Being as First Known and the Analogy or Univocity of Being: Scotus versus Cajetan

From the early fourteenth century onward, it was commonplace for Thomists and Scotists to engage each other's arguments for and against the analogous or univocal character of being as common to God and creatures and across the categories of being. On the Thomist side, Thomas de Vio Cajetan's contribution to this debate stands out for its attentiveness to the relevance of more foundational questions concerning how being is first known—distinctly or confusedly. Drawing from Scotus's Ordinatio and Cajetan's In De Ente et Essentia d. Thomae Aquinatis commentaria (1495), this paper shows how Cajetan offers both a genuine challenge and an alternative to the conception of being that underlies Scotus's primary argument for the univocity of being (that is, the argument from a certain and doubtful concept).