Submitted for examination to the University of Riversmeet by Ifor of Gwent, Anno Societatis XXIX.
Your Eminence, nobles and fellow scholars, I should like to discuss with you today my thesis concerning the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Now, I shall not keep you over long by reading the whole work, but instead, with your permission, I shall present a summary of its content.
The name Eucharist comes from the Greek eucharistia, which means 'thanksgiving', describing the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar.
To explain, for those not of the Catholic persuasion: the priest takes the Host, which is unleavened wheaten bread, and over it pronounces the words hoc est enim Corpus meum ("for this is my Body") and thereafter he takes the Chalice, in which he has mingled wine and water, and says hic est enim Calix Sanguinis mei ("for this is the Cup of my Blood"); and by divine power the bread and wine are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ.
The Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist and Transubstantiation are the central dogmata which I will now discuss, together with certain associated doctrines.
This discourse was originally inspired by a small book donated to the brothers at Barwell-in-the-Fens by Robert fitz John, who is inclined to give such to us, whenever he acquires them. This book includes a work published during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, in which is presented, with a translation alongside, some Old English texts by Ælfric, at one time Abbot of Eynsham, wherefore it is described as "the first book known to have been printed in the Saxon character".
In his 'Preface to the Christian Reader', the Elizabethan compiler begins as follows:
"Great contention hath nowe been of longe tyme about the moste comfortable sacrament of the body & bloud of Christ our Sauiour : in the inquisition and determination wherof many be charged and condemned of heresye, and reproued as bringers vp of new doctryne, not knowen of olde in the church... Fyrst thou hast here a Sermon or homelye, for the holy day of Easter, written in the olde Englishe or Saxon speech, which doth ... intreate of thys doctryne."
In this chapter I present an extract from Ælfric's Paschal Sermon, which was written sometime between about 990 and 995.
"Now ... men haue often searched ... howe bread that is gathered of corne, and through fyers heate baked, may bee turned to Christes body, or how wyne that is pressed out of many grapes is turned through any blessing to the Lordes bloude."
"Truely the bread and the wine which by the masse of the priest be halowed, shewe one thyng without to humayne vnderstanding and an other thing they call within to beleuing mindes. Without they bee sene bread and wine both in figure and in tast : but they be truely after the halowing, Christes body and hys bloude through ghostly mistery."
"Muche is betwixte the inuisible myghte of the holye housell, and the visible shape of hys proper nature. It is naturally corruptible bread, and corruptible wine : and is by myghte of Gods worde truely Christes bodye, and hys bloude : not ... bodely, but ghostly ... What soeuer is in that housell, whiche geueth substaunce of lyfe, that is of the ghostlye might, and inuisible doing. Therfore is the holy housel called a misterye, because there is one thing in it seene, and an other thing vnderstode."
In this chapter I set forth, in outline, the teaching of Holy Mother Church, which I shall later examine in greater detail. And in this matter I may most usefully begin by quoting the Fifth Article of the Tridentine Creed, set forth in 1564 :
"I profess, likewise, that in the Mass there is offered to God a true, proper, and propitiatory sacrifice for the living and the dead; and that in the most holy sacrament of the Eucharist there is truly, really, and substantially, the Body and Blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ; and that there is made a conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the Body, and of the whole substance of the wine into the Blood, which conversion the Catholic Church calls Transubstantiation. I also confess that under either kind alone Christ is received whole and entire, and a true sacrament."
Thus the doctrine of the Real Presence affirms that the bread and wine are no mere figures or symbols, but 'truly' and 'really' become Christ's Body and Blood. Moreover, the dogma of Transubstantiation states that this transformation is 'substantial', such that the very essence of each species is changed, although the outward appearance remains unaltered.
In this chapter I explain that the Eucharist combines both the functions of a sacrament and of a sacrifice, and that it confers grace upon the worthy communicant.
It is clear that the Mass is a Sacrament. Indeed, in the words of Saint Thomas Aquinas: "the Eucharist is the greatest of all the sacraments".
The Mass is also a true and proper sacrifice, for which the prototype was shown to us in the actions of Christ at the Last Supper. It is an error to suppose that the act of sacrifice lay in the crucifixion of our Lord by the Romans at Golgotha. This is not so, for he instituted the new covenant with an unbloody food-offering as antitype, wherein he accomplished the sacrifice of his Body and Blood under the forms of bread and wine; and the Mass is a continual repetition of this, as commanded by Christ himself, who said "do this in remembrance of me".
Now, in the enactment of a sacrifice there are four necessary elements, as even the heathen will admit: first, the res oblate, which is the gift; second, the minister legitimus, the priest who is entitled to enact it; third, the actio sacrifica, which is the action itself; and fourth the finis sacrificii, its metaphysical purpose.
Now Christ is the perfect priest, as Saint Paul explained in his Epistle to the Hebrews, and it is he who operates through the priest who performs the Mass. As Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote: "the form of this sacrament is pronounced as if Christ were speaking in person, so that it is given to be understood that the minister does nothing in perfecting this sacrament, except to pronounce the words of Christ."
And Christ is also the gift, as Saint Augustine noted in De Civitate Dei: "He is both the Priest who offers and the Sacrifice offered."
As to the res oblatae, the proper matter is wheaten bread and wine made from grapes, for we understand these to be the species employed by the Lord at his Last Supper.
The finis sacrificii, the purpose for which Christ instituted this most holy Sacrament, was summarised by Pope Eugenius IV thus: "The effect of this sacrament, which is produced in the soul of one who receives it worthily, is the union of him or her with Christ. ... For in it, as Pope Urban said, we recall the gracious memory of our Saviour, we are withdrawn from evil, we are strengthened in good and we receive an increase of virtues and graces."
In this chapter I briefly describe certain related dogmata.
First, the Totality of Presence. As Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote in his Summa Contra Gentiles: "Because the Body of Christ in its nature is not without His Blood, the Body and Blood are contained under both species; the Body under the species of bread by force of conversion, and the Blood by natural concomitance; and conversely under the species of wine." Also, the hypostatic union of Christ's Divinity and Humanity means that the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of the risen Saviour are inseparable, so that all are present in the Eucharist.
We are led thus to a further truth, also raised to the status of dogma by the Council of Trent, that Christ in his entirety is present in every particle and drop of either species: "for Christ whole and entire is under the species of bread, and under any part whatsoever of that species; likewise the whole [Christ] is under the species of wine, and under the parts thereof".
That Council also emphasised the permanence of the Eucharistic Presence, declaring: "If any one saith, that, after the consecration is completed, the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ are not in the admirable sacrament of the Eucharist, but [are there] only during the use, whilst it is being taken, and not either before or after; and that, in the hosts, or consecrated particles, which are reserved or which remain after communion, the true Body of the Lord remaineth not; let him be anathema."
However, permanent does not mean eternal, for when the Eucharistic Species decay, Christ ceases to be present therein; and this I shall discuss in more detail later.
Finally, the Adorableness of the Eucharist is a consequence of Christ's presence, for the same worship is due to the Divinity in the Blessed Sacrament as in heaven. Thus, after consecration, the Host is elevated for the adoration of the Congregation.
In the preceding chapters I outlined the doctrine of the Holy Mother Church. In this chapter I present the evidence from Scripture.
First we should note the Words of Institution, spoken by Christ at the Last Supper. For example, Saint Matthew in his Gospel recorded:
"And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins."
The Gospel of Saint John instead relates the Words of Promise, spoken by Christ earlier in the synagogue at Capernaum:
"I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world... Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day."
Now, from the time of the Apostles the Eucharist has been celebrated by the Christian church. And in this chapter I present evidence that from the first Christ has been understood to be truly present in this sacrament; yet I shall not attempt a comprehensive account, for many words have been written on a subject so dear to the pious heart.
Saint Justin Martyr, writing between 182 and 188, described the service of the early Church thus: "Those who are called by us deacons give to each of those present ... the bread and wine mixed with water over which the thanksgiving was pronounced ... And this food is called among us Eucharistía ... For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but ... we have been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word ... is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh."
In 380, Saint Ambrose referred to "the Sacramental Elements, which by the mysterious efficacy of holy prayer are transfigured into the Flesh and the Blood" And for the significance of 'transfiguration', I quote Tertullian, who wrote: "Whatsoever is transfigured into some other thing ceases to be that which it had been, and begins to be that which it previously was not."
This shows that belief in the Real Presence, and in some form of transubstantiation, dates back to the very time of the Apostles. From the ninth century onward, disputes arose over the precise mode of Christ's Presence, with some asserting a real substantial presence, and others (like Ælfric) supporting a spiritual presence.
This came to a head in the sixteenth century with the teachings of the Protestants. Martin Luther proposed a form of 'consubstantiation': a union of the bread and wine with the body and blood of Christ which is not hypostatic, nor of mixture, nor locally inclusive, but of some other transcendent and mysterious mode. On the other hand, Ulrich Zwingli, the founder of the Reformation in Switzerland, denied the Presence of Christ entirely, assigning the Eucharist a purely symbolic status. John Calvin assumed an intermediate stance, denying both transubstantiation and consubstantiation, but affirming a spiritual Presence.
To counter these heresies, the Council of Trent, in 1551, promulgated a comprehensive decree on the Sacrament of the Eucharist. Concerning the Real Presence, those learned men declared: "after the consecration of the bread and wine, our Lord Jesus Christ, true God and man, is truly, really, and substantially contained under the species of those sensible things." And on Transubstantiation they stated: "a conversion is made of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord, and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of His blood."
Thus I have provided evidence from learned writers that throughout the history of the Church the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist has been an article of faith amongst true believers.
In this chapter I present extracts from Saint Augustine's De Doctrina Christiana regarding "the mode of ascertaining the proper meaning" of Scripture. This work, written in the year 397, describes the interpretation of 'signs', meaning symbolism and figures of speech.
In Book II, Saint Augustine observed: "Now there are two causes which prevent what is written from being understood: its being veiled either under unknown, or under ambiguous signs." And in seeking to interpret signs, we should heed not only the writings of the faithful, but also those of the heathen. For although many of their institutions were founded upon superstition and idolatry, yet there may be found gold amongst the dross.
In Book III, Saint Augustine explained how to resolve ambiguous signs, describing such techniques as may be employed in diverse cases. Concerning the interpretation of passages that may be either literal or metaphorical, he notes: "It is a wretched slavery which takes the figurative expressions of Scripture in a literal sense." Conversely, "we must also pay heed to that which tells us not to take a literal form of speech as if it were figurative."
In this chapter I outline those aspects of Aristotle's philosphy that are necessary for the understanding of the doctrine of Transubstantiation.
Now, entities may be categorized by species and genus. Thus, of a dog named Phaedo, we may say he is a dog, and that he is an animal. We say that the species 'dog' is predicable of Phaedo, and the genus 'animal' is predicable of dogs as a species and of the individual dog. Species are distinguished by their differentiae; thus we say 'man' is a rational animal, whereas other animals are not rational.
Things capable of independent existence we term 'substances'. Individual beings are primary substances, while the species and genus are called secondary substances, because they are predicable of another entity.
Other things must always be present in a subject, as a particular shade of brown attaches to the dog Phaedo. The shade of brown is not a substance, nor is any member of the species 'colour', for these cannot exist unless present in a subject.
Of things which are not composite Aristotle identifies "substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, position, state, action, [and] affection." Of these, substance is unique in that it is not present in a subject, whereas the others must be. "Thus everything except primary substances is either predicated of primary substances, or is present in them, and if [they] did not exist, it would be impossible for anything else to exist."
Now, the term "'accident' means that which attaches to something and can be truly asserted, but neither of necessity nor usually". Thus Phaedo may be hot, "but since this does not happen of necessity nor usually, we call it an accident." Conversely, 'quadrupedal' is a definiens of 'dog', so it not an accident that Phaedo has four legs.
Substance may be described as a 'hylomorphic compound', from hulê, meaning 'matter' and morphê meaning 'form'. To make an iron ball, we impose the form of a sphere upon iron: we bring the form into this particular matter, and the result is an iron ball.
Matter is also termed 'substratum' as it underlies all changes. In coming-to-be, matter initially contains the privation - that is, the lack of form - and afterwards it contains the form. So matter exists as a potentiality, being neither created nor destroyed, but acting as the substratum from which substances may come to be by the imposition of form.
Now, Aristotle's Roman translators coined the word essentia to render his phrase to ti ên einai, literally 'the what it was to be' for a thing. "The essence of each thing is what it is said to be propter se." Primary essences are substances. Other 'essences', say that of 'hot', are secondary. "Each thing itself ... and its essence are one and the same in no merely accidental way." The 'what it is to be' of Phaedo is his essence. The desire to chew bones is part of that essence, but hotness is not. Essence is what is predicated of the entity in and of itself.
Finally, Aristotle states that "the soul must be a substance in the sense of the form of a natural body having life potentially within it. But substance is actuality, and thus soul is the actuality of [such] a body." That is to say, the soul is the essence of a living being, and its body is the matter.
Moreover, the body is only truly a body when ensouled. While alive, Socrates was a hylomorphic compound of body and soul, but when his soul departed, what remained was merely a cadaver. It could only be identified with Socrates homonymously, just as one might say of a statue made in his likeness: This is Socrates.
For confirmation that the soul is the form of the body, I cite the Council of Vienne, which declared: "we reject as erroneous ... every doctrine or proposition ... asserting that the substance of the rational or intellectual soul is not of itself and essentially the form of the human body".
Thus have I outlined what 'substance' is, that it is both substratum or matter and essence or form, that substances come to be by the imposition of form upon matter, and that the essence of a living being is its soul. Those attributes of a substance that inhere not as part of its essence, but merely incidentally - such as its position, dimensions and colour - are termed 'accidents', and these cannot exist unless they be present in a subject.
In this chapter I investigate the nature of that principle known as 'matter' or 'substratum'.
I have already identified matter as the substratum of change, and the origin of matter must surely have been the Creation, when everything, including the primary substratum, was made ex nihilo by God. In De Genesi ad Litteram S. Augustine explained: "There can be no doubt, therefore, that this un-formed matter, however slight its nature, was made by God alone and created together with the works that were formed from it."
In Genesis it is written that "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void." The Hebrew contains the phrase "tohu wabohu", meaning 'formless and empty', for without form no thing could be said to exist, according to Aristotle's philosophy.
In Book XII of his Confessions, S. Augustine wrote thus: "Hast not Thou taught me, O Lord, that before Thou didst form and separate this formless matter, there was nothing, neither colour, nor figure, nor body, nor spirit?
Yet it is said by many philosophers that primary substratum is purely a potentiality, rather than something that can have existence. So we must ask: did God create the primary substratum - this 'non-being' - first, and then inform it, or were matter and form 'concreated'?
S. Augustine argues for the latter viewpoint in De Genesi ad Litteram: "we must not suppose that unformed matter is prior in time to things that are formed; both the thing made and the matter from which it was made were created together."
So I conclude that in the First Creation, when God brought matter into being, it was not entirely formless, for without form it could not exist for any temporal duration. Instead its essence was primitive and imperfect, yet able to be wrought by God by division and adornment during the Hexaemeron proper - those six days known as the Second Creation.
I have therefore made clear the distinction between two kinds of substratum: the primal potentiality which God first created (though he simultaneously imbued it with primitive forms) is properly termed 'primary substratum', while that which admits of qualities perceptible to our mortal senses is what we commonly call 'matter'. And the experience of those senses advises us that those things regarded as 'matter' - such as clay or wood or bronze - have some degree of form, albeit imperfect, else we could not perceive them at all, even whilst they remain indefinite in the sense that they contain the potential to become many things by the hand of the craftsman or the processes of Nature.
It is not the place here to inquire as to the composition of this matter: whether its elements be air, fire, water and earth, or mercury, sulphur and salt (as Paracelsus proposed); nor whether its constituents be continuous or discrete (as the atoms posited by Democritus). Instead, I wish to observe that 'matter', as I have defined it, is attended by certain accidents, which experience teaches us are typical to the material, whatever it be.
Thus, if a certain chalice is yellow, is heavy, and does not corrode or tarnish, we identify these attributes as accidents, for not all chalices are so. Yet these properties are to be expected if the chalice be golden, for gold typically is yellow, and is heavy, and - being a noble metal - is not susceptible to corruption. Moreover, a golden statue will also have like attributes, as will a golden coin, and so forth. On the other hand, if a silvren coin be struck from the identical die, its form will be the same as the golden coin, but certain of its accidents will be those associated with silver, for instance it will be white in colour and apt to tarnish.
Wherefore evidence suggests that certain accidents inhere in the matter itself, for they endure when form is imposed upon it. Thus, if two hundred and forty pennyweight of silver be hammered out and struck into coins, the weight of them will be found to be one pound, demonstrating that this quantity has remained constant despite the imposition of form upon the matter. Furthermore, that property called densitas is characteristic of each metal, so that the weight of a volume of gold is always greater than that of the same volume of silver, an observation famously used by Archimedes to assay King Hiero's crown.
And thus I have set forth the nature of matter: that what is commonly called by that name is not primary substratum, but is informed to a degree, and I deduce that it admits the inherence of certain accidents, these being characteristic to each particular kind of matter.
In the preceding chapters, I have presented the evidence and defined such terms as are used in metaphysical discussion. In this chapter I examine the doctrine of the Real Presence. And here the principal point of contention is whether, when our Lord uttered the Words of Institution, he meant them figuratively or literally; for, as discussed in Chapter VII, we must be careful to distinguish between these modes of speech.
Now, in all four accounts it is written that Christ said "this is my body", whereas none indicate this was a figure, as in "this is a symbol of my body". And it has been argued that Christ would not have used some unusual figure when speaking to his disciples, for they were simple folk, lacking education in rhetoric.
Against this, however, I note that when our Lord first spoke to them, saying: "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men," they understood that he did not mean them to ensnare people as they would fish, for "they straightway left their nets, and followed him." So, in this case a metaphor did not confuse them.
Yet John Calvin wrote: "Had it not occurred to the apostles that the bread was called the body figuratively, as being a symbol of the body, the extraordinary nature of the thing would doubtless have filled them with perplexity. For, at this very period, John relates, that the slightest difficulties perplexed them ... How, then, could they have been so ready to believe what is repugnant to all reason - namely that Christ was seated at table under their eye, and yet was contained invisible [in] the bread? As they attest their consent by eating this bread without hesitation, it is plain that they understood the words of Christ in the same sense as we [Protestants] do ... that the name of the thing signified was transferred to the sign."
Against this, I observe that the Institution follows the Words of Promise, in which our Saviour said "the bread that I will give is my flesh"; and it is clear that they who heard those words understood them literally, for S. John recorded that "the Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?". Thus they surely understood the Words of Institution according to what they had previously been told.
And I have already shown in Chapter VI that Christian writers from the time of the Apostles onward have affirmed that Christ is truly present in the Eucharist. On this there has ever been a consensus, although the mode of his presence is a more difficult subject, to be discussed later.
So we must acknowledge the soundness of the doctrine of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. As Saint Cyril wrote: "Since ... He Himself declared and said of the Bread, This is My Body, who shall dare to doubt any longer? And since He has Himself affirmed and said, This is My Blood, who shall ever hesitate, saying, that it is not His blood?"
In this chapter I consider the mode of Christ's presence in the Eucharist. And to comprehend this, it is first necessary to consider 'place', as Aristotle did in Book IV of Physics. He concluded: "the innermost motionless boundary of what contains is place." "[It] is thought to be a kind of surface, and as it were a vessel, [or] container of the thing."
Now, it is the proper nature of a physical body that it is in a place 'circumsciptively' inasmuch as each individual point of its exterior surfaces is coincident with the corresponding point of the immediately environing surfaces that constitute its place.
Conversely, the proper mode of location for unembodied spirits such as angels, and for the embodied human soul, cannot be circumscriptive, for such an entity has no component parts which can be in extensional contact with the surrounding dimensions, but instead it is, by nature, entire within every portion of whatever space it occupies. Wherefore, a spiritual being is said to be in place 'definitively'.
Having thus made this distinction clear, I shall now explain the presence of our Saviour whole and entire under the species of bread and wine, notwithstanding the dimensive quantity of those things is much less than the dimensive quantity of Christ's body.
Dimensive quantity is an accidental property, and the accidents of the bread and wine remain after consecration, wherefore the dimensions of the bread and wine persist; yet as the whole Christ is truly present in the Sacrament, his entire dimensive quantity is present by real concomitance, not after the manner of 'quantity' (per modum quantitatis), but of 'substance' (per modum substantiae). Likewise, his body is not present locally and circumscriptively on the altar or in the ciborium, but substantially; whereas he is in heaven definitively under his own species.
Thus is explained how our Lord sits at the right hand of God while his body and blood are simultaneously present in many places across the world, yet Christ himself remains whole and undivided.
In this chapter I suggest how the Eucharistic Body and Blood constitute spiritual nourishment for the soul, while after the manner of bodily food it is conveyed to the mouth and consumed, as Saint John emphasises by the use of the verb trôgein (to chew).
As S. Thomas Aquinas wrote in Book IV of Summa Contra Gentiles: "Because spiritual effects are produced on the pattern of visible effects, it was fitting that our spiritual nourishment should be given us under the appearances of those things that men commonly use for their bodily nourishment, namely bread and wine." And the purpose of their ingestion is to bring about a spiritual and mystical union with Christ.
Saint Gregory of Nyssa, in his Great Catechism, indicated that consumption is indispensable to this assimilation. Wherefore I have considered whether there is a physical process by which the virtue inherent in the Eucharistic Species is distributed throughout the body for the nutrition of the indwelling soul.
Now Galen, in On the Natural Faculties: described how, after ingestion, food is chylified in the stomach and digested there and in the intestines and related organs, following which the nutriment is transformed into blood and the other humours within the veins. And the blood thereafter flows as required through the veins to the various parts of the body, bringing them nourishment.
But let us not pursue this purely physical reasoning too far, however, lest we be misled by it, as were those opponents of Transubstantiation known as Stercoranists, who in the tenth century sought to misinterpret Christ's words.
They claimed that his statement "that whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly, and is cast out into the waste" represents the major premise of a categorical syllogism, to which they added the minor premise that the consecrated elements enter in at the mouth, drawing the revolting conclusion that the Eucharistic Body and Blood of our Lord must therefore pass from the body after the way of Nature.
Gerbert, later Pope Sylvester II, proposed that the consecrated elements do not pass out of the body in the waste, but instead are reserved in the flesh for resurrection on the Day of Judgement. I suggest such an incorporation, taken literally, must be deemed unlikely: for, if a man were to consume half a drachm of host together with a drachm of consecrated wine every day for threescore years and ten, their accumulated quantity would exceed two hundredweight!
Instead I argue that, based on Galen's observations concerning superfluities, a perfect food would be taken up entirely, leaving no waste: and our Lord's Supper is surely such a superlative repast.
However, to address the question as to the material quantity ingested by the communicant, which as I indicated above could exceed that of the human body, I propose the explanation that, once the Eucharistic substances have begun to be acted upon by the stomach, Christ's essence separates from them to merge with the soul of the faithful communicant, leaving the base matter to be digested after the manner of other foods. But let us not concern ourselves further with controversy over what happens to mere matter once the sacrament has achieved its purpose.
In this chapter I consider whether the Eucharistic Species may bring harm to the unworthy. Saint Paul declared: "he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself." And Ælfric wrote: "It is very good for Christen men, that they goe often to housell, if they brynge wyth them to the alter innocencye in their harte ; if they be not possessed with vices. To the euill man it turneth to no good, but to destruction, if he receiue vnworthily the holy housel."
And still worse it is for one who does not believe in the holy mystery to partake of this sacrament, as S. Thomas explained, for "the sin of unbelief, which fundamentally severs a man from the unity of the Church ... makes him ... utterly unfit for receiving this sacrament; because it is the sacrament of the Church's unity... Hence the unbeliever who receives this sacrament sins more grievously than the believer who is in sin; and shows greater contempt towards Christ Who is in the sacrament, especially if he does not believe Christ to be truly in this sacrament."
And I have also related how witches bring damnation upon themselves by misusing the Host for their infernal and superstitious practices, but we lack the time to discuss that here.
In this chapter I consider whether Baptism may involve a type of Transubstantiation.
Saint Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Contra Gentiles, referred to Baptism as "spiritual regeneration." "And because what is brought into being by generation loses its previous form and the properties consequent upon that form, therefore Baptism, as being a spiritual generation, not only takes away sins, but also all the liabilities contracted by sins."
Observe that Saint Thomas specifically refers here to 'form'. Expanding further upon this theme, he continues: "With the acquisition of a new form there goes also the acquisition of the activity consequent upon that form; and therefore the baptised become immediately capable of spiritual actions, such as the reception of the other Sacraments."
Since the essence of substance is form, these words suggest that, in baptism, the recipient ceases to be one substance and becomes another, though remaining unchanged in outward appearance. And this is the signature of transubstantiation: that one substance is replaced by another, the accidents remaining.
As Saint Paul wrote: "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."
And in support of this hypothesis, we may note that many authors, including Fathers of the Church, have likened the Sacrament of Baptism to that of the Eucharist. For example, Ælfric wrote: "He that doth twise hallow one host to housell, is lyke vnto the heretike, who doth christen twyse one childe."
Now a child, as an individual being, must be a primary substance. This leads to the proposition that, qua spiritual nature, there must be two different secondary substances - that is, species - which we may describe as 'unbaptized person' and 'baptized person', and 'man' may be held to be the genus to which these species belong.
But let us now consider the alternative: that baptism causes an accidental change, rather than a substantial one. This requires the possibility that an indelible but accidental alteration may occur in a man, which does not alter his substance, but which is effected instantaneously, or nearly so: for the latter is the case with baptism. Now, an example of such is the blinding of a man in one eye, which may be done in an instant and its effect is permanent, yet the victim remains the same man - and therefore the same substance - whilst having undergone the accidental motion from 'two-eyed' to 'one-eyed'.
Yet it may be argued against this that it is the way of Nature that a faculty may be lost in an instant, whereas the gaining of the bodily faculties is a process that requires a considerable span of time; and therefore the analogy fails. And that which can be acquired in a moment, for example a certain item of knowledge, is not always permanent, for knowledge can be forgotten.
Also to the contrary, I showed in Chapter VIII that the soul is the essence of a rational creature, wherefore a spritual change must cause an essential alteration; and since substance is essence and substratum, baptism must bring about a substantial conversion.
But against this it could be argued that the change is more properly described as 'formal', as the matter remains unaltered; whereas in the sacrament of the Eucharist it is said that "a conversion is made of the whole substance", which is understood as implying 'all being': matter and form together, which is a point I address in Chapter XVI.
Thus I have demonstrated that baptism may involve a kind of transubstantiation, or at least a formal conversion.
In this chapter I examine the relationship between the body and soul.
Earlier I set forth the Aristotelian viewpoint, that the soul is the form of the human body, which otherwise is mere matter. On this, S. Thomas Aquinas expounded at length in Summa Contra Gentiles, wherein he asserted that soul and body unified constitute man, and that this unity can only be achieved by such a union as that of form with matter.
But when a human being dies, and the soul ceases to inform that assemblage of matter, is what remains the same body that existed just before death? In order to exist, the body requires a substantial form; yet if the soul be its only form, after death its form ex hypothesi is no longer present: what remains is merely matter arranged corpse-wise. But if the sole thing responsible for informing the matter has departed, should it not immediately lose its organisation? Furthermore, it sometimes happens that a man may suffer a malady that causes his vital signs to be so abated that he appears dead, yet still he lives and oftentimes recovers: thus it seems there is little to differentiate between an almost-dead body and a newly-deceased corpse.
John Duns Scotus suggested that the corpse is the identical body that existed before death. He argued in his Ordinatio that some substances have more than one substantial form, the human being possessing at least two: the forma corporeitatis, the bodily form, which gives a quantity of matter its status as an individual human body, and the animating form, the soul, which gives life to that body. At death, the animating soul ceases to vivify the body, yet numerically the same body remains; the corporeal form persists, maintaining the organisation of the matter for a while. However, this form is too weak to keep the body in existence indefinitely without the animating principle, wherefore in due course it decomposes.
Against this hypothesis it may be argued that if a body has two different forms, it must be two different things; but this is similar to a matter addressed by S. Thomas in Summa Contra Gentiles, wherefrom I may adapt a reply. He wrote: "The principle of corresponding unity of produced, production, and producer, holds good to the exclusion of a plurality of productive agents not acting in co-ordination with one another. Where they are co-ordinate, several agents have but one effect." Thus the corporeal form and the vegetative soul co-operate to inform the body; and furthermore, we may suppose that the superior form - the soul - while it is present, 'supersedes' the inferior.
This superposition of forms suggests an explanation of how changes can occur to the body, for example the loss of a limb, without a corresponding change within the essence of that body, namely the soul: it may be deduced that the alteration of the body merely affects the corporeal form. Conversely, it may be argued that such alterations are accidental and not formal, for the presence or absence of a component does not affect the essence of a thing.
But what if the body be so corrupted by injury or disease that, as experience teaches us, it is no longer apt to contain life? Such a loss of organisation would be an essential change, inasmuch as the flesh would no longer maintain the forma corporeitatis of a potentially living human being. Now, it seems inappropriate that destruction of the inferior form should affect the superior form; but in fact there is no such incongruity, for the loss of the bodily form does not annihilate the soul, but merely disembodies it, since it cannot reside in a physical entity that is not potentially a human being. As Aristotle explained in De Anima: "the actuality of any given thing can only be realized in what is already potentially that thing, i.e. in a matter of its own appropriate to it. From ... this it follows that soul is an actuality or formulable essence of something that [has the] potentiality of being besouled."
In this chapter I provide further detail regarding the Doctrine of Transubstantiation.
I have already noted the pronouncements of the Council of Trent regarding Transubstantiation. And in large part they followed what Saint Thomas Aquinas wrote around 1270 in Part III of Summa Theologica, from which I quote such passages as seem best to illuminate the subject at hand.
First, as to whether the substance of the bread and wine remains after consecration, he stated: "Christ's body cannot begin to be anew in this sacrament except by change of the substance of bread into itself. But what is changed into another thing, no longer remains after such change. Hence the conclusion is that, saving the truth of this sacrament, the substance of the bread cannot remain after the consecration." And likewise for the substance of the wine.
Second, as to the manner of the conversion, he indicated: "this change is not like natural changes, but is entirely supernatural, and effected by God's power alone." "The whole substance of the bread is changed into the whole substance of Christ's body, and the whole substance of the wine into the whole substance of Christ's blood. Hence this is not a formal, but a substantial conversion ... with a name of its own, ... called 'transubstantiation.'" "In this sacrament the whole substance of the bread passes into the whole body of Christ; whereas in natural transmutation the matter of the one receives the form of the other, the previous form being laid aside. ... [And whereas] the same matter ... remains in natural transmutation; in this sacrament the same accidents remain."
And this is the third point, that the accidents of the bread and wine remain after consecration, which is evident to the senses. "And this is ... done by Divine providence ... because it is not customary, but horrible, for men to eat human flesh, and to drink blood."
Fourthly, as to whether the accidents remain in the sacrament without a subject, he wrote: "The species of the bread and wine, which are perceived by our senses to remain in this sacrament after consecration, are not subjected in the substance of the bread and wine, for that does not remain, ... nor in the substantial form, for that does not remain, ... [nor] in the substance of Christ's body and blood, because the substance of the human body cannot in any way be affected by such accidents; nor is it possible for Christ's glorious and impassible body to be altered so as to receive these qualities." "Therefore it follows that the accidents continue in this sacrament without a subject."
S. Thomas then suggested: "Because something having quantity and color and ... [its] other accidents is perceived by the senses; ... [and] because the first disposition of matter is dimensive quantity ... and because the first subject is matter, [it follows] that all other accidents are related to their subject through the ... dimensive quantity ... And since, when the subject is withdrawn, the accidents remain ... [as] before, it follows that all accidents remain founded upon dimensive quantity."
Fifthly, he noted: "We perceive by our senses that the consecrated hosts become putrefied and corrupted." Ælfric commented likewise: "Some priests fil their boxe for housel on Easter day, and so reserue it a whole yere for sicke men, as though that housel were more holy then any other. But they doe vnaduisedlye, bicause it waxeth hory, or al together rotten by keping it so long space."
To explain this, Saint Thomas proposed that the accidents cease to be 'things in a subject' and become 'things per se'. Then, "Since ... corruption [takes] away the being of a thing, in so far as the being of some form is in matter, it results that by corruption the form is separated from the matter. But if such being were not in matter, yet [as though] in matter, it could be taken away by corruption, even where there is no matter".
In this chapter I consider two difficulties: how the accidents remain without a subject, and what occurs when the sacramental species become corrupted.
As regards the fourth point in Chapter XVI, I do not agree that all accidents attach to a subject in virtue of its dimensive quantity. For example, if a crystal of salt be dissolved in a certain volume of water, the crystal loses its dimensions, yet its salinity remains. Certainly, a small crystal will be found to impart a little saltiness, while a large crystal imparts much saltiness, but the saline taste itself does not depend upon the dimensions of the crystal. And this may be demonstrated if another crystal, identical in dimensions to the first, but of some other soluble material, be dissolved in the same amount of water: the taste - sweet, bitter, astringent, or whatever - is found to depend upon the material and not its dimensions. Since the crystals differ in their matter rather than their dimensions, I infer that the accident of taste is predicated of the matter, and not of the dimensive quantity. Indeed, experience shows us that whatever form or dimensions may be imposed upon salt, the resultant object will always be found to be salty.
Besides, even if the dimensive quantity were the subject of the other accidents, nevertheless quantity is itself an accident and Aristotle taught that accidents cannot exist without a subject. And "since ... the substance of the bread does not remain in this sacrament, it seems that its accidents cannot remain." To this Saint Thomas replied: "by God's power, which is the first cause of all things, it is possible for that which follows to remain, while that which is first is taken away."
Yet he himself wrote: "power is said in reference to possible things, [so the] phrase, 'God can do all things,' is rightly understood to mean that God can do all things that are possible." And therefore the power of God cannot cause accidents to exist without a subject, if such is actually impossible. But this inability to make contradictories true implies no defect in God's creative power, but rather a defect in the ability of contradictories to receive being.
Thus I have questioned the fourth point; yet it is clear that the third point must stand, for the accidents do remain after the conversion. Therefore it is necessary further to examine the nature of transubstantiation.
Turning to the second point, Saint Thomas wrote that "in transubstantiation, conversion is more than a mere change." It involves two entities related as positive extremes, such that the first extreme, the terminus a quo, ceases to be at the instant the last extreme, the terminus ad quem, begins to be. But he conceded "In this conversion not only is it difficult for this whole to be changed into that whole, so that nothing of the former may remain ... but furthermore it has this difficulty that the accidents remain while the substance is destroyed, and many other difficulties".
And whereas S. Thomas stated that in transubstantiation the matter of the terminus a quo is not the matter of the terminus ad quem, yet he appears to offer no strong evidence for this; he seems to assume the conversion of the whole being almost axiomatically.
So, let us hypothesize that, as with other changes, the substrate in transubstantiation is matter. Under this hypothesis the alteration is 'formal', but nevertheless one substance is converted into another, for the substantial form of the terminus a quo is replaced by the substantial form of the terminus ad quem. What is common to the extremes is then not only the accidents but also the matter. And I contend that this hypothesis is not contrary to the arguments of Saint Thomas, which speak of a conversion of substance, provided it is allowed that in this 'conversion' the form is supplanted without commutation of the matter.
For brevity, I shall pass over my arguments in favour of this, which are given at some length in my thesis. But I note it is reasonable for bread and wine to be transformed into body and blood, for this is done by the natural faculties, as Galen described. Moreover, it is in no way unfitting for the matter of bread and wine to become the body and blood of Christ, for he partook of such food and was nourished by it while incarnated on this earth. Nor does it detract from the mystery of the Sacrament to impute that the power of Christ miraculously effects in an instant an alteration that requires much time and toil in Nature.
Now let us re-examine the question of the accidents. Saint Thomas showed that the accidents of the bread and wine cannot inhere in Christ's Body and Blood, nor elsewhere - say, in the atmosphere - yet my hypothesis admits of a further alternative: that they are subjected in the matter of the sacrament. And I have already demonstrated in Chapter IX that certain accidents may inhere in matter.
Yet against this, it is not proven that all accidents inhere in this way; so I propose two solutions. Firstly, Christ's miraculous power may cause the matter to become the subject of all the accidents, whether this is natural to them or not; and this surely better conforms with philosophy than for them to be without any subject. Or, secondly, we may agree with Saint Thomas that the other accidents are subjected in the dimensive quantity of the bread and wine.
Finally, as to the fifth point, it is a property of bread that it is corruptible, but the impassible body of our Lord is not so. Then, what is it that presents the appearance of mouldy bread and sour wine? Saint Thomas suggested: "if the ... matter of the bread and wine were to remain in this sacrament, then ... it would be easy to account for this sensible object which succeeds to them." He rejected this solution, but by admitting it under my hypothesis, the difficulty is resolved.
Now, if I may, I shall present some further thoughts, which are not in the document I submitted, but which follow on from it.
To wax yet more speculative, I propose another hypothesis. Now, just as God imparts the rational soul to the flesh and blood of the embryo, which before then has an imperfect form, but not intellect; perhaps Christ takes residence in the bread and wine in a similar fashion, wherein it subsists and acts of its own power, and not on account of the matter or the physical form. That is, maybe Christ becomes embodied in the bread and wine such that those substances are a kind of forma corporeitatis - that is, bodily form - which is a concept we discussed in Chapter XV.
And in support of this, I note that one aspect of change, as taught by Aristotle, is its end or purpose. Now, we may say the purpose of the human form is to embody the soul and enable it to act in the material world in the way God intended. By analogy, I suggest the purpose of the bread and wine may be to embody Christ's soul, not so that it may move and perform physical actions, as his fleshly body did on earth, but that it may be consumed by the faithful and nourish them spiritually.
To quote Saint John of Damascus in De Fide Orthodoxa: "coal is not plain wood but wood united with fire: in like manner ... the bread of the communion is not plain bread but bread united with divinity. But a body which is united with divinity ... has one nature belonging to the body and another belonging to the divinity ... so that the compound is not one nature but two." Now, I infer that these two natures are the forma corporeitatis and the anima or soul; and in this, we must suppose that the definiens of the composite form comprises both spiritual and physical components, just as the definition of 'man' as 'rational animal' comprises both a spiritual - that is, 'rational' - and a physical - 'animal' - element.
Furthermore, just as if a body is damaged by disease or injury or old age to the extent that it is no longer apt to contain the soul, that soul departs and the person dies; so also if the forms of the sacramental bread and wine become corrupted so they are no longer fit for their purpose, Christ's soul departs from them, as we discussed earlier.
Now, this hypothesis may be described as 'impanation' (and, indeed, 'invination'), and I could provide further evidence to support it; but I shall not tire you further here. Instead, if Your Eminence permits, I shall append a chapter to my thesis at a later date to cover this topic fully.
And so I conclude my discourse.
©2006 Trevor Barker MA DPhil