Literal or Symbolic?...

[prettytwinkles7]

Seriously…Don’t over analyze it…or overthink it. God and all that included therein is not a legalistic concept. Just do what you feel convicted by Him to do. By Him being the operative phrase…

God and all he had to tell us is not to meant to be broken down into metaphors and allegories as if it were poetry…it is the Holy word of God. Just take it as YOU feel it should be interpreted and stop looking for approval.

 

[lyrikal]

Augustine’s words in blue.

Mine and Radical’s in black.

Hi Radical,

I am not revising Augustine’s works…I am merely letting Augustine speak for himself…

Both sides can make that argument.

as in, if he said the eating was done figuratively then we should know that he believed that the eating of Christ’s flesh is achieved in a figurative manner…Crying “Revisionist!” seems to be all that you can do when faced with the obvious

In order to understand what Augustine means by figurative, we have to understand what Augustine means by literal. What Augustine meant when he denied the literal interpretation of John 6 is that the Jews were not to chop off Christ’s body and start eating it as He is when speaking to them. I have shown you this many times. Augustine explicitly explains to us what his understanding of literal is. It has nothing to do with eating the Body of Christ in the Eucharist. Let’s let the Saint do the talking for us:

But does the flesh give life? Our Lord Himself, when He was speaking in praise of this same earth, said, “It is the Spirit that quickens, the flesh profits nothing.”…But when our Lord praised it, He was speaking of His own flesh, and He had said, “Except a man eat My flesh, he shall have no life in him.” John 6:54 Some disciples of His, about seventy, were offended, and said, “This is an hard saying, who can hear it?” And they went back, and walked no more with Him. It seemed unto them hard that He said, “Except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, you have no life in you:” they received it foolishly, they thought of it carnally, and imagined that the Lord would cut off parts from His body, and give unto them; and they said, “This is a hard saying.” It was they who were hard, not the saying;

-St. Augustine (Exposition on Psalm 99)

I’m not sure what else Augustine could have said to make it more clear as to what he meant by LITERAL interpretation. He wasn’t telling his audience that we are not to eat of the Body of Christ in the sacrament. That is just wishful thinking by modern day Protestanism. That is a modern day ideology being injected into a 4th/5th century Catholic saint.

That begs the question: What does he mean by figurative? Is it what you and David are trying to make it? Symbolic eating? Or does figurative mean spiritual for Augustine? And by spiritual, do I mean a spiritual presence of the Eucharist? Hardly! I mean a spiritual interpretation of the John 6. A literal interpretation would be to eat Christ literally as he is in the flesh talking to the Apostles and the Jews. A spiritual understanding is…well…How about we let St. Augustine do the talking again?

Continuing from the last place we left off, Saint Augustine says:

…and imagined that the Lord would cut off parts from His body, and give unto them; and they said, “This is a hard saying.” It was they who were hard, not the saying; for unless they had been hard, and not meek, they would have said unto themselves, He says not this without reason, but there must be some latent mystery herein.

Hmm…What is this latent mystery that he is talking about? Could it possibly be the Eucharist…? Let’s continue…

They would have remained with Him, softened, not hard: and would have learned that from Him which they who remained, when the others departed, learned.

Who are the others? What did they learn that the others didn’t learn when they departed? Could Augustine possibly be talking about the Last Supper here? Isn’t that when the Apostles (who stayed) learned what Jesus meant when He told them they must eat His flesh and drink His blood? Can anyone point anywhere else in scripture where the Apostles learned what John 6 means other than the Last Supper account? If you don’t think that Augustine’s idea of the Apsotles learning is about the Last Supper, then please point to what you think Augustine is talking about. Can anyone point to anything better that Augustine could have possibly meant by “learned” what this eating of flesh and drinking of blood means other than the Last Supper account? Where Jesus takes bread and says, “Take, EAT, This is my Body” and “Take this all of you and DRINK from it, THIS is my BLOOD.”?

Let’s continue with Saint Augustine’s words though:

For when twelve disciples had remained with Him, on their departure, these remaining followers suggested to Him, as if in grief for the death of the former, that they were offended by His words, and turned back. But He instructed them, and says unto them, “It is the Spirit that quickens, but the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” John 6:63

It doesn’t take long for Augustine to start to hint at the explanation. For Augustine, the key to understanding John 6 is verse 63. Verse 63 is the beginning of the explanation that Jesus gave the Apostles (according to Augustine). What does this explanation mean? Eucharist? Does Augustine believe that this explanation of spiritual interpretation of John 6 possibly mean the Eucharist? Well again, how about we continue and let Augustine do the talking?

Continued…

 

[lyrikal]

Understand spiritually what I have said; you are not to eat this body which you see; nor to drink that blood which they who will crucify Me shall pour forth.

Here, he distinguishes between a “figurative” interpretation (which is SPIRITUAL, NOT symbolic) and a literal interpretation which is not denying that we eat the Body of Christ in the Eucharist, but is denying that the Jews were to chop the body of Christ that they SEE in front of them and eat it and they were not to drink that SAME blood which they will crucify Him with. We are NOT to literally eat flesh and literally drink blood. THAT is what St. Augustine means by literal. We are to SPIRITUALLY understand these words of Jesus (not a spiritual presence, but a spiritual understanding) and what is this SPIRITUAL understanding? Well let’s continue again and let the Augustine finish this off for us:

I have commended unto you a certain mystery; spiritually understood, it will quicken. Although it is needful that this be visibly celebrated, yet it must be spiritually understood.

What else could Saint Augustine mean by CELEBRATING? Celebrating WHAT? His birthday? He is talking about the Eucharist. THAT is how we spiritually understand John 6 (according to St. Augustine). It is a sacrament that is VISIBLY CELEBRATED. It doesn’t mean it is figurative, it doesn’t mean it is symbolic, and it doesn’t mean there is merely a spiritual presence.

 

[benedictus2]

Evasion how, Cory? It is an understanding that it is a mystery how it happens. If you choose to explain it (Christ didn’t) as Trasubstantiation, I’ve already said that fine.

That is fair enough. But to try to understand is a natural progression of man’s possession of the intellectual faculty. Faith will always seek reason. Transubstantiation still leaves much of the Eucharist a mystery.

I respectfully disagree with the description as consubstantiation, on the same grounds as Luther disagreed with Transubstantiation. It employs a an Aristotelian metaphysics in an attempt to explain that which isn’t explained, Christ simply said that, literally, “this is my body”.

What transub does is to make sense of how we can see bread and yet affirm that it is his body. It does not completely explain it but I think it is the only one that makes sense even in this age of scientific advancement.

No, Transubstantiation, as I understand it, says the bread and wine are transubstantiated into body and blood.

As I understand it transub says that the substance of the bread and wine has been transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ such that it is no longer bread and no longer wine.

This seems a misstatement. I don’t think either of us believe He is bread and wine. Please clarify.

Jon

Yes, that was totally stupid of me. I should have written: the bread and wine is now truly Him.

 

[benedictus2]

Where in Judaic teaching does the unleavened bread equate to the lamb ?

Where did I say that the bread equates to the lamb?

What we say is Jesus is both bread and lamb. Surely you could not have missed that fact from reading the Scriptures.

 

[lyrikal]

Huh? You want me to show you where another ECF attacked Augustine for teaching something that Augustine didn’t teach? Well, at least that is no worse than your other demands which required me to imagine that there was a consensus (in Augustine’s day) wrt to the nature of Christ’s presence at the Eucharistic. From there it seemed that, if this imaginary consensus was assumed to teach a real bodily presence and if Augustine denied a RBP, then you wanted me to produce a quote from the imaginary guardians of the imaginary consensus condemning Augustine’s refusal to endorse a RBP…or was it that, if the imaginary consensus denied a real bodily presence and if Augustine denied a RBP, then you wanted me to produce a quote from Augustine (as guardian of the imaginary consensus) condemning the introduction of a RBP? Either way, I don’t pretend that there was anything close to a consensus.

How about Council of Nicea (Council #18)?:

"It has come to the knowledge of the holy and great Synod that, in some districts and cities, the deacons administer the Eucharist to the presbyters, whereas neither canon nor custom permits that they who have no right to offer should give the Body of Christ to them that do offer. And this also has been made known, that certain deacons now touch the Eucharist even before the bishops. Let all such practices be utterly done away, and let the deacons remain within their own bounds, knowing that they are the ministers of the bishop and the inferiors of the presbyters. Let them receive the Eucharist according to their order, after the presbyters, and let either the bishop or the presbyter administer to them. Furthermore, let not the deacons sit among the presbyters, for that is contrary to canon and order. And if, after this decree, any one shall refuse to obey, let him be deposed from the diaconate."

Doesn’t sound like something these Bishops of the Council are taking lightly. From my exchanges with you, Radical, you make Augustine seem as if he believed in a symbolic presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Just take a look at how you view Sermons 272 and 227. You think that Augustine is merely saying that the bread becomes the presence of the people. You completely leave Christ out of it. In fact, in your interpretation of those two sermons, you make Augustine sound more symbolic in his Eucharistic beliefs than Fundamental/Evangelical Christians of today. The F/E Christians would at least admit a symbolic presence of CHRIST in the bread. You made Augustine sound like was preaching a SYMBOLIC presence of the PEOPLE. Where is Christ in all this? That is the problem you face when your interpretation is taken.

With that said, if Augustine DID merely believe in such a heretical Eucharist, then it would sound like it is contradicting Canon 18. If Canon 18 is treating the Eucharist as something so important, that if it is not done right or distributed correctly by the correct minister, the Deacon loses his deaconate rights. Why would it even matter how it is distributed or by whom if all it is is a symbolic presence of the Church? I can’t imagine anyone making such a big deal about something so simple? A bread that represents the people of the Church? Really, who cares? It wouldn’t be THAT big of a deal.

Please note that I do believe your interpretation of Augustine’s sermons 227 and 272 have some truth in them but they are lacking in the fullness of what Augustine is saying.

If you think Augustine held to at LEAST a spiritual presence of Christ in the Eucharist, then I can understand how you can make such an argument to Nicea. But that’s not how you interpret Augustine’s “how” in those 2 sermons. You interpret them literally and when you do that, you come up with a wacky symbolic presence of the church and nothing else. If you believe there is something else, please let me know what it is. Please note that I do have your previous posts and can show you where you held to a two-fold interpretaion of the two sermons. Those being:

1.) Symbolic presence of the Church
2.) Bread and wine

With all that said, if that’s the case, then we would expect a Bishop to write to Augustine condemning his heretical view of such a belief of the Eucharist.

I am pretty sure that David and I don’t believe in any novetlies…heck, I don’t even know what a novetly is.

You just contradicted yourself here. How can you deny that you and David believe in any novelties when you don’t even know what a novelty is? Shouldn’t you first understand what it is before you come out and say whether you believe in novelties or not?

both serious and right

Perhaps the average Catholic. I think Nicea was referring to some Catholic Bishops and people like St. Thomas Aguinas.

God bless.

PS: This motivates me to reply to your other replies of my replies to the Augustine discussion we had. I have been busy lately with other stuff and hope I can find time for it.

 

[benedictus2]

It also blends perfectly where Jesus says thru faith /belief in Him, He abides in us, and we in Him.

He does abide with us through faith in Him but He specifically said to eat His flesh and you will have eternal life.

There just is no getting away from that because He said it 6 times in a span of 12 verses.

Same two way abiding, but not sacramentally, but believe that He is the son of God ,thru regeneration. “If a man love me and keep my words, my Father will love him and we will make our abode with him” John 14:23. “I am the vine, and you are the branches (figuratively speaking please). Abide in me and I in you. If ye abide in me and my words (figurative please) in you, ye shall ask what you will.”,

And you know how close the branch is to the vine. The sap, that life giving sap that flows through the vine, flows into the branches. That is why cut off the branches die.

If Jesus is the vine, what is the sap that flows in HIm? His blood, and this blood He gives to us to regenerate and sustain.

Sorry David, there just is no arguing against this because when you deny this, you deny the very words that He said. We are not the one saying eat His flesh, drink His blood. He is. He is the one saying eat my flesh, drink my blood. And there is nothing in John 6 that the eating He meant was to believing in Him. He had already said " believe in me" in other chapters but this time, He says something different. Something deeper. In fact something too deep we cannot fathom it this side of eternity.

John 15. His words abide in us ( flesh is not mentioned.The best you could say is eating his flesh are part of His words.

John 15:10 says: If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love.

What does He command in John 6? Eat His flesh, drink His blood. Have you kept that commandment?

The worst you could say, that it is the only way, either/or, declaring anathema to any other way of love and obedience to His word ) .It is possible Augustine tied this to John 6. ( I do not mean His words are literally running thru our veins - though He holds all things together, even our atoms ). **Eat His Words, as meat preferably **(undigested by another-cow- ,as milk is).

The only problem with that is He DID NOT say Eat My Words. He said Eat My FLESH.

 

[lyrikal]

Where did I say that the bread equates to the lamb?

What we say is Jesus is both bread and lamb. Surely you could not have missed that fact from reading the Scriptures.

I’m not sure why David keeps recycling the same arguments over and over. We have already dealt with this in much detail in the previous thread called “The Real Presence.” I remember giving a lot of attention to this and answering David’s questions regarding the bread and the lamb.

The problem is not to be taken with us Catholics, it should be taken with Jesus. It’s simple really:

The LAMB of God, JESUS CHRIST, took BREAD and called it His Body.

David, do you see? We didn’t make this up, Jesus did. Jesus, being the LAMB OF GOD, took BREAD and called it His Body. You’re arguing against Scripture and need to take it up with Scripture, not us. We are only telling you what the Scriptures are teaching.

If the Lamb of God took BREAD and called it His Body, then that seems to imply that the Bread is now the LAMB of GOD’S Body.

 

[Gabriel_of_12]

JonNC;8411162]Hi Gabe. If you read the articles I linked, you’ll see that it is the old Lutherans who did not express the RP as consubstantiation, and for the exact same reasons they did not agree with Transubstantiation. Are any of the historians you have read Lutheran?

I copied this statement from your own website you have provided; The sites do reveal a movement of Lutherans objecting to the term “consubstantiation”, but from the definitions to move away from “consubstantiation” Lutherans still maintains that the bread and wine are symbols with the real presence.

"This labeling is still used in the latest edition of the** Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, 1854, edited by J. Newton Brown. Under the entry “Consubstantiation” **we read the following: “A tenet of the Lutheran church respecting the presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper. Luther denied that the elements were changed after consecration, and therefore taught that the bread and wine indeed remain; but that together with them, there is present the substance of the body of Christ, which is literally (!) received by communicants. As in red-hot iron it may be said, two distinct substances, iron and fire, are united, so is the body of Christ joined with the bread.”

Under the entry “Lutheranism” we are told that “It has undergone some alterations since the time of its founder. Luther believed the impanation or consubstantiation.”

… But it is even more unpardonable and presupposes either the greatest ignorance or evil intent **when alleged theologians who call themselves Lutherans **are just as incorrect in presenting the teaching of the church whose servants, stewards, and watchmen they want to be.

Alas, this is by no means an infrequent occurrence! This is so notorious that we may dispense with documentation from the Lutheran Observer or the Evangelical Lutheran.

**Consubstantiation is identified as “Lutheran” in The Harper Collins Encyclopedia of Catholicism of 1995…Should it then surprise us that a recent identification of what Lutherans confess of the Lord’s Supper as consubstantiation should come from Princeton?" **

No. He is saying "let it be with the wine as God wills, IOW, the disposition of the wine is God’s choice. It is a choice Christ does not elaborate on

But Christ does elaborate emphatically taking the bread “This is my body”. Jesus never states let this be God’s will to do “with the wine”. If Luther’s disposition is what you reveal it to be “let it be with the wine as God wills”? For Luther being a biblical Augustinian theologian comes across as a lose canon in regards to the Eucharist here.

If Luther is referencing the blood in his “let it be” and places the blood “with the wine,” “as God wills”? I can see very confusing drawn conclusions by both Lutheran camps in pro-Consubstantiation and anti-Consubstantiation.

Why not just accept the mystery as a mystery. Why not accept Christ’s words as they say, “This is my body”? He takes the bread holds it, brakes, it and gives it to them, saying: “This is my body”. I can’t see how anyone gets “this represents my body” from that.

I agree with you wholeheartedly here Jon; And this has always been the practice in the Catholic Church up until the reformation period and man developed intellectually in science and abused “free will”. It is here when the teachings of Christ come under attack again from secular science, which began to try and disprove the real presence and Christianity as myth and superstitous, that many were falling for the new sciences.

The Catholic Church and the Popes did what Jesus taught them to do through the apostles. When Jesus disproved His enemies by using His own enemies words and thinking. That the Church defending the Real Presence on the same footing with the scientific Intellectuals and silenced them with “Transubstantiation”.

This definition is for those atheist who need help to begin a faith in Christ. For those in the body of Christ “This is my body, This is my blood” has sufficed all RP believers since the last supper unchanged in the Catholic Church.

cont.

 

[Gabriel_of_12]

cont;’

“Transubstantiation” is for those who scientifically need an answer to begin a faith in Jesus Christ and this term helps removes any doubt from those seeking “Truth” from the flesh into the mysteries.

Those who oppose trans. stand in direct defeat against science which can disprove any belief in a Real Presence in the Eucharist other than Transubstantiation, is just a man made myth and superstitious.

The Orthodox did not defend this RP teaching when it came under attack partly because they are ruled over by these same secular “anti-christ” powers, thus Orthodox maintain to Mystery which is the same Sacrament (mystery) terminology used in the West, Lutheran’s did not come to the RP defense when the secular world attacked the RP.

Had not the Popes defended the RP against the evil powers and principalities in science, these gates of hell would of prevailed the Church’s faith in the RP. What science did not account for? is that Jesus built His Church upon Rock, she cannot be moved by every wind of doctrine that has attacked her divine revelations and teachings from God in every age.

Because they are both a human attempt to explain how it happens. Christ chooses not to provide those details.

Oh, but Christ did reveal how it happens to His contemporaries of His time period “it is the Spirit that gives life, while the flesh is of no avail”.

Later the Rock = Peter would also meet this same enemy only this time, the enemy has scientific proof.

So the Popes excersing their divine Keys to bind and loose on earth, when Jesus will bind and loose in heaven “what so ever you (Peter) bind and loose on earth,”

The Catholic Church Like Jesus did His enemies “bound” the evil powers of science with its own medicine in “Transubstantiation.”

The definition defends the RP against “all enemies”, Trans. never attempts to exhaust by definition the mystery of the Eucharist. From Transubstantiation the Mystery of the Eucharist remains “This is my body, This is my blood”.

If you are saying His body and blood are bread and wine, this seems opposite of what Christ said. He said the bread and wine are His body and blood. I fear that yours and Cory’s statement that Jesus is bread and wine gives fodder to the symbolicists.

I as a Catholic never believe that Jesus body and blood are bread and wine. What I as a Catholic believe is that the “substance of bread and wine” are changed into the body, blood soul and divinity of Jesus Christ.

How? by Transubstantiation, at the Word of God, the substance of bread and wine have changed into the body, blood of Jesus Christ, yet the accidents of bread and wine remain these to my flesh (senses) which availeth nothing, but to my soul, when Christ body, blood soul and divinity “cosumes” me, through my eating His body, and drinking His blood, It is here “That the Spirit gives Life”, as Jesus promises "Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood will have eternal life.

Amen

 

[david_ruiz]

Where did I say that the bread equates to the lamb?

What we say is Jesus is both bread and lamb. Surely you could not have missed that fact from reading the Scriptures.

Semantics. “Both” and “equate” I take to mean as the same. Sorry I used your word equate with the wine and blood. It made you miss the point totally .

 

[david_ruiz]

I’m not sure why David keeps recycling the same arguments over and over. We have already dealt with this in much detail in the previous thread called “The Real Presence.” I remember giving a lot of attention to this and answering David’s questions regarding the bread and the lamb.

The problem is not to be taken with us Catholics, it should be taken with Jesus. It’s simple really:

The LAMB of God, JESUS CHRIST, took BREAD and called it His Body.

David, do you see? We didn’t make this up, Jesus did. Jesus, being the LAMB OF GOD, took BREAD and called it His Body. You’re arguing against Scripture and need to take it up with Scripture, not us. We are only telling you what the Scriptures are teaching.

If the Lamb of God took BREAD and called it His Body, then that seems to imply that the Bread is now the LAMB of GOD’S Body.

Hi Lyrikal .Only brought this up again due to several threads before where one denies connection between blood and wine in Passover. Yes Jesus set the new meaning to old symbols.The bread to the lamb (His flesh) ,the wine to His blood.Some were objecting to the latter.I understand symbols is only before consecration under RP dogma,then literal after.

 

[Radical]

In order to understand what Augustine means by figurative, we have to understand what Augustine means by literal.

why not just refer to the explanation that Augustine provided regarding what it was to eat figuratively?

What Augustine meant when he denied the literal interpretation of John 6 is that the Jews were not to chop off Christ’s body and start eating it as He is when speaking to them. I have shown you this many times. Augustine explicitly explains to us what his understanding of literal is.

yes, Augustine described their carnal understanding. When Augustine said we are not to understand the requirement to eat Christ’s flesh literally and were to understand it figuratively, he was speaking about how we (not the Jews in front of Jesus that day, but we - him, you and I) are to understand that requirement.

I’m not sure what else Augustine could have said to make it more clear as to what he meant by LITERAL interpretation. He wasn’t telling his audience that we are not to eat of the Body of Christ in the sacrament. That is just wishful thinking by modern day Protestanism. That is a modern day ideology being injected into a 4th/5th century Catholic saint.

Again, you simply can’t let Augustine speak for himself. He said in that lesson:

…you are not to eat this body which you see; nor to drink that blood which they who will crucify Me shall pour forth. I have commended unto you a certain mystery; spiritually understood, it will quicken…
but you want to make it read:
…you are not to eat this body which you see, but you will eat this very body that you see in a Eucharistic celebration (during which my body can’t be seen); nor to drink that blood which they who will crucify Me shall pour forth. **except that you will drink exactly that blood in a Eucharistic celebration ** I have commended unto you a certain mystery; spiritually understood, it will quicken…
You have got Augustine speaking out of both sides of his mouth at once.

That begs the question: What does he mean by figurative?

again, why not just refer to the explanation that Augustine provided regarding what it was to eat figuratively?

Is it what you and David are trying to make it? Symbolic eating?

I have never said that it was purely symbolic for Augustine

Or does figurative mean spiritual for Augustine? And by spiritual, do I mean a spiritual presence of the Eucharist? Hardly! I mean a spiritual interpretation of the John 6. A literal interpretation would be to eat Christ literally as he is in the flesh talking to the Apostles and the Jews. A spiritual understanding is…well…How about we let St. Augustine do the talking again?

great, please be reminded that Augustine believed that Peter ate Christ’s flesh that day. Peter didn’t eat Christ’s flesh that day in the carnal fashion that Augustine described, nor in a literal fashion nor in a Eucharistic fashion…yet Peter savored the taste of Christ’s flesh that very day.

Hmm…What is this latent mystery that he is talking about? Could it possibly be the Eucharist…? Let’s continue…

The mystery IMHO is the redemption and eternal life gained through his death on the cross…

Who are the others? What did they learn that the others didn’t learn when they departed? Could Augustine possibly be talking about the Last Supper here? Isn’t that when the Apostles (who stayed) learned what Jesus meant when He told them they must eat His flesh and drink His blood? Can anyone point anywhere else in scripture where the Apostles learned what John 6 means other than the Last Supper account? If you don’t think that Augustine’s idea of the Apsotles learning is about the Last Supper, then please point to what you think Augustine is talking about.

the crucifixion…the crucifixion is celebrated at the Eucharist

Can anyone point to anything better that Augustine could have possibly meant by “learned” what this eating of flesh and drinking of blood means other than the Last Supper account? Where Jesus takes bread and says, “Take, EAT, This is my Body” and “Take this all of you and DRINK from it, THIS is my BLOOD.”?

you must keep in mind that Augustine has Peter eating Christ’s flesh that very day…it can’t have been a Eucharistic/Last supper eating. It is belief in Christ for one’s eternal life. As Augustine said: “Believe, and you have eaten already.”

 

[Radical]

Understand spiritually what I have said; you are not to eat this body which you see; nor to drink that blood which they who will crucify Me shall pour forth.

Here, he distinguishes between a “figurative” interpretation (which is SPIRITUAL, NOT symbolic) and a literal interpretation which is not denying that we eat the Body of Christ in the Eucharist, but is denying that the Jews were to chop the body of Christ that they SEE in front of them and eat it and they were not to drink that SAME blood which they will crucify Him with. We are NOT to literally eat flesh and literally drink blood. THAT is what St. Augustine means by literal. We are to SPIRITUALLY understand these words of Jesus (not a spiritual presence, but a spiritual understanding) and what is this SPIRITUAL understanding?

any way you want to dress it up…we still have Augustine saying that we don’t eat Christ’s body and we don’t drink his blood…which absolutely contradicts what you claim happens at your Eucharist. Again, if you don’t believe me, start a thread here declaring that “Catholics, at their Eucharist, do not drink the blood of Christ that was poured out at the cross” and see how that flies with the Catholics here.

What else could Saint Augustine mean by CELEBRATING? Celebrating WHAT? His birthday?

his crucifixion…which is when his blood is actually poured out and what (if accepted) actually saves us.

It is a sacrament that is VISIBLY CELEBRATED. It doesn’t mean it is figurative, it doesn’t mean it is symbolic, and it doesn’t mean there is merely a spiritual presence.

the sacrament is the visible celebration of the cross and nothing you have provided starts to establish a real bodily presence

 

[Nicea325]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nicea325
Radical’s has done NOTHING of the sort to prove a symbolic Eucharist. I beg your pardon? There is no reason to post Augustine’s works on the Eucharist because it has been done for centuries, thus Radical’s revisionism of Augustine’s works are exactly that… revisionism.

I am not revising Augustine’s works…I am merely letting Augustine speak for himself…as in, if he said the eating was done figuratively then we should know that he believed that the eating of Christ’s flesh is achieved in a figurative manner…Crying “Revisionist!” seems to be all that you can do when faced with the obvious

Crying? The only one crying here is you with your perverted beliefs about Augustine. The obvious? Yes the obvious you are adamant about Augustine believed in your nonsense.No you are not not,you are putting words in the mouth of Augustine. Problem is that you are to blind to acknowledge your huge blunder.And yes I’ll say it again,you are revisionist no matter how much you wish to deny it! Time to swallow some pride Radical.

Quote:
If your NOVELTY are FACTS,then explain to me why Radical has failed as of today to present to me where another ECF attacks him for teaching a heretical teaching called the Real Presence?

Huh? You want me to show you where another ECF attacked Augustine for teaching something that Augustine didn’t teach? Well, at least that is no worse than your other demands which required me to imagine that there was a consensus (in Augustine’s day) wrt to the nature of Christ’s presence at the Eucharistic. From there it seemed that, if this imaginary consensus was assumed to teach a real bodily presence and if Augustine denied a RBP, then you wanted me to produce a quote from the imaginary guardians of the imaginary consensus condemning Augustine’s refusal to endorse a RBP…or was it that, if the imaginary consensus denied a real bodily presence and if Augustine denied a RBP, then you wanted me to produce a quote from Augustine (as guardian of the imaginary consensus) condemning the introduction of a RBP? Either way, I don’t pretend that there was anything close to a consensus.

Huh? Then tell me what Protestant church Augustine followed? You make one argument strictly on ONE ECF-very weak at best! Oh that is right, silly me,I forgot Augustine was a Protestant teaching a symbolic Eucharist. All the other ECF’s also taught the Protestant novelty of a symbolic Eucharist. Indeed.How silly of me to forget that Radical who is lives more than 1700 years later is the one of the few to only understand Augustine. Can your Protestant arrogance get more than skin deep? As I said before, Protestanism is self-centered from day one and still is today.

Quote:
All Radical did was divert and come up with another tangent unrelated to the issue

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trying to explain how there wasn’t always a consensus on important matters (so that one shouldn’t assume that there necessarily was a consensus) isn’t unrelated…though it might require someone to connect the dots. The example that I often used was the lack of a consensus on where to draw a line for the canon of scripture

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Consensus? That is your basis of your entire argument? God’s Truth is based on consensus? No wonder you believe what you do.

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So yes it is living proof you and Radical believe a NOVETLY no matter how much if you wish to deny it!

I am pretty sure that David and I don’t believe in any novetlies…heck, I don’t even know what a novetly is.

Well you do for the ten million time. You do not know what a novelty is? Here I’'ll give you a hint: SYMBOLIC EUCHARIST.

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Quotes most Catholics have not seen? Are you truly serious?:

both serious and right

Well it is a good thing you convinced yourself,but you have done nothing of the sort to make me believe your delusions.

 

[Radical]

How about Council of Nicea (Council #18)? Doesn’t sound like something these Bishops of the Council are taking lightly.

I never suggested that the Eucharist was taken lightly…Similarly, just because Irenaeus was very serious about there being only four gospels, it doesn’t mean that there was a consensus at that time regarding which epistles were scripture and which weren’t.

Please note that I do believe your interpretation of Augustine’s sermons 227 and 272 have some truth in them but they are lacking in the fullness of what Augustine is saying…If you think Augustine held to at LEAST a spiritual presence of Christ in the Eucharist, then I can understand how you can make such an argument to Nicea. But that’s not how you interpret Augustine’s “how” in those 2 sermons. You interpret them literally and when you do that, you come up with a wacky symbolic presence of the church and nothing else. If you believe there is something else, please let me know what it is. Please note that I do have your previous posts and can show you where you held to a two-fold interpretaion of the two sermons.

It seems that you don’t understand my position. here are some bits from that other thread where I clarified a few things:
…You might be forgetting the ancient view point that the symbol/figure of a thing somehow shares in the power of the thing that it symbolizes. As such, in the neoplatonist view, if God injects the saving grace/ the unifying grace (“earned” by the body of Christ on the cross) into the bread, then by taking that bread (which is a figure of that body) the participant shares in the grace of the body. Further, (from a neoplatonistic outlook), b/c the reality of a thing is best defined by the power it possesses, one could declare that by giving the (empowered) bread and wine, “the Lord Christ gives to you HIS BODY and BLOOD, WHICH HE POURED OUT FOR US UNTO THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS”. No RBP is contemplated. The figurative understanding describes a spiritual reality and the spiritual reality is “more real” than a material reality. You have not produced anything that requires a change in the substance of the bread…and that is something you won’t find in Augustine. The bread can be called the body of Christ (meaning incarnated body) b/c it (after consecration and belief) possesses (some of?]) the saving and unifying grace possessed by the incarnated body. The bread can be called the body of Christ (meaning the Church) b/c it (after consecration and belief) possesses (some of?]) the saving and unifying grace possessed by the Church. In neither case is it that the bread’s substance is replaced by the substance of the incarnated body or the substance of the Church…

…obviously, I wasn’t clear enough…like you, I see that Augustine focused primarily on the unity achieved by the Eucharist and so when that focus is in play, it is the Church that is on the altar. On the other hand, if it is the saving grace imparted by the Eucharist that Augustine has in mind, then it is the incarnated body of Christ that is on the altar. Neither, is on the altar by way of a substantiated presence. Both are on the altar through the bread that symbolizes those things…What is actually on the altar is bread and wine and grace and nothing else.

You just contradicted yourself here. How can you deny that you and David believe in any novelties when you don’t even know what a novelty is? Shouldn’t you first understand what it is before you come out and say whether you believe in novelties or not?

a few things: a) read more carefully…Nicea325 mentioned a NOVETLY, not a novelty; b) having done that, you should realize that I was only having a little fun with Nicea325 and c) perhaps you could tell Nicea325 about this, as I see from his last post, that he didn’t catch it either.

PS: This motivates me to reply to your other replies of my replies to the Augustine discussion we had. I have been busy lately with other stuff and hope I can find time for it.

I doubt I’ll find the time to respond to the (what will likely be 10 plus) posts of yours

 

[lyrikal]

the sacrament is the visible celebration of the cross and nothing you have provided starts to establish a real bodily presence

Before I post a reply, I would like to ask you to be more specific here, please. Not according to you and me, but according to Augustine in this context, what sacrament is the visible celebration of the cross?

I’ll wait for your response then reply accordingly.

Thank you.

 

[Gabriel_of_12]

Radical;8414815] Both are on the altar through the bread that symbolizes those things…What is actually **on the altar is bread and wine **and grace and nothing else

Radical I never got an answer from david ruiz and am interested your practice also.

Does your church have an altar to which your clergy distributes actual “fermented wine”, leavened or unleavened bread as the bible reveals “To do this in memory of me”, nothing else**?**Or does your clergy distribute something other than “wine and bread” to your children and adults?

I find it interesting to learn from you and non-catholics by which “symbols” does your church use to symbolize the body and blood of Jesus?

Do you follow the bible prescriptions nothing else? Can you relate here, to what exactly your church uses for bread and wine to symbolize Jesus body and blood, If your church does not use real wine and real unleavened bread?

If you believe “nothing else” but bread and wine are on the altar and no RP of Jesus body and blood? How is it that you can justify giving wine to all of your community, or are your children deprived of the wine that symbolizes Jesus?

Do you think Augustine used real wine and unleavened bread as Catholics do today, or did Augustine use for symbols your church uses?

Peace be with you

 

[Nicea325]

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Radical;8414815] Both are on the altar through the bread that symbolizes those things…What is actually on the altar is bread and wine and grace and nothing else

Wow! What arrogance! A mere creature and finite to top it off knowing not what God is capable of doing? :ehh:

 

[JonNC]

=benedictus2;8412830]That is fair enough. But to try to understand is a natural progression of man’s possession of the intellectual faculty. Faith will always seek reason. Transubstantiation still leaves much of the Eucharist a mystery.

I have learned enough about Transub to agree.

What transub does is to make sense of how we can see bread and yet affirm that it is his body. It does not completely explain it but I think it is the only one that makes sense even in this age of scientific advancement.

On the first sentence, here again I agree. On the second, I can see why you would say so, and will not question your faith.

As I understand it transub says that the substance of the bread and wine has been transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ such that it is no longer bread and no longer wine.

Leaving only the accidents, that which our senses observe/ recognize.

Yes, that was totally stupid of me. I should have written: the bread and wine is now truly Him.

Not stupid, just a misstatement. We both knew what you meant. I only mention it so you could clarify for the lurkers.

Peace, Cory.

Jon