Adversus Heresaes, Book V, Ch. 2

Some bodies have done a wonderful exposition of a great deal of Augustine's teachings (often in sermon or catechetical form) about the Eucharist here and here.

Josephus, I do not believe, would have written about the Eucharist.

And, of course, are you willing to hear out other Church Fathers on the Eucharist?

Sure. As long as they were orthodox in their theology and not heretics. (i.e. Gnostics, Arians, etc.)

Alright.

"They [who hold a heterodox position] abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again." Ignatius of Antioch, Epistle to Smyrnaeans, 7,1 (c. A.D. 110).

"For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh." Justin Martyr, First Apology, 66 (c. A.D. 110-165).

"For the blood of the grape--that is, the Word--desired to be mixed with water, as His blood is mingled with salvation. And the blood of the Lord is twofold. For there is the blood of His flesh, by which we are redeemed from corruption; and the spiritual, that by which we are anointed. And to drink the blood of Jesus, is to become partaker of the Lord's immortality; the Spirit being the energetic principle of the Word, as blood is of flesh. Accordingly, as wine is blended with water, so is the Spirit with man. And the one, the mixture of wine and water, nourishes to faith; while the other, the Spirit, conducts to immortality. And the mixture of both--of the water and of the Word--is called Eucharist, renowned and glorious grace; and they who by faith partake of it are sanctified both in body and soul." Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor, 2 (ante A.D. 202).

"Then, having taken the bread and given it to His disciples, He made it His own body, by saying, 'This is my body,' that is, the figure of my body. A figure, however, there could not have been, unless there were first a veritable body…He did not understand how ancient was this figure of the body of Christ, who said Himself by Jeremiah: 'I was like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter, and I knew not that they devised a device against me, saying, Let us cast the tree upon His bread,' which means, of course, the cross upon His body. And thus, casting light, as He always did, upon the ancient prophecies, He declared plainly enough what He meant by the bread, when He called the bread His own body. He likewise, when mentioning the cup and making the new testament to be sealed 'in His blood,' affirms the reality of His body. For no blood can belong to a body which is not a body of flesh. If any sort of body were presented to our view, which is not one of flesh, not being fleshly, it would not possess blood. Thus, from the evidence of the flesh, we get a proof of the body, and a proof of the flesh from the evidence of the blood." Tertullian, Against Marcion, 40 (A.D. 212).

"Having learn these things, and been fully assured that the seeming bread is not bread, though sensible to taste, but the Body of Christ; and that the seeming wine is not wine, though the taste will have it so, but the Blood of Christ; and that of this David sung of old, saying, And bread strengtheneth man's heart, to make his face to shine with oil, 'strengthen thou thine heart,' by partaking thereof as spiritual, and "make the face of thy soul to shine."" Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, XXII:8 (c. A.D. 350).

It should be obvious to anyone reading this in context that Jesus is speaking metaphorically.

6:35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

The verse above, where Jesus is speaking literally, says "he that comes", not "he that eats". At the last supper (where he was present in human form) he did not tear off his own flesh and feed it to the disciples. No, they ate bread. It is nothing more than a rememberance of Jesus. It is the same with the woman at the well in that there was no literal liquid life, but a metaphor for having faith.

Acts 1:11 Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.

The angels which appeared after Jesus' ascension claimed Jesus would come back just as they saw Him go. Transubstantiation is not how Jesus left, so therefore that is not how He will return.

This post has been edited by Yoda: May 22 2009, 11:31 PM

But, if Jesus was simply speaking metaphorically, why then did his disciples leave when he said in Jn 6:53-56: ""Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. "

In John 6:66, it says, "As a result of this, many (of) his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him."

Throughout Scripture, if Jesus' disciples did not understand him, he would teach them or correct them in what they were thinking. He would not simply let them walk away without correcting them. Obviously, Jesus had to be speaking on the literal sense when he said "...eat the flseh of the Son of Man and drink his blood..." because if he was simply speaking metaphorically, it would not be a hard concept to grasp and to believe in.

I'm not sure if it has been mentioned before, but because God is outside of our time (Kairos,) everything that happened to Him is outside of our time. Thus, at Mass we relive the Paschal Mystery. We are present at Calvary where Jesus was crucified and died. We are present for the Resurrection.

This perhaps is one of the hardest doctrines that I have struggled with and continue to struggle with, but ask the Father to reveal the Son. It is through the Father that we know the Son.

If you have any questions, just PM me.

Very good CatholicChick... Also, you need to take this in the context of the time. An Old Testament professor of mine was talking about covenants and the word that is used is much like "make the covenant again." So it's very different from our idea of remember.

To the original poster, i'd like to answer your question for you sir.

Jesus was speaking of the New Covenant He had been sent to the world to seal for eternety.

I'm going to keep this very simple and very plain, feel free to PM me for further meaning if it's not totaly clear ok.

But - This was to describe that covenant made between God and man.
The covenant supper. A covenant was established with a meal. Jesus gave His life to give us the chance at eternal life, we give our lives to God to receive the eternal life Jesus made available for us. The Covenant was sealed (like all covenants) with a meal. This is the meal Jesus was speaking of. The following of His life is what we have to take part in, the "giving the life" part. We give our lives for God just as Jesus gave His for us. The Lords supper we take part in is for us to remember that covenant we entered into with God when we willfully "gave" our lives to God, so He would live through us. I said all that to say this. Jesus was saying if you don't enter into this covenant with Me, you will not have eternal life.

Again, to the O.P. if you don't understand PM me, i'd really like for you to understand what Jesus was teaching.

Ok, hi it's me again sorry I was unable to reply for a while, because I'm on a vacation, so I was packing then unloading, and stuff like that, so this is the first time that I'm able to reply, and I have some thing to say, first a thankyou note; to: AquinasD thankyou for your replys they didn't really state a topic, mainly just scripture, and I liked that, so thanks! and, to: Joseph thanks you're like the king of comon sense! lol didn't state much scriture just the topic. and, to: Zabby, thanks your's were the most interesting to read! you stated what you thought, and scripture, and what you thought about the scripture! lol anyway, I have a few thing to reply for you,

first: when you quoted my theory, you missunderstood what I meant, but it's not your fault, it's mine I should have phrased it better, but anyway, what I meant was not that what comes out of your mouth could "earn" salvation, but that what comes out of your mouth could "get" you saved, the way that I said it could of been ether/or, sorry. because even though Jesus dies for everyone, that doesn't mean that everyone is instantly saved, otherwise why would He tell us to share the gospel? No, you have to do something it's writtten here: (Rom 10:9) "that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." you have to: "confess with your mouth" so something that comes out of your mouth can get you saved, and believe in your heart of course, don't forget that!

although, I was a little surprised to hear your reasponse, I mean I know that in each religion there are many different beliefs, but I thought that one of the key things that Catholics believed (what made them Catholic) was that they had to do works to, well "earn forgiveness for their sins"? basically; earn salvation, I'd like to talk with you about how that exactly works? but that's another discussion.

and as for transubstanchiation (SC) well it says right there it's hard to understand: "This is a hard saying; who can understand it?" (john 6:60) but apparently someone did understand it; transubstanchiation. however as I'd like to have that be true, I can find no support for it in the bible? the passage describes the "need" for His blood and body, but not how to get it. and plus the math doesn't match up with the 'theory' of transubstanchiation. For one, it would go against my conscience, to eat human flesh, as it would for anyone else, so why would God make something good, that would go against your God given conscience? (and no I wasn't swaring) it just doesn't match up.

Now my theory is that, He told us to consume His flesh and blood, but now, since He's died and risen, He's now in spirit form, and you can't consume His flesh and blood because it doesn't exist, and it doesn't really matter if it did, because he said that "the flesh proffets nothing" the spirit is where it's at, so you need to consume His spirit, and the way that you do that is written: "that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. " (Romans 10:9) and I'm pretty sure that everyone agrees that you have to do that to get saved, right? well it says in that passage that you have to cosume Him get gain eternal life, why should these two things be different?

and for: awedbytruth : quote: "Which is one of the reasons the Jews flipped out in John 6. They took Him literally and Jesus does not say, "No. This is a parable." I really doubt that Jesus would let SO many walk away because of a misunderstanding. " umm did Jesus ever say: "No. This is a parable."? but no, they left because they didn't have faith in Him, they may have been missunderstood about something, that made them leave, but they wouldn't have left if they really had faith in Him.

and thanks to everyone else as well! please keep reasponding! this is good stuff! and no arguements yet a bunch of you completely disagree with each other, but there's been no heated arguements so far, so thanks! please continue to act in love of one and another.

I still don't think that public displays are really a sign of salvation though. I mean, there's a reason why Jesus tells us to pray in our own room, quietly. There are people who do it outwardly just for the recognition and the like. God judges us by our hearts, not our words or actions. Although, actions can often indicate what the believes.


You can always PM me if you want to talk about it.


It's spelt transubstantiation. Jesus gave us his flesh and blood. At the last supper, "While they were eating, Jesus took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and giving it to his disciples said, "Take and eat; this is my body." Then he took a cup, gave thanks, 16 and gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed on behalf of many for the forgiveness of sins." Matthew 26: 26-28. I mean, he says this is it. He didn't say this is like my body and this is like my blood. He didn't say this is symbolically my body and symoblically my blood. He told us this is my body and this is my blood. Why would he need to be symbolic at this time, in his last hours? Jesus gave us the forumla for transubstantiation at the last supper and so we echo his words at every Mass. It's that simple.


That could be true, but I feel like it's trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. If God wants to turn bread and wine into Jesus, who are we to say he can't. I find it much simpler if we just take his words at face value and follow that. Considering that the flesh does not profet from the Eucharist. It is the soul that profets, and in the doctrine, it is Jesus's soul that you consume through communion. It is his body, blood, soul, and divinity. It is him. That's what we believe.

This post has been edited by Zabby: May 29 2009, 08:03 PM

It is another discussion, but I will note that Catholic teaching on justification is not Pelagian.



First, Jesus says (in his discourse at Capernaum) that we need to (literally) eat His body and blood.

Then, at the Last Supper, Jesus establishes the Eucharist, saying "This is my body, this is my blood. Take and eat."

So, we conclude that it was the Eucharist established at the Last Supper to fulfill his discourse at Capernaum.

It is a hard saying, and admittedly, I do still have difficulty with wrapping my mind around the concept. However, we must understand that ultimately God's thought is absolutely other than ours. He understands things we could never possibly understand. I'm not meaning to cop out here, I'm only pointing out that we must accept that God's way of doing something is not our way of doing something.



There is no formal moral ethic against eating flesh ultimately. Our repulsion in many ways is natural; it is an evolutionary benefit to not eat the raw flesh of living or dead things. However, this is where I admit the mystery of it; God chose for the Eucharist to be the method for which His life was imputed to us.



That's absurd. Christ would command C and then make sure it is impossible that C could be fulfilled?



If the flesh ultimately profits nothing, then Christ's death on the Cross was perfectly worthless.

Christ's words "The flesh profits nothing" is not referring to an inability of our temporal bodies to fulfill meaningful goals of itself, but of an inability of our temporal minds to fully comprehend what is spiritual.

Just some Bible for you.

John 1:1

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

John 1:14

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

1 Peter 1: 23-25

Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.

Romans 10:8-10
8 But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; 9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. 10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Hebrews 4:12

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

Phillipians 2:16

Holding forth the word of life; that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain.

Also, John 17 is an excellent read. Jesus is our one and only mediator, and a perfect one at that.

Michael, what exactly did your verses have to do with anything? I mean, they are very nice verses. I'm just missing how they apply. Could you explain them to me?

This post has been edited by Zabby: May 30 2009, 11:09 AM

Actually, when Jesus appeared to the apostles after the Resurrection He ate fish to prove He wasn't just a ghost/spirit.

This post has been edited by AwedbyTruth: May 31 2009, 06:41 PM

Hey, I do have a reasponse that I want to give but I don't have time right now, I'm really sorry I haven't been very active, I'm still getting ajusted, it's been busy. but I have a free day comming up soon, and I wasn't sure when they delete messages, so I wanted to post to see if they could hold on to this one for a little bit longer? I noticed it was at the back. =/

DDOG, don't worry about it. I've never known CTF to delete anything. I mean, perhaps they do, but not anything this young. They do dissapear, but they are not deleted if you do a search. I await your responce though, and don't worry we all get busy at times.

This post has been edited by Zabby: Jul 1 2009, 10:31 PM

I'm guessing it has to do with people being saved by JUST believing and being born again.At least a couple of those verses.

b]Should we say that the disciples who were sitting right there with Jesus, actually thought that what Jesus was holding in his hands was his own body and blood?[/b]

Hello it's been awhile since I've posted on this board, and it's my board! xD lol well I'm sorry about that, maybe it just wasn't God's timing. Well, I hope this message goes back to the front on the boards, when I reply, because I do want to get to an agreement on this subject after all it refers to something very, VERY important; "Eternal life" (v. 54). Now then, I did wright a big old speech about my discoveries on this subject, but I don't think you really need someone to lecture to you about scripture, you pretty clearly know your scripture already. Now remember that the root word in "Christian" is: "Christ".. So, I'll answer using the same method Christ used when He was asked a hard question; Ask another question. So, here is my long awaited question, It's pretty simple, but then again so was "let Him without sin cast the first stone" here it is:

When were the apostles saved?

It sounds simple, but it's actually not.. (Romans 10:9) "if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved."

Now think about it for awhile, and give me your answer, and God willing, I'll reply. But here's my current theory on the matter, however not having the knowledge of all the scripture to support it, I won't, yet, go into great detail. My theory is as follows: That the communion accounts in Matthew & Mark, should not be mixed with the passage in John 6, as they were speaking of two different things.

Please answer my question when you can, and hopefully my theory will become more and more accurate as my knowledge of the scripture grows day by day (Luke 11:13)

yeah..know this is old...but can I get the verse for that?

John 21: 1Afterward Jesus appeared again to his disciples, by the Sea of Tiberias.[a] It happened this way:
...........
12Jesus said to them, "Come and have breakfast." None of the disciples dared ask him, "Who are you?" They knew it was the Lord. 13Jesus came, took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. 14This was now the third time Jesus appeared to his disciples after he was raised from the dead. 15When they had finished eating, Jesus said

John 6:35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

John 6:53 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

Jesus is the bread of life, if you come to Christ you shall never hunger, if you believe in Him you shall never thirst. John 6:35 shows that metaphorically if you eat the bread of life you will not hunger. John 6:35 does not point to a literal eating of Christs flesh but a metaphorical one. This is all within the same chapter.

I'm just warning you now that we are never, ever going to have agreement upon this subject. There are a lot of things about my personal faith that I would be willing to think about and reconsider, but this is not one of them. I know with 100% certainity that Jesus was speaking literally when he said, "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." I doubt that I could ever provide you with enough proof be it from the bible itself, early church fathers or my own life, but if you really want to keep discussing this until we come to an agreement, I promise you it will end badly.


Ermm... I don't really see why the apostles being saved has anything to do with communion... And besides the fact that I don't believe the doctrine of salvation the same way that you do anyway (I don't believe there is a moment where we are saved), so that may be why I don't see the relevance. Can you try explaining it to me?


Ronald, you made a statement, but you did not back it up. Why are you alloed to take it metephorically? I odn't see your reasoning.

Because Jesus said He is the bread of life. I suppose the word worth investigating is "cometh" and so many verses in the Bible that show salvation is through the acceptance of Jesus Christ. You dont deny this do you? Clearly the bible states many times that through Jesus Christ we are saved and not from such things as eating bread and drinking wine and having it literally turned into his flesh and blood when it happens.

Jesus said "Eat this bread for it is my flesh" Jesus was giving them bread, he was clearly in physical form when He said this and did this, they were not actually eating his flesh, they were eating bread. However, symbolically they were eating his flesh. So if you want to symbolically eat Christs flesh and drink His blood then theres nothing wrong with this. It can be in memory of all Jesus has done for us or it can be out of respect, honor, etc. Also the symbolic eating his flesh and never going hungry or never thirsting is from "coming" to Jesus, not from eating literal bread or drinking literal wine. But the actual act of eating bread and drinking wine does not save one, this is very clear in the Bible.

My final point is that all those who heard the word of God spread it, they did not literally eat Christs flesh, however through the acceptance of Jesus they most definately did "accept the bread of life" and thats what saved them. The man on the cross next to Jesus did no such thing either, and neither must we, however there is nothing wrong with doing the act literally, but we must symbolically accept the bread of life to have life.

Because God is limited by time and space and could not have been in two Forms at once.

Wait a minute. . .

What two forms are you talking about? A physical and another physical form, one sitting at the table the other made of bread? I doubt it, but hey if you believe it, thats cool.