impedes marriage, and indeed, when joined with adultery or with a promise of marriage, it dissolves it with respect to the accomplice, just as adultery too with the same promise.*

**I respond:** It must be said that one can kill his wife in three ways: either by pursuing fault, or by pursuing nature, or by pursuing marriage. By pursuing fault, as when he catches her in the crime of fornication and so detests it that in vengeance of the crime he inflicts death. By pursuing nature, as if a woman, on account of some defect which she has in herself, does not have her husband's favor; whence the husband holds her hateful and burdensome, and on account of that detestation and intensity of hatred, his fury being kindled, he does away with her. By pursuing marriage, as when he commits adultery with some woman whom he wishes to take as wife and cannot, except with his wife dead; and therefore he kills her. The first is a grave sin on account of the excess; the second is graver, and the third is gravest.

In any of these he is prohibited from contracting marriage, but more so in the second and most of all in the third; and in any of these cases dispensation is granted by the Church, and especially in the young; but in the first easily, in the second more difficultly, in the third in a certain way yes and in a certain way no. For with respect to that person with whom he committed adultery and for the sake of having whom in marriage he killed his spouse, dispensation will never be granted with him — nay, if he has been joined [to her], he is simply separated; but with respect to other women dispensation is granted on account of the danger. Whence, although the crime does not make him wholly illegitimate with respect to all women, on account of the danger of fornication, yet it does make him simply illegitimate with respect to some determinate person — namely, homicide joined with adultery, or adultery with the giving of faith, or the giving of faith together with uxoricide. — And so it must be conceded that such a crime impedes marriage in one way thus, because it impedes but does not dissolve; in another way, that it even dissolves, as has been touched upon.

**To the arguments:**
1. To that then which is objected, that one who kills another man's wife [is not disqualified]; it must be said that it is not similar; for because he offends against marriage in itself when he kills his own wife, therefore he must be punished in itself; not so, when he kills another's.

2. To that which is objected concerning zeal, it must be said that zeal does not excuse from the whole, but from so much; whence dispensation is more easily granted with him.

3. To that which is objected, that it can be blotted out through penance; it must be said that an enormity is not so quickly blotted out — nay, it remains longer as a penalty, as is plain in the case of irregularity.

4. To that which is objected, that adultery is more repugnant; it must be said that it is false, because uxoricide is against the *substance* of marriage, since it destroys the subject; but adultery is against the *good of faith*, without which marriage can exist; and therefore it is not similar.

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