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Bonaventure, Aristotle, and the
Being of Universal Forms
Franziska van Buren
About 50 years ago, there was a flurry of debate around the question of
the influence of Aristotle on Bonaventure’s philosophy. At one end of
the extreme, Gilson claimed that Bonaventure was entirely opposed to
Aristotelianism. At the other end, van Steenberghen—indeed, alone in
this position—maintained not only that Bonaventure was wholly committed to integrating Aristotelianism into his own thought, but that
Aristotle was the key influence on Bonaventure’s philosophical views, to
a greater extent even than Augustine. Over time, these two extreme
positions arrived at a kind of middle ground in the minds of most
scholars: Bonaventure uses Aristotle, but his philosophical thought is
not properly speaking Aristotelian in nature. Why? Certainly, one of the
most important reasons is that Bonaventure and Aristotle have fundamentally opposed ontologies due to the differences between their
respective understandings of form.1 Indeed, with the exception of van
Steenberghen, this is a point that all scholars of Bonaventure’s thought
agree is a major rift between the two thinkers—perhaps one even more
foundational than the question of the eternity of the world. Bonaventure’s
forms have esse in the sense of being ontologically prior to the hylomorphic
composite, while Aristotle’s forms are immanent in and dependent on
1 David Knowles, for example, cites this as the major rift between the two thinkers. See The
Evolution of Medieval Thought (New York: Vintage Books, 1962), 245. Elders comes to a similar
conclusion in Leo Elders, “Les citations d’Aristote dans le ‘Commentaire sur les Sentences’ de
Saint Bonaventure,” in A. Pompei (ed.), San Bonaventura maestro di vita Francescana e di sapienza Cristiana (Rome: Pontificia Facoltà Teologica San Bonaventura, 1976), I: 831–42.
Franziska van Buren, Bonaventure, Aristotle, and the Being of Universal Forms In: Oxford Studies in Medieval
Philosophy Volume 9. Edited by: Robert Pasnau, Oxford University Press. © Franziska van Buren 2021.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192844637.003.0005
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their composition in sensible things. Taking the ontological priority of
the forms to imply separateness of the forms, it seems then that, on this
pivotal metaphysical position, Bonaventure must adhere to Platonism
rather than Aristotelianism. In turn, if Bonaventure is at odds with
Aristotle when it comes to a metaphysical position as basic as the nature
of forms, it seems difficult to see how one could be justified in calling
him an Aristotelian.
This characterization of Bonaventure’s thought, however, is precisely
what I will bring into question in this paper. First of all, Bonaventure
certainly would not agree with the above assessment of the difference
between Plato and Aristotle. For Bonaventure, both Plato and Aristotle
consider forms to be universals and ontologically prior to sensible
things. The difference, in Bonaventure’s eyes, is that Plato considers his
forms to be separate from (or to transcend) particulars, insofar as they
exist in a world distinct from the sensible world around us. Aristotle,
however, considers the forms to be an inseparable part of nature. When
it comes to this choice between the Platonic view of forms and the
Aristotelian, Bonaventure quite clearly and emphatically takes the side
of Aristotle. In the course of this paper, I will show that Bonaventure’s
understanding of form, despite being in accordance with Plato’s view
that forms are not ontologically dependent on sensibles, is based entirely
on his reading of Aristotle’s texts, such as we find it primarily in his
Commentary on the Sentences. Thus, with respect especially to the
concept of form, Bonaventure is indeed an Aristotelian—even if he is
advocating an Aristotelianism quite different from our contemporary
notions.
In order to demonstrate Bonaventure’s unique brand of Aristotelianism,
I will highlight the following positions in Aristotle’s thought upon which
Bonaventure bases his understanding of form: (1) Aristotle’s prohibition
on universals being in sensible particulars, as Bonaventure finds it in the
Categories and the Posterior Analytics; (2) Aristotle’s distinction between
the form and the particular in de Caelo and the Metaphysics.2 The first
point establishes the foundational paradox for Bonaventure: universal
2 Particularly on the first point, we will see Bonaventure’s arguments are quite similar to
those of Ockham (Ordinatio 1.2.7), insofar as Bonaventure argues against both a naive realism
which places the whole universal in each particular, and the conceptualist position which
claims that the particularized form allows the mind to attain knowledge of a universal.
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forms cannot be “in” particulars without being deprived of their universality; however, they also cannot be separate from their particulars, lest
we end up with all the same problems that Plato had with his separate
forms. The second point directs us to Bonaventure’s solution: to posit a
“particularized” form (i.e. the seminal reason) that is distinct from the
universal form—a distinction that Bonaventure does not name explicitly,
but one that lies between the real and the conceptual. On the one
hand, Bonaventure avoids understanding the forms as separate, inasmuch as the forms are not really distinct from the sensible world, as the
forms of the Platonists are—yet, on the other hand, he also does not
reduce the forms to being dependent on the sensible composite inasmuch as they are also not merely conceptually distinct from the particularized form.3 This distinction between the universal form and the
particular form (i.e. seminal reason) Bonaventure bases on Aristotle’s
understanding of the relationship between the form itself (the universal)
and the form-in-the-matter (the particularized form), as found in
de Caelo.
However, before we delve into the details of the above two points,
which will comprise the second and third sections of this paper, I would
like briefly to lay out some basics about Bonaventure’s notion of form,
and how it has been received in modern scholarship. Here, we will look
at the texts in Bonaventure that have been most often discussed, including Bonaventure’s infamous critique of Aristotle in the Collationes—
quite clearly the biggest challenge to my thesis—before turning to my own
selection of passages from Bonaventure, ones that are often overlooked.
1. The Current Consensus: Bonaventure’s Forms
and his Attitude towards Aristotle
When scholars first became interested in Bonaventure at the end of the
nineteenth century and into the twentieth, the general consensus was
that Bonaventure should be characterized as an “Augustinian” in
3 To a certain extent, this is similar to Duns Scotus’s distinction between the individual form
and the common nature. Yet, in contrast to Scotus, Bonaventure clearly places being (esse)
among the forms instead of among sensible things.
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opposition to the “Aristotelians” of his day, such as Aquinas.4 Indeed,
this earlier characterization was compounded by Gilson’s in-depth study
of Bonaventure’s thought, which in a similar manner portrayed
Bonaventure as a defender of the traditional Augustinian sources against
the perils of Aristotelianism.5
It was in this climate that van Steenberghen made the claim that his
fellow scholars found so provocative: that Bonaventure is an Aristotelian.
As van Steenberghen points out, the only real evidence that Bonaventure
was critical of Aristotle comes from the Collationes6—a text that no
doubt has already been in the forefront of the reader’s mind. In the
Collationes, Bonaventure criticizes (or appears to criticize) Aristotle not
only for maintaining that the world was eternal and for developing a
philosophy that could be used to defend the unity of the intellect, but—
most worrisome for our purposes here—for denying Platonic forms.
Wanting to mitigate Bonaventure’s anti-Aristotelian sentiment in the
Collationes, van Steenberghen rightly notes that the Collationes sermons
were written after the Commentary on the Sentences, during the period
(1267–73) when the validity of using the works of Aristotle was being
questioned.7 Van Steenberghen’s position is that because of Bonaventure’s
generally positive attitude towards Aristotle in the Commentary, these
comments made about Aristotle in the Collationes are simply a concession made to an increasingly anti-Aristotelian audience—and thus
should be taken with a grain of salt. However, van Steenberghen’s claim,
insofar as it did not go into the details of what Bonaventure says in
the Commentary as opposed to what he says the Collationes, only
served to mitigate the earlier characterization of Bonaventure as an
4 This view of Bonaventure was also very much tied to the characterization of Bonaventure’s
student, John Peckham, as an anti-Aristotelian. See Franz Ehrle, “Der Augustinismus und der
Aristotelismus in der Scholastik gegen Ende des 13 Jahrhunderts,” Archiv für Literatur und
Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters 5 (1889), 603–35, and “John Peckham über den Kampf des
Augustinismus und Aristotelismus in der zweiten Hälfte des 13 Jhs,” Zeitschrift für katolische
Theologie 13 (1889), 172–93.
5 Etienne Gilson, La philosophie de Saint Bonaventure (Paris: Vrin, 1924), 98–100. In agreement with Gilson, see Daniel Callus, “The Philosophy of St. Bonaventure and St. Thomas,”
Blackfriars 21 (1940), 151–64, and Knowles, Evolution, 243–5.
6 Specifically, Collationes in Hexaemeron 6–7.
7 Fernand van Steenberghen, The Philosophical Movement in the Thirteenth Century (Belfast:
Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1955), 59.
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anti-Aristotelian—leading us to the now standard position that
Bonaventure uses some Aristotle, but is not properly an “Aristotelian.”
Here, it is necessary for us to turn to the Collationes themselves insofar as this is the main (and indeed often only) text that scholars mine for
evidence of Bonaventure’s “anti-Aristotelianism.” While it is almost universally accepted that the Collationes confirm Bonaventure’s hostility
towards the task of incorporating Aristotelianism into a Christian philosophy, I will show that by looking at the text of the Collationes, as well
as comparing it to parallel discussions from the Commentary, we will
find quite a different picture. First of all, we will see that while the
Collationes seems critical of Aristotle on a number of issues, when each
of these issues is discussed in the Commentary, Bonaventure speaks
rather quite positively of Aristotle. Secondly, in the Collationes themselves, Bonaventure includes in each of his critiques of Aristotle a caveat
that he is targeting not Aristotle himself but a particular interpretation
of Aristotle, citing either the Arabic philosophers or fellow Christian
interpreters.
In the Collationes, there are three positions to which Bonaventure
seems to accuse Aristotle of being “blind.” The most easily dismissed is
the criticism concerning the unity of the intellect, a position that is certainly not maintained by Aristotle himself but only defended using
Aristotle—and Bonaventure is aware of this in the Collationes as well as
in the Commentary, and so this critique in reality is not aimed at
Aristotle, but at Ibn Rushd. The second “blindness” on the part of
Aristotle is his dismissal of Platonic ideas. Indeed, this one seems most
important for our purposes in this paper and so we will wait to address
it in greater detail in the following section when we turn to the intricacies of Bonaventure’s view of forms. We can say, however, in a preliminary way, that while the Collationes praises Plato’s quasi-anticipation of a
Christian notion of divine ideas, the Commentary quite explicitly rejects
the application of Platonic forms to divine ideas and even states that
Aristotle was right to reject the Platonic notion of separate forms.8
8 It is also good to note that in the Collationes, Bonaventure is not speaking about divine
ideas in general, but specifically targets ideas of virtues.
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Leaving this second blindness aside for the moment, let us move
directly on to the third—and indeed most infamous criticism of
Aristotle: that he was wrong to maintain that the world was eternal.9
First of all, one should note that in the Collationes Bonaventure says that
the position that the world is eternal is one that only seems to be in
Aristotle (not dissimilar to the issue of the unity of the intellect).
Bonaventure makes clear that in attributing such a position to Aristotle,
he is relying on the interpretation of Aristotle provided by the “Greek
Doctors” and the Arabs, while he himself concludes only that “Aristotle’s
words seem to sound like this.”10 Secondly, in the Collationes, there is
not the extensive list of arguments for the position that the world began
at one point in time that we find in the Commentary. Turning then to
the Commentary, we find that each of Bonaventure’s arguments in favor
of a temporal beginning to the world, barring the last which is based on
the definition of “creation,” begins with a premise from Aristotle—either
explicitly naming Aristotle or quoting him.11 This, of course, means
nothing more than that Bonaventure was using Aristotle—a point that a
few (although oddly not all) scholars concede—not that Bonaventure
necessarily thinks Aristotle is on his side in this debate.12
9 Most scholars have highlighted this as one of the main points of division between
Bonaventure and Aristotle. See Angelo Marchesi, “L’atteggiamento di S. Bonaventura di fronte
al pensiero di Aristotele,” in A. Pompei (ed.), San Bonaventura maestro di vita Francescana e di
sapienza Cristiana Vol. I (Rome: Pontificia Facoltà Teologica San Bonaventura, 1976), 843–59;
Bernandino Bonansea, “The Question of an Eternal World in the Teaching of St. Bonaventure,”
Franciscan Studies 34 (1974), 7–33; and Christopher Cullen, Bonaventure (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2006), 42.
10 Collationes VI.4. “ . . . as Aristotle seems to say, according to all of the Greek Doctors, as
Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory of Nazianzus, Damascus, Basil, and all of the Arabic
commentators . . . .”
11 The references to Aristotle are as follows: Argument 1 (impossibility of adding to the
infinite) contains a direct quote: “it is impossible that infinity be increased” (de Cael. I.12
[283a4–11], cf. Phys. III.6 [206a9–207a14]). Argument 2 (impossibility of traversing the infinite) references Phys. VIII.5 [257a32–258b9], de Cael. I.V [272a22–30], and Meta. II.2
[994b28–35]. Argument 3 (impossibility of knowing the infinite) contains a direct quote: “It is
impossible to traverse the numerically infinite” (Post. Anal. I.22 [83b7], cf. Phys. VI.7
[238a32–238b22]). Argument 4 (impossibility of ordering the infinite) references Meta. VII.3
[1043b33–1044a11], and Phys. VII.1 [241b33–242b54]. Argument 5 (impossibility of an infinity existing at one time, with respect to an infinite number of souls) contains a direct quote:
“the proper act is in the proper matter” (de An. II.2 [414a26–27]), and references Phys. II.2
[194a1–194b8], cf. Phys. III.5 [205b7–206a6], and de Cael. I.5 [271b1–27].
12 Boehner and Gilson both mention his use of Aristotle, but do not draw any conclusions.
See Gilson, La philosophie, 179–95 and Philotheus Boehner, The History of the Franciscan
School: John of Rupella and Saint Bonaventure (St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute
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However, after these arguments, Bonaventure explicitly addresses
Aristotle’s own position—Aristotle, whom he here calls the “most excellent of philosophers.”13 Bonaventure entertains two different readings of
Aristotle on this point. The first is that Aristotle does in fact think that
the world is eternal. The other is the position held by the quite obviously
“Aristotelian” thinker Albert the Great.14 Albert maintains that Aristotle
considers the world to be eternal only with reference to physical causes.
Bonaventure concedes that one cannot say with absolute certainty that
the reading à la Albert is right, because Aristotle himself never explicitly
stated such. However, Bonaventure says that a reading such as Albert’s is
the better reading because it makes better sense within Aristotle’s wider
metaphysics—as evidenced by the fact, as Bonaventure notes, that he
himself has just used basic Aristotelian positions to argue that the world
began in time.15 Bonaventure then concludes that if Aristotle himself
were to have thought that the world did not begin in time, he would
simply have been contradicting himself. Or put another way, despite the
fact that Aristotle might have made a mistake, for Bonaventure,
Aristotelianism, taken as a philosophical system, supports Bonaventure’s
Publications, 1943). Quinn and Kovach mention only a few of Bonaventure’s references to
Aristotle. See John Francis Quinn, “St. Bonaventure and the Arabian Interpretations of Two
Aristotelian Problems,” Franciscan Studies 37 (1977), 219–28, and Francis Kovach, “The
Question of the Eternal World in St. Bonaventure and St. Thomas: A Critical Analysis,” The
Southwestern Journal of Philosophy 5 (1974), 141–72.
13 In Sent. II, d. 1, p. 1, a. 1, q. 2, p. 22.
14 For a summary of Albert’s position, see David Twetten, Steven Baldner, and
Steven C. Snyder, “Albert’s Physics,” in I. M. Resnick (ed.), A Companion to Albert the Great:
Theology, Philosophy, and the Sciences (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 173–219. Interestingly, both Albert
and Bonaventure make reference to the fact that Aristotle seems to indicate that even the fifth
element which engages in eternal motion needs a cause—i.e. God. See footnote 26. And see de
Cael. I.4 [271a34–5].
15 The assessment of the second position is as follows: “However, some moderns say that the
Philosopher did not himself feel nor intend to prohibit that the world began in time at all, but
only to prohibit that it began by a natural motion. Which of these is more true, I do not know; I
know that if he held the first, that the world did not begin according to nature, then he maintained the right position and his reasons which I have summarized above from motion are
efficacious. If, however, he felt that the world did not begin at all, obviously he was in error,
according to those reasons I have put forth above. And it was necessary, putting him at a
contradiction which should be avoided, that either the world was not made or it was not made
from nothing.” This point about the contradiction in Aristotle seems to reference the fact that
Bonaventure thinks Aristotle considered the world to be made from nothing (see footnote 26),
which Bonaventure thinks implies a temporality to creation. He then says that attributing the
eternity of the world to Aristotle would also contradict the position—which Bonaventure considers Aristotle to maintain—that souls are immortal, and there is no transmigration of the
soul, a point he made in his fourth argument. In Sent. II d. 1. p. 1. a. 1. q 2, pp. 22–3.
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own position that the world began in time. Most importantly, the fact
that Bonaventure considers Aristotle’s own position not to be clear
makes Aristotle quite emphatically not Bonaventure’s opponent in this
debate. At best, he is an ally; at worst, neutral.16
How then are we to react when presented with two contradictory
statements, one made under the influence of being politically correct,
and the other made free from such an influence? There seems to be a
few possible options. The first is that Bonaventure simply changed his
mind at some point between writing the Commentary and the
Collationes—in which case we can amend our thesis that Bonaventure is
an Aristotelian to the claim that the “early” Bonaventure is an
Aristotelian. Or, one could conclude that Bonaventure is simply lying
about his feelings towards Aristotle in one text or the other, as van
Steenberghen asserted of the Collationes. However, there is also a third
option that is not as drastic as these other two. Here, I would like to
highlight again the fact that in each of the critiques of Aristotle in the
Collationes, Bonaventure is sure to work in a comment that this criticism is thrown at an interpretation of Aristotle, e.g. that of the Greek
Doctors or of the Arabs. Thus, the contradiction between the
Commentary and the Collationes is perhaps not as stark as it appears.
Rather than being critical of Aristotle, Bonaventure presents himself as
critical of certain readings of Aristotle and rather unenthusiastic about
defending Aristotle from such readings—a lack of enthusiasm that one
might find understandable considering also that, as the head of the
Franciscan order, Bonaventure, unlike his contemporary Thomas
Aquinas, had to maintain a certain political figura. Thus, it is fair to conclude that these apparent critiques of Aristotle are in fact critiques of
only certain interpretations of Aristotle, and they neither indicate a hostility towards Aristotle nor stand in contradiction to his positive attitude
in the Commentary, where he was freer to express his enthusiasm for
Aristotle.
16 van Steenberghen takes a different position here regarding how Bonaventure viewed
Aristotle, maintaining that Aristotle only thinks the world is eternal because it would not have
occurred to him not to think so. See Fernand van Steenberghen, “Le mythe d’un monde éternel: note complémentaire,” Revue philosophique de Louvain 80 (1982), 497.
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Returning now to the reception of van Steenberghen’s original claim
about Bonaventure’s Aristotelianism, which resulted in a moderation of
the original opposing positions of van Steenberghen and Gilson, we find
ourselves today having arrived at the “standard” position that
Bonaventure is not entirely hostile to Aristotle, but also that he is not an
Aristotelian fundamentally. However, despite the many disagreements
regarding Bonaventure’s notion of forms, and indeed his philosophy
generally, we find one point of commonality among all scholars of
Bonaventure’s thought, from Gilson to today: for Bonaventure, forms
possess esse. As I have indicated in the introduction, I do not dispute
this point, insofar as this position is repeated by Bonaventure in a number of places throughout his corpus, which we will discuss in the following section.17
But what does it mean for Bonaventure to say that forms have esse?
The answer to this question is usually to explain this statement as though
it came from the mouth of a Neoplatonist—if this point is treated at
much length at all. If forms have being that is ontologically prior
to sensibles, does this not also mean that Bonaventure’s forms are
transcendent à la Plato? Are these forms then hypostasized like Platonic
ideas? Are they exemplars? Or are they something else? To answer these
questions, I will focus on two key points that have not yet been fully
addressed in Bonaventure’s thought. The first is that, although the forms,
for Bonaventure, are ontologically prior to sensibles, they quite clearly
are not transcendent, as they are often understood to be; for
Bonaventure, forms are neither exemplars in the mind of God nor are
they hypostasized as in a Plotinian Intellect. Here, recalling the point I
made in the introduction, for Bonaventure the claim that forms are
ontologically prior to sensibles and have “being” in themselves is a position shared by both Plato and Aristotle. For Bonaventure, the position
that makes his own account “Aristotelian” is his emphatic assertion that
these forms do not exist separate from sensibles—neither in a separate
17 See for example the discussion of spiritual matter: In Sent. II, d. 3, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 90.
Similarly, when Bonaventure responds to the question of whether the image of God is greater
in man than in woman, his answer—thankfully a “no”—is that “they are produced from the
image with regard to their primum esse,” i.e. the form of the soul (In Sent. II, d. 16, a. 2, q. 2,
p. 403).
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“world” nor in the mind of God. Rather, forms exist only in the natural
world, as they do for Aristotle. However, and this is indeed the difficulty
of understanding Bonaventure, these forms nonetheless cannot be conceived as dependent on their composition in sensible things—as he
makes clear in a number of arguments that he also derives from
Aristotle.
A second point that has been neglected in Bonaventure’s thought, but
is crucial to his understanding of forms, concerns the role of the seminal
reasons and how they are understood as distinct from the universal
forms, as well as how they allow Bonaventure to place the forms qua esse
into his wider ontology. While it is clear enough that Bonaventure
adopts the Augustinian term as well as the use of seminal reasons to
explain occurrences such as new species coming to be after the seven
days of creation,18 I wish to highlight another aspect of seminal reasons:
they take on the role of the form in the sensible composite, i.e. the form
as present in, ontologically dependent on, and particularized in the
composite qua operative principle, which signifies the potency from
which the composite is generated—this in contrast to the universal form
in itself which maintains its status as ontologically prior. What is particularly important here is the way in which Bonaventure understands
the relationship between the seminal reasons and the universal form, i.e.
in a manner that indicates neither a conceptual nor a real distinction.19
On the one hand, because this distinction is not real, Bonaventure
avoids separating the universal form from the composite; on the other
hand, because the distinction is not conceptual, he avoids equating the
universal with the seminal reason, which would render it ontologically
dependent and thereby particularized, i.e. would make it no universal at all.
18 However, he attributes such an account of seminal reasons to Aristotle just as much as to
Augustine (In Sent. II, d. 15, a. 1, q. 1. p. 374). He cites ad Orosium (Quaest. 65, q. 37) and On
the Generation of Animals II.3 [736a25–737b10].
19 Boehner considers Alexander of Hales’s distinction between quo est and quod est to be a
quasi-formal distinction. Bonaventure similarly uses quo est and quod est—which Boehner
himself does not mention. See The History of the Franciscan School: Alexander of Hales (St.
Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 1943), 64, as well as Alexander of Hales,
SH II, n. 60, p. 75.
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2. Forms: Universal or Individual?
In order to see where Bonaventure stands on the question of the universality of forms, let us turn to his discussion of angels, where he first of all
argues that angels cannot be pure form because form is pure actuality or
pure being. Angels, however, are not pure act, thus they must have a
component of potentiality, i.e. spiritual matter.20 There is, however, a
perhaps more important reason why angels cannot be forms: angels
cannot be forms because they are not universal, whereas forms are. In
this discussion, Bonaventure lists a number of different kinds of
compositions which angels have, e.g. quo est and quod est or quis est and
quod est. It is not necessary to summarize them here, but what they all
indicate is that angels are particular things. It would be absurd to say of
something universal, namely a form, that it has, e.g., a composition of
quo est and quod est—since “what” a form is does not differ from the “by
what” it is. Bonaventure supports this point by turning to de Caelo where
Aristotle makes a distinction between the form itself (i.e. the universal)
and the compound of form and the matter (i.e. the individual thing)—a
distinction that we see Bonaventure quite frequently shorthand by quoting the line, as he does here: “when I say heaven I mean the form, and
when I say this heaven I mean the matter.”21 Again, using Aristotle to
substantiate what it means for the form to be universal, he cites another
preferred text, the Posterior Analytics, that “the universal form is by
nature ‘always and everywhere’ ”—angels, by contrast, are not always and
everywhere, but here and now.22 This indicates that we must have some
principle that distinguishes the individual angel from the universal
form, and for Bonaventure this is matter or, more precisely in the case of
angels, spiritual matter. The only way to get around the position that
angels must have matter is to assert that forms are not universal species,
and then angels could each be one “individual form” (and thereby, as
Aquinas maintains, could be said to be composed simply of act and
potency but not of form and matter). However, as we will see
20 In Sent. II, d. 3, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 90.
21 In Sent. II, d. 3, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 90; de Cael. I.9 [277b27–278a26].
22 In Sent. II, d. 3, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 90; Post. Anal. I.31 [87b29–33].
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Bonaventure argue momentarily (again using Aristotle), an individual
or particular form is a contradiction in terms: forms insofar as they are
intelligible must be universals.
Given now that Bonaventure is clear in his statement that forms not
only have being (esse), but also are considered strictly as universals, a
question arises concerning the existence of sensible things relative to
these forms. In a question considering the hylomorphic composition of
creatures, Bonaventure writes: “Metaphysics considers the nature of all
creatures and the highest substance being in itself (per se entis), in which
is considered the act of being (actus essendi), and this is what the form
gives [to composite substances].”23 In contrast, the matter gives “existence (existere)” and “stability for things existing (per se existendi).”24 On
the one hand, the form gives, and therefore presumably itself has, the act
of being (actus existendi) that it provides for the composite thing, i.e.
makes it to be (esse) what it is, makes it intelligible as one kind of thing,
e.g. a horse or a dog. However, there is a kind of being that the form
cannot provide to the composite—being that is not intelligible and that
is not “always and everywhere,” but rather is a kind of “existential”
stability—a stability that endures through the many “heres and nows” in
the life of a creature existing in space and time. This is what the matter
provides: the existential stability of being the substratum for generation
and change as this composite leads out its spatio-temporal existence.25
This is to say, the being (esse) that the form provides is not quite the
same as the being (existere) that the matter provides—which perhaps is
why Bonaventure uses two different terms loosely to indicate the two
different ways of being.
Thus far, we know that the forms are universals, have being in themselves, and that in some way their being is distinct from the being of
matter, as well as from the being of composite things that partake in
both matter and form. But this advances us little in substantiating my
claim that Bonaventure’s forms are not “separate” from sensible things—
in fact, none of this eliminates the possibility that Bonaventure
23 In Sent. II, d. 3, p. 1, a. 1, q. 2, p. 96.
24 In Sent. II, d. 3, p. 1, a. 1, q. 2, p. 96.
25 Accordingly, Bonaventure writes, extending this concept to include both kinds of matter:
“for, just as the matter of corporeal things sustains and gives to the forms existence (existere)
and subsistence (subsistere), so also does spiritual matter” (In Sent. II, d. 1. p. 1. a. 2, q. 2, p. 29).
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will endorse some kind of Platonic separateness of these forms. Yet,
Bonaventure is well aware of the problems that arise in positing forms
that are separate, either in the manner of Plato’s transcendent forms or
in the manner of the Neoplatonic hypostasis of the Intellect. Indeed, he
argues against both the notion of transcendent forms in general,26 as
well as against the Neoplatonic theory of emanation.27 Here, to aid in his
critique of the Platonic positions, Bonaventure draws on the discussion
of Platonic forms in Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Bonaventure first targets the
obvious implication involved in the Platonic understanding of participation, i.e. “it seems absurd to posit a third man . . . .”28 Bonaventure then
turns to the perhaps more important issue—again drawing on Aristotle’s
critique of Platonic forms—that if forms are separate, they do little to
account for the existence, generation, and motion of sensible things.
Bonaventure first explains that matter is pure potentiality, for “matter,
which in itself is imperfect, is never perfected except through the
form,”29 i.e. matter never exists unless it receives (or is composed with)
some principle of being, a form. If then the forms were always separate
from matter, matter would never attain any level of perfection, i.e. it
would never exist in any way. Or, put another way, were matter never to
have form, it would never attain any kind of existence, and no material
thing would ever exist. But material things do exist. Hence, Bonaventure
comes to the same conclusion as Aristotle that it is absurd to say that
forms could ever be separate from matter, or as Aristotle puts it in the
form of a question: “how can the Ideas, if they are the substances of
things, exist in separation from them?”30
Returning to our Collationes issue, it is clear that the above assessment of Platonic forms is far from a ringing endorsement. Moreover, we
find Bonaventure expressing doubt about Augustine’s claim that Platonic
26 In Sent. II, d. 1, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 16. It is interesting to note that this explicit dismissal of
the Platonic position takes place within Bonaventure’s wider discussion of the position that the
world was created from nothing—a position which he sees evidence for in Aristotle, citing
Meteor. II.3 [354b1–356b1], and “the beginning of de Caelo.” Bonaventure adds that there are
so “many other places” where Aristotle indicates that the world was in fact made that he does
not need to provide the references himself.
27 In Sent. II, d. 1. p. 1. a. 2, q. 2, p. 29.
28 In Sent. II, d. 1, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 16.
29 In Sent. II, d. 1, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 16.
30 Meta. I.9 [991b3–5].
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forms are like divine ideas.31 Indeed, in a different question, Bonaventure
quite explicitly rejects the equation of forms with divine ideas insofar as
forms are themselves (a) a plurality and (b) each intelligible, and so
positing forms, such as Plato’s, in the mind of God would imply both
plurality and intelligibility in God.32
Given that Bonaventure carefully spells out the problems with
Platonic forms, it is clear that his intention is not to take the route of
positing separate or transcendent forms, despite the fact that he wants
the forms to be universal and ontologically prior. But if he wants the
form to be immanent in the composite, as the forms of Aristotle are, we
arrive at our central paradox: how can the form be in the composite
without sacrificing its universality and ontological priority? His own
answer to this question is based on a distinction that he draws out of de
Caelo between “the form” and “the form in the matter”—or, to use
Bonaventure’s alternative terminology, “the form of the whole” and “the
form of the part.”33 The former, for Bonaventure, is the universal form
that is ontologically prior to the composite, and properly speaking this is
what he means by the form. The latter, which refers to the particularized
“form,” is rather dependent for its existence on its own composition
within a certain hylomorphic composite—and, for Bonaventure, this is
indeed not itself a form at all, but what he rather calls a seminal reason
or, alternatively, the natural form or the singular form.34 However, before
we answer this first question, we need to ask the more foundational
question—why does Bonaventure think it is actually impossible to posit
the universal form in the sensible? Why does he dismiss the position
that there is just the one form, immanent and inseparable from a
hylomorphic composite, which accounts for the existence and intelligibility of the sensible thing?35
Quite useful for our purposes, this very question is asked in the
Commentary on the Sentences: “are the seminal reasons universals?”
31 In Sent. II, d. 1, p. 1, a. 1, q. 1, p. 16.
32 In Sent. II, d. 1. p. 1. a. 2, q. 2, p. 29.
33 de Cael. I.9 [277b27–278a26].
34 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 2, p. 435. “. . . seminal reasons are singular forms.” In Sent. II, d. 18,
a. 1, q. 3, p. 439. “. . . therefore this white (haec albedo) signifies the singular form . . . .”
35 This is precisely the distinction which, as I noted above, many scholars miss, e.g. Boehner,
History of Franciscans: Bonaventure.
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And Bonaventure’s answer to the question is “yes and no”—loosely “yes,”
but more properly “no.”36 In his respondeo, he first takes a step back and
clarifies his terms: “the seminal reason is an active power, inserted into
the matter . . . and this active power is the essence of the form.”37 The
seminal reason, however, is “incomplete,” i.e. esse in potentia, and
thereby dependent on the sensible things in order to be actualized, while
the universal form is “complete,” i.e. esse in actu and, in this sense,
independent of the sensible thing.38
It is important to note that by “in act,” it is clear that Bonaventure
means that the universal form is not only independent of this particular
composite but from any composition; e.g. even though particular dodo
birds no longer exist (existere), the form of the dodo bird still does exist
(esse). While Bonaventure is not aware of species going out of existence,
he is aware of a phenomenon which happens in the opposite direction:
new species appearing after the world was created. He explains such a
phenomenon by saying, “all things were made to be (esse) at once, but
were not all made at once,” i.e. all things were (esse) but did not yet
happen to be made into existing (existere) sensible particulars. Thus,
forms exist (esse) regardless of whether or not they have spatio-temporal
existence (existere).39 Applying such a principle to our dodo bird: what
has happened with the form of the dodo bird is that even though it does
not exist (existere) anymore, it still is (esse)—it always is, and always is
everywhere. In a certain sense, that the dodo bird still is (esse) is evidenced by the fact that I can still know what a dodo bird is, i.e. we still
have a concept of “dodo bird,” and so it must still be in order for it to be
the object of knowledge—and indeed it exists (existere) whenever
someone thinks about it, or describes it, draws it in a book, or even recognizes it from fossil remains. Thus, Bonaventure asserts that the status
36 Here in this “yes” and “no” we already begin to see an indication of a distinction which is
neither real nor conceptual, as I mentioned above.
37 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
38 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439. “. . . the seminal reason is the essence of the productive
form, differing from it according to the distinction between being incomplete and complete,
i.e. according to being in act and being in potency.” Also interesting to note is that Bettoni
attributes this definition of seminal reasons as “incomplete” to Gilson’s interpretation of
Bonaventure instead of to Bonaventure himself. See Efrem Bettoni, S. Bonaventura: gli aspetti
filosofici del suo pensiero (Milan: Biblioteca Francescana Provinciale, 1973), 147.
39 In Sent. II, d. 12, a. 1, q. 2, p. 296.
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of the forms as actuality and being is not taken away from them by the
fact that they enter into composition with matter: “matter does not
remove actuality from the form . . .,” i.e. the fact that the form is instantiated
by matter has nothing to do with the actuality of the form considered in
itself.40
Bonaventure then turns more explicitly to the question of why there
needs to be a distinction between the form which is in the sensible thing
as a potency, i.e. the seminal reason, and the universal form, which
exists as an actuality. Why can we not simply say, contrary to the above,
that the universal form and the seminal reason are identical—that the
universal form is in and dependent on the sensible thing—and so when
I know Socrates, I can know the universal form, humanity? Bonaventure
indeed takes this option as his starting point: “For there are some who
want to say that, given that the universals are not made up (fictiones),
they really and according to truth exist not only in the mind but also in
nature; and since all things that are in nature have been inserted into
matter, so universal forms, and singulars, have being (esse) in matter.”41
This is clearly a realist position, in the sense that it does not deny being
to the universals, but rather indicates that they exist and have being only
insofar as they are singular, i.e. are in matter—or, put another way, that
humanity exists whenever there is a man. The form of humanity, according to this position, would exist in both Socrates and Callias, although
only as a singular, and this “singular” form is sufficient for us to know
the universal.42 This brand of realism seems either not to make a clear
distinction between a singular form and a universal form, or explicitly
clarifies that only the singular form exists external to the mind, whereas
the universal exists only in the mind, abstracted.
Bonaventure admits that this account seems prima facie to make the
most sense, insofar as we usually think about things in this way: “ ‘singular’
indicates being in act and ‘matter’ being in potency, and the universal
40 In Sent. II, d. 13, a. 2, q. 1, p. 317.
41 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
42 This is not dissimilar to Scotus’s position that the forms only exist when they are contracted into individuals. Interestingly, Bonaventure himself makes use of the term contraction:
“But composite creatures are not really simple, since they have in their being a mixture of
actuality and potency, and likewise in species and genus through a contracted addition (per
additionem contractum) . . .” (In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439). Bonaventure’s student, John
Peckham, also makes use of a notion of contraction. See Summa de Esse et Essentia 7.
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form means in one sense being in actuality [i.e. when the composite is
actualized] and in another sense being in potency [i.e. when the composite is not actualized].”43 Indeed, this brand of realism sounds very
much like a certain reading of Aristotle,44 which Bonaventure himself
notes, saying that it finds support not only in the Commentator45 but
also in Aristotle’s Physics, where we find Aristotle provide an account of
our experience of sensible reality in which we move from a particular
sensible to knowledge of a universal.46
However, Bonaventure sees two main problems with the above
position—problems that, we should note, will also be pointed out by
Ockham.47 Bonaventure targets these problems in a two-horned critique
of the above—what one might want to call—quasi-realist, or perhaps
proto-conceptualist, position. The first horn targets the position that
considers the universal form to be in a sensible thing in the sense of
being ontologically dependent upon the sensible thing, by showing that
this position is self-contradictory—the universal cannot be in a particular, insofar as this would render the universal form itself particular and
therefore not universal. For the second horn of his critique, Bonaventure
targets the position that tries to ground knowledge of a universal form
in the sense perception of a particularized form. Here, he argues that a
particularized form is not sufficient to ground (1) any kind of human
knowledge (even of the particular sensible thing), or (2) univocal predication. Indeed, Bonaventure’s arguments are quite similar to Ockham’s
arguments that individualized forms are not sufficient to ground our
knowledge of a universal. But, of course, while Ockham uses these arguments as a platform for turning to nominalism, Bonaventure goes on to
defend a realism that will withstand his own critiques.
Looking now to the first horn, how does Bonaventure develop his
argument that the universal form cannot ever really be in a sensible particular? Here, he refers the reader back to his responses to the opposing
43 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
44 I.e., Aquinas’s reading of Aristotle.
45 Metaph. cap. quoniam autem in fundamento.
46 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439; Phys. I.1 [184a10–184b14].
47 Ockham similarly uses Aristotle, although he quotes instead the Metaphysics—like
Bonaventure, Ockham argues against the existence of universals as being immanent in sensible
things (Ordinatio 1.2.7).
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positions where he argues, on the basis of Aristotle’s texts, for the
impossibility of a universal form (qua universal) being “in” a particular.
Bonaventure provides five arguments, all of which aim to demonstrate
that one cannot place the universal form into a particular composite as
dependent on this composite without rendering this universal particular—
thereby negating the very universality of the form.
Here, we will examine only the fourth and fifth arguments in depth
insofar as they are the strongest and most elaborate. It is to be noted that
the premises from the first three arguments are all taken from Aristotle—
the first from de Anima,48 the second from Posterior Analytics,49 and the
third from De Interpretatione.50 These three arguments aim to show:
(1) the universal cannot be in the sensible insofar as the universal—
precisely because it is actual being—cannot be the potency from which,
e.g., a baby becomes a man;
(2) rather, it is the seminal reason which is in the sensible thing as
the thing’s own potency, e.g. Socrates’s own particular potency to become
a man, and therefore it is not—as the universal is (according to
Aristotle)—“always and everywhere,” e.g. in Socrates in Athens in 430
bc and in Cicero in Rome in 60 bc;
(3) in a similar vein, if the universal is applicable to the many (i.e.
predicated of many), it cannot belong to one particular—e.g. we do not
predicate Socrates’s humanity of Socrates, but the humanity common to
Socrates and Callias.
Bonaventure’s fourth argument (and fifth as well) demonstrates the
absurdity of claiming that the whole of the universal is present in
48 “The Philosopher writes in de Anima: ‘the universal is either nothing or it is posterior.’ ” In
Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439; de An. I.1 [402b7]. Here, “posteriority” is clearly meant with
reference to temporal posteriority, i.e. a man is born with the potency to become a man, not
with the actuality of humanity. John Peckham takes this position, almost word for word, from
Bonaventure (along with the quote from Aristotle), and develops the same interpretation. See
Summa de esse et essentia 7.
49 “ ‘The universal is always and everywhere’; but the seminal reason is with respect to this
matter, in which it is made determinately: therefore, the seminal reason cannot be the universal form” (In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439; Post. Anal. I.31 [87b29–33]).
50 “The seminal reason is not predicated of that of which it is a seminal reason . . . but ‘the
universal is predicated of singulars’: therefore, the seminal reason cannot be a universal” (In
Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439; de Int. VII [17a39–17b5]).
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the particular. We should note that Bonaventure takes the whole of the
universal to mean not only the universal species, but also the universal
genus—i.e. anything which corresponds to secondary substance in
Aristotle’s Categories, the text that Bonaventure uses as his guide in these
passages. Here, he is focusing on Aristotle’s prohibition in the Categories
against a universal (i.e. a secondary substance—universal or specific)
being present in a substrate. Bonaventure begins by taking the universal
genus as his example: “if the seminal reason means the universal form, it
is therefore either the form of the genus or the form of the species. If the
form of the genus, then in man there is the seminal reason with respect
to a donkey.”51 This is to say that, if some particular animal, e.g. a man,
had the genus of animality as potency within itself, this particular man
would have the potency to become any other animal, e.g. a donkey—
which is obviously not the case.
Bonaventure next considers the possibility that the universal form of
the species (rather than the form of the genus) is present in the sensible
composite:
But this is the seminal reason of something (aliquid), which preexists
in matter, before it may be the complete thing in act (res completa in
actu): therefore, there is the form of humanity in matter, before there is
the complete thing. But this is false and unintelligible, that the form of
humanity be in a particular, and that it not be the complete thing.
Therefore, one may not think that the universal form is the seminal
reason.52
Bonaventure’s position here is that the universal means the complete
thing in act—the form of humanity is the whole of humanity—and if the
whole of humanity is in one man, this is unintelligible because one man
is not the whole of humanity. Socrates is not humanity—he is a man.
This seems moreover to be a clear reference to the Categories, where
Aristotle gives the same examples: “man is said of the particular man as
substrate, but is not in a substrate: man is not in the particular man.”53
51 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
53 Cat. V.5 [3a10–12].
52 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
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Likewise, Aristotle substantiates Bonaventure’s claim above that the
universal genus cannot be in the particular things: “Similarly, animal
also is said of the particular man as substrate, but animal is not in the
particular man.”54
Bonaventure’s fifth argument also demonstrates the absurdity of positing a universal form in a particular, this time focusing on the attempt
to posit the universal form as an operative principle in a particular, and
using as his example the accident of whiteness being posited a universal
present in the particular:55
If the universal form, with respect to the particular, were the seminal
reason, then, while ‘this white’ (haec albedo) means the singular form,
and ‘white’ (albedo) means the form of the species, and ‘color’ the form
of the genus, and ‘sensible quality’ furthermore the more universal
form, then nature, in producing this white (haec albedo), would proceed through the mediation of all of these predicates: therefore, quality
would be made before corporeal quality, and corporeal quality before
sensible quality, and sensible quality before color, which is not
intelligible.56
Here, Bonaventure shows the absurdity of a position that would place a
universal within a particular as a principle of operation or of generation.
In order to arrive at the “this white,” which is indeed in this particular
thing, there would also have to occur the generation of every universal
54 Cat. V.5 [3a13–15].
55 It is admittedly unclear whether Bonaventure thinks that the seminal reason/universal
form relationship should also include accidents or qualities, e.g. whiteness or smallness—
indeed, as well the more general “color” or “sensible quality.” This is to ask whether Bonaventure
thinks that there is a universal form of, e.g. not only “whiteness” but also “quality,” which would
then have to have a correlate seminal reason within each particular, or if is he only speaking
counterfactually, i.e. “if there were a form a whiteness . . . .” It seems to me more likely that he is
speaking counterfactually because of his fondness for the Categories—in which secondary substances (i.e. universals) are understood as those predicates whose definitions are said of a substrate (i.e. both species and genus). However, the above argument would work by taking any
universal one would like, regardless of whether or not it happens really to be a universal—it
would work with “tallness” as well as “humanity,” i.e. one would have to generate “the whole of
animal” before “the whole of man” before “this particular humanity” in this particular man. It
seems moreover that Bonaventure chooses this example of whiteness because it is Aristotle’s
example in the Categories (see Cat. V.1 [2a27–34]).
56 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
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form, from the most general to the most specific. This would entail first
the generation of the universal form of sensible quality, then the universal form of color, then the universal form of white—all within one particular white thing.
From Bonaventure’s arguments above, it is clear that he maintains the
impossibility of the universal form being in (i.e. being ontologically
dependent on) a particular thing, precisely because what is in a particular thing in such a manner must itself be particularized. Whatever is
dependent upon Socrates belongs to him and is particularized in him.
This must be the case with reference to the generation of the particular
since the cause of generation must itself be particular, not universal—i.e.
it must be Socrates’s humanity, in a proximate sense, which causes him
to grow up to be a man, not humanity in general.57
Then again, with regard to knowledge or predication, what is in the
particular sensible thing is itself particular, and thus it is no real predicate or object of knowledge. As Aristotle writes: “Sense-perception must
be concerned with particulars, whereas knowledge depends upon recognition of universals.”58 Thus, the humanity that exists in Socrates
belongs to Socrates—it is not the humanity in Callias, it is not the universal, and thereby it is only perceived by the senses, not known by the
intellect.59 Indeed, for Bonaventure, the quasi-realist position cannot
respond to the above objections and therefore must relinquish its realism and turn explicitly to a conceptuality, i.e. accept the position that the
being of the universal qua universal—not qua singular instantiated in
matter (in which case it is no universal at all)—exists only in the soul: “if
one wishes to maintain this position [i.e. the quasi-realist position], one
would have to avoid reasons brought up to the opposition, saying, that
57 Of course, Bonaventure considers that humanity (i.e. the universal) is ultimately the
cause of Socrates, but more proximately he considers it necessary that the incomplete seminal
reason be present in Socrates as the principle from which he actually grows—i.e. it is the
potentiality to become humanity which is more proximately the cause of him becoming a man,
than the actuality towards which he is aiming, because, temporally speaking, he has potentiality before actuality.
58 Aristotle, Post. Anal. I.31 [87b29–33]. Bonaventure cites the lines just preceding this passage, but not this passage itself.
59 This is very similar not only to the problem brought out in the Categories, but to Plato’s
sail problem in the Parmenides.
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he is speaking of the universal as it is abstracted in the soul.”60 Thus, the
universal would exist only in the mind—and such universals are, as
Bonaventure puts it, quite close to being “fictiones.” Or, to make the situation sound less dire, we could say that this position, insofar as it does
not provide a response to Bonaventure’s objections, would have to abandon its strong realism in favor of a conceptualism. And, indeed, this is
still an option on the table insofar as none of the above shows that the
extra-mental particularized form in Socrates or Callias would be insufficient to allow the mind to abstract the universal form, humanity—i.e.
that there is not an ontological grounding for the universal in the mind,
namely this particularized form.
This brings us to the second horn of Bonaventure’s wider argument,
which targets not only the implicitly conceptualist position, but also the
position of the “self-aware” conceptualist. Here, Bonaventure’s argument
against particularized forms grounding knowledge of universals is itself
two-fold: “it is necessary to posit universal forms for the sake of (1) cognition and (2) univocal predication.”61 These arguments show that a
universal is necessary not only for knowing the particular, i.e. by connecting the particular with a universal, but also for being able to know
that different particulars are of the same kind.62
For his first argument, Bonaventure begins by stating that, when we
know, we know the universal: “it is not complete cognition if the whole
being of the thing (totum esse rei) is not cognized; and it is not cognition
unless it is through the form.”63 This position is taken quite clearly from
Aristotle, whom he quotes here: “Sense-perception must be concerned
with particulars, whereas knowledge depends upon recognition of
universals.”64 Put another way, we only know what a thing is when we
know its whole essence, i.e. the universal form, which in some way must
be “in” the many particulars of which we predicate it in order to justify
60 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
61 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
62 One could say that whereas Ockham does not consider a form which has esse and is ontologically independent from sensible things and which is also not transcendent à la Platonic
forms, Bonaventure does just that.
63 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
64 Post. Anal. I.31 [87b29–33]. This point is found in many places in Aristotle. The
Quaracchi editors cite de An. II.2 and III.8.
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such a predication. We do not know what something is when we know
only the essence which is in the one particular, i.e. particularized essence
or seminal reason; rather we know what something is when we know
the essence which is in many particulars, without itself ever being
particularized: “the thing abstracted from matter [i.e. the universal]
itself may very well be in other things, which each have their own matter
and form [i.e. seminal reason], just as the similitude of color in a
mirror.”65 The fact that cognition is dependent upon the universal,
which is in the many, is made evident by the fact that one knows what a
particular is not by knowing particular thing alone, but only by knowing
the particular thing’s universal form. With respect to cognition, we
seem, at least to ourselves, to be working from the particular to the
universal simply because we encounter the particular first—with the
senses.66 However, sense perception of the particular does not constitute
knowledge. We do not know what the particular is before we have connected it to the universal, and so it is the universal that we know first,
despite the fact that we immediately connect it to the particular, i.e.
name the universal of the particular. For example, it is necessary to
know what humanity is more primarily than to know what Socrates is,
because one can know what Socrates is, i.e. a man, only once one knows
what humanity is. Thus, we cannot say that we know the universal from
the particular.67 Rather, quite the opposite is the case: knowledge of the
particular has to be grounded in knowledge of the universal, i.e. in the
connecting of the universal with the particular. Thus, Bonaventure
concludes that if we want to have cognition of anything (particular or
universal) that is grounded extra-mentally, “it is necessary that there be
some form that embraces the whole esse; but this we call the essence and
this is the universal form.”68
65 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 2, p. 414.
66 Aristotle makes this point in Phys. I.1 [184a10–184b14]. While the particular is what we
encounter first, what we know and what is prior is the universal.
67 Ockham would agree here, and—like Bonaventure—takes this argument to indicate that
the conceptualist position is absurd. However, of course, Ockham—in contrast to Bonaventure—
does not take this point to indicate that we have to attribute a stronger sense of being to
universal forms.
68 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
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We now come to Bonaventure’s second line of argument: without the
universal, it is impossible to make univocal predications between
particulars. While the first argument concerns the issue of knowing the
particular and the universal, this second argument concerns our ability
to identify two particulars as being of the same kind, i.e. predicating of
two particulars the same quality or essence, where this quality or essence
means the same thing for both particulars. Bonaventure writes: “similarly, there is no true univocation except when something (aliquid) is
really assimilated to a common form, which is then essentially predicated of it (i.e. of the aliquid).”69 He continues: “but this form, to which
many assimilate, can only be the universal form; for what is essentially
predicated of them can only be the form that embraces them all (forma
totum complectens).”70 This is to say, if we have access only to the particular humanity in Socrates and the particular humanity in Callias, it is
impossible to say that they are both humans. Even if one could know
Socrates’s humanity without knowing first the universal (which as we
saw above was not possible either), one still would be knowing a particularized humanity, i.e. the humanity that I would abstract from
Socrates would not be applicable to Callias, but only to Socrates.
Moreover, when we also take into consideration the fact that the form is
universal and “being in act,” it seems plainly absurd to say that what
Callias and Socrates assimilate to is already complete (completus), i.e. is
already the totum esse rei, in Callias and Socrates. In particular, if Callias
and Socrates are each assimilating to one and the same thing, how could
it already be particularized in each of them?
Bonaventure’s conclusions thus far are (1) that universals as universals cannot exist as ontologically dependent upon sensible particulars,
i.e. that one cannot simply identify the immanent particularized form
(i.e. seminal reason) with the universal form, and (2) that this particularized form is not sufficient to ground knowledge of the universal.
Given that Bonaventure does not want to posit separate forms, as the
Platonists do, he is left with two options: (1) to assert that the universal
neither exists in nor is ontologically grounded in particulars, but is just a
69 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
70 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
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convention or a name we attribute to things, or (2) to find a way of
affirming the existence of the universal without positing it as ontologically dependent on the particular, or as something that exists only in the
mind. Naturally, wanting to defend a realist account, Bonaventure
decides on the second option. Here, it is quite clear that the main
difficulty Bonaventure has to face is the apparent contradiction, or
paradox, between the two claims to which Bonaventure has committed
himself: (1) universals qua universals cannot exist “in” particular sensible
things, but (2) they also cannot exist separately from them, as the forms
of Plato do—both of these claims based in his reading of Aristotle.
In order to see how Bonaventure resolves this paradox, we need
now to examine the relationship between the universal form and the
seminal reason.
3. The Relationship between Seminal Reasons
and Universal Forms
The preliminary discussion of angels, earlier, showed Bonaventure
speaking of forms as universals. In a different question he also explicitly
denies that there can be anything like a particularized form that is a
form in the true sense of the word—i.e. while the preceding section
showed that the seminal reason and the universal are not identical,
Bonaventure also explicitly denies that we can conceive of seminal
reasons as being a second “kind” of form in addition to universal forms.
We find this argument in Bonaventure’s account of individuation, in
which he objects to a position quite similar to that of Duns Scotus,
namely, one that would posit a forma individualis as the principle of
individuation. Bonaventure’s reasoning for dismissing this individual
form as the cause of individuation is that an individual form is quite
clearly no form at all—such would be a contradiction in terms.71 Were it
a form, the individual form would be included in the universal definition; for example, Socrates’s humanity would be part of the definition of
humanity. Bonaventure bases this position on an example given in the
71 In Sent. II, d. 3. p. 1, a. 2, q. 3, p. 109.
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Metaphysics, where Aristotle entertains the idea that the definition of
the sun or the moon may be individual because there is only one individual sun and one individual moon. Aristotle’s conclusion is that even
though there is only one (individual) sun or one (individual) moon, this
does not mean that when we define the sun or the moon, the definition
itself is individual. These definitions are still universal and potentially
applicable to many suns and many moons. It just happens to be the case
that there is only one individual instance of the universal.72 The form is
the definition of the thing, while the individualized form, e.g. Socrates’s
humanity or this sun’s sun-ness, is not part of the definition.73 Therefore,
the individual form is no form in the strict sense of the word.
If then the seminal reason and the universal form cannot be distinguished as two different kinds of forms, what is the nature of the distinction between the two? In answering this question, we will also clarify
why Bonaventure responded to the original question above of whether
the universal is the seminal reason with a “yes” and a “no.” Bonaventure
writes: “if the universal form is said properly, according to the thing that
is ordered into a genus, which metaphysics considers, the seminal reason is not the universal form. If, however, the universal form is said to
be existing (existens) according to an incomplete being in matter and
indifferent and able to be produced in many, so may one call the seminal
reason the universal form.”74 This is to say, they can be equated only
insofar as the universal form is “existing (existere) in potency” in some
composite.75 The crux of the distinction brings us back to our original
esse/existere distinction. The universal form really exists (esse), while the
seminal reason has merely a contingent existence (existere). Or put
another way, insofar as the universal form exists (esse) it is distinct from
(or better, “indifferent to”) the fact that it happens to exist (existere) as
operative in some composite. However, this does not mean that we have
72 The Quaracchi edition gives the reference as Meta. VI.15, which must be a typo. The correct citation is VII.15. The editors are, however, right to cross-reference de Cael. I.9, a chapter
which we have seen Bonaventure cite very frequently.
73 For a study of a similar reception of this passage in Plotinus and Porphyry, see Peter
Adamson, “One of a Kind: Plotinus and Porphyry on Unique Instantiation,” in R. Chiaradonna
and G. Galluzzo (eds.), Universals in Ancient Philosophy (Pisa: Edizioni della Normale,
2013), 329–52.
74 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
75 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
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two entities, nor again that we have something which is merely conceptually distinct. The distinction is correlate neither to the ontological distinction between “Rye the horse” and “Alejandro the horse,” nor the
conceptual distinction between calling Rye “the horse from Germany”
or “the horse who won the competition.” We rather have a distinction
which is neither real nor conceptual, i.e. the distinction between Rye’s
equinity and equinity in general.
Indeed, it is clear, although he does give a particular name for this
distinction, e.g. a “formal distinction,” that Bonaventure must intend a
distinction which is neither real nor conceptual. Otherwise, he would be
contradicting himself with regard either to (1) his position that the universal cannot be in, or inhere in, the particular in any way that would
render it ontologically dependent, or to (2) his position that the universal cannot be separate. If the distinction were real, the universal would
be separate from the particular; if the distinction were conceptual, the
universal would be dependent on the particular.76 It is important to
mention here that Bonaventure has a well-developed account of what a
conceptual and a real distinction are. He indicates a conceptual distinction with the phrase, secundum rationem (e.g. he applies a conceptual
distinction to God as final end and God as beginning)—a phrase that is
emphatically absent from Bonaventure’s discussion of the distinction
between the seminal reason and the universal.77 Of course, on the other
hand, if he had intended a real distinction, he would simply have
answered the original question of whether the seminal reason is the universal form with a “no,” and not, as he does, with a “yes” and a “no.”
We can also bring this above distinction to bear on Bonaventure’s
understanding of the hylomorphic composite. Bonaventure’s well
known doctrine of a universal hylomorphism is usually described as the
position that all things are a composition of form and matter—but this
is only correct very generally speaking, just as it is only correct generally
76 Bonaventure also draws a parallel between God’s relationship to his exemplar causes and
the universal form’s relationship to the singular form in his Disputed Questions on the
Knowledge of Christ (III con.). Just as the distinction between God and the exemplar causes is
neither real nor conceptual, so is the distinction between the universal and the singular form
neither real nor conceptual.
77 For a study of the different types of distinction in Bonaventure, see: Sandra Edwards, “St.
Bonaventure on Distinctions,” Franciscan Studies 38 (1978), 194–212.
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speaking to say that the universal form and the seminal reason are one
and the same. More properly speaking, it is the seminal reason, not the
universal, which is compounded with matter—and the seminal reason is
thereby individualized by its dependence on such a composition, while
the universal retains its independence, being formally distinct from the
seminal reason. This distinction between the universal and the seminal
reason provides now a more nuanced understanding of hylomorphism
in Bonaventure’s thought. Bonaventure’s hylomorphism is not simply
the form and the matter, but the seminal reason and matter—while the
universal form is the third thing, not separate from the matter, insofar as
it is not ontologically distinct from the seminal reason, but not particularized by it either, insofar as it is also not identified with the seminal reason.
Turning now back to the texts, we see that Bonaventure draws the
two-fold understanding of form as (1) the universal and (2) the seminal
reason (the latter of which is compounded with the matter), out of the
texts of Aristotle:
For this position [i.e. the preceding account of universals and their
relationship to seminal reasons] agrees with authority. For the
Philosopher says, “when I say heaven, I mean the form; when I say this
heaven, I mean the matter”: therefore, the individual does not add
form beyond the universal, but only adds matter. For Boethius says
“that the species is the whole being of the individual”: therefore, the
universal form, which is the species, is the form of the whole, which
embraces complete being, and which is the sufficient grounding of
knowledge (ratio cognoscendi) with regard to substantial being.78
It is unclear what Boethian text Bonaventure has in mind, but the passage from Aristotle is one that we have seen him often utilize, and
indeed with good reason, insofar as it expresses the two-fold understanding of forms: the form itself and the form in the matter (or here, we
could say qua operative principle in the matter). If we look at the full
78 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
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passage in Aristotle from which Bonaventure is quoting, we see even
more clearly what Bonaventure has in mind:
Suppose for instance only one example of a circle were apprehended,
the distinction would nonetheless remain between (1) the essential
nature of the circle (~ă u‡uvz|) and (2) the essential nature of this
particular circle (~ŷop ~ŷ u‡uvƒ). The former is simply the form
(pÉoz|), and the latter is the form-in-matter (~ă o’pÉoz| §x ~ō âvr) and
must be counted among the particulars (uls’ªul}~zx).79
From this Aristotle concludes: “This heaven and heaven in general are
therefore two different things, the latter being distinguishable as form or
shape and the former as something compounded with matter.”80 Prima
facie, one would think that here by “this heaven,” Aristotle means the
composite of form and matter—the individual sensible hylomorphic
composite. But this is not precisely what he says. He rather says that
“this heaven” is that which is compounded with matter, not the resulting
compound of form and matter. This is to say, “this heaven” is one half of
our composite sensible thing, with matter, of course, being the other—
and indeed “this heaven” is not the universal form but “~ă o’pÉoz| §x ~ō
âvr” or, as Bonaventure would take it, the particularized form or seminal reason.81 Continuing in a similar vein, Aristotle writes: “In all formations and products of nature and art alike a distinction can be drawn
between the shape in and by itself and the shape as it is combined with
the matter.”82 This dual way of thinking about a (certainly not separate)
form in Aristotle’s thought seems to be what Bonaventure is drawing on
here. “Essential nature of the circle” would be the form in itself and
“essential nature of this circle” would be the form considered as existing
in this particular.
Moreover, what Aristotle is calling the “essential nature of the circle”
and the “essential nature of this circle” also correspond in Bonaventure
79 de Cael. I.9 [278a7–11].
80 de Cael. I.9 [278a13–15].
81 Here, we see why he states that Augustine and Aristotle both agree when it comes to
seminal reasons (In Sent. II, d. 15, a. 1, q. 1. p. 374).
82 de Cael. I.9 [277b30–5].
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to the notions of the forma totius and the forma partius.83 The universal
is “the form of the whole (forma totius),” in contrast to “the form of the
part (forma partius),” which is rather the seminal reason.84 Bonaventure
gives an example of the difference between the forma totius and the
forma partius: with respect to the forma totius, “soul is not said with
respect to one man, but rather with respect to man.”85 Here, “soul said
with respect to one man” is the particularized form (forma partius),
while “soul said with respect to man” is the universal (forma totius). The
former is applicable to only part of the set of members of this kind
(i.e. only to one man), while the latter is applicable to the whole set of
members (i.e. to every man). When one designates “soul” as the form
of man, “soul” itself is known as something that is related to many men,
or to man in general, i.e. to the whole. As we have already seen
Bonaventure argue, we cannot even know a particular soul if we cannot
connect it to a universal. This universal form is indeed the form “that
gives being to all [i.e. the whole set of members of a species], and this
is called the essence of the thing (essentia rei), which embraces the
complete being (esse).”86
4. Conclusion
By way of conclusion, let us first of all relate Bonaventure’s account of
forms back to his use of Aristotle, and make a few comments about the
way in which Bonaventure has interpreted Aristotle. Here, it is probably
also a good idea, to forestall any objection to the way in which
Bonaventure has used Aristotle to defend his notion of forms, to stress
that of course Bonaventure is assuming a certain reading of these texts.
In particular, as we saw above, he assumes that these texts have an ontological and not only a logical import (particularly with regard to the
83 The “whole-to-part” relationship is said with respect to a one particular related to the
whole set of particulars. This is to say the “whole” is the whole set of particulars and the “part”
is any one particular member of the set. We then arrive at a distinction between the form of the
whole (i.e. of the whole set), which is universal, and the form of the part (i.e. of one particular),
which is particular.
84 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
85 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
86 In Sent. II, d. 18, a. 1, q. 3, p. 439.
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Posterior Analytics and the Categories). This, of course, has been questioned by contemporary scholars of Aristotle. Indeed, one could also
object to Bonaventure’s reading of de Caelo by saying that the “essential
nature of the circle” exists only in the mind, while the “essential nature
of this circle” is the only thing that exists extra-mentally. However, this
objection, insofar as it would appeal to a more conceptualist interpretation
of Aristotle, would have to respond to the many arguments that
Bonaventure puts forth against conceptualism, himself relying on
Aristotle’s texts.
Indeed, Bonaventure’s interpretation of Aristotle certainly has its
merits—particularly insofar as he attempts to respond to his own
arguments against alternative realist and conceptualist positions, and in
doing so to eliminate any contradiction from the understanding of
form that Aristotle develops over his entire corpus. Given that, for
Bonaventure, Aristotle wishes to posit the universals as existing extramentally, if Aristotle posits them as existing in sensibles, such that they
are dependent on sensibles, he is contradicting his own position in the
Categories where he says that universals cannot be “in” a substrate.
Moreover, if Aristotle posits the forms as existing only as particularized
in sensible composites, i.e. as a singular or individual form, then his
account is incoherent insofar as such forms would not provide us with
knowledge of the universal. Thus, if we want to read Aristotle as a realist, Bonaventure provides us with a solid interpretation, particularly
because it anticipates and addresses the critiques that someone such as
Ockham would raise.
We can also highlight the main points that Bonaventure has taken up
from Aristotle’s thought in developing his understanding of forms. The
first of course is the position that although the form is universal and
ontologically prior, it nevertheless cannot be separate. Or, put another
way, the form must be conceived of as being in the composite, but not
in any way that would deprive it of such universality or priority.
Maintaining these two seemingly contradictory positions has indeed
proven to be a fine line for Bonaventure to walk. But just as he took this
original paradox concerning the simultaneous ontological priority and
inseparability of forms from Aristotle, in Aristotle he also found its solution: a distinction between the two modes of form, the form’s esse and
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the form’s existere, or the form considered as the universal and the form
considered as the seminal reason—a distinction that straddles the real
and the conceptual.
What then of the Platonic or Augustinian character of Bonaventure’s
notion of forms? It is quite clear that Bonaventure takes from Augustine
both the term “seminal reason” and the general notion that the seminal
reason is a kind of potency within the sensible thing. However, insofar
as Augustine does not develop a detailed understanding of the relationship between these seminal reasons and universal forms, we can hardly
say that Augustine is the main influence on Bonaventure’s forms. With
regard to the Platonists, it seems apparent that Bonaventure would certainly agree that forms primarily exist and are universals. However, this
does not make Bonaventure’s notion of forms Platonic in the way that
many scholars have considered. Bonaventure does not see the position
regarding the form’s existence and universality as the dividing point
between Plato and Aristotle. The dividing point is whether the forms are
separate or not, and here he quite clearly takes the position of Aristotle
over Plato—regardless of the fact that his reading of Aristotle does not
correspond to the more standard interpretations of both his day
and ours.
As a final point, showing the Aristotelian character of Bonaventure’s
notion of form makes Bonaventure’s metaphysics more significant not
only from a conceptual but also from a historical perspective. If we see
the Aristotelianism in Bonaventure’s understanding of form, we arrive at
a more accurate picture of the development of Franciscan thought and
the kinds of conversations occurring among scholastic Franciscans. This
is to say, we can see Bonaventure not as the last defender of the traditional Augustinianism of scholastics before him, but as a figure who,
precisely like the later Franciscans, e.g. Scotus and Ockham, was highly
critical of alternative medieval accounts of universal forms, Platonic and
Aristotelian alike. As we saw, in a manner very similar to Ockham,
Bonaventure argues both against the naive realism of his day and against
conceptualism—using Aristotle’s texts to do so. He also arrives, as I have
mentioned above, at a relationship between universals and particularized forms quite similar to, yet nonetheless different from, the account
provided by Scotus. My reading of Bonaventure thus allows us to see a
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clearer continuity between his writings and those of the later Franciscans,
precisely insofar as he anticipates so much of later Franciscan thought.
Moreover, because Bonaventure anticipates (and quite possibly influences) the positions of these later thinkers, his view of forms, from our
point of view, is in a better position to hold strong against the concerns
and critiques they would later raise.87
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, München
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