Was the doctrine of the real presence of
Christ in the Eucharist, which was eventually defined by the Catholic Church as
transubstantiation, always taught by the Church?”
You claim that the following is the central point of the passage from John, and I agree that it is very important:
“This is the work of God, that you believe
in Him whom He sent .”
My question for
you: Do you believe in what Jesus
actually said, or only what your own human understanding enables you to
believe?
St. Ambrose:
"Let us be
assured that this is not what nature formed, but what the blessing consecrated,
and that greater efficacy resides in the blessing than in nature, for by the
blessing nature is changed… Surely the word of Christ, which could make out of
nothing that which did not exist, can change things already in existence into
what they were not.
The question we ask of
this text is, “Is Jesus really teaching about the doctrine of
transubstantiation here?” In the context
of when this event took place, this most certainly cannot be the case at all!
We note first that
this event did NOT take place on the night before his death.
I’m not sure why this
is relevant. Jesus taught many important
things throughout his three years of ministry.
What is relevant is that this talk took place during Passover, the same
time of year as the Passion.
John 6.
3Then Jesus went up on a mountainside
and sat down with his disciples. 4The Jewish Passover Feast was near.
Why was this time of the Jewish year
chosen for this particular teaching?
What is the
significance of blood sacrifice and the eating of flesh?
Lev 17
"For the life of a creature is in
the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the
altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one's life."
Lev 4
"If he brings a lamb as his sin
offering, he is to bring a female without
defect. He is to lay his hand on
its head and slaughter it
for a sin offering
Lev 6
The LORD said to Moses,
"Say to Aaron and his sons: These
are the regulations for the sin offering: The sin offering is to be slaughtered
before the LORD in the place the burnt offering is slaughtered; it is most
holy. The priest who offers it shall eat
it; it is to be eaten in a holy place, in the courtyard of the Tent of Meeting.
Given this background and the time of
year, it is clear to his audience what Jesus was saying.
Read these words again understanding
that he was speaking to Jews during Passover:
51I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world."
52Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?"
“I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him.” (John 6:53-56)
Key points:
1) Jesus is submitting himself as a sacrifice
for sin. He explicitly states that we
must eat his flesh and drink his blood.
He chose the time of Passover to make these comments.
2) The Jewish audience understood this
parallel, and they were shocked and angered.
They did not consider his words to be metaphorical.
3) Jesus
did not correct his followers who left him. If there was a misunderstanding,
don’t you think he would have cleared it up?
You
point out the following:
… when Jesus uses the personal form
of the “to be” verb in saying “I am the door” or “I am the vine”, why doesn’t
It is
clear from the response of his listeners reaction that
Jesus was speaking metaphorically in these cases. Did any of his followers complain about the
difficulty of these teachings? Did they
ask: “How can this man be a door?” or
“How can this man be a vine?”
As to 1
Cor.(I assume that is what you meant), yes, the cup of
blood does become the New Covenant. Our
act of faith in following Jesus is the new covenant. We are no longer bound by the Old
Covenant. The Eucharist is the central
ritual in the New Covenant.
26For whenever you eat
this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.
You write:
“How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” they said. Jesus was obviously not speaking literally.
Obvious to whom? Rationalists in the 21st century? It wasn’t obvious to his audience, which is why they protested and many of his followers left him. If Jesus was not speaking literally, then why didn’t he stop those who left him and explain what he actually meant?
You make the following comparison:
“…that everyone
who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal
life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”
“Whoever feeds
on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise
him up on the last day.”
Have
you looked on the Son? Have you looked
on the Son in the Eucharist and not believed in him? How can you see the Son if he does not make
himself physically present to you? What
is it that you are to believe?
Your
point that the doctrine of transubstantiation is implicit in scripture rather
than explicit is technically true, as is the doctrine of the Trinity. I would argue that the Eucharist is more
explicitly described than the Trinity.
Regardless, it is there and it was believed by the early church. Your attempt to place Augustine at odds with
transubstantiation is ineffective. He
was very explicit many times.
"You ought to know what you have received, what
you are going to receive, and what you ought to receive daily. That Bread which
you see on the altar, having been sanctified by the word of God, is the Body of
Christ. The chalice, or rather, what is in that chalice, having been sanctified
by the word of God, is the Blood of Christ." -"Sermons", [227,
21]
The
faithful know what I am saying. They know Christ in the breaking of the bread.
For not all bread, but only that which receives the blessing of Christ, becomes
Christ’s body (Sermons 234, 2).4
Christ
was carried in His Own hands when, referring to His Own body, He said, .This is
My body…For He carried that body in His hands (Explanations of the Psalms 33, 1, 10).
[Jesus]
received earth from earth; because flesh is from the earth, and He took flesh
from the flesh of Mary. He walked here in the same flesh, and gave us the same
flesh to be eaten unto salvation. But no one eats that flesh unless he first
adores it... and not only do we not sin by adoring
[His flesh], we do sin by not adoring (Explanations of the Psalms 98, 9).
Body and Blood of the Priest Himself . . . Recognize then in the Bread what hung upon the tree; in the chalice what flowed from His side. {Sermo iii. 1-2; on p.62}
The Blood they had previously shed they afterwards drank. {Mai 26, 2; 86, 3; on p.64}
Eat Christ, then; though eaten He yet lives, for when slain He rose from the dead. Nor do we divide Him into parts when we eat Him: though indeed this is done in the Sacrament, as the faithful well know when they eat the Flesh of Christ, for each receives his part, hence are those parts called graces. Yet though thus eaten in parts He remains whole and entire; eaten in parts in the Sacrament, He remains whole and entire in Heaven. {Mai 129, 1; cf. Sermon 131; on p.65}
Out of hatred of Christ the crowd there shed Cyprian’s blood, but today a reverential multitude gathers to drink the Blood of Christ . . . this altar . . . whereon a Sacrifice is offered to God . . . {Sermo 310, 2; cf. City of God, 8, 27, 1; on p.65
You
write:
I Cor 10:16 also makes it clear
that when believers partake of the Lord’s supper, it
is a “communion” or “participation” in the body and blood of Christ. The text
does NOT say that it is the body and blood in a transubstantiated sense at all.
It is a participation in those things.
The Lord’s supper is to demonstrate the unity
of the body of Christ – as Paul will deal with in 11:16-34.
I know
of no time when the body of believers is referred to as the body AND blood of
Christ.
He is
not talking about sinning against the Church(body of
Christ):
27Therefore, whoever
eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be
guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord.
You’ve
gone to great lengths in an attempt to change the meaning of 1 Cor. 11. The words are not confusing unless you don’t
like the meaning.
There
is no dispute regarding what could constitute receiving the Eucharist in an
unworthy manner, so I don’t need to respond to those points.
Here’s
something I think you missed. Note that
in 1 Cor. 10 that Paul is appealing to a previously understood dogma:
16Is not the cup of
thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ?
And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ?
He’s reminding them of
the serious and sacred nature of the Eucharist(Thanksgiving). It is important to note that he is not giving
us a detailed teaching of the Eucharist here, he is
just reminding them of the meaning so as to reinforce proper attitudes and
actions at the Lord’s Supper.
Regarding the early church, you write:
I have read many words from many early fathers including the ones quotes in the opening statement in which they say many things like the bread and wine “is the flesh and blood”, etc… what NONE of these quotes of the fathers are clear on is HOW they are the flesh and blood of Christ.
That is just not true.
The early fathers are clear that the bread and wine become, or are
transformed, by the eucharist
prayers which are the Word of God.
Let’s
take a closer look at Justin Martyr in about 150 AD:
We call this food Eucharist; and no one else is permitted to partake of it, except one who believes our teaching to be true and who has been washed in the washing which is for the remission of sins and for regeneration, and is thereby living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread nor as common drink do we receive these; but since Jesus Christ our Savior was made incarnate by the word of God and had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so too, as we have been taught, the food which has been made into the Eucharist by the Eucharistic prayer set down by Him, and by the change of which our flesh and blood is nourished, is both the flesh and blood of that incarnated Jesus.
Four key points: 1) Jesus was made incarnate by the word. 2) This a church teaching 3) The transformation is brought about by the Eucharistic prayer 4) The Eucharist is the literal flesh and blood of Jesus.
The entire doctrine of transubstantiation is contained in this single quote.
St. Cyril of
Do not, then, regard the eucharistic elements as ordinary bread and wine: they are in fact the body and blood of the Lord, as he himself has declared. Whatever your senses may tell you, be strong in faith.
In other words, believe the words of Jesus, believe in him!
St. Ignatius makes it clear that to deny the eucharist puts you out of the Christian faith:
Ignatius of
Take note of those who
hold heterodox opinions on the grace of Jesus Christ which has come to us, and
see how contrary their opinions are to the mind of God ... They abstain from
the Eucharist and from prayer because they do not confess that the Eucharist is
the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins and
which that Father, in his goodness, raised up again. They who deny the gift of
God are perishing in their disputes
Note that Cyprian
clearly equates the Eucharist with John 6:
St. Cyprian of
As the prayer proceeds,
we ask and say: 'Give us this day our daily bread.' This can be understood both
spiritually and simply, because either understanding is of profit in divine usefulness
for salvation. For Christ is the bread of life and the bread
here is of all, but is ours. And as we say 'Our
Father,' because He is the Father of those who understand and believe, so too
we say 'our Bread,' because Christ is the bread of those of us who attain to
His body. Moreover, we ask that this bread be given daily, lest we, who
are in Christ and receive the Eucharist daily as food of salvation, with the
intervention of some more grievous sin, while we are shut off and as
non-communicants are kept from the heavenly bread, be separated from the body
of Christ as He Himself declares, saying: 'I am the bread of life which came
down from heaven. If any man eat of my bread he shall
live forever. Moreover, the bread that I shall give is my flesh for the life of
the world.' Since then He says that, if anyone eats of His bread, he lives
forever, as it is manifest that they live who attain to His body and receive
the Eucharist by right of communion, so on the other hand we must fear and pray
lest anyone, while he is cut off and separated from the body of Christ, remain
apart from salvation, as He Himself threatens, saying: 'Unless you eat the
flesh of the Son of man and drink His blood, you shall not have life in you.'
And so we petition that our bread, that is Christ, be given us daily, so that
we, who abide and live in Christ, may not withdraw from His sanctification and
body.
One more from John
Chrysostom:
Let us submit to God in
all things and not contradict Him, even if what He says seems contrary to our
reason and intellect; rather let His words prevail over our reason and
intellect. Let us act in this way with regard to the (eucharistic) mysteries, looking not only at what falls
under our senses but holding on to His words. For His word cannot lead us
astray. . . When the word says, `This is My Body', be convinced of it and
believe it, and look at it with the eyes of the mind. . . How many now say, `I
wish I could see His shape, His appearance, His garments, His sandals.' Only
look! You see Him! You touch Him! You eat Him!
In conclusion, we agree that faith is central to our walk with Christ. The faith to take him at his word even when he gives us mysterious instructions is part of this walk. We can clearly demonstrate that if John 6 is read in light of the Passover, during which a fleshly sacrifice is physically eaten, it appears to be a description of the Eucharist. We can also find that early Christians believed that John 6 was describing the Eucharist. Jesus often used metaphors to teach, but these metaphors were understood as metaphors. His words in John 6 were taken literally by those listening, and he said nothing in clarification to change the minds of his followers who left because they could not accept this hard teaching. Paul clearly states that the eucharist is a participation in the body and blood of Christ. This is not confusing. He also warns against participating in the Eucharist without recognizing the body. This is also very clear. We see from the writings of the early church that the bread and wine become the blood and body of Christ by the words of institution given to them by Christ and passed on by the apostles.
Matt 26 While
they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to
his disciples, saying, "Take and eat; this is my body." Then he took the cup, gave thanks and
offered it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is
poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
Mark 14 While they were eating, Jesus
took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying,
"Take it; this is my
body." Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, and
they all drank from it. "This is
my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many," he said to them.