Why would Paul say "Body and Blood" if it were not the Body and Blood?
'Guilty of the body and blood' is pretty meaningless unless you can grab some nuggets with context and other scripture to define it...
So what do you figure 'guilty of the body and blood' is???
Meaningless? It's not meaningless at all; and its real meaning is plain from the immediate context:
According to the Bible, one who receives the Eucharist unworthily is guilty of the body and blood of the Lord; not guilty of careless mishandling of a mere symbol. St. Paul says that a person eats and drinks damnation by receiving the Eucharist without the proper discernment. If the Eucharist is just a piece of bread and some wine, taken in memory of Christ, how could one who receives it improperly be found guilty of the Body and Blood of the Lord?
1 Corinthians 11:26-29
“For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew the Lord's death till he come. Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord."But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body.”
One could not be held to such blood-guilt for the mishandling of an inferior token.
You maintain --- unless I am misunderstanding you --- that a true Christian takes Communion ONLY AS A SYMBOL. This statement is to be found nowhere in the Bible and as such is a violation of the supposed doctrine of Sola Scriptura.
And secondly, Jesus never referred to Communion as symbol. What you call a symbol, Jesus calls true food and drink; “My body is true food and my blood is true drink” (Jn 6:55).
What you call Symbol, the Apostle Paul calls the Body and Blood of the Lord. “Wherefore whosoever shall eat the bread and drink the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.” (1 Cor 11: 27-28).
Look, please, at the Old Testament types. Jesus makes reference to the manna in the desert (a foreshadoing of the far greater miracle that would come in the NT), and then says that His flesh is the true manna from Heaven.
The New Testament fulfillment MUST be greater than the Old Testament type or token. If, as you say, the Eucharist is just ordinary bread, then it would be inferior to the manna in the desert, which appeared miraculously. It would be weaker than the original foreshadowing.
Exodus 16:15- “And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another: Manhu! which signifieth: What is this! for they knew not what it was. And Moses said to them: This is the bread, which the Lord hath given you to eat.”
Would God give a series of "types" leading up to a wonderful fullfillment with the coming of the Messiah, and then the "wonderful fulfillment" turns out to be ---TA-DAAH! --- just another symbol?? And one much less impressive than the one in the Old Testament? It's inconceivable.
Another OT type was the Passover lamb, sacrificed and eaten by the Hebrews before their exodus from Egypt. Once again, they were actually to eat the flesh of this lamb. Then so many centuries later, comes Christ, the true Lamb of God, and we are not to eat His flesh? How is He the Lamb, if our Communion turns out to be not Communion in Him at all: ordinary, not miraculous?
The purpose of this Communion is actual union with the Lord our God. Jesus is not just a symbol, and does not give us just tokens, but the real fulfillment of all the tokens. He gives us Himself as the true Lamb of God.
Thus it is unworthy --- leading to condemnation, damnable --- to receive this Communion "without discerning the Lord's Body."
When Jesus says "This is My Body" is it wrong to say "Amen"?