Theological Studies

64 (2003)

REVISITING THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

ILIA DELIO, O.S.F.
[Franciscan theologians posit an integral relation between Incarnation and Creation whereby the Incarnation is grounded in the Trinity of love. The primacy of Christ as the fundamental reason for the
Incarnation underscores a theocentric understanding of Incarnation
that widens the meaning of salvation and places it in a cosmic content. The author explores the primacy of Christ both in its historical
context and with a contemporary view toward ecology, world religions, and extraterrestrial life, emphasizing the fullness of the mystery of Christ.]
RAHNER, in his remarkable essay Christology within an Evolutionary View of the World, noted that the Scotistic doctrine of
Christ has never been objected to by the Churchs magisterium,1 although
one might add, it has never been embraced by the Church either. According to this doctrine, the basic motive for the Incarnation was, in Rahners
words, not the blotting-out of sin but was already the goal of divine
freedom even apart from any divine fore-knowledge of freely incurred
guilt.2 Although the doctrine came to full fruition in the writings of the
late 13th-century philosopher/theologian John Duns Scotus, the origins of
the doctrine in the West can be traced back at least to the 12th century and
to the writings of Rupert of Deutz.

ARL

THE PRIMACY OF CHRIST TRADITION

The reason for the Incarnation occupied the minds of medieval thinkers,
especially with the rise of Anselm of Canterbury and his satisfaction
theory. While Bernard of Clairvaux had been a more powerful spokesman
of medieval devotion to Christ and Thomas Aquinas a more balanced
exponent of satisfaction theology, Anselms combination of deep devotion
ILIA DELIO, O. S. F., is associate professor in the department of ecclesiastical
history at the Washington Theological Union, as well as the academic coordinator
of spirituality studies and director of the Franciscan Center. She received her
doctorate from Fordham University. Besides a recent article in Theological Studies
(1999), she has also published a book, Simply Bonaventure: An Introduction to
His Life, Thought and Writings (New City Press, 2001), and several articles on
Bonaventure. She is currently writing a book provisionally entitled Chaos and
Transformation: A Franciscan Perspective.
1
Karl Rahner, Christology within an Evolutionary View of the World, Theological Investigations, 5, trans. Karl-H. Kruger (Baltimore: Helicon, 1966) 184.
2

Ibid.
3

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

and theological innovation made him the special catalyst of the distinctive
Latin view of the role of the God-man.3 In his Cur Deus Homo Anselm
considered redemption as the remission of sins within the context of satisfaction. He defined sin as an affront to Gods honor, that is Gods transcendent being, so that divine justice demands recompense either by satisfaction or by punishment.4 The infinite magnitude of the offense of sin,
Anselm claimed, requires a like satisfaction that can be achieved only by
one who is both (and therefore can make such satisfaction) and also a
human being (who is bound to make it).5 Following the satisfaction theory,
Western Christology has focused on the sinfulness of the human person,
the guilt incurred by sin, and the saving work of Christ. While this theory
assumed prominence in the West, other medieval thinkers were discussing
the Incarnation less in juridicial terms and more in a cosmological context.
The medieval theologian Boethius, for example, wrestled with the relationship between Creation and Incarnation, as did Rupert of Deutz who
affirmed that Christ would have become human even if Adam had not
sinned.6 On the whole, however, it is the Franciscan theologians who argued most convincingly in favor of the primacy of Christ against the Ansel3

Bernard McGinn, Christ as Savior in the West, in Christian Spirituality: Origins to the Twelfth Century, ed. Bernard McGinn and John Meyendorff, World
Spirituality: An Encyclopedic History of the Religious Quest 16 (New York: Crossroad, 1987) 256. Although Anselm articulated the need for redemption in an exclusive way, it was Augustine who first drew a strict correlation between Incarnation and redemption. Comparing Jesus to a physician who had come to heal a sick
man, he stated that had there been no illness, there would have been no need to
send for a physician. See Augustine, Sermo 174 ad populum, de verbis Apostoli,
Opera omnia (Paris: Muguet, 1683) 5, col. 834. Michael Meilach claims that fallacy
is inherent in Augustines reasoning. Whereas it is true to say that God became
human to redeem us, it does not follow that Christ did so only, or even primarily,
to redeem us. The simply, affirmative proposition is transformed into an exclusive
one. The former states a reason for the Incarnation and the latter makes that reason
the unique or principal one (Michael D. Meilach, The Primacy of Christ: Life and
Doctrine [Chicago: Franciscan Herald, 1964] 7). Meilach provides a good historical
view of the primacy of Christ tradition.
4
Anse`lme de Cantorbery: Pourquoi Dieu sest fait homme, trans. Rene Roques,
Sources chre tiennes 91 (Paris: Cerf, 1963) 1.13, 19, and 22.
5
Anselm, Opera omnia, vol. 2 (Edinburgh: Nelson, 1946) 37133; McGinn,
Christ as Savior in the West 256.
6
Rupert of Deutz, De gloria et honore Filii Hominis, lib. 13 (PL 168.162429);
Kenan B. Osborne, Alexander of Hales: Precursor and Promoter of Franciscan
Theology, in The History of Franciscan Theology, ed. Kenan B. Osborne (New
York: Franciscan Institute, 1994) 31. Honorius of Autun (d. 1150) agreed with
Rupert, as did Albert the Great pace his revered student Thomas Aquinas. See
Honorius of Autun, Libellus octo quaestionum, c. 2 (PL 172.118788); Albert the
Great, III Sentences d. 20, a. 4, in Opera omnia, vol. 28, ed. Borgnet (Paris: Vives,
1894) 36062. According to Aquinas, there would have been no need for an incar-

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

mian notion of satisfaction. The term primacy of Christ is based on the

Pauline notion that Jesus Christ is the the image of the invisible God, the
first born of every creature (Colossians 1:15).7 While the term is unconventional in contemporary Christology, it is operative in Franciscan Christology to describe the predestination of Christ.8 Its basis is due in part to
Francis of Assisi whose insight to the beauty of Creation as a gift from God
centered on the preeminent gift of Jesus Christ.
Just as Francis grasped an integral connection between Christ and Creation, so too Franciscan Christology is marked by its cosmological context.
The notion of cosmic Christology, rooted in Scripture, particularly in
Johns Gospel as well as in Colossians 1:1516; Ephesians 1:2023, attained
a flowering of thought in many of the Greek writers from Origen to Maximus the Confessor.9 One of the first theologians in the Franciscan tradition
to expound the relationship between Christ and Creation was the renation if there had been no sin to blot out. See Thomas Aquinas Summa theologiae
3, q. 1, a. 3.
7
Meilach, The Primacy of Christ 5.
8
It is interesting to note that in translating Scotuss text on the primacy of Christ,
Allan Wolter uses the language of predestination wherein predestination is the
primacy of Christ. See John Duns Scotus, III Ordination (Suppl.) S. 19 (Assisi com.
137, fol. 161 v); trans. Allan B. Wolter, John Duns Scotus on the Primacy and
Personality of Christ, in Franciscan Christology, ed. Damian McElrath (New
York: Franciscan Institute, 1980) 153. To my knowledge no one has explained why
the term primacy of Christ is favored in the Franciscan tradition other than it
connotes the Pauline idea of first born of creation, which in turn relates to the
cosmic Christ. While the term predestination might avert any Arian or subordinationist tendencies conceived by the notion of primacy, it is used by Scotus only
to explain the reason(s) for the Incarnation. The term primacy of Christ, however, describes the doctrine of predestination and is used as the operative term by
later theologians.
9
The formulation of cosmic Christology is rooted in Scripture and tradition. The
letters to the Colossians 1:1320 and Ephesians 1:310 affirm the primacy of Christ
and provide a basis for this doctrine. Among the early Fathers of the Church,
Irenaeus (d. 202) insisted on the primacy of the incarnate Word in Gods creative
plan. Salvation for Irenaeus is not restricted to redemption from sin but is a more
extensive process by which all are led from a state of infancy to that of maturity,
or perfection. See Irenaeus of Lyons, Adversus haereses 5, 38, 1 (PG 7.1105).
Recapitulation is the summing up of the entire cosmos in Christ as its head (3, 16,
6 [PG 7.92526]). Maximus the Confessor (d. 662) also insisted that the Incarnation
would have taken place even without a fall. Although the Incarnation in its proper
and historical sense is directly related to the constitution and meaning of the cosmos, it also restores fallen humanity to its proper relationship to God. The Incarnation therefore provides both redemption and completion of the cosmos. See Lars
Thunberg, Man and the Cosmos: The Vision of St. Maximus the Confessor (New
York: St. Vladimirs Seminary, 1985) 55, 7680. See also George A. Maloney, The
Cosmic Christ: From Paul to Teilhard (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1968); Eric
Osborn, Irenaeus of Lyons (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2001) 97140; De-

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

nowned Alexander of Hales who was Bonaventures principal mentor.

Alexanders theological foundations of Christology began not with the
person of Jesus Christ but with the question of God and the possibility of
a divine nature united to a human nature. In the early Church, the question
of Incarnation in view of monotheism posed a problem for early Christians.
The formulation of a trinitarian understanding of God was a response by
the early Christian community to the question of whether the divine nature
could unite itself to human nature. In the same way, Alexander realized
that incarnation was possible only in light of a trinitarian theology. As
Kenan Osborne has observed: Both in the earliest formulations of Christology and in Alexanders opening statements on the Incarnation, the question of God is basic, that is, what kind of God is being presented when one
speaks of incarnation, and whether such a doctrine of God is a credible
doctrine or not.10 For Alexander, one must consider the doctrine of God
prior to the doctrine of Incarnation; or conversely stated, the Incarnation
is a central entryway to faith in a credible God. Christocentrism and theocentrism are two sides of one and the same coin.11 If the doctrine of God
fundamentally relates to the question of Incarnation, such a possibility can
be considered only within the context of Creation itself. Franciscan theology has consistently held together the twin poles of creational theology and
incarnational theology in such a way that one without the other is theologically inconceivable.12
Examining the nature of the Trinity and the possibility of Incarnation,
Alexander explored the question whether God is a Trinity in Gods own
self, or because of a Creation or an Incarnation. He concluded that there
is no necessity in God for either Creation or Incarnation. Rather, the
power to create and the power to be incarnate focuses on the divine nature
as such, rather than on a person of the Trinity. Since nature refers to action,
Creation and Incarnation find their sources in the divine nature understood
as a principle of action rather than in the divine essence.13 This position,
which underscores the absolute freedom of God and the contingency of
created reality, is the basis for Scotuss formulation of the primacy of
Christ. As Osborne has indicated, Alexanders position not only leads to a
clear relationship between Creation and Incarnation but the person of
nis Edwards, Jesus, The Wisdom of God: An Ecological Theology (Maryknoll, N.Y.:
Orbis, 1995) 6987.
10
Osborne, Alexander of Hales 30; Walter H. Principe, Alexander of Hales
Theology of the Hypostatic Union (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1967) 7296.
11
Osborne, Alexander of Hales 31.
12
Ibid.
13
Alexander of Hales, Quaestiones disputatae: Antequam esset frater, (Quarrachi: Collegium S. Bonaventurae, 1960) 197.

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

Jesus becomes more revelatory of a credible God than of human nature

itself.14
Alexanders position can be traced through subsequent writers in the
Franciscan tradition. Matthew of Aquasparta (1282) held that the Incarnation was supposed for the perfection of the natural order, and Raymond
Lull (1289) asserted that the primary aim of the Incarnation was to show
forth the love of God.15 In his Libre de Sancta Maria Lull wrote: The
nature of Jesus Christ is the most eminent and most noble of all creatures,
because it is the end, the beginning and the crown of all other things since
all things that God made, he created to be clothed with this human nature,
born of our Blessed Lady.16 In addition, Roger of Marston and William of
Ware, both at Oxford, held that the Incarnation would have taken place
apart from sin.17 In the 17th century Lawrence of Brindisi also proclaimed the primacy of Christ: For this reason the humanity of Christ, the
first creature conceived in the mind of God, was to be the archetype for
human nature, not only in his natural being but also in his supernatural
being of grace and glory.18 However, it is in the writings of Bonaventure
(d. 1274) and Duns Scotus (d. 1308) that the primacy of Christ attains a
level of theological achievement that provides a powerful alternative to
Anselms satisfaction theory. While Scotus articulated an explicit doctrine
of the primacy of Christ, Bonaventure offers insight to the relationship
between Creation and Incarnation that points to the primacy of Christ,
albeit without explicitly formulating a doctrine. Both writers, however,
provided a rich understanding of the centrality of Christ that merits our
attention today.
SCOTUS AND THE PRIMACY OF CHRIST
Scotuss doctrine on the primacy of Christ centers around divine freedom and self-revelation. According to him, God is absolutely free and
chose to create this world precisely as it is to reveal divine love. Scotus
considered not what God would have done had the fall not occurred (that
is, the question, would Christ have come if Adam did not sin?) but rather
what was Gods original intent relative to the Incarnation: Utrum Christus

14

Osborne, Alexander of Hales 32.

Mary Beth Ingham, John Duns Scotus: An Integrated Vision, in The History
of Franciscan Theology 220; Robert North, The Scotist Cosmic Christ, in De
Doctrina Ioannis Duns Scoti (Rome: Ercolano, 1968) 197 n. 90.
16
Raymond Lull, Obras de Ramon Lull (Palma, 1915) 63.
17
North, The Scotist Cosmic Christ 198 n. 92.
18
Lawrence of Brindisi Santorale, Opera omnia 9 (Padua, 1928) 115.
15

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

praedestinatus fuerit esse Filium Dei.19 In other words, what kind of God
would become incarnate? The possibility for Incarnation, according to
Scotus, is grounded in the nature of God as ultimate goodness or love.
Gods love is ordered, free and holy and in which God loves Gods own self
forever, even in others, and this love is unselfish since God is the cause of
all creatures. On this point Scotus stated that the predestination of anyone
to glory is prior by nature to the prevision of the sin or damnation of
anyone.20
According to Scotus, the divine initiative of love has as its primary object
that creature capable of receiving the fullest measure of Gods goodness
and glory, and who in turn could respond in the fullest measure. He wrote:
First, God wills good for himself as the end of all things; second, he wills
that another be good for him. This is the moment of predestination.21 God
wills ordinately and thus intends the end, and that which is closer to the
end. In Scotuss terms, God is perfect love and wills according to the
perfection of that love. Since perfect love cannot will anything less than the
perfection of love,22 Christ would have come in the highest glory in Creation even if there was no sin and thus no need for redemption. Although
Jesus Christ is Gods supreme masterpiece, subject to no other, dependent
on no one and independent of all contingencies, he does not exist in isolation. Rather, he is the center and summit of all Gods creative and redemptive works; all of Creation is ordered to him. God, therefore, intended
the highest glory as the ultimate and final end, and then the Incarnation as
leading to that end.23 In his Ordinatio, Scotus indicated that the fall of
Adam was not sine qua non for the Incarnation. Jesus Christ holds the
center place in the universe as one freely created and redeemed by God.
He writes:
Predestination consists in foreordaining someone first of all to glory and then to
other things which are ordered to glory. Now the human nature in Christ was
19

John Duns Scotus, Opus Oxoniensis (Oxon.) 3, d. 7, a. 3. vol. 14 (Paris: Vives,

1894) 34860.
20
Allan B. Wolter, Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary [intro., text, and trans.]
(Santa Barbara, Calif.: Old Mission Santa Barbara, 1988) 29.
21
This quotation is found in the Reportationes Parisiensis III, d. 32, q. ii; XXIII,
508 a: Vult enim Deus ex caritate primo bene esse sibi tanquam fini omnium;
secundo vult alium velle sibi bonum esse. In isto instanti potest poni praedestinatio. Cited in Giovanni Iammarrone, The Timeliness and Limitations of the Christology of John Duns Scotus for the Development of a Contemporary Theology of
Christ, [trans. Ignatius McCormick], Greyfriars Review 7.2 (1993) 233 n. 13.
22
Duns Scotus, Oxon. 3, d. 7, q. 3 Tertio vult se diligi ab alio, qui protest eum
summe diligere cited in Iammarrone, The Timeliness and Limitations of the
Christology of John Duns Scotus 234 n. 17.
23
Ingham, John Duns Scotus 221.

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

predestined to be glorified, and in order to be glorified, it was predestined to be

united to the Word, in as much as such glory as it was granted would never have
been conferred on this nature had it not been so united. Now if it would not be
fitting to ordain one to such glory if certain merits were absent, whereas it would
be fitting if they were present, then such merits are included in the predestination.
And so it would seem that this union by way of fitness is ordered to this glory,
although it is not exactly as merit that it falls under this predestination. And just as
it is foreordained that this nature be united to the Word, so it is predestined that the
Word be man and that this man be the Word.24

For Scotus, therefore, the Incarnation takes place in light of Gods glory
and not in light of any sin which might be committed prior to the Incarnation. The Incarnation represents not a divine response to a human need
for salvation but instead the divine intention from all eternity to raise
human nature to the highest point of glory by uniting it with divine nature.25 Scotus does not neglect sin and the need for redemption; however,
he simply does not view sin as the reason for the Incarnation.26 Rather, the
mutuality between God and human persons realized in the Incarnation is
grounded in the very nature of God as love. As Allan Wolter has noted:
[the primacy of Christ] makes the human nature of Christ the motif the
Divine Architect was to carry out in the rest of Creation . . . after his body
the visible world was sculptured. The whole universe is full of Christ.27
Christ, therefore, is the meaning and model of Creation and every creature
is made in the image of Christ. Another way of expressing this idea is that
the body of the universe is the body of Christ. Since Incarnation is the
perfect mutuality between divine and human nature, Scotus views the summit of Creation as the communion of all persons with one another and with
God.
BONAVENTURE AND THE CHRISTIC UNIVERSE
Although Scotus defines primacy as the absolute predestination of Christ
in view of God as love, it is with Bonaventure that the notion of primacy
assumes an element of dynamism in light of a Christ-centered or Christic
universe. Some scholars contend that Bonaventure opted for the tradi24

Wolter, Four Questions on Mary 29.

Ingham, John Duns Scotus 222.
26
Iammarrone, Christology of John Duns Scotus 236. According to Iammarrone, Scotus grants sin the fourth place in the reasons for the Incarnation. God the
Creator, foreseeing sin and the fall of humankind structured the Incarnation with
a view to redemption. Thus, the Word-made-flesh, the God-man, was entrusted
with the task of restoring the human family and all creation to their original purpose, a share in the life and glory of God.
27
Wolter, John Duns Scotus on the Primacy and Personality of Christ 141.
25

10

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

tional solution of Anselm.28 However, a thorough perusal of his writings

shows a development in his Christology. While in his Breviloquium (1255)
he clearly adopts the Anselmian position with regard to the Incarnation, his
thought later shifts toward Christ as the noble perfection of the universe in
his De reductione artium ad theologiam (1257). Even in his Sermon on the
Nativity, composed after the De reductione artium, one finds no mention
of satisfaction but rather an emphasis on the Incarnation as the perfection
of the created order and an act of cosmic completion. As Bonaventure
wrote:
It is in the Word that we discover the perfection of that greatness of heart which
brings all reality to its consummation and completion, since the figure of the circle
attests to the perfection of bodies both in the macrocosm and in the microcosm. . . .
But this figure is not complete in the universe. Now, if this figure is to be as perfect
as possible, the line of the universe must be curved into a circle. Indeed, God is
simply the first. And the last among the works of the world is man. Therefore, when
God became man, the works of God were brought to perfection. This is why Christ,
the God-man, is called the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end.29

While the emphasis in this passage is clearly on cosmic completion, he

states elsewhere in this Sermon that the Incarnation of the Word took
place for the sake of the flesh in view of its final salvation.30 This twofold
emphasis on completion and redemption marks Bonaventures doctrine.
His writings are complex and nuanced as he tried to hold together the
reality of sin, redemption, and cosmic completion. He clearly viewed sin as
embedded in historical reality. However, he did not limit the mystery of
Christ to sin. Unlike other thinkers of his time, Bonaventure did not ask
whether the Word would have become incarnate had Adam not sinned.31
28

See, e.g., Ingham who states only Bonaventure appears as a major Franciscan
thinker who, while affirming either position to be orthodox, opted for the traditional solution of Anselm (John Duns Scotus 220). Similarly, Iammarrone maintains that Bonaventure held to Anselms satisfaction theory in accordance with
piety and tradition (Christology of John Duns Scotus 231).
29
Bonaventure, Sermo II in nat. Dom. (IX, 107); trans. Sermon II on the Nativity of the Lord, in What Manner of Man? Sermons on Christ by St. Bonaventure,
2nd ed., trans. Zachary Hayes (Chicago: Franciscan Herald, 1989) 7374. The critical edition of Bonaventures works is the Doctoris Seraphici S. Bonaventurae Opera
Omnia, ed. PP. Collegii S. Bonaventurae, 10 vols. (Quaracchi: Collegium S. Bonaventurae, 18821902). Citations from the Latin are indicated by volume and page
number in parentheses.
30
Bonaventure, Sermon II on the Nativity 67.
31
Zachary Hayes, The Hidden Center: Spirituality and Speculative Christology in
St. Bonaventure (New York: Franciscan Institute, 1992) 187. As Hayes points out,
this question became very common in Scholastic circles. See J. M. Bissen, De
motivo incarnationis, Antonianum 7 (1932) 314-36; J. Kaup, Cur Deus Homo?
Franziskanische Studien 21 (1934) 23242; Dominic Unger, Franciscan Christol-

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

11

He did ask, however, what the ratio praecipua of the Incarnation might be
and in his answer he tried to avoid anything external to God necessitating
the divine in any way.32 While he viewed the Incarnation within the present
historical order, he did not consider the Incarnation to be a sort of afterthought on the part of God. As Zachary Hayes has observed: Christ
cannot be willed by God occasionaliter, that is, simply because of sin.33
Rather, from eternity, God included the possibility of a fall of the human
race34 and therefore structured the human person with a view to redemption. God predestined Christ, he noted, not only principaliter but principalius.35 God does not predestine Christ because humankind sinned, for as
the most noble of Gods works, the Incarnation is willed for its own sake
and not for the sake of any lesser good. However, the redemptive function
is not simply added to the Incarnation; for the actual Incarnation is shaped
by its redemptive function. Hayes has stated:
While the Incarnation bears its own ratio, the soteriological dimension appears as
the ratio inducens, a term which points to the actuality of a fallen history, and holds
open the possibility that an Incarnation willed for its own sake as the highest
revelation of the love of God can, in fact, enter into history as a redemptive act.
Thus while the Incarnation is a redemptive mystery, it fulfills the functions in the
world as well, particularly the perfection of the universe.36

ogyAbsolute and Universal Primacy of Christ, Franciscan Studies 23 (1942)

42830.
32
Bonaventure, III Sentences (Sent.) d. 1, a. 2, q. 2, resp. (III, 23). The entire
second article deals with the congruity of the Incarnation of the Word. Here
Bonaventure indicates that God is always free in relation to the world, and since
nothing outside God can move God to act, whatever we find in history is characterized by a profound contingency.
33
Zachary Hayes, Christ, Word of God and Exemplar of Humanity, Cord 46.1
(1996) 6.
34
Bonaventure, III Sent. d. 1, a. 2, q. 2, ad 2 (III, 26); see Hayes, Hidden Center
189 who states that the incarnation is not to be see as a sort of after-thought on the
part of God. From eternity, God knew the course that history would take, including
the fall of the human race. From the very beginning, therefore, God has acted in
view of his intention of restoring what he knew would in fact become a fallen
creation. This position seems to be that of Scotus as well (see n. 24). Rahner
(Christology Within an Evolutionary View 18586) offers a similar solution to
the question of sin in light of the primacy of Christ. He writes: The world and its
history are from the outset based on the absolute will of God to communicate
himself radically to the world. In this self-communication and in its climax (i.e. in
the Incarnation), the world becomes the history of God himself. And so if and in so
far as it is found in the world, sin is from the outset embraced by the will to forgive
and the offer of divine self-communication becomes necessary.
35
Bonaventure, III Sent. d. 1, a. 2, q. 2, ad 5 (III, 26-27); Hayes, Hidden Center
189.
36
Hayes, Hidden Center 190.

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THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

To understand why the Incarnation brings about cosmic completion is to

understand it in the context of Creation and, in turn, Creations relationship to the Trinity. The Trinity according to Bonaventure, is marked by
dynamic self-diffusive goodness, a goodness which is communicative and
expressive. Bonaventure described Creation as sharing in the mystery of
generation of the Word from the Father; it is a limited expression of the
infinite and dynamic love between the Father and Son, emerging out of this
relationship and exploding into a thousand forms in the universe.37 He
used the term emanation (emanatio)38 to describe the emergence of
Creation from the triune God of love. Although the Platonic use of this
term means that Creation necessarily flows out of the infinite, transcendent
One, Bonaventure uses the term emanation in a Christian context. Creation, he wrote, is like a beautiful song that flows in the most excellent of
harmonies but it is a song that God freely desires to sing into the vast
spaces of the universe.39 Creation is simply the loving outflow of a loving
God whose infinite dynamic goodness is shared in a limited dynamic way.
God does not have to create since God is infinitely fecund and selfcommunicative within Gods self. God simply desires to create because
God is love, and perfect love can never be self-contained but must be
shared freely with another. The world exists, Bonaventure indicated, by
virtue of the free creative power of divine love.
According to Bonaventure, the possibility of Creation, is grounded in
divine transcendent fecundity. His doctrine of exemplarism is a doctrine of
relationships between God and Creation whereby the fecundity of divine
ideas, centered on the Word of God, is the basis of all that exists. The
source of fecundity in the Trinity is the Father who is a coincidence of
unbegottenness (innascibilitas) and fountain fullness (fontalis plenitudo).
Because the Father is without origin, he is the infinite source of everything,
including the Son and Spirit.40 As fountain fullness of the good, the Father

37

Alexander Gerken, La the ologie du Verbe: La relation entre lIncarnation et la

Cre ation selon S. Bonaventure, trans. Jacqueline Gre al (Paris: E ditions Franciscaines, 1970) 132; Zachary Hayes, Incarnation and Creation in St. Bonaventure,
in Studies Honoring Ignatius Brady, Friar Minor, ed. Roman Stephen Almagno and
Conrad L. Harkins (New York: Franciscan Institute, 1976) 314.
38
Bonaventure, Collationes in Hexae meron (Hex.) 12.3 (V, 385).
39
See Bonaventure, I Sent. d. 44, q. 1, a. 3, concl. (I, 786a). Optime ordinatae
sunt res in finem, salvo ordine universi, quia universum est tamquam pulcherrimum carmen, quod decurrit secundum optimas consonantias.
40
Bonaventure, I Sent. d. 27, p. 1, a. u., a. 2, ad 3 (I, 469470); Ewert Cousins,
Bonaventure and the Coincidence of Opposites (Chicago: Franciscan Herald, 1978)
1023. The idea that the Father is innascible and fecund underlies the dialectical
style of Bonaventures thought. It also provides the basis of Bonaventures metaphysics as a coincidentia oppositorum. The Fathers innascibility and fecundity are

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

13

is infinitely expressive and expresses [him] self in the Word/Son.41 Expressionism is at the heart of trinitarian life and thus at the center of reality.
The eternal expressionism within the Trinity is the basis for exemplarism in
Creation. In generating the Word, the Father produces in the Word all that
can be created. Thus, all creatures are the expression of the Word and lead
back to the Word, and through the Word to the Father.42
The logic of Bonaventures divine language of exemplarity is the coincidence of opposites. The Father is expressed in the Word, and is united
to the Word in the Spirit. These dynamic opposites in the Trinity issue in
Creation which as finite expresses the opposite of the divine, but which
coincides with the infinite in the exemplarity of the Word.43 The entire
created world, therefore, is an objectification of that one inner Word; it is
like an external Word that gives public expression to the inner Word of
Gods self-awareness.44
The idea that Christ perfects Creation is related to the idea that the
whole Creation is in some sense incarnational. The very existence of Creation reflects a potency within it for union with the divine because of its
exemplary nature. While everything in Creationfrom stars to protons to
humansbears an expressed relationship to God, there is a tendency in
matter toward spirit. Bonaventure does not speak in evolutionary terms;
however he considers the idea that matter itself is spiritualized and cries
out for perfection.45 The union of matter and spirit or the full spiritualization of matter is the basis of perfection. Christ is the one in whom matter
mutually complimentary opposites which cannot be formally reduced to one or the
other; the Father is generative precisely because he is unbegotten. See Zachary
Hayes, introduction to Disputed Questions on the Mystery of the Trinity, vol. 3,
Works of Saint Bonaventure 3, ed. George Marcil (New York: Franciscan Institute,
1979) 42 n. 51.
41
Ewert H. Cousins, Language as Metaphysics in Bonaventure, in Sprache und
Erkenntnis im Mittelalter, ed. Jan P. Beckmann, Ludger Honnefelder et al., Miscellanea Mediaevalia 2, ed. Albert Zimmerman (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1981)
949.
42
Ibid.
43
Cousins, Language as Metaphysics 950; The Coincidence of Opposites in
the Christology of Saint Bonaventure, University of Toronto Quarterly 40 (1971)
185201; Bonaventure and Contemporary Thought, Cord 25 (1975) 6878;
Bonaventure and the Coincidence of Opposites 11014.
44
Hayes, Hidden Center 132, 146.
45
Bonaventure, II Sent. d. 12, a. 1, q. 2, concl. (II, 297a). Sic cum posset statim
perficere materiam, maluit tamen ipsam sub quadam informitate et imperfectione
facere, ut ex sua imperfectione quasi materia ad Deum clamaret, ut ipsam perficeret. Et hoc idem voluit per senarium dierum differre, ut in perfectione numeri
simul ostenderetur perfectio universi. See Kent Emery, Reading the Word
Rightly and Squarely: Bonaventures Doctrine of the Cardinal Virtues, Traditio 39
(1983) 195.

14

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

is fully spiritualized in union with God. Christ, therefore, is the noble

perfection of the universe. As Bonaventure stated:
Again, the natural tendency in matter is so ordered to the intellectual principles
that generation would not be perfect without the union of the rational soul with the
material body. By similar reasoning, therefore, we come to the conclusion that the
highest and noblest perfection cannot exist in this world unless that nature in which
the seminal principles are present, and that nature in which the intellectual principles are present, and that nature in which the ideal principles are present are
simultaneously brought together in the unity of one person, as was done in the
Incarnation of the Son of God.46

For Bonaventure, all of Creation points to this ultimate expression of the

Word in Jesus Christ. Jesus is the fullest realization of the most noble
potency of Creation which brings the created order to its completion.47 As
he asserted in his Sermon on the Nativity: The perfection of the entire
order is realized, for in that one being the unity of all reality is brought to
consummation.48 What Bonaventure highlighted is the congruent relationship between the Word of God in whom the divine transcendent fecundity of divine ideas is expressed and the finite expression of the Word
in Creation. Jesus in his humanity is the fullest expression of the Word in
Creation, the one in whom the Word itself is revealed. It is precisely in his
human existence, according to Bonaventure, as Word become flesh, in his
life, death and Resurrection, that Jesus Christ perfects the universe because in his humanity he unites the opposites of divine and temporal,
eternity and time, beginning and end.49 In Christ, the coincidence of opposites, he stated, our humanity (and by virtue of our humanity all of
Creation) reaches its perfection.50
In the context of medieval theology, this is a rejection of the idea that
God first created a world that had no relation to the figure of Christ, and
that only after the fall of humanity did a second decree of God direct
itself to the figure of a savior in the form of Christ.51 For Bonaventure, as
for Scotus, a world without Christ is an incomplete world. The whole
Creation is made for Christ.52 In short, the primary reason for the Incar46

Bonaventure, De reductione artium ad theologiam 20 (V, 324b).

Bonaventure, Sermon II on the Nativity 74; Hayes, Hidden Center 162.
48
Ibid.
49
Bonaventure, Itinerarium Mentis in Deum (Itin.) 6.5 (V, 310).
50
Bonaventure, Itin. 6.7 (V, 312).
51
Zachary Hayes, ChristologyCosmology, in Spirit and Life: A Journal of
Contemporary Franciscanism, vol. 7, Franciscan Leadership in Ministry: Foundations in History, Theology, and Spirituality, ed. Anthony Carrozzo, Vincent Cushing, and Kenneth Himes (New York: Franciscan Institute, 1997) 48.
52
Although Bonaventure did not explicitly profess a doctrine of absolute predestination, he clearly viewed Christ as preeminent when he wrote: Humanum
47

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

15

nation is related not to the forgiveness of sin but to the completion of

Creation in its relationship to God.53
PRIMACY AND SALVATION
The primacy of Christ as the fundamental reason for the Incarnation
underscores a theocentric understanding of Incarnation that widens the
meaning of salvation and places it in a cosmic context based on the fullness
of the mystery of Christ. It is not surprising, therefore, that this doctrine,
although accepted within the Churchs theological tradition, is not included
within the Churchs ecclesiocentric doctrine of salvation. The difference
between a theocentric versus an ecclesiocentric understanding of salvation
corresponds, I believe, to the fundamental understanding of Incarnation.
While the Church clearly desires to safeguard the mystery of the incarnation, death and resurrection of the Son of God and invites theologians
to explore how the positive elements of other religions may fall with the
divine plan of salvation54 it is careful to protect the doctrine of Incarnation from theological speculation beyond the notion of sin and the saving
work of Christ. The difficulty of the Churchs current position lies not in
the formulation of Christ per se as the unique mediator and Redeemer but
in its strict anthropocentrism which confines the mystery of Incarnation to
sin and justification. John Paul II in his encyclical Redemptor hominis
reflects this position when he states:
We do not forget even for a moment that Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God,

vero genus respectu incarnationis et nativitatis Christi non fuit ratio finaliter movens, sed quodam modo inducens. Non enim Christus ad nos finaliter ordinatur, sed
nos finaliter ordinamur ad ipsum (Bonaventure, III Sent. d. 32, q. 5, and 3 [III,
706]).
53
It is important to distinguish in Bonaventure the ratio of incarnation and the
significance of this event. It is clear from his writings that forgiveness of sins is
integral to the work of Christ, and he devotes considerable importance to the cross
of Christ as that which restores us to God. In the first collatio of his Hexae meron
(Hex. 1, 1338) he points out that Christ is the center of the universe but this center
is the crucified Christ. One could interpret Bonaventures notion of primacy in
terms of the crucified Christ, where suffering, death and transformation are integral
to the completion of the universe. A contemporary understanding of the centrality
of Christ crucified is offered by Holmes Rolston who writes: There is a great divine
yes hidden behind and within every no of crushing nature. . . . Long before
humans arrived, the way of nature was already a via dolorosa. In that sense, the
aura of the cross is cast backward across the whole global story, and it forever
outlines the future (Kenosis and Nature, in The Work of Love: Creation as
Kenosis, ed. John Polkinghorne [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001] 5961).
54
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration: Dominus Iesus on
the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church no. 9.

16

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

became our reconciliation with the Father. He it was, and he alone, who satisfied
the Fathers eternal love, that fatherhood that from the beginning found expression
in creating the world, giving man all the riches of Creation, and making him little
less than God, in that he was created in the image and after the likeness of God.
He and he alone also satisfied that fatherhood of God and that love which man in
a way rejected by breaking the first Covenant and the later covenants that God
again and again offered to man. The redemption of the worldthis tremendous
mystery of love in which Creation is renewedis, at its deepest root, the fullness of
justice in a human Heartthe Heart of the First-born Sonin order that it may
become justice in the hearts of many human beings, predestined from eternity in the
Firstborn Son to be children of God.55

While the pope alludes to the primacy of Christ in this passage (the
Heart of the First-born Son), the language of satisfaction and justice
ultimately reveals his conviction that the Incarnation reflects a sin-centered
and thus anthropocentric universe. Such an emphasis places the weight of
Incarnation on fallen humanity rather than on God, highlighting the human
need for God to become incarnate. The emphasis on a sin-centered universe, however, is at odds today with the new science. Evolutionary cosmologists point out that our universe is approximately 14 billion years old,
and evolutionary biologists indicate that the human species is one of the
most recent developments within the history of the universe. Although
paleontologists continue to find new evidence of our earliest hominid ancestors, scientists believe that the first humans are no more than a few
million years old and our nearest ancestors much less than that. In this
respect, the insights of the new science have impelled scholars to seek a
new understanding of original sin within an evolutionary universe.56 As
55

John Paul II, Redemptor hominis no. 8 (emphasis added).

In light of the new science, particularly evolutionary biology and cosmology,
the concept of original sin is under revision. Theologians such as Zachary Hayes
and John Haught describe sin within the context of an unfinished universe. Hayes,
for example, writes: Sin is not a mere infringement of a law extrinsic to our nature.
It is a failure to realize the potentiality of our nature itself. If our nature is fundamentally a potentiality to expand, sin is a contraction. (Zachary Hayes, A Window
to the Divine: A Study of Christian Creation Theology [Quincy, Ill.: Franciscan,
1997] 59-75, 93); John F. Haught, God Beyond Darwin: A Theology of Evolution
(Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 2000) 137143. Marjorie Suchocki describes sin as the
unnecessary violation of the well-being of any aspect of creation . . . sin can be
called a rebellion against creation (The Fall to Violence: Original Sin in Relational
Theology [New York: Continuum, 1994] 48). On the other hand, some scientists
claim that evolutionary biology dispels the myth of Adam and Eve, since the
genetic diversity of the present human population could not possibly have been
funneled through a single couple. Daryl Dooming claims that there is virtually no
known human behavior that we call sin that is not also found among nonhuman
animals. Sin, therefore, in evolutionary terms is behavior that is directed to selfperpetuation in a world of finite resources; natural selection enforces selfish behavior as the price of survival and self-perpetuation in all living things. See Daryl
56

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

17

John Haught has noted: an evolutionary understanding of life cannot be

reconciled in a literal sense with the story of a primordial couple, Adam
and Eve, rebelling against God in the Garden of Eden and passing down
the consequences of their disobedience through our genetic history.57
Although the origin of sin is still highly speculative, scholars such as
Haught view original sin as integral to an unfinished, imperfect universe
where forces lead us away from participating in Gods creative cosmic aim
of maximizing beauty in the universe.58 This new view of sin corresponds
to a new understanding of God at work in an evolutionary universe. For if
sin is the reason for the Incarnation, as the Church maintains, is it possible
that fourteen billion years of evolving life are totally unrelated to the
mystery of Christ? Such a position, it seems to me, strips the theological
search for a credible God today, a God who is the Creator of this evolutionary universe and possibly the Creator of life on other planets and other
universes as well.
The doctrine of the primacy of Christ, as it is articulated within the
Franciscan tradition, provides the basis for a Christology that is ecological,
global and evolutionary. Because the doctrine locates the possibility of
Incarnation within the Trinity of love, the primacy of Christ rests primarily
on belief in God as self-communicative love. The relationship between
Incarnation and Creation is the perfection of that divine selfcommunication in one other than God. As Hayes explains: God creates so
that Christ may come into existence. So that Christ may exist, there must
be a human race. But a human race needs a place in which to live. So it is
that, for both Bonaventure and Scotus, though for each in a distinctive way,
a cosmos without Christ is a cosmos without its head. . . . It simply does not
hold together.59
While Franciscan theologians such as Bonaventure and Scotus do not
deny the redemptive work of the Incarnation, redemption is not the primary reason for the Incarnation. Bonaventures emphasis on the crucified
Christ throughout his writings clearly indicates that redemption is integral
to the completion of the world. However, such redemption is cosmic. In the
cross, God reaches down to what is furthest from him and reconciles all
things in his love.60 For Bonaventure, the salvation of the cosmos, the
process by which God brings to completion the world which God creates,
Dooming, Evolution, Evil and Original Sin, America 185 (November 12, 2001)
1421; Patricia A. Williams, Doing Without Adam and Eve: Sociobiology and Original Sin (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001).
57
Haught, God Beyond Darwin 137.
58
Ibid. 138.
59
Hayes, Christ, Word of God and Exemplar 13.
60
Bonaventure, Hex. 1, 22 (V, 333); Ilia Delio, Crucified Love: Bonaventures
Mysticism of the Crucified Christ (Quincy, Ill.: Franciscan, 1998) 11217.

18

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

is mediated through the salvation of humanity. However, salvation is larger

than humanity alone. The issue for believers, as Hayes has stated, is not
whether they can see the cosmos through the categories of sin and still
believe in God. Rather, the issue is what kind of God they believe in.61 This
idea points to a salvation of inclusion by which all things are summed up in
the unity of Christs love. Hayes observed:
What Jesus is about is more than helping us get rid of sin. In the final analysis, the
issue of overcoming sin is a matter of overcoming all obstacles that stand in the way
of the accomplishment of Gods creative aim. And that aim is the fullest possible
sharing of life and love between God and Creation. . . . This is what happened in
Christ. . . . While redemption is the overcoming of sin, salvation is the completion
of what God initiates in creating. Both of these are what we discover in the mystery
of Christ.62

For Bonaventure, as for Scotus, Christs redemptive work relates to the

overcoming of sin, but it does so in a way that brings Gods creative action
in the world to completion. This notion of redemption-completion, underscoring the primacy of Christ, allows for a broader view of salvation, one
focused not on sin but on the primacy of love. In this respect, redemption
is creative; it is that healing of the brokenness within humanity and Creation that enables the cosmic process to be completed, in which completion
itself is a dynamic process of continuous Creation that is oriented toward
the new Creation. Redemption, therefore, is not being saved from but
rather being made whole for the healing and wholeness of Gods Creation, and this wholeness is ultimately the transformation of created reality
through the unitive power of Gods creative love.63
While it is the task of the Christian to bring to conscious awareness the
reality of Gods love and to live according to this love, the mystery of Christ
is larger than the task of the Christian. The primacy of Christ, as formulated in the writings of Bonaventure and Scotus, implies that the world we
know cannot contain the fullness of the mystery of Christ. For this mystery
in its fullness is a mystery of the utter fecundity of divine goodness, the
fullness of which embraces the whole Creation beyond what our human
minds can grasp. The primacy of Christ, therefore, especially in light of the
new science, demands our attention in light of the fullness of the mystery
of Christ.
While much work is needed on this theme, I wish to offer some ways that
the primacy of Christ can speak to a global and evolutionary world. First,
the doctrine highlights a much broader relationship between humanity and
the created world. Christ is the totality of all that exists. For Scotus and
61

Hayes, ChristologyCosmology 54.

Hayes, Christ, Word of God and Exemplar 9.
63
Ibid. 12.
62

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

19

Bonaventure, the universe is the external embodiment of the inner Word

of God. When Jesus comes as the Incarnation of God, there is a perfect
fit because everything has been made to resemble Christ. Bonaventure
described a fittingness between the divine Word and Creation, particularly the human person, in such a way that there is a congruency between
Christ and Creation.64 Everything in the created worldstars, trees,
cloudsall are christological and express what the body of Christ is like
because Christ is the Word through whom all things are made (see John
1:1).65 Scotuss idea that all of Creation is christoform, within his doctrine of haecceitas,66 finds a parallel in Bonaventures Sermon on the
Resurrection. Bonaventure writes that in his transfiguration Christ shares
existence with all things: with the stones he shares existence; with plants he
shares life; with animals he shares sensation; and with angels he shares
intelligence. In his human nature, he stated, Christ embraces something
of every creature in himself.67 Bonaventure, like Scotus, therefore, sees
the whole of Creation related to the mystery of Christ. Christ is not an
abstract concept. Rather, Christ is the Word incarnate, crucified and glorified, and the body of this incarnate Word embraces the whole of Creation.68 The primacy of Christ, therefore, allows us to speak of the entire
Creation as christoform and points to the fact that the mystery of Christ

64
On the notion of congruency in Bonaventures doctrine see Zachary Hayes,
The Meaning of Convenientia in the Metaphysics of St. Bonaventure, Franciscan
Studies 34 (1974) 74100; Incarnation and Creation in St. Bonaventure 30929.
65
Resource Manual for the Study of Franciscan Christology, ed. Kathleen Moffatt
and Christa Marie Thompson (Washington: Franciscan Federation, 1998) 266.
66
Scotuss notion of essential thisness is known as the doctrine of haecceitas
and relates to essential individuation. On the use of the term haecceitas, see Allan
Wolter, Scotuss Individuation Theory, in The Philosophical Theology of John
Duns Scotus, ed. Marilyn McCord Adams (Ithaca: Cornell University, 1990) 76 n.
26; Marilyn McCord Adams, Duns Scotus Early Oxford Lecture on Individuation
(Santa Barbara, Calif.: Old Mission, 1992).
67
Bonaventure, Sermo I Dom. II in Quad. (IX, 215219); trans. Zachary Hayes,
Christ, Word of God and Exemplar of Humanity 13.
68
This notion is alluded to but never explicitly stated in the writings of Bonaventure and Scotus. However, it acquires a more explicit description in later writers
such as Teilhard de Chardin and Karl Barth, although the latter did not pursue this
idea. Both scholars speak of a third nature of Christ, pointing to a cosmological
nature integral to the Christ mystery. For Teilhard, the third nature of Christ is
integral to the cosmic Christ. According to this nature, the cosmic Christ is neither
a principle of divinity nor a vague construct of humanity but the truly divine, God,
united to the flesh and thus to the cosmos in the resurrected Jesus Christ. See James
A. Lyons, The Cosmic Christ in Origen and Teilhard de Chardin (London: Oxford
University, 1982) 18386. On Barths position see Ju rgen Moltmann, The Way of
Jesus Christ: Christology in Messianic Dimensions, trans. Margaret Kohl (San Francisco: HarperSan Francisco, 1990) 279.

20

THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

is essentially ecological. The hope of salvation is held out for the entire
cosmos, without which the fullness of Christ would be incomplete.
Secondly, the primacy of Christ can help us come to a fuller understanding of the mystery of Christ in light of world religions. The reality of the
other world religions remains a stumbling block for true unity beyond
dialogue because of the particularity of Jesus Christ. For Bonaventure, the
mystery of Christ is really a mystery of the coincidence of opposites. Christ
is the one in whom all opposites coincide. In his Itinerarium mentis in Deum
he describes the ground of all beingGodas ultimate self-diffusive goodness which in its self-communication gives rise to a coincidence of opposites in the Trinity. He posits a dialectical structure within the Trinity that
eventually manifests itself in the mystery of the person of Christ. He describes the Trinity of opposites as one whose center is everywhere and
whose circumference is nowhere.69 He then proceeds to show how this
divine coincidence of opposites is expressed in the unity of the person of
Christ who is the center of the soul and center of the universethe true
metaphysical center.70 Christ is the one in whom all opposites coincide so
that in Christ our humanity reaches its perfection. As Bonaventure wrote:
For if an image is an expressed likeness, when our mind contemplates in Christ the
Son of God, who is the image of the invisible God by nature, our humanity so
wonderfully exalted, so ineffably united, when at the same time it sees united the
first and the last, the highest and the lowest, the circumference and the center, the
Alpha and the Omega, the caused and the cause, the Creator and the creature, that
is, the book written within and without, it now reaches something perfect.71

To speak of Christ as the coincidence of opposites, that is, the Christ to

whom all Creation is related, is to speak of the mystery of Christ in every
person, religion, and culturein their opposition. In order for Christ to
exist, according to Bonaventure, there must be opposites. The fullness of
the Christ mystery is the unity of opposites. Can we interpret this idea in
69

Bonaventure, Itin. 5.8 (V, 310); trans. Ewert H. Cousins, Bonaventure: The
Souls Journey into God, The Tree of Life, The Major Life of Saint Francis (New
York: Paulist, 1978) 100.
70
The description of Christ as the metaphysical center is described by
Bonaventure in the first collatio of his Hexae meron (1.17 [V, 332]) where he writes:
For this reason he [Christ] is the tree of life, because through this center we return
and are given life in the fountain of life . . . this is the metaphysical center that leads
back and this is the sum total of our metaphysics: emanation, exemplarity, and
consummation, to be illumined by spiritual rays and to return to the Most High.
Engl. trans. Jose de Vinck, On the Six Days of Creation, vol. 6, Works of Bonaventure (Paterson, N.J.: St. Anthony Guild, 1966) 9; Zachary Hayes, Christology and
Metaphysics in the Thought of Bonaventure, Journal of Religion 58 (Supplement,
1978) 8788.
71
Bonaventure, Itin. 6.7 (V, 312); trans. Cousins, Bonaventure 1089.

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

21

view of world religions as expressions of the fullness of the mystery of

Christ? Ewert Cousins claims that the speculative roots of this Christ mystery is the awareness of Gods fecundity and the expression of fecundity in
Creation. This fecundity is rooted in the mystery of the Father as fontalis
plenitudo and is manifested in Christ who is the fullest expression of the
Father in Creation. For Bonaventure, the divine fecundity achieves an
unsurpassable expression in the Incarnation, since in Christ the eternal is
expressed in time, the highest in the lowest, the beginning and the end. The
notion of fullness and expression, according to Cousins, are linked with the
logic of the coincidence of opposites and the concept of Christ the center.
As he has shown:
The norm for fullness is the expression by way of the union of opposites through
perfect centering. This norm is realized in an unsurpassable way in Christ, in whom
opposites are joined as in a universal center. Hence, we can speak of the mystery
of Christ expressing in an unsurpassable way the unsurpassable fontalis plenitudo of
the Father. This means, then, that in its fullness the mystery of Christ touches all
levels of the universe, all dimensions of human experience and the entire sweep of
history. In Christ, the greatest coincidentia oppositorum, all things are drawn together as to their center.72

Cousins is aware that the doctrine of Christ particularizes and differentiates. In our current Christology, he noted, it is Christ who separates
Christianity from other religions.73 Bonaventures Christology, however,
is both universalized and particularized. The cosmic significance of Christ
is always related to the way in which the awareness of this principle has
emerged in human experience, namely, through the history of Jesus, the
preeminent, historical embodiment of the eternal, creative, and revelatory
Word of God.74 Jesus is the Christ. However, the fullness of this mystery
must be expressed in the entire body of Christ. In Bonaventures view, the
fullness of Christ will not be totalizing sameness but the greatest coincidence of opposites in the unity of Gods love.
Finally, the primacy of Christ enables us to consider the Incarnation in
extraterrestrial terms. That is, we can begin to consider the mystery of
Christ as a truly cosmic mystery by considering it as an intergalactic mystery. The Franciscan formulation of the primacy of Christ clearly has implications for a cosmic Christology that is much broader than what has
been conceived in the past. The congruent relationship between Christ and
72
Ewert H. Cousins, Bonaventures Christology and Contemporary Ecumenism, in Maestro di vita francescana e di sapienza christiana, ed. A. Pompei, vol. II
(Rome: Pontificia Facolta` Teologica San Bonaventura, 1976) 349.
73
Cousins, Bonaventure and World Religions, in S. Bonaventura 12741974,
vol. III, ed. Commissio Internationalis Bonaventuriana (Grottaferrata: Collegio S.
Bonaventura, 1973) 704.
74
Hayes, ChristologyCosmology 50.

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THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

Creation points to a relationship that is fundamentally grounded in the

infinite self-communication of God as triune. Exploring this idea on an
extraterrestrial scale means that Christ is first in Gods intention to create
wherever there is Creation since the Word, as the divine exemplar, is the
basis for everything created. In this respect, Incarnation may not be limited
to the planet earth and the mishaps of an intelligible species. The Franciscan theologians remind us that Incarnation is much more profound than sin
in its relationship to God and Creation. Rather, Incarnation is a possibility
wherever there is Creation and within that Creation, a fitting congruency
between the Word of God and the species most able to express that Word
of God in an intelligible way. Bonaventures doctrine of exemplarism in
which the divine Word is the ars Patris or center of divine ideas suggests
that any finite expression of these ideas in any possible world order (e.g.,
extraterrestrial life) will ultimately lead to Incarnation within that world
order. The expression of the Word must come to perfect expression in one
other than God if it is to manifest and express a perfect relationship to
God. Similarly, Bonaventures metaphysical structure of the coincidence of
opposites means that the total Christ mystery may not only be realized on
the terrestrial level but the fullness of this mystery may include every
possible Incarnation in every world order. The totality of opposites, held in
union as opposites by the power of Gods love, underscores the fullness of
the mystery of Christ.
As long as one confines the mystery of Christ to the sinful condition of
humanity, one thwarts the fullness of this mystery in its relationship to
other religions, to the cosmos, and to the possibility of extraterrestrial life.
Jesus Christ is indeed the way, the truth, and the life but this life is
grounded in the source of all life, the God of self-communicative love.
Until one recognizes that Incarnation and Creation are integrally bound,
one remains indebted to the myth of Adam and Eve as the reason for the
Incarnation. The gift of Darwin to theology, as Haught states, is that we can
envision God acting in a new way in Creation, a way that allows Creation
to unfold slowly and unpredictably. If God is indeed the ground of this
universe and God is love, then it is love and not sin that is the center of the
universe. Love, according to Bonaventure and Scotus, is the reason for the
Incarnation, and it is the fullness of love that underscores the mystery of
Christ. In an evolutionary universe, love knows no time or limits, it simply
grows and attracts until all things are united in a common center, the center
named Christ. It is not unreasonable to say that the development of the
fullness of love in Christ the center may take millions of years to come.
CONCLUSION
The doctrine of the primacy of Christ is one of the oldest doctrines in the
Christian tradition, with its New Testament foundation in the Pauline let-

THE FRANCISCAN DOCTRINE OF CHRIST

23

ters and its cosmic setting in the writings of the Fathers of the Church.
Although many Eastern writers viewed the Incarnation through a cosmic
lens, the development of Christology in the West focused more on the
juridical and moral implications of the Incarnation due to the masterful
formulation of the satisfaction theory by Anselm and support of this theory
by Thomas Aquinas. As a result, Western Christology, which marks the
official teaching of the Church, maintains a strict correlation between the
Incarnation, sin, and redemption. Despite the fact that satisfaction theology rose to prominence in the Middle Ages, it was not entirely accepted,
particularly among Franciscan theologians who viewed the Incarnation as
a theocentric possibility rather than an anthropocentric need. As a result,
scholars such as Bonaventure and Scotus articulated a much more profound understanding of the Incarnation that provided a framework for
understanding the significance of humanity and Creation in relation to a
God who is essentially love (1 John 3:8). Although it is Scotus who provided a clear and explicit articulation of the primacy of Christ, Bonaventure described a theology of primacy that underscores the mystery of the
fullness of Christ. Together, these theologians provided an understanding
of the Incarnation that is broad, dynamic, and inclusive.
As we face a radically new understanding of the universe today, one that
is ancient, evolutionary, and expanding, it is apparent that our Christology
is no longer reasonable in light of our experience of the world. As Hayes
has written: Christian theology no longer has an effective cosmology that
enables believers to relate to the world in its physical character in a way
that is consistent with their religious symbols.75 My present study has
attempted to retrieve the doctrine of the primacy of Christ within the
Franciscan tradition, a doctrine that is rich in depth and profound in scope,
one that is utterly significant for a world that is global, ecological, and
evolutionary. I have suggested that retrieval of this doctrine can shed new
light on the mystery of Christ in view of world religions, and the meaning
of Christ in view of extra-terrestrial life. A retrieval of this doctrine could,
with further examination, impart new light on the mystery of Christ as
absolute Savior without necessitating the need for an exclusive Christology
or for relativizing Jesus Christ. In short, the primacy of Christ tradition
underscores a positive relationship between Creation and Incarnation in
such a way that love and not sin is the reason for Christ, a love which binds
together all things in the unity of God.
75

Ibid. 42.