Transubstantiation & The Incarnation

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It’s a great argument but please show me how the Apostles knew it WASN’T a metaphor. Show me how they believed what you say, that the wine turned into blood, (literally.) and the bread literally turned into Christ. Please show me how they taught these very specific details. Or did they? please offer chapter and verse to the very specific details of a transubstantiation as you call it. Otherwise we are left with a significant collection of metaphors such as "I am the vine, I am the Light, I am the door,… I am the bread of life, yet the bread gets a exception to the rule. Okay… on what scriptural bases does it?

Again, if you can show me how the Apostles and N.T. writers all knew Jesus was NOT speaking in a metaphor, but prescribed all that you have said in a literal sense, then I will pay much closer attention to the Roman Catholic view on this.

Happy thanksgiving
 
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I note that you made yourself a pre-condition - I give you the answer you want and you will take a closer look at Catholicism. Please don’t do that. I am not asking you to.

You realise you have upped the ante and keep asking proof or verses of the Bible. My guess is you will not be satisfied anyway. And I am not gonna satisfying you.

Btw, it is all in the Bible if that’s what you want. We don’t know whether the apostles knew but they did follow Jesus anyway unlike those who left. So your question is moot. It is not a matter whether they knew it was not a metaphor but rather they followed him and believed even though they admitted they could not understand the teaching.

My original statement again - do you believe Jesus could perform the transubstantiation or not? That’s the real question for you. Btw, transubstantiation is not literal changing of the bread to flesh or the wine to blood, it means the substance that changes, not the accidents.
 
Btw, the belief in Real Presence was held by the apostles and their successors as they celebrated the Eucharist. The writings of the Church Fathers testified to that.
 
Reuben_J, thank you but unfortunately you’ve done a good job skirting my question. The disciples were not just anyone. They became the very conduits of God, led by the Spirit of God to convey transcending truth. You drop an idea into our laps (non-Roman Catholic laps) with the notion that since this doctrine came from the RCC it is the truth.
Reuben_J said:
Btw, it is all in the Bible if that’s what you want. We don’t know whether the apostles knew but they did follow Jesus anyway unlike those who left. So your question is moot
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This response is a non-response. It is more than whether or not the Apostles knew about transubstantiation, it is all about whether they knew of it through the teachings of Jesus, believed in it, and taught it throughout scripture, seeing that they were the arbitrators of divine truth when they wrote their gospels and letters. This is where we have the problem. The inner circle of apostolic thought seems to be left out in the dark on this matter. Why is that? O’ yeah… it wasn’t developed until 1215 A.D… when it finally got official approval by pope Innocent III.

This exposes a greater issue than the Lord’s table here. It is the issue of evolving extra-biblical revelation, but since it is thanksgiving I am not going to go any further. Blessings to you Reuben_J May you and your family receive all of God’s rich love and grace in this season.
 
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We can’t think of this in a limited, linear temporal sense. God transcends space and time. When we celebrate Mass today, the Holy Spirit makes present the one sacrifice of Christ offered in the past. At the Last Supper, the Spirit made present the one sacrifice of Christ offered in the future. Past / present / future is not a hurdle or a limitation for God. As I understand it, Jesus sat the table with his earthly, natural body of that particular moment, but in His hands held His own body…but His body as it would come to be: glorified.
 
I still don’t get what it means by the change in substance and substantially.
 
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So, when Jesus held the Eucharist at The Last Supper, the Eucharist was Glorified?
 
I’ve read both, that He held His glorified body and that He held His non-Glorified body. Do you have any links that say it was Glorified?
 
tgGodsway said:
Reuben_J, thank you but unfortunately you’ve done a good job skirting my question. The disciples were not just anyone. They became the very conduits of God, led by the Spirit of God to convey transcending truth. You drop an idea into our laps (non-Roman Catholic laps) with the notion that since this doctrine came from the RCC it is the truth.
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Reuben_J:
Btw, it is all in the Bible if that’s what you want. We don’t know whether the apostles knew but they did follow Jesus anyway unlike those who left. So your question is moot
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This response is a non-response. It is more than whether or not the Apostles knew about transubstantiation, it is all about whether they knew of it through the teachings of Jesus, believed in it, and taught it throughout scripture, seeing that they were the arbitrators of divine truth when they wrote their gospels and letters. This is where we have the problem. The inner circle of apostolic thought seems to be left out in the dark on this matter. Why is that? O’ yeah… it wasn’t developed until 1215 A.D… when it finally got official approval by pope Innocent III.

This exposes a greater issue than the Lord’s table here. It is the issue of evolving extra-biblical revelation, but since it is thanksgiving I am not going to go any further. Blessings to you Reuben_J May you and your family receive all of God’s rich love and grace in this season.
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I doubt your sincerity in asking the questions, our answers which probably you have heard already, thus I didn’t bother to entertain those answers that you wanted because they would be just another platform for you to reject.

I have told you it was not a metaphor unlike the door or the vine, which are ways of speaking to illustrate a point. The Eucharist was not, your analogy was put up errorniously. So if that is your argument, you have not one.

As to whether the apostles understood and believed, gleaning through the NT, obviously they did. If not, why would Paul said not to receive it unworthily, meaning it is not something that can be eaten as if it is just another piece of bread or a cup of wine.

I added another post - the Eucharist was celebrated by the apostles and not something made up more than a thousand years later. You should read about the Church Fathers more because your source is wrong.

So if the apostles and their successors believed in the Real Presence, obviously they were taught by Jesus himself.
 
Reuben_J said:
I have told you it was not a metaphor unlike the door or the vine, which are ways of speaking to illustrate a point
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But what you have not told me is WHY is isn’t a metaphor and should be interpreted literally. WHY? on what scriptural bases?
 
Reuben_J said:
As to whether the apostles understood and believed, gleaning through the NT, obviously they did. If not, why would Paul said not to receive it unworthily, meaning it is not something that can be eaten as if it is just another piece of bread or a cup of wine.
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No… if one’s heart is not right with God, (and they partake unworthily) then to practice such a ritual is not living in true spiritual reality. What good is it to practice the Eucharist with an unrepentant heart? it serves no redeeming purpose. But this does not mean that one should force a figure of speech to become literal simply because they can potentially abuse the Lord’s table. Obviously the Lord’s table could be abused, otherwise the Apostle Paul would not have offered a warning.
 
In an old Ask The Apologist Fr Serpa said His body was non-Glorified while some theologian named Ron Conte said in his blog that Jesus’ body was glorified.
 
Are you sure that Father meant the Eucharistic body? Or did he mean Jesus sitting at the table?
 
The Eucharistic body. It’s under the question Which Body Do We Receive?
 
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Hope1960 said:
I still don’t get what it means by the change in substance and substantially.
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That is hardly surprising. Its Aristotle, most students take two or three papers before they even start to understand him.

And the Church took his philosophy to an extreme that he would likely have considered fanciful (accidents of bread inhering without a substance to inhere in).
 
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So can YOU explain what a change in substance, substantially and sacramentally mean?
 
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tgGodsway said:
Jesus also said, “I am the vine you are the branches…” He said, “I am the door…” How about “I am the bread of life” or, “I am the light of the world.” These were all common metaphors used throughout the gospels. Do you think Jesus wanted us to believe He was a literal door? of course not, but why not? … Should we believe He was a literal vine? of course not, but why not? on what bases?
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Did Jesus say He was the Son of God? (Actually, yes, in John 10:36, and also, by way of affirmation, in Mt 16:17.)

Do you claim that He was just using ‘metaphor’ when He made that claim? (Boy, I hope not! 😉 )

If your answer is “no”, then you have a problem: Jesus spoke both metaphorically and literally. How are you to judge what his intent was, when He said “this is my body”, then? I mean… you weren’t there to see if He was making finger quotes, right?

But, the apostles were there. And their belief – and the belief and practice of the early Church – was that it was a literal statement. Who are we to contradict them, who themselves were at the first Eucharist?
He said He was bread. Why should we treat this statement any different than the others? if so, on what scriptural bases?
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On every Scriptural basis that talks about the Eucharist as the body and blood of Christ. 1 Cor 11:29 comes to mind immediately.

(However, where does the Bible say that there must be a Scriptural basis? In fact, it says precisely the opposite: "Then Jesus approached and said to them, ‘All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.’ " (Mt 28:18-20) You see, Jesus’ command was that the apostles teach. We have records of what they taught; people wrote about what they taught … and what they taught is what the Catholic Church teaches today: the Eucharist is truly the body and blood of Christ.)
It was common for Jesus to convey spiritual truth by natural means. There is no reasonable point made here to make an exception by one verse of scripture while ignoring the many others.
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I agree: there is no reasonable point here to make an exception by one verse of Scripture while ignoring the many others in which Jesus also spoke literally.
It smells of a bias read into the passage forcing an unreasonable interpretation by people determined to defend a doctrine that evolved centuries in time.
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No – it was believed to be Jesus’ body from the beginning. Read up on the early Church Fathers. You’ll see. (Now, what did develop over time was a philosophy that explained how it could be so. However, the belief had been there all the time, even though it took a while to explain it satisfactorily.)

Blessings,
G.
 
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