Per Caritatem

 

Apparently Peter Martyr Vermigli had quite an influence on Thomas Cranmer’s Eucharistic theology.  In the translator’s introduction to Vermigli’s Oxford Treatise and Disputation on the Eucharist, 1549, he notes that Cranmer and Vermigli shared research during 1547-1551 and that “Cranmer’s collection De re sacramentaria resembles Martyr’s biblical and patristic sources in the Treatise” (p. xxxii). Vermigli, in fact, was a frequent guest at Cranmer’s  house.  During one particularly important visit, Martyr shared with Cranmer “two new texts, which proved most significant in defining the Eucharistic theology of both men in the fateful years of 1548 on.  One was his own manuscript copy of Chrysostom’s Ad Caesarium monachum, which he presented to the archbishop [...] The other consisted of excerpts from Theodoret’s first two Dialogues, which reinforced the same Christological analogy for the sacramental relation as did Chrysostom.  Cranmer makes use of both of these texts in his 1550 Defence” (p. xxxiii).

For more on Vermigli, see the following:  Part I:  St. Augustine, Vermigli and Calvin on the Eucharist  and Part II.

[Part I can be accessed here]. 

For Zwingli, because Christ is now seated at the right hand of the Father, he therefore cannot be real-ly present in the Eucharist.  Zwingli’s starting point, in contrast with Thomas’s (and we all have starting points) is that “the presence of a thing in a sign excludes its being present as ‘real’ [i.e.  real for Zwingli seems to be synonymous with local bodily presence]” (p. 67).  As Zwingli himself states, “the very body of Christ is the body which is seated at the right hand of God, and the sacrament of his body is the bread and the sacrament of his blood is the wine … Now the sign and the thing signified cannot be one and the same.  Therefore the sacrament of the body of Christ cannot be the body itself” [On the Lord's Supper, in Zwingli and Bullinger, SCM Press, p. 188, as quoted in Turner, p. 67].  Put simply, according to Zwingli, the material absence of Christ’s body localiter necessarily excludes Christ’s real presence in the body.  Thomas, however, though agreeing with Zwingli that Christ’s bodily presence is not localiter, does not draw Zwingli’s conclusion. As Turner notes, “the presence of Christ in the Eucharist is the real presence of Christ’s body,” but this real presence requires “an absence which is eschatological” (p. 67).  Turner then ends this section with the passage below, which I quote in full because it was the section that I had the most difficulty understanding. 

 [W]hat the Eucharist ‘realises’ is a bodily presence which is not yet, a real absence, a body making really present that of which, as yet, we cannot take possession.  For Christ’s body is raised, and our bodies are not.  Hence, if we cannot, in the fallen condition of our bodiliness, enter fully into communication with the presence of the absent, because raised, person of Jesus, then neither can we enter fully into communication with that absence.  For just as we cannot yet know that kingdom which one day we shall see and fully enjoy, so neither can we have any grasp of how far we fall short of communicating with it.  We fail even in our calculation of the degree to which our Eucharistic communication fails.  Hence, if there is a problem about how Christ is present in the Eucharistic sign there must equally be a problem of accounting for how that absence is present within it; and that problem is not to be resolved on any account of the nature of signs, but only on some account of the relationship between the apophatic and the cataphatic, that relationship being itself defined only under the constraint of the eschatological.  If, therefore, we ask:  ‘How is Christ present in the Eucharist?’ Thomas’s answer is:  ‘Really, as bodies are present to one another.’ And if you ask:  ‘How is Christ’s body present?’ Thomas’s answer is:  ‘Sacramentally’, that is, ‘eschatologically’, as the raised body of Jesus can be present to us in our pre-mortem condition as unraised.  And that is a mode of ‘real absence’ as much as it is a mode of ‘real presence’.  For such is the nature of a sacrament (p. 67). 

If I understand Turner correctly, he seems to be saying that to be eschatologically, bodily present in the Eucharist is to be sacramentally present in the Eucharist.  Thus, the idea is that the real presence of Christ is a bodily presence that obtains under a sacramental sign (bread and wine).   Contra Zwingli, Thomas claims that sign-presence is both real-presence and bodily presence.  If sign- presence is real-presence, then we are necessarily involved in real-absence.  With regard to the Eucharist, what is really absent is the local presence of Christ’s body.  Given our un-glorified state in this life, we cannot grasp how a body can be genuinely (real-ly) present without simultaneously being locally present, we are unable to, as Turner says, fully “communicate” with the kind of bodily-presence-beyond-local-presence that constitutes Christ’s Eucharistic (bodily) presence.  Once we possess our glorified bodies, we will be able to partake fully of Christ’s glorified body; however, until then, our partaking is not a complete partaking but neither is its reality cancelled.  It is an already-not-yet partaking that involves a presence/absence dialectic, and consequently, necessitates a catophatic/apophatic dialectic.  This already-not-yet sacramental presence assures us of a more full presence and partaking of Christ that has been promised us in our glorified state.  This sacramental presence is as my friend and colleague, Derek, says, “a promise of the presence to come, signifying it and partially bringing it to pass in the present (i.e. it is an effectual sign, not merely signifying what it signs, but also effecting what it signifies”).[1]

Lastly, I found Turner’s summary of Zwingli’s position fair and accurate (in so far as my knowledge of Zwingli goes); however, his criticisms of course do not apply in toto to other Protestant Eucharistic theologies (e.g., real presence as understood by those within the Anglican tradition, Calvin, Luther, Peter Martyr Vermigli).   It seems to me that at the end of the day, Thomas is saying with regard to the how Christ is bodily present (and absent) that it is a mystery that cannot be explained (which is not a criticism of Thomas on my part-Calvin would heartily agree).[2]  Moreover, Calvin and Vermigli also emphasize the real presence of Christ, as well as a mysterious partaking of Christ’s body and blood in the Eucharist.  For example, after speaking of our need for communion with Christ’s flesh and blood in order to “aspire to the heavenly life,”

Calvin then adds,

[t]his could not be, did not Christ truly form one with us, and refresh us by the eating of his flesh, and the drinking of his blood. But though it seems an incredible thing that the flesh of Christ, while at such a distance from us in respect of place, should be food to us, let us remember how far the secret virtue of the Holy Spirit surpasses all our conceptions, and how foolish it is to wish to measure its immensity by our feeble capacity. Therefore, what our mind does not comprehend let faith conceive, viz., that the Spirit truly unites things separated by space. That sacred communion of flesh and blood by which Christ transfuses his life into us, just as if it penetrated our bones and marrow, he testifies and seals in the Supper, and that not by presenting a vain or empty sign, but by there exerting an efficacy of the Spirit by which he fulfils what he promises (Instit. IV.17.10). 

Notes

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[1] A huge thanks to Derek for a helpful dialogue on this particular section of Turner’s presentation.

 [2] “I am not satisfied with the view of those who, while acknowledging that we have some kind of communion with Christ, only make us partakers of the Spirit, omitting all mention of flesh and blood. As if it were said to no purpose at all, that his flesh is meat indeed, and his blood is drink indeed; that we have no life unless we eat that flesh and drink that blood; and so forth. Therefore, if it is evident that full communion with Christ goes beyond their description, which is too confined, I will attempt briefly to show how far it extends, before proceeding to speak of the contrary vice of excess. [...] if, indeed, it be lawful to put this great mystery into words, a mystery which I feel, and therefore freely confess that I am unable to comprehend with my mind, so far am I from wishing any one to measure its sublimity by my feeble capacity. Nay, I rather exhort my readers not to confine their apprehension within those too narrow limits, but to attempt to rise much higher than I can guide them. For whenever this subject is considered, after I have done my utmost, I feel that I have spoken far beneath its dignity. And though the mind is more powerful in thought than the tongue in expression, it too is overcome and overwhelmed by the magnitude of the subject. All then that remains is to break forth in admiration of the mystery, which it is plain that the mind is inadequate to comprehends or the tongue to express. I will, however, give a summary of my view as I best can, not doubting its truth, and therefore trusting that it will not be disapproved by pious breasts” (Inst. IV.17.7). 

As mentioned in part I, Vermigli and Calvin regularly appeal to St. Augustine (as well as other Church Fathers) and understand their position to be in line with Augustine, who defines a sacrament as the “sacrae rei signum, aut visibile signum invisibilis gratia” (“a sign of a holy/sacred thing, or a visible sign of invisible grace”). As Vermigli argues, “[j]ust as we are said to receive salvation through the words of God, not that salvation is concealed in those words […], but is contained through signification. Such comparison of divine words is appropriate, since in St. Augustine’s opinion sacraments are visible words” (Ibid. , p. 283). Augustine in fact makes his view even clearer when he says that the Apostle Paul “could have proclaimed [potuit praedicare] the Lord Jesus Christ by means of signifying [significando], in one way by his tongue, in another way by epistle, and in another way by the sacrament of His body and blood (De Trinitate III.4.10). Here, as Vermigli points out, the Lord Jesus is understood by St. Augustine as being signified by a sacrament of his body and blood. Augustine goes on to say in the passage, “since, of course, we neither claim that his [i.e., the Apostle’s] tongue nor the parchments and ink, nor the sounds which signify [significantes] that he brought forth [editos] with his tongue, nor the marks [signa] of alphabetical signs [litterarum] written together [conscripta] on small skins [to be; sc. esse] the body and blood of Christ, but we take in hand [sumimus] that only which has been received [acceptum] from the fruit of the earth and ceremonially consecrated [consecratum] by mystical prayer [prece mystica] for the purpose of [our] spiritual health in memory of the Lord’s passion for us, [and] that which although guided [perducator] by the hands of men to that visible appearance [visibliem speciem], is not sanctified so that it would be so great a sacrament, except by the Spirit of God working invisibly [operante invisibiliter]” (De Trinitate III.4.10). Vermigli then points out that “what we receive from the earth’s fruit is called the Lord’s body. So that it follows that bread remains there,” as it would not make sense to understand the earth as bringing forth accidents, and yet the bread is conjoined sacramentally to the Lord’s body (The Oxford Treatise and Disputation On the Eucharist, p. 284).

This effectual, sacramental signification that occurs in the Supper is of course no common signification, but is that by which the believer’s relationship with Christ is strengthened and nourished. The power and efficaciousness that the signification obtains derives from God and is a Trinitarian affair. By effectual signification Vermigli means the exhibere of Christ. As McLelland notes in his introductory chapter, here perhaps Martin Bucer and Calvin were at times more clear as they are at pains to stress the bread and wine as signa exhibitiva and a real presence. Both Melanchthon and Bucer in the Wittenberg Concord of 1534 employ the phrase, “signa exhibitiva,” e.g., “the bread and wine are signs, signa exhibitiva, which being proferred and taken, the body of Christ is proffered and taken at the same time. We read something similar in H. Bullinger’s, First Helvetic Confession of 1536, which states, “symbols by which the true communication of his body and blood is present (exhibeatur) by the Lord himself (Ibid., p. xxxviii). Lastly, a nice Christological analogy flows from this Reformed position, viz., just as the natures of the elements (bread and wine) remain and are then sacramentally joined to the body and blood of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit and hence are truly present in an unconfused way, not passing into one another, so too in Christ the human and divine natures truly coexist, yet unmixed and unconfused.

Though I am still working through a good deal of Calvin, Vermigli, and others on the subject of the Eucharist and want to (re)emphasize that my thinking on this topic is still very much in progress, the following seem to me important additions to add to the on-going discussion of a Reformed view of the Eucharist. According to Vermigli (and it is understood by many scholars that Vermigli and Calvin were more or less in unison regarding their views of the Eucharist), Christ’s true flesh is given in the Supper,[1] but it must be received by faith and eaten (as Calvin claims) spiritually—a reference to the mode of our receiving. Yet, with his flesh Christ also gives a symbol (e.g., the bread) in which there is no substantial change. Some claim that such a position ipso facto severely diminishes our need for Christ’s humanity in the present life and is practically equivalent to affirming that Christ hung on the Cross only spiritually. Yet, it is entirely unclear to me how this follows unless perhaps one assumes the truth of transubstantiation. In fact, similar accusations were charged against Vermigli who in no way denies the reality of Christ’s sacrificial death on the cross and even affirms that Christ’s “body is eaten by the communicants, yet not in the same way that it hangs or is crucified” (emphasis added; The Oxford Treatise and Disputation On the Eucharist, 1549, p. 267) [2]. Vermigli goes on to say that “a sacrament is something heavenly that nature did not form, but through consecration comes to the bread, yet not so as to throw its own substance away” (Ibid., p. 273). In other words, Vermigli claims that the nature of the symbols (bread/wine) need not be transubstantiated in order for Christ’s true substance to be present. The latter, viz., Christ’s true substance, is present in the Supper and is conjoined to the symbols. Vermigli clarifies further, stating that the elements are indeed, as it were, altered, but the change is not in terms of species understood as accidents of the bread and wine, for the senses show that these do not change. Rather, by the power of the Holy Spirit, Christ’s substance is brought into a sacramental relation with the symbols. As Vermigli explains, “while this holy rite is proceeding, a sacramental dimension [ratio] is brought to the symbols through the institutions of the words of the Lord. That relation of signifying both the mystical body and Christ’s body itself is grounded not in the accidents of bread and wine but in their natures, through the coming of the Holy Spirit, who uses them as instruments” (Ibid. , p. 274). In other to avoid an equivocation, Vermigli makes the following distinction, if change is understood according to substance such that the substance itself must perish or be converted into some other substance, then he denies such a change. However, if one understands “that the substance is changed in a way that receives another quality and condition than it had before,” then he grants that it has changed (Ibid. , p. 274). So after the words of consecration, the elements obtain another quality and “a greater dignity, namely, a sacramental state, which they did not have before” via the power of the Holy Spirit (Ibid. , p. 275). In short, Vermigli (and Calvin) do not deny the presence of the body (and blood) of Christ in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, but rather their dispute is with the mode of presence in which we receive the body and blood of Christ. Vermigli and Calvin hold that we receive Christ’s body and blood sacramentally through an effectual or sacramental signification by faith, and we receive the symbols of these realities via the senses. Accordingly, the body of Christ is present through sacramental signification. One might counter that if one claims that the same body is given which Christ offered on the cross, then it must follow (in the very same way) that Christ is truly and substantially in the sacrament. However, Vermigli rejects this argument and claims that one would be guilty of turning quid (“what”) into quale (“how”) [Ibid., p. 281]. Vermigli thus affirms that it is the same flesh given in the Supper, but here it is received through the instrument of faith. Hence, an unbeliever would not receive Christ’s body, because he lacks the instrument, viz., the gift of faith, by which the body of Christ is received.

Neither Calvin nor Vermigli see themselves as pure innovators in their understanding of the Eucharist and regularly cite the Church Fathers for support of their position. Part II will discuss an important passage by St. Augustine found in De Trinitate III.4.10 to which Vermigli appealed in his disputation on the Eucharist.

Notes
[1] See e.g. Calvin’s Institutes IV.17.7, where he writes, “I am not satisfied with the view of those who, while acknowledging that we have some kind of communion with Christ, only make us partakers of the Spirit, omitting all mention of flesh and blood. As if it were said to no purpose at all, that his flesh is meat indeed, and his blood is drink indeed; that we have no life unless we eat that flesh and drink that blood; and so forth.” Calvin goes on to describe the intimate nature of our relationship with Christ via union and participation in the Eucharist. “But ever since that fountain of life began to dwell in our nature, he no longer lies hid at a distance from us, but exhibits himself openly for our participation. Nay, the very flesh in which he resides he makes vivifying to us, that by partaking of it we may feed for immortality. ‘I,’ says he, ‘am that bread of life;’ ‘I am the living bread which came down from heaven;’ ‘And the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world’ (John 6:48, 51). By these words he declares, not only that he is life, inasmuch as he is the eternal Word of God who came down to us from heaven, but, by coming down, gave vigour to the flesh which he assumed, that a communication of life to us might thence emanate. Hence, too, he adds, that his flesh is meat indeed, and that his blood is drink indeed: by this food believers are reared to eternal life. The pious, therefore, have admirable comfort in this, that they now find life in their own flesh.” Hence, for Calvin, Vermigli and we might add Bucer, Bullinger and others of the Reformed tradition, our participation in the humanity of Christ is not something that simply has to do with a future salvation. Rather, the nourishment and life that we receive from our participation in Christ’s body in the Eucharist is a present and on-going grace gift.

[2] As cited in Peter Martyr Vermigli, The Oxford Treatise and Disputation On the Eucharist. Trans. and ed. by Joseph C. McLelland. Kirksville, Sixteenth Century Essays & Studies, 2000.

The Catholic scholar, John Patrick Donnelly, S.J. in his book, Calvinism and Scholasticism in Vermigli’s Doctrine of Man and Grace, shows that Peter Martyr Vermigli (1499-1562) was thoroughly acquainted with Aristotle and St. Thomas, as well as a number of other medievals (Lombard), patristics, and numerous ancient philosophers. In fact, Vermigli wrote a commentary on Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics; however, he only completed through book III. Vermigli’s approach to the relationship of theology and philosophy and the appropriation of the latter for the service of the former, has much in common with St.Thomas.

Having examined Vermigli’s thought on a number of topics (e.g., reason and revelation, philosophical anthropology, soteriology), Donnelly, near the end of his book, devotes some space to address the claims of older scholarship on the supposed intrinsic link between Protestantism and nominalism. Representatives of the older view, e.g., John Todd and Joseph Lortz, see nominalism as a “decadent scholasticism, even a theology no longer authentically Catholic. They see Luther’s theology partly as a direct result of his nominalist background, partly as a reaction against it, especially its Pelagianism. For these Catholic authors several of Luther’s central teachings—justification by extrinsic imputation, simul justus et peccator, predestination, distrust of human reason—are rooted in nominalist presuppositions. In fact, none of these Catholic authors has an expert background in nominalist theology or philosophy. Recent research, especially that of Heiko Oberman, has revised their interpretation of nominalism, seeing it in a more favorable light, employing more precise scholarship, and re-opening the question of Luther’s relation to the whole Occamist tradition[1]” (pp. 202-203). Donnelly goes on to say that he is not necessarily denying certain aspects of the influence of nominalism on Luther’s personal development, nor is he purporting to give an analysis of the “proper evaluation of nominalism as a philosophical or theological system” (p. 204). It is, however, a calling-into-question the claim that there is an intrinsic connection between Protestantism and nominalism. “The thesis that Occam is the foster father of Protestantism needs revision in the light of Peter Martyr’s theology.” With Martyr, we have a theologian who maintains essential continuity with the Protestant distinctives of Calvin and Luther; however, Martyr “came to these conclusions out of a generally Thomistic rather than Occamist background. The same applies a fortiori to Zanchi [1516-1592]” (p. 204).

Notes
[1] In a footnote (n. 13), Donnelly states that “several recent Catholic studies, independently of Oberman, have begun a reassessment of the relationship between nominalism and the Reformation, particularly McSorley, 183-215, and Francis Clark, Eucharistic Sacrifice and the Reformation, (London: 1960), 296-322. William J. Courtenay reviews the recent literature, “Nominalism and Late Medieval Religion,” […] in Charles Trinkas and Heiko A. Oberman, editors, The Pursuit of Holiness in Late Medieval and Renaissance Religion, (Leiden, 1974),” [Donnelly, p. 203].