On The Lord'S Supper
On the Lord's Supper
INTRODUCTION
URING THE VERY PERIOD WHEN HE WAS ENGAGED
1): bitter internal controversy with the Anabaptists Zwingli was also active in the development and exposition of his apparently novel doctrine of the Lord's Supper.
Already in the De vera et falsa religione commentarius he had given a brief statement of his position, and it was evident that he could not accept either the Lutheran or the Renaissance alternatives to traditional teaching. During the following year
(1525) the Mass was abolished in Zurich,! and Zwingli wrote two Latin treatises in defence of his views: the Subsidium sive coronis de eucharistia in August,? and the Responsio ad epistolam
Joannis Bugenhagi in October.3 As the doctrine of Zwingli became known it provoked hostility on the part of the Lutherans and active suppression on that of the Romanists, In many places the Zwinglian position was officially condemned, and in the canton of Uri and the city of Nuremberg Zwingli's writings were proscribed. Bitter controversies developed with both the Romanists on the one hand and the Lutherans on the other, and even in Zurich itself Zwingli was opposed by an exponent of the Renaissance understanding, a certain Joachim am Griit.
It was in these circumstances that Zwingli felt the need for a more popular work on the subject in order that his position should be made clear not merely to theologians but to the Church at large. On the one hand the work was necessary for the
1D.C.R. 205.
2 This was the work dedicated to Berne in place of the treatise on baptism.
3 This answer was directed against the Lutheran view as represented by Johann Bugenhagen of Wittenberg.
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purposes of defence. It was known generally that the doctrine of Zwingli had been disowned by all parties, but so long as that doctrine was expounded only in Latin the ordinary reader had no means either of knowing that doctrine or of judging for himself whether it was true or false. Hence there was a very real danger that in some districts the new teaching would be condemned unheard. On the other hand, the work was also necessary for the purposes of attack. Zwingli could see clearly that the eucharistic doctrine held a key position in the whole mediaeval system. Much of the ignorance and superstition which afflicted the pre-Reformation Church derived from this source.
And the reinterpretations suggested either by Erasmus on the one hand or Luther on the other did nothing to remove the root-cause of the error: the belief in a literal and corporal presence of Christ either in or with the elements. So long as that belief remained, dark shadows would continue to obscure the pure light of the Gospel. It was urgently necessary, therefore, that the true and scriptural doctrine of the Lord's Supper should be propagated as widely and forcefully as possible, and a pamphlet in the national tongue was indispensable to that purpose.
The first mention of such a work appears in a letter to Vadian which is dated January 17, 1526.4 Zwingli had not yet made a start, but the project must have been fully formed in his mind.
Certainly he set to work almost immediately afterwards, for Capito and Bucer both refer to the matter in letters at the end of January (28 and 29),5 and the treatise was finished on February 23. Early in March copies were already on their way to Vadian and Oecolampadius, and Bucer was eagerly awaiting the arrival of the work in Strassburg. §
Notwithstanding the interest with which it was received, and the definiteness of the statement, the treatise did not play any notable part in the complicated controversies which followed. A reply was written by Joachim am Griit, who advocated a real presence of the ascended body of Christ, thus avoiding the crasser literalism of the traditionalists. However, Zwingli now found himself engulfed in more detailed argumentation with Luther and his disciples and he did not find time to write his projected answer. In the bitter and protracted struggle with the Lutherans the treatise on the Supper did not figure directly, although it had a certain general value as a clarification of Zwingli's teaching.
4C.R., VIII, 442.
5 Ibid., 444, 446.
6 Ibid., 458.
Z.B.—12
ZWINGLI The central issue in the essay, as indeed in all the ensuing controversies, was that of the nature of the presence of Christ in the sacrament of Holy Communion, and especially in relation to the doctrines of the Ascension and Session. For the most part the battle was fought out over the exegesis of the words of institution: '"This is my body." In answer to the controversial requirements the work is divided into four sections. In the first of these Zwingli states the false interpretations which have been advanced. In the second he offers proof of their falsity. In the third he expounds and supports the correct understanding.
And finally he answers some objections which might be lodged against it.
The three false interpretations which he attacks are of course the traditional, the Renaissance and the Lutheran. According to the traditional view the words: "This is my body'? imply that the bread literally becomes the crucified body of Christ.
The Renaissance alternative is that the bread becomes not the crucified but the resurrected body of Christ. The Lutheran view is that the bread remains, but the body of Christ is present in and with it. As Zwingli saw it, all these interpretations rested upon a misunderstanding of the true nature of a sacrament, and they were defended by ill-grounded assertions concerning the omnipotence of God. They also had the disadvantage of being mutually exclusive. The Lutheran doctrine had the further disadvantage that it is illogical and self-contradictory.
It claims that the word "'is'? must be taken with absolute literalness, but it then explains that the phrase: "This is my body" really means: ""This is bread and my body." Far from resting on simple Scripture, it rests on Scripture interpreted in the most confused and unintelligible manner.
Having stated his general criticisms of the prevailing views, Zwingli then went on to develop his more detailed and positive arguments against them. He had two main points to make: first, that a proper exegesis of John 6 makes it plain that faith is the true feeding upon Christ, and second, that the doctrine of the Ascension of Christ, confirmed by Scripture, Creeds and Fathers, destroys all possibility of a literal presence of Christ's body. On this latter point Zwingli could not accept either the Lutheran argument from the communication of attributes, i.e., that the attributes of the divine nature of Christ, including ubiquity, are imparted to the human, or the Renaissance argument from the transfigured character of the resurrection body, i.e., that after the resurrection the body of Christ is
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no longer subject to the ordinary limitations of time and space.
Against the Lutheran view Zwingli maintained that the communication of attributes is true only in a logical sense but not in actuality. This is proved by the death and passion: for although the one who suffered was God, he did not suffer as God—otherwise God died, which is quite impossible.
Against the Renaissance view he pointed out that it would prove the ubiquity of all the resurrected, and in any case it is directly contradicted both by the teaching on the Ascension and also by the fact that Christ instituted the Supper prior to his death and passion.
The rest of the treatise was devoted to the statement and defence of Zwingli's own interpretation. As he saw it, the words:
"This is my body" were plainly figurative or symbolical.7
Zwingli had no intention of denying a spiritual presence of Christ in the sacrament. Indeed, in the course of the Christological discussion in the second part he had freely allowed a presence of Christ after his divine nature.
This presence certainly means that the communion is more than a "'bare"' sign, at any rate to the believing recipient. But what Zwingli cannot allow is that the presence is in any way to be wesuutied with the element itself. The importance of the elements is that they are a sign of the body and blood of Christ offered up for us: and that is why they are called a sacrament. This does not mean that the elements are necessarily nothing more than a reminder of the death and passion of Christ. For in the sacrament we have to do not merely with the elements but with the spiritual presence of Christ himself and the sovereign activity of the Holy Spirit. What it does mean is that in themselves the elements are nothing more than a representation of the body and blood of Christ. The words: "This is my body," simply mean: "This represents my body." There is no literal identity between the sign and the thing signified.
In support of this interpretation Zwingli could adduce many examples of figurative language drawn from other parts of Scripture. Perhaps the most interesting and instructive of these was the description of the Paschal Lamb as the Lord's
Passover: a relating of the Old and New Testament signs which his Romanist opponents could hardly concede. But parallels could also be found in the New Testament, and even in the Pauline narrative of institution in I Corinthians 11 the cup is
7 He seems to have been helped towards this interpretation by a letter from Cornelius Hoen of the Hague, 1523-1524.
ZWINGLI called the '"'new testament in my blood"', a statement which can hardly bear a strictly literal interpretation. Having explained and defended his figurative understanding Zwingli concluded by replying to two objections which might be made against it. The first was that the exponents of this understanding did not agree in their interpretation of the verse. Zwingli himself took it to mean: "This represents my body,"' but Oecolampadius construed it: 'This is a representation of my body."
Zwingli had little difficulty in showing that these are merely two different ways of saying precisely the same thing. The second objection was that the text I Cor.
10:16 speaks of a communion of the body and blood of Christ, which implies a literal feeding upon the substance of the body and blood.
But Zwingli did not accept the traditional exegesis of the verse.
As he understood it, the word translated "'bless'" does not mean "consecrate" but "'praise" or "honour," and the word translated "communion" really means "the community," i.e., the Church. In any case, he could always claim that the fellowship which we have with Christ is not physical but spiritual.
Taken as a whole the treatise forms a clear and forceful statement of Zwingli's doctrine. Like many writings of the period, it suffers from the disproportionate amount of space devoted to detailed and rather wearisome exegesis. But in the eucharistic debate the exegetical battle was undoubtedly the crucial one, and if we remember the setting we can hardly blame Zwingli for doing that which the demands of the controversy inevitably required of him. The whole doctrine of a substantial presence rested upon a particular interpretation of the words: "This is my body," and of related statements such as those contained in the all-important sixth chapter of St.
John. If Zwingli wished to combat error and to establish what he held to be the truth, he was compelled to investigate the true sense of these passages of Scripture. And in face of the detailed and complicated exposition of his opponents—for nowhere did the subtlety of the schoolmen find greater scope—he could find no short cuts to the vindication of his apparently novel teaching.
Again, even if we allow that much of the exegetical discussion is tiresome and artificial, this at least may be urged in favour of Zwingli's treatment, that he did contend for a sensible and in the main a true exegesis of the texts relevant to the question.
His opponents could appeal to the superficial straightforwardness of their understanding, but surely they betrayed a lack of perception and even intelligence when they attempted
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to derive a substantial presence and literal partaking from the words of institution and the parallel discourse in John 6.
Indeed, on analysis even their supposedly straightforward exegesis involves all kinds of logical difficulties. It may well be that the detailed discussions with which Zwingli sustained his thesis appear trivial and tiresome, but the thesis itself is still for the most part a valid one, and it is an apparent truism to the modern Protestant only because Zwingli and his supporters laboriously penetrated through the hard crust of traditional misinterpretation.
A more serious criticism of the statement is that it fails to develop any consistent or constructive doctrine to replace the discarded mediaeval, Renaissance and Lutheran teachings.
The truth is that Zwingli does the negative work of criticism far better than he does the positive work of reconstruction.
Certainly he reveals serious weaknesses in the prevailing interpretations. Certainly he gives adequate exegetical and doctrinal reasons for suspecting and perhaps rejecting those interpretations. Indeed, he goes further, and suggests a true line of interpretation which is in harmony with his general conception of the nature and function of the sacrament. But beyond that Zwingli does not go. He tears down the false structures of his opponents. He uncovers the true and solid basis upon which the doctrine of the sacrament must be built. But he does not make any large-scale contribution towards the actual work of reconstruction. And it is that failure to advance a developed positive understanding which makes it appear that he has nothing at all to offer except a bare sacramentarianism, 1.e., the sacrament is a sign, and no more.
Now it is must be admitted that in the doctrine of the Supper, as in that of baptism, Zwingli does tend to separate overharshly between the two aspects of the sacrament: the sign and the thing signified. True, in the doctrine of transubstantiation he had to meet a virtual obliteration of the sign by the thing signified, which meant the end of the sacrament in any meaningful sense. But in his own expositions Zwingli concentrated almost exclusively upon the sign, that is to say, the sacrament in its purely external sense. Naturally, he had no great difficulty in showing that the presence of the sign is no guarantee of the presence of the thing signified. As he understood it, the presence of the thing signified depended entirely upon the sovereign will and working of Almighty God. For that reason it was incalculable, although not, of course, unreal. And in his reaction
ZWINGLI against the identification of sign and thing signified he failed to give any very coherent account of the relationship between the two. He did not deny that God can and does use the sacrament as a means of grace, but he so isolated the sovereign operation of God that for all practical purposes there was no connection between the internal and the external work. The sign was one thing, and in itself it was only a sign. The thing signified was quite another, and it had no necessary connection with the sign except that it was represented by it. A possible link was true faith in the recipient, but even this was ultimately the gift of God and independent of the external sacrament.
The fact remains that while Zwingli had a strong sense of the two ''natures" of the sacrament, he did not show any clear sense of its unity. This does not mean that he was necessarily a sacramentarian in the full sense, but it certainly does mean that he was a sacramentarian in effect.
But two points must be made in Zwingli's defence. The first is that his primary task was to meet a false and dangerous interrelating of sign and thing signified. Inevitably, then, the main drift of his work was to isolate the two in order to make it plain beyond all doubt that they are not identical. Whether he saw the need for a more correct interrelating or not, he certainly could not run the risk of a possible misunderstanding.
The exigencies of the situation forced him to lay the whole stress upon the distinctness of the external and internal aspects.
But second, Zwingli did incidentally suggest many lines of thought which were to lead to something more positive in sacramental understanding. For one thing, he was always conscious of the fact that there is an objective thing signified.
In the strict sense the sacrament is only a sign, but it is more than the expression of a subjective experience. It is a sign which points us to something else. Therein lies its value and necessity.
And that objective something is not merely a given fact of history. The sacrament does bring before us the historical work of Christ, but it also points us to the present activity of God. That activity may not bear any necessary relationship to the outward administration of the rite, but it is still the underlying reality represented and proclaimed by it. But again, that activity of God is linked up with the spiritual presence of Jesus
Christ, who is known in the sacrament not merely as the one who was crucified for our redemption, not merely as the one who is risen and ascended and will come again to judge the quick and the dead, but also as the ever-present Son of God:
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"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world."
For Zwingli does not dispute that Christ is truly present in the Supper. What he disputes is that he is substantially present, present in the substance of his flesh and blood, present after his human nature. As the Bible itself testifies, the Ascension brought a break in the form of Christ's presence: but it did not end the presence itself. Prior to the Ascension, Christ was present locally, in the body. After the Ascension he was still present, but spiritually. That thought of the spiritual presence of Christ is not emphasized, indeed it is almost taken for granted, for it was not a point at issue. But the fact that Christ is indeed present in that way formed an obvious starting-point for a more positive understanding.
Against Zwingli's view of the presence the Lutherans could argue that it rested upon a faulty Christology. The divine nature of Christ cannot be present apart from the human— otherwise the unity of the person of Christ is negated. Now it must be admitted that Zwingli did tend towards that isolation of the distinctive natures or aspects both of Christ himself and also of the Word and sacraments. But it must be stressed that in this case a real distinction has to be made, and the Bible itself certainly gives us good reason to make it. In his humanity
Jesus Christ is not present in the world in the same way as he was even during the forty days or as he presumably will be at his coming again. Logically he is present in his humanity wherever he is present at all, and to that extent the Lutherans contend for a real truth of Christology. But in actual fact he is not present according to his human nature, and there does not seem to be any meaningful sense in which we can say that the body and blood of Christ are literally present in the Supper.
Even if Zwingli was wrong, it is still true that he had no wish to deny the presence of Christ altogether, and the reality of the spiritual presence of Christ involves something far more than a bare memorialism. The Supper cannot be merely a commemorative rite when the one commemorated is himself present and active amongst those who keep the feast.
One final point: the activity of God is not only linked with the spiritual presence of Christ but it is also related to the internal ministry of the Holy Spirit. At this point, the doctrine of Zwingli joins hands with its opposite, the ex opere operato doctrine of sacramental efficacy, for at bottom both of them are concerned to emphasize the divine transcendence and sovereignty. In the one case, the divine transcendence and
ZWINGLI sovereignty is seen in the freedom of God to work only how and where he chooses. In the other it is seen in the faithfulness of God to_work how and where he has promised to do so. With Zwingli the inward operation of God is not related in any clear or definite way to the outward sacramental rite, but the separation between the two need not be so complete or final as it perhaps appears to be in his own statement. Without any sacrifice of the divine sovereignty the outward sacrament can itself be an instrument used by the Holy Spirit, not automatically, but according to his own free appointment. That, at any rate, was the positive sacramental doctrine developed by Calvin, and the seeds of it were all present already in Zwingli's work.
Editions The first edition of this treatise was published by Hager of Zurich in 1526, and it was quickly followed by an edition by Froschauer of Zurich in the same year. A third anonymous edition also appeared in 1526. Since this is in all respects identical with a fourth edition (again 1526) which bears the name of Képfel of Strassburg there is every reason to suppose that it was published by the same house. Between these originals there are very few differences apart from the variations in spelling and the correction of occasional printers' errors. The original text has been reproduced by Schuler and Schultess
(II, 1, pp. 427-468), and more recently in the Corpus Reformatorum, Zwingli IV, No. 75, and the Volksausgabe XI, 1948.
Gwalter translated the essay into Latin in his Opp. Zw., Tom. II, and a version in modern German was included by Raget
Christoffel in his Zeitgemdssige Auswahl, 1843.
There do not appear to have been any early translations into English. The following translation is based on the Corpus Reformatorum edition of the original text.
On the Lord's Supper
THE, TEXT
Hear the words of Christ in Matthew 11: "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."
To all Christian believers Huldreich Zwingli offers grace and peace from God and our Lord Jesus Christ.
May God, who sent into this world his only begotten Son, the true light which penetrates all darkness, grant unto us such light and truth that we may speak only those things which will serve his glory, the setting forth of the truth and the good of our neighbour. We make that prayer to him by the faith which we have in him and by the strict judgment which he will exercise over the whole of the human race.
He has promised that if we pray he will hear us: and that which he has promised he will surely perform.
Fellow-believers in Christ, in the space of a single year I have written some three or four times concerning the sacrament of the body of Christ.(1) So far I have never written in German,(2) but only in Latin, as the situation in our own and other lands then demanded.(3) But I now see that in some parts my writings are being refused entry and proscribed(4)—with what kind of conscience I leave to the judgment of those concerned, who once proclaimed earnestly the words of Paul:
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.'' But they publicly speak of my works as heretical, and in their writings they call upon God to deliver us from the error. For although we know from the Word of God that in this sacrament there is no partaking of the corporal body and blood, they say that we cannot have any certainty in the matter, and they decry our opinion as a monstrous error. They will not suffer themselves to be taught, but with every word they rate us soundly. In
ZWINGLI these circumstances I thought it necessary to gather together from the Word of God the more essential texts and passages which point us to the basic meaning of this sacrament, and together with them some pronouncements of the primitive doctors and of the papal canons or decrees.(5) My purpose is that the ordinary and simple Christian may learn the truth for himself, so that those who are accounted preachers of the Gospel will not be able either to withhold or to misrepresent it: (6) for these latter plunged into deep water at the very outset, and they refuse to see that it is better to return to land than to press further and further into the deep, and consequent darkness.
For what is darkness if not the delusion that the bread is flesh and the wine blood, and that we partake of the flesh and blood really or essentially? The transubstantiation of the bread has long been disputed. Some argue that we take the body and blood of Christ as they hung on the cross; (7) others that we take the resurrection body.(8) The Word of God shows us that all these opinions are erroneous. And yet in spite of that fact these false teachers claim that it is we who are in error, and that we constantly shift our ground. That that is not the case we shall make as clear as daylight in what follows. In the name of God, therefore, I warn all dignities, princes, lords, dominions and powers not to allow themselves to be embittered against the truth, but as is particularly fitting in rulers to do all things advisedly and quietly, and indeed to restrain all wicked and violent action and to weigh the matter with a serious and mature judgment. For in this matter they are confronted by the articles of our Christian Creed: ""He ascended into heaven, And sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty; From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead." Therefore they must either abandon the false doctrine of the presence of the essential body of Christ in this sacrament, or else they must at once renounce these three articles, which God forbid that anyone should ever dream of doing. In all justice, then, we ought not to yield to that papal arrogance which orders princes to protect the Christian faith under the guise of flesh and blood. For those who think that in so doing they are safeguarding the faith are really jeopardizing it, as we shall see. And I also warn scholars not to handle this matter with craftiness and subtlety, but if they desire to dispute, let them come out boldly and openly, for it is our aim to avoid all sophistry, philosophizing and rhetoric, except in so far as we are forced to give answer along such lines. And let them also
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cease from unworthy tirades, and the pouring out and heaping up of abusive words. Not that we quake before such storms. I am used to them, thank God, and I stand upon a rock which does not shake under me and prevents me from being swept away. But I would rather see the truth standing by itself than see it despoiled by unmeasured words which necessarily suggest arrogance. I know well how Christ himself spoke sharply and administered severe rebukes. But I am speaking only of those who at the very first glimpse of truth and irrespective of all reasoning take to themselves blustering and deceitful words and smite their way in, misleading the simple by crying: They are agitators—to whom we are as little partial as to Lucifer. If the matter were only investigated, it would soon appear who were the instigators of past tumults—or, They root about in Scripture merely out of a spirit of mischief or the desire for notoriety—if it were notoriety we were after we should have to seek it some other way— or, They have no faith—but if we had no faith we should never have discovered that the flesh profiteth nothing—and so on. With these and similar words they cause the simple people to flee from the truth before they have ever even considered it. But I know that the ordinary Christian will listen more readily to the truth when it comes to him in its own garb and without over-much adornment or arrogant noise.
And I know too that the blame for the wicked speeches which meet us in all quarters is due in no small measure to the writings of certain scholars who have presented the whole matter in the most bad-tempered and shameless fashion.(g) If it were merely a matter of arebuke, I should have nocause for complaint.
However little I might expect such a rebuke, either from God or from true believers, I realize that there is a controversy in this matter, and that that controversy will not be settled in a day.
But if we blacken our opponents with rough words, the stain may well become so great that the truth is lost, as in the old saying: In the multitude of strife, the truth is forfeit. For that reason I ask scholars not to overload the matter with their hostile clamour, but to conduct themselves with sobriety.
Otherwise as much evil will issue from the roughness of the words as good is wrested from their meaning and force.
The whole question has its source in the misunderstanding of the text: '"This is my body." Therefore our first task will be to consider these words in the light of the various misinterpretations and to see what errors result.
As our second article we will turn to the Scriptures and the
ZWINGLI articles of the Creed in order to prove that the text cannot have the meaning which a wresting of the words has given to it.
As our third, we will establish out of the Scriptures the true and natural sense.
And as our fourth we will answer some apparent objections.
THE First ARTICLE Amongst those who believe that in this sacrament we partake of the literal body and blood of Christ there are three groups.
First there are those who say that we partake of his body and blood as they hung on the cross, the corporal substance of the bread and wine being transubstantiated into that of the corporal body and blood.(10) Then there are those who say that we eat the body of Christ under the bread. All the time the bread remains bread, and we are not to ask how we eat Christ's body, but simply to confess the fact and rejoice that we eat: for Christ said: ""This is my body," and therefore it must be so.(11) Finally, there are those who say that we eat of the body of Christ as it was in the resurrection when he came to his disciples through closed doors, etc.(12)
Now for the sake of the ordinary reader, before we expound and refute these opinions, we must first make it clear what a sacrament is and what it signifies.(13) A sacrament is the sign of a holy thing. When I say: The sacrament of the Lord's body, I am simply referring to that bread which is the symbol of the body of Christ who was put to-death for our sakes. The papists all know perfectly well that the word sacrament means a sign and nothing more, for this is the sense in which it has always been used by Christian doctors. Yet they have still allowed the common people to be deceived into thinking that it is something strange and unusual, something which they cannot understand and which for that reason they have come to equate with God himself, something which they regard as holy in that sense. But the very body of Christ is the body which is seated at the right hand of God, and the sacrament of his body is the bread, and the sacrament of his blood is the wine, of which we partake with thanksgiving. Now the sign and the thing signified cannot be one and the same. Therefore the sacrament of the body of Christ cannot be the body itself.
We come now to the first group who say that in this sacra-
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ment the substance of the bread is changed into the substance of the real body of Christ, that body which lay in the crib and hung on the cross. They defend their position in this way:
The power of the Word of God is so great, so present, so living, that everything that God says is as he says, for heaven and earth must pass away, but not the Word of God, not even a single tittle of his Word (Luke 16). (14) For example, at the beginning of creation, in Genesis 1, God said: "'Let there be light: and there was light.''(15) Hence we see that the Word of God is so living and powerful that the moment he commands, things which are not spring forth out of nothing. How much more is the substance and essence of bread changed into the essence of the body of Christ when he says: '""This is my body"'; for it is easier to change one substance into another than to create a substance out of nothing. Therefore when Christ says:
"This is my body," it literally is his body. For he says that it is, and therefore it is so, and all things must give place and allow this bread to be the true and essential body of Christ. For when he says: "Is," it is so. In Matthew 8, when Christ said to the leper: "Be thou clean," he was clean from that very hour.
And again, when he said to the blind man: "'See,"' he saw from that very hour. In the same way, when he says: ""This is my body," the bread is his body and the wine his blood.(16)
Answer: Notice, good Christian, how the eyes of the simple are obscured by this fabrication, and they are asked to believe falsehoods. Yet if only we can open their eyes there is nothing easier than to refute these errors, as we shall now proceed to do. For it is our intention to answer these assertions from the assertions themselves. Thus: I do not deny that which is adduced concerning the power of the Word of God. I confess that when God says a thing it is so. For the Word of God is a living command. But note that there are two flaws in the argument. The first is that we are not given any reason to believe that when the Pope or some other man says: ""This is my body," then the body of Christ is necessarily present. It is of no avail to say that Christ himself said: '"'Do this in remembrance of me'': therefore the body of Christ is there. For the Pope does not say: '""This is the body of Christ," but: "This is my body."
Therefore only his own body would be present.(17) But since this answer involves much futile wrangling, we will pass on, not using the first flaw as the basis for what we have to say, as well we might: for there are many who do use it. The second flaw is the failure to see that before we use the Word of God
1g0 ZWINGLI to justify anything we must first understand it correctly. For example, when Christ says: "I am the vine," we have to con- ° sider first that he is using figurative speech, i.e., he is like a vine, for as the branches are nourished by the vine and cannot bear fruit without it, so believers are in him, and without him they can do nothing. Now if you object against this interpretation:
He said: ''I am the vine," therefore he must be a real vince, you make Christ a vine. In the same way, when you come to the words: '""This is my body," you must first make sure that he intended to give his flesh and blood in bodily form. Otherwise it is quite futile to argue: He said it, and therefore it is so.
For it is so only as he himself understood it to be so, and not as you misunderstand it.(18) And how can you prove from Scripture that he gave his flesh and blood in bodily form when he says in John 6: ""The flesh profiteth nothing," meaning, to eat, etc. We will come to this in the next article. For the moment let us consider the basis of the doctrine. If in Christ's saying: '"This is my body," we take the little word "'is" substantive, 1.e., literally, then it follows necessarily that the substance of the body or the flesh of Christ is literally and essentially present.
But this gives rise to two manifest errors.
The first: If he is present literally and essentially in the flesh, then in the flesh he is torn apart by the teeth and perceptibly masticated. We cannot evade the issue by saying: ""With God all things are possible."' For as you yourself showed at the outset, it is not possible that the light which he created by the Word should not be a literal and perceptible light. On the contrary, when he spoke the Word, the light was there, a literal, perceptible, present and visible light, as it still is. In the same way, if we take the word "'is" literally, it is not possible that the flesh should not be perceptible, for the light was not an imperceptible light. Similarly, the cleansing given to the leper and the sight to the blind were not imperceptible. The leper and the blind perceived their wholeness as something which they actually possessed. But in this sacrament no one has ever partaken of the body literally and perceptibly; for although fables have been invented and proclaimed to that effect, they do not prove anything; for even if it did occasionally take place by fraud, that is not enough: it must be the same in the mouths of all who communicate, for the word and the partaking are in all cases the same. It is evident, then, that the flesh is not there literally and corporally. For if it were, its mass and substance
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QI would be perceived, and it would be pressed with the teeth.
In short: It would be there just as literally as the firmament and light which God also commanded: for these are not imperceptible, but perceptible. Therefore, if the "'is" is to be taken literally, the body of Christ must be visibly, literally, corporally and perceptibly present. For that reason even in the erroneous teaching itself there is proof that the words cannot possibly mean that we partake physically of flesh and blood: for I maintain that if God says literally: "This is my body," then the body ought to be there literally and corporally, just as the light was there literally when he commanded it to be so.
And since we do not experience or perceive any such presence, it follows that the words of Christ cannot refer to physical flesh and blood. For if that were the meaning, we should constantly perceive them, for he cannot lie. You see, then, that the argument for a literal presence merely turns to their own confusion. (19) The second error resulting from a literal interpretation corresponds to that second opinion which we mentioned alongside the first, namely, that we eat the body of Christ in or under the bread, the bread itself remaining bread.(20)
If we take the word "'is"' substantive, i.e., literally, then it is an obvious mistake to say that the bread remains bread and to deny transubstantiation, the changing of the substance of bread into that of flesh. And for this reason: I apply the argument used in the first error. The Word of God is living. He said: "This is my body." Therefore it is his body. But if we take the word "'is" literally, as the second error obstinately maintains, then necessarily the substance of tread has to be changed completely into that of flesh. But that means that the bread is no longer there. Therefore it is impossible to maintain that the bread remains, but that in or under the bread flesh is eaten. Notice how utterly unreasonable this position is.
On no account will it allow that Christ's words: '"This is my body," are figurative or symbolical. It insists that the word
"is" must be taken literally. But it then proceeds to set that word aside and to say: "The body of Christ is eaten in the bread."' Yet Christ did not say: '""Take, eat, my body is eaten in the bread." He said: ""This is my body.'(21) How fearful a thing it is to get out of one's depth. Ifit were I who perverted the words of Christ in that way, surely the axe of judgment would smite me down.(22) The second error is easily perceived, then, and we have only to compare the two and they cancel
ZWINGLI each other out. For the first maintains that the flesh and blood are present by virtue of the word "'is."' But if we take that word literally, it destroys the second, which tries to take it literally but still asserts that the bread remains bread. For if the word is taken literally, the bread is not bread but flesh. Conversely, the second error does at least perceive and recognize that the substance of bread is not turned into the substance of flesh. In so doing, it safeguards the truth that the word "'is'? cannot be taken literally. If it were literal, the flesh would be no less perceptible than the bread. For as prior to the consecration
(as they term it) the bread is perceptible as bread, so from the moment of consecration it would have to be perceptible as flesh. Hence the first error is destroyed, and we may conclude that they are both manifestly false.
For when the second maintains that the "'is"' is to be taken literally, it is adopting a quite unwarrantable position, as we have seen: for there is no alternative way of avoiding a figurative interpretation. Yet when we forcibly expose this defect, pointing out that there is no foundation for such fancies, they simply cry: We abide by the simple words of Christ,(23) trusting that those Christians who follow the simple words of Christ will not go astray. But what you call the simple meaning of those words is the most doubtful, the most obscure, the least intelligible of all. If the simple meaning of Scripture is that which we maintain through a misunderstanding of the letter, then Christ is a vine, or a silly sheep, or a door, and Peter is the foundation-stone of the Church. The simple or natural sense of these words is that which obtains in all similar instances, that which the minds of all believers find the most natural and the most readily comprehensible, that which is not contradicted by the truth, as are the two views expounded above, of which neither the one nor the other can prove the truth of its assertions. For the first cannot prove that the body is present. If it were, we should be able to see and perceive it Jike all the creatures which God has made. And the second cannot prove that the body is present under the bread. For Christ does not say: "This is my body under the bread." Therefore in Scripture the simple or natural sense is that which is grounded and secured in the truth, that is, in the Word of God, not standing in any possible contradiction to it.(24) The papists might complain that we do not abide by the natural sense when it is a matter of the saying: '""Thou art Peter, that is, a stone, or rock, and upon this rock I will build my Church." Does that mean that we fall into error if
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we do not abide by the simple or natural sense, as the second view alleges? Not at all. For we find that Christ alone is the rock, Christ alone is the Head, Christ alone is the vine in which we are held secure. Therefore Christ himself is the rock upon which the Church is built, and that is the natural sense of the words. As applied by the papacy, the words are not natural.
They are contrary to faith and reason, and quite unacceptable to the believing heart. So too with Christ's words: "This is my body." To refer them to his physical flesh is not the natural interpretation. To the believing heart it is the least intelligible of all. And it has no basis in the Word of God, as we shall see later. According to their proper signification, the words cannot bear this sense, as we have already seen. The third error, that we eat the body of Christ as risen from the dead, we shall oppose under the second article.
We will now turn to the papal canons in order to show that there is no justification in Christ's words for the view that in this sacrament we partake physically of the body and blood of Christ. When I appeal to the papal law, it is not my intention to use that law to prove anything to true believers, but simply to show those who accept the papacy that it is possible to reach the truth even by way of the papal canons.(25) For God has ordained that even in those writings which Antichrist has exalted there should be found that which subverts the erroneous doctrine of Antichrist. The text De consecr. dist. 2 ca. Ego (26) is as follows: "I, Berengarius,(27) an unworthy servant of the church of St. Maurice of Angers, confessing the true, catholic and apostolic faith, anathematize all heresy, including that of which I myself have been long suspected, which maintains that the bread and wine which we place upon the altar is after consecration only a sacrament, that is, a sign—notice how even the papacy uses the word sacrament—and that it is not the very body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that it
(that is, the body) is handled and broken by the priests and pressed by the teeth of the faithful only symbolically and not essentially and literally. But now I agree with the holy Roman church and the apostolic see, and both with my lips and in my heart I confess that in respect of the sacrament of the Lord's
Table I hold the same faith as that which my noble lord Pope Nicholas (28) and holy synod (29) prescribed and confirmed on evangelical and apostolic authority, namely, that after consecration the bread and wine on the altar are not merely a sacrament (that is, a sign, etc.) but the very body
Z.B.— IQ
ZWINGLI and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that manifestly not merely the sacrament but the very body and blood of Christ are handled and broken by the priests and pressed or crushed by the teeth of the faithful.' Now first let the thoughtful believer consider how the devil may transform himself into an angel of light. This Berengarius lived about 1080 years after Christ.
He felt that there had been serious error in relation to this sacrament, for there have always been those who have perceived the error. But the Pope intervened to prevent this window being opened, and he forced him to make a ridiculous public recantation, in which it is quite obvious that what is said concerning the physical flesh of Christ is utterly false.
And there are some historians who testify that Berengarius was so pious that after his death many princes said that they would rather follow Berengarius than the Pope,(30) notwithstanding the fact that he was under suspicion right up to the time of his death: as though in his heart he had never really abandoned the view which is stated in the first part of the recantation. He made what is obviously a false recantation in the face both of his own conscience and of that of all men. Second, let us consider what is involved in the recantation. It involves the confession that with his lips and in his heart he believes that the body of Christ is perceptibly taken by the priests, perceptibly broken, and perceptibly pressed or crushed by the teeth of the faithful. But these three affirmations are all of them manifestly false, like the devil's words to Eve: "Ye shall not surely die, but ye shall be as gods." For where is the priest who ever took the body of Christ perceptibly? For if the body were really there, how could they elevate it? And is it not an outrage upon Christ to enclose him in a damp and stinking tabernacle? (31) For ifthe priest can perceive Christ, then surely he can perceive himself. And if so, then surely, too, he suffers the cold and discomfort. But here they argue that we are not to take the word "'perceptibly"' quite so baldly or literally, (32) but to read the gloss.(33) Answer: Tell us then how we are to understand the word. You reply: as it says in the gloss. And the gloss says the same as you do, that we must understand the words properly, and then it goes on to say that these things are to be understood of the two forms of bread and wine.
But what else was it that Berengarius maintained when he said that the body is broken sacramentally? Is not that to refer only to the forms of bread and wine? But he was forced to confess that the very body of Christ is truly taken, and broken, and
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pressed with the teeth. Do not these words make it quite plain what is meant by the word "'perceptibly''?? For it is clear that if they insist upon a literal interpretation of the word "'is" in the saying of Christ: "This is my body," they must inevitably maintain that Christ is literally there, and therefore they must also maintain that he is broken, and pressed with the teeth.
Even if all the senses dispute it, that is what they must inevitably maintain if the word "'is" is taken literally, as we have already shown. Hence they themselves recognize that the word "'is" is not to be taken literally. If the sky is red at dawn, we can say: It will be stormy by evening; and if it is red at sunset, we can say: It will be fair tomorrow; and yet we are quite blind to the fact that if in the flesh Christ is miraculously present in the bread, or if the bread is actually flesh, we must be able to perceive it. And if we say that although the bread is flesh and the flesh is literally eaten, this takes place miraculously so that the flesh and blood are not perceived, is it not evident that we are lying and deceiving ourselves? For God never performed miracles or manifested them to the world without someone either seeing them or in some way perceiving them. The recantation then goes on to say that the body of Christ is literally handled and broken by the priests. But how is it broken? Without doubt they will reply: As it was broken on the cross, that is to say, as it was put to death: for there can be no doubt that this is the basis of their doctrine of the eucharistic sacrifice. But what of the verse which tells us that Christ dieth no more? Or perhaps they say: Only the bread or "species," that is, the form, is broken. Our grateful thanks!
For that is what Berengarius said when he claimed that Christ's body is not broken in the flesh, but only in the sacrament of the flesh. So the words "literally broken" are just as meaningless as the words "'literally handled or taken." Next, the recantation states that the body of Christ is perceptibly pressed and chewed by the teeth of the faithful. But who is the believer who ever perceived any such thing? And who is the believer who would not shudder to perceive any such thing? Is the Word of Christ no longer valid (Matt.
15): "'Whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly, and is cast out into the draught?" What nonsense this erroneous statement leads us to imagine, nonsense for which there ought not to be any place in the hearts of believers. But here some thinkers have felt that an answer needs to be given to sceptics like
Rabanus for example.(34) But it is grounded in the same false
ZWINGLI teaching. Yes, we say, it all takes place miraculously, and with that one word all our difficulties are resolved, as though God worked miracles which could not be perceived. If only those tiny pieces of bread and wine were actually perceived to be flesh and blood, that would be a miracle indeed. The manna which came down from heaven was of the same size and shape as coriander seed, but its taste was quite different. Here the case is otherwise, for what we see and what we taste are exactly the same, bread and wine. And how can we say that it is flesh when we do not perceive it to be such? If the body were there miraculously, the bread would not be bread, but we should perceive it to be flesh. Since, however, we see and perceive bread, it is evident that we are ascribing to God a miracle which he himself neither wills nor approves: for he does not work miracles which cannot be perceived. And the uninstructed who read the gloss must not press it too hard, for it is mere words without any real meaning, for the one who wrote the gloss De consecratione di. I cap. 1(35) says himself that it is harmful and even dangerous to speak the truth concerning the sacraments. It looks as though Gratian (36) was afraid to speak the truth, but simply alluded to it through the Fathers, not pronouncing or legislating in his own name as was his usual custom elsewhere. Good Christian, that is how even a papistical commentator speaks. He knows that in face of the papacy it is dangerous to speak the truth concerning the sacraments. But it is not dangerous to say that the flesh and blood are present, for that is what the papacy requires. The dangerous thing is to say what we say. And that is the truth as the commentator understood it: for he says that it is dangerous to speak the truth concerning the sacraments.(37) If he had merely said: It is dangerous to speak of them, there would have been no great significance in the words. But when he says: It is dangerous to speak the truth concerning them, it is evident that the truth concerning them was not spoken in his day. I have had to say all this about the gloss for the sake of some foolish people with whom I should have dealt quite differently had I not spared them in the Lord's name.
But at this point there are some who say: I do not believe that we eat the physical flesh with our mouth and teeth, but that we eat it quite apart from external perception.(38) Of such I have good hopes that they will soon receive the truth with joy: for when they say that, they are in effect renouncing the papal doctrine, although they do not want to be thought
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to do so. For the papacy maintains that we perceptibly press or chew with the teeth. Again, they make it quite clear that they do not understand the word "'is" literally as they allege, for if they did understand it literally they could not deny that the flesh of Christ must be literally present.
It is a fair assumption that the truth contained in Gratian's book—which was called the Papal Decretals because the papacy itself endorsed it and used it over a long period (39)— was in fact suppressed. For as we have already shown from the commentator, it is obvious that Gratian himself did not hold to the papist view, even though he lived about a.p. 1160 when the darkness of ignorance was at its worst. After the recantation of Berengarius, this Gratian introduces as his sixth canon some words of Augustine; which the papacy also affirmed. The words are these: "What need of teeth and stomach? Believe and thou hast eaten. For to believe in him is to partake of the bread and wine. He who believes on him feeds on him.''(40) Now obviously these words contradict the previous words in the recantation of Berengarius. For in the one it says: ""What need of teeth and stomach?"' but in the other it says: ""The body and blood of Christ are perceptibly pressed with the teeth." In the one the teeth are unnecessary, in the other indispensable. It was not the intention of Gratian that the truth should be suppressed. 'The whole basis of the sacrament is contained in these words of Augustine. For when he says: ""What need of teeth and stomach?"' he gives us to understand that we are not eating anything physical, for if we were there would be need of teeth and stomach. And when he says:
"Believe and thou hast eaten," he makes it perfectly clear that to feed on Christ is simply to trust in him, to confide oneself to him. But our opponents say: The word: "Believe and thou hast eaten,' must be understood in this way: If you believe or trust that the body and blood are present, you will then partake of the body and blood. Those who believe partake, and those who do not believe do not partake. Here I should like to ask: How many are there who actually perceive that they are partaking of flesh and blood? From the time of the institution by Christ they cannot point to a single one, and therefore they have to confess that no one has ever believed. And here we catch them out, for this means that they themselves do not believe that they partake of the body of Christ, etc. But I will avoid provocation and make this answer: The words which follow are these: '"To believe in him is to partake of the bread
ZWINGLI and wine," and from these words we may learn the correct understanding of the first part of the saying. Augustine says first: '"Believe in him," teaching us that the object of trust or faith is not the bread or the body, but Christ alone. And then he says: "To believe in Christ is to partake of the bread and wine." How does that happen? We have here two hard sayings: how are we to interpret them? On the one hand there are many who have a constant faith in Christ yet seldom partake of the sacrament, the wine and the bread. On the other, Augustine still speaks of believers as partaking of wine and bread. Note, then, that what he means is simply this: If we believe in Christ, we go to communion, we partake of the bread and wine, in the right way: we make a right use of the sacrament. For immediately after he says: ""He who believes on him feeds on him." It follows then that to feed on Christ's body is to believe in him who was given up to death on our behalf. But the deluded say that what Augustine means is that those who believe on him feed on his flesh and blood. Answer: the previous saying: ""To believe in him is to partake of the bread and wine," makes it quite plain that Augustine did not mean: He who believes on him feeds physically on his flesh and blood, for lalready Augustine has shown that the partaking which is
'needed is to believe in him. Indeed, at the very outset he said:
| "Believe, and thou hast eaten.'' And what we eat physically ia \ \ Augustine refers to as bread and wine, called by Christ his body and blood in order that in our act of thanksgiving they might be the significant signs of his body and blood, as they
- are also described by Paul. Briefly, then, the whole meaning _ of Augustine is this: When you come to this thanksgiving you
; need neither teeth to press the body of Christ nor stomach to / receive that which you have chewed, for if you believe in him
{ you have already partaken of him. And when in the thanksgiving, In company with the congregation, you partake of the | two elements of bread and wine, all that you do is to confess publicly that you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore when we take the signs of bread and wine the principal thing to which we must look is to believe in Christ. For he who believes on him feeds on him. To feed on him is simply to believe on him. The papists have altered the whole meaning and have done violence to these sacred words—which are none other than the words of God himself, John 6—as may be seen further in De con. di. 2 c. Credere,(41) quoting Augustine: "To believe in Jesus Christ is to eat the living bread. He who believes eats,"' etc.
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Thus far the first article, in which we have shown what serious difficulties are caused by taking literally Christ's words:
"This is my body," and how the words themselves make it clear that the saying is not literal but figurative and symbolical.
For if the "'is" is to be taken literally, then we must eat the body of Christ with its flesh, bones, veins, nerves, marrow and other members which I will forbear to mention: for God cannot lie. If Christ spoke literally and not figuratively, then of necessity it follows that his body is eaten literally and perceptibly, as Berengarius was forced to confess: but all believers know very well that they do not eat the body of Christ in that way. Hence the very nature and truth of the matter will not allow us to take the words literally. And by nature and truth I do not mean only the nature of our human understanding, but that of the Word of God, which is, that where God speaks literally his words are fulfilled literally, i.e., in such a way as may be seen and touched and known and experienced. But since that does not obtain in the present case, we have conclusive evidence that God did not speak literally: for God never deceives us. If he did speak literally, we should perceive the body. Hence we have clear proof that the saying is not to be taken literally.
THE SECOND ARTICLE
In the first article we have, I hope, seen quite clearly from the nature and property of God's Word that the saying of Christ: ""This is my body," cannot be taken literally. In the second article we will further demonstrate and prove that the words cannot have the literal sense ascribed to them, first from the evident teaching of the Word of God and then from the articles of the faith as set forth in the introduction.
The primitive Fathers, and we ourselves in the Commentarius and Subsidium,(42) have shown quite clearly that in the teaching brought before us in John 6,(43) when Christ referred to eating his flesh and drinking his blood he simply meant believing in him as the one who has given his flesh and blood for our redemption and the cleansing of our sins. In this passage he is not speaking of the sacrament, but preaching the Gospel under the figure of eating and drinking his flesh and blood.
In case there are any who are not yet aware of this fact, I will briefly recapitulate the main points, indicating the clear signs by which we know that throughout the discourse Christ is simply declaring the Gospel, that is, the salvation which
ZWINGLI God has given us in him. Now Christ usually prefaced or introduced his teaching by taking something external and upon that as upon a simile he built up and taught the heavenly and spiritual message.
For example, when someone told him: 'Thy mother and thy brethren stand without desiring to speak with thee" (Matt. 12), he uses the incident as an opportunity to teach the lesson that all believers are his members and brethren, saying: ""Who is my mother? and who are my brethren? And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren. For whosoever shall do the will of my Father, which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother." There is a simple case in Matthew 16. The disciples had forgotten to take bread across the sea, and in that fact he saw an opportunity or opening to teach them to avoid the leaven of the Pharisees.
And so too it is in John 6. He had provided them with such an abundance of food that the disciples had taken up twelve baskets full of fragments. The people ran to him. But he saw that they pursued him because they marvelled at the sign and not because they longed for salvation. Therefore he held out salvation to them. They went after him for the sake of physical— food and he taught them concerning the spiritual food, which is himself. But he uses the physical food which they were seeking as an introduction or opening, saying: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled. Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed (that is, given him as an infallible pledge)."' '""Then said they unto him—i.e. because he had called them to labour for a lasting food—What shall we do, that we might work the works of God?" "'Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent." (Note that this is clear proof that everything which he says about eating and drinking is meant to lead them to belief in him, which is the true nourishment of the soul.) '"They said therefore unto him, What sign shewest thou then, that we may see, and believe thee? what dost thou work?" (Note how it is with the crowd. Some understand one thing and some nothing. And they all cry out according to their own desire or understanding. And when they saw that he was preaching faith in himself they scorned him, crying out that he should show them a sign in order that they might believe
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on him. And they pointed him to a great work of the past, saying: "Our fathers did eat manna in the desert,'' etc.)
But Jesus answered: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world." (Note how he still keeps to the same figure of bread, and under the image of the heavenly bread he teaches them that he himself is sent down from heaven to give new life to the world. Even if we had no clearer words, the single saying:
"The bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world," would be sufficient to prove that Christ is described as bread because he gives life to the world.
And he did that by means of his death. Hold fast to Christ, and you have nourishment and life. But hold fast to him, not as eaten but as crucified for you. For that alone is how he gives life. To eat Christ physically does not help to give life). '""Then said they unto him, Lord, evermore give us this bread,"' for he had said that this bread gives life to the world. "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."
(But how is he life, crucified or eaten? Crucified, as we shall see later. But note how appropriately his words follow up the introductory figure: "I am the bread of life,'' that is, I am the only food which can nourish the desolate soul and give it life.
"He that cometh to me shall never hunger." Note that it is he who comes that is nourished, not he who eats physically. The necessary thing is to come to him, to believe on him, as he himself immediately says: ""And he that believeth on me shall never thirst.'' The little word ''and"' is here used after the Hebrew manner to denote explanation, namely, that to come to him is simply to believe on him. And why do those who would partake of flesh and blood in this sacrament speak of a hunger and thirst after the physical flesh and blood in addition to faith? For Christ says that he that cometh to him, that is, he that believeth on him shall not hunger or thirst for anything else, for any other hope or ground of comfort. This is confirmed by the words which follow, when he says: "But I said unto you, that ye also have seen me, and believe not." Here we see clearly that he does not demand any other eating but faith, setting aside entirely any external or physical perceiving or partaking, for he says; '""Ye have seen me, and believe not'. This completely overthrows the childish statement which is sometimes
ZWINGLI put out to the simple: "'I believe, and therefore I will partake of him. I will have both my belief and also that in which I believe."' For the Jews could see him plainly enough, but their seeing did not help them. Similarly eating does not help us, for eating and seeing are both on the same plane, they are both experiences of the senses.) Christ then goes on to teach that no one can believe in him except he is drawn of the Father: which means that the flesh does not profit anything whether it is eaten or seen: for he says: "All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out." (That is, no man can receive him, except the Father draw him, as will appear later.) "For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me." (We shall speak of the two wills of Christ, the divine and the human, later in this section.) "'And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day." And that is simply to say, This is the will of him that sent me, that he that seeth the Son—that is, knoweth the Son, for in all three languages the word ''see"' is frequently used for know, or recognize, or understand, and we have already made it sufficiently clear that physical seeing does not help us—and believeth on him hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. Now first, note that Christ explains his own words. For twice he says: ""This is the will of him that sent me," but the second time he speaks more plainly than the first.
Second, note that in Scripture words like "resurrect"? and "resurrection" are used not only of the general resurrection of the dead but of the life of the soul after this present age, as may be seen in I Corinthians 15 and also in this passage.
But this is not the place to speak at large on that topic.(44) Again, the last day refers not merely to the day of judgment but to our departure from this present world. Hence in this context the words of Christ: "I will raise him up at the last day," do not mean only: I will summon him to the final judgment, but: I will give him eternal life the very moment that he departs this life, as is clearly stated in John 5. ""The Jews then murmured at him, because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven. And they said, Is not this
Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I came down from heaven. Jesus therefore answered and said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves" (Note his kindness in not allowing them to err
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through ignorance). "No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day."' (That is, From the last hour of this present time I will keep him to life everlasting.) "It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me." (Note what is meant by the earlier sayings:
"All that my Father giveth me," and: "My Father draweth him"': As he himself reveals, they mean simply this, that by his Spirit the heavenly Father teaches the knowledge and faith of Christ to those whom he has willed to save through him.) ''Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father." (He is referring to himself.)
"Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.'" This is one of the clear places which teach us that by eating his flesh and blood Christ simply means believing in the one who gave his flesh and blood that we might live.
It is not eating or seeing or perceiving him which saves, but believing on him. And here too we see clearly what he meant earlier when he spoke of coming to him: to come to him is simply to believe on him. He then begins to reveal to them the mystery of his passion, and he answers the objection which they brought against him when they said: "'Our fathers did eat manna in the desert," saying: ""I am that bread of life."
(Undoubtedly that food of eternal life to which he had just referred: "He that believeth on me hath everlasting life."
Hence it follows that in this context the bread and flesh are simply believing on him, for it is faith which carries with it eternal life. If he is the bread of life, he gives everlasting life to those who believe on him.) "Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die.
I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever.' (Note that the first time he had spoken obscurely: "'Of all that the Father hath given me I shall lose nothing, but shall raise it up again at the last day." Then he used rather plainer speech: "Everyone which seeth the Son, that is, knoweth him, and understandeth his work, and believeth on him, hath everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day."' And now the third time he again takes up the main point, using the same illustration as that with which he introduced his message, that in giving himself up to death he is a spiritual food or bread, saying: ""He that eateth of
ZWINGLI this bread shall never die," which is the equivalent of what he said earlier: "I will raise him up again at the last day."') ""And the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world." Note first that he now gathers his meaning into one short sentence, as if to say: I have been telling you that I am the living bread, but I have not yet told you how. In this way: I am about to give my flesh in death. In so doing I shall propitiate the righteousness of my heavenly Father, and as a result man will be raised up again to a new life and will attain to divine grace. Note further that he is the lifegiving bread as put to death, not as pressed with the teeth or eaten. For he does not say: The bread is my flesh which I will give you physically to eat, but, '""The bread that I shall give you is that I will give my flesh for the life of the world." And that is what nourishes the soul as bread nourishes the body. Third, we learn that the flesh is not itself a satisfaction or payment, but it stands for the payment of death.(45) The death and passion which Christ bore in the flesh are the means of our redemption. Hence we see the meaning of Christ's words: ""This is my body which is given for you." The word "body" stands for the suffering which he bore in the body, as the phrase "'which is given for you" specifically shows us. The body of Christ is redemptive in so far as it is given up to death. We are not to look for any other kind of physical eating. ""Uhe Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" And why did they strive among themselves? Because they neither saw with their eyes nor heard with their ears nor understood with their hearts. Christ had spoken a good deal about food and bread, and he had just shown them that this food is simply his being given up to death for the world, saying: "The food or bread of which I speak is my flesh which I will give for the life of the world." But they try to seize upon the first part of his saying: ""The bread that I will give is my flesh', ignoring the latter part: "which I will give for the life of the world." And they strove among themselves because they did not see that what Christ was teaching was that his death is the only consolation and nourishment of the believing heart.
Therefore Jesus said to them: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.
He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in
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me, and I in him." (There is no need to oppose specifically those who claim that Christ now begins a fresh discourse on the subject of the sacrament: for if they take note of the opening word, ''then" or "'therefore,'"' they will see that this saying of Christ is connected with the one which preceded it, and whenever he speaks of eating his flesh and drinking his blood he simply means believing in the worth of that suffering which he bore for our sakes. For here he says: "'Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life.'"" And just before he said: "He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.'' Therefore to eat his flesh and to believe on him are one and the same, otherwise there are two ways of salvation, the one by eating and drinking the flesh of Christ and the other by believing on him. And if that is the case, then the crucifixion was not necessary, for the disciples were children of everlasting life the moment they partook of his flesh and blood in the Last
Supper. To such calumniating of the truth does the misinterpretation of Scripture lead. But the aim of Christ is simply to teach us that he is our consolation and salvation, having given his flesh and blood to death on our behalf.) And now follows: "'As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me." (Here is another passage in which he is clearly speaking of faith in himself: for that is what makes the soul live, that is, live by him.)
"This is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever." (Note that what he had just described as flesh and blood he now calls bread, and for two reasons, first, to adhere to his original illustration and point of departure, and second, to explain and to make it quite clear that when he speaks of bread or flesh and blood he means that the one bread, food, nourishment, growth and life of the soul is to know that for our sakes God has given his Son to death in the flesh, that is, in his true humanity. In short, whether it is bread, or flesh, or faith, it is all one and the same, as those who have ears to hear will quickly perceive.) "These things said he in the synagogue, as he taught in Capernaum. Many therefore of his disciples, when they had heard this, said,
This is a hard saying; who can hear it? When Jesus knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said unto them,
Doth this offend you? What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before? It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you,
ZWINGLI they are spirit, and they are life. But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him." And note what ignorance does. The less it understands a matter, the more arrogantly it draws aside and holds aloof. Therefore Christ says: "Doth this offend you?" that is, Are you so violently incensed against me because I explain myself so clearly?
You know perfectly well that I am not forcing you to eat my physical flesh, but teaching you to believe on me. But if,
_you do not, then take as a token of your unbelief that physical eating of my body by which you hope to lay upon me the scandal of your apostasy. And when you see me ascend up where I was before, then the unbelief which refuses to receive me will be confounded. For my Ascension will show you clearly that I am the Son of God, the Saviour of the world, the Way of life. And there will then be brought to light that secret sin of unbelief which you now falsely excuse by alleging the difficulty of a literal partaking of my flesh (John 16). Moreover, when you see me ascend up to heaven, you will see clearly that you have not eaten me literally and that I cannot be eaten literally. It is the spirit which gives life. I speak of the life of the spirit, the life of the soul. There can be no doubt that only the spirit can give life to the soul. For how could the physical flesh either nourish or give life to the soul? To partake of the flesh does not profit anything if you do it as something necessary to the life of the soul. But the words which I have spoken to you: "He that believeth on me hath everlasting life," and,
''Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life', and similar sayings, should all be interpreted in this sense, that I am the nourishment and consolation of the soul as I was put to death for the world, not as I am eaten with the mouth: for only then do we interpret them spiritually, and only then are they life. Now note, dear reader, that when the ancient doctors speak here of the spiritual and carnal sense, they do not mean carnal in the sense of sinful, as some maintain, nor do they mean by spiritual that which is frequently described as the spiritual sense, as when the enemy in Matthew 19 is referred to as our enemy the devil. But when they speak of the carnal and spiritual sense, by carnal they mean that sense in which it is supposed that we eat the flesh and blood, and by spiritual they mean the interpretation and understanding of Christ himself, which is, that the soul must believe on him.(46)
To quote passages in proof of this statement would take up
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too much space. But with his own words Christ teaches us that everything which he says concerning the eating of flesh or bread has to be understood in terms of believing, and that those who expressed repugnance at the idea of eating flesh did so in error, and in order to have a pretext for departing from him,
'\ for he said: ""There are some of you that believe not.'
Note how salutary is the saying: '""There are some of you that believe not," or have no faith in me, but try to fasten their aversion upon my flesh, which I do not literally give to eat. Yet it is their unbelief which drives them away: that is the true cause of their departing. Obviously he would have been quite satisfied with them if they had believed on him, like Peter, who later said in the name of all the disciples—and with this I will conclude my exposition—''We believe and are sure that thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." He does not say: We believe that we eat thy flesh and blood, but, they believe that he is Christ, the Saviour, the Son of the living God. It was that that saved them. And it was surely the purpose of all the prior discourse of Christ to reveal to them the purpose of the incarnation and the value of his death. And that is the sum of the Gospel.
I have thought it most necessary to indicate the true meaning of what Christ said in John 6 in order that the uninstructed should not be misled by those who support the papacy. And I trust that the proper sense has been so securely established from the words themselves that no further arguments can be brought against it. We will now see whether this is the true sense according to the papal canons, not in order to prove anything to the believer from such a source, but in order to be able to confront the papacy itself with its own canons. For in those canons the interpretation for which we are anathematized is contained just as clearly as it is in our own statement. You will say: Then why does not the papacy abide by its own canons. Answer: That is the complaint which is made by all true believers. For side by side with the truth the papacy says: Let the truth perish, let it be no more held. You may see for yourself how arrogant and dishonest and unbearable that is to true Christians. And the words of the canon or papal decree are those of St. Augustine. It is his words which they have made into the canon or decree.
The words are as follows:
De consecr. di. 2 ca. prima: (47) ""The first heresy (that is, schism) arose amongst the first disciples of Christ (not meaning the twelve, but the many others), and it seemed to derive from
ZWINGLI the obscurity of his sayings. For he said: Except ye eat my flesh and drink my blood, ye have no eternal life in you. And they did not understand his words, but they all said: That is a hard saying, for who can eat his flesh? And with those words: That is a hard saying, they departed from him, and only the twelve remained with him. But when some had departed, he taught the rest, saying: The spirit giveth life; the flesh profiteth nothing. The words which I have spoken unto you are spirit and life. If you understand them spiritually they are spirit and life.'' (Note that here too "'spiritually"' means "'in the sense in which Christ understood them," which was, that we are to believe in him who gave up his flesh and blood to death for our sakes.) "'If you understand them carnally, they are still spirit and life. But they are not spirit and life to you, for you do not understand them spiritually."' (Note that here to understand them "'carnally" is to interpret them in the same way as those who departed from him. Therefore Augustine says that the words of Christ were still spirit and life even though those who departed from him would not receive them spiritually: but they were not spirit and truth to them. From this we may clearly gather that the carnal understanding in terms of flesh and blood does not give life. But now Augustine and the papacy add, still in the name of Christ): "The things which I have said unto you you must understand spiritually. You do not eat the body which you see, nor do you drink the blood which is to be poured out by those who crucify me. I have given you a sacrament (that is, a sign) which spiritually understood will give you life: but the flesh profiteth nothing. But they made answer according to their understanding. They thought of flesh in terms of the flesh which is sold and cut up in the market
(and at this point, good Christian, do not let yourself be led astray or seduced by the papists, as though Augustine were speaking loosely or even representing their view. For he simply reverses the order. The first point is that the Jews applied to the carnal flesh that which Christ spoke only in respect of his suffering; the second, that if the carnal flesh is there, it may be handled and seen and perceived. As Augustine uses the words he is simply thinking of "'carnal flesh"'.) But when Jesus saw it, he said: Does it offend you that I said: I give you my flesh to eat and my blood to drink? What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before? What does this mean? He resolves that which provokes them and explains that which scandalizes them: for they believed that he would
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give them his body, but now he says that he will undoubtedly ascend up whole and entire into heaven. And when you see the Son of man ascend up to heaven where he was before, you will know for certain that he does not give his body as you now imagine. For you will perceive that his grace is not given by eating." (48) Now here, good Christian, you see how the first
Christians thought concerning the body of Christ. On what grounds then do they cry out, Heretic, Heretic, when we do not say anything but that which is contained in their own decrees? And how can anyone put it more plainly: ""You do not eat the body which you see, nor do you drink the blood which is to be poured out by those who crucify me?'? Where then are the papists who say: We eat him as he was present in the crib and at the wedding-feast, and as he hung on the cross? Can that mean anything else, as Augustine observed, but the eating of his flesh in the same way as all other flesh is eaten, the view which Berengar too was forced to confess?
And is not that a necessary view if the word "'is" has to be taken literally, as we have already seen? But no: even of itself the text in John 6: "The flesh profiteth nothing' (meaning the flesh as it is eaten, not as it is crucified) is quite enough to prove that Christ's words: "This is my body," cannot possibly refer to the literal, carnal flesh. For if the flesh profiteth nothing, then Christ did not give it.
But at this point we are informed by some of whom we should least expect it that when Christ says: "The flesh profiteth nothing," we are not to think that he is speaking of his own flesh, but of the nature and frailty of the flesh in general, as in Isaiah 40: "All flesh is grass.''(49) Hence we must interpret his words as follows: A carnal understanding profiteth nothing. For he does not say: "My flesh profiteth nothing":
Indeed, how could he say that when it is the means of our salvation? Answer: This objection is the source of many others which we can now pass over because they have no sure basis in the Word of God. And why should we answer childish objections without any scriptural basis when they will not accept the solid and unshakable text: ""The flesh profiteth nothing," and are unable to make any reply when we show them the true interpretation of the words: "This is my body?" For taken literally these two texts cannot stand together. However, for the sake of Christian courtesy we will reply to all objections.
As regards the first, it is quite true that a carnal understanding profiteth nothing and is indeed harmful. But Christ is not Z.B.—14
ZWINGLI speaking of the carnal understanding as you maintain. For to begin to speak in this critical way about the carnal understanding would not have been sufficiently adapted to the needs of his disciples, the point then at issue being the carnal eating of his flesh. If they were to avoid misunderstanding, then necessarily his answer had to refer to the carnal eating of his flesh. Otherwise Christ was not meeting the error but introducing something completely new concerning the material or carnal understanding. But that was not his custom, for normally he explained sayings which they did not understand.
Indeed, his own words show specifically that he was answering their murmuring against the carnal flesh. For it says that "when
Jesus knew in himself that they murmured at it, he said unto them," etc. These words make it perfectly clear that it was his aim to elucidate that which had given them offence. Again, the fact that his intention was still the same is shown by many of the things which he said, for example: '""Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.' Three times already he had brought this saying, or the drift of it, to their notice. In short, then, the subject of the controversy was his carnal flesh. Therefore the teaching refers to the carnal flesh. And Christ says that literally to eat that flesh profiteth nothing.
As regards the second point, we must not be led astray by the fact that Christ does not say: "My flesh profiteth nothing."
For he was not referring to any flesh except his own. He does not say: "My spirit giveth life,' but simply: "The spirit."
But every believer understands that he is referring to his own spirit, even though he does not say: "'My spirit."
As regards the third, the flesh of Christ does indeed profit us greatly as it was put to death for us. But that was something which the Jews and the disciples refused to accept, for they were thinking in terms of a carnal eating. Therefore he says that eaten it profiteth nothing, although crucified it is the greatest blessing ever experienced or received by our miserable race. Thanks be to God that our opponents cannot bring forward any other arguments apart from feeble sophistries.
But they return to the attack, saying: In this sixth chapter of John there is no reference to the sacrament. Why then do you relate it to that subject? Answer:
Because you have introduced into the sacrament a carnal eating of the flesh and blood.
Now seeing this passage tells us that the carnal eating of
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2I1 Christ's flesh and blood profiteth nothing, and you have introduced such a carnal eating into the sacrament, how refute the error more appositely than by quoting the very words with which Christ himself refuted the same error? It is true that in that discourse Christ was declaring the Gospel. But the Jews and the disciples went astray, conceiving this notion of a literal
| eating of his flesh. And when today we find the same false idea that his flesh is literally eaten in the sacrament, it is only right 7 ~ that we should seek the remedy in the very place where the idea first arose.
So much for the first of those plain Scriptures which strongly forbid a literal or carnal interpretation-ofthe_ words of Christ:
"This is my body." ne The second plain Scripture is isJ Corinthiaws to: "'Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye shouktbe ignorant, how that our fathers etc. ... did all eat the same spiritual meat; and did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them: and that rock was Christ."
The sense of this passage is wrested this way and that by those who do not examine closely the intention of Paul himself. For what Paul was trying to convey was this: that our fathers were just as precious as we are, and that they had the same God as we have and the same Christ as we have, although they fixed their hopes on one who was still to come, we on one who has already come. But in spite of all that they displeased God when they fell into disobedience. He tells us that amongst the other things which our fathers had no less than we was the same spiritual food and the same spiritual drink as we now enjoy. Now there cannot be the slightest doubt that they did not partake of the literal body and blood of Christ, for Christ did not come in the flesh until sixteen hundred years later.
Therefore in their case this eating was simply believing in the one who was to give his flesh and blood to death on their behalf. Similarly in our case the eating and drinking of his body cannot be anything else but believing in the one who has already given his flesh and blood. For he says to auto, that is, "'one and the same food.' This text is sufficiently firm and clear to make it plain to the uninstructed that to feed on Christ is simply to believe on the one who offered up his body and blood for our sakes. It does not make any difference if there are some who scoff. For the text has been misunderstood even by many who are of some account in the Gospel of Christ.
The fact is that those who came before had the same faith as
Z12 ZWINGLI we have, for they had the same God. If they looked to a Christ still to come, whereas to us he has been given, that does not make any difference to faith, for we have the same spirit of faith as they had (II Cor. 4, Gal. 3). That is how Augustine interpreted this passage of Paul, Tract. XLV in Fohannem, clearly teaching that '"'although we have other signs, they still partook of the same Christ as we do." And that partaking cannot be anything else but believing in him.
The third plain Scripture is to be found in the three articles of the Creed, which are based upon the Word of God, otherwise they would not be articles of faith. And the three are as follows: ''He ascended into heaven, And sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty; From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead." The first two are found in Mark 16: "'He was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God." And he is there literally, for Stephen saw him there (Acts 7). But some are so sure of themselves that they make the matter a subject for jest, saying: In Matthew 28 he said just as clearly: "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." And they refer these words to the body of Christ, which cannot possibly be the case, as we shall show clearly in what follows.
For note well, good Christian, that in Christ there are two different natures, the divine and the human: and yet the two are only the one Christ.(50) According to his divine nature
Christ never left the right hand of the Father, for he is one God with the Father, and that is why he says: "I and the Father are one" (John 10), and again, ""No man hath ascended up to heaven: but the Son of man which isin heaven" (John 3).
According to his divine nature he did not need to ascend up to heaven: for he is omnipresent. Even where two or three gather together in his name, he is there in the midst (Matt. 18).
Again, according to this nature he is always at the right hand of the Father, for he says that he is in heaven even when in the body he is upon earth (John 3). That was possible only according to his divine nature. The other nature is Christ's human nature. For our sakes he took this upon him in the pure body of Mary by the receiving and fructifying of the Holy
Spirit, and he carried it truly in this present time. According to this nature he increased and grew both in wisdom and stature. According to it he suffered hunger and thirst and cold and heat and all other infirmities, sin only excepted. According to it he was lifted up on the cross, and with it he ascended up
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into heaven. This nature was a guest in heaven, for no flesh had ever previously ascended up into it. Therefore when we read in' Mark 16 that Christ was received up into heaven and sat on the right hand of God we have to refer this to his human nature, for according to his divine nature he is eternally omnipresent, etc. But the saying in Matthew 28: "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," can refer only to his divine nature, for it is according to that nature that he is everywhere present to believers with his special gifts and comfort.(51) If without distinction we were to apply to his human nature everything that refers to the divine, and conversely, if without distinction we were to apply to the divine nature everything that refers to the human, we should overthrow all Scripture and indeed the whole of our faith.
For what can we make of a saying like: ""My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"' if we try to refer it to his divine nature? And the same is true of countless other Scriptures, although I know that by virtue of the fact that the two natures are one Christ, things which are said of only the one nature are often ascribed to the other. Nevertheless, the proper character of each nature must be left intact, and we ought to refer to it only those things which are proper to it. For instance, it is often said that God suffered on our behalf. This saying is tolerated by Christians and I myself do not object to it: not that the Godhead can suffer,(52) but because he who suffered according to his human nature is very God as well as very man. Yet strictly speaking, the suffering appertains only to the humanity. Similarly the Ascension can be ascribed properly only to his humanity. And 'do not make of this a matter for jest, for according to his divine nature he no more needed to ascend up into heaven than he was capable of suffering, for John says in John 1:
"The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father'"'"— and yet in the flesh he was at that time on the earth and not at the right hand of the Father. Therefore in respect of his divine nature he did not need to ascend up into heaven, although we are not at fault but speak quite rightly if we say: The Son of God ascended up into heaven, for he who ascended up is
God. Strictly speaking, however, the Ascension is proper only to his human nature. Let the ordinary reader hold fast to that truth and not puff himself up with mischievous subtleties, for much contention has arisen in relation to this question and it all comes back ultimately to what I have briefly set out concerning the two natures.
ZWINGLI Hence the content of the two groups of texts must not be confused. That which is said concerning the Ascension must be referred specifically to the human nature, as, for example, in Mark 16: "'He was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God." And that which is proper to his divine nature must be referred specifically to that nature, as for example, his omnipresence, his abiding fellowship with us, his presence in all our hearts, and that all things consist in him, etc. In our reading of Scripture this distinction must always be made. But if Christ is now seated at the right hand of God, and will sit there until he comes at the last day, how can he be literally eaten in the sacrament? You say: He is God. He can be everywhere. But note with what circumspection you say this.
First you say: He is God. You give it to be understood that it is the property of God to be everywhere. But it is not the property of the body. I will elucidate. In John 16 Christ says:
'"T came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father." Note that these words contradict his saying: "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," for here he says: "'Again, I leave the world.'? How then does he leave the world? With his divine presence and protection and grace and goodness and loving-kindness? God forbid: it is not for any creature to say that. But necessarily he has left us, for he said so himself, and he cannot lie. It follows, then, that he has departed from us at any rate in the body, he has left us in the body. And there is nothing singular in that, for in Matthew 26 he said even more plainly: "Ye have the poor always with you; but me ye have not always.' Now if the saying: "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," refers to the body of Christ, it follows that he is with us in the body, but not with divine grace and power, for he said: ""Me ye have not always." But that saying is incredible and misleading if we refer it to his divine nature. Therefore we have conclusive proof that the two sayings: "Again, I leave the world," and: "Me ye have not always," both refer to the departure and absence of his human nature. But if he has gone away, if he has left the world, if he is no longer with us, then either the Creed is unfaithful to the words of Christ, which is impossible, or else the body and blood of Christ cannot be present in the sacrament. The flesh may fume, but the words of Christ stand firm: he sits at the right hand of the Father, he has left the world, he is no longer present with us. And if these words are true, it is
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impossible to maintain that his flesh and blood are present in the sacrament.
These three Scriptures are of themselves quite sufficient to establish the articles of the Creed and to expose the falsity of the alleged presence of the flesh of Christ in the sacrament.
But in order to answer the contentious we will say something more concerning them.
At this point we are attacked by those who say: (53) Note their blasphemies, for they speak as if God were not able to restore to us the body of his Son. Is not that to deny the divine omnipotence? And there are others to whom we have already referred who say: It is the nature and property of the resurrection body to be present at one and the same time both in heaven and also in the sacrament, and indeed everywhere. (54)
To the former group we return this threefold answer.
First, it is those who make God a liar who blaspheme him; for the supreme Good cannot be a liar. Yet God is a liar if he acts contrary to his own Word. But he does not do so. For God has said: "I will not alter the thing that is gone out of my lips"
(Ps. 88 (A.V. 89)). Therefore if he has said: "Again, I leave the world," and: "'Me ye have not always," and if those sayings are to be taken literally, as we have seen, then we make him a liar if we say that he is still here in the body and that he will remain here in the body until the last day. And if they say:
We too have a clear word: "This is my body," that is not the case. For the saying is obscure, and it is contradicted by the clear sayings which we have already noted. Therefore we cannot take it in the sense which they ascribe to it, for the Word of God is not self-contradictory. But the whole context and force both of Scripture and the Creed show us that it cannot bear that crudely literal sense. For if it did, it would be impossible to reconcile it with these other passages. For the whole context and meaning show us that Christ's aim was to teach them that he would ascend up bodily into heaven and sit at the right hand of the Father until the last day. The omnipotence of God accomplishes all things according to the Word of God: it never does that which is contrary to that Word. Therefore it cannot possibly be as they say: for God does not do anything contrary to his own Word. And that is not impotence, but true omnipotence.(55) For because a thing is possible to God it does not follow that it is. It was quite possible for God to make the seven lean years into years of plenty, (56) but the fact that it was possible did not actually make them
ZWINGLI into years of plenty, as we have shown in the Subsidium sive coronis.
Second, we point out that until the last day Christ cannot be anywhere but at the right hand of God the Father. In Psalm
I1o it is written: '"'Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool."' Paul refers to this text in I Corinthians 15 when he teaches that Christ will sit at the right hand of the Father until the last day. But if Christ is seated there, he is not present here. And if he were here, we could not speak of his return, for he would have returned already. The proof of this is in Matthew 26: "Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven." What could be clearer than that? The word ap arti, "hereafter," is of itself quite enough to show us that we must seek him at the right hand of the Father until that day when he returns in the clouds to judgment. That "'hereafter'' extends to the last day. And that 1s the basis of the third article in the Creed: ''From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead." This article requires that he shall not come from thence until he comes to judge. For it says: "From thence he shall come to judge," not, ""From thence he shall come into the bread."' It follows, therefore, that he will not come from the right hand of the Father until he comes to judge.
That is what David says in Psalm 110, it is what Christ himself tells us, and it is what we are taught by this article of the Creed, which it would be a heresy to deny. Again, Christ himself says in Matthew 25: '""When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory: and before him shall be gathered all nations,"' etc.
_ But if he is present in the bread, or if the bread is the body of Christ, then the last day has already come, he is already present, he is already seated on the judgment throne. But if E the last day has not yet come, he is not present in the flesh: for when he does come in the flesh, he will sit in judgment. I know quite well how the foolish try to evade this: The judgments and penalties of God are daily with us, and therefore the body of Christ is present daily. Answer: We have no right to obscure the matter in this way. For it is evident that Christ is speaking here only of the last judgment, to which the whole world will come, from the first man to the last. He is not speaking of daily judgments at which his presence in the flesh is neither required nor promised.
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Third, Christ cannot come in any way but visibly. For in Acts 1 it is written: 'While they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; 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." This text will not cause any difficulty to the ordinary reader. If he came in the bread in the same visible form as the disciples saw him go up, we would believe that he is there: for the angels said that he would so come in like manner as they saw him go. But if he does not come openly and visibly, we will not expect his bodily return until he does come as he said by the angels. And no matter what protestations may be made of his bodily presence, we will believe neither angels from heaven, nor men, nor devils, until we see him come in the same visible form as the disciples saw him go. It was to this that St. Paul referred in I Corinthians
11 when he said: ""Ye do shew the Lord's death till he come."
If Paul had believed that we eat the body of Christ in the Supper he could not have said "till he come."" And he knew perfectly well that according to his divine nature he is with us always. Therefore in these words he is necessarily referring to his human nature. In the same way Christ himself says in Matthew 24: "For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be."' When we see him as clearly as the lightning we shall have every reason to believe that he is really present. When we do not see him, we are not exercising faith by believing something for which we have no clear word of Scripture. Again, in Luke 17, when his disciples asked him concerning the time of the last judgment, Jesus said: ""Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together." By giving them this illustration as his answer, he meant to teach them that as the eagles gather together where the body is, so where his body is we shall be also.(57) He is really present when we are with his body in the same sure and visible way as the eagles are with their prey. As long as that is not so, we must be content to await his coming until we can see him with the same openness and certainty as he himself has taught.
To the others,(58) who say: After the resurrection the body of Christ can be wherever he himself wills: therefore he sits at the right hand of God and yet at the same time he is eaten by us.
ZWINGLI For if he can be wherever he wills, then he is present everywhere, even though we do not know either the cause, manner or mode of his omnipresence. He was born of the Virgin Mary without violation of her maidenly purity. He passed through closed doors. Twice he made himself invisible and escaped the hands of his enemies. All these things are beyond our comprehension. Yet we firmly believe that his body has in fact been transformed in this way. To such we give the following answers.
First, they make all these statements without any warrant in God's Word. For the thesis upon which their doctrine is grounded is merely a theological deduction, namely, to say that it is the property of Christ's resurrection body to be wherever he wills. And this is a mischievous assertion for which there is no basis in the Word of God, although they do try to make it more plausible by saying that the transformation applies only to the bodies of the elect and not of the reprobate.
But if that is the case, then it follows at once that it is not the property of the resurrection body as such, for otherwise all the resurrected could be wherever they willed. And then they add: But the elect will to be where God wills, of which I have not the slightest doubt. But if so, it follows necessarily that Christ is where his heavenly Father wills, and nowhere else.
But as David tells us in Psalm 110: the Father said that he should sit at his right hand until he made his enemies his footstool, that is, until the last day, as St. Paul tells us in I Corinthians
15 and as we have made as clear as the day in our previous exposition. Therefore he is nowhere else: for by the word
"until," which the theologians (59) have never been able properly to explain, we see that a clear reference is made to the fact that he is now seated above and that we shall not see him until the last day. Hence it is quite evident that the view under discussion is only an opinion of men, so that we are not really under any obligation to answer it. Nevertheless it is only right that we should try to meet its exponents with charity and truth. And it is also right that we should expose the futility of their evasion. Consider, then, that notwithstanding his birth of a pure virgin, Mary, the body of Christ was not ubiquitous, as we shall see. He did not always pass through closed doors.
In short, he is only in the one place at the one time, as we shall show in our second answer from God's Word. The fact that he is wherever he wills does not mean that he is everywhere at once. For in the body he does not will to be anywhere except at the right hand of the Father.
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Second, it belongs only to the divine nature of Christ to be ubiquitous. Otherwise Christ could not have ascended up bodily into heaven, as we have seen, for he would be there already.
Note that in the early Church there was an obstinate heretic named Marcion who refused to believe that Christ was very man.(60) In defence of his opinion he alluded to the passages already mentioned. Christ was born of a virgin. He made himself invisible. Without support he walked miraculously on the water. He appeared to his disciples, etc. But Marcion found his main prop in the text: "This is my body," which he expounded in the following way: It cannot be his body that is eaten, because he did not have a substantial or natural body; for we could not eat such a body. Hence it follows
| that it is only an incorporeal and spiritual body. To that | interpretation the pious teachers and evangelists of the time made this reply: that he did not give us his material body to eat, but in the bread and wine he appointed a sign or sacrament of his very flesh and blood which he truly bore and truly offered up to death.(61) I mention this point only in passing.
And now I come to the answer. If we wish to argue that Christ's body is in the bread in the same way as it was born of the Virgin
Mary and passed through closed doors, etc., then we either have to say that his passion did not cause him any hurt, that he did not experience it, or else we have to accept the heretical doctrine of Marcion. And for the following reason. If we partake of him miraculously, in the same way as he was miraculously born of Mary without violation of her virginity, or miraculously put to death without any suffering: for as he left the virginity of Mary inviolate, so he himself remained inviolate, for his words are these: '""This is my body whichis broken, that is, put to death for you"' (62)—if, then, we partake of him as he was put to death, and if we also partake of him as he was born of the Virgin and passed unhindered through closed doors, it follows necessarily either that he did not experience his passion or that he had only an incorporeal and spiritual body, as Marcion heretically maintained. But to believe this is to offer the most grievous and outrageous insult to the Christ who suffered so bitterly for us miserable sinners. And that is what happens when we oppose the evident truth with our human reason and the words and subtleties of man. But no: Let us look only to the truth and we shall see clearly the error of those who would tell us that the partaking of the body of Christ takes place invisibly and imperceptibly, saying: We eat him
ZWINGLI corporally modo quodam ineffabili, that is, in a way which defies expression. And for this reason : If they tell us that the words:
"This is my body," must be interpreted literally, then consider the words which follow: "Which is broken, that is, put to death for you."' For if he suffered death visibly and perceptibly, not invisibly and imperceptibly, and if he gave his body to be eaten as he gave it to his passion, then necessarily his body is pressed with the teeth visibly, perceptibly and materially: for that was how he was pierced and smitten by the cruel thorns and the lash and the nails and the spear so that even the sun and earth and stones could not withold their pity.
This, then, is our answer to those who maintain that we eat his flesh invisibly and imperceptibly, or as he rose again from the dead: We have to concede either that he suffered imperceptibly, or that his disciples did not eat in the same way as we do: for he had not yet risen again when he instituted this act of thanksgiving. For he does not say: "This is my body which is to rise again from the dead," but: "'which is given up to death for you."' And here we must leave the point.
The third answer we have already outlined, namely, that those who maintain that we partake of the body of Christ as he rose again from the dead are already opposed by the fact that Christ is speaking of his mortal body: ''which is broken, that is, put to death for you." For as we have already said, if we wish to refer the words: ""This is my body," to the literal flesh, as if he were giving us that to eat, then the words which follow are: "which is given, that is, put to death for you," and we have to partake of him as he was put to death and not as he rose again. Hence their speculations are shown to be groundless and even mischievous, obscuring and confounding the Word of God. But in order to counter them thoroughly we will now prove to them from the Word of God that it is not possible for the body of Christ to be in many or all places at one and the same time, but that even after the resurrection it is possible for his body only to be in the one place. In this way we shall deprive their philosophy of the ubz or locus (63) with which they sustain themselves. Now we have already made it sufficiently clear that although Christ was born without any violation of the virginity of his mother, the pure Virgin Mary, that does not mean that his body could be in many places at one and the same time, for there is no record of anyone being in different places simultaneously. We will now prove that even after his resurrection he could not be in
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many places at one and the same time. First, it is the same thing to be in many places and to be everywhere, which is proper only to his divine nature. With that in mind let us consider the words
' of the angel in Matthew 28 when he told those that sought him, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary: "I know that ye
| seek Jesus, which was crucified. He is not here," etc. But if the body of Jesus was everywhere, then the angel was not telling the truth, for necessarily he was there also. But if he was not there, it is a sure sign that he cannot be in more than one place, for he was not at the place where the women sought him. Yet he says that where two or three are gathered together in his name he is there in the midst. Seeing then that he was not there, it follows that he is omnipresent only according to his divine nature and not his human. Similarly Christ himself says in Matthew 24: "There shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders," etc. "'Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not," etc. In this and in other passages already mentioned we are given clearly to understand that we must not seek him in the body, for if we do we are acting like those who say:
I have seen the Lord God here or eaten him there, etc. If he is in many places at once he is in all places at once, and in that case he would not have taught us not to believe those who show him in this place or that. Do not let yourself be misled, good
Christian, by the fact that some interpret the passage differently, for he specifically teaches us not to allow ourselves to be deceived when we are told that he has come in this place or that. Read Luke 17 on the point and you will get a full understanding. Similarly in John 12 he says: ""'Where I am, there shall also my servant be.'' The text refers to both natures, but it refers primarily to the human. For his sake the disciples would have tribulations, but he consoled them with the fact that they were finally to be with him. And if they are where he is, that is, in heaven, where he is seated at the right hand of the Father, then it follows that in the body he is only in one place: otherwise the disciples would be in more than one place, seeing they are with him. Similarly in John 14: "I will receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also."
This can refer only to his human nature, for otherwise the creature cannot be where the Creator is, or they would be everywhere as God is, which is a heresy. But if the disciples are where he is, it follows that in the body he is only in one
ZWINGLI place, otherwise the disciples would be in many places, and indeed they would be in the host, as they call it. Again, in John
17 he says: "Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am."' This verse teaches us that according to his humanity he cannot be in more than one place even after his resurrection, for in the same passage he speaks of his ascension into heaven and of their being left physically in the world. You may be told, ordinary reader, that in this verse we are doing violence to the text of Scripture, but do not be concerned no matter who it may be that tells you. Let him state his view in writing and with the help of God we will prove that what we teach is the truth and that the word of truth is in us.
We will now prove to the papacy from their own canons that the risen body of Christ cannot be in more than one place at one and the same time. For in De consecra. dist. 2 ca. prima, paragr. finali,(64) it is written: ""The Lord himself is above until the end of the world; but the faithfulness (65) of the Lord is still with us. For the body which is risen is necessarily in one place: but his faithfulness or grace is poured out everywhere." (66) Thus far from the papacy's own book. And what could be clearer? You will see that by the Lord he means Christ.
Therefore if the body of the risen Christ is necessarily only in the one place, without doubt that place cannot be any other than at the right hand of the Father. And if so, how can he be here below in the bread? The papists will try to win you over to some other interpretation, as we have shown, but do not allow yourself to be outwitted. Hold fast to the words: The body which is risen is necessarily in one place, and you will counter all their objections.
If God wills, all men of piety will now perceive the honesty of those who allege against us that like the Jews we are going about to cast down from heaven the Lord Jesus Christ, the very
Son of God our Saviour, and to deny him and the like. For it will be evident to them that in large measure we deduce our understanding of the partaking of his flesh from the fact that he sits unchanged at the right hand of the divine majesty until the last day, and then eternally. To whom be praise and glory, world without end. Amen.
THE THIRD ARTICLE
In the first article, God willing, it was made clear from the nature of Christ's words that the saying: ""This is my body,"
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cannot be taken literally, otherwise we tear his flesh with our teeth in the very same way as it was pierced by the nails and the spear. In the second we considered the clear Scriptures which will not permit of the literal presence of his flesh and blood in this sacrament, a necessary procedure if we are not to rush to the details of the letter of Holy Scripture but in everything to test the meaning which Scripture as a whole will bear.
For if Scripture is spoken by God, as is taught by Peter and Paul, then it cannot contradict itself. If it appears to do so, it is because we do not rightly understand it, comparing Scripture with Scripture. In this connection it has been made perfectly clear that the three articles of the Creed, '"'He ascended into heaven, And sitteth on the right hand of God the Father
Almighty; From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead," cannot be maintained if we accept the view that he is eaten in the body. Our present task is to indicate that interpretation of the words: '""This is my body," which will best harmonize with the rest of Scripture and the three articles of the Creed. With the help of God we will do this no less forcefully in this third section. O Lord open thou our eyes.
Now first we must understand that throughout the Bible there are to be found figures of speech, called in the Greek tropos, that is, metaphorical, or to be understood in another sense. For instance, in John 15 Christ says: "I am the vine."
This means that Christ is like a vine when considered in relation to us, who are sustained and grow in him in the same way as branches grow in the vine. Similarly the words: "'Ye are the branches," are a trope. We have to take them metaphorically, that is, we are like branches, as we have seen already. Similarly, in John 1: "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," the first part of the verse is a trope, for Christ is not literally a lamb. Necessarily, then, it has quite a different meaning, namely, that he is the pure offering which takes away the sin of the whole world. Similarly in John 6: "I am the living bread," the word "'bread'' has to be taken metaphorically, namely: I am the living food, nourishment or consolation of the soul. Similarly in Matthew 21, when Christ refers to himself as a stone: '"Whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken," there is a twofold trope or metaphor: in the word ''stone"', which signifies Christ in his unshakable constancy, and in the words "'fall on it'? which are a figure for "do him violence,"' etc. Now the word '"'is" is used with particular frequency in a figurative or metaphorical sense.
; ,4
ZWINGLI For example, in Luke 8 Christ says: ""The seed is the Word of God." The sense here is necessarily a non-literal one, namely, that the seed of which he has been speaking signifies the Word of God. In this instance, then, the word "'is"' is used for "'signify,"' that is: '""The seed signifies the Word of God." Similarly in Matthew 13, in his exposition of the parable of the wheat and the tares, Christ says: "He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man," that is, the man of whom it is said that he soweth the good seed signifies the Son of man. Again, "'the field is the world" means '"'the field signifies the world." Again, "'the good seed are the children of the kingdom" means "'the children of the kingdom are signified by the good seed." Again,
"the tares are the children of the wicked one," means, "the children of the wicked one are signified by the tares." Again,
"the enemy that sowed them is the devil," means, "the enemy signifies the devil." "The harvest is the end of the world? —'"is" is used for "'signifies." "The reapers are the angels'—"'are" for "'signify.'"' In all these sayings "is"? means "signifies," or "are" "'signify."? But someone says: Yes, but this is only in parables. Answer: Not so, it is in the exposition of parables, when everything must be as clear as possible. And where it is does not really make the slightest difference. We are simply trying to show that there are innumerable passages in Scripture in which the word "'is" is used for "signifies." And to those who have briefly Pia relic this fact, but in Latin,(67) I will make this short answer: If I may be allowed to say so, they observe neither grammar nor logic. We may find another example in the Old Testament, in Genesis 41, when Joseph is expounding the dream and says: "The seven good kine and the seven good ears are seven fruitful years,' and again, ""The seven thin kine and the seven empty ears are seven years of famine"': in both these cases by virtue of the trope or figure the word
"are" is used for "'signify.'' But it is objected that in the Hebrew there is no word for "are.'? Answer: And do you know how it is that there is no word for "'are''? But this is no time for childish frolic. There is no word for "'is" and ''are'' simply because the Hebrew language is not the same as the German. Ifit were, the words "'is'" and ''are''? would be present when occasion required. But in Hebrew there are expressions which have the same sense as in German, as shown above. A more detailed answer will be given in Latin.(68) We will now omit as superfluous the many other instances which might be cited, for we have already furnished an adequate number of incontrovertible passages.
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Our next task is to see whether Christ's words in Matthew 26: "This is my body," can also be taken metaphorically or tropice. It has already become clear enough that in this context the word "is" cannot be taken literally. Hence it follows that it must be taken metaphorically or figuratively.
In the words: 'This is my body," the word '"'this" means the bread, and the word "body" the body which is put to death for us. Therefore the word "is" cannot be taken literally, for the bread is not the body aiid cannot be, as we have seen already. Necessarily, then, it must be taken figuratively or metaphorically; '"This is my body," means, "The bread signifies my body," or "'is a figure of my body.' For immediately afterwards in Luke 22 Christ adds: '"This do in remembrance of me," from which it follows that the bread is only a figure of his body to remind us in the Supper that the body was crucified for us. And now out of the Old Testament we will show how exactly the trope or metaphor corresponds to the words used.
In Exodus 12 we are specifically told that in one night God smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both of man and beast, but spared the children of Israel, for he instructed them to take a lamb and to kill it and to cover with the blood the two side-posts and the upper door post of their houses, that he might see the sign and not smite there. And before that awful night they were to eat the lamb roast with fire: ""And thus shall ye eat it: with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff-in-your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord's(passover.% Note that the lamb itself is here called a Pe caivalis cic when they first ate the lamb the passover had not yet taken place. And apart from that, a lamb is not a passover, for a passover is forbearance to smite, whereas a lamb is flesh and blood, etc. Yet God himself says: "'It is the passover."" Therefore in this context the little word
'"'is'" is necessarily figurative, that is, it is used for "'signify'': the reas signifies the passover, that is, it is to do so in the night which follows: and this passover was later celebrated every year by the children of Israel. The fact that the words are wrested by some scholars merely serves to confirm our interpretation, for nothing can be gained by wresting the verse, as we shall show in our Latin work. No type of Christ is moré precious, more exact or more evident than that of the\ Paschal Lamb. and that is why Christ shared it with his disciples with such
S joy just before his death (Luke 22). And for that reason, when we ponder and investigate the figurative meaning of Christ's
Z.B.—15
ZWINGLI words, there is no text to which we may turn more confidently than that which speaks of the Paschal Lamb: for everything corresponds. The Paschal Lamb was eaten the night before the smiting and passing over, and yet then and in years to come it was to be the representation of the Lord's Passover. In the same way Christ instituted the remembrance of his death the night before he died, and that remembrance of his death, instituted before he died, is to be observed by all believers until he comes. In the former the Egyptians were smitten and the children of Israel were passed over. In the latter Christ is taken and put to death and the murderer Barabbas is passed over, our guilt being borne by the righteousness of Christ, as we have shown at greater length in the Subsidium. (69)
And now compare the two texts: The Paschal Lamb is the passover, that is, the Paschal Lamb represents the passing over of the angel of God; and, ""This is my body," that is, This represents my body, the eating of this bread being the sign and symbol that Christ, the soul's true consolation and nourishment, was crucified for us. But some argue: In the text about the former Paschal Lamb the word "'it'' or "'this'" does not refer to the lamb but to the feast, thus: The feast is the passover, the word "'this"' referring then to the feast. To such we make this reply: It is not at all the case that the word "'this"' refers to the feast, as they maintain, but it refers to the Paschal Lamb, as the text itself makes perfectly clear. But even assuming that the word "'this"? does refer to the feast: The feast is the passover, we still have to make enquiry concerning the origin of the feast, for all feasts derive from something. And they are forced to answer: it derives from the lamb and the passover. But if it is found that it derives from the lamb and the passover, the victory is with us, for the words: The lamb is the passover, relate to the original lamb. You see then that there is no solid foundation for some of the epistles now circulated so widely.(70) But again, even assuming that the word "this" refers to the feast: The feast is the passover, we have still to explain the word '"'is," for a feast cannot be a passover. Necessarily the word "'is'' is used for "represents" or "'signifies," and even if they try to argue that the Paschal Lamb is a feast, we have still to ask of what it is the feast, and again we are brought back to the passover: the lamb is a figure of that first passing over. But further, if we allow that it is a feast, and do not press the enquiry into the derivation— although the origin ought to be investigated and discovered—then we have every right to take the words of
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Christ: "This is my body," to mean, This bread is a feast, just as we take the words: The lamb is the passover, to mean, the lamb is a feast. For it is indeed a feast of thanksgiving, as Paul shows us in I Corinthians 5, and as Origen describes it in his exposition of Leviticus, basing his statement upon the most primitive Fathers.(71) In short, once we have proved that the words: "This is my body," are necessarily figurative or metaphorical, it is self-evident that they bear a similar sense to the words: ""This is the Lord's passover,"' namely, The bread represents my body which is given for you, and, The lamb represents the passover of the Lord. That this is the true and natural sense we are clearly taught by various points in the context.
The first of these is the clear saying of Christ himself in Matthew 26;°when after instituting the sacrament he said:
"But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my
Father's kingdom."' Note that even after Christ had given them the wine, describing it as his blood, he could still point to it and call it the fruit of the vine. This is a clear indication that when he said: '""This is my blood,"' he was not speaking literally but metaphorically: This wine represents my blood, for immediately after he himself calls it the fruit of the vine. And he used the word "'fruit'? deliberately, for it shows us plainly that literally and according to its true nature and kind this drink is really wine, and comes from the vine. Why then cannot we accept it as the fruit of the vine as Christ himself does? The fact that Luke puts the saying earlier helps to serve the same purpose, for Luke puts it first in order to prevent any misunderstanding of the saying which follows, as though the wine were really blood.
The second point is the perfect calm of the disciples. They were not at all excited or perturbed. They did not begin to question and argue amongst themselves.
Yet only a few moments previously, in a matter of far less importance than this is, if it is as we are supposed to picture it, the very same disciples had been greatly agitated and slow of understanding, and even Peter had tried to find reasons for not allowing his feet to be washed. But in this matter there is not the least hint of any word of incredulity. But surely we have good grounds to think that it is here rather than when he was with him in the boat in Luke 5 that Peter would have said: ''Depart from me, for I am a sinful man O Lord," if he had really understood Christ to mean that he was eating him in the flesh?
ZWINGLI Surely all the disciples would have echoed amongst themselves the words of the centurion in Matthew 8: "Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under the roof of my sinful mouth."
But this was not the case. We are told neither that they exclaimed violently nor that they recoiled and shrank back from him in awe. And for this reason: Being Jews, they did not find anything novel in the words: "This is my body." For every year when they ate the Paschal Lamb they heard the similar words: "The lamb is the passover,' and they had always taken it that these words meant simply that the lamb represents the passover. Hence they perceived that the Lord was instituting a similar feast of thanksgiving and using not dissimilar words. The result was that they did not feel any particular surprise, or awe, or sense of novelty at that which Christ said and did.
The third point is that none of the apostles ever taught specifically that in this sacrament the bread becomes the body and the wine the blood of Christ. Yet surely the very contrary is to be expected, for if they had preached concerning this sacrament as is done today all kinds of curious questions would have arisen and to these they would have had to make some answer. But that was not the case, and even after he has given a full account of the institution St. Paul still calls the elements bread and wine, as Christ himself did.
We will now examine the incident word by word as described by Luke in chapter 22 and Paul in I Corinthians 11. In the light of these narratives I hope before God that we shall be able to understand with the same clarity as the disciples themselves the words recorded in Matthew 26 and Mark 14. The text in Luke 22 is as follows: "And he took bread and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me."
We must not separate the two phrases, "This is my body," and, ''which is given for you,' but keep them together: for only when they are kept together is the saying of Christ complete. Hence it follows that Christ is speaking only of that body which is given for us in death. It follows, too, that the bread itself is not the body, otherwise the body would be given for us in the form of bread: for the words are these: ""This— and he points to the bread—is my body." If then the bread is his body, it is also given for us, for he says that the bread is his body which is given for us. Therefore if the bread is his body which is given for us, the bread is given for us. But that is not
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the natural sense of the words of Christ. For the word "'is" cannot possibly connect bread and body in a literal sense, but must be understood metaphorically, that is, the bread represents my body which is given for you, or, the bread is a figure of my body. But in what way? How does the sacramental bread represent the body of Christ? Answer: When Christ himself says: ""Which is given for us,'' what he means is simply this, that the bread is a sign that his body is given for us, and his next words make this perfectly clear, for he says: '"'Do this in remembrance of me." These words tell us why it is that he has instituted this symbolical bread, for the remembrance of Christ and his self-offering for us. Hence it follows once again that the bread is the body in the sense that it signifies the body, for by it we are reminded of the body, the body itself not being present. In I Corinthians 11 Paul gives us the words in this form: '"This is my body, which is broken for you." ''Given for us" and "broken for us" are one and the same. It is simply that Paul wishes to touch on an analogy concealed at this point, namely, that as Christ is broken, that is, put to death for us, so in remembrance of him we offer one another the bread and break it, each representing and communicating with the other, as Christ did for us all.
The institution of the cup is given by Luke as follows: "'This cup—the word 'vessel' or 'cup' is used for its contents, just as we often say that we have drunk a cup or beaker of wine, although we do not in fact drink the vessel—is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you." To elucidate this saying, let us turn to the words of I Corinthians 11, where Paul says: ""The wine, the new testament, is in my blood," etc.
And briefly the meaning is this: The wine is the new testament.
The new testament is in my blood. And my blood is shed for you.
Note that neither in Luke nor Paul are we told that the wine is the blood of Christ. By this we may see clearly that the other two evangelists merely intended to say the same as these two.
For although they say: '""This—that is, the wine—is my blood," what they mean is that the wine is a sign, a figure, a memorial of the blood of the new testament which was shed for us. And seeing there is an evident trope or metaphor in this case, the same principle has to be applied in the case of the bread. But some argue: (72) If the wine is the new testament, it is also the blood of Christ. For the blood of Christ is the new testament.
Answer: The new testament is not the blood of Christ. It is the free and gracious remission of our sins. That is the new covenant
ZWINGLI of Jeremiah 31 and Hebrews 8. And that remission is wrought for us by the blood of Christ. It is free, but it not free to Christ, for he purchased it dearly enough. Yet God gave it to us without any merit on our own part, of his own free grace. Hence it; follows that Christ's blood is not the new testament itself, but the blood of the new testament, that is, the blood by which the new testament, the free remission of sins, is wrought and won. Similarly in the Old Testament the blood sprinkled upon the people and the law is called the blood of the covenant, or testament, but it is not the testament itself (Exod. 24), for the testament is that which is preached to them. Therefore we never find the blood of Christ described as a testament but only as the blood of the testament. And when the wine is called the new testament we have to see that this is a manner of speech, like that which we find in Genesis 17, where circumcision is called the covenant, although properly it is only the sign of the covenant. Similarly in the Eucharist the wine is referred to as the new testament because it is a sign of the blood of Christ with which the new testament was won for us, as we have already seen. If you wish to pursue the point further you may consult my Subsidium.(73) The words, '"'which is shed for you," form an additional answer to the objection, for it is not the wine which is shed for us but the blood of Christ.
And if the blood itself is not called a testament, how much less can that which represents it be a testament? That it is called a testament is in line with the common practice in Scripture of giving to signs the names of the things which they signify, as we have shown.
Reading on in I Corinthians 11 we now come to the verse which teaches us clearly both what the remembrance is and to what it refers: "'As often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup—note that even after the institution he still calls the elements bread and wine, which he would not have done had he thought of them as we once did—ye do shew the Lord's death till he come." In this verse the word "shew" simply means to praise, honour, give thanks, as in I Peter 2 and many Old
Testament passages. This is clear proof that Paul regarded it as a public thanksgiving. ""Till he come"' necessarily refers to the body, for according to his divinity he is always with us.
But he is not with us if he is still to come. And Paul's meaning is that the Christian Church must not cease to give thanks until he comes at the last day.
In order to be brief we will omit the other passages in Paul
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except for the saying: "'But he that eateth unworthily is guilty of the body and blood of Christ, not discerning the Lord's body."
What Paul has in mind here is that we must all go to the Supper worthily, that is, with a true faith, for those who do not go with a true faith are guilty of the body and blood of Christ, not the body which we eat, but the real body which Christ gave in death.(74) For if a man professes a true faith in Christ and yet all the time he is dissembling before God, he is guilty of that innocent blood in which he does not believe, although outwardly he appears to do so. This is how the words were understood by Augustine in Jo. tractatu LXII and also by Ambrose on I Corinthians 11.
Our next task is to show that the Christians and Fathers of the first five centuries all understood Christ's words: ""This is my body," in a figurative and not a literal sense. However, the learned and pious Oecolampadius has already published a most Christian book (75) in which he has proved this interpretation at great length out of the early Fathers, and seeing this book has now been translated (76) I will here refer to only three of these Fathers, the three who are best known to the ordinary and uninstructed Christian: Jerome, Ambrose and Augustine. erome speaks of the words: ""This is my body," in the following terms: (77) '"'When the figure of the passover had been fulfilled and he had eaten the flesh of the lamb with his disciples, he took bread, which strengthens the heart of man, and followed the pattern of the passover, that as Melchisedek, a priest of the Most High God, had done in type when he brought forth bread and wine, he represented and signified the reality of his body and blood." Thus far Jerome, and do not be misled because he speaks of the offering of Melchisedek, for that is a difficulty with which we have frequently dealt. But note with what clarity Jerome at once describes the bread as simply a sign or sacrament of the Paschal Lamb, that is, Christ. He sees clearly that it is the intention of Christ to signify or represent his very body and blood. Hence Jerome takes the words of Christ: '"This is my body," to mean: The bread represents my body, the very body which I give for you.
Ambrose comments on I Corinthians
as follows: (78) "Seeing we are redeemed by the death of the Lord, we remember it constantly; and when we eat and drink the flesh and blood, we represent the things which are offered up for us."
The papacy includes these words of Ambrose in the canons
ZWINGLI de cons. di. 2 ¢. Quia morte, but they are there ascribed to Augustine, although they are not really his.(79) I have translated the words as the papists themselves interpret them, lest they should have any cause for complaint. But they might equally well be translated: 'Seeing we are redeemed by the death of Christ, we remember it constantly; and when we eat and drink
(i.e., the sacramental bread and wine of which he is speaking), we represent the flesh and blood which are offered up for us."'(80) By misinterpreting the words of Ambrose the papists can say: We eat the flesh and blood of Christ in remembrance of the flesh and blood offered up for us, for he says that when we eat and drink the flesh and blood we represent the things which are offered up for us. Our answer: If I have heard you rightly, there is a twofold flesh and blood, the first, that which was put to death for us and now sits at the right hand of the Father; the second, that which we eat in remembrance of the true flesh which was put to death for us. For it is impossible to deny that the flesh and blood which was put to death for us ascended up into heaven, as Christ himself said in Luke 24:
"Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have."
In these words it was the express purpose of Christ to show that the body which had been raised was the same as that which had died. And that means that it was the same body which departed from them into heaven, for immediately after it says:
"And it came to pass,. while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven."' Note that the body which ascended up into heaven was the same as that which he had just commanded them to touch. Therefore we cannot possibly regard the resurrection body as a representation of that which was crucified, as some would maintain; for the resurrection body is identical with that which was crucified: otherwise the resurrection of Christ was vain, which it is an outrage against our most holy faith (81) even to suggest. At this point we may note that in the phrase: '""'When we eat and drink the flesh and blood we represent the things which are offered up for us," Ambrose is necessarily using the words
"flesh and blood'' for "'bread and wine," that is, the thing signified for the significant sign. In Greek this form of speech was called metonymia or catachresis, that is, the use of one word for another: for Christ called the bread his body whex what he meant was that it is a representation of his body. (82)
And that this is Ambrose's view is shown by the words: ''We
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represent the things which are offered up for us."' We do not eat the things which are offered up for us. We merely represent them. For if we were to eat them, we should eat them as they were offered up: for he says: ""This is my body which is given for you." Note that "offered up" and "'given"' are equivalent.
But this is unnecessary, for what Ambrose means is simply that when we eat and drink the bread and wine, which are the signs of the flesh and blood, we show thereby that the flesh and blood were offered up for us. For just before he had called it a remembrance of our redemption, etc. From the words of Ambrose it may be clearly seen that for him '"'is" had the force of "represents," est of significat. It should also be noted in this connection that when the early doctors called the bread and wine flesh and blood, they were speaking in exactly the same way as Christ himself, meaning that the bread and wine
© were the signs of the very flesh and blood which were given for us. I myself used the term '"'sacrament of the sacred body and blood of Christ"' in just the same way in the exposition of my theses: (83) for the very body of Christ sits at the right hand of the Father, but the sacrament, that is, the sign of that sacred and living body is now eaten by us in Christian fellowship in thanksgiving and remembrance that his body was slain for us.
| And because it represents that body, it is often called the body | and blood of Christ, for that is what it was called by Christ himself.
The words of Augustine may be found in de cons. di. 2 c. Semel Christus,(84) and they are as follows: "Christ once died, the just for the unjust. And we know, and are sure, and have a constant hope, that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more: death hath no more dominion over him. These are
Paul's words. But that we might not forget that which once happened we are to keep it annually in remembrance in the Paschal feast. Is Christ slain again on these occasions? No: but the annual remembrance signifies or represents that which once happened, thereby recalling it as though we actually saw the Lord present on the cross." (85) All these are the words of Augustine, and they make it plain that the sacrament is simply a recalling or representing of something which happened only the once: for in the preface to his exposition of the third Psalm he says: "Christ took Judas with him to the Last Supper, in which he gave his disciples and bade them observe a representation or sign of his body and blood." (86)
It is hardly necessary to give any further extracts from the
ZWINGLI early Fathers, for Oecolampadius has given a sufficient number of references in his little work. There are some with more impudence than erudition who venture to assert that we do violence to the Fathers, but we will deal with such in our reply to their writings. Those who are more erudite than impudent will see that the Fathers held exactly the same view as we do.
And they use exactly the same speech as we do, for they call the bread and wine the body and blood of Christ, although what they really mean is that they are the representation and memorial of his body and blood, just as a faithful wife, whose husband has left her a ring as a keepsake, frequently refers to the ring as her husband, saying: This is my late husband, although what she means is that it recalls her husband.(87)
Or again, as Augustine shows in his epistle to Boniface,(88) we often say: Today is the Lord's ascension or the Lord's resurrection, or the annunciation of Mary, and yet the annunciation of Mary and the resurrection and ascension of her Son took place only once. But to the anniversaries of what took place only once we give the same names as were given at the time of their occurrence and institution. That is why in our act of remembrance we have retained the words of Christ and of Paul in exactly the same form as originally given,(89) and together with them we have given the following words of explanation to point to a right understanding: "That on the night that he gave himself up to death, by which death he brought to an end the blood of the Old Testament and abrogated all carnal offering, our Lord Jesus Christ purposed to institute a remembrance of that his death, and his grace and redemption. The deliverance and exodus from Egypt was a type of his redemption, and in that deliverance a lamb was slain and eaten as a sign of the passover and the blood was sprinkled on the side posts and the upper door posts, all which expressly typified and represented the Lord Jesus Christ. In the same way he himself instituted a remembrance of that deliverance by which he redeemed the whole world, that we might never forget that for our sakes he exposed his body to the ignominy of death, and not merely that we might not forget it in our hearts, but that we might publicly attest it with praise and thanksgiving, joining together for the greater magnifying and proclaiming of the matter in the eating and drinking of the sacrament of his sacred passion, which is a representation of Christ's giving of his body and shedding of his blood for our sakes. And this he signified by the words: 'This is (that is,
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represents) my body,' just as a wife may say: "This is my late husband,' when she shows her husband's ring. And when we poor creatures observe this act of thanksgiving amongst ourselves, we all confess that we are of those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and seeing this confession is demanded of us all, all who keep the remembrance or thanksgiving are one body with all other Christians. Therefore if we are the members of his body, it is most necessary that we should live together as Christians, otherwise we are guilty of the body and blood of Christ, as Paul says." And if only the sacrament had been administered after this sort, it would have been impossible for so much unfaithfulness and arrogance and envy and hatred and all manner of tares to take root and to ripen amongst
Christian people. Therefore in Zurich we have left the words of Christ unaltered, but we have added some words of explanation to point to the right understanding which was held by Christ and the disciples and the early Church, as already indicated.
May God reveal the truth to us all, and make it dear to us, and never suffer us to fall from it. Amen.
THE FourTH ARTICLE In this section we will answer some objections, although only one or two, for those who have followed the expositions already given will be able to make a good answer to any arrogant criticisms.
One objection is as follows: We who know that the flesh and blood are not literally eaten in the sacrament are divided amongst ourselves: the one part saying that Christ's words:
"This is my body,' mean, This represents my body; the other that they mean: This is a representation of my body. And if we are not agreed about the words of Christ, we do not have the same Spirit.(go) Answer: Note the extraordinary nature of this complaint. For as long as the sense is the same and the words mean the same thing, it does not matter in the least whether different words are used, if only the sense remains the same. For similar differences may be seen not only between the different evangelists and apostles but even in the different writings of the same author. It would take too long to demonstrate this fact, but compare Romans 6 and Colossians
2, where Paul is stating exactly the same view but uses different words. Again, with reference to the wine both Matthew and Mark give this version of the words of institution, "This is my
ZWINGLI blood of the new testament." But in Paul and Luke the words are as follows: ""This cup is the new testament in my blood."
Note that the words are not identical and yet the sense remains the same, 2s we have already seen. And it is the same in our case: what does it matter if the one says: '""This bread represents my body," and the other: "This is a representation of my body," so long as it is quite clear that there is no difference in the sense.
To such well-worn stratagems do some have recourse, and yet they themselves understand neither the words nor the sense, as we have shown above.
The second objection is on the grounds of I Corinthians ro, which they construe as follows: '"The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?
For we being many are one bread and one body, for we all partake of the one bread." They think that in this verse Paul says that we partake of the body and blood of Christ. But this he does not do, as we may show unmistakably even from passages in the papal canons. For one thing, it is wrong to translate
"'blessing'' and '"'bless'—as they construe the word—but what it ought to be is "thanksgiving"? and "to give thanks" or to "honour,"' for that is the true meaning of the Hebrew and the Greek, as we shall now show. The words barach and eulogein mean "'to give thanks" or "'to praise,' which is also the true sense of the Latin, for the Romans "'blessed,"' that is, honoured those who had made some big contribution to the public good or well-being. For example, in Genesis 47 it says: "And Joseph brought in Jacob his father, and set him before Pharaoh: and Jacob praised Pharaoh, that is, he gave him thanks."
Those who are ignorant of the speech-forms of Scripture translate the last words: '""And Jacob blessed Pharaoh,"' but it was far from the purpose of that wise and capable and godly man to bless an unbelieving and idolatrous king who would only have made a mockery of his blessing. The real meaning is: '""He praised him,"' that is, he gave him thanks for all the honour and favours which he had shown to himself and to Joseph and to all his house. Similarly Psalm 145 ought not to be translated: ''I will bless thee daily," but, "I will daily give thee praise or thanksgiving.' Once we see this point it is easy to understand the word "'communion"', for we have simply to give it the sense of "'ccommunity.''(g1) Now consider the meaning of the words: "The cup of praise or thanksgiving, with which we give praise or thanks, or which we praise, or
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drink with thanksgiving, is it not the community of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the community of the body of Christ? For we are one bread and one body, one company, or community, seeing we all partake of the one bread."' It is the aim of Paul to draw the Corinthian Christians away from the worship and sacrifice of idols, and the main point which he makes is this: You are not a community which ought to eat in the company of idol-worshippers: for you are the community of the body and blood of Christ. For when you offer thanks with the cup and the bread, eating and drinking together, you signify thereby that you are one body and one bread, namely, the body which is the Church of Christ, which in this sacrament confesses its faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave his body and blood on our behalf. And Paul calls believers the community of the blood of Christ, as we may see clearly in the words: ''For we are one bread and one body, one company, or community, seeing we all partake of the one bread." Note that he quite obviously calls us one bread and one body because we partake together of the one bread. Study Paul afresh and you will see that we are right.
We will now refer to the papacy's own book to show that our interpretation is correct. The paragraph consecr. di 2 ca.
Quia passus est (92) contains. these words of Augustine: (93) "Because the Lord suffered for us, he entrusted his body and blood to us in the sacrament—that is, the remembrance that his body and blood were given for us. And he has made us that body and blood. For we are made his body, and by his grace we have become that which we have received."' That is to say, by the grace of God we have received as our Saviour the Son of God according to his human nature, for he became man
(John 1). And we have been made his body, for the Church is his body (Col. 1).
Again, in eadem dist. c. Commendavit: (94) "In this sacrament Christ entrusted to us his body and blood, and we are made that body and blood: for we have become his body." The other objections have no foundation in the Word of God and are therefore without force.
So much concerning this sacrament, in which we are just as certain that Christ cannot be present bodily as we are that he is bodily seated at the right hand of God: although we have always stated our position with moderation and reserve in order not to give an example of self-assertion in the Church of God. Yet I have no more doubt than I have in the God who
ZWINGLI made heaven and earth, or in Jesus Christ the true Son of God, that the body of Christ cannot possibly be present in this sacrament unless we are to set aside the articles of the Creed already mentioned. And for that reason I will not make any attack upon that most learned man, Martin Luther, unlike the anonymous writer (95) who in a published work rightly defended me against Luther and Carlstadt. (96)
In this matter, good Christians, do not allow the scholars to entangle you to your own vexation and hurt. For they plunged in at the outset, and now they will neither maintain the truth nor acknowledge their error: for either the Creed must be shattered or our teaching is true. May God give us grace to surrender to the truth and not to defend that which is against God. Amen. Zurich, February 23.
The question of a simple layman:
Tell me, if thou know'st, How Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, And bread and wine, and flesh and blood,
Can all together be one God?