Wendelin's "Christian Theology": Doctrine of the Lord's Supper, Part 3

[A fundraising update: We are 25% of the way to our fundraising goal 25 new $100/month subscribers! Thanks be to God. If you are being blessed by the translation work, please consider supporting the work and speeding it on its way.  Click here to watch a brief video on the project.]

THESIS X:  Hitherto the efficient.  The Matter of the Lord’s Supper is either of which or concerning which.

THESIS XI:  The Matter of which is the sign or the thing signified.

THESIS XII:  The sign is substantial or ceremonial.

THESIS XIII:  The substantial sign is:  (1.)  the true edible bread; (2.)  the true and natural wine.  Both signs are to be offered to all communicants and each.

EXPLANATION:  I.  We affirm, that in the Lord’s Supper true bread is to be employed, edible and nourishing; and that on account of the following reasons:

(1.)  Because Christ made use of bread of this sort, which He took from the table, broke, and offered to His disciples to be eaten.

(2.)  Because the Apostolic Church retained the same bread, and the same was retained for more than a thousand years after the birth of Christ.

(3.)  Because between the bread, nourishing and edible, and the body of Christ, which is signified by it, there is an altogether genuine analogy.  For, as bread, nourishing and edible, is an efficacious means, whereby our bodies are verily fed, and are nourished for this animal life:  So the body of Christ, received in true faith, feeds our souls, and nourishes them unto eternal life.

II.  But why in the Lord’s Supper we do not use the circular hosts, which they vulgarly call offerings of bread, these are the reasons:

(1.)  Because wafers of bread of this sort Christ did not employ the first institution and administration of the supper; but food-bread, and received in its common use.

(2.)  Because the Roman Papists, against the institution of Christ, in the place of nourishing bread in the Lord’s Supper have instituted hosts, after they persuaded the common people that the bread has been transmuted into the body of Christ, and have transformed the Lord’s Supper into a sacrifice.  Whence the Church of Christ is not able to make use of them without great scandal.

(3.)  Because theses hosts or wafers are not true and nourishing bread; and so they do not have the analogy with the body of Christ that we explained above:  which we prove:

1.  Because they do not have the proximate matter of bread, that is, flour and water, worked up and laid out in the way that true and edible bread requires.  For, as true and edible bread is made from water and flour, and the mere mixing of the two principal materials is not a sufficient preparation for it; but it is required, 1.  That they be mixed in the right quantity, so that the mixture becomes a substance solid, thick, and suitable for nourishing men.  2.  That they be properly kneaded with labor and then cooked, and thence obtain a taste and aroma agreeable to bread and pleasing to man, nothing of which is found in these hosts, which are without the proper corpulence, taste, and aroma.

2.  Because they do not have the form of edible bread:  which is evident from this, that their matter does not have the dispositions that the form of true and edible bread requires:  as we have just now shown.

3.  Because they do not have the end and effects of true and edible bread, for they do not nourish and strengthen bodies, nor are they added to other foods; but they are rather hurtful to our bodies, and impede digestion:  whence they are not added to meals, and are prohibited by physicians as harmful to good health.  See Exercitations 101, 102.

III.  The Lutherans and Papists take exception:

(1.)  The bread in the Eucharist is not given to nourish the body.

Therefore, no power of nourishing in it is necessarily required.

Response:  I deny the consequence.  The rationale:  because the power to nourish is required, not so that it might nourish our bodies in the use of the Lord’s Supper, but so that it might represent and seal the power of the body of Christ spiritually to nourish our souls:  which it certainly does not do, if it has in itself no power to nourish.  In like manner, unless the water of baptism has the power of washing away bodily filth, it would not be a suitable symbol of the blood of Christ washing away spiritual filth, that is, sins.  For this very same reason true and natural wine is employed in the Lord’s Supper.  For, unless the sacramental symbols have a certain analogy with the things signified, they certainly could not truly be called sacraments, as Augustine testifies.

Exception is taken, (2.)  Hosts are more suitable for the elderly and toothless old women, which are not able to chew and swallow more solid food or bread.

Response:  This evasion is inane.  Food-bread, by the example of Christ, is able to be employed, as it is among us, which is able to be chewed and easily swallowed even by the toothless.  Neither is the excuse of the toothless old women to contemplated, contrary to the institution of Christ.

Eckhard fights for the retention of the circular hosts using the following arguments, in his fasciculo:

(1.)  The circular placentulæ, which are in use among the Lutherans, consist of the essential parts of bread, flour and water mixed together, reduced by heat consuming the moisture to one chewable consistency.

Therefore, they are true bread.

Response:  The antecedent is not true in a simple way:  they do indeed have the proximate matter of bread, flour and water; but they do not have the whole form:  as we have shown a little before in our third reason.

(2.)  The words of institution do not require the use of bread, larger and useful for food.

Therefore, that is not necessary.

Response:  The antecedent is false concerning food-bread.  Christ, in using food-bread in the first observance of His Supper, by His example taught of what sort we ought to make use:  concerning the quantity we take no pains.  And who, I ask, would deny that it is safer in this matter to follow Christ than Antichrist?

(3.)  The Placentulæ of the Papists and of the Lutherans are as suitable for that function, which the bread distributed by Christ sustained, as food-bread.

Therefore, their use in the Eucharist is as suitable as food-bread.

Response:  1.  The antecedent is false.  For the function of the bread distributed by Christ was to signify and seal to believers the power of nourishing our souls unto eternal life, which is present in the body of Christ apprehended by faith:  those placentulæ do not fulfill this function; because they do not have the salutary power of nourishing.

2.  Neither is the consequence solid:  because there is to be no withdrawing from the divine law, and, with those things that were prescribed by Christ omitted, similar things are not to be substituted according to our will.

(4.)  The Placentulæ, by the custom of many ages, have been received in the Church, neither is there any weighty reason on account of which they ought to be removed.

Therefore, no change concerning those is to be attempted.

Response:  1.  The prescription of a number of ages argues for food-bread:  Therefore, this is rather to be retained, than circular hosts.

2.  The antecedent is false:  the reasons are weighty; because they were instituted by Antichrist against the institution of Christ, and because they do not fulfill the function of the sacramental symbol.

(5.)  The Placentulæ of the Lutherans agrees with the bread, of which Christ made us, both in substance and taste.

Therefore, they ought not to be rejected.

Response:  The antecedent is false:  as we have shown above.  See Exercitation 102.

IV.  Both substantial signs, the bread and the wine, ought to be offered to the communicants; and that on account of the following reasons:

(1.)  Because Christ offered both to His disciples, and commanded them to do the same thereafter in the administration of the supper, by that precept, this do, that is, offer to all, as I myself have done.  Whence He also expressly says, drink ye all from this.

(2.)  Because the Apostles, and their successors, for more than a thousand years after the birth of Christ, namely, all the way to the twelfth century, offered both symbols to each and every communicant.

(3.)  Because Christ commands the same to eat and to drink.

But without any distinction He commands all communicants to eat.

Therefore, He also commands all to drink.

(4.).  Because not only the body of Christ, but also the blood, pertains to all communicating believers.

Therefore, not only the symbol of the body, but also of the blood, namely, the wine, is to be offered to each and every one.

(5.)  Because the commemoration, for the sake of which the use of the cup is taken up, pertains to all communicants without distinction.  Therefore, to whom the commemoration of the death of Christ was committed, to them also the determined means for the obtaining of that end are especially accommodated, of which sort is the use of the cup.

(6.)  Because it is not permitted to detract anything from the Testament of a man, how much less shall it be permitted to detract anything from the Testament of Christ the θεανθρώπῳ/Theanthropos/God-man.  And hence the cup, which was bequeathed to all in the testament of Christ, is not to be taken away from any of the communicants.

(7.)  If in the administration of the supper Lay communicants are also made partakers of the blood of Christ, certainly the cup, which contains the symbol of the blood of Christ, is not to be denied to them.  But the former is true, with the Papists themselves admitting it:  Therefore also the latter.

The rationale of the hypothetical:  that the blood of Christ is a far more precious and holy a thing than the cup.  And, who is reckoned worthy of the thing signified, why would he not be admitted to the participation of the sign?

We conclude, therefore, by no right, indeed, contrary to the divine law and manifest reason, Laics are deprived of the cup by the Papists.

(8.)  The institution of the Eucharist received from the Lord, Paul delivered to the Corinthians, who were Laics; and he wanted the supper to be administered just as the Lord instituted, and he did not exclude anyone from participation in the cup.

V.  Among this sacrilege’s other strongholds, sought by the Papists, are also the following:

(1.)  In Luke 24:30, Christ administers the Eucharist to two disciples, proceeding to Emmaus, under only the one kind of the bread.  Therefore, communion under the one kind of the bread is not contrary to the institution.

The antecedent is evident:  because mention is made only of the bread blessed and broken.

Response:  The antecedent is false.  That Christ at that time administered the Eucharist, is not able to be evinced from the text; seeing that to Christ, outside of the use of the Eucharist, when He took bread, the blessing and the breaking of the bread was also customary.  As it is also customary to many fathers of families to break bread, with the blessing of their children performed before.

Then, if such an extravagant concession were granted, that the Eucharist was at time administered by Christ; nevertheless, communicating under the kind of the bread alone could not be concluded from that:  because the expression is able to be synecdochical, wherein the whole is indicated by a part.  Whence the whole Eucharist in sacred rites is often called the breaking of bread.  And what is more common, than to signify a whole feast by the taking of food, which is never without drink?  Let the passage in Acts 27:35, 36 be considered.

(2.)  In Acts 2:46; 20:7, the Supper is found to have been administered without any mention of the cup:  mention is made only of the bread broken.

Therefore, communication under one kind, and that of the bread, rests upon Apostolic authority.

Response:  Because the antecedent is wont to be conceded by many Theologians; we deny the consequence.  For, as we previously said, by a synecdoche of the part is indicated the whole Eucharistic action, which is not completely summed up in the breaking of the bread, but also in the administration of the cup.

(3.)  The withholding of the sacred cup does not exclude the laity from participation in the blood of Christ, which happens in the Eucharist.

Therefore, the Eucharist is able rightly to be administered to them under the kind of the bread alone.

The antecedent is proven:  Because under the kind of the bread they receive both the body and blood of Christ:  for body of Christ is in no way able to be separated from the blood.  Hence they say:  Under the bread the laity also receives the blood through concomitance:  because the blood always attends the body.

Response:  1.  The antecedent is false.  For sacramental or Eucharistic participation in the blood of Christ does not happen through the bread, but through the cup, or the wine of the cup:  because Christ willed, not the bread, but the wine, to be the sacrament of His blood:  and He willed the sacrament of His body, indeed not separated from the blood, yet distinct, to be the bread, not the wine.

The proof of the antecedent is false.  Under the bread only the body is received sacramentally.  It is no objection, that it is not separated from the blood:  because it was pleasing to Christ to institute separate and distinct sacramental symbols of those, which are distinct, even if not separated; and to exhibit, represent, and seal by the bread, not the blood but the body, and by the wine, not the body but the blood.  Here we must rest.

2.  The consequence is also denied even according to the opinion of the Papists.  For, in the same manner it could be gathered, that the Eucharist is also able to be rightly administered under the kind of the wine alone:  because under the kind of the wine alone the blood of Christ is received together with His body:  for the blood is in no way able to be separated from the body.  But this the Papists would never admit.

THESIS XIV:  The ceremonial sign is the external and visible action concerning the substantial signs:  and in the administration and use of the Lord’s Supper those are four:  (1.)  the blessing of the bread and of the wine; (2.)  the breaking of the bread, and pouring of the wine into the cup; (3.)  the distribution of the broken bread and the poured wine among the communicants; (4.)  and eating of the bread, and the drinking of the wine.

EXPLANATION:  I.  In the first administration of the supper, performed by Christ Himself, these four actions occurred, as it is evident from the words of institution.  The same things were thereafter observed by the Apostles and by the Doctors of the Church in its purer state:  whence also they are also with good reason observed by use.

II.  Now, it is a question between us and the Lutherans:  Whether the breaking of the bread in the administration of the Lord’s Supper is necessary?

We say that it is indeed necessary, and prove it by the following arguments:

(1.)  Because Christ in the first administration of the supper broke the bread, and commanded His disciples to do the same, by the precept, this do, which is to be referred to all parts of the preceding action, as Luther contends, Tome 2, folio 144; Tome 3, folio 486, and in his Larger Catechism:  let Chemnitz[1] also be seen in his Examine Concilii Tridentini, part 2, page 272.

(2.)  Because Christ’s Apostles and disciples, and their faithful successors, broke the bread in the administration of the supper.

(3.)  Because the breaking of the bread is a sacramental ceremony, signifying and sealing to us the breaking, that is, the suffering and crucifixion of Christ.  Whence, with respect to this ceremony, Paul says:  The body of Christ is broken for us,[2] although it was not properly broken.

(4.)  Because from the action and ceremony of breaking employed in the administration by Christ the whole sacrament takes its name.

III.  The Lutherans esteem the breaking of the bread as an indifferent ceremony, which one may employ or not employ:  whence according to the liberty that they attribute to themselves they administer the Lord’s supper without the breaking.

Now, that this rite is indifferent, they thus prove:

In the first administration of the supper Christ employed the breaking of bread, as a ceremony commonly received, and also familiar to Him in other contexts, outside of the use of the sacrament.

Therefore, the breaking of the bread is not necessary in the administration.

Response:  I deny the consequence.  The rationale of the negation:

(1.)  Because Christ commanded His disciples to do whatever He did:  now, what Christ commands to be done, that is made necessary.

(2.)  Because distribution and eating of bread were also actions used outside of the sacrament:  which, nevertheless, are necessary in the supper.

(3.)  Because, as the distribution and eating of the bread, used elsewhere outside of the supper, in the supper are indeed sacramental actions, and denote a singular mystery, and so are necessary; so also the breaking has its own mystery, with regard to which it is necessary.  But even if the rationale of the mystery were not at all clear, nevertheless it is necessary to abstain from change:  because, according to Luther, a change of the ceremonies in the sacraments has Satan as its author, Tome 6, folio 93b:  see also Tome 2, folio 370; Tome 3, folio 369:  see Exercitation 92.

[1] Martin Chemnitz (1522-1586) studied under Luther and Melanchthon, and rose to become a theologian and churchman of some prominence.

[2] 1 Corinthians 11:24.