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75 4 GUERRIC OF ST. QUENTIN The first Dominican to take up Christ’s transfiguration in the form of a disputed question was Guerric of St. Quentin, who taught at the University of Paris from 1233 to 1242. Little is known about his life, but he left a number of exegetical and systematic works, most of which remain unedited.1 Because no commentary on any of the synoptic gospels remains, and because Guerric does not take up Christ’s transfiguration in his quodlibetal questions, Guerric’s theology of the transfiguration can be derived only from one of his disputed questions.2 This brief disputed question on Christ’s transfiguration is similar in style to Alexander’s. While Alexander had one larger inquiry and one smaller one, Guerric’s question consists of six brief inquiries, in which he tends to adduce terse objections and responses with brief solutiones.3 1. On Guerric’s life and work, see Palemon Glorieux, Répertoire des maitres en théologie de Paris au XIIIe siècle, 2 tt. (Paris: J. Vrin, 1933–1934), t. 1, 54–58; Thomas Kaeppeli, Scriptores Ordinis Praedicatorum Medii Aevi, 4 vols. (Rome: Ad S. Sabinae, 1970–1993), vol. 2, 61–70; F. M. Henquinet,“Les écrits du Frère Guerric de Saint-Quentin, O.P.,” Recherches de théologie ancienne et médiévale 6 (1934): 184–214, 284–312, 394–410, and “Notes additionelle sur les écrits de Guerric de Saint-Quentin,” Recherches de théologie ancienne et médiévale 8 (1936): 369–88. Henquinet notes that there may be a fragment of Guerric’s Luke commentary in Ms. Assisi Biblioteca Communale 131; see his“Les écrits du Frère Guerric de Saint-Quentin, O.P.,” 193. 2. See Jean-Pierre Torrell’s introduction to Guerric of Saint-Quentin, Quaestiones de quolibet, edited by Walter H. Principe, 3–177 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2002). Torrell reviews Guerric’s exegetical works on 9–13. 3. Guerric outlines only five questions in the prologue to the question, but the two parts of the last question are not directly related. 76 guerrIC of St. QueNtIN Quaestio de transfiguratione Domini The first inquiry, which is the longest, asks whether Christ assumed true clarity or only a likeness of clarity. Guerric opens the question with fourteen arguments, eight in favor of the position that Christ did indeed assume true clarity and six arguing against it. A full half of these brief arguments are taken from various glosses, and nearly all are exegetical in nature. Most of the arguments for true clarity, which derive from glosses, tend to emphasize that the transfiguration is a foretaste of Christ’s heavenly kingdom, which He will establish at the Last Judgment . Another argument compares the transfiguration to the vision of Paul, as recorded in 2 Corinthians 12, concluding that if“Paul, while he was yet mortal, sees the true glory of [His] soul, which is greater than the glory of the body . . . how much more, therefore, were Peter and the others able to see the true glory of [His] body.”4 The two most compelling arguments, however, allege that it would be inappropriate for Christ to manifest the glory of His future resurrection by means of a likeness to that glory or for Him to confirm the apostles’faith by means of a likeness and not the true glory itself. The arguments suggesting a likeness of Christ’s clarity emphasize the temporal and qualitative difference between Christ before His resurrection and Christ after His resurrection. If the transfiguration is a sign and example of Christ’s future glory, it should be distinct from that glory. The transfiguration is not an instance of future glory, but merely a foreshadowing. Guerric’s solution is based primarily on a gloss (later attributed to Bede by John of La Rochelle), which asserts that Christ’s mortal body cannot be subject to immortality. Here is Guerric’s solution in full: Some say that Christ is the first-fruits of those who are asleep and the firstborn of the dead and that His resurrection is the cause of ours: It was fitting that, while He was still in His mortal body, He should manifest that excellence in His body. Hence they say that He assumed the true clarity 4.“Paulus adhuc mortalis vidit veram gloriam animae, quae maior est quam gloria corporis . . . ergo multo magis Petrus [et] alii potuerunt videre veram corporis gloriam,” Quaestio de transfiguratione Domini, edited by Thomas Marschler...

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