Bonaventure

Distinctio VII

Cap. I

Utrum Pater potuerit vel voluerit gignere Filium.

Hic solet quaeri a quibusdam, utrum Pater potuerit vel voluerit generare Filium. Si enim, inquiunt, potuit et voluit generare Filium: ergo potuit aliquid et voluit, quod nec potuit nec voluit Filius; nam Filius nec potuit nec voluit generare Filium. Cui versutiae facile respondemus dicentes: posse vel velle generare Filium non est aliquid posse vel velle subiectum voluntati vel potentiae. Est tamen aliqua potentia vel voluntas, scilicet posse vel velle gignere Filium; et ideo distinguenda est intelligentia propositi verbi: posse vel velle gignere Filium est posse vel velle aliquid. Neque enim generatio Filii aliquid eorum est, quae subiecta sunt divinae potentiae et voluntati, nec est aliquid inter omnia vel de omnibus, sed super omnia et ante omnia. Non enim ante voluit vel potuit, quam genuit; sicut nec ante fuit, quam genuit, quia ab aeterno fuit et ab aeterno genuit.

Ex simili quoque hoc videre possumus. Pater enim potest esse Pater et vult esse Pater; Filius autem nec potest nec vult esse Pater: ergo Pater potest vel vult esse aliquid, quod non potest vel vult esse Filius. Non sequitur, quia esse Patrem non est esse aliquid, sed est esse ad aliquid, ut in sequenti ostendetur.

Sed vehementer nos movet quod ait Augustinus in secundo libro contra Maximinum¹, qui asserebat Patrem potentiorem Filio, eo quod Filium genuit Deum creatorem, Filius autem non; dicebatque Patrem potuisse gignere non-Filium; et ideo potentiorem esse Filio. Ad quod respondens Augustinus dicere videtur, quod Filius etiam potuit gignere, volens ostendere, Patrem non esse potentiorem Filio, his verbis: «Absit, ut ideo potentior sit Pater Filio, sicut putas, quia Creatorem genuit Pater, Filius autem non genuit Creatorem; neque enim non potuit, sed non oportuit». Vide et diligenter attende haec verba: non enim non potuit, sed non oportuit. Videtur enim dicere, quod Filius potuit gignere, sed non oportuit; et ita potuit quod non oportuit.

Quare autem non oportuit, subdit dicens²: «Immoderata enim esset divina generatio, si genitus Filius nepotem gigneret Patri, quia et ipse nepos, nisi avo suo pronepotem gigneret, secundum vestram mirabilem sapientiam impotens diceretur». Hoc autem non videtur quibusdam posse stare, scilicet quod Filius potuerit gignere. Si enim Filius potuit gignere, potuit esse pater; et si potuit esse pater, ergo potuit esse pater vel sui, vel Patris, vel Spiritus sancti, vel alicuius alius. Sed alius non, quia nullus alius semper fuit; nec Patris, quia Pater est ingenitus et innascibilis; nec sui, «quia nulla res se ipsam gignere potest»³; nec Spiritus sancti, quia nasci non potuit⁴.

Quomodo ergo accipietur quod supra dictum est: non enim non potuit gignere, sed non oportuit — quasi potuit, sed non oportuit? Potest sic intelligi: non enim non potuit, sed non oportuit, id est, non ex impotentia sui fuit, quod Filius non genuit, sed ei non conveniebat, sicut Deus Filius non est Deus Pater; nec tamen hoc ex impotentia sui est.

Cap. II

An posse gignere Filium sit aliqua potentia in Patre, quae non sit in Filio.

Item quaeritur a quibusdam, si Pater potens sit natura gignere Filium, et an haec sit aliqua potentia, quae sit in Filio. Ad quod dicimus, quod Pater non est potens nisi natura; eius enim potentia natura est vel essentia.

At inquiunt illi, si potens est gignere, habet ergo potentiam gignendi; Filius autem non habet potentiam gignendi, si non potest gignere: habet ergo Pater aliquam potentiam, quam non habet Filius. Non sequitur. Eandem enim potentiam penitus habet Filius quam et Pater, qua Pater potuit gignere, et Filius potuit gigni. Eadem enim potentia est in Filio, qua potuit gigni, quae est in Patre, qua potuit gignere.

Sed contra hoc opponitur: aliud est posse gignere, aliud est posse gigni; quia aliud est gignere, aliud gigni. Hic distinguendum est. Si enim, cum dicitur: aliud est posse gignere, aliud posse gigni, aliam significes potentiam, qua Pater potens est gignere, et aliam, qua Filius potens est gigni, falsus est intellectus. Si autem dicas, Patrem posse habere aliam proprietatem sive notionem, qua genitor est; et Filium aliam, qua genitus est, verus est intellectus. Aliam enim habet Pater proprietatem, qua Pater est, aliam Filius, qua Filius est.

Ita etiam, cum dicitur: Filius non habet potentiam generandi, quam habet Pater, dupliciter intelligi potest. Si enim dicatur: Filius non habet potentiam generandi quam et Pater, id est, qua potens sit ad generandum (id est, ut genuerit, vel ut generet sicut Pater), verum est. Si vero intelligatur sic: non habet potentiam, qua possit gigni vel genitus esse, qua eadem Pater potens est, ut genuerit vel ut generet, falsum est.

Absit; quia eadem est potentia Patris, qua potest esse Pater, et Filii, qua potest esse Filius. Ita etiam eadem est voluntas, qua Pater vult esse Pater, non Filius, et Filius vult esse Filius, non Pater: et eadem est voluntas Filii, qua vult esse genitus, et Patrem genuisse; et Patris, qua vult esse genitor, et Filium genitum esse.

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Distinction VII

Chapter I

Whether the Father could or willed to beget the Son.

It is customarily asked by some whether the Father could or willed to beget the Son. For if (they say) He could and willed to beget the Son, then He could and willed something that the Son neither could nor willed — for the Son neither could nor willed to beget a Son. To this quibble we easily respond: to be able to beget the Son or to will to beget the Son is not something that is able or willed as a thing subject to will or power. There is, nevertheless, some power or will — namely, the power or will to beget the Son; and therefore we must distinguish the meaning of the proposed phrase: to be able or to will to beget the Son is not to be able or to will something. For the generation of the Son is not among those things subject to divine power and will, nor is it something among all things or of all things, but above all and before all. For He did not will or have the power before He begot, just as He did not exist before He begot — for from eternity He was and from eternity He begot.

By a similar example we can see this. For the Father can be Father and wills to be Father; but the Son cannot and does not will to be Father: therefore the Father can or wills to be something which the Son cannot or does not will to be. It does not follow — because to be Father is not to be something, but to be in relation to something, as will be shown in the following.

But what Augustine says in the second book Against Maximinus¹ moves us greatly — Maximinus who asserted that the Father was more powerful than the Son, because the Father begot the Son as Creator but the Son did not; and he said the Father could beget a non-Son, and therefore was more powerful than the Son. To this Augustine responds, seemingly saying that the Son also could beget, wishing to show that the Father is not more powerful than the Son, in these words: "Far be it that the Father be more powerful than the Son, as you suppose, because the Father begot a Creator, but the Son did not beget a Creator; for not that He could not, but it was not fitting."

Note and carefully attend to these words: for not that He could not, but it was not fitting. He seems to say that the Son could beget but it was not fitting; and so He could what was not fitting. Why it was not fitting, Augustine adds²: "Divine generation would be immoderate if the begotten Son begot a grandson to the Father — because that grandson, unless he begot a great-grandson for his grandfather, according to your wonderful wisdom would be called impotent."

But it does not seem to some that this can stand — namely that the Son could have begotten. For if the Son could beget, He could be father; and if He could be father, then He could be father either of Himself, or of the Father, or of the Holy Spirit, or of some other. But not of another, because no other has always existed; nor of the Father, because the Father is unbegotten and unborn; nor of Himself, because "no thing can beget itself"³; nor of the Holy Spirit, because the Spirit could not be born⁴.

How then are we to take what was said above: for not that He could not beget, but it was not fitting — as though He could but it was not fitting? It can be understood thus: for not that He could not, but it was not fitting — that is, it was not because of any impotence on His part that the Son did not beget, but it was not fitting for Him, just as God the Son is not God the Father; yet this is not from any impotence of His either.

Chapter II

Whether the power to beget the Son is some power in the Father which is not in the Son.

Likewise it is asked by some: if the Father is by nature able to beget the Son, is this some power that is not in the Son? To this we say: the Father is not powerful except by nature; for His power is nature or essence itself.

But they say: if He is able to beget, He therefore has a power of begetting; but the Son does not have a power of begetting, since He cannot beget: therefore the Father has some power the Son does not have. It does not follow. For the Son has entirely the same power as the Father — namely the power by which the Father could beget, and by which the Son could be begotten. It is the same power in the Son by which He could be begotten as is in the Father by which He could beget.

But against this it is objected: to be able to beget is one thing, to be able to be begotten is another; because to beget is one thing and to be begotten is another. Here a distinction must be made. If, when it is said to be able to beget is one thing and to be able to be begotten is another, you mean one power by which the Father is able to beget and another by which the Son is able to be begotten, the sense is false. But if you mean that the Father can have one property or notion by which He is begetter, and the Son another by which He is begotten, the sense is true. For the Father has one property by which He is Father, and the Son another by which He is Son.

So too when it is said: the Son does not have the power of begetting which the Father has, it can be understood in two ways. If it is taken to mean: the Son does not have the power of begetting that the Father has — that is, by which He is able to beget (so as to have begotten or to be begetting as the Father does), that is true. But if it is taken to mean: He does not have the power by which He could be begotten or be a begotten one, which same power the Father has for begetting, that is false.

Far be it; for the very same power is in the Father by which He can be Father, and in the Son by which He can be Son. So also the very same will by which the Father wills to be Father (not Son), and by which the Son wills to be Son (not Father); and the very same will of the Son by which He wills to be begotten and for the Father to have begotten; and of the Father by which He wills to be begetter and for the Son to have been begotten.

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