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it from that font and channeled it through the streams of their teaching and manner of life to those desirous of a life of perfection.a
2 Nor let anyone think that this value is disproved by the fact that Christ is said at times to have had a purse.b For Christ did everything perfectly: He so practiced the path of perfection in all He did, that on occasion He stooped to the imperfections of the weak. While extolling the path of perfection, He did not on the other hand condemn the weaker course of the imperfect.c
Thus Christ assumed the role of the weak by keeping a purse, and in certain other ways He took upon himself the weaknesses of human nature, as the Gospel narrative bears witness, stooping to our frailty not only in body but in spirit as well. For He assumed human nature in such a way that, always being perfect in what He did, He lowered Himself to our human state while remaining ever on the exalted plane of His divine nature. And so He was moved in the condescension of His total love for us to perform certain actions conformable to our imperfect nature without thereby deviating from the straight course of absolute perfection.
So, Christ did indeed perform and teach the works of perfection, but He also performed acts proper to our weakness, as is clear from His taking flight at times, and having a purse. Both courses, however, He carried off perfectly, so as to commend himself as the way of salvation for perfect and imperfect alike, just as He had come to save both and as He wished eventually to die for both.
3 Nor let anybody at this point make the erroneous objection that people who renounce the ownership of all things for the love of God are in this way putting their life in jeopardy, like suicides or persons that tempt God. For in their way of life, the brothers do not commit themselves to God's providence in a manner that scorns the course of human provision; on the contrary they seek sustenance either from alms freely offered, or from what they humbly beg, or from what
- The Latin text reads: "Dicemus, quod abdicatio proprietatis huiusmodi omnium rerum tam in speciale quam etiam in communi propter Deum meritoria est et sancta, quam et Christus vitam perfectionis ostendens verbo docuit et exemplo firmavit." This is exactly Bonaventure's thesis in the Apologia pauperum, VII 2-5 in S. Bonaventurae, Opera Omnia, Vol. VIII, ed. Patres Collegii S. Bonaventurae (Ad Claras Aquas, Quaracchi: Collegium S. Bonaventurae, 1898), English translation by José de Vinck, Defense of the Mendicants (Paterson, NJ: St. Anthony Guild Press, 1966), 126-9. Here Bonaventure distinguishes the perfection of renouncing individual ownership, as seen in the early Jerusalem community, and the higher perfection of the renunciation of property both by individuals and in common, as seen in the earthly life of Jesus and his disciples. Franciscan poverty is thus on a higher plane than that of other religious. Cf. Lambert, Franciscan Poverty, 133-136.
- The classic text used by opponents of the Franciscan ideal of the common renunciation of property was John 13:29: "Some felt that, because Judas held the common purse, Jesus was telling him, 'Buy what we need.' "
- The argument here is simply a compressed version of Bonaventure's Apologia Pauperum: that Christ performed some actions as an example to the perfect, and others out of condescension to the imperfect, cf. Apologia Pauperum I 6; VII 35-40 (VIII 236-7; 284-6), Defense 10-13, 158-163.