The great write-in write-out campaign

White Horse Inn ^ | feb15,2015 | Timothy F. Kauffman

[RnMomof7]

We concluded our last series on The Sacrifice Challenge with a few citations from Cyril of Jerusalem, so we thought it opportune to use him to demonstrate one of the ways Rome “finds” her doctrines in the Early Church. As we noted last week, Cyril’s Catechetical Lectures were part of a late-fourth century trend during which Rome’s novel Mass Sacrifice was invented. Catholic Answers used a few select quotes to prove Cyril’s belief in transubstantiation, but as we demonstrated, those quotes were truncated in order to isolate them from their context, and Cyril—even in the midst of his other errors—nevertheless maintained his conviction that the elements of the Lord’s Supper were only figuratively Christ’s body and blood, and remained so even after the consecration.

But in his 23rd Catechetical Lecture, Cyril also instructed the neophytes in such a way that he appears to be telling the new converts how to adore the elements of the Lord’s Supper as they receive them. Cyril’s 23rd Lecture is often used to support eucharistic adoration, and Rome has pressed Cyril’s language past its breaking point in order to get him to affirm the idolatrous practice. By way of example, we will cite Alban Butler’s Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs and other Principal Saints, volume 3:

“We learn the manner of receiving the blessed sacrament from his Catech. 23. ‘Putting your left hand under your right,’ says he, ‘form a throne of your right hand to receive the king; hold it hollow, receiving on it the Body of Christ. Answer, Amen. Carefully sanctify your eyes by touching them with the holy Body, being very watchful that no part of it fall. Approach to the cup of the Blood, bowed in a posture of adoration and reverence; saying, Amen, take of the blood of Christ. Whilst yet something of the moisture sticks on your lips, touch them with your hand, and by applying it then to your eyes, forehead and other senses sanctify them.’ ” (Butler, Lives, Vol. III, Dublin (1866)  p. 185).

Approach the cup bowed in a posture of adoration? That certainly sounds like eucharistic adoration, does it not?

As we noted last week, Cyril rejoiced in the manifold figurations of objects and events within the Scripture and within the liturgy, calling Jesus’ body a figure for bread (Lecture 13, paragraph 19), and bread a figure for His body and wine a figure for His blood (Lecture 22, paragraph 3). He said in Lecture 23, the same lecture cited by Butler, in the Lord’s Supper we “are bidden to taste, not bread and wine, but the anti-typical Body and Blood of Christ” (Lecture 23, paragraph 20).  By way of a refresher, “antitype” (‪αντιτύπου‬) means “something that is represented by a symbol.” To Cyril, the elements of the Lord’s Supper were figures for His body and blood, and what we eat and drink is symbolic of what they represent.

But might his “commendation” of eucharistic adoration in the same lecture inform us of the limits of his figurative language? Maybe the elements of the Lord’s supper are a figure for His Body and Blood, but nonetheless, a transubstantiated figure. After all, one does not approach the cup “bowed in a posture of adoration” for a mere figure! In Rome’s vain imagination, that is what Cyril must have said, and in her proud imagination that is what Cyril must have meant. But Cyril did not say that.

We can see evidence of Rome’s tampering when we read what Cyril was actually talking about. Butler cited two successive paragraphs (21 and 22) from Cyril, largely omitting his main point, and then fused the two paragraphs together to make them seem to confirm eucharistic adoration. Here is paragraph 21 in its entirety, starting immediately after his insistence that what we eat and drink is an antitype (‪αντιτύπου, symbol‬) of Christ’s body and blood:

“In approaching therefore, come not with your wrists extended (τεταμενοις), or your fingers spread; but make your left hand a throne for the right, as for that which is to receive a King. And having hollowed your palm, receive the Body of Christ, saying over it, Amen. So then after having carefully hallowed your eyes by the touch of the Holy Body, partake of it; giving heed lest you lose any portion thereof ; for whatever you lose, is evidently a loss to you as it were from one of your own members. For tell me, if any one gave you grains of gold, would you not hold them with all carefulness, being on your guard against losing any of them, and suffering loss? Will you not then much more carefully keep watch, that not a crumb fall from you of what is more precious than gold and precious stones?” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Lecture 23, paragraph 21)

The first point we will make is that these are catechetical lectures for the newly converted. They have never received communion before in their lives. Cyril is telling them how to do it. The term we highlighted, τεταμενοις, literally means “hanging” and is so rendered in the Septuagint regarding hanging banners or ribbons in Esther 1:6. This is not advice for the experienced Christian on how to adore the eucharist.  It is advice to the neophyte to make sure he does not come forward to receive the bread with limp wrists and splayed fingers. Rather he is to hold his fingers together and make a cup out of his hands, forming a hollow in the palm, so that the presbyter may have an obvious place to put the bread. Rome may read what she will into his words, “make your left hand a throne for the right,” or “form a throne of your right hand,” but since Cyril preceded that description with a caution against limp wrists and spread fingers, his meaning is obviously for the catechumen to form a hollow in his palm to receive the bread so that none falls through. His use of such an analogy is a useful illustration to ensure that the sacrament is approached reverently, but what he does not do, curiously, is have the catechumen bow to the bread when receiving it.

That Cyril is concerned here with the operational rather than the dogmatic implications of the liturgy is shown by how he goes on making sure that the neophytes do not drop the bread. Limp wrists and spread fingered are just asking for a eucharistic accident. He does not, for example, say

“Don’t come limp-wristed with spread fingers, but rather bowed down in adoration, lest you spill something.”

He says, rather,

“Don’t come limp-wristed with spread fingers, but with closed fingers and firm hands, lest you spill something.”

Forming a “throne” is a way to keep those fingers together and those hands firm. He is merely talking about how to receive the Lord’s Supper without spilling something in the process. This is what Butler left out of his citation from Cyril.

The significance of the omission from paragraph 21 is seen plainly when Cyril proceeds with his advice on how to receive the cup in paragraph 22. Again, because the core of his message is not “how to adore the eucharist,” but rather how to receive it without spilling it, Cyril again instructs them on how to hold their hands. Here is paragraph 22 in its entirety:

“Then after you have partaken of the Body of Christ, draw near also to the Cup of His Blood; not stretching forth your hands, but bending (κύπτων), and saying with an air of worship and reverence, Amen, hallow yourself by partaking also of the Blood of Christ. And while the moisture is still upon your lips, touch it with your hands, and hallow your eyes and brow and the other organs of sense. Then wait for the prayer, and give thanks unto God, who has accounted you worthy of so great mysteries.” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Lecture 23, paragraph 22)

In paragraph 21, Cyril was giving advice on how to arrange one’s hands so that one does not spill the bread when receiving it. Here in paragraph 22, he explains that one is not to reach out to the wine with extended hands, but rather should “draw near to the cup” with hands near the body. On the one hand, leaning toward the cup avoids the likelihood of spillage when the catechumen translates the cup to his lips. It would be consistent with his advice for receiving the bread—the further the catechumen has to move the cup to his lips, the higher the likelihood of a eucharistic accident.

On the other hand, the word Cyril uses here, κύπτων, which we have highlighted above, means to bend forward, or to stoop. Is he prescribing that the catechumen bow down in adoration to the wine? The term is used in another form in the Septuagint to refer to crouching down: “He croucheth (κύψω), and humbleth himself” (Psalms 10:10), and in the New Testament for the same, as in John being unworthy to stoop down to loosen Jesus’ sandal (Mark 1:7) and Jesus stooping down to write in the sand (John 8:6,8). The term is used in the apocrypha to  refer to “the one who is grieved, who goes about weak and bent over (κύπτων)” (Baruch 2:18).

Chrysostom uses the term to refer to a penitent man “shedding tears, and bending toward the ground” (John Chrysostom, On the Statutes, Homily 21, paragraph 6). Elsewhere, he uses it to refer to a wicked man, when he is found out, bowing his head in shame, broken and in need of mercy (Chrysostom, Homily 88, Migne’s PG, Book 8, p. 603). Basil uses the term to refer to someone who has been humbled from high places, and cast to the ground (Basil, de Hominis Structura, Oration II, Migne’s PG, Book 30, p. 57).

What is notable about its typical usage, is that while it can be used to describe the head bowed down for worship, i.e., “then they bowed (κύψας) their heads and worshiped” (Exodus 4:31, Septuagint), it is more often used to describe a posture of contrition. As noted in the link to the Liddell-Scott lexicon, above, it means to hang the head from shame, sorrow or thought, or to bow down under a burden.

Cyril’s meaning in both paragraphs 21 and 22 is plain. When taking the bread, do not hold your wrists limp and your fingers spread, but rather adjust your hands to receive the bread with reverence, making sure you do not spill anything. When receiving the wine, instead of taking the cup at arm’s length, one ought rather to draw near in humility with an attitude and a posture of contrition. The “air of worship and reverence” for the catechumen is in the saying, not in the bending. Nobody disagrees that the Lord’s Supper should be received with a worshipful reverent composure. What is denied is that the worship is to be directed to the elements, and we deny that Cyril was so directing his adoration in Lecture 23.

One thing that makes Cyril difficult for Rome is that he only has the catechumen bending while receiving the wine. Since Rome’s argument is that Cyril is bowing before the Eucharistic Christ in adoration, and since Rome generally prefers to administer the Lord’s Supper under the species of bread alone, it is fair to ask why Cyril does not have the catechumen bowing to the bread as well. Additionally, because Cyril has the catechumen saying “Amen” over the the cup “with an air of worship and reverence,” it is fair to ask why Cyril only has the catechumen saying “Amen” over the bread in the hollow of his palm, without “an air of worship and reverence.” Why bow to the wine and not to the bread? Why say “Amen” with worship and reverence over the wine, but not over the bread? In context, Cyril appears to be instructing the neophytes to approach the Lord’s table respectfully, with contrition and reverence to receive “not bread and wine, but the anti-typical [symbolical] Body and Blood of Christ” (Lecture 23, paragraph 20), being particularly careful not to spill anything. We need not read anything further into his words than the context will allow.

But that was not enough for Bellarmine, who wanted to see Eucharistic adoration in Cyril’s 23rd Lecture. Bellarmine translated the Greek “κύπτων” into the Latin “genu flexo” (bending the knee), as if Cyril had been prescribing a gesture of kneeling to the consecrated wine. Here, Migne corrects Bellarmine, and rightly so because the post-Nicene Church insisted on taking the Lord’s Supper standing up, not genuflecting (see Migne’s Patrologiæ Græcæ, Volume 33, col. 1126, n. 3). The Early Church, after all, insisted that Christians do not kneel on the Lord’s Day (Council of Nicæa, Canon 20).  As we explained in our article, “It’s Complicated,” the Early Church’s custom was “not bending the knee upon Sunday” (Irenæus, Fragments, 7), which is to say, “not genuflecting.” There had been some occasions of kneeling in the ante-Nicene church, but the Council had put an end to the practice. It would make no sense therefore to suggest genuflection in Cyril at precisely the point that the Early Church insisted on not genuflecting.

Another remarkable irony that makes Rome’s quest for Eucharistic Adoration in Cyril so futile is what he actually recommends that the catechumens do with the elements they receive. When taking the bread in the hand, the catechumen is to touch it to his eyes, and thus “hallow” them:

“So then after having carefully hallowed your eyes by the touch of the Holy Body, partake of it” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Lecture 23, paragraph 21)

Then, after taking the wine, while it is still on the lips, the catechumen is to take it on his fingertips and touch his eyes, forehead, nose and ears with it:

“And while the moisture is still upon your lips, touch it with your hands, and hallow your eyes and brow and the other organs of sense.” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Lecture 23, paragraph 22)

In other words, the catechumen is instructed to rub “Jesus” on his face and ears while partaking of His Body and Blood. In Rome there is only one possible word for this practice:

“Sacrilege!”

Among the Roman Catholic faithful there is a continuing controversy about whether communion should be taken on the tongue or in the hand. The General Instruction of the Roman Missal says “The consecrated host may be received either on the tongue or in the hand” (GIRM, 160), but this has not quelled the firestorm. To receive the eucharist with true reverence, says Bishop Athanasius Schneider, one must receive it on the tongue, on one’s knees:

“The reverence and awe of Catholics who truly believe they are receiving Jesus in the Eucharist should lead them to kneel and receive Communion on their tongues, said a bishop writing in the Vatican newspaper.” (Catholic News Service, Bishop says Catholics should kneel, receive communion on tongue)

Others see the reception on the hand as a sign of irreverence and disrespect for the Body and Blood of Christ. These Last Days Ministry, an apologetics ministry devoted to the messages of the Apparitions of Mary, cites the preferences of the last three popes (Paul VI, John Paul II and Benedict XVI) who “encouraged solely, kneeling and on the tongue, as the preferred way of receiving Holy Communion,” and then has the vision of Mary weigh in on this abominable practice:

“Communion in the hand has not been, and will not be accepted by Heaven. This is a sacrilege in the eyes of the Eternal Father, and must not be continued, for you only add to your punishment when you continue on in the ways that have been found to be unpleasing to the Eternal Father.” – Our Lady of the Roses, June 30, 1984 (These Last Days Ministry, “Kneeling and Communion on the Tongue” Will Bring Back True Devotion)

Others say that communion in the hand is an invention of the Protestants during the Reformation to repudiate the belief in the Real Presence. Michael Davies, writing at CatholicTradition.org writes,

“Communion in the hand … was introduced in the 16th century by the Protestant Reformers specifically to repudiate belief in … the Real Presence.” (Michael Davies, Communion in the Hand and Similar Frauds)

Communion in the hand is sacrilege? Disrespectful? Irreverent? Fraudulent? An unacceptable Protestant invention? What then are we to do with Cyril of Jerusalem’s instructions that we receive the symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ in the hands, and then rub “Him” all over our face?

There is no difficulty at all, say the proponents of communion on the tongue. Cyril’s advice is so thoroughly incompatible with the reverence that is due the Lord in the sacred species, that we must assume that Lecture 23 has been corrupted by a heretic:

“Considered in context, it becomes suspect. For it speaks of a strange custom entirely alien to the highest veneration which the faithful have always had for the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist. … In view of this unheard of liberty which is incompatible with the total veneration due to the Sacred Species, those who are learned in these matters think of an interpolation … made by the Patriarch John, the successor of St. Cyril in Jerusalem … [who was] of suspect orthodoxy. ” (Receiving Communion on the Hand is Contrary to Tradition, The Catholic Voice, 2001)

“This rather odd (or even superstitious? Irreverent?) recommendation has caused scholars to question the authenticity of this text. Some think that perhaps there has been an interpolation, or that it is really the saint’s successor who wrote it.” (Jude Huntz, Rethinking Communion in the Hand, parentheses in original)

“The description of such a bizarre Communion Rite … was most certainly not preached by St. Cyril in the Church of Jerusalem, neither would it have been licit whatsoever in any other Church. What we have here is a rite which is a product of the imagination, oscillating between fanaticism and sacrilege, by …an anonymous Syrian, a devourer of books, an indefatigable writer who poured into his writings, indigested and contaminated figments of own his imagination. … a crypto-Arian, influenced by Origen and Pelagius…” (The great Catholic horror story: the pseudo-historical deception of Communion in the hand)

We actually agree with these Roman Catholics who are offended at Cyril’s instructions—his instructions are incompatible with Eucharistic adoration and a belief in the “Real Presence.” However, they are consistent with a belief that the bread and wine are only symbolically Jesus’ body and blood, which is exactly what Cyril said they were:

“[F]or they who taste are bidden to taste, not bread and wine, but the anti-typical [symbolical] Body and Blood of Christ.” (Lecture 23, paragraph 20)

If Cyril’s practice of rubbing the consecrated bread and wine on his face is grossly inconsistent with a belief in the Real Presence, then his instructions to approach the cup bowing certainly cannot be construed as support for the Real Presence. One does not worship the wine and then rub it on one’s face. What one touches to one’s face is that which he holds to be symbolic of something else, which is why Cyril uses the same symbolic language for the Eucharist as he does for the Holy Oil, which is symbolically applied to one’s forehead (Lecture 21, paragraph 3), and baptismal Water, in which we are symbolically dipped (Lecture 20, paragraph 3). Sure, the oil, the water and the bread and wine are “holy” to Cyril, but only because they symbolize something else, not because they are what they symbolize. Because of Whom and what the elements symbolize, they ought to be approached with humility, reverence and contrition. That is what the context of Cyril tells us, and it is that context that Roman Catholics find so abhorrent that it must be ignored.

Bellarmine was so disposed to find Eucharistic Adoration in Cyril that he actually edited in a genuflexion that was unlawful in the Early Church. Others who wish to use Cyril to support eucharistic adoration either ignore the fact that he (allegedly) “bowed” only to the wine, or simply assume that he must have bowed to the bread, too, though he says nothing of it. To arrive at their conclusions they must edit into his 4th century lectures an 11th century innovation, and then ignore his “irreverent,” “sacrilegious” handling of the wine and bread that he is alleged to have been worshiping only a moment ago. Those who believe that communion on the hand is irreverent, are quick to highlight Cyril’s “odd,” “entirely alien,” “fanatical, “bizarre” practice, and thereby edit out his Lecture entirely. Such are the contradictions Rome finds when she attempts to discover her novel religion in the early church.

Rome’s belief in Eucharistic Adoration and the Real Presence makes Cyril’s 23rd Lecture logically incomprehensible, because Roman Catholics must find Eucharistic Adoration wherever they look. Where it cannot be found, it must be written in, in order to make sure the ancient data agrees with Rome’s novelties. Where the data disagrees with Rome’s novelties, it must be written off as the writings of a deranged heretic. What does not occur to Rome—and indeed, what cannot occur to her—is the possibility that Cyril really believed what he said: that the consecrated bread and wine were just symbols.

As we noted last week, Cyril of Jerusalem introduced dangerous errors when he taught that we should offer Christ’s Sacrifice to God in our prayers as a propitiation for the sins of the living and the dead, and his errors opened the door for Rome’s late-fourth century novelty of the Mass Sacrifice. But he did not worship the Eucharist, and he did not believe in the “Real Presence.”

[Campion]

When I knew Kauffman, he had exactly no professional credentials in, history, theology, Greek, or Scripture. Has he acquired any, or is he still as self-taught as I am?

[verga]

I don’t know if I should be glad prots have so much time that they can waste it on post garbage like this, or feel sorry that their lives are so empty they can’t find anything better to do.

[bonfire]

Yet here you are wasting time.

[verga]

Putting down misconceptions about Jesus and heresies about His Church, the Catholic Church, is never a waste of time.

[RnMomof7]

A late history ping

[MamaB]

Telling the truth about a religion is not a waste of time either. I sure do enjoy these threads and am learning so much.

[Alex Murphy]

Putting down misconceptions about Jesus and heresies about His Church, the Catholic Church, is never a waste of time.

Putting down misconceptions about Jesus and heresies that originated with the Catholic Church is never a waste of time.

[WVKayaker]

I don’t know if I should be glad prots have so much time that they can waste it on post garbage like this, or feel sorry that their lives are so empty they can’t find anything better to do.

Putting down misconceptions about Jesus and heresies about His Church, the Catholic Church, is never a waste of time.

I must have missed your brilliant rebuttal to the article. The only put down I see is your typical nothing.

No refutation! No dialogue. Plenty of snark.

Sad, sad, sad...

[maryz]

“We learn the manner of receiving the blessed sacrament from his Catech. 23. ‘Putting your left hand under your right,’ says he, ‘form a throne of your right hand to receive the king; hold it hollow, receiving on it the Body of Christ. Answer, Amen. Carefully sanctify your eyes by touching them with the holy Body, being very watchful that no part of it fall. Approach to the cup of the Blood, bowed in a posture of adoration and reverence; saying, Amen, take of the blood of Christ. Whilst yet something of the moisture sticks on your lips, touch them with your hand, and by applying it then to your eyes, forehead and other senses sanctify them.’ ” (Butler, Lives, Vol. III, Dublin (1866) p. 185).

AFAIK, the best current scholarly opinion is that the last five of the (I think 18) tractates bundled together and attributed to Cyril are actually the work of his successor John, widely suspected of Arianism by no less than St. Jerome and St. Augustine, among others. This guy's scholarship seems at best out of date.

[MHGinTN]

Pigeons are like that don’tchaknow. They will peck at anything and on rare occasion find a crumb. This pigeon doesn’t seem so lucky.

[MHGinTN]

It also appears to dance around the real blasphemy,too.

[verga]

Only of you listen to and believe the Catholics

[verga]

Not a single one did, those all came from prots.

[verga]

Sad, sad, sad...

Yes the prots are.

[MamaB]

I have done way too much research to believe just about anything Catholics say. I had no idea they believed the junk they do until I started reading threads on here and doing my own research. Not just one site, either. I read my Bible, too. Some of y’all need to do the same.

[MamaB]

Thank you.

[Alex Murphy]

Putting down misconceptions about Jesus and heresies that originated with the Catholic Church is never a waste of time.

"Not a single one did"

Your posts, of course, carry all of the necessary Imprimi Potests, Nihil Obstats, and Imprimaturs so as to grant them the teaching authority to express the magisterium to the most infinitesimal degree.

I'll bet it sends thrills up your leg just thinking about that.

[verga]

Try reading Catholic sources rather than what ex-Catholics say. Do you always believe what the ex-wife says about her former spouse?

[MamaB]

Thank you but I read Catholic sources, too. Y’all should read various sites/sources to get a true picture of what Protestants think/believe instead of relying on catholic sites/sources. Are y’all afraid to learn the truth?