FOUR QUESTIONS ON MARY - Franciscan Institute Publications

Introduction
fore, is: Does the moment of sanctification coincide with that
of animation? 30 If the two moments do not coincide, then
there are two possibilities, namely, either (1) once the soul is
infused in the body and is infected with sin, it is immediately
sanctified so that for no continuous period of time does it remain
in a state of sin, or else (2) there is a period of time in
which Mary’s soul remained in a state of original sin, whether
it be long or short, Henry does not care. Here then we have
the second and third possibilities Scotus refers to and considers
as the only logical alternatives to his own preferred third
view that Mary never contracted sin to begin with. It is only
these three possibilities he considers in our question, since it
is from his final version or Ordinatio. The second possibility
is the only one to which some objection is raised that he takes
time to answer. When he first proposed this alternative at
Oxford, he may not have been as fully familiar with Henry’s
position as he became later in Paris, for he seemed to think
Henry might be interpreted this way. 31
Henry, however, wanted to go still further. He thought he
could show that the instant of conception and sanctification
coincide for all practical purposes. 32 For one can distinguish
within a single instant of time two distinct aspects of nature
one of which is prior, the other posterior. According to this
priority of nature Mary’s soul can be first in a state of sin and
afterwards in a state of grace. In an extremely lengthy and
involved argument, based in part upon Aristotle’s physics of
30 Henry, op. cit., [V]: Si ergo loquamur de ista...[nativitate] in utero,
ulterius distinguo, quia virgo aut in illo eodem instanti, quo sic concepta
est mundo et originali peccato infecta simul fuit concepta Deo etiam per
gratiam sanctificationis, aut non.
31 Scotus, Lectura (Balić, op. cit., p. 92): "But the second is also possible,
namely, that it is only for an instant that she was in original sin and for
any time period she was in grace. And if one understands the Ghentian in
this way, his opinion is good, so that for an instant of conception she was in
sin and a daughter of ire, and in the whole time-span was subject to grace.”
In Paris, according to the Valencia Codex, he admits this is a benign interpretation
of what Henry actually said. See note 44 infra.
32 Henry, op. cit., fol. 585v [X]: Quod tamen originalis culpa et sanctificationis
gratia simul sint, seu esse habeat quodammodo in eodem instanti,
etsi non in eodem subiecto pro illo eodem instanti, hoc non est omnino impossibile.
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