CHAPTER TWELVE: The Significance of the Lord's Supper (part 1 of 3)
CHAPTER TWELVE
Of the Lord's Supper
The other sacrament given and instituted for the Christian Church is bread sanctified as the body of our Lord Jesus Christ, and wine sanctified as his blood, as the Ancients customarily spoke. We call it either the Lord’s Supper or the Eucharist, because in it we are spiritually fed and nourished by the kindness of our Lord, and on our part give thanks to him for his goodness. The promise given to us in it clearly shows the purpose for which it was instituted and the end toward which it tends. It is intended to assure and confirm us that the body of our Lord Jesus Christ was once delivered for us in such a way that it is now ours and shall remain ours forever; and likewise that his blood was once shed for us in such a way that it is and always shall be ours.
Thus the error of those who have dared to deny that the sacraments are exercises of faith, given to preserve, sustain, strengthen, and increase it, is once again refuted and overthrown. For these are the Lord’s words:
“This cup is the new covenant in my blood.”
—Luke 22:20; 1 Corinthians 11:25
That is, it is a sign and testimony of the promise. Wherever there is a promise, faith has something upon which to rest, in which to find consolation, and by which to be strengthened.
Our souls may draw from this sacrament great sweetness and abundant consolation: we recognize that Jesus Christ is so incorporated into us, and we into him, that everything belonging to him we may call ours, and everything belonging to us we may call his. Therefore we may confidently assure ourselves that eternal life is ours and that the kingdom of heaven can no more fail us than it can fail Jesus Christ himself. On the other hand, we cannot be condemned for our sins any more than he can, because they are no longer ours but his—not because any guilt for them may be imputed to him, but because he has made himself our debtor for them and has fully discharged the debt.
This is the exchange that, in his infinite goodness, he was pleased to make with us: by receiving our poverty, he transferred his riches to us; by bearing our weakness upon himself, he strengthened us with his power; by taking our mortality, he made his immortality ours; by descending to earth, he opened the way to heaven; and by becoming the Son of Man, he made us children of God.
All these things are so fully promised to us by God in this sacrament that we must be certain and assured that they are as truly set before us there as if Jesus Christ himself were visibly presented before our eyes and tangibly placed within our reach. For this word can neither fail us nor deceive us:
“Take, eat, and drink. This is my body, which is delivered for you. This is my blood, which is shed for the forgiveness of your sins.”
—Matthew 26:26–28; Mark 14:22–24; Luke 22:19–20; 1 Corinthians 11:24–25
By commanding us to take, he signifies that it is ours. By commanding us to eat and drink, he shows that it is made one substance with us. When he says, “This is my body, which is delivered for you,” and, “This is my blood, which is shed for you,” he declares and teaches us that they are not so much his as ours, since he took them and laid them down, not for his own benefit, but out of love for us and for our good.
We must carefully observe that the principal and almost the entire power and savor of the sacrament lies in these words: “Which is delivered for you,” and, “Which is shed for you.” Otherwise, it would profit us very little for the body and blood of Jesus Christ to be distributed to us now if they had not once been delivered for our redemption and salvation. Therefore they are represented to us under bread and wine to teach and show us not only that they are ours, but also that they are given to us for life and nourishment.
This is what we said above: that through the bodily things presented to us in the sacraments, we must be led, according to a certain correspondence and likeness, to spiritual things. For when we see bread presented to us as the sign and sacrament of the body of Jesus Christ, we must immediately grasp this likeness
—just as bread nourishes, sustains, and preserves the life of our bodies, so the body of Jesus Christ is the food, nourishment, and preservation of our spiritual life. And when we see wine offered to us as the sign of his blood, we must consider all that wine does for and contributes to the human body, so that we may understand that the blood of Jesus Christ does as much for us spiritually: it strengthens, comforts, refreshes, and gladdens us. For if we carefully consider what benefit we receive from the delivery of Christ’s most sacred body and the shedding of his blood for us, we shall clearly see that, according to this analogy and likeness, what is attributed to bread and wine corresponds perfectly to them.
The chief purpose of the sacrament, therefore, is not simply to present the body of Jesus Christ to us, but rather to seal and confirm the promise by which Jesus Christ tells us that his flesh is truly food and his blood truly drink, by which we are nourished unto eternal life. For he declares himself to be the bread of life, of which whoever eats shall live forever.
“I am the bread of life. Whoever eats of this bread shall live forever.”
—John 6:48, 51
To accomplish this—that is, to seal the promise just mentioned—the sacrament directs us to the cross of Jesus Christ, where that promise was fully verified and entirely fulfilled. For Jesus Christ called himself the bread of life, not because of the sacrament, as many have falsely interpreted it, but because he had been given to us as such by the Father and revealed himself as such when, having become a participant in our human mortality, he also made us participants in his divine immortality; when, offering himself as a sacrifice, he took our curse upon himself in order to fill us with his blessing; when in his death he devoured and swallowed up death; and when in his resurrection he raised to glory and incorruption our corruptible flesh, which he had assumed.
This teaching is clearly proved by the words he speaks in Saint John:
“The bread that I shall give is my flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.”
There he undoubtedly showed that his body would be bread for the spiritual life of our souls because he was to deliver it to death for our salvation. For he gave it once as bread when he delivered it to be crucified for the redemption of the world. He gives it daily when, through the word of his gospel, he offers it to us so that we may partake of it insofar as it was crucified for us.
The sacrament, therefore, does not make Jesus Christ the bread of life by which we live and are continually nourished, but it gives us a certain taste and savor of that bread. In sum, it promises us that everything Jesus Christ did and suffered, he did and suffered to give us life, and that this life-giving power is eternal, so that by it we may always and without end be nourished, sustained, and preserved in life. For just as Jesus Christ would not have been the bread of life for us if he had not been born and died for us, and if he had not risen again for us, so he would not now be the bread of life if the fruit and efficacy of his birth, death, and resurrection were not eternal and immortal.
If this power of the sacrament had been sought and considered as it ought, it would have been sufficient to satisfy us, and the dreadful controversies by which the Church has been so grievously tormented, both in ancient times and even now within our own memory, would never have arisen. These disputes began when inquisitive men sought to define how the body of Jesus Christ is present in the bread, as though this were a matter worthy of being contested with such great strife, both in words and in minds.
It is commonly regarded as such, certainly, but those who do so fail to perceive that they ought first to have sought how the body of Jesus Christ becomes ours insofar as it was delivered for us, and how his blood becomes ours insofar as it was shed for us. For to know that his body and blood have become ours in this manner is to possess the whole crucified Christ and to partake of all his benefits. Yet these matters, though of such great weight and consequence, have now been neglected—or rather despised and virtually buried—while this one thorny question is debated: How is the body swallowed and consumed by us?
Nevertheless, so that amid such a multitude and diversity of opinions the one sure truth of God may remain with us, let us first remember that the sacrament is a spiritual thing, by which our Lord intended to feed not our stomachs but our souls. Let us seek Jesus Christ in it, not for our bodies, nor as though he could be comprehended by our bodily senses, but in such a way that the soul recognizes him as presently given and offered to it. In sum, let us be content to possess him spiritually, for in this way we shall possess him unto life—which is to receive the entire benefit that may be received from the sacrament. Whoever has carefully considered and understood this will easily comprehend how the body of Jesus Christ is presented to us in the sacrament.
But in order to free ourselves from every scruple by which simple minds can scarcely avoid being perplexed amid such a diversity of opinions, let us first explain in what sense the bread is called the body of Christ and the wine his blood. Afterward, let us consider what communion in his body and blood our Lord gives to his believers in the Supper.
Before all else, we must reject as a monstrous invention the notion imagined by the Sophists concerning what they call transubstantiation. For if anyone, out of reverence for Christ’s words, insists that the bread placed into the hand is the body delivered for us, their fantasy is very far removed from the plain meaning of those words. They interpret the word “is” to mean “is transubstantiated,” adding that this transubstantiation does not occur through the conversion of one substance into another, but because the body takes the place of the bread, which they imagine vanishes.
Our Lord plainly testifies that what he breaks and places into the hands of his Apostles is his body. Who can fail to understand that by this he points to the bread? They cannot therefore claim that reverence for the words of Jesus Christ compels them to adopt this interpretation, for it is a forced gloss, contrary to the letter and doing violence to it. Never in any language in the world has the verb called substantive—namely, “to be”—been understood in this sense.
There are also many other arguments by which their opinion may easily be refuted. For by this means the mystery that the Lord intended to represent in his Supper would be taken away. What is the Supper but a visible and manifest testimony to the promise found in the sixth chapter of Saint John?
“Christ is the bread of life who came down from heaven.”
—John 6:35, 41
The visible bread must therefore remain as a sign by which the spiritual bread is represented to us, unless we wish to destroy the entire benefit of the sacrament and the consolation our Lord has given here to sustain our weakness. For just as the inward cleansing of the soul is more firmly assured to the hearts of believers when it is represented in Baptism by the outward washing with water, so the bread is of no small importance in the Supper as a testimony to us of the spiritual nourishment we have in the flesh of Christ.
Indeed, to what purpose would Saint Paul conclude:
“We are one bread and one body, because we all partake of one bread,”
if there were nothing but a false appearance of bread and its true natural substance had been taken away? I pass over the many passages in Scripture where the bread and wine, even after they have been made signs of the body and blood, nevertheless retain their names.
It is a frivolous quibble when they say that Moses’ rod was still called a rod after it had been turned into a serpent. For even if I pass over the fact that there was good reason for it to be called by that name, since it was shortly afterward to return to its own nature, there is nevertheless another, more evident reason. It is said there that the magicians’ rods were swallowed up by Moses’ rod. To speak properly, it was necessary to use the same name on both sides.
To call the magicians’ rods serpents would not have been fitting, for it would have seemed that they had truly been changed into serpents, whereas it was only an illusion. It was therefore necessary to say that Moses’ rod had swallowed up all the others.
What resemblance is there between this and the following expressions?
“The bread that we break.”
“As often as you eat this bread.”
“They continued in the breaking of bread.”
Moreover, the authority of antiquity, which they customarily set against the evident word of God, does nothing to support this article. For it was only recently invented—or at least was unknown in ancient times, when the doctrine of the gospel still retained some purity—since there is not one of the ancient Fathers who does not plainly confess that the signs of the Supper are truly bread and wine, although they often adorn them with various titles to honor the excellence of the mystery.
The opinion of those who obstinately insist upon holding to the words down to the final syllable, refusing to admit any figure of speech, is no more credible. Whatever absurdity is brought against them, they pay no attention to it. They insist that it must be settled that the bread is truly the body, contenting themselves with this single argument: that Christ pointed to the bread when he said:
“This is my body.”
—Matthew 26:26; Mark 14:22; Luke 22:19; 1 Corinthians 11:24
Now, although they protest that their reverence for Christ’s words prevents them from accepting any interpretation of so plain a statement, this is not a sufficient pretext for rejecting all the arguments presented against them. Yet I do not think that many arguments are needed to refute them, since they cannot open their mouths without revealing the absurdity of their doctrine. For when they say that the body is so mingled with the bread that the two become one thing in substance, this is not only contrary to the common judgment of all mankind but wholly opposed to faith.
“But,” they say, “it is not lawful to interpret rashly those things that are plainly expressed in Scripture.” Who denies it? But that this argument, which is continually on their lips, is irrelevant and improperly applied to the present matter will become clear once we have set forth the true interpretation.
Some, therefore, have judged rightly that, because of the affinity and close relationship between the things represented and their signs, the name of the thing is here attributed to the sign itself. It is true that this is a figurative expression, yet it is entirely fitting. For although the sign differs in essence from the thing signified—the latter being spiritual and heavenly, while the former is bodily and visible—nevertheless, since the sign does not merely portray the thing it represents as an empty image but truly delivers it, why should it not take its name?
For if human signs, which are representations of absent things rather than tokens and marks of things present, and which most often deceive us in what they signify, nevertheless take the names of those things, then with far greater reason may the signs instituted by God borrow the titles of the things they represent, whose meaning they contain with certainty and without deception, and whose truth is always joined to them.
Therefore, whenever you encounter expressions such as “the bread is the body,” “the breaking of bread is the communion of the body,” and others like them, remember that the name of the higher and more excellent thing is transferred to the lower thing, according to the ordinary usage of Scripture.
I leave aside allegories and parables, lest anyone say that I am wandering beyond the proper bounds in search of evasions. But this figure of speech is especially common in connection with the sacraments. For otherwise we could not understand why circumcision is called the covenant, the lamb the Passover, the Mosaic sacrifices cleansings from sin, and the rock from which water flowed in the wilderness Christ, unless we understood these expressions as instances of transferred language.
Such is the likeness and close relationship between the sign and the thing signified that the passage from one to the other is easy. And since the sacraments bear a great resemblance to one another, they especially agree in this transference of names. Thus the Apostle teaches:
“The rock from which the Israelites received spiritual drink was Christ.”
It was Christ insofar as it was a symbol under which that spiritual drink was truly received, though not visibly perceived by the eye. In the same manner, the bread is now called the body of Christ because it is a symbol under which our Lord offers us the true eating of his body.
If some troublesome and importunate person stubbornly fastens upon the words, “This is my body,” closing his eyes to every other consideration, there is enough in that very saying of Christ to overcome such obstinacy.
For the Lord does not say that the bread is his body in any other sense than he says that the wine is his blood. Now, where Saint Matthew and Saint Mark report that the Lord called the cup his blood of the new covenant, Saint Paul and Saint Luke say:
“This cup is the new covenant in my blood.”
—Luke 22:20; 1 Corinthians 11:25
Therefore, whoever is so obstinate as to insist upon the former expression may cry as loudly as he pleases that the bread is the body and the wine is the blood; I shall maintain, on the contrary, that it is the covenant in the body and blood. For what will he say? Will he claim to be a more certain or faithful interpreter than Saint Paul or Saint Luke, who understand by the blood the new covenant confirmed in the blood?
It is now necessary to explain what this covenant in the body and blood of Jesus Christ is. For when we deny that the bread eaten in the Supper is the body of Christ, we do not intend in the least to diminish the communion in his body that is there offered to believers. We wish only to teach that the thing represented must be distinguished from its sign. Experience shows us that this distinction is of far greater consequence than we would wish, and this to our great harm. For the human heart is so inclined to fall into superstition that, as soon as men forsake the truth, they become wholly absorbed in the sign unless they are loudly and clearly called away from it.
Yet here we must guard against two errors. The first is that, by diminishing the signs too greatly, we separate them from the mysteries with which they are in some measure joined and thereby lessen their efficacy. The second is that, by magnifying them beyond measure, we obscure the inward power.
No one, unless he is entirely without religion, refuses to confess that Christ is the bread of life by which believers are nourished unto eternal salvation. But there is no agreement among all concerning the manner in which we partake of him. For some define eating the flesh of Christ and drinking his blood simply as believing in him. Yet it seems to me that Christ himself intended to express something higher in that remarkable discourse in which he commends to us the eating of his body: namely, that we are given life through the true participation in himself that he grants us. He signified this by the words “drinking” and “eating,” so that no one might suppose that it consists merely in knowledge.
For just as eating bread, rather than looking at it, supplies nourishment to the body, so the soul must truly be made a participant in Christ in order to be sustained by him unto eternal life.
Meanwhile, we readily confess that this eating takes place only through faith, since no other means can be imagined. But the difference between us and those whose interpretation I oppose is this: they consider eating to be nothing other than believing, whereas I say that by believing we eat the flesh of Christ and that this eating is a fruit of faith. Or, to state it more plainly, for them the eating is faith itself, whereas I say that it proceeds from faith. The difference in words is slight, but in substance it is great.
For although the Apostle teaches:
“Christ dwells in our hearts through faith,”
no one will interpret this indwelling as faith itself. Rather, everyone recognizes that he intended to express a singular benefit of faith: that through it believers obtain Christ dwelling within them. In the same manner, when the Lord called himself the bread of life, he intended to signify not only that our salvation rests upon trust in his death and resurrection, but also that, through the true communion we have in him, his life is transferred to us and made ours, just as bread, when taken as food, gives strength to the body.
Saint Augustine, whom they bring forward as their advocate, wrote that we eat the body of Christ by believing in him only to signify that this eating proceeds from faith. I do not deny this, but I add that we receive Christ not as appearing from afar, but as giving and communicating himself to us.
Nor do those satisfy the matter who, after confessing that we have some communion in the body of Christ, explain it by making us participants only in his Spirit, leaving behind all mention of his flesh and blood—as though these words had been spoken in vain:
“My flesh is truly food, and my blood is truly drink.”
And again:
“Unless you eat this flesh and drink this blood, you shall have no life.”
The same applies to other similar statements. Therefore, since it is evident that the communion in question extends beyond what they say of it, let us explain briefly how far it extends—if indeed it is possible to express in words so great a mystery, which I plainly see that I cannot comprehend even in my mind.
I readily confess this, so that no one may measure the greatness of this mystery by my words, which are so feeble that they fall far beneath it. On the contrary, I urge my readers not to confine their understanding within such narrow bounds and limits, but to strive to rise higher than I am able to lead them. For whenever I myself consider this subject, after attempting to say everything, I plainly see how far I remain from attaining to its excellence. And although the understanding has greater power to conceive and comprehend than the tongue has to express, even the understanding itself is overcome and overwhelmed by such greatness.
In the end, therefore, nothing remains for me but to fall into wonder before this mystery, which the understanding is incapable of comprehending fully, just as the tongue is incapable of explaining it. Nevertheless, I shall present here the substance of my doctrine, which I no more doubt to be true than I doubt that it will be approved by every upright and God-fearing heart.
First, Scripture teaches us that from the beginning Christ has been the life-giving Word of the Father, the fountain and source of life, from whom all things have received the power to exist. Saint John therefore sometimes calls him the Word of life and elsewhere says that life has always been in him, intending to signify that he has continually diffused his power throughout all creatures to give them life and strength.
Yet Saint John immediately adds that life was manifested when the Son of God, having assumed our flesh, gave himself to be seen and touched. For although he had previously diffused his powers throughout creation, man, having been alienated from God by sin, had lost communion with life and was besieged on every side by death. He therefore needed to be received anew into communion with this Word in order to recover any hope of immortality.
For how little ground for hope would we have if we understood that the Word of God contains within himself the entire fullness of life, while we remained far removed from him and saw nothing but death both within and around us? But since that fountain of life began to dwell in our flesh, it is no longer hidden far from us but gives and presents itself to us so that we may enjoy it. In this way Jesus Christ has brought near to us the benefit of life, of which he is the source.
Moreover, he made the flesh that he assumed and clothed himself with life-giving, so that by participating in it we might be nourished unto immortality. For he says:
“I am the bread of life who came down from heaven.”
—John 6:35, 51
And again:
“The bread that I shall give is my flesh, which I shall offer for the life of the world.”
By these words he shows that he is life insofar as he is the eternal Word of God who descended from heaven to us. But he also shows that, in descending, he poured this power into the flesh he assumed so that communion in it might reach even to us. From this follow these statements:
“My flesh is truly food, and my blood is truly drink.”
Thus both are nourishment by which believers are sustained unto eternal life. We therefore have a singular consolation in this: that we find life in our own flesh. For in this way we not only ascend to life, but life comes forth to meet us and present itself to us. Let us only open our hearts to receive it, and we shall possess it.
Now, although the flesh of Christ does not possess so much power in itself that it could give us life—since in its original condition it was subject to mortality, and when made immortal received its power from elsewhere—nevertheless, it is rightly called life-giving because it was filled with the perfection of life in order to communicate that life to us. In this sense we must understand our Lord’s words:
“As the Father has life in himself, so he has appointed the Son to have life in himself.”
For in that passage he speaks not of the attributes he eternally possessed in his divinity, but of those given to him in the flesh in which he appeared to us. He therefore shows that the fullness of life dwells even in his humanity, so that whoever partakes of his flesh and blood shall obtain the enjoyment of that life.
We may explain this more clearly by a familiar example. The water in a fountain is sufficient for drinking, irrigation, and other uses. Yet the fountain does not possess such abundance from itself, but receives it from the spring that continually flows into it and fills it, so that it never runs dry. In the same way, the flesh of Christ is like a fountain insofar as it receives the life flowing from his divinity in order to communicate it to us.
Who, then, does not see that communion in the body and blood of Christ is necessary for all who aspire to heavenly life? To this end tend all these statements of the Apostle:
“The Church is the body of Christ and his fullness.”
“He is the Head, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by its bonds and joints, grows.”
“Our bodies are members of Christ.”
These things cannot be fulfilled unless he adheres to us wholly in body and Spirit.
But the Apostle sheds still greater light upon this fellowship by which we are united to Christ’s flesh when he says:
“We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.”
Finally, to signify that the matter surpasses all words, he concludes in wonder:
“This is a great mystery.”
It would therefore be desperate folly to acknowledge no communion in the Lord’s flesh and blood when Saint Paul declares it to be so great that he prefers to marvel at it rather than attempt to explain it in words.
Nevertheless, we must not imagine this communion as the Sophists have dreamed it: as though Christ’s body descended upon the table and were placed there in a local presence to be touched with the hands, chewed with the teeth, and swallowed down the throat. For just as we do not doubt that his body possesses the dimensions required by the nature of a human body and is contained in heaven, where it was received until he comes for judgment, so we regard it as unlawful to bring it down among corruptible elements or to imagine that it is present everywhere.
Indeed, none of this is necessary for us to partake of him, since the Lord Jesus grants us this benefit through his Spirit: that we are made one with him in body, spirit, and soul. The bond of this union, therefore, is the Holy Spirit, by whom we are joined together with him. He is like a channel or conduit through which all that Christ is and possesses descends to us.
For if we see with our eyes that the sun, shining upon the earth, transmits something of its substance through its rays to produce, nourish, and cause the earth’s fruits to grow, why should the light and radiance of the Spirit of Jesus Christ be less able to communicate his flesh and blood to us? Therefore, when Scripture speaks of the participation we have with Christ, it ascribes the entire power of it to his Spirit.
One passage will suffice in place of all the others. In the eighth chapter of Romans, Saint Paul declares that Christ dwells in us only through his Spirit. In doing so, however, he does not destroy that communion in Christ’s body and blood of which we are now speaking, but shows that the Spirit is the sole means by which we possess Christ and have him dwelling within us.
The Lord testifies to such a communion in his body and blood in the Supper. Indeed, he offers and gives it to all who receive this spiritual banquet, although believers alone partake of it, insofar as through true faith they make themselves worthy to enjoy such a benefit. For this reason the Apostle says:
“The bread that we break is the communion of the body of Christ, and the cup that we sanctify by the words of the gospel and by prayers is the communion of his blood.”
No one should object that this is a figurative expression in which the name of the thing represented is attributed to the sign. For although they allege that the breaking of bread is plainly only the outward sign of the spiritual substance, and although we grant them this interpretation of Saint Paul’s words, we may nevertheless infer from the fact that the sign is given to us that the substance is also truly delivered to us. For unless someone wishes to call God a deceiver, he will not dare to say that God presents a sign that is empty and devoid of its truth.
Therefore, if the Lord truly represents to us participation in his body under the breaking of bread, there can be no doubt that he gives that participation at the same time. Believers must hold firmly to this rule: whenever they behold the signs ordained by God, they should likewise regard it as certain that the truth of the thing represented is joined to them, and they should rest in that sure persuasion. For why would our Lord place the sign of his body into your hand except to assure you of its true participation? Now, if it is true that the visible sign is given to us to seal the gift of the invisible reality, we must possess this unwavering confidence: that in receiving the sign of the body, we likewise receive the body itself.
But because many, unwilling to admit any participation in the body and blood of Jesus Christ unless it consists in a local presence and physical contact, devise many foolish fantasies concerning that local presence, we must briefly oppose this error.
Just as Jesus Christ clothed himself with and assumed our true flesh when he was born of the Virgin, and just as he suffered in our true flesh when he made satisfaction for us, so in rising again he received and resumed that same true flesh, and at his ascension carried it into heaven. For this is our hope: that we shall rise again and ascend into heaven because Jesus Christ rose again and ascended there. Yet how weak and frail would this hope be if our own flesh had not truly risen in Jesus Christ and entered the kingdom of heaven?
Now, it is the abiding nature of a body that it be contained in a place, possess definite dimensions, and have a visible form. I am well aware of the quibbles devised by certain stubborn men who obstinately defend the error into which they have once fallen. They claim that the dimensions of Christ’s body have never been anything less than the entire length and breadth of heaven and earth. They say that his birth as a little child from his mother’s womb, his growth, his being stretched upon the cross, and his enclosure within the tomb all occurred by a certain dispensation, so that he might be born, die, and perform all other human works. They say likewise that his appearance after his resurrection in the customary form of his body, his visible reception into heaven, and finally his being seen after his ascension by Saint Stephen and Saint Paul all occurred by that same dispensation, so that he might visibly declare to men that he had been appointed and established as King in heaven.
What is this but to raise Marcion from hell? Who could doubt that Christ’s body was merely an apparition if it were of such a nature?
They allege that Jesus Christ himself said:
“No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven.”
But are they so dull and senseless that they do not see that this is spoken by a communication of attributes? In the same way, Saint Paul says:
“They crucified the Lord of glory.”
He does not mean that Christ suffered according to his divinity, but that the Christ who suffered upon the cross, despised and rejected, was himself also God and the Lord of glory. In the same manner, the Son of Man was in heaven because this same Christ, who according to the flesh was the Son of Man upon earth, was also God in heaven.
For the same reason, in that very passage he is said to have descended from heaven according to his divinity—not because his divinity forsook heaven to hide itself within the prison of the body, but because, although it fills all things, it nevertheless dwelt bodily in Christ’s humanity, that is, substantially, truly, and in an incomprehensible manner.
Others devise a somewhat subtler evasion. They say that the body presented in the sacrament is glorious and immortal, and therefore that there is no absurdity in its being in many places, being contained in the sacrament without occupying any place and without possessing any form. But I ask them: What kind of body did our Lord give to his disciples on the day before he suffered? Do not the words themselves declare that it was the mortal body that was shortly afterward to be delivered?
“But,” they say, “he had already manifested his glory to the three disciples on Mount Tabor.” This is certainly true. Yet by that brightness he gave them only a momentary foretaste of his immortality. But when he distributed his body to them at his final Supper, the hour was already near when he was to be struck by God, humbled and brought low, and disfigured like a leper. So far was he at that time from intending to display his glory.
And what a wide door is opened here to Marcion if the body of Jesus Christ could at one and the same time be seen in one place as mortal and despised and in another be borne as immortal and glorious! But I shall pass over so great an absurdity. Let them answer me only concerning the glorified body: Is it still a body? “Yes,” they say, “but without place, existing in many places, without form and without dimensions.” Yet this is simply to call it a spirit, though by circumlocution rather than in one word.
Either let us openly deny the resurrection of the flesh, or let us confess that when the flesh has been raised, it will still be flesh. It differs from spirit precisely in being contained within spatial bounds, visible, and tangible. For whom, I ask, will they persuade that our bodies must become infinite after they have been received into heavenly glory and immortality? Yet the Apostle testifies:
“They shall be transformed to be like the glorious body of the Lord.”
Therefore, let them not attribute to Christ’s glorified body the property of existing in many places without being contained within any space, unless they are willing to confess the same of our bodies—which, I think, no one would concede.
Nor does the objection they so often raise help them at all: that Jesus Christ entered where his disciples were while the doors were shut. He certainly entered miraculously, for he neither broke the doors open by force nor waited until they were opened by human hands. Rather, by his power he caused every obstacle to give way and made a passage for himself.
After entering, however, he proved to his disciples the reality of his body:
“Look and touch, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones.”
Here the glorified body of Jesus Christ is proved to be a true body because it can be seen and touched. Take these properties away from it, and it will no longer be a true body.
At this point, in order to make us odious, they reproach us for speaking too narrowly of the power of Almighty God. But either they foolishly deceive themselves or maliciously lie. For the question here is not what God could have done, but what he willed to do. And we affirm that everything he was pleased to do has been done. Now, it pleased him that Jesus Christ should be:
“Made like his brothers in all things, except sin.”
—Hebrews 2:17; 4:15
What is the nature of our body? Does it not have its own definite dimensions? Is it not contained in a place, touched, and seen?
“And why,” they ask, “could God not cause one and the same body to occupy many different places, to be contained in no definite place, and to possess neither form nor dimensions?” O madman, why do you demand that the power of God make a body both a body and not a body at the same time? It is as though you demanded that it make light both light and darkness at once. But God wills light to be light, darkness to be darkness, and a body to be a body.
Certainly, whenever he wills, he can turn darkness into light and light into darkness. But when you demand that light and darkness should not differ from one another, what are you doing but overturning the order established by God’s wisdom? A body must therefore be a body and a spirit a spirit, each according to the law and condition under which it was created by God.
The condition of a body is that it exists in a definite place, with its own definite dimensions and form. Under this condition Jesus Christ assumed a body. He certainly bestowed incorruption and glory upon it, but he did not deprive it of its nature and reality. For the testimony of Scripture is clear and evident:
“He was taken up into heaven and shall return from there in the same manner as you saw him go.”
These stubborn men still attempt to retreat, saying that he ascended and will return visibly, but that in the meantime he remains with us invisibly. Yet our Lord testified that he possessed flesh and bones that could be touched and seen. And to depart and ascend does not mean to make a show of departing and ascending, but truly to do what the words declare.
But someone will ask whether we must assign Christ some particular region of heaven. To this I answer with Saint Augustine that the question is too curious and unnecessary. Provided that we believe he is in heaven, that is enough.