(1221–1274)
Saint Bonaventure was born Giovanni, son of the physician Giovanni di Ritella, in Bagnorea near the city of Viterbo in 1221.According to legend, he was healed of an illness at the age of 10 through the intercession of St. FRANCIS OF ASSISI. He studied with the Franciscans as a young man and was sent to complete his education at the University of Paris in 1235, where he studied under the English scholar Alexander of Hales. He joined the Franciscans in Paris after receiving his master of arts degree in 1243. By 1254 he was master of theology at the Franciscan school at Paris. As a student and later an instructor in Paris, Bonaventure was a colleague of the Dominican scholar Thomas AQUINAS.When in 1256 the secular priest William of St. Amour attacked both orders of friars as false apostles, it was Aquinas and Bonaventure who wrote the defenses of their respective orders, and later in his life, Bonaventure upheld the Franciscan order once more against similar attacks from Gerard of Abbeville.
In 1257, in part because of his recent strong defense of the order, Bonaventure was chosen minister general of the Franciscans, a position he held for 16 years. In this office, Bonaventure dealt with the severe internal division among the Franciscans between the Spiritualists, who called for the strict observance of St. Francis’s original Rule, and the Relaxati, who sought relaxation of the Rule. Bonaventure wrote the first constitution of the order, reforming the organization in the true spirit of St. Francis, and regularly visited Franciscan houses throughout Europe to see that the constitution was being implemented. He resolved the con-flict so successfully that he was called the Second Founder of the Franciscan order.
When the general chapter of the Franciscans met in 1260, it commissioned Bonaventure to write a new, more authentic, life of Saint Francis. Bonaventure used THOMAS OF CELANO’s biography as a guide, but also did a good deal of original research by speaking with the companions of St.Francis who were still alive, and by visiting places frequented by the saint. By the general chapter meeting in 1263, Bonaventure had completed two forms of his Life: the Legenda maior, giving a complete biography, and the Legenda minor, to be used for liturgical readings on Francis’s feast day. Later that year, Bonaventure recodified the Rule for the Franciscan-affiliated Poor Ladies of St. Clare. By 1266, philosophers at the University of Paris, following arguments of the Islamic philosopher AVERROËS (Ibn Rushd), had begun teaching what became known as the doctrine of the doubletruth: Natural reason, it was claimed, must accept things as true that are contrary to the truth of divine revelation. Moving to Paris early in 1267,
Bonaventure gave a series of sermons opposing the unorthodox teachings of the philosophers, particularly attacking the philosophers’ arguments for the eternity of the world (a notion that denied God’s Creation) and for the existence of a single active intellect for all human beings (a notion that denied individual immortality). Bonaventure gave two more series of sermons against the philosophers in September of 1267 and February of 1268. In Rome for the coronation of Pope Gregory X in 1272, Bonaventure was recruited by the new pope to organize an ecumenical council to meet on reforming the church, reunifying the Roman church with the Greek, and ensuring the safety of the Holy Land. While working on this task, Bonaventure was also back in Paris by March 1273, giving another series of sermons against the philosophers. But he never completed this series, being called back to Italy at the end of May at the request of the pope, who wanted to appoint him cardinal bishop of Albano, and also wanted him to prepare for the Council of Lyons to take place in 1274. At that council, Bonaventure resigned as minister general of the Franciscans. But shortly after preaching a sermon celebrating a “reunification” with the Greeks who attended the council, Bonaventure fell ill and died on July 15. He was buried at Lyons the same day.
In addition to his myriad sermons and his Life of Saint Francis, St. Bonaventure left a number of scriptural commentaries and theological works. These include a commentary on Ecclesiastes that emphasizes God as the eternal good; one on the Gospel of Luke concerned with the role of the preacher; and one on the Gospel of John focused on the dual nature of Christ. Bonaventure’s commentary on PETER LOMBARD’s Sentences deals with the science of theology itself as faith made understandable by reason, but subordinated to the divine authority of Scripture. In his theological texts, Bonaventure relied most heavily on the writings of St. AUGUSTINE, rather than on the philosophy of Aristotle, on which his Dominican contemporaries so heavily relied.
But even more than these texts, Bonaventure’s mystical writings may be his greatest literary contribution. The best known of these is Itinerarium mentis in Deum (The Mind’s Road to God), which he wrote in 1259 on a pilgrimage to Alverna, the site where St. Francis had received the stigmata (the five wounds of Christ) 35 years before. The tract visualizes a seven-stage journey from contemplation of the created world to mystical contemplation of the Trinity. Bonaventure’s other mystical works include De triplici via (concerned with reflection, prayer, and contemplation as the “threefold way” to God), Soliloquium (a “soliloquy” in which the soul speaks as the voice of God), and Lignum vitae (in which Christ’s cross is the “Tree of Life”). In these tracts, Bonaventure follows the mystical lead initiated by St. Francis, and stresses the importance of love over intellect in the individual’s relationship with God. Aside from Aquinas and Pope Gregory, Bonaventure was personally acquainted with many of the other major figures of his time. He wrote an office on the Passion of Christ for the French king Louis IX (St. Louis), and wrote other treatises for the royal family.He was revered for his saintliness in his own lifetime, and DANTE places Bonaventure in paradise in his DIVINE COMEDY (1321), where the poet has Bonaventure chastise corrupt members of his own order. Bonaventure was canonized in 1482 and was named a doctor of the universal church”by Pope Sixtus V in 1587. He was called the Devout Doctor in the 14th century, and ever since the 15th has been known as the Seraphic (that is, Angelic) Doctor.
Bibliography
■ Bonaventure, Saint. Bonaventure: The Soul’s Journey into God, The Tree of Life, The Life of St. Francis. Translated by Ewert Cousins. New York: Paulist Press, 1978.
■ ———. The Journey of the Mind to God. Translated by Philotheus Boehner. Edited, with introduction and notes by Stephen F. Brown. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1993.
■ ———. What Manner of Man? Sermons on Christ by St. Bonaventure. A translation with introduction and commentary by Zachary Hayes. Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1974.
■ ———.The Works of Bonaventure: Cardinal, Seraphic Doctor, and Saint. Translated by José de Vinck. Paterson, N.J.: St. Anthony Guild Press, 1960.
■ ———. Works of Saint Bonaventure. Edited by Philotheus Boehner and Sr. M. Frances Laughlin. 2 vols. St. Bonaventure, N.Y.: The Franciscan Institute, 1955–1956.
■ Bougerol, Jacques G. Introduction to the Works of Bonaventure. Translated by José de Vinck. Paterson, N.J.: St. Anthony Guild Press, 1964.
■ Hayes, Zachary. Bonaventure: Mystical Writings. New York: Crossroad, 1999.