BUSEMBAUM, HERMANN. - Jesuit, moralist, b. at Nottuln (Westphalia) in 1600, d. at Münster on 31 January 1669. A professor for several years of philosophy, dogmatics and moral theology, then rector at Hildesheim and at Münster, and a highly esteemed director of conscience, he owes his universal fame to the work Medulla theologiae moralis (Münster 1650).
As professor of moral theology at Cologne he had composed for his students a brief, clear, well-ordered compendium, making use of the notes and jottings of two of his predecessors, the fathers H. Nünning and F. von Spee; the compendium pleased so much that it had to be printed, and it met with such favor that, besides the numerous editions (more than 200 up to 1766), it also served as the basic text on which famous theologians such as C. La Croix, A. Ballerini and especially St. Alphonsus Liguori wrote their extensive commentaries. Indeed the Saint, before his work Theologia moralis, published the same Medulla in four successive editions (Naples 1748; ibid., 2 vols., 1753-55; Rome, 3 vols., 1757; ibid., 3 vols., 1760), adding to it ever more copious notes and appendices. There was no lack, however, of vehement criticism of B.; in fact certain opinions, accepted by B. as probable, were later condemned by Alexander VII (1665-66) and by Innocent XI (1679) and were therefore corrected in later editions. More arduous was the struggle over the proposition concerning the lawfulness of self-defense to the point of killing an unjust aggressor, even if he were a sovereign (l. III, tr. iv, chap. 1, doubt 3, n. 8), for which the Medulla was condemned to the flames by the Parliaments of Paris and Toulouse (1757); and over the proposition that the end justifies the means (l. IV, chap. 3, doubt 7, art. 2, n. 3). But the first proposition, even if judged inopportune, is in itself true and just, according to eminent theologians among whom is St. Antoninus, from whom it is taken almost literally, and it is substantially admitted also by St. Thomas. The second concerns only those means which are in themselves indifferent, and therefore remain justified by a legitimate end.
Bibliography7 works
Celestino Testore