Dist. 49, Part 2, Art. 2, Q. 2
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/49/q/bon-sent-IV-d49-p2-s2-a2-q2
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### Question II. *Whether glorified bodies can hide their brightness from our eyes at the command of the soul.*

Secondly, inquiry is made concerning brightness in comparison; and it is asked whether glorified bodies can hide their brightness from our eyes at the command of the soul. And that they can, seems to follow:

1. Because Christ after the resurrection appeared to the disciples in the same shape and colour in which he was before; but, as Augustine says in *The City of God*, "Christ by his resurrection showed what our body is to be": therefore other bodies likewise will be able to.

2. Likewise, that body is in perfect obedience with respect to the soul: therefore it appears and shines forth according to more and less, as it pleases the soul.

3. Likewise, that brightness is disproportionate to eyes that are not glorified: therefore that it be seen by them is a matter of condescension: therefore the hiding of it from our eyes belongs to the nature of that glorious light itself.

**On the contrary:** 1. The more luminous a thing is, the less it can lie hidden from sight; but a glorified body is more luminous than one not glorified; but the latter cannot lie hidden: therefore neither can the former.

2. Likewise, light manifests itself by illuminating; but to illuminate is the natural and essential act of light: therefore, since nothing can be deprived of its essential act while it itself is preserved in *being*, it is impossible that a glorified body should not irradiate, and therefore that it should not illuminate and manifest itself to sight.

3. Likewise, as *to suffer* stands to *the impassible*, so *to be hidden* stands to *light*; but a glorified body cannot suffer, because it is impassible: therefore neither can it be hidden, since it is luminous.

> **Conclusion.** Glorified bodies can, at the command of the soul, hide their brightness from our eyes, but also display it.

**I respond:** To this some say that the brightness of a glorified body is manifest *to glorified sight* and cannot be hidden from it, whereas *to an eye not glorified* it is hidden and cannot be manifested to it, because it is disproportionate to it; whence, since *to hide* is to make hidden what is manifest, they say without qualification that it cannot. Nor is any consequence to be drawn from Christ, because he was God. — But it is astonishing to say that bodily brightness is altogether disproportionate and hidden; and because, if not in itself, at least it could be seen in its irradiation. And *besides*, it seems that Christ did not work marvels, but displayed proofs of the resurrection.

And therefore it must be said otherwise, that the quality of a body acts according to the requirement of that in which it is. Now a glorified body is subtle, and by its subtlety it can *penetrate* everything not glorified, as will appear below; it can also *resist*. And therefore I say that, because a glorified body through the effect of a spiritual power can *penetrate* every body, it can also penetrate the eye; and then it will not be the eye's object, and therefore it can *lie hidden*. — *Again*, because it can *present itself* to a body, it can also display its brightness entirely, although the eye be dulled and not comprehend it. And because it can *lie wholly hidden* by penetrating subtly, and *lie wholly open* by presenting itself visibly, it can also display itself *in a middle way*, more and less. Whence, if a glorified soul were here with a glorified body, it could close off from our eyes more and less of its body's brightness, and this by that nature whereby it is not only *bright*, but *penetrative* and *spiritual*. — And the reasons for this side are to be granted.

1. To that which is objected, that the more luminous a thing is the less it can lie hidden from sight, it must be said that this is true by the nature of *light*; nevertheless it can, by the nature of *spirituality* and *subtlety*.

2. To that which is objected, that light manifests itself by illuminating, I say that it does so not only *by illuminating*, but also *by presenting itself* to the eyes of those beholding; and because it can happen that glorified bodies penetrate the visible rays of a body not glorified, therefore etc.

3. To the other it must be said that *to be hidden* is twofold: either on account of obscurity on the side of the *object*, and of this it is true that light cannot be hidden; the other is by an incapacity on the side of the *eye*, because it cannot be fixed upon it on account of its surpassing subtlety, and this is not repugnant to light, as passibility is to impassibility. And in the first way it is impossible for light to be hidden, in the second way it is true and possible.

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