Dist. 43, Art. 1, Q. 5
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/43/q/bon-sent-IV-d43-a1-q5
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### Question V. *Whether the resurrection is natural or miraculous.*

Fifth, it is asked whether the resurrection is natural or miraculous. And that it *is not natural* is shown:

1. *From the standpoint of the beginning:* because «by nature there is no return from privation to a possessed state»; but in death there is the utmost privation: therefore the resurrection, since it is from death, is not through nature.

2. Likewise, this same thing is shown *from the standpoint of the terminus:* because everything that nature produces is corruptible and mortal; but the glorified body is immortal and incorruptible: therefore, etc.

3. Likewise, thirdly it is shown *from the standpoint of the mode of operating:* because nature works successively, not suddenly; but the resurrection will be sudden, *in the twinkling of an eye*: therefore it is not from nature.

4. Likewise, it is also shown *from the standpoint of the effective principle:* because «nature is a force implanted in things, procreating like from like»; but in the resurrection like is not made from like: therefore, etc.

5. Last, it is shown *from the standpoint of all these together:* because it is an article of faith, which is not concerned with those things that come about through nature, but above nature: therefore, etc.

**On the contrary:**
1. Job compares the resurrection of man to the sprouting of a felled tree, Job fourteen; the Apostle, to the quickening of a dead grain, First Corinthians fifteen; Gregory, in the Paschal homily, to the cyclical generation of the body of a tree from a small seed. And by these they wish to show and prove the resurrection: therefore, if the reasoning and likeness they set forth is good, since all these things are from nature, the resurrection is natural.

2. Likewise, this same thing is shown because Augustine says in the book *On the Greatness of the Soul*: «If we attend to the course of natural things, it will be more certain to us that the resurrection is to come than that the sun will rise tomorrow».

3. Likewise, the Apostle says: *This corruptible must put on incorruption*; but what is above nature need not come to pass: therefore the resurrection is within the power of nature.

4. Likewise, this same thing is proved *by reason:* because the aptitude of a man's dust for the generation of a man is greater than for that of another animal; but nature through putrefaction can generate another animal from such dust: therefore it can also restore the body of a man.

5. Likewise, the aptitude of the matter of a man's body for that body is greater than that of the rods for serpents; but the production of serpents from the rods of the magicians, although it came about by diabolical agency, was nevertheless natural: therefore, etc.

6. Likewise, what is in the appetite of nature is natural, because nature did not establish appetite in vain; but the soul naturally desires to be reunited to the body; this is established by Augustine *On Genesis according to the Letter*, where he says that «the soul is held back on account of its appetite for the body, lest it be borne with its whole intention into the highest heaven»: therefore, etc. *If you say* that the appetite is only on the part of the *soul*, it is shown also to be on the part of the *dust*: because the human body, from its conjunction with the soul, is ordered to immortality; but the conjunction with the soul is natural: therefore so also is that ordering. But that to which a thing is naturally ordered, it has a natural appetite for, as fire has to be borne upward: therefore, etc. *Moreover*, those dusts are either *resolved* into the first elements, or *not*. If so, then since the elements are homogeneous, they have no more an ordering to the human body than any other part of the element which was never a body: therefore there is no greater reason why a human body should be made again from it than from another; which is false. If they are *not* resolved into the elements, then some force holds them, which is in those dusts, and through it they are ordered to a further form, therefore a natural one: therefore, from the standpoint of both body and soul, the resurrection is natural.

### Conclusion

> **Conclusion.** *The resurrection is not natural, but above nature.*

**I respond:** It must be said that in the resurrection there are three things: the first is the *reformation* of the body from the dust; the second, the *union of the soul* to the body thus reformed; the third, the inseparable *binding-together* of the things united. The first is *against* nature, that is, against the accustomed course of nature, which can destroy what is complete but cannot restore what is destroyed. The second is *according to* nature, namely that the soul be united most fittingly to the body organized for it, to which it desired to be united. The third is *above* nature, namely that from the corruptible there be made the incorruptible, not separable.

Since, therefore, the first and the last are not *from* nature, but *above* or *against* it, therefore it must not be said that the resurrection is natural, but above nature.

**To the arguments:**

*To 1, 2.* To that, then, which is objected — that it is proved and compared to the operations of nature — it must be said that the proof is good and proceeds through the *topic from the lesser*. For if created nature can make the living from the dead, and from a small seed make a great body — nature which is of finite power — much more can God by Himself do this with regard to man; and to this those reasonings and comparisons tend. And on account of this Augustine says: «The resurrection will be most certain to us, if we attend to the natural course», not because it is from nature, but because this can be done better by God than nature's own works can be done by nature.

*To 3.* To that which is objected concerning fittingness (*opportunitas*), it must be said that there is a *fittingness of the matter* and of the *efficient cause*, just as there is a necessity [of each]; and the fittingness on the part of the *efficient cause* is by reason of immutability, not of compulsion; and therefore it is fitting because God decreed and disposed it, not because He is compelled, or because the *matter* is necessarily

prepared on the part of nature. And therefore such a *fittingness* does not entail that a resurrection of this kind is from a natural cause, since it stands together with a cause operating supernaturally.

*To 4, 5.* To that which is objected — that nature can act with regard to those things generated by putrefaction, and with regard to serpents — it must be said that certain animals have a *slight* organization, such as worms and ringed-bodied animals; and of such the nature is productive through putrefaction. Certain others have a *complete* [organization], such as perfect sentient and walking animals, like the horse; and such nature cannot [produce] except through a formative power infused with the emission of seed; and such is the human body, which cannot be naturally organized unless there be present seed and a fitting receptive vessel, namely the womb; and therefore it is not similar in the case of serpents.

*To 6.* To that which is objected concerning the appetite of nature, one can respond in two ways: in one way, that that proposition is false. For there are certain things in the *appetite* of nature which are nevertheless not in its *power*; and such are not natural, as is clear in the case of beatitude. But those which are in *appetite and in power*, such are natural; but the resurrection is not such. — Otherwise it can be resolved thus: that on the part of the *soul* there is appetite, on the part of the *dust* there is no appetite; nor on that part is it natural, but against nature.

Hence note three opinions concerning the *dust*. For some say that [the dusts] *have an appetite* and a natural ordering to incorruption on account of the soul; and by reason of that they hold that they *cannot be resolved all the way down to the elements*, yet they can be the matter of any bodies whatever. — But this I do not grasp: that a man could revert into the body of a worm, or into the body of a wolf, and not be resolved into the elements; indeed the Gloss on that verse of the Psalm: *They have set out the dead bodies*, seems to say that the resurrection is «from the most hidden bosoms of nature». The word of Augustine in the *Enchiridion* also opposes it, for it implies that they can be resolved even into the elements themselves.

Another opinion is that they are *resolved into the elements*, and yet *the appetite remains* on account of this: that those elements, inasmuch as they were the matter of the human body, had much of the nature of light, which stands together with all the elements; and by reason of that nature they have appetite and ordering. — But neither do I understand this: how light should remain together with earth, and that the earth which is the matter of the human body should be more luminous; and that the worm which is generated from a human body should have more of the nature of light than another worm.

The third opinion is that the dusts are resolved, or can be resolved, into the elements; nor do those elements have any appetite or ordering to the body according to nature, but only according to divine providence, which disposes to reform that same body for the soul, that in it [the soul] may be rewarded; nor is that part distinct from the other parts of the element in itself, but [only] in comparison to the divine wisdom, from which nothing lies hidden, nothing escapes.

And this opinion is more probable, as I believe. And then the reply to the objection is clear: because a body never, from its union with the soul, receives any created quality or disposition of incorruptibility according to the present state — unless perhaps you say merit or demerit, but that remains in the soul, not in the body — or if you should posit some other disposition, either after corruption and resolution it does not remain, or it remains in a very remote potency. — This, nevertheless, is true without cavil: that the body, from the moment it is united to the rational soul, straightway has an ordering to immortality according to divine providence.

And if you ask: how does the soul have an appetite for this part of the element, since it is wholly homogeneous and of one nature with the other parts of the element, and does not even have a distinction — because it can be entirely mingled with others, and again a body could equally well be restored to it from another part of the element, of the same complexion and disposition and completeness? — it must be said that, however much it may have been like [the rest] and mingled with other elements, whether with one or with many, nevertheless the substance of the matter always remains together with its *seminal reason*; and the part of the substance of that matter, even if it is not actually separated from the other parts with which it is commingled, is nevertheless separable; and although it is not separable nor distinguishable according to human power, it is nevertheless separable and distinguishable according to the divine power and wisdom, which knows into what the human body will have returned, by however many and whatever changes and conversions it may have been altered: and thus, through the discernment of that wisdom and the operation of [its] power, it is afterward disposed through the same forms by which it was disposed for the forming of the soul.

And if you ask why the soul desires this one rather than another, since there is no prior choice on the ground of uniformity — it must be said that it desires [it] more on account of the bond and conjunction which it had to it. — And this is clear thus. For the rational soul, because it is a soul, differs from an Angel and agrees with other souls, and through this it has an inclination to a body; because it is rational, to a human body; because it is noble, to a more nobly organized one; but to this one more than to another on account of the conjunction which it had to it. — There is an example, if someone should wish to contract marriage: given two maidens equally beautiful and good, and equal in all other conditions, here he will be indifferent with respect to either. But suppose he is joined to one, the conjunction itself will now bind him so much to this one — if it was from love — that he now takes no comfort in having the other, nor would he give this one for another more beautiful and better. So the soul is united with such affection to the substance of the flesh which it formerly gave life to, that it is not completely satisfied unless that same [flesh], wherever it lies hidden, be restored to it.

And thus it is clear that the soul has an ordering and appetite by which it is ordered to that body, however much it may be conformed to others; but the body has its ordering *by reason of divine providence*. But that it should have [this ordering] through something that is *in itself*, from which it has been fully resolved — I do not *dare to assert* on this account, because neither reason nor authority nor faith compels it. Nevertheless, since it can be that God has given it, I do not *dare pertinaciously to deny* it. Therefore, holding fast what is certain, let us leave the uncertain to deeper minds. For suppose there is no appetite in the dust, and that the resolution goes all the way to the last [elements]; nothing perishes that pertains to the resurrection, on account of this: that, as Augustine says, «earthly matter, from which the flesh of mortals is created, does not perish for God. But whether it be dissolved into any dust or ash, or scatter away into any breaths or breezes, or be turned into the substance of whatever other bodies, or into the elements themselves, or into whatever food, and so on; even in a point of time it returns to that soul which first gave it life».

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