Christian tradition is against transubstantiation
The Roman Catholic Church says that God can turn bread and wine into his Son
Jesus. The result is that they are not bread and wine at all any more but Jesus.
This doctrine is called transubstantiation. It is sometimes called the Real
Presence. The Real Presence means Jesus's presence in its fullest sense body,
blood, soul and divinity.
God performs this change when the Catholic priest blesses bread and wine on the
altar at Mass.
Protestants disagree with all that. The early Church and even the early
Catholic Church had no such doctrine.
A Catholic book says, "In truth, scanty as the Ante-nicene notices may be of the Papal Supremacy, they are both more numerous and more definite than the adducible testimonies in favour of the Real Presence. The testimonies to the latter are confined to a few passages." My response to that is that for such a core doctrine as bread becoming God that the pagans would have loved the silence is deafening!
Augustine the main doctrine maker of Christianity wrote that when Jesus said
we must eat his flesh we must not get our teeth ready for if we believe, we have
eaten his body already (Vol 7, Tractates on John, Tractate 25).
The Roman Catholic Church says that God can turn bread and wine into his son so
that they are not bread and wine at all any more but Jesus. This doctrine is
called transubstantiation. God performs this change when the Catholic priest
blesses bread and wine on the altar at Mass.
The eccentric dogma that the bread and wine are transformed into Jesus by the
priest comes from tradition, not reason and not the Bible. Nobody talked about
the substance of bread and wine turning into the substance of Jesus until 1079.
Hildebert de Lavardin, a French priest and theologian, originated that talk.
The problem for Catholics is that it is late tradition. The early liturgies
always blessed the bread and wine and called the Holy Spirit to empower them
after the words and actions of Christ at the Last Supper were repeated. The
oldest Eucharistic prayer, that of Hippolytus (who died in 236 AD) about 225 AD
does this too and never speaks of the bread and wine as the body and blood of
Jesus (page 75, Documents of the Christian Church). The same man spoke of the
bread and wine as figures or representations of the body and blood of Jesus
(page 266, The Early Church). He however commanded great care to be taken with
them for that reason for to disrespect what symbolised Jesus was to disrespect
Jesus.
Also belief that the bread and wine ceased to exist and became the body and
blood was universal in the early Church is wrong. A pope denied the current
Catholic doctrine. “The sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, which we
receive, is a divine thing, because by it we are made partakers of the
divine-nature. Yet the substance or nature of the bread and wine does not cease.
And assuredly the image and the similitude of the body and blood of Christ are
celebrated in the performance of the mysteries.” Gelasius, bishop of Rome, in
Jacques Paul Migne, Patrologiae Latinae, Tractatus de duabis naturis Adversus
Eutychen et Nestorium 14.
Catholics say that by substance he meant the appearance of the bread and wine not the inner essence. That is just a desperate distortion and would mean he used the wrong word. The quote is talking about how communion is the image of Jesus not about how bread and wine can be Jesus without looking any different.
Joe Mizzi writes, "How do Catholic apologists react to this? One Catholic
writer argues that “Pope Gelasius was simply saying that the appearance
[accidents] of bread/wine remain alongside the Real Presence in an attempt to
explain the mystery of the Incarnation, since Christ humanity remains alongside
His divinity. Some scholars interpret the above passage to refer to the
accidents of the bread and wine.” (Kenneth Henderson). Did Pope Gelasius
really mean “appearance” when he wrote about “substance” and “nature”? Was the
pope ignorant of the meaning of the very terms used in the Nicene Creed (325AD)
and the Definition of Chalcedon (451AD) to describe who Jesus actually is?
There is a very simple reason why Gelasius did not mean “appearance”. Remember
he is using the Eucharist as an analogy for the Incarnation, namely that
“Christ’s humanity remains alongside His divinity.” Now if by “substance or
nature” he meant that only the appearance of bread and wine remains, it follows
that Christ merely appeared human but in fact he was not! That is the very
heresy he was refuting! No, rather, Gelasius rightly believed that the
distinction of divine and human natures of Christ are “in no way annulled by the
union” (Council of Chalcedon). Jesus is truly God and truly man! The Eucharist
illustrates this great truth, for, just as the substance of the bread and wine
remains unchanged, so the human nature of Christ remained unchanged despite its
union with divinity. Pope Gelasius did not try to prove that the
bread and wine remain unchanged. He could take it for granted that his readers
at the close of the fifth century believed that the substance of the eucharistic
elements do not cease. The novel idea of transubstantiation was developed and
adopted much later in the history of the Catholic church."
Consider, “The mystical emblems of the body and blood of Christ continue in
their original essence and form, they are visible and tangible as they were
before [the consecration]; but the contemplation of the spirit and of faith sees
in them that which they have become, and they are adored also as that which they
are to believers.” (Theodoret, Dialogue ii, Opera ed. Hal. tom. iv p. 126).
The Church would have given communion nearer the start of Mass rather than near
the end if it believed that you eat Jesus literally at communion. Why? Because
giving it at the end means people are being sent out into their ordinary lives
with Jesus still inside them for he stays in them until the wafer is broken down
in the stomach which takes about fifteen minutes! And when they should be
praying and sensing the presence of Jesus in them instead. The communion service
then had communion at the end for it was not believed to be physically Jesus and
even when the Church started to disagree it didn’t change the timing of
communion in the service for it followed the outlines of the old service out of
deference to tradition and custom.
The early Church used to say that each member carried the death of Jesus in his
body. Carry death does not mean they were transubstantiated into the corpse of
Jesus any more than eat me means Jesus has to turn into food. Carry death
corresponds in usage to eat my body. If one is not literal neither is the other.
Paul says that Christians are the Body of Christ. The way he talks seems so
literal that some churches today, for example, the Church of the Living Word,
think that the Church is destined to become Jesus Christ. He says in Ephesians
that the Church is his body and the fullness of him who fills all in all (1:23).
Some would say that he means the Lord is the soul of the Church which is made up
of our bodies and not that we have become Jesus. But the point is that he talks
very very literally looking in relation to the body of Jesus so it would be no
surprise to hear the Eucharist bread being called the body of the Lord just like
the Church is. But we know he is not literal so the Eucharist is not literally
the Body of Jesus.
It is imagined that the doctrine first appears in tradition in the letters of
the saint and martyr, Ignatius of Antioch who wrote them in the second century
when he had little to do. But we have to be grateful to him for in Trallians 8
he announced that faith is the flesh of Jesus and love is the blood of Jesus. He
claimed to have known John though not necessarily as the reputed author of the
gospel of John so this might be an insight into the true meaning of John 6 which
speaks of eating the flesh of Jesus and drinking his blood.
In Romans 7, Ignatius says he hungers for the flesh of Jesus and to drink his
blood. He was a bishop and had no need to hunger if he meant the Eucharist so he
did not mean it. He was in prison at the time and when the soldiers let him
write his letter they would have given him some bread and wine. Ignatius further
indicates that he does not have the Eucharist in mind when he says that the
blood of Jesus he wants to drink is endless love. He means symbolic blood.
In Smyrnaeans 7, Ignatius writes that the Eucharist or thanksgiving is the body
of Jesus that was murdered and raised again and says the heretics won’t attend
the ritual for they can’t admit this. But if we offer the body of Jesus to God
without it being present we could do this at a Eucharist at which no real
presence took place so Catholics are stupid to assume that this character proves
that Ignatius subscribed to the notion of transubstantiation. Jesus’ body is the
thanksgiving sacrifice to God offered by the symbols of bread and wine which do
not change.
In 185 AD, St Irenaeus said that heretics cannot claim that the bread is the
body of the Lord and the cup his blood if they do not admit that Jesus made the
world. Whether it is symbolically the body and blood or literally they cannot
believe the bread and wine are the body and blood if Jesus was not a creator.
Irenaeus thought that Jesus was God. It was the case that the heretics he
opposed were matter-hating Gnostics. To them it was blasphemy to say a good God
would make the world or turn bread into God.
Irenaeus is giving his opinion about what the heretics cannot believe and
what he cannot believe either if it proves false that Jesus made the world. Does
he mean that if Jesus could not make all things then he could not turn bread and
wine into himself? But God could turn them into Jesus if Jesus can’t do it
himself so that is wrong – that is not what he meant. Also, he did not say he
meant they thought Jesus was not God and could not make the world for most of
them thought he was God but did make the world. The logic of Irenaeus is, if the
Son did not make all things then the bread is not literally or symbolically his
body for that means the Son opposes matter. The heretics believed that the body
and blood of Jesus were present in the Eucharist but they did not believe these
were the material body and blood but some level of spiritual existence. The
version in spirit of body and blood. Irenaeus would have known this. Since he
did not write they were denying the physical body and blood being in the
Eucharist it follows that he meant no body of any kind could be there if Jesus
was not creator. He did not mean that he thought the bread was Jesus’ physical
body.
Then he expresses puzzlement at how the heretics can say that flesh will not
rise again when it is nourished by Jesus’ body and blood. This is odd for
what do you expect if they think Jesus would not give evil flesh and evil blood
to nourish anyway?
Irenaeus opposed transubstantiation for in it you are not physically nourished
by the body and blood of Jesus but by the appearances of bread and wine. If
Jesus does not feed your body with the substance of his own then his argument
defeats itself. Irenaeus wants to say that the body must be sacred enough to be
raised from the dead when it is literally fed by Jesus himself who is literally
digested. If it is just the appearance of bread that feeds it would not prove
that the body will rise because Jesus has merely turned bread into himself and
is not giving your body nourishment for the body can’t digest his body and
blood. The Gnostics believed that matter though evil is used by the good God who
hates it.
So Irenaeus either thought the bread was sacramentally as in not literally
the body or he thought it was a slab of meat looking like bread through God
doing illusions. The latter can be safely dismissed as a candidate for
what he was thinking.
Irenaeus stated that as the Eucharist bread is not common bread and consists of
earthly and heavenly elements so our bodies that eat and drink are normal and
yet incorruptible meaning the promise of a glorious resurrection is given (page
75, Documents of the Christian Church). So like the Eucharist, the body gets a
heavenly element but the element is only potential. So the Eucharist is not
physically the body of Christ but is as good as the body of Christ having been
filled with its power. Irenaeus held that the sacrifice of the cross was made to
the Devil (page 30) so it was unlikely that he would have held that Jesus
physically changes into the form of bread and wine when the supper represents
that sacrifice.
There is not a splinter of evidence that this notion of transubstantiation goes
back to Jesus or existed in the first century of the Church. In Irenaeus, we
have evidence that it would have rightly been perceived as something from what
many would call the lunatic fringe for he says “we” have been taught his
doctrine meaning all Christians he knows.
Some scholars believe that just as your toenail is you though it is made of dead
substances so God could make bread and wine his body and blood. The bread and
wine are still as much bread and wine as before. There is no transubstantiation.
But they become the body and blood in the same way your toenail is a part of
your body and still is when it is broken off. So you can call them the body and
blood of the Lord. They are sacramentally the body and blood of the Lord and not
substantially. Irenaeus of Lyon who accepted this view held that the Lord
becomes incarnate in the bread and wine but they stay bread and wine (page 242,
Handbook to the Controversy with Rome, Vol 2). This would be the same as Justin
Martyr’s view. The doctrine implies that you do not worship the bread and wine
for they are like parts of the body but focus on the body they remember, the
full body of Jesus in Heaven. Justin and Ireaneus would have agreed that Roman
Catholicism is idolatry for adoring the communion wafer as God. There is no
evidence for the idea of transubstantiation in the early Church (page 247,
Handbook to the Controversy with Rome, Vol 2). The New Testament doctrine of the
Church being the body of Christ which is put forward very very literally is
definitely sanctioning the belief that a thing can perhaps not be literally
Christ but still be Christ the same way as a cut toenail can be part of the body
of a person who had it removed.
Tertullian (160-221 AD?) declared that the bread was the body of Jesus for Jesus
said the bread was his body meaning the figure of his body (Contra Marcion. Lib.
5, page 458. Paris. 1675). He called the bread the body of Christ showing that
he meant he was a symbol and that this had been meant since the time of Christ.
Origen (185-254 AD) wrote, “Acknowledge that they (bread and wine) are figures
which are written in the sacred volumes; therefore, as spiritual not as carnal,
examine and understand what is said. For if as carnal you receive them, they
hurt, not nourish you” (Leviticus, Homilies, VII).
Eusebius (261?-339/340 AD) point blankly declared that Jesus gave the bread as a
symbol of his body (Demons, Evan. Lib. VII, C. II, page 236).
The Church simply says to all this that the bread and wine indeed are symbols and yet they really are what they depict. But why would the fathers like the symbol language instead of being more forthright? It shows what they really thought. The bread and wine do not turn substantially into Jesus Christ.