II. A Doubt about the Adoration owed to Christ as he is a man

36. But there remains a doubt here: what adoration is owed to Christ as he is a man such that the nature, in which he performed the works of redemption as meritorious cause of our salvation, is the reason for the adoration?

A. The Opinion of Others

37. And if it be said that the adoration is hyperdulia (which is the highest reverence due to a creature), there are many arguments to the contrary:

38. First, that this reverence of hyperdulia is due absolutely to Christ as to the nature whereby, even had he not redeemed us, he was full of grace; so a greater reverence is due to him now when, as Mediator in that nature, he has redeemed us.

39. Again, Christ in that nature is head of the Church, according to Augustine, commentary on John 15.1, ‘I am the vine’ - therefore he has to infuse grace into the whole Church; therefore the whole Church is more especially beholden to him than if he were not head and did not have to infuse grace. But if he had only the amount of personal grace he does have, then, even though he would not be head, he would still be owed supreme hyperdulia; therefore a greater reverence now is due to him.

40. Further, a reason that some posit as to why man could not have been repaired by a pure creature is the following, that then man would not have been perfectly restored to the excellence that he had before, because he would be bound to serve that creature and not God alone as he is now; therefore the repairer had to be God. - This reasoning would not be conclusive if Christ was to be adored only with the adoration of hyperdulia; for man could very well have been restored to his former excellence so as to be held to adore God alone with the adoration of latria and to adore that other mediator with the adoration of hyperdulia; but man would not be held to adore that other mediator with adoration of hyperdulia if Christ now in his human nature is to be adored by reason of no other adoration than hyperdulia; therefore man should not now adore him only in this way.

41. Again Anselm, Why God Man 2.14, proves that the life of the man Christ was better than all the sins were evil, or could be evil, that were not sins against God or the person of God. But Anselm is speaking of the created life that Christ was deprived of by death, because he says that his killing is a graver sin than all other sins that are not committed immediately against God; for it was more detestable, according to Anselm, to deprive the man Christ of life than to commit any other sin; but in the case of any sin the will is turned away from the supreme Good; therefore it was more detestable to take away the life of the man Christ than to turn away, by any other sin, from the supreme Good (unless one turns immediately away from this Good). Therefore too Christ’s life was more to be loved than the supreme created good, and so it was to be adored as an infinite good.

42. Or one can argue from the words of Anselm in this other way, that if Christ’s life was as great a good as the privation of it was an evil, and if the privation of it was a greater evil than all the evils, even infinite evils, that there could be, then that evil was worse than all the other infinite evils; therefore the good opposed to it was the infinite Good; therefore Christ in his human nature is owed the adoration of latria that is owed to the infinite Good.

B. Scotus’ own Response

43. As to this article then [n.36], it can be said that a reason for giving latria can be the intrinsic goodness of the one adored or this goodness as communicating itself to the one adoring (and its doing so first, freely and principally, and in accord with the greatest good of the one adoring). Likewise too a reason for the adoration of hyperdulia can be the intrinsic goodness of the one adored or this goodness as through it (as through a second cause) the greatest good is communicated to the one adoring.

44. If the first way is held then for neither cause is there due to Christ in his human nature an adoration because of his being redeemer greater than were he not redeemer; but, according to this opinion, neither is a greater latria, or a latria for an additional reason, due to God if he is Creator than would be due to him if he were not Creator.

45. But if the other opinion is held, then, it can be said of hyperdulia just as of latria in respect of God that a greater reverence is due to Christ because he is redeemer than would be due to him if he were not redeemer (and this if the reverence then due to him were not the greatest reverence) - or if the reverence were the greatest, the same reverence would be due to him now for an additional reason.

46. And this is what the arguments seem to prove [nn.38-42].

47. The fact is plain about the first argument [n.38] because it proceeds of Christ as he is mediator and meritorious cause of our salvation; and plain about the second one [n.39] because it proceeds of Christ as he is head of the Church.

48. The other two [nn.40-42] reasons, which proceed from authorities, need solving.

As to the third argument [n.40], about the perfect repair of man - it concludes by way of congruity that the person who redeemed and meritoriously saved was God, so that we owe the supreme hyperdulia that is owed by reason of meritorious redemption to the same person to whom we also owe, by reason of creation, the adoration of latria; but we would, for this reason, not have been less perfectly saved if we were obliged to show the reverence due a meritorious savior, as he is meritorious savior, to someone other than him to whom we owe latria; just as now we adore Mary with hyperdulia and all the other saints with dulia, and yet we are not lower down because of this adoration than if God alone were to be adored; we would however be very low down if we owed to someone else the adoration we owe to God, because then we would be wholly subject to that someone else, which would prove a great unhappiness and weakness for us. An example of this is that it is more fitting for my father to care for me than for someone else do so in such wise that I would owe him the same reverence that is owed to my father and carer; but if someone else were to be carer, I would owe one sort of reverence to my father and another sort to that someone else, and so I would in some way be subject to several persons, but not with an equal subjection.

49. To the other argument [n.41] I say that the created life of the man Christ was not an infinite good formally, nor was it something to be supremely loved - hence the Trinity wanted it not to die the death it wanted it to die; but, to turn away from God in one thing is graver than to turn away from him in some other thing, and the graver the more noble the turning toward him would be, other things being equal. Now by loving this human nature in Christ, which was the best creature as to fullness of grace, there could be the supreme turning toward God that happens by act of using a creature, because this creature was closest to the end and most able to be referred to the end; therefore a turning away from God with respect to this usable object, namely by hating the created life in him whom God wished to hate it, was the worst turning away - and thus the killing of the man Christ was the gravest sin as far as depends on the object taken as such.

50. And if you say that it was the gravest of all other possible sins not immediately committed against God, one can say that since these other sins are distinct in their gravity, and one of them does not intensify the other, the gravity of this one sin was greatest as to its intensity, but in the others it was greatest as to extent. However the created life of Christ was so good that its being taken way would suffice to destroy infinite evils (there will be discussion of this below in the topic of the satisfaction of Christ for our sins [Lectura 3 d.20 nn.24, 28]).