Bonaventure
Encyclopedia
Saint
Bonaventure, O.F.M., , born John of Fidanza , was an Italian medieval scholastic
theologian and philosopher. The seventh Minister General of the Order of Friars Minor, he was also a Cardinal Bishop of Albano. He was canonized on 14 April 1482 by Pope Sixtus IV
and declared a Doctor of the Church
in the year 1588 by Pope Sixtus V
. He is known as the "Seraphic Doctor" . Many writings believed in the Middle Ages
to be his are now collected under the name Pseudo-Bonaventura
.
in Latium
, not far from Viterbo
. Almost nothing is known of his childhood, other than the names of his parents, Giovanni di Fidanza and Maria Ritella.
He entered the Franciscan Order in 1243 and studied at the University of Paris
, possibly under Alexander of Hales
, and certainly under Alexander's successor, John of Rochelle. In 1253 he held the Franciscan chair at Paris and was proceeded as Master of Theology. Unfortunately for Bonaventure, a dispute between seculars and mendicants delayed his reception as Master until 1257, where his degree was taken in company with Thomas Aquinas
. Three years earlier his fame had earned him the position of lecturer on the The Four Books of Sentences
—a book of theology written by Peter Lombard
in the twelfth century—and in 1255 he received the degree of master, the medieval equivalent of doctor.
After having successfully defended his order against the reproaches of the anti-mendicant party
, he was elected Minister General of the Franciscan Order. On 24 November 1265, he was selected for the post of Archbishop of York
; however, he was never consecrated and resigned the appointment in October 1266. It was by his order that Roger Bacon
, a Franciscan friar himself, was interdicted from lecturing at Oxford
and compelled to put himself under the surveillance of the order at Paris.
Bonaventure was instrumental in procuring the election of Pope Gregory X
, who rewarded him with the title of Cardinal Bishop of Albano
, and insisted on his presence at the great Council of Lyon
in 1274. There, after his significant contributions led to a union of the Greek and Latin churches, Bonaventure died suddenly and in suspicious circumstances. The Catholic Encyclopedia
has citations which suggest he was poisoned. The only extant relic of the saint is the arm and hand with which he wrote his Commentary on the Sentences, which is now conserved at Bagnoregio, in the parish church of St. Nicholas.
. It remained on that date, with the rank of "double", until 1960, when it was reclassified as a feast of the third class. In 1969 it was classified as an obligatory memorial and assigned to the date of his death, 15 July.
, and ranked along with Saint Thomas Aquinas as the greatest of the Doctors of the Church by another Franciscan Pope Sixtus V
, in 1587. His works, as arranged in the most recent Critical Edition of his works by the Quaracchi Fathers (Collegio S. Bonaventura), consist of a Commentary on the Sentences of Lombard, in four volumes, and eight other volumes, among which are a Commentary on the Gospel of St Luke and a number of smaller works; the most famous of which are Itinerarium Mentis in Deum, Breviloquium, De Reductione Artium ad Theologiam, Soliloquium, and De septem itineribus aeternitatis, in which most of what is individual in his teaching is contained. Nowadays German philosopher Dieter Hattrup denies that De reductione artium ad theologiam might be written by Bonaventure, claiming that the style of thinking does not match Bonaventure's original style.
In philosophy Bonaventure presents a marked contrast to his contemporaries, Roger Bacon and Thomas Aquinas. While these may be taken as representing, respectively, physical science yet in its infancy, and Aristotelian
scholasticism in its most perfect form, he presents the mystical and Plato
nizing mode of speculation which had already, to some extent, found expression in Hugo
and Richard of St. Victor
, and in Bernard of Clairvaux
. To him, the purely intellectual element, though never absent, is of inferior interest when compared with the living power of the affections or the heart. He used the authority of Aristotle in harmony with Scriptural and Patristic texts, and attributed much of the heretical tendency of the age to the attempt to divorce Aristotelian philosophy from Catholic theology. Like Thomas Aquinas, with whom he shared numerous profound agreements in matters theological and philosophical, he combated the Aristotelian notion of the eternity of the world vigorously. Augustine
, who had imported into the west many of the doctrines that would define scholastic philosophy, was an incredibly important source of Bonaventure's Platonism. Another prominent influence was that of a mystic by the name of Dionysius the Areopagite
.
Bonaventure accepts the Platonic doctrine that ideas do not exist in rerum natura, but as ideals exemplified by the Divine Being, according to which actual things were formed; and this conception has no slight influence upon his philosophy. Like all the great scholastic doctors he starts with the discussion of the relations between reason and faith. All the sciences are but the handmaids of theology; reason can discover some of the moral truths which form the groundwork of the Christian system, but others it can only receive and apprehend through divine illumination. In order to obtain this illumination, the soul must employ the proper means, which are prayer, the exercise of the virtue
s, whereby it is rendered fit to accept the divine light, and meditation which may rise even to ecstatic union with God
. The supreme end of life is such union, union in contemplation
or intellect and in intense absorbing love
; but it cannot be entirely reached in this life, and remains as a hope
for the future. The mind in contemplating God has three distinct aspects, stages or grades—the sense
s, giving empirical knowledge of what is without and discerning the traces (vestigia) of the divine in the world; the reason, which examines the soul itself, the image of the divine Being; and lastly, pure intellect (intelligentia), which, in a transcendent act, grasps the Being of the divine cause.
To these three correspond the three kinds of theology: theologia symbolica, theologia propria and theologia mystica. Each stage is subdivided, for in contemplating the outer world we may use the senses or the imagination; we may rise to a knowledge of God per vestigia or in vestigiis. In the first case the three great properties of physical bodies—weight, number, measure—in the second the division of created things into the classes of those that have merely physical existence, those that have life, and those that have thought, irresistibly lead us to conclude the power, wisdom and goodness of the Triune God. So in the second stage we may ascend to the knowledge of God, per imaginem, by reason, or in imagination, by the pure understanding (intellectus); in the one case the triple division—memory, understanding and will,—in the other the Christian virtues—faith, hope and charity,—leading again to the conception of a Trinity of divine qualities—eternity, truth and goodness.
In the last stage we have first intelligentia, pure intellect, contemplating the essential being of God, and finding itself compelled by necessity of thought to hold absolute being as the first notion, for non-being cannot be conceived apart from being, of which it is but the privation. To this notion of absolute being, which is perfect and the greatest of all, objective existence must be ascribed. In its last and highest form of activity the mind rests in the contemplation of the infinite goodness of God, which is apprehended by means of the highest faculty, the apex mentis or synderesis. This spark of the divine illumination is common to all forms of mysticism, but Bonaventura adds to it peculiarly Christian elements. The complete yielding up of mind and heart to God is unattainable without divine grace, and nothing renders us so fit to receive this gift as the meditative and ascetic life of the cloister. The monastic life is the best means of grace.
Bonaventure, however, is not merely a meditative thinker, whose works may form good manuals of devotion; he is a dogma
tic theologian of high rank, and on all the disputed questions of scholastic thought, such as universals, matter, the principle of individualism, or the intellectus agens, he gives weighty and well-reasoned decisions. He agrees with Saint Albert the Great
in regarding theology as a practical science; its truths, according to his view, are peculiarly adapted to influence the affections. He discusses very carefully the nature and meaning of the divine attributes; considers universals to be the ideal forms pre-existing in the divine mind according to which things were shaped; holds matter to be pure potentiality which receives individual being and determinateness from the formative power of God, acting according to the ideas; and finally maintains that the intellectus agens has no separate existence. On these and on many other points of scholastic philosophy the "Seraphic Doctor" exhibits a combination of subtlety and moderation, which makes his works particularly valuable.
thinkers. Hossein Nasr, in his A Young Muslim's Guide to the Modern World mentions Bonaventure amongst the outstanding saints, saying:
1979. ISBN 978-1-57659-045-4
Saint
A saint is a holy person. In various religions, saints are people who are believed to have exceptional holiness.In Christian usage, "saint" refers to any believer who is "in Christ", and in whom Christ dwells, whether in heaven or in earth...
Bonaventure, O.F.M., , born John of Fidanza , was an Italian medieval scholastic
Scholasticism
Scholasticism is a method of critical thought which dominated teaching by the academics of medieval universities in Europe from about 1100–1500, and a program of employing that method in articulating and defending orthodoxy in an increasingly pluralistic context...
theologian and philosopher. The seventh Minister General of the Order of Friars Minor, he was also a Cardinal Bishop of Albano. He was canonized on 14 April 1482 by Pope Sixtus IV
Pope Sixtus IV
Pope Sixtus IV , born Francesco della Rovere, was Pope from 1471 to 1484. His accomplishments as Pope included the establishment of the Sistine Chapel; the group of artists that he brought together introduced the Early Renaissance into Rome with the first masterpiece of the city's new artistic age,...
and declared a Doctor of the Church
Doctor of the Church
Doctor of the Church is a title given by a variety of Christian churches to individuals whom they recognize as having been of particular importance, particularly regarding their contribution to theology or doctrine.-Catholic Church:In the Catholic Church, this name is given to a saint from whose...
in the year 1588 by Pope Sixtus V
Pope Sixtus V
Pope Sixtus V , born Felice Peretti di Montalto, was Pope from 1585 to 1590.-Early life:The chronicler Andrija Zmajević states that Felice's family originated from modern-day Montenegro...
. He is known as the "Seraphic Doctor" . Many writings believed in the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
to be his are now collected under the name Pseudo-Bonaventura
Pseudo-Bonaventura
The Pseudo-Bonaventura, or Pseudo-Bonaventure is the name given to the authors of a number of medieval devotional works which were believed at the time to be the work of Saint Bonaventure: "It would almost seem as if 'Bonaventura' came to be regarded as a convenient label for a certain type of...
.
Life
He was born at BagnoregioBagnoregio
Bagnoregio is a comune in the Province of Viterbo in the Italian region of Lazio, located about 90 km northwest of Rome and about 28 km north of Viterbo.-History:...
in Latium
Latium
Lazio is one of the 20 administrative regions of Italy, situated in the central peninsular section of the country. With about 5.7 million residents and a GDP of more than 170 billion euros, Lazio is the third most populated and the second richest region of Italy...
, not far from Viterbo
Viterbo
See also Viterbo, Texas and Viterbo UniversityViterbo is an ancient city and comune in the Lazio region of central Italy, the capital of the province of Viterbo. It is approximately 80 driving / 80 walking kilometers north of GRA on the Via Cassia, and it is surrounded by the Monti Cimini and...
. Almost nothing is known of his childhood, other than the names of his parents, Giovanni di Fidanza and Maria Ritella.
He entered the Franciscan Order in 1243 and studied at the University of Paris
University of Paris
The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...
, possibly under Alexander of Hales
Alexander of Hales
Alexander Hales also called Doctor Irrefragabilis and Theologorum Monarcha was a notable thinker important in the history of scholasticism and the Franciscan School.-Life:Alexander was born at Hales ,...
, and certainly under Alexander's successor, John of Rochelle. In 1253 he held the Franciscan chair at Paris and was proceeded as Master of Theology. Unfortunately for Bonaventure, a dispute between seculars and mendicants delayed his reception as Master until 1257, where his degree was taken in company with Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas, O.P. , also Thomas of Aquin or Aquino, was an Italian Dominican priest of the Catholic Church, and an immensely influential philosopher and theologian in the tradition of scholasticism, known as Doctor Angelicus, Doctor Communis, or Doctor Universalis...
. Three years earlier his fame had earned him the position of lecturer on the The Four Books of Sentences
Sentences
The Four Books of Sentences is a book of theology written by Peter Lombard in the twelfth century. It is a systematic compilation of theology, written around 1150; it derives its name from the sententiae or authoritative statements on biblical passages that it gathered together.-Origin and...
—a book of theology written by Peter Lombard
Peter Lombard
Peter Lombard was a scholastic theologian and bishop and author of Four Books of Sentences, which became the standard textbook of theology, for which he is also known as Magister Sententiarum-Biography:Peter Lombard was born in Lumellogno , in...
in the twelfth century—and in 1255 he received the degree of master, the medieval equivalent of doctor.
After having successfully defended his order against the reproaches of the anti-mendicant party
Mendicant Orders
The mendicant orders are religious orders which depend directly on the charity of the people for their livelihood. In principle, they do not own property, either individually or collectively , believing that this was the most pure way of life to copy followed by Jesus Christ, in order that all...
, he was elected Minister General of the Franciscan Order. On 24 November 1265, he was selected for the post of Archbishop of York
Archbishop of York
The Archbishop of York is a high-ranking cleric in the Church of England, second only to the Archbishop of Canterbury. He is the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of York and metropolitan of the Province of York, which covers the northern portion of England as well as the Isle of Man...
; however, he was never consecrated and resigned the appointment in October 1266. It was by his order that Roger Bacon
Roger Bacon
Roger Bacon, O.F.M. , also known as Doctor Mirabilis , was an English philosopher and Franciscan friar who placed considerable emphasis on the study of nature through empirical methods...
, a Franciscan friar himself, was interdicted from lecturing at Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
and compelled to put himself under the surveillance of the order at Paris.
Bonaventure was instrumental in procuring the election of Pope Gregory X
Pope Gregory X
Pope Blessed Gregory X , born Tebaldo Visconti, was Pope from 1271 to 1276. He was elected by the papal election, 1268–1271, the longest papal election in the history of the Roman Catholic Church....
, who rewarded him with the title of Cardinal Bishop of Albano
Roman Catholic Suburbicarian Diocese of Albano
The Diocese of Albano is a suburbicarian see of the Roman Catholic Church in a diocese in Italy, comprising seven towns in the Province of Rome...
, and insisted on his presence at the great Council of Lyon
Second Council of Lyon
The Second Council of Lyon was the fourteenth ecumenical council of the Catholic Church, convoked on 31 March 1272 and convened in Lyon, France, in 1274. Pope Gregory X presided over the council, called to act on a pledge by Byzantine emperor Michael VIII to reunite the Eastern church with the West...
in 1274. There, after his significant contributions led to a union of the Greek and Latin churches, Bonaventure died suddenly and in suspicious circumstances. The Catholic Encyclopedia
Catholic Encyclopedia
The Catholic Encyclopedia, also referred to as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia and the Original Catholic Encyclopedia, is an English-language encyclopedia published in the United States. The first volume appeared in March 1907 and the last three volumes appeared in 1912, followed by a master index...
has citations which suggest he was poisoned. The only extant relic of the saint is the arm and hand with which he wrote his Commentary on the Sentences, which is now conserved at Bagnoregio, in the parish church of St. Nicholas.
Feast day
Bonaventure's feast day was included in the General Roman Calendar immediately upon his canonization in 1482. It was at first celebrated on the second Sunday in July, but was moved in 1568 to 14 July, since 15 July, the anniversary of his death, was at that time taken up with the feast of Saint HenryHenry II, Holy Roman Emperor
Henry II , also referred to as Saint Henry, Obl.S.B., was the fifth and last Holy Roman Emperor of the Ottonian dynasty, from his coronation in Rome in 1014 until his death a decade later. He was crowned King of the Germans in 1002 and King of Italy in 1004...
. It remained on that date, with the rank of "double", until 1960, when it was reclassified as a feast of the third class. In 1969 it was classified as an obligatory memorial and assigned to the date of his death, 15 July.
Philosophy and works
Bonaventure was formally canonized in 1484 by the Franciscan Pope Sixtus IVPope Sixtus IV
Pope Sixtus IV , born Francesco della Rovere, was Pope from 1471 to 1484. His accomplishments as Pope included the establishment of the Sistine Chapel; the group of artists that he brought together introduced the Early Renaissance into Rome with the first masterpiece of the city's new artistic age,...
, and ranked along with Saint Thomas Aquinas as the greatest of the Doctors of the Church by another Franciscan Pope Sixtus V
Pope Sixtus V
Pope Sixtus V , born Felice Peretti di Montalto, was Pope from 1585 to 1590.-Early life:The chronicler Andrija Zmajević states that Felice's family originated from modern-day Montenegro...
, in 1587. His works, as arranged in the most recent Critical Edition of his works by the Quaracchi Fathers (Collegio S. Bonaventura), consist of a Commentary on the Sentences of Lombard, in four volumes, and eight other volumes, among which are a Commentary on the Gospel of St Luke and a number of smaller works; the most famous of which are Itinerarium Mentis in Deum, Breviloquium, De Reductione Artium ad Theologiam, Soliloquium, and De septem itineribus aeternitatis, in which most of what is individual in his teaching is contained. Nowadays German philosopher Dieter Hattrup denies that De reductione artium ad theologiam might be written by Bonaventure, claiming that the style of thinking does not match Bonaventure's original style.
In philosophy Bonaventure presents a marked contrast to his contemporaries, Roger Bacon and Thomas Aquinas. While these may be taken as representing, respectively, physical science yet in its infancy, and Aristotelian
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
scholasticism in its most perfect form, he presents the mystical and Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
nizing mode of speculation which had already, to some extent, found expression in Hugo
Hugh of St Victor
Hugh of Saint Victor was born perhaps in France, or more probably in Saxony. His origins and early life are rather obscure. He studied and taught at the Augustinian Abbey of Saint Victor in Paris after which he is named. His writings include works of theology, mysticism, philosophy and the arts...
and Richard of St. Victor
Richard of St. Victor
Richard of Saint Victor is known today as one of the most influential religious thinkers of his time. He was a prominent mystical theologian, and was prior of the famous Augustinian Abbey of Saint Victor in Paris from 1162 until his death in 1173....
, and in Bernard of Clairvaux
Bernard of Clairvaux
Bernard of Clairvaux, O.Cist was a French abbot and the primary builder of the reforming Cistercian order.After the death of his mother, Bernard sought admission into the Cistercian order. Three years later, he was sent to found a new abbey at an isolated clearing in a glen known as the Val...
. To him, the purely intellectual element, though never absent, is of inferior interest when compared with the living power of the affections or the heart. He used the authority of Aristotle in harmony with Scriptural and Patristic texts, and attributed much of the heretical tendency of the age to the attempt to divorce Aristotelian philosophy from Catholic theology. Like Thomas Aquinas, with whom he shared numerous profound agreements in matters theological and philosophical, he combated the Aristotelian notion of the eternity of the world vigorously. Augustine
Augustine of Hippo
Augustine of Hippo , also known as Augustine, St. Augustine, St. Austin, St. Augoustinos, Blessed Augustine, or St. Augustine the Blessed, was Bishop of Hippo Regius . He was a Latin-speaking philosopher and theologian who lived in the Roman Africa Province...
, who had imported into the west many of the doctrines that would define scholastic philosophy, was an incredibly important source of Bonaventure's Platonism. Another prominent influence was that of a mystic by the name of Dionysius the Areopagite
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, also known as Pseudo-Denys, was a Christian theologian and philosopher of the late 5th to early 6th century, the author of the Corpus Areopagiticum . The author is identified as "Dionysos" in the corpus, which later incorrectly came to be attributed to Dionysius...
.
Bonaventure accepts the Platonic doctrine that ideas do not exist in rerum natura, but as ideals exemplified by the Divine Being, according to which actual things were formed; and this conception has no slight influence upon his philosophy. Like all the great scholastic doctors he starts with the discussion of the relations between reason and faith. All the sciences are but the handmaids of theology; reason can discover some of the moral truths which form the groundwork of the Christian system, but others it can only receive and apprehend through divine illumination. In order to obtain this illumination, the soul must employ the proper means, which are prayer, the exercise of the virtue
Virtue
Virtue is moral excellence. A virtue is a positive trait or quality subjectively deemed to be morally excellent and thus is valued as a foundation of principle and good moral being....
s, whereby it is rendered fit to accept the divine light, and meditation which may rise even to ecstatic union with God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
. The supreme end of life is such union, union in contemplation
Contemplation
The word contemplation comes from the Latin word contemplatio. Its root is also that of the Latin word templum, a piece of ground consecrated for the taking of auspices, or a building for worship, derived either from Proto-Indo-European base *tem- "to cut", and so a "place reserved or cut out" or...
or intellect and in intense absorbing love
Love
Love is an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. Love is central to many religions, as in the Christian phrase, "God is love" or Agape in the Canonical gospels...
; but it cannot be entirely reached in this life, and remains as a hope
Hope
Hope is the emotional state which promotes the belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one's life. It is the "feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best" or the act of "look[ing] forward to with desire and reasonable confidence" or...
for the future. The mind in contemplating God has three distinct aspects, stages or grades—the sense
Sense
Senses are physiological capacities of organisms that provide inputs for perception. The senses and their operation, classification, and theory are overlapping topics studied by a variety of fields, most notably neuroscience, cognitive psychology , and philosophy of perception...
s, giving empirical knowledge of what is without and discerning the traces (vestigia) of the divine in the world; the reason, which examines the soul itself, the image of the divine Being; and lastly, pure intellect (intelligentia), which, in a transcendent act, grasps the Being of the divine cause.
To these three correspond the three kinds of theology: theologia symbolica, theologia propria and theologia mystica. Each stage is subdivided, for in contemplating the outer world we may use the senses or the imagination; we may rise to a knowledge of God per vestigia or in vestigiis. In the first case the three great properties of physical bodies—weight, number, measure—in the second the division of created things into the classes of those that have merely physical existence, those that have life, and those that have thought, irresistibly lead us to conclude the power, wisdom and goodness of the Triune God. So in the second stage we may ascend to the knowledge of God, per imaginem, by reason, or in imagination, by the pure understanding (intellectus); in the one case the triple division—memory, understanding and will,—in the other the Christian virtues—faith, hope and charity,—leading again to the conception of a Trinity of divine qualities—eternity, truth and goodness.
In the last stage we have first intelligentia, pure intellect, contemplating the essential being of God, and finding itself compelled by necessity of thought to hold absolute being as the first notion, for non-being cannot be conceived apart from being, of which it is but the privation. To this notion of absolute being, which is perfect and the greatest of all, objective existence must be ascribed. In its last and highest form of activity the mind rests in the contemplation of the infinite goodness of God, which is apprehended by means of the highest faculty, the apex mentis or synderesis. This spark of the divine illumination is common to all forms of mysticism, but Bonaventura adds to it peculiarly Christian elements. The complete yielding up of mind and heart to God is unattainable without divine grace, and nothing renders us so fit to receive this gift as the meditative and ascetic life of the cloister. The monastic life is the best means of grace.
Bonaventure, however, is not merely a meditative thinker, whose works may form good manuals of devotion; he is a dogma
Dogma
Dogma is the established belief or doctrine held by a religion, or a particular group or organization. It is authoritative and not to be disputed, doubted, or diverged from, by the practitioners or believers...
tic theologian of high rank, and on all the disputed questions of scholastic thought, such as universals, matter, the principle of individualism, or the intellectus agens, he gives weighty and well-reasoned decisions. He agrees with Saint Albert the Great
Albertus Magnus
Albertus Magnus, O.P. , also known as Albert the Great and Albert of Cologne, is a Catholic saint. He was a German Dominican friar and a bishop, who achieved fame for his comprehensive knowledge of and advocacy for the peaceful coexistence of science and religion. Those such as James A. Weisheipl...
in regarding theology as a practical science; its truths, according to his view, are peculiarly adapted to influence the affections. He discusses very carefully the nature and meaning of the divine attributes; considers universals to be the ideal forms pre-existing in the divine mind according to which things were shaped; holds matter to be pure potentiality which receives individual being and determinateness from the formative power of God, acting according to the ideas; and finally maintains that the intellectus agens has no separate existence. On these and on many other points of scholastic philosophy the "Seraphic Doctor" exhibits a combination of subtlety and moderation, which makes his works particularly valuable.
In Islamic thought
St. Bonaventure was widely regarded as one of the greatest Christian theologians by early MuslimMuslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
thinkers. Hossein Nasr, in his A Young Muslim's Guide to the Modern World mentions Bonaventure amongst the outstanding saints, saying:
St. Bonaventure was one of the greatest theologians and philosophers of Christianity. An Italian Franciscan, he was declared one of the Doctors of the Church and remains to this day as one of the most important authorites on the interpretation of Christian thought among Catholics. He entered the University of Paris where he joined the Franciscan order and studied theology, in which he soon became a notable figure. He is especially well known for his insistence that the pursuit of truth is part of divine worship. He wrote commentaries on the Bible as well as the Sentences of Peter Lombard and was well versed in the philosophies of Augustine of Hippo and Aristotle as well as Islamic philosophy...Saint Bonaventure was also a great mystic and wrote one of the most famous treatises of mysticism in the Middle Ages, The Journey of the Mind to God...
Places, churches, and schools named in his honor
- The town of BonaventureBonaventure, QuebecBonaventure is a town on the Gaspé Peninsula in the Bonaventure Regional County Municipality of Quebec. It is located on Baie des Chaleurs near the mouth of the Bonaventure River...
, QuebecQuebecQuebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
, CanadaCanadaCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean... - Bonaventure HighwayQuebec Autoroute 10Autoroute 10 is an Autoroute in southern Quebec, Canada...
in Quebec - Place BonaventurePlace BonaventurePlace Bonaventure is an office, exhibition and hotel complex in Downtown Montreal, Quebec, Canada, adjacent to the city's Central Station. At in size, Place Bonaventure was the world's largest building upon its completion in 1967....
and the adjacent Bonaventure Metro StationBonaventure (Montreal Metro)Bonaventure is a station on the Orange Line of the Montreal Metro rapid transit system, operated by the Société de transport de Montréal . It is located in the borough of Ville-Marie in downtown Montreal, Quebec, Canada....
in MontrealMontrealMontreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, Quebec - Bonaventure IslandBonaventure IslandBonaventure Island is a Canadian island in the Gulf of St. Lawrence located off the southern coast of Quebec's Gaspé Peninsula, southeast of the village of Percé...
and the Bonaventure RiverBonaventure RiverThe Bonaventure River is a river in the Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec, Canada. It rises in the Chic-Choc Mountains and flows south to empty into Baie des Chaleurs near the town of Bonaventure, Quebec. The river is about long....
in the Gaspé PeninsulaGaspé PeninsulaThe Gaspésie , or Gaspé Peninsula or the Gaspé, is a peninsula along the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Quebec, Canada, extending into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence...
Region of Quebec - St. Bonaventure's College, a private Roman Catholic school, in Newfoundland and LabradorNewfoundland and LabradorNewfoundland and Labrador is the easternmost province of Canada. Situated in the country's Atlantic region, it incorporates the island of Newfoundland and mainland Labrador with a combined area of . As of April 2011, the province's estimated population is 508,400...
, Canada - St Bonaventure's Catholic Comprehensive SchoolSt Bonaventure's Catholic Comprehensive SchoolSt. Bonaventure's Roman Catholic Comprehensive School, also known informally as St. Bon's, is located in Forest Gate, London Borough of Newham, United Kingdom. It is a voluntary-aided Catholic comprehensive secondary school for boys aged 11–18. The school has had Technology College status since...
, in Forest GateForest GateForest Gate is a residential area in the London Borough of Newham, 7 miles northeast of Charing Cross. It is bordered by Manor Park to the east and and to the west lies Stratford town centre. The northern half of the busy Green Street runs through it.-History:...
, LondonLondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, England - The City of VenturaVentura, CaliforniaVentura is the county seat of Ventura County, California, United States, incorporated in 1866. The population was 106,433 at the 2010 census, up from 100,916 at the 2000 census. Ventura is accessible via U.S...
, CaliforniaCaliforniaCalifornia is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
, officially named San Buenaventura, the county seatCounty seatA county seat is an administrative center, or seat of government, for a county or civil parish. The term is primarily used in the United States....
of Ventura County, CaliforniaVentura County, CaliforniaVentura County is a county in the southern part of the U.S. state of California. It is located on California's Pacific coast. It is often referred to as the Gold Coast, and has a reputation of being one of the safest populated places and one of the most affluent places in the country...
, in the United States - St. Bonaventure UniversitySt. Bonaventure UniversitySt. Bonaventure University is a private, Franciscan Catholic university, located in Allegany, Cattaraugus County, New York, United States. It has roughly 2,400 undergraduate and graduate students....
, a Franciscan university, in AlleganyAllegany (town), New YorkAllegany is a town in Cattaraugus County, New York, United States. The population was 8,230 at the 2000 census.The Town of Allegany is on the south border of the county, west of the City of Olean. There is a village called Allegany inside this town....
, New YorkNew YorkNew York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east... - The Municipality of BuenaventuraBuenaventura, ColombiaBuenaventura is a port city and municipality located in the department of Valle del Cauca, Colombia . Buenaventura is the main port of Colombia in the Pacific Ocean....
on the Pacific Coast of ColombiaColombiaColombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the... - The cities of San BenaventuraSan Buenaventura, ChihuahuaSan Buenaventura is a city in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. It serves as the municipal seat for the Buenaventura Municipality.As of the 2005 INEGI Census, the city had a total population of 9,402....
in Chihuahua and San Buenaventura, CoahuilaCoahuilaCoahuila, formally Coahuila de Zaragoza , officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Coahuila de Zaragoza is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico...
in MexicoMexicoThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
and State of San Benaventura - Barangay San Buenaventura, a village in San Pablo City, Laguna, Philippines. Three small chapels can be found within the village in honor of Saint Bonaventura
- St. Bonaventure's High School, a school in Hyderabad, Pakistan
- St. Bonaventure's Church, a 16th century Portuguese church is situated on the beach in ErangalMadh Islandthumb|Madh fortMadh Island is a group of several quaint fishing villages and farmlands in northern Mumbai.-Description:Madh Island barely escapes being called a peninsula since only a small creek, bounded by mangroves, cuts it off from the mainland near Aksa...
near Mumbai. The annual Erangal Feast held on second Sunday of January, celebrating the Feast day of St. Bonaventure, attracts thousands of people of all faiths to this scenic spot. The Birthday Of St. Bonaventure is celebrated on the 15th of July every year.
Works
- Life of St Francis of Assisi, TAN Books, 2010. ISBN 9780895551511
- On the Reduction of the Arts to Theology (De Reductione Artium ad Theologiam), Franciscan Institute Publications, 1996. ISBN 978-1-57659-043-0
- Itinerarium Mentis in Deum (Journey of the Soul Into God), (†)Philotheus Boehner, OFM, Franciscan Institute Publications, 2002. ISBN: 978-1-57659-044-7
- Saint Bonaventure’s Disputed Questions on the Mystery of the Trinity, Franciscan Institute Publications,
1979. ISBN 978-1-57659-045-4
Further reading
- From Bonaventure to the Reformers (Marquette Studies in Theology), 2005, George Henry TavardGeorge TavardReverend George H. Tavard was an ordained member with the order of the Augustinians of the Assumption, and lectured extensively in the areas of historical theology, ecumenism, and spirituality.- Early life :...
, Marquette University Press, ISBN 0874626951 ISBN 9780874626957
External links
- St. Bonaventure (pdf) from Fr. Alban ButlerAlban ButlerAlban Butler , English Roman Catholic priest and hagiographer, was born at Appletree, Northamptonshire.He was educated at the English College, Douai, where on his ordination to the priesthood in 1735 he held successively the chairs of philosophy and divinity...
's Lives of the Saints
- St Bonaventure from the Franciscan Archive.
- S Bonaventura: Opera Omnia Peltiero Edente (Latin original texts).