FOUR QUESTIONS ON MARY - Franciscan Institute Publications

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Introduction Even this restrained and prudent departure from the common theological opinion provoked a storm of opposition at Paris, including the accusation of heresy. A year after Scotus’s death, for example, the secular Master John of Pouilly attacked his views in a public Quodlibetal disputation. 52 Though John mentions no names, he cites Scotus's own words at length, answering his arguments in detail and challenging his solution, to conclude that neither Mary, nor God, her Son, needs our lies, that inasmuch as Scotus’s position is against all Scripture it must be reckoned heretical and that one who has so taught must be dealt with otherwise than by mere argument. 53 Others were more moderate in their opposition and even admitted Scotus’s opinion seemed to be valde rationabilis. The fact is, as Brady and others show, 54 Scotus initiated a trend that would never die out but would continue to grow until the “new theologians,” as they were first called, 55 deals rather with Bernard’s specific problem as to why the moment of the “conception of the seed” could not have been the moment the Holy Spirit sanctified her soul. Though Scotus preferred the Anselmian explanation to Augustine’s as to “why the seed is said to be infected,” he wishes to show whatever view one holds, this does nothing to rule out the possibility that her conception was immaculate. 52 John states his intent in these words: Primo volo declarare quod non potest dici probabiliter nec teneri pro opinione probabili quod beata Virgo de facto non contraxit originale peccatum. Imo salva cuiuscumque reverentia, videtur quod debeat haereticum reputari. (Quodl. III, q. 3 in Ioannis de Pollicaco et Ioannis de Neapoli Quaestiones Disputatae de Immaculata Conceptione B.M.V., ed. C. Balić [Bibl. Mariana Medii Aevi: Textus: I] (Sibenici, 1931), 2; the whole text is given 1-70. 53 John of Pouilly, Ibid., 13-14. 54 I. Brady, O.F.M., “The Developmemt of the Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception in the Fourteenth Century After Aureoli” in Franciscan Studies 15 (1955) 175-202; see also his article “The Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception in the Late Fourteenth Century,” Studia Mariana 9 (1954), 86-110. See also C. Balić, “Ioannes Duns Scotus et historia Immaculatae Conceptionis,” Antonianum 30 (1955), 349-488; this article was republished in book form with an index Ioannes Duns Scotus et Historia Immaculatae Conceptionis (Romae: Via Merulana 124, 1955); Alexander DiLella, O.F.M., “The Immaculate Conception in the Writings of Peter Aureoli,” Franciscan Studies 15 (1955), 146-58. 55 The Franciscan Alvarus Pelagus (Alvaro Pelayo), penitentiary of Pope John XXII, called them such as late as the 1330-32. In his De planctu Ecclesiae II, c. 52 (Venetiis, 1560), f. 110rb-110va) he complained: Mater Christi ... in originali peccato concepta fuit, ut late probat Bernardus ... 19
John Duns Scotus: Four Questions on Mary would eventually outnumber the old, and Feast of December 8 would become simply that of the Immaculate Conception and the Marian prerogative it honored would some four centuries later be defined as a dogma of faith. The third question on marriage illustrates the difficulty theologians in Scotus’s day had in reconciling the Marian account in the Gospel of Luke with that in the Gospel of Matthew. The first contained the story of the Annunciation, the second that of Mary’s marriage to Joseph. When Gabriel announced she was to become the mother of the long awaited Messiah, Mary expressed surprise. “How can this be since I know not man?” The traditional explanation of the Fathers of the Church was not just that she was still a virgin, but that she had no intentions of ever having sexual relations with a man, and had even taken a vow to that effect. And it was to one vowed to virginity that Gabriel addressed his answer: “The Holy Spirit shall come upon you, etc.” For medieval canonists concerned with the legal aspects of contracts made under oath, this presented a problem. If Mary had vowed perpetual virginity, how could she take marriage vows as well? Did not the partners exchange the sexual rights to each other’s body for the purpose of procreation as well as for mutual support and comfort? Some theologians suggested the vow of virginity was taken only conditionally and not absolutely. Scotus was quick to perceive the condition they suggested did nothing to solve the legal problem. He offered instead another canonical solution based on something Pope Nicholas III had granted to the Franciscan Order of which he was a member. The vow of poverty taken by Franciscans differed from that of other Orders in that it was not only et hanc sententiam tenent omnes antiqui theologi: Alexander, Thomas in suo IV et II, Bonaventure, Richardus, licet novi quidam theologi a sensu communi ecclesiae recedentes teneant contra, indevoti revera Dominae, et tamen devoti cupientes apparere nitantur, eam quodammodo sic Deo et suo Filio comparantes, quorum opinio nova et phantastica sit a fidelibus cancellata, quia sanctificationem Virginis negat contra id quod tenet Ecclesia ipsam sanctificationem fuisse. From the long list of these new theologians, however, it is clear that he was one of the minority of Franciscans who held out against the Immaculate Conception; on the other hand, as Brady shows (see the preceding note), opponents without the Order, especially among the Dominicans, grew in number. 20
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