INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION
Scotus's principal writings on the Blessed Virgin are found in his various commentaries on the Sentences of Pe ter Lombard. Since they spanned the entire field of theol ogy, Lombard's four books constituted the official textbook a bachelor of theology preparing for regency as a Master used to order his lectures on theology. Before becoming Master,
Scotus commented on Lombard, first at Oxford and later at Paris1 and, on the basis of these two sets of lectures, almost completed a third and official version for distribution to the booksellers before his premature death in 1308. Known as his Ordinatio, this is Scotus's most comprehensive theologi cal work, and is the source of these four questions on Mary.2
They are all of some historical and theological interest.
The first on the predestination of Christ marks a turning point in the theological literature on the motive of the In carnation. Unlike many of his predecessors, Scotus was not primarily concerned with what God might have done in an other order, for instance, if Adam had not sinned. He began with the actual order, with the fact of the Incarnation. What
1 There is also evidence Scotus lectured at Cambridge on part of Lom bard's work.
2 Since these questions are all from the last two books of Ordina tio, as yet unavailable in the Vatican edition, for the Latin texts in the present volume we used two earlier critical editions made by Carl Balic,
O.F.M., founder of the Bibliotheca Mariana Medii Aevi and later head of the Scotistic Commission editing the new Vatican Opera omnia. The first is a relatively complete edition of all of Scotus's extant writings on Mary, entitled Scoti Doctor Mariani Theologiae Elementa quae ad fidem codi cum manuscriptorum edidit Carolus Balić, O.F.M. (Sibenik in Jugoslavia:
Ex typographia Kacic, 1933). We have used it for the first and last two questions. The second is entitled Ioannes Duns Scotus Doctor Immacu latae Conceptionis [Bibliotheca Immaculatae Conceptionis n. 5] (Romae:
Academia Mariana Internationalis, 1954), and contains a new edition of those pertaining to the Immaculate Conception, done for the Marian Year of 1954, commemorating the centenary of the Bull Ineffabilis Deus of Pius
IX, declaring this prerogative of Mary a dogma of Catholic faith. We have used this for all references to Scotus's questions on the Immaculate Con ception.
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary was its primary purpose? Put negatively, Scotus rejects the redemption as the fundamental reason for Christ's coming.
The glory of the souls he redeemed cannot compare with the glory of Christ's own human nature. Hence their restoration to grace and glory cannot have been the primary reason why
Christ's soul was created, assumed by the Word, supernatu ralized by grace. Positively stated, Scotus held that human ly speaking God first intended Christ as king and center of the universe. Only secondarily, so to speak, did God conceive
Christ as redeemer of fallen man. But if the incarnation was designed as a means of ennobling human nature, it must involve somehow both sexes and that meant the God-man must have a human mother. Hence it is not surprising that in its full development, Scotus's doctrine was extended further by the Scotist school to include Mary as the next most perfect of God's works, and is cited by its proponents as the funda mental reason for Mary's Immaculate Conception.3
The second and most important of these four questions shows how Scotus solved the radical theological objections of his day to this prerogative of Mary.4 The way in which the Immaculate Conception came to be explicitly recognized and eventually defined by Pius IX in the Ineffabilis Deus as a dogma of faith has long interested theologians. It figures largely in their theories of the role played by the sensus fide lium or the living faith of the common Christian in the devel opment of doctrine. In this case that faith centered on a feast to honor St. Ann's conception of Mary. If John the Baptist was cleansed of sin in Elizabeth's womb, what of Mary who would be even more intimately connected with the redeem er? The apocryphal gospels5 already drew parallels between 3 A. B. Wolter, "Duns Scotus on the Primacy and Personality of Christ," in Franciscan Theology, ed. Damian McElrath, Franciscan Sources, No. 1
(St. Bonaventure, NY: The Franciscan Institute, 1980), 140-41.
4 See New Catholic Encyclopedia article on the "Immaculate Concep tion" by E. D. O'Conner (vol. 7, 378-82).
5 See especially "The Gospel of the Birth of Mary" and the "Proto evangelion," in The Apocryphal Books of the New Testament (Philadelphia:
David McKay, 1901). The angelic apparitions to St. Ann and Joachim re corded there parallel those described in the Gospel of St. Luke of Mary and her cousin Elizabeth, and these miraculous circumstances like those surrounding the birth of the Baptist, whose conception was also called holy
Introduction the angelic appearances to Joachim and his wife and those recounted of Zachary in Luke's gospel. A feast embodying these popular beliefs originated in the East,6 but only when introduced in the West did it provoke the opposition that led to a significant development of Mariology.
Before the Norman invasion the Feast of Mary's Concep tion had become popular with the Saxons, but after 1066 it underwent a period of eclipse. William the Conqueror con ferred many of the episcopal sees and abbacies in England upon his ecclesiastical followers. The general contempt of these newcomers for Anglo-Saxon customs, and the fact that the feast seemed based on apocryphal works, may have ac counted for its suppression in many dioceses.7 Saxon pride, however, kept the feast alive, and reputed miracles like the famous vision of Helsin, the Abbot of Ramsey, helped it regain its popularity.8 In 1129 the Council of London confirmed it for the whole English province. From there it spread naturally enough to Normandy and other parts of Europe. Though mi raculous confirmations accounted for this popular appeal, it was the Benedictine monk, Eadmer of Canterbury who first by the Greeks, were the primary object of the feast. Though it began as a Feast of St. Ann, the emphasis even then was on the exceptional holiness of the child she would bear, a child who would be sanctified already in the womb like Jeremiah and John the Baptist. As the "Gospel of the Birth of Mary," puts it, after appearing first to Joachim, the angel came to Anna, saying: "A daughter will be born to you, who shall be called Mary, and shall be blessed above all women. She shall be, immediately upon her birth full of the grace of the Lord." The Apocryphal Books, 19.
6 The Protoevangelion of St. James played a particularly prominent role. Cf. M. Jugie, "Le protoévangile de Jacques et l'Immaculée Concep tion," in L'Echos d'Orient 14 (1911) 16-20. See also M. Mildner, O.S.M.,
"The Immaculate Conception in England up to the Time of John Duns Scotus," in Marianum 1 (1939), 86-99, 200-21; 2 (1940), 173-93, 284-306.
7 Mildner, art cit., 95; E. Bishop, Liturgica Historica (Oxford, 1918), 227-28; idem, "Origins of the Feast of the Immaculate Conception" in Downside Review 5 (1886), 107; H. Thurston, "The English Feast of Our
Lady's Conception," The Month 53 (1891), 457.
8 H. Thurston, "The Legend of the Abbot Elsi," The Month 104 (1904), 5-9; the story is recounted in a sermon erroneously attributed to St. An selm; see pseudo-Anselm, Sermo de conceptione S. Mariae (PL 159, 319323); see also pseudo-Anselm, Miraculum de conceptione S. Mariae (Ibid.
323); these texts are also quoted as appendices to the Thurston-Slater edi tion of Eadmer's Tractatus de conceptione S. Mariae, see the following note.
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary gave a sound theological argument for celebrating Mary's conception itself. If Jeremiah and the Baptist were sanctified before birth, how much more should Mary as the Queen of Angels and the tabernacle of the Son of God be completely untouched by sin.9
Eadmer's interpretation, however, overcame one theologi cal difficulty at the expense of creating a far more serious one based on a carefully worked out theory about the nature of original sin and its transmission to Adam's progeny by sex ual intercourse. It claimed when the newly created soul was infused into a seminally conceived fetus it contracted origi nal sin.10 It was only because concupiscence played no part
9 Si igitur Jeremias ... in vulva est sanctificatus, et Joannes ... Spiritus sanctus ex utero Matris repletus, quis dicere audeat, singulare totius sae culi propitiatorium, ac Filii Dei omnipotentis dulcissimum reclinatorium, mox in sua conceptionis exordio Spiritus sancti gratiae illustratione des titutum ... Angelis aliis peccantibus, bonos a peccatis servavit, et feminam
Matrem suam mox futuram, ab aliorum peccatis exortus servare non valu it? In aeternitate consilii fixum statuit, eam dominatricem et reginam fore
Angelorum, et nunc inferiorem Angelis natam est consortium acceptam esse credemus omnium peccatorum? Tractatus de conceptione B. Mariae Vir ginis (PL 159, 305, 307). Though the idea that since Mary was sanctified in the womb, she may never have contracted original sin was expressed earlier (cf. e.g., pseudo-Ildephonse [Radbertus], De partu virginis, PL 96,
211), the Benedictine monk, Eadmer of Canterbury (d. 1124), is generally regarded as the first explicitly to connect her sanctification with the in stant of her conception and use it as the rationale for celebrating this as a feast. As he was the secretary, disciple and biographer of St. Anselm, it is not surprising that his treatise as late as the fourteenth century, however, was mistakenly attributed to the Archbishop and Primate of England him self. Migne printed the tract among the spurious works of Anselm (PL 159,
301-318; for a critical edition see Eadmeri monachii Cantuariensis tracta tus de conceptione S. Mariae, ed. H. Thurston and T. Slater (Fribourg im
Breisgau, 1904); for a study of his works as a whole and of his relationship with St. Anselm, see R. W. Southern, Saint Anselm and His Biographer
(Cambridge: University Press, 1963).
10 Before the fall, concupiscence or the natural human desire for sense pleasure was kept within the bounds of reason (see the following note); after the fall, it became a drive that could be controlled only with difficulty
(cf. Rom. 7, 21-25). Concupiscence, as the insubordination of the flesh to wards reason, with the unavoidable propensity to all kinds of evil, largely due to the influence of St. Augustine, came to be essentially identified with original sin. Since sin was removed by baptism, while concupiscence was not, Augustine's theory was frankly insufficient and created more difficul ties than it solved. St. Anselm of Canterbury produced a more satisfactory
Introduction in Mary's virginal conception of Christ, that his human soul was immaculate.11 How then could Ann's conception of Mary itself be holy, or sin absent, where libido was present?12 asked theory. Original sin, he said, is nothing more than the absence of original justice or rightness of will with which our first parents were endowed at the moment of their creation. Anselm calls it original because it belongs to the original constitution of man as God planned and made it. It was God's express wish that this justice should adorn the souls of all his descendants.
But since Adam, through his sin of disobedience, lost original justice for himself and all his descendants, every child is born in a state which does not correspond to God's will; we ought to be born in the state of original justice, and we are in fact born without it. This absence of a justice which is due, which should be there but is not, constitutes the essence of origi nal sin. Concupiscence is a mere effect of the privation of original justice, and does not enter into the essence of original sin. As Lottin showed in a remarkable series of articles, Anselm's notion was practically ignored for a century and only gradually introduced into the mainstream of scholastic thought (Cf. Dom Lottin, O.S.B., "Les théories sur le péché originel de Saint
Anselme a Saint Thomas d'Aquin," in Psychologie et Morale aux XIIIe et XIIIe siècle, tom. 4, pt. 3, (Louvain: Abbaye du Mont César/J. Duclot, 1954),
11-280). Scotus will adopt Anselm's interpretation to refute the argument that original sin is somehow due to a physical corruption or qualitas mor bida in the flesh that is communicated as a real taint to the soul.
11 In a letter addressed about 520 by the monks of Scythia to the Af rican bishops in exile in Sardinia, Peter the Deacon explains their firm
Christian belief in this doctrine: Credimus itaque, bonum et sine ulla carnis impugnatione, a Deo creatore omnium, factum Adam, magnaque praeditum libertate; ita ut et bonum facere in propria facultate haberet, et malum, si vellet, posset admittere. Eratque mors et immortalitas in eius posita quodammodo arbitrii libertate. Capax enim erat utriusque rei, ut si servaret praeceptum, sine experientia mortis fieret immortalis: si vero contemneret, mors continuo subsequeretur. Itaque serpentis astutia depra vatus, sponte divina legis praevaricator effectus est; et ideo secundum quod ei praedictum fuerat, justo Dei judicio mortis paena damnatur, totusque, id est, secundum corpus et animam in deterius commutatus, amissa liberate propria, sub peccati servitio mancipatur. Ex hoc nullus est hominum, qui non hujus peccati vinculo nascatur astrinctus, praeter eum qui ad hoc vin culum peccati solvendum, novo generationis modo natus est, mediator Dei, et hominum homo Christus Jesus (I Tim 2:5). Quid enim aliud potuit aut potest nasci ex servo, nisi servus? Neque enim cum esset liber Adam, filios procreavit, sed postquam servus peccati factus est. Ideo sicut omnis homo ab illo est, ita et omnis homo servus peccati per ipsum est. Hinc et Aposto lus: Ex uno, inquit, in omnes homines in condemnationem (Rom. 5:18). Et rursus, Per unum hominem peccatum intravit in hunc mundum, et per pec catum mors, et ita in omnes homines pertransiit, in quo omnes peccaverunt
(Ibid., 12)." (Liber de Incarnatione et gratia, c. 6; PL 62, 88).
12 Unde ergo conceptionis sanctitas?... An forte inter amplexus marital es sanctitas se ipsi conceptioni immiscuit, ut simul et sanctificata fuerit, et
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary St. Bernard in his passionate letter to the Canons of Lyons, chiding them for spoiling their splendid record in liturgical matters by introducing this novel feast which the Church ignores, which reason disavows, and tradition disapproves.
"Are we more learned or pious than the Fathers?"13 And are we really honoring the Mother of God when we attribute to Ann what is unique to Mary, her immaculate conception of a child? "Where would her singular prerogative be, if we attri bute this same privilege to her mother? This is not honoring
Mary but detracting from her honor."14
Far more serious, claimed St. Thomas Aquinas, it de tracts from the dignity of Christ himself. "If the soul of the Blessed Virgin had never incurred the stain of original sin, this would be derogatory to the dignity of Christ, by reason of his being the universal savior of all. Consequently after Christ, who as the universal saviour of all, needed not to be saved, the purity of the Blessed Virgin holds the high est place. For Christ did not contract original sin in any way whatever, but was holy in His very conception, according to Luke 1: 35: 'The Holy which shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God.' But the Blessed Virgin did indeed contract original sin, but was cleansed therefrom before her concepta? Nec hoc quidem admittit ratio. Quomodo namque aut sanctitas absque Spiritu sanctificante, aut sancto Spiritui societas cum peccato fuit? aut certe peccatum quomodo non fuit, ubi libido non defuit? St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Epistola 174 (PL 182, 335). Scotus devotes specific attention to this argument of Bernard at the close of his question, for he sees no way to gainsay or reinterpret the mind of the saint; he can only point out where his reasoning went wrong.
13 Ibid., 333: Inter Ecclesias Galliae constat profecto Lugdunensem hactenus praeeminuisse ... Praesertim in officiis ecclesiasticis haud facile unquam repentinis visa est novitatibus acquiescere, nec se aliquando ju venili passa est decolorari levitate Ecclesia plena juidicii. Unde miramur satis, quod visum fuerit hoc tempore quibusdam vestrum voluisse mutare colorem optimum novam inducendo celebritatem, quam ritus Ecclesia ne scit, non probat ratio, non commendat antiqua traditio. Numquid Patribus doctiores, aut devotiores sumus? Periculose praesumimus, quidquid ipso rum in talibus praeterivit. Nec vero id tale est quod nisi praetereundum fuerit, Patrem quiverit omnino diligentiam praeteriisse.
14 Ibid., 335: Ubi erit praerogativa Matris Domini, qua singulariter cre ditur exultare et munere prolis, et integritate carnis, si tantumdem dederis et matri ipsius? Non est hoc Virginem honorare, sed honori detrahere.
Introduction birth from the womb."15 This, as Scotus saw it, was really the crucial difficulty he had to address before serious theologians like Bonaventure and Aquinas could accept the Immaculate
Conception even as a possibility. And for those who cited the widespread celebration of the feast, even though the Holy
See had not sanctioned it and canonists objected to it, Aqui nas already had this answer. "Although the Church of Rome does not celebrate the Conception of the Virgin, yet it toler ates the custom of certain churches that do keep that feast; wherefore this is not to be entirely reprobated. Nevertheless the celebration of this feast does not give us to understand that she was holy in her conception. But since it is not known when she was sanctified the feast of her Sanctification rather than the feast of her conception is kept on the day of her conception."16
Obviously, then, the immaculist sense was far from be ing the universal interpretation of the feast,17 and this more than anything helped to spread its celebration, especially at Paris where the precise object and rationale of the Feast of the Conception on December 8th remained a controversial is sue well into the fourteenth century. During Scotus's student days, it provoked the solemn public debates between the two most prominent secular Masters of Theology at the Univer sity of Paris, Henry of Ghent and Godfrey of Fontaines.18
15 St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologica III, q. 27, art. 2, ad 2 (New York: Benziger, 1947), vol. II, 2164.
16 Ibid., ad 3, 2165; William of Ware had suggested another acceptable way to celebrate the conception itself, not just Mary's sanctification. See infra, note 43.
17 Not until 1328 did the provincial council of Canterbury decide to celebrate the feast of the Conception in the sense proposed by Eadmer or pseudo-Anselm. For a history of how the Franciscans interpreted the feast see Ignatius Brady, O.F.M., "The Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception in the Late Fourteenth Century," Studia Mariana IX (1954), pp. 70-110.
18 Henry of Ghent, Quodlibet XV, q. 13, held during the academic year of 1291/92. If the interest in this question was provoked because the prox imity of this disputation to the Feast of the Conception, celebrated on Dec.
8, as seems highly probable, it would indicate Advent of 1291 rather than Easter of 1292 as the date of its composition. Godfrey's question (Quodlibet
VIII) is dated by Wippel 1292/93, but I see no reason why it might not have been in Easter of 1292 when interest in Henry's controversial claim was still high.
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary Both admitted the common opinion that Mary contracted original sin, but as St. Thomas had indicated earlier no one knew the precise moment after animation that her soul was sanctified. Henry of Ghent, however, had proposed a particu larly controversial theory claiming that the period her soul was in a state of sin could be reduced to a single moment, a mathematical point in time. The occasion on which he pro posed this novel theory was in a solemn public disputation open to any interested non-professional as well as to the fac ulty and university students of theology from all over Europe.
This was not the ordinary disputation the regent Masters took turns in conducting regularly during the academic year, but the specially challenging public disputation held either the second or third week of Advent or shortly before Eas ter when all classes were suspended to facilitate attendance.
Called a "Quodlibet" (the Latin term for "anything") it was an academic event where anyone could raise any question on any topic of current theological interest and the presid ing Master had to answer it. The particular question asked of Master Henry concerned the Feast of the Conception of Mary recently celebrated on December 8th. It was probably a few days later that Henry held his fifteenth Quodlibet dur ing Advent of 1291, and most likely someone from England in his audience raised the hotly controversial subject: "Is the conception of the Virgin Mary to be celebrated by reason of her conception?"19 The student theologian knew many back home believed Mary had never contracted original sin. They claimed Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of England himself supported this view, because they credited St. An selm with the authorship of Eadmer's unsigned tract. But here in Paris, as Bonaventure had noted earlier, no Master ever accepted such a theory.20 Hence the carefully worded
19 Henry: Utrum conceptio virginis Mariae sit celebranda ratione con ceptionis. Quodlibet XV, q. 13 (Parisiis, 1518, photoreprint Louvain, 1961), fol. 584r).
20 After presenting a masterful account of the "pious opinion" the An glo-Norman students brought to Paris, St. Bonaventure reluctantly rejects it in favor of traditional view. Securior etiam est, quia magis consonat fi dei pietati et Sanctorum auctoritati ... communiter Sancti, cum de materia ista loquuntur, solum Christum excipiunt ab illa generalitate, qua dicitur
Introduction question. "Is Mary's feast celebrated really by reason of her conception, not just her sanctification?
After the introductory debates between the bachelor op ponents and respondents participating in the dispute as part of their academic training, Henry as Master finally summed up the matter in by far the longest and most detailed of the fifteen questions he had fielded during the entire Quodlibet.
He began by pointing out every liturgical feast is celebrated by reason of a person's sanctity or sanctification. Hence it cannot be the act of conception but the hour, the moment, the time of conception that is being celebrated. "Conception," however, could be understood in various ways. There is the conception of the seed when fetal life begins.21 Some thirtyfive or forty-two days later, depending on the sex,22 a rational soul is created and infused in the growing fetus.23 This mo ment of animation, as all theologians agree, marks the con ceptio hominis24 "No rational mind," St. Anselm had pointed out, "accepts the view that an infant has a rational soul from Omnis peccaverunt in Adam. Nullus autem invenitur dixisse de his quos audivimus auribus nostris, Virginem Mariam a peccato originali fuisse im munem. Sent. III, dist. 3, pars 1, Opera omnia (Quaracchi, 1887), tom. III,
68; see also A. B. Wolter, "Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception in the Early Franciscan School," Studia Mariana 9 (San Francisco: Franciscan
National Marian Commission, 1954), 48-58.
21 Henry, op. cit., fol. 585r [V]: Non statim in hora conceptionis seminis fuit homo perfecta ex anima rationali et carne sicut nec alii; sed per tempo ris intervalla actione naturae ad illam perfectionem producta.
22 Ibid.: Et hoc 35 die a conceptu seminis nudi si sit foemina, 42 dies si sit masculus. Et hoc quia fortiori et ampliori digestione maturatur mas quam foemina.
23 After discussing the views of physicians like Hippocrates and others on fetal development, Henry concludes: Ista autem membrorum divisione completa in ultimo instanti illius perficitur totius corporis organizatio et generatur a forma corporeitatis humanae, atque anima rationalis creando a Deo infunditur, ut actus et perfectio illius extrema; a quo in unione cum illo propter morbidam dispositionis fomitis contractam, anima rationalis in eodem instanti contrahit maculam peccati originalis, et concipitur in peccato homo perfectus informa humana formata ex semine (Ibid.).
24 Henry, op. cit., fol. 584v [T]: Distinguo: quia est quaedam conceptio seminis: et est quaedam conceptio hominis formati ex semine secundum formam corpoream.
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary the moment of his conception."25 Hence, he concludes,26 there is no will, and consequently no question of either sin or sanc tification. If the moment of animation marks the "conception as regards the world," Henry explained, then the moment the soul is sanctified may be called a "conception as regards
God." Basing his computations on the date of Mary's birth day (September 8), Henry points out that December the 8th, the day the Normans celebrate the feast, must be the concep tio nudi seminis (the conception of the bare seed). Since there is nothing sacred about this biological event, "conception" in this sense cannot be precisely what is being commemorated.
"If they celebrate this day 'by reason of conception,' it must be some other sort of conception they have in mind,"27 name ly, the date of animation by the rational soul on Jan. 11 when her soul was created and infused in her body. This moment could be also called her nativity within the womb.28 But in asmuch as the seminally conceived flesh has this qualitas morbida, the soul in contacting it contracts original sin au tomatically as it were. But once sin is present, sanctification, by definition,29 becomes possible.
Since sanctification is what is being celebrated, the real question the inquirer who posed it wants answered, there
25 Anselm, De conceptu virginali et de originali peccato, c. 7, (ed.
Schmitt, vol. II, 148): Quod autem mox ab ipsa conceptione rationalem ani mam habeat, nullus humanus suscipit sensus. Henry agrees with Anselm; see note 21 supra.
26 Ibid.: [Ergo] in eo non est peccatum originale mox cum conceptus est.
27 Henry, op. cit., fol. 585r [T]: Sed si celebrant illud ratione conceptio nis, debent intendere quod rationis alicuius alterius conceptionis, ut iam videbitur.
28 Ibid. [V]: Si ergo loquamur de ista conceptione virginis qua concepta est homo perfectus 11 die Ianuarii, scilicet 3 Idus Ianuarii, qua concepta fuit eius nativitas in utero.
29 Sanctification has a technical meaning, as Alexander of Hales ex plains: Dicimus quod sanctificatio secundum quod communiter vel gener aliter accipitur, prout scilicet communiter est in omnibus sanctificatis, est mundatio ab originale culpa, nec plus habet sanctifiatio de ratione sua communi quam huiusmodi mundationem. Quaestio de sanctificatione (Co dex Vat. lat. 782, fol. 60c; see also Thomas Aquinas, Summa theol. III, q.
27, art. 2: "The sanctification of the Blessed Virgin cannot be understood as having taken place before animation ... because the sanctification of which we are speaking is nothing but the cleansing from original sin." (ed. cit., vol. II, 2164).
Introduction fore, is: Does the moment of sanctification coincide with that of animation?30 If the two moments do not coincide, then there are two possibilities, namely, either (1) once the soul is infused in the body and is infected with sin, it is immediately sanctified so that for no continuous period of time does it re main in a state of sin, or else (2) there is a period of time in which Mary's soul remained in a state of original sin, wheth er it be long or short, Henry does not care. Here then we have the second and third possibilities Scotus refers to and consid ers as the only logical alternatives to his own preferred third view that Mary never contracted sin to begin with. It is only these three possibilities he considers in our question, since it is from his final version or Ordinatio. The second possibility is the only one to which some objection is raised that he takes time to answer. When he first proposed this alternative at Oxford, he may not have been as fully familiar with Henry's position as he became later in Paris, for he seemed to think
Henry might be interpreted this way.31
Henry, however, wanted to go still further. He thought he could show that the instant of conception and sanctification coincide for all practical purposes.32 For one can distinguish within a single instant of time two distinct aspects of nature one of which is prior, the other posterior. According to this priority of nature Mary's soul can be first in a state of sin and afterwards in a state of grace. In an extremely lengthy and involved argument, based in part upon Aristotle's physics of 30 Henry, op. cit., [V]: Si ergo loquamur de ista...[nativitate] in utero, ulterius distinguo, quia virgo aut in illo eodem instanti, quo sic concepta est mundo et originali peccato infecta simul fuit concepta Deo etiam per gratiam sanctificationis, aut non.
31 Scotus, Lectura (Balić, op. cit., p. 92): "But the second is also possible, namely, that it is only for an instant that she was in original sin and for any time period she was in grace. And if one understands the Ghentian in this way, his opinion is good, so that for an instant of conception she was in sin and a daughter of ire, and in the whole time-span was subject to grace."
In Paris, according to the Valencia Codex, he admits this is a benign inter pretation of what Henry actually said. See note 44 infra.
32 Henry, op. cit., fol. 585v [X]: Quod tamen originalis culpa et sanctifi cationis gratia simul sint, seu esse habeat quodammodo in eodem instanti, etsi non in eodem subiecto pro illo eodem instanti, hoc non est omnino im possibile.
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary motion and change, and part upon a curious example of how a falling millstone will reverse the direction of a bean thrown against its underside, he attempted to prove this philosophi cally.33
From an Aristotelian standpoint, sin and grace represent contrary forms that cannot coexist in the human soul as their subject.34 On the other hand, according to the Philosopher, contrary forms causally affect one another.35 Grace expels the state of sin, and vice versa, since the two cannot coexist as simultaneous forms of the soul as subject. But if the presence of grace is what causes the sin to leave, grace must somehow
33 In his Paris lecture, Scotus goes into Henry's position in more detail than in either the Lectura or Ordinatio. He sums up this position of Henry briefly as follows: Dicit unus doctor quod in eodem instanti fuit in peccato et in gratia, sed in priori signo naturae fuit in peccato et in posteriori in gratia. Exemplum ad hoc: si faba proiciatur contra molarem, adest et abest puncto, et tamen non est ibi quies media, sed oportet ponere in priori signo adesse et in posteriori abesse. (Reportatio Parisiensis III, dist. 3, q. 1 in Io annes D. Scotus Doctor Immaculatae Conceptionis, 26.)
34 Henry, op. cit., fol. 585v [X]: Quod autem virgo simul in eodem in stanti quod concepta est mundo, et originali peccato infecta, hoc omnino est impossibile, quia contraria sunt originali culpa et sanctificationis gratia et simul fuissent in eodem subiecto. Contraria autem in eodem instanti sim plici secundum rem non possunt inesse eidem subiecto.
35 Henry, ibid., [X]: De esse enim formatum contrariarum distingui tur secundum duplicem considerationem quam habet quaelibet talium formarum. Uno enim modo consideratur in ordine sive in comparatione ad agentem ..., a quo producit in esse et a quo habet suum esse. Conside rando autem primo modo formam et esse eius secundum primam compa rationem, scilicet in origine ad agentem producentem illam, semper in for mis contrariis sibi succedentibus forma posterior habet esse prius natura, quam corrumpatur prior, quia prior non corrumpitur, nec a subiecto suo expellitur, nisi per actionem formae alterius introductae posterius in idem subiectum, et hoc ratione contrarietatis, quam habet ad illam, qua se non compatiuntur in eodem subiecto, et etiam ratione maioris virtutis et effica ciae, quam illa forma habet in agendo super minorem virtutem et effica ciam, quam forma alia habet in patiendo et resistendo, dicente Philosopho in libro De motibus animalium. Est aliqua multitudo vigoris et virtutem secundum quam manet quod manet; quemadmodum et secundum quam movet movens: et est quaedam proportio ex necessitate quemadmodum et contrariorum motuum, sic et quietum, et aequales quidem impassibiles ad invicem obtinetur autem secundum excessum, sicut enim pellens pellitur sic pulsum pellitur similiter secundum virtutem.
Introduction exist if it is to act on sin.36 But according to Aristotle's theory of action, what acts and what is acted upon must somehow coexist causally.37 To show how this paradoxical situation is possible, Henry appeals to his "Gedankenexperiment" of the bean and the falling millstone.38 For in his physics, Ar istotle analyzed continuous or rectilinear motion as well as what happens when a moving object recoils or reverses its movement on striking an immovable obstacle. In such a case, though the forward and the reverse movements are opposed and discontinuous according to Aristotle, and hence distinct and radically different from one another.39 Henry uses his example, however, to blur this sharp distinction, for to the eye at least the falling millstone seems to continue down ward motion with no interruption whereas the bean reverses its motion when it encounters the millstone.40 Despite their
36 Henry, op. cit., [X]: Nihil autem agit nisi habens esse, quia actus se cundus, cuiusmodi est agere, necessario praesupponit actum primum qua est esse. Semper ergo forma corrumpens prius habet esse natura, quam per illam forma ei contraria corrumpatur.
37 Henry, op. cit., [Y]: In illa ergo duratione necessario simul habent esse formae illae contrariae, licet diversimodo, puta forma corrumpens in ordine ad agentem, et producentem illam et forma corrumpenda in ordine ad subiectum.
38 Henry, op. cit., fol. 586r [C-D]: Si ergo sanctificari potuit et mundari a peccato, ut non nisi per instans, sive momentum in macula peccati origi nalis fuerit, recta ratione determinante (ut mihi videtur) hoc pie sentiri potest ... Et mihi videtur quod hoc bene possibile est, sicut in aliis dispo sitionibus, quae acquiruntur post subitas mutationes, quae sunt termini motuum quorundam, et amittuntur per motus alios: inter quos mediae sunt dictae mutationes, et ipsa mutata esse in instantibus mensurantibus dictas mutationes: in quibus sunt sub illis dispositionibus, et in motibus circum stantibus non sunt sub illis. Talem autem mutationem convenit mediam esse inter duos motus ... cum faba movetur superius motu violento, et obviat fortius moto, puta lapidi molari descendenti naturaliter inferius, in con tactu lapidis subito in instanti mutata est ... Et valet sicut mihi videtur hoc exemplum secundum ad nostrum propositum.
39 Aristotle, Physics VIII, c. 8 261b 29-34.
40 Henry, op. cit., fol. 586r [D]: Talem autem mutationem convenit me diam esse inter duos motus dupliciter. Uno modo inter duos motus quae sunt partes unius motus simplicis. Alio modo inter duos motus contrarios.
Primo modo secundum quamdam demonstrationem Philosophi VIII Physi corum omnes continue motum in quolibet instanti signato sui transitus est in spatio sibi aequali, sic quod per partem motus praecedentem in fine eius mutatum est in illud, et per partem motus sequentem in principio eius mutatum est ab illo et est mutatio una secundum rem et in uno instanti
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary opposition, the last instant of forward motion coincides with the first instant of reverse movement and the reversal of di rection takes on the time-characteristics of continuous recti linear motion.
Henry sees this as proof that there is an intermediate po sition between Aristotle's opposites of continuous and discon tinuous change, and because of his great devotion to Mary, he sees a way to shrink the interval between her contracting original sin and her subsequent sanctification to an absolute zero time-wise. For at one and the same instant of time, there can be two distinct "signs of nature."41 In one Mary's soul con tracts original sin, but in the other, she is sanctified and con tinues to remain in that state for her entire life. Henry maps his time-distinction on linear co-ordinates, since the flow of time is analogous to that spatial movement. Let the millstone represent the bodily flesh and the bean the spiritual soul; and let the moment the bean touches the millstone represent the instant Mary's soul was created and infused in her body.
The downward movement of the bean represents the time secundum rem, differenti solum secundum esse et rationem, ut est finis temporis mensurantis motum praecedente et principium temporis mensur antis motum sequentem. Secundo modo cum faba movetur superius motu violento, et obviat fortius moto, puta lapidi molari descendenti naturaliter inferius, in contactu lapidis subito in instanti mutata est in spatium sibi aequale per motum eius violentum sursum, et in eodem instanti ipsam faba mutatur ab illo per motum naturale lapidis deorsum fabam impellentem, ut non sit possibile eam in illo spatio sibi aequali quiscere, sicut quisceret si sibi relinqueretur, secundum aliam quandam demonstrationem Philoso phi in eodem VIII, nec esse aut manere nisi per istas medium inter tem pora illorum motuum in quo tamen spatio est per illud instans secundum veritatem, nec fuit in tempore praecedenti, nec tempore sequenti, et est illud instans signum commune utriusque temporis et primo et posteriori et idem et unum numero, ratione autem non idem, ut dicit Philosophus in eodem
VIII. Quod si spatium illud sibi aequale et totum residuum spatii sursum obscurus esset et tenebrosum, et totum residuum spatii deorsum esset cla rum et illuminatum , superficies fabae superior in illo instanti in quo esse in spatio sibi aequali esset obscura et in toto tempore sui ascensus fuisset clara et illuminata, et similiter in toto tempore sui descensus. Et valet sicut mihi videtur hoc exemplum secundum ad nostrum propositum.
41 "Signum" or "sign" has the technical sense of a non-dimensional unit such as a "point" in space, or a point in time. And a distinction of signs is used to express some conceptual distinction or non-mutual implication that can be used to order things conceptually that coincide temporally.
Introduction Mary's soul was in a state of grace; its upward movement the time her soul was under the shadow of sin cast by the millstone. But since Mary soul did not temporally preexist its infusion in her body, this dimension shrinks to the initial zero point at which the bean touches the millstone and im mediately begins to move downward. If there is no period of rest between the upward motion of the bean and its reversal on striking the millstone, the two contrary movements coin cide to the same extent as the last instant of earlier motion overlaps with the first instant of later motion.
This was Henry's canny solution to a most controversial question. Undoubtedly, it left his divided audience, if they could follow his involved reasoning, both astounded and probably speechless. For it claimed the Feast of the Concep tion could be interpreted in a way that might satisfy both parties, since, for all practical purposes, Mary did not exist for any span of time, however, short its duration, in a state of original sin. Nevertheless, she did contract it the instant her soul was created and animated her body.
No sooner had Henry proposed his mind-boggling solu tion than it was attacked as philosophically nonsensical by his habitual opponent, Godfrey of Fontaines, the other great secular Master of Theology of Scotus's student days.42 Need less to say, the bachelors of theology could hardly ignore the 42 Godfrey of Fontaines, Quodlibet VIII, q. 4: Utrum in expulsione cul pae sive originalis sive actualis sint simul culpa quae expellitur et gratia quae expellit? Ed. J. Hoffmans in Les Philosophes Belges, tom. IV (Louvain,
1924), 51-60.
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary dispute and Scotus was no exception.43 In his Paris lectures44 he had to treat Henry's explanation in some detail, even though he admitted "If this position posits what it sounds like verbally, there is no need to argue against it, since it is opposed to a first principle, by claiming that contradicto
43 Knowledge of the Parisian dispute spread quickly to Oxford, where Henry's theory was presented at length in a disputed question of William of Ware, one of Scotus's teachers. See my article, "Doctrine of the Immacu late Conception in the Early Franciscan School," Studia Mariana 9 (San
Francisco: Franciscan National Marian Commission, 1954), 59-67. This same volume of papers given at the Second Franciscan National Congress, held in California (May 4-9, 1954) to honor the centenary of the definition of the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception, contains two excellent his torical accounts of the intellectual milieu at the Universities of Oxford and Paris at the time Scotus presented his defense and of the reactions it pro voked. One is that of Berard Vogt, O.F.M., "Duns Scotus, Defender of the Immaculate Conception–an Historical-dogmatic Study," ibid. 161-75, and the other is the article of Ignatius Brady referred to in note 17. See also
Brady's other article, "The Developmemt of the Doctrine of the Immacu late Conception in the Fourteenth Century After Aureoli" in Franciscan
Studies 15 (1955), 175-202.
44 In addition to the Reportatio Parisiensis edited by Wadding and based on the Worcester and Balliol MSS, Balic edited three additional sig nificantly different "reports" based on MSS discovered at Troyes, Barcelo na and Valencia. (Cf. C. Balić, Ioannes D. Scotus Doctor Immaculatae Con ceptionis, 25-83). The one from Troyes (Reportatio Trecensis, 35-47) may contain the report most widely circulated in Paris, since John of Pouilly used it as the basis for his public attack on Scotus's position in 1309. See
C. Balic, "Ioannes Duns Scotus et historia Immaculatae Conceptionis," An tonianum 30 (1955), 402-08. In the Barcelona Codex (Reportatio Barcino nensis, 48-65) we find the most detailed treatment of Henry's view together with the suggestion that it can be interpreted in a worse or a better way. It is also the most polished of these reports. The Valencia Codex (Reportatio
Valentinensis 66-83) departs completely from the usual tri-partite format.
It begins immediately with the definitive assertion that an immaculate conception is both possible and fitting. Only after refuting the argument from the common opinion against this does it present the second possibil ity with a reference to the fact that Henry could be interpreted this way, al though this is not what he actually said. And only then are the twenty five arguments from authority against the thesis brought up for refutation. XV century writers refer to a public dispute by Scotus wherein he answered numerous objections against the Immaculate Conception proposed by his audience and attribute his title of "Subtle Doctor" to his brilliant defense of this prerogative. Balic suggested that this MSS as well as that of Bar celona may contain fragments of that historic dispute though admittedly the complete text of it has not been found. Cf. Balić, Scoti Doctor Mariani
Theologiae Elementa, cx.
Introduction ries are simultaneously true at the same instant of time ...
Neither does his example of the bean validate it."45 However, Scotus did use the occasion to explain how Aristotle's theory of motion needs to be interpreted. It seems Henry's theory also suggested Scotus's second possibility. This minimizes the interval between animation (and the contracting of sin) on the one hand and her subsequent sanctification on the other, but avoids the contradiction inherent in Henry's expla nation. In his Paris lectures, according to both the important
Reportatio Trecensis46 and in the Reportatio Barcinonensis,47 Scotus stressed that his second possibility gives us "a better way"48 to interpret what is really essential to Henry's defense of the common opinion, namely, that there was no interval or length of time in which Mary was in a state of original sin, since this was reduced to a single non-durational instant.
Even this second possibility, when Scotus explained it, apparently caused some difficulty of understanding, since two objections were raised by his hearers which he had to answer at some length. However, since it represented the best interpretation one could give to the common opinion, it became the generally accepted understanding of this view
45 Reportatio Parisiensis III, dist. 3, q. 1 (Balić, 26): Sed si ista positio ponat ut verba videntur sonare, non est arguendum contra, cum sit opposi tum primi principii, ponendo contradictoria simul vera in instanti tempo ris, quia non minus impossibile est ponere privative opposita simul vera in eodem instanti temporis quam contradictoria. – Nec valet exempla de faba.
46 According to this Troyes MS Scotus presents this alternative first and defends it as a distinct possibility: Dico ad quaestionem quod potuit
[1] in primo instanti fuisse in originali peccato et in toto tempore sequente in gratia, et potuit [2] per tempus fuisse in originali peccato et postea in gratia. Secundum primum modum [intelligo] illam opinionem Magistri
Henrici quod 'in primo instanti fuit in originali peccato et toto tempore posteriori in gratia.' Et hoc possibile. Reportatio Trecensis in Balic, Ioannes
D. Scotus Doctor Immaculatae Conceptionis, 45.
47 According to the Barcelona MS he made the same point: Respondeo ad quaestionem.–Dico quod potuit in originali per instans tantum et
[fuisse]–ut dixi–per tempus consequens habitum, et potuit numquam ha buisse originale. Primo modo intelligitur opinio Henrici. Reportatio Barci nonensis in Balic, Ioannes D. Scotus Doctor Immaculatae Conceptionis, 60.
48 Ibid., 49: Hic dicitur quodam doctore, qui male et melius potest intel ligi.
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary in the decades that followed.49 In the Ordinatio it is the only alternative to his own preferred position, and since this ver sion is really Scotus's own rather than Henry's he does not even mention the "Ghentian" as he did in the earlier Lectura
Completa.50 Nevertheless, it is clear from all his accounts that Scotus himself chose to believe Mary never contracted sin to begin with, since he sees this as a distinct possibil ity and according to his Marian principle "If the authority of the Church or the authority of Scripture does not contradict such, it seems probable what is more excellent should be at tributed to Mary." And it is on this basis that he interprets the Feast of the Conception.51
49 This second possibility would become the preferred interpretation of those who wished to hold the common opinion, and did not feel comfortable with Scotus's first possibility. Thus, the Dominican Durandus of SaintPourçain, writing a decade or more later, says: Hic est duplex modus di cendi. Primus est quod B.V. non fuit concepta in originali peccato, sed simul tempore fuit animata et grata ipsi data. Et huius dicti ostenditur primo possibilitas ... secundo congruitas ... et tertio probatur quod ita factum fue rit ... Alius modus dicendi est quod ... non decuit ut praeservata fuerit. He also agrees this view does not rule out the fact that Christ was also Mary's redeemer, but he then goes on to give his own opinion. His non obstantibus,
[alia] opinio videtur verior, scilicet quod Deus potuit facere quod B. V. per solum instans esset in culpa originali et toto tempore sequenti in gratia...
Sent. III, d. 3, q. 2 (Antverpiae, 1566), f. 218rb; q. 2, f. 218va.
50 Scotus, Lectura completa (92). Referring to this second possibility he writes: Sed secundum etiam fuit possibile, scilicet quod tantum per unum instans fuit in peccato originali et in tempore habito in gratia. Et si sic in telligit Gandavus, tunc est opinio bona, ita quod pro instanti conceptionis fuerit in culpa et filia irae, et in tot tempore habito sub gratia, quia hoc patet in creaturis frequenter. According to the Krakow MS (Bibl. univer.
Iagell., lat. 1408) a detailed account of what Henry really taught is ap pended as a note at the end of the Lectura, as though it were something discovered later. (Ibid., 98-100).
51 In the Lectura Scotus answers the Canonical objection to the cel ebration of the Feast explaning that the glossarist knew nothing more than what others had said about the feast and one should answer it as he had answered the objection from Bernard and the other saints. "Hence one must say that the seminal conception must not be celebrated but the conception of the animated body can be celebrated" (96). At Paris, accord ing to the Barcelona MS he put it this way: "As to that decree 'about the celebration of conception of the Virgin' it can be said that Gratian had in mind that it was not to be celebrated so far as her procreation was natural; but inasmuch as as she was deprived of original [sin] it can be celebrat ed." (65) In the Ordinatio Scotus does not mention the Feast explicitly but
Introduction Even this restrained and prudent departure from the common theological opinion provoked a storm of opposition at Paris, including the accusation of heresy. A year after Sco tus's death, for example, the secular Master John of Pouil ly attacked his views in a public Quodlibetal disputation.52
Though John mentions no names, he cites Scotus's own words at length, answering his arguments in detail and challenging his solution, to conclude that neither Mary, nor God, her Son, needs our lies, that inasmuch as Scotus's position is against all Scripture it must be reckoned heretical and that one who has so taught must be dealt with otherwise than by mere argument.53 Others were more moderate in their opposition and even admitted Scotus's opinion seemed to be valde ratio nabilis. The fact is, as Brady and others show,54 Scotus initi ated a trend that would never die out but would continue to grow until the "new theologians," as they were first called,55 deals rather with Bernard's specific problem as to why the moment of the "conception of the seed" could not have been the moment the Holy Spirit sanctified her soul. Though Scotus preferred the Anselmian explanation to Augustine's as to "why the seed is said to be infected," he wishes to show whatever view one holds, this does nothing to rule out the possibility that her conception was immaculate.
52 John states his intent in these words: Primo volo declarare quod non potest dici probabiliter nec teneri pro opinione probabili quod beata Virgo de facto non contraxit originale peccatum. Imo salva cuiuscumque rever entia, videtur quod debeat haereticum reputari. (Quodl. III, q. 3 in Ioannis de Pollicaco et Ioannis de Neapoli Quaestiones Disputatae de Immaculata
Conceptione B.M.V., ed. C. Balić [Bibl. Mariana Medii Aevi: Textus: I] (Si benici, 1931), 2; the whole text is given 1-70.
53 John of Pouilly, Ibid., 13-14.
54 I. Brady, O.F.M., "The Developmemt of the Doctrine of the Immacu late Conception in the Fourteenth Century After Aureoli" in Franciscan
Studies 15 (1955) 175-202; see also his article "The Doctrine of the Im maculate Conception in the Late Fourteenth Century," Studia Mariana
9 (1954), 86-110. See also C. Balić, "Ioannes Duns Scotus et historia Im maculatae Conceptionis," Antonianum 30 (1955), 349-488; this article was republished in book form with an index Ioannes Duns Scotus et Historia
Immaculatae Conceptionis (Romae: Via Merulana 124, 1955); Alexander DiLella, O.F.M., "The Immaculate Conception in the Writings of Peter Au reoli," Franciscan Studies 15 (1955), 146-58.
55 The Franciscan Alvarus Pelagus (Alvaro Pelayo), penitentiary of Pope John XXII, called them such as late as the 1330-32. In his De planctu
Ecclesiae II, c. 52 (Venetiis, 1560), f. 110rb-110va) he complained: Mater Christi ... in originali peccato concepta fuit, ut late probat Bernardus ...
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary would eventually outnumber the old, and Feast of December
8 would become simply that of the Immaculate Conception and the Marian prerogative it honored would some four cen turies later be defined as a dogma of faith.
The third question on marriage illustrates the difficulty theologians in Scotus's day had in reconciling the Marian ac count in the Gospel of Luke with that in the Gospel of Mat thew. The first contained the story of the Annunciation, the second that of Mary's marriage to Joseph. When Gabriel an nounced she was to become the mother of the long awaited
Messiah, Mary expressed surprise. "How can this be since I know not man?" The traditional explanation of the Fathers of the Church was not just that she was still a virgin, but that she had no intentions of ever having sexual relations with a man, and had even taken a vow to that effect. And it was to one vowed to virginity that Gabriel addressed his answer: "The Holy Spirit shall come upon you, etc." For medi eval canonists concerned with the legal aspects of contracts made under oath, this presented a problem. If Mary had vowed perpetual virginity, how could she take marriage vows as well? Did not the partners exchange the sexual rights to each other's body for the purpose of procreation as well as for mutual support and comfort? Some theologians suggest ed the vow of virginity was taken only conditionally and not absolutely. Scotus was quick to perceive the condition they suggested did nothing to solve the legal problem. He offered instead another canonical solution based on something Pope
Nicholas III had granted to the Franciscan Order of which he was a member. The vow of poverty taken by Franciscans differed from that of other Orders in that it was not only et hanc sententiam tenent omnes antiqui theologi: Alexander, Thomas in suo IV et II, Bonaventure, Richardus, licet novi quidam theologi a sensu communi ecclesiae recedentes teneant contra, indevoti revera Dominae, et tamen devoti cupientes apparere nitantur, eam quodammodo sic Deo et suo
Filio comparantes, quorum opinio nova et phantastica sit a fidelibus can cellata, quia sanctificationem Virginis negat contra id quod tenet Ecclesia ipsam sanctificationem fuisse. From the long list of these new theologians, however, it is clear that he was one of the minority of Franciscans who held out against the Immaculate Conception; on the other hand, as Brady shows (see the preceding note), opponents without the Order, especially among the Dominicans, grew in number.
Introduction the individual friar who renounced the right of ownership of any property or personal goods, but the Order itself did the same and only accepted the simple use of what they needed.
Nicholas III in his explanation of the obligation of the Fran ciscan vow of poverty distinguished between ownership and use. The owner could obviously let others use what he owned.
The benefactors who gave the friars what they needed to live retained the ownership while ceding the simple use to the friars. If the benefaction was an outright gift to the friars, then the Holy See accepted the ownership while the friars retained the use. Boniface VIII, himself a canon lawyer, had incorporated the decrees of Nicholas III in his revision of canon law, and Scotus refers to this in this question as his canonically acceptable answer to a problem the university lawyers sought to solve.
The fourth and last question concerns the maternity of Mary. "Was the Blessed Virgin truly the Mother of God and of Man?" As Scotus indicates in the body of the question, no theologian any longer questioned the fact that she was. Nev ertheless, his special wording of the question as well as his pro forma introductory arguments "Pro" and "Con" recall the heated theological controversies as to whether her relation ship of motherhood to one of the three divine persons en tailed also a truly real relationship to the divine nature of God or solely to the human nature or manhood of Christ.
With the exception of one question on the filiation of Christ referred to later, these theological questions belonged to a yesteryear. However, as his query on the maternity indicates there were still two disputed points as to the philosophical or biological grounds for calling anyone a mother. The first or biological reason stemmed from the grossly inferior pro creative role played by women according to Aristotle's widely accepted sexual theory. According to the Philosopher, the male is active, the female essentially passive in procreation.
Scotus attacks this theory with four arguments defending woman's active cooperation in the procreative role. The sec ond objection arises from the once popular, but now outdated theory proposed by Augustine, namely that any activity on
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary the part of creatures was based on some seminal reason the creator had built into their natures. Scotus could not accept this theory any more than he could that of Aristotle. Hence, he presents his own account as to why Mary was as truly a mother as any other human parent. For those concerned with the history of the feminist movement it might be inter esting to note that it was devotion to Mary more than any thing else that brought the medieval theologians a long way towards realizing something of the symbolic implications of Paul's statement (Gal. 3:28): "There does not exist among you
Jew or Greek, slave or freeman, male or female. All are one in Christ Jesus."
We have omitted the even more philosophically compli cated Mariological question Balic includes in his collection of Scotus's writings on Mary. It stems from the fact that Christ was the son of a divine Father and a human mother. This caused university theologians to raise the question of wheth er there were two real relationships of filiation or sonship in Christ. Suffice it to say that Scotus, contrary to many of his contemporaries, insisted on the distinct reality of both filial relationships in Christ.56 Though the question might still be of some interest to a philosopher discussing the nature of relations, or one concerned with proper theological discourse, to include it in its entirety seemed inappropriate for the pres ent book.
56 Duns Scotus, Ordinatio III, dist. 8, quest. unica: Utrum in Christo sint duae filiationes reales? ... Ad quaestionem dico quod alia est filiatio in Christo ad Patrem, et alia ad matrem, et utraque est realis. Balić, Theolo giae Marianae Elementa, 127, 140.